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Chapter 01
A small shadow was climbing the mountain alone.
Cold.
Hongseol spread open her reddened, frozen hands and breathed warm air onto them. Before her warm breath could even thaw them, cold snowflakes landed on her palms first.
“Is this really snow?”
In Anhui Province, where Hongseol lived, snow almost never fell. The only place where blizzards raged was the peak of this Daechoksan Mountain.
“So snow comes together with the cold.”
Hongseol had never even climbed over the wall of Myogajang by herself before. There was no way for her to know beforehand just how cold and frightening snow could be.
Shivering, Hongseol looked upward.
When she had first stepped onto the foot of the mountain, it had definitely still been bright outside.
But before she realized it, fluffy snowflakes were drifting down from the pitch-black sky.
Cold wind kept slipping through the gaps in the ragged clothes Hongseol was wearing.
“Achoo!”
At this rate, it seemed impossible to continue.
Hongseol suddenly flipped through the air once. In an instant, the eight-year-old girl disappeared, and a small kitten remained in her place. It was a baby cat covered entirely in soft pink fur, with only its snout, ears, and front and hind paws colored brown.
Why did nobody tell me the mountain was this cold?
Even after transforming into a cat, the cold pierced straight through her fur.
On top of that, the icy wind striking her face made tears keep flowing from her eyes. Soon, the fur along the tear tracks froze stiff.
Lick.
Hongseol licked her frozen front paws a few times and washed her face like a cat. But it was useless. The moment she rubbed away the ice, her face froze again. Fear suddenly gripped her.
Can I reach the summit before all my fur freezes solid?
Hongseol raised her head and gauged the remaining distance. Through the blowing snow, she could faintly see the mountaintop.
If only I could use internal energy, I could’ve leapt there in a single bound.
“You useless cripple! The shame of Myogajang!”
The words she had heard all her life seemed to buzz endlessly in her ears. Hongseol hunched her shoulders and trembled.
I can’t give up here. If I do, Mother will hate me forever.
When she finally reached the summit, the blizzard lashing at her face stopped as if it had all been a lie.
“Wow!”
Just as her mother had said, there was an enormous lake there.
“When you arrive, throw a large stone into the lake.”
Hongseol flipped through the air again. The tiny kitten instantly transformed back into a raggedly dressed child.
After glancing around briefly, Hongseol soon picked up what seemed to her like a large stone with her tiny hands.
Splash.
The moment ripples spread across the lake, a voice echoed from somewhere.
— Ah. Who dares throw stones at me?
“Ah!”
Startled by the sudden voice transmission, Hongseol flattened herself against the ground.
Young Hongseol had no way of knowing that true masters could secretly transmit their voices freely even from far away.
— Since you refuse to answer, I suppose I must punish you!
The instant the words ended, a massive white pillar shot up from the center of the lake amidst a tremendous splash.
No, it was not a pillar.
It was a gigantic snake.
S-scary!
Hongseol’s legs trembled violently. But she could not retreat now.
Barely forcing out her voice, Hongseol shouted,
“A-are you the owner of the lake?”
Upon hearing that, Dokwang Tang Imu was dumbfounded.
He was a famous snake beastman and the Taesang Elder of the Sichuan Tang Clan.
In the past, most people would lose their wits and flee just at the sight of his shadow.
Yet somehow, not only had this little brat with barely dry blood on her head thrown a stone at him, she was even talking to him.
Have I spent too long away from the Jianghu resting?
Tang Imu let out a small sigh before sending a voice transmission to the little brat who was not even enough for a single bite.
— Yes. It seems the people of Anhui Province all call me the “Owner of the Lake.”
“T-then……”
Hongseol quietly recalled her mother’s words.
“Go and tell the owner of the lake, ‘Please give me your inner core.’”
Just thinking about saying those words made sweat gather in her tiny palms.
I didn’t know the owner of the lake would be such a terrifying snake……
But she could not return empty-handed and disappoint her mother.
Hongseol barely gathered her courage.
“P-p-please give me your inner core.”
— What did you just say?
Tang Imu was speechless.
What exactly was an inner core?
It was the “crystallization of internal power” condensed within an animal that had lived long enough to become a spiritual creature.
Asking a living being for its inner core was essentially no different from saying:
“Please die quietly.”
And to say that to a master who had reached the Hwagyeong Realm like Tang Imu?
It was practically saying:
“Please kill me.”
Someone intended to use my hand to take this child’s life.
Experienced Tang Imu immediately understood what was going on.
But young Hongseol could not possibly understand such circumstances. She merely held out her trembling little hands toward Tang Imu.
“Please give me your inner core.”
At that moment, a voice like the heavens themselves shaking rang out from somewhere.
“Hah, now this is an unbelievable sight.”
Hongseol looked up.
In the distance, she saw a man carrying a gourd bottle walking toward them.
His hair was streaked with gray, and a long scar ran down his right cheek. On the chest of his blue martial robe was a clear embroidery of a cloud pattern.
Wait, a cloud-pattern embroidery?!
“Eek!”
Startled, Hongseol hurriedly ran and hid behind a tree.
I-it’s the Namgung Clan!
Her tiny heart pounded wildly.
This was her first time seeing one of the Namgung Clan’s dog beastmen up close, the ones she had only heard about in stories.
