Stigma Chapter 2 part2

When the door opened, SeoYoon, who had been leaning on a pillar, turned his head.

The old man was opening the door.

A young man followed behind. SeoYoon had never seen that young man before.

“Is that him?”

After the young man had left, SeoYoon stared in the direction he had disappeared off to as he asked.

“Yes.”

“He looks quite young.”

“Age doesn't matter. His blood is what's important.”

“When do we start?”

“When everything is ready. If we mess up, everyone dies. Therefore, we mustn't hurry. We must prepare everything perfectly so that we can strike all at once.”

“I don't care about anything else, but please remember your promise to me. Prime Minister Chae's throat is mine.”

This man was the same man that had carried maiden EunSeo in the mountains when she had lost her way.

SeoYoon truly did have business to attend to in the mountains. On his way up, he had come across the lost maiden EunSeo and had helped her.

“I will keep my promise, so don't you worry.”

“I only need to slit Prime Minister Chae's throat. I don't need anything else.”

“But you still need to bring some wealth and honor to your name.”

“I'm not interested in wealth or honor. I only need to kill Prime Minister Chae and wipe out the rest of his family.”

“Does your hatred run that deep?”

“It's in the deepest depths of my heart, so even I don't know how deep it runs.”

Spite poured out of SeoYoon's eyes.

His father had left the palace a dead man.

He had died a gruesome death in the palace. When she saw the returning corpse of his father, his mother hanged herself and took her own life.

His sister had been engaged to be married, but had received a letter from her fiancé's family instead. They were canceling the engagement. A few days later, after having starved herself of food and drink, she took a dagger and slit her wrists, taking her own life as well.

Now SeoYoon was left behind.

His family had died, so why was he still alive? He decided to avenge his family. He needed to stay alive in order to kill those that had done this to his family.

He couldn't leave his younger brother behind, so he kept himself alive.

SeoYoon had a brother who was fourteen years younger than him.

His younger brother had just turned eleven, so SeoYoon couldn't leave him and die on his own.

SeoYoon only had three wishes.

The first was to kill the king who had returned his father in such a horrible state. The second was to decapitate the man who had cut off his father's head, Prime Minister Chae.

He needed to cut off his head and rip the limbs off his body. Only then would he begin to feel some satisfaction.

His final wish was for his younger brother live a good life without any suffering. However, if this rebellion failed, then SeoYoon would die. But he wasn't worried. The old man had promised to take care of his younger brother if that ever happened.

His fair and just father and his kind mother. His sister who was as pretty as a pear blossom.

They used to be such a happy family. 5 years had passed since his family had shattered.

And soon he'd have his revenge.

He would avenge his family, who had all died such torturous deaths.

The malice burned brightly in SeoYoon's eyes.

“My goodness, your eyes. Save that energy for later.”

The old man clicked his tongue as he watched the spite build up in SeoYoon's eyes.

“Go and wash your face in some clean water. If anyone sees your face, this rebellion will be over before it's even started.”

The old man pushed SeoYoon's back.

“Behind the temple tower, there's a spring. Go and refresh yourself by washing your face and neck. It's icy water, so it'll wake you right up. Only then may you go down the mountain. I'm afraid you might kill some people if you go down without cooling off.”

The old man pushed SeoYoon's back once again, and SeoYoon reluctantly began to walk.

The cold, night wind of the mountain ruffled SeoYoon's hair as it passed by.

Just like the old man said, there was a small spring behind the tower.

It was still full of unmelted ice. However, the running water was clear. He scooped some up with his hands and poured it around his neck. Then SeoYoon began to walk down the mountain.

The moon above him was bright.

Before the tragedy had fallen on his family, they would go out on these kinds of nights to enjoy the clear moonlight.

His sister and his younger brother would play as they made shadow puppets under the moonlight as their parents laughed from the side.

His father used to be the king's valet. He was a man of integrity who knew his duty was to serve the king.

When the king had run into trouble, his father was there by his side. The king's younger brother had usurped the throne and killed his own older brother, killing SeoYoon's father in the process.

It was Prime Minister Chae who had encouraged the king's younger brother to usurp the throne, and it was Prime Minister Chae who had ordered for the king to be killed along with everyone one around him.

Prime Minister Chae had also used to be his father's closest friend.

Ultimately, his father had died by his friend's hand as he tried to protect the king.

“Because of our old friendship, your family has managed to avoid being wiped out as the family of a man who went against the king.”

The hateful man who had just killed his friend had come to speak to the widowed wife. The prime minister's face was the face of the most hateful beast that roamed the earth.

When SeoYoon took his little brother and left their home, he set fire to his house with his own hands.

Then he took his brother to live in hiding.

He didn't know when more trouble would be coming their way, so he and his younger brother had been living in hiding for 4 years when they met the old man, General Oh.

