Chapter 30

The rain had stopped. But the whole world still felt soaked. The ground squelched underfoot, the air was damp, and the clouds hung heavy as if ready to fall. Even the wind held its tongue.

At Gamunsa Temple Site, only two stone pagodas remained standing. Everything else had crumbled into scattered stones, like bones left behind from the temple that once was.

By the time midnight approached, the place felt less like temple ruins and more like a grave.

Beomjin and Jinyoung stepped across the wet earth and into the ruins. The temple site stretched wide like an empty field, with not a single shadow to hide behind.

“It’s too quiet. Gives me the creeps.”

“Same. This is… uncomfortable.”

Jinyoung’s voice came from a step behind him, her head turning this way and that. Her calm face betrayed the nervous gulping in her throat.

“Something’s wrong.”

Beomjin stopped near one of the pagodas, eyes drawn to the trees at the edge of the site.

“What do you mean?”

“There’s no sound. That’s what felt off.”

“…Right? It’s like a ghost is going to pop out.”

Jinyoung finally admitted what she had been holding back. But that wasn’t what Beomjin meant.

“There aren’t even any bugs chirping.”

“Ugh… why’d you have to say that? Now I’ve got goosebumps.”

Jinyoung shivered.

Beomjin’s nose twitched. He lowered his gaze, taking careful steps. On the ground was a stain, dark red smeared into the mud. Rain had thinned it, but the color remained.

“Blood.”

He said it flatly. Jinyoung crouched to confirm, nodding.

“They definitely came this way.”

They followed the blood trail through the ruins.

Their steps grew quieter, warier. The flashlight beam caught droplets of red on stones and wet leaves.

The trail led them to the far pagoda. At its base, one of the stone slabs had shifted aside, revealing a narrow gap. Behind it, stone steps spiraled downward. A passage into the earth.

Blood marked the edges of the stone and the steps themselves.

“They went down there.”

The smell struck them immediately—mildew, damp stone, the stink of old air, layered with the metallic bite of blood.

“Let’s go.”

Beomjin aimed his flashlight into the black opening and went first. Jinyoung followed. Their footsteps sank into the soaked stone, echoing faintly down the stairwell.

The staircase was narrow—barely wide enough for one person—and it wound deeper and deeper. After what felt like an eternity, their feet finally touched level ground.

Water rippled across the floor, shallow but cold. The walls bore the scars of centuries of moisture and mold.

The air was heavy, pressing down on their lungs. The stink of sweat, blood, mildew, and dirt clung together into a single suffocating odor.

Jinyoung swept her flashlight forward, but the corridor stretched so far she couldn’t see the end. The damp walls glimmered faintly under the beam.

“This goes much deeper than I thought. How did anyone build this?”

She exhaled in awe.

“I smell salt. Sea water.”

Beomjin pressed his nose against the wall, then touched his finger to the damp stone and tasted it. Salty.

“Could this tunnel connect all the way to King Munmu’s Underwater Tomb?”

Jinyoung grimaced.

“To the sea? Don’t tell me this whole place could collapse.”

Each drop of water falling from the ceiling made her flinch.

“Let’s move.”

They quickened their pace, following the faint streaks of blood left along the walls.

Eventually, the corridor split. One path wider, one narrowing into a side passage.

A scraping sound echoed nearby.

“This way.”

Beomjin pointed to the narrow path.

A solemn heaviness filled the air, like the lingering breath of prayers and rituals once held here.

Each step rang heavy against the stone tiles beneath their feet.

At the end of the passage loomed a stone door, carved with the image of a great dragon. The massive slab was cracked just enough for a single person to slip through.

“Hurry!”

Driven by urgency, Beomjin broke into a run. Beyond the open doorway, he spotted a familiar silhouette.

The Imugi.

He stood before yet another door, this one still sealed shut.

“Ha… hahaha! You’re too late!”

Noticing Beomjin, the Imugi thrust his blade toward him and laughed with twisted satisfaction.

“The Flute of Ten Thousand Waves is mine. No matter how desperately you struggle, in the end I win! That arrogant Dragon, those bastards who mocked me—they’ll all kneel before me now!”

In the next instant, he shoved his hand into a round indentation in the center of the sealed door, where the shape of a palm was carved into the stone. His face twisted.

Too late.

Beomjin sprinted toward him—

Boom!

A violent blast threw both of them backward. The Imugi’s scream tore through the passage.

“Uwaaaahhh!!”

His right arm, the one thrust into the stone, was shredded to ribbons. It was like holding a grenade in his hand and letting it explode. Flesh and bone were mangled beyond recognition, and his body was drenched in blood. Cuts ripped across his face and neck, deep and raw.

The Imugi staggered, eyes unfocused, then collapsed face-first to the floor.

“Why… why did this happen…?”

His tear-filled gaze never left the door. Even as Beomjin approached, the Imugi stared past him at something beyond.

“The flute… the flute is mine. Mine. I… I am…”

His bloodshot eyes rolled aimlessly, his ruined hand clawing at empty air as if reaching for something forever out of his grasp.

