Chapter 9
Murong Yeon came to a halt before the two boys. His gaze swept over the table with one leg snapped off and a corner splintered, the shattered bowls, and the food strewn across the floor. His brow furrowed.
"Disciples of the Murong Clan, brawling in the corridor like street thugs! Have you both lost your minds?"
At the frigid rebuke, Wi Hyeokrin bowed his head at once. "Forgive me, Young Master."
"And you. What did you do to reduce a table to this?"
The question fell on Jang Pungyeop, who had been standing there dazed, still holding his wooden sword. He jerked his head up.
"It's nothing, Young Master. We simply weren't watching where we were going and collided."
Truthfully, he wanted to expose Wi Hyeokrin's insolence and boast that he had only meant to teach the boy a sharp lesson. Wasn't he, after all, far above some nobody with no pedigree?
But he couldn't bring himself to say so, not under the weight of Murong Yeon's piercing stare.
Disciples? How could the Young Master lump a mere servant in with us?
Still, he grumbled inwardly. That boy never sweated beside them on the training grounds. All he did was wait on a sickly young master!
"Is that so?"
Murong Yeon turned his eyes to Wi Hyeokrin with a look asking whether Jang Pungyeop's excuse was true. What the answer would be was obvious, of course.
"Yes, that's—"
Not that there was anything more worth hearing.
"Then why are you gripping that wooden sword like that?"
Murong Yeon cut across Wi Hyeokrin without mercy and rounded on Jang Pungyeop. The boy before him was a collateral-line scion of the Third Elder and had arrived at the Murong Clan a month before Wi Hyeokrin.
He had been packed off to the clan after being crowded out by his much older brothers. With his hulking frame he looked every inch a born warrior, but in truth he was merely mediocre.
What good is a body like that when you've got no talent?
At first, he must have swaggered about, trading on his family name. But as time passed the gap between them widened, and with Wi Hyeokrin, a boy of lowly birth, rising to prominence right beside him, his pride must have taken a beating.
It was the tragedy of a mediocre man standing next to a genius. And so, in time, Jang Pungyeop would join forces with Jo Muryang and Gongson Yu and become one of the prime movers in driving Wi Hyeokrin out of the Murong Clan.
Murong Yeon swallowed a sigh. Truthfully, Jang Pungyeop wasn't the only pathetic one. The old Murong Yeon had envied Wi Hyeokrin just the same.
It hadn't mattered that he had a brilliant mind and had mastered every manual in Mangyeong Pavilion. The Taiyin Severed Meridians were like a river frozen solid, where no boat could sail. No matter how many elixirs he poured in or how diligently he circulated his qi, his internal energy never gathered in his dantian and simply scattered.
Wait. Come to think of it, Wi Hyeokrin finds a spirit herb and restores his dantian, doesn't he?
If it could do that, couldn't it cure severed meridians too? His eyes lit up for an instant, and without thinking he glanced back at Wi Hyeokrin. He met a pair of eyes, clear as spring water, gazing straight up at him.
"Hm…"
It was not a guilty conscience that made him clear his throat. And it wasn't as though he had decided to filch the herb for himself!
Yet that trusting gaze strangely unsettled him. Murong Yeon hurriedly smoothed his expression and barked, "Well? Speak the truth at once!"
"I-it's just that… that servant brat was rude to me, so…"
Terrified, Jang Pungyeop drew his neck in like a turtle's and confessed. Somewhere along the way, he had also slid the wooden sword behind his back.
"Don't tell me you meant to use that sword to assault a servant in my employ?"
"A-assault? Absolutely not!"
Murong Yeon had heard the two squabbling before he ever reached the scene. The servants nearby could hardly have missed it either.
"You there! Come here."
The servant who had been sweeping, clearly not expecting to be summoned, edged forward, unable to hide his flustered expression.
"Speak. What just happened between these two?"
The servant stole a glance at Jang Pungyeop before opening his mouth.
"F-from what this humble one saw, that boy over there swung a wooden sword at this boy here."
"And?"
"Sir?"
"What else?"
Pressed by Murong Yeon, the servant desperately combed his memory. The young master before him punished the smallest slip without mercy, and everyone kept a wary distance from him. Breaking into a cold sweat, the servant scrambled for any answer that might satisfy him.
"Ah! Th-that is, he said he was going to teach him the rules!"
"Teach him the rules? Ha!"
Having drawn out the words he wanted, Murong Yeon snorted.
"How utterly arrogant you are. A mere disciple, daring to invoke the clan's laws! Do you not know that this, too, is a crime, one that disrupts the proper order of rank?"
"Y-Young Master, I didn't mean it that way…"
Jang Pungyeop's face had gone past the color of clay to ashen gray.
I can use this as a pretext.
If he treated that wooden sword not as a petty squabble but as a breach of the clan's order, he could command Wi Hyeokrin and Jang Pungyeop to spar in the name of setting things right. That would do nicely.