General Oh, who used to follow the old king, had gathered his supporting soldiers and escaped when the current king had staged his rebellion. He planned on returning the throne to its rightful owner by gathering those who were disappointed by the evil deeds of the current king who had taken the throne by treason.

The young man who had met with General Oh just now was the past king's son.

The young prince had been thirteen years old when his uncle had killed his father. Having lost the throne, he had barely managed to escape the palace with only his body intact. Now he was a young man of eighteen who was trying to reclaim the throne.

“Don't you want revenge?”

Those were General Oh's words to SeoYoon, a man who had been waiting for a chance to have his revenge all these years. And like that, they joined hands.

They had prepared for almost a year, and now everything would begin before the rainy season came.

No matter what happened, he would personally remove the heads of the king and Prime Minister Chae from their shoulders.

He would behead the king and rip the prime minister apart.

Even if he ripped the meat off of Prime Minister Chae's bones, he still wouldn't be satisfied.

Tap.

SeoYoon heard something fall at his feet and looked down.

It was the pouch that had been hanging on his waist.

His mother had personally embroidered it for him when she was still alive.

This was the only thing he had left of her.

Right when he bent down to grab it…

Thump.

He heard the sound of footsteps. Suddenly they stopped.

His outstretched hand stopped in midair just as it was about to grab the pouch on the ground. When he raised his head, he saw a maiden illuminated by the moonlight.

The scattered moonlight above her head made her look so heavenly. Or was it just her milky face reflecting the milky moonlight?

It was her.

She was the maiden who had been wandering in the mountains.

He had originally planned to bring her to this temple, but maybe this was her destination all along.

He never imagined that he'd meet her here again.

“EunSeo—!”

He remembered somebody looking for her as they called out that name.

EunSeo. What a lovely name.

“Wait, your name…”

He didn't have a name to give her, so he hadn't replied.

The child of a fallen family, the son who dreamed of revenge, a life that didn't know what tomorrow would bring. He didn't have a name worth giving to this beautiful maiden. His name…

“Ah, um, we meet again.”

Seeing that SeoYoon wasn't moving as he had bent down to retrive his pouch, she spoke first.

She looked incredibly surprised.

“……”

“Because the sun has already set, my brother decided to just spend the night at the temple before heading down tomorrow morning… Did you have some business here as well, Mr. Savior?”

‘Savior'? That sounded so odd to him.

“When I told my brother about you, Mr. Savior, he told me that he wanted to return the favor no matter what, so if you don't mind, would you…”

“There's no favor to return. I didn't do much.”

He gruffly replied as he grabbed his pouch.

Then he turned around, but EunSeo spoke up.

“It looks like the string has torn off. I may not be very good, but I can still sew a string back onto a pouch. If you hand that over to me, I can…”

“It's fine.”

SeoYoon quickly left.

He felt uncomfortable and awkward.

Just exchanging a few words with the beautiful maiden made him feel awkward and uncomfortable.

Maybe it wouldn't have been like this in the past, but considering his circumstances, he thought it best to just keep his distance from others.

If he got close to anyone, they might get hurt by being associated with him.

That had already happened many times.

He didn't want to hurt anyone just because he helped someone on a mountain just this once.

“My lord!”

The maiden called out from behind him, but he didn't turn around. He continued to walk away.

EunSeo pouted as she watched the man leave.

“If we met in a place like this again, I'd call it fate. But that man is so mean…”

She wasn't going to eat him.

She wasn't even going to ask him to do anything for her.

She only wanted to thank him for saving her. She wanted to return the favor, but he heartlessly turned around and left.

“Is he going to stay on the mountain for a while…?”

Either way, now that she knew he was on this mountain, she might be able to come by in the morning and greet him with her brother.

He wouldn't be going somewhere else at this time of night, would he?

“He's cold-hearted and gruff…”

Even as she said this, EunSeo's lips stretched into a smile.

She could still remember the feeling of his back as he carried her.

It was warm and sturdy.

It was the first time she had been carried by a man who wasn't family, but she wasn't scared.

“Hmph.”

Her heart had been racing inside her chest. But she was going to keep that a secret.

Early the next morning, before they were about to leave, they asked around the temple about the other guests that were staying here. However, the only reply they received was ‘There are no other guests here.'

He had definitely been a guest at this temple. She even gave them a description of him. He looked like he was in his mid-twenties and was incredibly tall. But they told her that they hadn't had any guests since yesterday till this morning. EunSeo's brother merely told her, ‘Something must have come up to make him leave.'

Even though her brother told her that he must have had to leave the mountain in the middle of the night, EunSeo's heart felt empty… as if there was a hole and the wind was blowing through it.

There was still snow on the mountain, and the valley was still frozen. However, the ice was beginning to thaw, and the water was starting to run downstream. The yellow adonis blossoms began to peek through, alerting the coming of spring.

TN: EunSeo was such a cutie! So sad that her life experiences turned her so bitter… 😟

Chapter end