As if something were that desperate, the Vice Hall Lord trembled as he waited for her permission.
Sohwa lifted her head and spoke to Namgung Hyun, who was still standing by the doorway.
“Young Hero, if you don’t mind, could you bring a cup of water? It seems the Vice Hall Lord ran a long way and his throat has grown cracked.”
“But—.”
“It’s fine. The Vice Hall Lord is not someone who would harm me, so please don’t worry.”
Namgung Hyun was uneasy, but the scene before his eyes made the hierarchy unmistakably clear.
The Vice Hall Lord was begging her.
It seemed there had been some unspoken exchange between the two.
Namgung Hyun truly did not want to leave, but since a wedding envoy might arrive, he thought it was important for the Vice Hall Lord to regain his composure.
Forcing his reluctant feet forward, he went downstairs to fetch water.
When the lingering presence of Namgung Hyun faded into the distance, Tang Sohwa spoke again.
“Did the Blood Demon go to the Great Desert?”
The Vice Hall Lord raised his head. His pale lips were split and dry. He looked disheveled, but did not appear to be injured anywhere.
“The Hall Lord is confronting the Blood Demon. We must hurry and stop him.”
“So you ran off alone after watching your Hall Lord fight?”
Her voice carried no emotion, but perhaps it sounded like reproach, because the Vice Hall Lord flushed and raised his voice.
“There was no choice. The Blood Demon promised that if I brought you to him, he would return the Sun Palace, but the Hall Lord would not even listen—so before the Blood Demon changed his mind, I had to come and bring you.”
Sohwa’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“He said he would return the Sun Palace if he took me?”
“The Blood Demon says he no longer intends to hide his existence from the world. If that is so, it no longer matters if people learn how the Outland bloodlines continued their lineage.”
Sohwa let out a scoffing laugh.
“The two Outland bloodlines reclaimed their palaces after slipping from his grasp, so he can no longer control them. This isn’t charity. At a time when he needs to devour the Central Plains, leaving his seat would only invite attacks on Geumeunsan from both sides—so he must be trying to coax and placate.”
“You say that only because you don’t know the Blood Demon. He isn’t a human rational enough to think that way. If the Blood Demon cannot tame someone, he would rather erase them from the world, even at some loss.”
The Vice Hall Lord’s complexion turned ashen. It was unclear whether it came from having had nothing to eat or drink, or from sheer terror.
“Then he could simply wipe out the Crimson Blood Hall. Why, then, did he say he would forgive it only if I brought you?”
From the start, Sohwa had not believed the Blood Demon.
The man before her did not seem to trust the Blood Demon much either.
So she grew curious what the Blood Demon had said that made this proposal seem reasonable enough for him to leave his Hall Lord behind and rush here alone.
Was it really an offer tempting enough for the Blood Demon to covet?
What could be worth more to him than the Crimson Blood Hall Lord and the Sun Palace?
“I didn’t think it would be such a difficult request even for Young Lady Tang. Th—however, if you find it difficult, then please tell me what you want. Even if I have to offer my life, I will fulfill it.”
Instead of answering, the Vice Hall Lord rambled nonsense.
He claimed it wasn’t a difficult request, yet said he would pay the price even with his life.
It seemed he did not even realize, as he spoke, how wretched a negotiation this was.
No—first of all, the claim that it wasn’t a difficult request was wrong to begin with.
“If the Blood Demon takes me, he’ll imprison me at Geumeunsan and use me for the rest of my life. And you call offering my life to that mad old man ‘not a difficult request’?”
At Sohwa’s words, he lifted his head.
“No. Young Lady would stay not at Geumeunsan, but at the Sun Palace. Once he obtains something he likes, he won’t be satisfied with just one—he’ll keep wanting more...”
“Speak so I can understand.”
The Vice Hall Lord bit his lip once and hesitated. Blood seeped from the cracked flesh.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he finally forced the words out.
“The Blood Demon wants a frame between the Hall Lord and Young Lady. He promised that if we hand over a frame he finds pleasing, he will return the Sun Palace.”
Sohwa fell silent for a moment.
Unsure she had understood correctly, she asked again,
“By ‘frame,’ you mean a child made by mixing the blood of two bloodlines, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“If it’s a frame made from the Hall Lord’s blood and mine, then that means you’re asking me to hand over a child born between the Hall Lord and myself. Are you saying you truly uttered such filth?”