"If you didn't mean it that way, then what did you mean?"
"I-I only meant to scare him… I swear there was nothing more to it."
Jang Pungyeop made his excuses desperately. Every trace of the swagger from moments ago, when he had preened, certain he was better than a mere servant, had vanished. Backed by the Third Elder though he was, he knew his standing wasn't great enough to shield him from a charge of breaking the clan's law.
"Young Master! I've made a grave mistake. Please forgive me!"
Sensing danger, he hurriedly bowed his head low. Murong Yeon kept his expression frosty, but his mood had eased a little.
Even I don't torment him. What right do you have to do it?
Did the boy have any idea what heartbreaking lengths Murong Yeon was going to just to stay alive?
"Pretending to repent now is pointless. Go back at once and reflect on your conduct. I will hand down a fitting punishment shortly!"
He would have liked to make the two spar then and there. But if he declared that Wi Hyeokrin, a mere attendant, could match Jang Pungyeop blow for blow, it would contradict everything he had shown so far. Better to put it off.
"Get out of my sight!"
"Eek! Y-yes, I'll take my leave!"
Jang Pungyeop, utterly aghast, scrambled away. The servant, reading the room, offered a quick bow and slipped off too.
That left only the scattered food, Wi Hyeokrin standing in silence, and Murong Yeon, his displeasure plain on his face.
"What are you standing around for? Go see to your duties."
"Ah…"
Normally so brisk, Wi Hyeokrin blinked blankly, as though he had never expected to hear such words. Yet it was Murong Yeon who ended up looking baffled.
《Your favorability with Wi Hyeokrin has been updated.
– Current favorability: 60/100
※ Warning: Be careful not to let your favorability drop sharply. A penalty will be applied automatically.》
Why on earth did it go up again?
All he remembered was losing his temper and dressing people down, and still the affinity had jumped by a full 10 points in one go. Murong Yeon swiftly replayed the scene.
He had raged at Jang Pungyeop and humiliated him. To Wi Hyeokrin, he had asked a single question, cut him off mid-answer, and never even asked why it had happened.
Surely not…
He couldn't actually enjoy being bullied, could he? The suspicion crept up on him once more.
"Why didn't you respond more forcefully?"
Shaking off the absurd thought, Murong Yeon asked in a deliberately stern voice. In truth, he had a guess as to the reason.
"Did you decide he was beneath you, too weak to be worth your effort?"
"Never."
The eyes meeting his looked less aggrieved than desperate, pleading for his sincerity to be understood.
"I only worried that making a scene would bring shame upon the Young Master's name…"
Just as I thought. Murong Yeon clicked his tongue. What was he supposed to do with a boy this foolishly loyal?
"Don't you realize that attitude of yours shames me even more? Next time, deal with them properly!"
He had deliberately put more force into it, yet this time the boy's eyes only grew bright and shining.
"Yes, Young Master. I'll remember it. Then I'll go and prepare the morning meal again…"
"I've lost my appetite. Never mind."
Murong Yeon stopped Wi Hyeokrin just as the boy stepped off, ready to dash to the kitchens that very instant. Honestly, he was hungry.
But for a young master as famously high-strung as he was supposed to be, calmly sitting down to a meal after a scene like this simply wouldn't be believable.
"Then I'll bring some refreshments. Please wait just a little while."
At those words, offered with an earnest upward glance, the corners of Murong Yeon's mouth curved.
Of course he would.
He had expected Wi Hyeokrin to say exactly that.
"Hmph!"
Instead of answering, he gave a cold snort and strode straight back to White Cloud Pavilion. A little while later, Wi Hyeokrin arrived carrying a spread so generous that calling it refreshments was almost embarrassing.
"You may go."
"If you need anything, please call for me."
Murong Yeon, who had been feigning indifference, snatched up his chopsticks the instant he was alone. As the sweet, nutty treats went down, he finally felt halfway human again.
"All right. Time to go see Uncle."
He cleared the plates in no time, rinsed his mouth with tea, and swept out of his chambers with vigor. Glancing at Wi Hyeokrin, who was waiting at the door, he tossed out a remark as though it were an afterthought.
"Go straight to Mangyeong Pavilion and copy out every verse of the Five Rings of Flowing Water Form. Don't leave out a single word."
"…All of it?"
"Yes. I'll be testing whether you truly understand each technique."
From behind him came a sharp gasp, cut off halfway. It was so adorable that Murong Yeon had to struggle not to laugh.
Then his expression crumpled again.
《Your favorability with Wi Hyeokrin has been updated.
– Current favorability: 65/100
※ Warning: Be careful not to let your favorability drop sharply. A penalty will be applied automatically.》
Unable to stand it any longer, he whirled around to look at Wi Hyeokrin. Unless he was mistaken, the emotion shining in the boy's eyes was…
What the… why is he looking at me with eyes so full of reverence?!
Something was seriously off about Wi Hyeokrin's personality.
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