Duty (2)

Seeing Gyeong Hang staring at him in a daze, Jin-hyeon felt an inexplicable discomfort.

The reason was clear. Gyeong Hang had done him no wrong.

But he had cut ties with the Gyeong family with his own hands. He had cut ties even with Gyeong In-geol, his adoptive father, and Gyeong Do-cheon, whom he had lived with like a brother, was now someone he had to kill.

He had no intention of changing his purpose because of a relationship, but it still felt different from Gyeong In-geol. If Gyeong Hang had treated him badly too, his heart might have felt cleaner.

Because he knew what kind of person Gyeong Hang was.

He made many mistakes and failed often, but he still treated Jin-hyeon like a real grandson, so Jin-hyeon couldn’t help feeling conflicted.

“Are you truly Se-hwi?”

“I threw that name away.”

The words slipped out without meaning to.

The coldness of what he said meant he had settled his own heart.

Gyeong Hang swallowed dryly.

“What do you mean? Threw your name away? No, wait. Forget that.”

“…”

“You were alive?”

“Yes.”

Swaying, Gyeong Hang slowly came toward Jin-hyeon.

Jin-hyeon looked at Gyeong Hang in silence.

After returning, his gaze and attitude had changed greatly from the days of Gyeong Se-hwi. But Gyeong Hang didn’t seem to feel those changes. No, it even looked like they didn’t matter at all.

Gyeong Hang’s face, staring blankly at Jin-hyeon, twisted with sorrow.

“You brat!”

Gyeong Hang grabbed Jin-hyeon’s hand.

“You, you rotten bastard! If you were alive, you should’ve told this grandpa you were alive! You unfilial wretch!”

The words were close to scolding, but his face was filled with upheaval.

In his tear-soaked eyes were fierce relief and joy, in his twisted wrinkles were resentment and worry, and in his warped mouth were self-reproach and aching affection.

“I believed, like stone, that that beast worse than an animal had harmed you! Do you know how much this grandpa cursed the heavens after hearing that?!”

The voice he poured out trembled from start to finish.

Even if he had settled his ties with the Gyeong family, Jin-hyeon couldn’t stay cold to the end before Gyeong Hang, who had truly worried for him.

“I’m sorry.”

“You brat. You wretched brat!”

Gyeong Hang struck Jin-hyeon’s chest several times with a weak fist, then couldn’t contain it and burst into tears.

They were feelings he had suppressed, then suppressed again. The Supreme Patriarch, who had lived each day like hell from extreme rage and self-loathing, finally collapsed at the appearance of the grandson whose blood wasn’t even his.

Looking down at Gyeong Hang sobbing and beating the floor, Jin-hyeon couldn’t say anything.

He felt sorry. He felt grateful. And he felt sad.

It was after a quarter-hour had passed that Gyeong Hang, after pouring out tears for a long time, came to his senses.

And Jin-hyeon realized, from the first words Gyeong Hang spoke in his right mind, that he hadn’t been able to cut every tie.

“I’m sorry. And thank you. Just having you alive like this, this grandpa could die right now with no regrets.”

The two of them shared many words.

But most of the talking came from Jin-hyeon. He told him that he had been stabbed by Gyeong Do-cheon, survived by a miracle, and was now relying on the White Sword Seol Clan.

Gyeong Hang listened to all of it in silence. When the long story ended, he clasped both of his grandson’s hands on the table tightly.

“I see. So that’s how it was.”

Gyeong Hang let out a sigh.

“The heavens weren’t indifferent. I feel a gratitude beyond words to the unknown extraordinary man who saved you and passed martial arts on to you.”

He couldn’t reveal the entire truth.

Whether he believed it or not, Gyeong Hang’s mind was already at its limit. Rather than stringing along things hard to interpret, it was better to adjust the telling.

What mattered was that Jin-hyeon lived. To Gyeong Hang, that single fact was all that mattered.

