Seeing The Demon (1)

Gyeong In-geol couldn’t hold it in.

“Even if there are many lawless men under heaven, how can there be someone like you!”

The voice that burst out was packed with sharp reproach and bottomless fury. He wanted to rise right then and tear out the throat of the son who had committed filial impiety.

“Killing your father wasn’t enough, and now you say you’ll dig up your mother’s grave? Are those words that should come out of a human mouth? You beast who’s worse than an animal, you—!”

“I enjoyed your little performance.”

“What?!”

Gyeong Do-cheon turned slowly.

In that instant, Gyeong In-geol flinched. The face of the son who had committed filial impiety looked far too different from before.

Skin that looked oddly pale, eyes curved round like overturned crescent moons, and a mouth that climbed all the way up to his cheekbones.

It was his son’s face, yet it felt like he was looking at a completely different person. Like a white mask with three crescent moons embedded in it.

“It was truly entertaining. The face pretending to be unconscious because you didn’t dare face your son, and in the middle of it, the trembling eyelids and the twitching ear.”

“!”

“Just how much more pathetic do you plan to become, showing me that? It was entertaining, but it almost made me pity you.”

A light of humiliation rose on Gyeong In-geol’s face.

His son was playing with him right now. Separate from his rage, the thought that he really had shown such a sight made the back of his neck burn.

Gyeong Do-cheon leisurely perched on the window ledge.

“Still, it’s unexpected. By now, the Hundred Poisons should be making your vitality surge and dip. Yet you’ve come to your senses. Is it the chief physician’s skill?”

“Shut your mouth!”

“Like I said, don’t be so lonely. I’ll send the chief physician along with you.”

“You…!”

Trembling with rage, Gyeong In-geol soon let out a sigh.

“Why? Why did you do this? What for?”

“…”

“I’m sick anyway. Before long, I meant to pass the Patriarch’s seat to you. Was your greed for the seat so great you couldn’t endure those few years. I truly…”

“I can understand you saying that, Father, since you’re the sort of man who’d be satisfied with something like the Patriarch’s seat of the Divine Iron Merchant House.”

“?!”

“They call it a frog in a well, don’t they? You lived not knowing how wide the world is, so it makes sense you’d think a sky the size of a fist is still the sky.”

“What did you say!”

“Who cares who holds the Patriarch’s seat of the Divine Iron Merchant House. Of course I have to take it, and I want to. But if you ask whether it’s a seat worth staking a life on, I could never say yes.”

Gyeong In-geol’s face flushed red. No one had ever spoken of the Patriarch’s seat of Divine Iron like that.

“How dare you say such……!”

“Do you want to protect the Divine Iron Merchant House?”

“Shut up! Don’t speak Divine Iron’s name with that filthy mouth!”

“Do you know? Father has never lived for the clan even once.”

Gyeong In-geol’s eyes trembled.

“What strange nonsense are you trying to use to bewitch me!”

“You didn’t live for the clan. You lived only for yourself.”

His tone changed suddenly.

The face that had been full of laughter now held bottomless loathing.

“If you truly cared about the clan, you should’ve passed the Patriarch’s seat to Uncle.”

“?!”

“You know it too, don’t you. That Uncle was far more talented than you.”

“!!”

“People said Uncle was a great man. That there had never been another like him in Divine Iron’s history. Not only was he Sichuan’s finest blacksmith, he understood the world’s principles and managed people well. They said if he became Patriarch, he would be a peerless qilin who would spread Divine Iron’s name across the Central Plains.”

Gyeong Do-cheon cocked his head.

“You weren’t in those stories. Well, thinking about it now, it’s only natural. You’re not much of a capable person.”

Gyeong In-geol bit his lip until it bled.

“I committed filial impiety? Right. What I did is filial impiety. Then let me ask you something too.”

Gyeong Do-cheon leaned his upper body forward.

“Wasn’t it filial impiety when you erased my younger brother by staging it as an accident?”

“…Shut up!”

“Haha. Looks like our bloodline is a house born with the karma of filial impiety. If the father is like that, how would the son be any different? One can’t escape their blood”

“I told you to shut up!”

“You didn’t live for the clan. You were nothing but a petty man who took pride only in the clan you pictured, the clan from when you held the Patriarch’s seat.”

“You bastard! That mouth of yours……!”

“Do you truly think so?”

Frost settled on Gyeong Do-cheon’s face.

“Did you truly live thinking of the clan? Not living only for yourself?”

Gyeong In-geol couldn’t answer easily.

Even if he answered, the bastard wouldn’t believe him, but it was also true that his throat felt blocked in that moment.

Gyeong Do-cheon watched him quietly, then smiled again.

“You getting sick. Do you think that was a coincidence?”

“?!”

“Has such a thought never passed your mind? That someone, someone very close, became obsessed with the poison arts of assassins and tested those methods on you.”

“…You?”

“You would’ve passed on the Patriarch’s seat? As if. Your greed has no end. Still, who knew a frog in a well could have greed that vicious. Do you know how ugly and pitiful it is? A miserable man with no ability clutching torn rags, cackling his whole life.”

“You… you bastard!”

“It was a spectacle. A man with no ability sitting in the Patriarch’s seat and ruining the future I’m trying to draw. You have no idea how much I cursed alone after returning to my quarters.”

Gyeong Do-cheon snorted.