The Namgung Clan hates cat beastmen. If that person finds out I’m a cat beastman too, he’ll definitely try to hurt me!
To Hongseol, the Namgung Clan was even more frightening than the gigantic snake before her. It was because she had spent her entire life hearing about their atrocities at Myogajang.
“Because of those cruel bastards from the Namgung Clan, Myogajang’s power has shrunk to this extent!”
“Our martial artists were attacked by Namgung’s Cheonchangdae! Every single one of them had their throats bitten out!”
A-a dog beastman… scary……. What should I do?
The Namgung Clan was originally a wolf clan famous throughout the Jianghu.
But in Myogajang, a cat clan, they deliberately belittled them by calling them “dogs.”
So it was not strange that young Hongseol mistook them for dog beastmen.
Meanwhile, the man from the Namgung Clan had already approached close enough that Hongseol had to tilt her head up to look at him.
In a solemn voice, he spoke to Hongseol.
“You. Why do you need this creature’s inner core?”
The moment she faced him, darkness clouded Hongseol’s vision, and a strange ringing filled her ears. Perhaps because her heart was beating so wildly, her mind instantly turned completely blank.
I-I have to run away!
Hongseol frantically flipped through the air.
In the next instant, with a pop, a tiny kitten sprang out from behind the tree.
“Wait, that way is a cliff!”
The man had no time to move.
In an instant, the tiny kitten’s body tumbled down beneath the cliff.
Downward.
Further downward.
Hongseol continued falling endlessly.
Because the cold had stiffened her joints, she could no longer control her body properly. The baby kitten, who had already slammed into the cliff several times, was bruised and broken all over.
Boom.
At last, Hongseol crashed onto an icy flat rock and cried weakly.
Mother, I’m hurting so much.
I’m sorry.
I don’t think…… I can bring back the inner core…….
Naturally, her mother gave no answer to the dying kitten’s cries.
At that moment—
Two black shadows descended along the cliff and covered Hongseol’s tiny body.
They were the Namgung Clan man she had seen earlier, and another man wearing a green martial robe with white hair and red eyes.
I have to run away……
Even while the man in green checked her pulse, Hongseol could not so much as twitch a paw. Only a faint “nyaa—” barely escaped her mouth.
The Namgung Clan man asked gravely,
“Tang Imu, how is the child’s condition?”
“There is no hope.”
The man called Tang Imu shook his head.
“If she had mastered even basic martial arts, this wouldn’t have been a fatal height. Move aside. I’ll try pouring some internal energy into her.”
“……This child’s meridians are severed, Namgung Ho.”
At those words, the expression of the man called Namgung Ho visibly hardened.
The meridians were the pathways through which internal energy flowed.
No matter how good the cart was, if the road was broken, it could not pass through. Even if they poured internal energy into her, she would not survive.
Namgung Ho let out a sigh.
“So this child is the famous eldest daughter of Myogajang. The one unable to use internal energy.”
“That’s right. Whoever ordered her to do this, their intentions are obvious. They deliberately sent her here to die.”
As Hongseol lay there listening to their conversation, tears welled up in her eyes.
But it was Mother who sent me to Daechoksan. Did Mother want me to die……?
If that were true, then everything made sense.
The reason she had not warned her how cold Daechoksan was.
The reason she had not told her the owner of the lake was a gigantic snake.
Because she didn’t want a cripple like me to come back…….
Hongseol’s sorrowful panting gradually weakened.
“Tsk.”
Clicking his tongue pityingly, Namgung Ho removed his outer robe. Seeing this, Tang Imu spoke in surprise.
“Wasn’t the Namgung Clan constantly at odds with Myogajang?”
“……She’s just a pitiful child who knows nothing, Tang Imu.”
The robe embroidered with cloud patterns was gently draped over the baby kitten’s small body.
It became Hongseol’s shroud.
“You must have lived a difficult life. Now sleep peacefully.”
Namgung Ho carefully closed Hongseol’s eyes.
His hands are warmer than I expected…….
Resting her head against his palm, Hongseol silently called for the one she missed most.
Mother……!
With that final cry, the small kitten parted from the world.
The falling snow warmly covered Hongseol’s body wrapped in the blue martial robe.
From somewhere deep within her mind, she faintly heard singing.
This song is……?
It was the lullaby her mother used to sing during her distant childhood.
Filled with longing, Hongseol unconsciously hummed a few lines along with it. At once, one part of her wrist suddenly burned as if scorched by fire, and that heat rapidly spread throughout her entire body.
“Ah!”
Hongseol finally opened her eyes.
The first things she saw were the gigantic lake and the white snake. Cold wind fiercely struck Hongseol’s cheeks as she stood before them.
“This is…… the summit of Daechoksan?”
Hongseol touched her tingling cheek.
I definitely fell off the cliff and died just now though?
Hongseol looked down at her thin wrist. The place that had broken upon smashing into the rocks was perfectly fine without even a trace of injury. She could not believe it.
What happened?
Had she merely fallen asleep for a moment and dreamed it all?
But…… it had felt far too vivid to be a dream.
Then a familiar voice reached her ears.
“Hah, now this is an unbelievable sight.”
Huh?
She had definitely heard those words before.
Blinking, Hongseol raised her head.
From afar, Namgung Ho, dressed in a martial robe embroidered with cloud patterns, was walking toward her while carrying a gourd bottle.