Gyeong Hang, looking at Jin-hyeon with wet eyes, soon cocked his head.

“But why has your hair changed like that?”

“Ah, this…”

Jin-hyeon trailed off. It was hard to explain.

With his quick wits, he could’ve covered it somehow. But maybe Gyeong Hang’s heated reaction flustered him more than expected. The words didn’t come easily.

Seeing Jin-hyeon trail off, Gyeong Hang sighed.

“Right. I know your heart well enough. You nearly died at the hands of someone you were close to like a real older brother. How could you endure reality in your right mind?”

“…”

“I truly have no face to look at you.”

Jin-hyeon gave a bitter smile.

“You don’t need to say that, Supreme Patriarch.”

Not Grandfather, not Grandpa. Supreme Patriarch. Gyeong Hang couldn’t bring himself to tell him to drop that form of address.

“No. Everything is my fault. If I hadn’t been greedy when I was young, our house wouldn’t have become like this, and your father wouldn’t have ended up like this.”

“If you put it that way, the clan ending up like this might be because of me.”

“Hah. What kind of absurd talk is that.”

“If I hadn’t existed, that bastard Gyeong Do-cheon wouldn’t have committed filial impiety either.”

Bloodshot veins stood out in Gyeong Hang’s eyes.

“Nonsense! The reason he became that way is clearly his own fault! And it’s your father’s fault for failing to teach him properly, and this grandpa’s fault!”

“…”

“You must never think that way. You may not remember it, but when your father first said he’d take you as an adopted son, your grandpa, me, didn’t like your existence. But as time passed, watching your character and your actions, I truly accepted you as a person of the Gyeong family.”

Gyeong In-geol tried to take Jin-hyeon as an adopted son after seeing his talent, but Gyeong Hang acknowledged him as a grandson after seeing his character.

Gyeong In-geol thought only of the clan even with death ahead of him, and Gyeong Hang, unable to die and forced to live, still worried about blood kin. That was the decisive difference between the two.

“No matter what anyone says, you are my grandson. Even if I die and go to hell and suffer for endless ages, I will never forget that I left behind a grandson named Se-hwi.”

Jin-hyeon bowed his head in silence.

For the first time since returning, he felt words clog his throat. Normally he would have said to stop with useless talk and speak of business, but he couldn’t bring himself to.

The piercing sincerity made his chest ache.

The only reason he could say to his face that he once found him displeasing was because he had already erased those thoughts completely.

He could tell. Before, and even now, Gyeong Hang regarded Jin-hyeon as a grandson. He grieved when he disappeared, and he was deeply happy that he returned alive.

Before such an obvious truth, it was hard to say anything, or even make a face.

Gyeong Hang patted Jin-hyeon’s hands.

“Your father and I are sinners. I truly have nothing to say to you.”

“It’s fine.”

After steadying himself for a moment, Jin-hyeon spoke evenly.

“It’s already passed. I’m only settling debts of grace and grudges. So if I cleanly settle it, the past can be anything.”

It was no ordinary statement.

“What do you mean?”

“Not long ago, I met Patriarch Gyeong.”

Jin-hyeon told him everything. How he infiltrated the Divine Iron Merchant House, and the conversation he had with Gyeong In-geol.

Anger surfaced on Gyeong Hang’s face.

“That bastard In-geol. Even with his body headed for death, he still hasn’t come to his senses.”

Separate from how he felt about his son, he couldn’t help being angry at the foolish things he had said.

“The first words he should’ve spat out when he saw you were an apology. Even with that body, he didn’t know what came first and treated you like that. I can’t believe it.”

“It’s fine.”

Jin-hyeon shook his head.

“I had no grudge to settle with Patriarch Gyeong. So ending the relationship was simple.”

“…”

“I made a deal with him, so I’ll only work to see that deal finished properly.”

Gyeong Hang sighed again.