“But what meaning does that have now? The grand plan I prepared little by little all these years is finally blooming. I don’t need to bring up old history that can’t even become a memory, like some petty man. I’m not you.”

“So… even that illness was from poison you used?”

“Why? Hard to believe?”

“…”

“Believe it. I’ve found you disgusting since before I even grew up. Just knowing I was born from the seed of a cripple like you makes bile rise in my throat.”

Gyeong In-geol’s face went white.

He had misread him by far too much. Gyeong Do-cheon wasn’t his son. He wasn’t even human.

He was a monster.

Gyeong In-geol fell ill six years ago. Back then, Gyeong Do-cheon was still a teen.

That meant he had been poisoning his father since then and laying a grand plan for years. It was something that would shock heaven and flip the earth.

Brrr.

Gyeong In-geol’s breathing grew rougher as his body trembled.

It was fortunate he didn’t faint even after such a mental shock. Looking at a monster beyond anything he’d ever imagined, he couldn’t even tell if this was his room or hell.

Watching Gyeong In-geol’s complexion, Gyeong Do-cheon asked bluntly.

“Do you want to live?”

“…”

“You’re a petty man who can’t affect anyone, the clan, or the world. To me, your existence has no meaning either.”

“…”

“But even hearing that, you won’t want to die. Even in a moment this miserable, you’re the kind of person who chooses life over death. I know that.”

A single tear slid from Gyeong In-geol’s unfocused eyes.

A smile of satisfaction settled on Gyeong Do-cheon’s face.

“I alone know how to detoxify the Hundred Poisons.”

“!”

“It’s not because my medicine is better than the chief physician’s. It’s because I memorized all of Hundred Poisons’ forbidden arts. I know every poison parasitizing your body. Which poison does what, one by one.”

“…”

“I’ll ask again. Do you want to live?”

Gyeong Do-cheon could see it. Gyeong In-geol’s tear-wet eyes wavered slightly.

“If you want to live, if you want to know the detox method, make a deal with me.”

“…A deal?”

“It’s simple. Get up right now and gather everyone in the clan. Then announce formally that you’ll pass the Patriarch’s seat to me.”

“…”

“Then I’ll give you the detox method. I’ll drag that body of yours, half in the underworld, back into this world.”

“…”

“So. Do you have any intention of making a deal?”

“You said you weren’t that interested in the Patriarch’s seat, but in the end, that’s what you wanted?”

Gyeong Do-cheon snorted.

“Think whatever you want. What matters is whether you accept my offer, or refuse it.”

“If I die, you become Patriarch anyway. Is there a need for all this?”

“Even in a moment like this, you still can’t be honest? Or have you truly become a crippled idiot?”

Gyeong In-geol’s teeth clacked. His son’s foul talk made his mind feel like it was fading, but with inhuman patience, he clung to his sanity.

“Gyeong Hang has the Incomplete Strange Sword and the Patriarch’s Seal.”

“…”

“The smiths’ superstition, treating objects like some holy Patriarch’s Treasure, is laughable. But if I want to drag those bastards along too, I need legitimacy. Yet Gyeong Hang hides the Patriarch’s Treasure and won’t hand it over.”

Gyeong Do-cheon didn’t bother saying that Gyeong Hang had disappeared.

“It’ll come into my hands someday. That’s only natural. But if you just croak and I take an acting Patriarch’s seat and run the merchant house, won’t those smith bastards refuse to acknowledge me?”

“…”

“I have a lot to do. I have a grand goal. I live each day faithfully to make that goal real.”

A strange light flickered in Gyeong Do-cheon’s eyes.

“To spend a day meaninglessly means the dream moves one day farther away too.”

“…”

“I want to achieve my goal, my dream, even one day sooner. To do that, I need the Patriarch’s seat of the Divine Iron Merchant House. The seat as Divine Iron’s master that everyone acknowledges.”

“What is your dream?”

“Hey.”

Annoyance rose on Gyeong Do-cheon’s face.

“You think I’m babbling just to keep you company?”

“!”

“I made an offer. You only need to choose. Don’t try to probe me with useless words.”

“…”

“Why? Do you need more time?”

Gyeong In-geol swallowed. Even if there was no saliva left, he needed to wet his throat somehow to keep up this mind-breaking conversation.

“How much will you give me?”

“And you’re indecisive on top of it. You really are the worst.”

Gyeong Do-cheon glanced out the window.

“One hour. No more.”

Not days. Only an hour.

In that instant, Gyeong In-geol’s eyes flashed.

“One hour?”

“Why. Is that too long? Want it shorter?”

“…”

“Fine. You’re dying anyway, so I’ll be generous and give you two hours. Absolutely no more than……”

“Something happened.”

“What?”

The reason he kept forcing himself through a conversation that made his guts turn.

It was because Gyeong In-geol also wanted to know what was inside Gyeong Do-cheon. And now, he could finally predict Do-cheon’s situation.

“Something happened on your side.”

“…”

“Now I see it. Why you came all the way here claiming things were finished, when you liked Fragrant Brocade’s eldest daughter that much. Something went wrong with what you did.”

“…”

“And the reason you told me to announce the transfer of the Patriarch’s seat before everyone is because you got desperate.”

Gyeong In-geol smiled faintly.

“Why? Did my father disappear or something?”

Gyeong Do-cheon’s cheek twitched slightly.