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Episode 14
When Cheon-rang naturally tried to follow, Baek-seon caught his shoulder and pressed him back into his seat.
“It’s just nearby. I have a few things to ask the servants.”
Baek-seon gave an awkward smile and glanced at the door. Cheon-rang soon nodded.
“Ah, well. I suppose you’d need time for that.”
With those puzzling words, Cheon-rang obediently sat back down.
Baek-seon tilted his head briefly, then just as he was about to leave the room—
“Dang Baek-seon.”
“Yes?”
“If you need my help, just shout. I can hear you from here.”
Cheon-rang shoved a big dumpling into his mouth as he said it, his cheeks puffed out adorably.
“I’ll do that.”
With a low chuckle and a short reply, Baek-seon stepped out.
The only reason he wanted to wander alone was one thing—
—to learn more about “Dang Baek-seon.”
“Excuse me.”
He had no trouble deciding whom to ask.
“……Y-yes! Young master!”
“I want to ask something.”
With a gentle smile, Baek-seon spoke, and the servants and maids passing by hurried over in a fluster.
They didn’t know what words might come out of Baek-seon’s mouth, so their faces were tense.
From the swollen cheek marks, it was clear he had been struck by Dang Jin-myeong, and they seemed fearful of what he might say.
“How long have you worked here?”
The servants exchanged glances.
“I’ve been here just under ten years.”
“Three years for me…”
“I was born as a maid of the Dang family.”
Lucky!
Baek-seon cheered inwardly. With this mix of people, he was bound to uncover how “Dang Baek-seon” had lived.
“I have something important to tell you.”
“……?”
“The truth is, I’ve lost my memory.”
“……Wh-what?”
“I took a lethal poison, but the antidote was delayed—and this is what happened.”
Baek-seon’s smiling eyes made them swallow hard. Some looked skeptical, but others seemed half-convinced.
“Is… is that true?”
“Why would I lie about this?”
“Well…”
“Quite often, actually…”
—Had it happened often, Dang Baek-seon?
With a sigh, Baek-seon put on a solemn face.
“I’m not joking. From the jade token I know I belong to the Dang family, but…”
Dropping his gaze, his green eyes shaded with melancholy, he left the words hanging. The servants looked at one another.
“Now that you mention it… the young master never spoke politely to us.”
“I thought it meant we’d die if we slipped up…”
“Could it be true?”
“Seems like it…”
They all nodded at once.
“If what you say is true… why did you call us here?”
“There’s much I want to know. Why I left the Dang family five years ago, and what kind of person I was before I left.”
At his words, the hesitant servants finally began to talk.
Dang Baek-seon was twenty-four, two years older than Cheon-rang. The reason he left five years ago was…
“There was a trial to become the next head of the clan.”
“The trial was to find the missing Blood Rain Sword Demon and his disciple, who vanished after the War of Righteous and Demonic.”
They even revealed Dang Jin-myeong’s original plan:
Baek-seon was supposed to marry as soon as he returned from the trial. But since he didn’t come back for five years, the marriage was canceled.
“Marriage, huh…”
“We… we begged the master to wait a little longer, but he said two years was already more than enough…”
One maid bowed her head in shame.
That marriage must have been a lifeline not only for Dang Baek-seon, but for them as well.
‘So the original “Dang Baek-seon” was ambitious for the position of heir.’
Which meant the marriage was extremely important to him.
‘That’s why he looked so terrified when I showed up.’
Baek-seon didn’t know all the wickedness “Dang Baek-seon” had committed. But if the servants could beg so easily for death, then he must have taken lives just as easily.
“…W-we begged desperately for just a little more time!”
“It’s the truth! But the master—”
“I see. Well, it’s fine. The past can’t be changed now.”
Baek-seon waved it off, and the servants stared blankly at his unexpected response.
“But, aside from marriage, I do need medicine. The poison hasn’t been fully neutralized. To get it, I’ll have to enter the inner quarters for a while…”
He deliberately sighed aloud.
With his swollen face and pitiful expression, he looked miserable enough—but they still lowered their heads in silence, knowing they couldn’t grant him access.
Then one servant spoke up.
“…The master surely wishes for the young master to achieve some merit.”
“Hm?”
The others tried to silence him, but he insisted.
“The second young master won first place in the martial tournament. The third young master is a physician so skilled he can bring the dead back to life. But…”
“Ah, I see what you mean.”
Baek-seon nodded slowly.
It didn’t matter to the family that people called him the Poison Prince, or that he had been missing for five years.
What mattered was that the first son, Dang Baek-seon, was weaker than the second and third.
“So it’s merit they want…”
Rubbing his chin, Baek-seon exhaled.
In truth, he didn’t care how the family treated the real Dang Baek-seon. But he did need the clan’s martial manuals hidden in the main house.
“No choice then. Is there any way I could earn merit quickly?”
The servants exchanged anxious looks, then spoke.
“In fact… there’s a strange rumor in the marketplace.”
“A rumor?”
“The Blood Rain Sword Demon, Man Yu-gang.”
At that name, Baek-seon’s fingers trembled.
“They say he’s alive—and walking about.”
“…What?”
“Yes, Man Yu-gang. The very one who was supposed to have died in the War of Righteous and Demonic!”
According to the servants, sightings of Man Yu-gang had spread in Sichuan’s marketplaces. His behavior suggested he was searching for someone.
‘Impossible…’
Unable to help himself, Baek-seon covered his mouth.
Man Yu-gang was dead.
He had been the one to inhabit that body—how could “Man Yu-gang” still be walking around?
“Well, even just verifying the truth of it might make Father view me differently.”
If he at least tried, they might grant him entry to the inner quarters.
With that thought, Baek-seon rose.
He remembered Cheon-rang, still eating inside, and hesitated.
‘It won’t take long. No problem.’
If all he had to do was confirm the rumor was false, nothing dangerous would happen.
With hands clasped behind his back, Baek-seon strolled away.
Less than one shigyeong later—
“What the…”
Baek-seon froze, unable to breathe, staring as though bewitched at the figure standing before him