‘I tried not to think it, but truly, I raised my child terribly. How are you still like that?’

Gyeong In-geol was pathetic, and he resented him.

It was only because his grandson accepted the request in the form of a deal. If not, Gyeong In-geol would have died as an incapable Patriarch. He himself would have become a ghost wandering the nine heavens, unable to release his resentment.

He understood wanting to undo wrongs, but was it truly so hard to say a single word of apology to the adopted son who returned alive?

‘It’s my fault. It’s my fault.’

Unable to raise his head, Gyeong Hang stared only at the tea that had gone cold, his face full of turmoil.

Jin-hyeon watched him in silence.

How much time passed?

“All right.”

Gyeong Hang raised his head after forcing himself to gather his mind.

“To complete the deal, the clan has to be intact first.”

“That’s right.”

“And for the clan to be intact, that bastard Do-cheon has to be brought down.”

“Yes.”

“And for that, you’ll need the Patriarch’s Treasure.”

“That’s why I came here. I heard the Patriarch’s Treasure is with the Supreme Patriarch.”

Gyeong Hang gave a bitter smile.

“Not long after you went missing, your father came and entrusted it to me.”

“I see.”

“That’s why I’m still alive. If I die, no one will know where the Patriarch’s Treasure is, and that bastard Do-cheon will kill his father, fabricate the incident, and become Patriarch.”

Gyeong Do-cheon already held considerable power. If Gyeong Hang died, he would quickly climb onto the Patriarch’s seat and seize public opinion.

Of course, that was the last move.

The reason Gyeong Do-cheon exiled Gyeong Hang was to seize the Patriarch’s Treasure by holding Gyeong In-geol’s life hostage. The goal was also to isolate him completely and break his mind, but most important of all was the Patriarch’s Treasure.

If he refused to give it up to the end, he would personally kill his grandfather and father and take the Patriarch’s seat, but then there was the risk that people who hadn’t sworn loyalty to him would leave the organization. There would be ugly rumors as well.

Meaning, in the worst case, he would have to kill even those who hadn’t sworn loyalty and become Patriarch, and then the matter would become far too big.

“The Patriarch’s Treasure is like the emperor’s imperial seal. Of course, you can become Patriarch even without it, but the problem is what comes after. Divine Iron already has a history of choosing its leader by ability first, and if you don’t even have the Patriarch’s Treasure, legitimacy will take massive damage.”

“That’s right.”

Gyeong Hang looked at Jin-hyeon with wavering eyes.

“Se-hwi.”

“Please call me Jin-hyeon.”

“No. To me, you’re Se-hwi. I don’t know any name like Jin-hyeon.”

“…”

“Will you be all right?”

Jin-hyeon smiled for the first time.

“Believe it or not, I’m a fairly capable man.”

“I’m not worried about whether you’re capable. I’m asking if you can resolve it well without getting hurt.”

With three generations already a mess, another grandson had come. Gyeong Hang couldn’t bear to see Jin-hyeon hurt.

“Don’t worry. The one who proposed that deal wasn’t Patriarch Gyeong. It was me.”

“…”

“I proposed it because I have confidence, so don’t worry too much, Supreme Patriarch.”

“…All right.”

Gyeong Hang nodded and said it once more.

“All right.”

“Now tell me where you hid the Patriarch’s Treasure.”

“To obtain the Patriarch’s Treasure, we have to call someone.”

Jin-hyeon found it odd. He was being thoroughly watched by Do-cheon’s underlings, so how could he “call someone”?

Gyeong Hang spoke with a sigh.

“At first, I regretted it, but from the look of it, they didn’t betray me. They were only thorough bystanders. At least it’s fortunate they aren’t so shameless they’d refuse to return what was entrusted.”

“Who did you entrust it to?”

Gyeong Hang pointed to the far ceiling with his hand.

“It’s with Songpungja (Pinewind Daoist) of Daoling Palace on Mount Qingcheng.”