Beomjin looked down at him, expression hard. He didn’t need to check—he could already tell. The man’s life was slipping away.

“Always… I was behind my brother. No matter how I fought… the world—”

His voice rasped, faint as the wind.

“With my own power… I wanted… to make the world bow…!”

His bloodied palm scraped against the stone floor as he wept.

“I… I should’ve been the dragon…!”

The final cry bled into the damp stone, too weak to even be called a scream.

By the time Jinyoung caught up, she could only look down at the Imugi with pity.

“He’s dying.”

“It’s already too late.”

Beomjin’s voice was low, resigned. He turned from the Imugi to the door the dying man still glared at with such hatred.

“Khak!”

The Imugi suddenly convulsed, coughing up blood as his body thrashed violently. He dragged in ragged, metallic breaths. His throat bobbed, his chest heaved.

Once it was pain. The second time, resistance. The third step shook his entire frame, until another mouthful of blood spilled out.

“Khuk!!”

The Imugi’s strangled breath tore free, his outstretched hand slipping from the stone door. He collapsed for the last time, the blood at his lips mingling with the water on the floor and washing away.

His bloodshot eyes remained open, clouded with lingering resentment.

“…Such a pitiful death.”

Jinyoung’s voice was quiet. She reached down and gently closed his eyes.

Beomjin’s gaze lingered on the broken fingertips, then drifted—drawn, as if by spell—to the sealed stone door. Slowly, he raised his hand toward the palm-shaped indentation.

His heartbeat thundered as he pressed his hand against the hollow.

“Baek Beomjin!”

Jinyoung’s sharp voice snapped him back. He turned, only to see her shaking her head.

“You shouldn’t. It’s too dangerous.”

Reluctantly, Beomjin withdrew his hand. Raising his flashlight, he examined the carved imprint.

There was blood. Droplets ran from fingertip to palm.

Leaning closer, he noticed the faint gleam of metal. The imprint was lined with a dozen hidden needles. At the bottom, a groove was carved, with a small hole where liquid could drain.

“What are you looking at?”

Jinyoung stepped closer. Beomjin glanced from the bloody mechanism to the Imugi’s mangled hand.

“This is the key. Blood. You stick your hand in and feed it.”

“That’s the creepiest lock I’ve ever seen.”

Jinyoung shuddered.

“It just means only the worthy are allowed through.”

Beomjin brushed his hand across the carved dragon on the door.

“My guess… only a Beast-Blooded with dragon’s blood could open it.”

“…Makes sense. Here.”

Jinyoung muttered as she pulled something from her bag. She handed him a leather-bound book—warm, unsettling to the touch.

“The stolen Manual of Music Theory. He had it tucked on him.”

Beomjin stared at the tome in his hand, then back at the sealed door.

“The Flute of Ten Thousand Waves is behind this door.”

His conviction left Jinyoung silent for a long moment before she nodded.

“But it’s not something we can take. Not us.”

Beomjin’s hand trembled. He knew she was right, yet he couldn’t bring himself to turn away. One step through that door and the legendary flute would be his. The thought of leaving empty-handed gnawed at him.

“No.”

Jinyoung gripped his shoulder firmly and pulled him back.

“If you force it, you’ll end up like him.”

It was a warning steeped in ice. And yet his fingers still twitched, drawn to the door, as if something beyond was calling.

At last, he clenched his fist and pulled it to his chest. The Imugi’s ruined body reflected back at him like a grim mirror.

“Let’s go.”

His voice was cold as he turned away. He didn’t look back once as he climbed toward the stairs.

Retracing their steps, they emerged from the underground, climbing out through the gap beneath the pagoda. The first breath of fresh air stabbed into their lungs, sharp and bracing.

The sky was faintly lighter, though dawn had yet to break.

Their tense breaths slowly eased. Their shoulders loosened. The brief time underground had felt like hours.

Mist blanketed the ruined temple grounds, the damp air heavy enough to cling to their skin.

The two of them looked up together, silently catching their breath.

“…Even after recovering the score, it doesn’t feel like a victory,” Jinyoung murmured.

Beomjin felt the same. It wasn’t pity for the Imugi. It was something darker, fouler. Like he had rolled through the muck of a sewer.

Finally, he exhaled.

“We can’t leave things as they are.”

The flute’s location was no longer secret. That meant no one was safe. If the Imugi could open the seal, then so could the Dragon. Even if he didn’t know now, word would reach him eventually. The only way forward was to retrieve the flute and hide it somewhere untouchable.

“What do you mean, ‘can’t leave it’? Don’t tell me—you’re planning to blow this whole place up?”

Beomjin shot her a look. “What do you take me for? We need to recover the flute.”

“And how exactly do you plan to do that?”

“Break the seal.”

“And how do you think you’re going to manage that, when anyone but a dragon dies trying?”

She wasn’t wrong.

Beomjin pressed his lips together, then finally spoke.

“Then we’ll need a dragon. Someone who can open it… and someone willing to help us.”