The Vice Hall Lord could not answer.
Sohwa was not someone who displayed her emotions vividly, yet revulsion was unmistakable in her voice.
“Doesn’t the Blood Demon call people like you frames, belittle the place where your clans grow as farms, and treat you like livestock? And now the Crimson Blood Hall is saying I should create an innocent life and feed it to the Blood Demon just so you can survive?”
Her sharp words slashed at the Vice Hall Lord’s eardrums.
“And you say this—you, the Vice Hall Lord of the Crimson Blood Hall, who risked your life to go to the Great Desert to escape the Blood Cult’s rule. You would create a new sacrifice to secure your own safety? Do the bloodlines of the Sun Palace know no shame?”
At her words, the Vice Hall Lord lowered his head and avoided her gaze.
“It’s not for my own safety,” he said, as if making excuses.
“The Hall Lord can never defeat the Blood Demon. No—there is no one in this world who can defeat the Blood Demon. Even Young Lady Tang cannot deny that. And now, the Blood Demon has come to the Great Desert first. If the Hall Lord confronts him in earnest, he may die.”
His voice began to tremble again.
“I know shame. I know better than anyone how vile and horrifying my request is. But to me, the Hall Lord is someone worth bearing all that shame for. It isn’t loyalty to a superior. Min Hae-rak is—.”
Having choked into silence on his cracked voice, the Vice Hall Lord spoke again.
“He is my family.”
Silence flowed.
“The Hall Lord would never bow to the Blood Demon, so I must kneel instead. But the Blood Demon has no interest in the life of someone like me, so I had no choice but to beg you. I’m sorry to have made you hear something so disgusting.”
His parched cheeks were soaked with tears.
Once more, he pressed his head to the floor.
“If you do not wish it, there is no need to create a frame. Just pretend to make a frame with our Hall Lord—please, help ensure the Blood Demon does not kill him.”
“What are you talking about?”
A voice came from the doorway.
Namgung Hyun stood there holding a cup of water, his face deeply furrowed in a frown.
“Young Lady Tang making a frame?”
“There will be no such thing.”
Tang Sohwa cut the words off cleanly.
Namgung Hyun looked at them with a bewildered expression.
“Then what is this about?”
Unable to step into the Hall Lord’s room before, he crossed the threshold and approached.
“It seems the Blood Demon went to the Great Desert and took hold of the life of the Crimson Blood Hall Lord who was there, threatening him. It’s a proposal too absurd to be worth considering.”
At Tang Sohwa’s dry voice, the Vice Hall Lord’s face became not merely dark, but utterly wretched.
Having lost all hope, he curled his body as if to hide his face, pressing his forehead to his knees as his shoulders shook—perhaps sobbing.
“...You’re a Vice Hall Lord. Control yourself. I said I won’t accept the Blood Demon’s proposal; I never said I would let the Crimson Blood Hall Lord die.”
At Sohwa’s words, the Vice Hall Lord lifted his head.
When their eyes met, she asked something else.
“All the Passages connecting the Northern Sea Ice Palace and Geumeunsan have now been blocked. If one were to go from the Ice Palace to the Black Tortoise Pavilion without using a Passage, how long would it take?”
It was an abrupt question.
“If one runs the whole way, it would take about ten days. But there is a Passage to Geumeunsan in the southern part of the Northern Sea, so reaching there would take two days. Even accounting for the time to pass the marriage trial, three days would suffice.”
“And from Geumeunsan to the Sun Palace, how long would it take?”
“The Passage between the Great Desert and Geumeunsan hasn’t been blocked, so it would take one day.”
Sohwa fell silent for a moment.
She seemed to be calculating the dates he had given.
Her black pupils shifted subtly. After looking over the Vice Hall Lord’s disheveled appearance, she asked in a skeptical voice,
“What is the condition of your body right now? Is it sufficient to run for three days straight, raid Geumeunsan, and then return to the Northern Sea?”
Her face remained expressionless, but suspicion showed in her eyes.
The Vice Hall Lord retorted as if in protest.
“It’s more than enough.”
Sohwa replied,
“Then go to the Ice Palace at once and tell them that Geumeunsan is empty. Say I sent you, and with the Ice Palace’s support, go to the Black Tortoise Pavilion and bring back the man staying in the vault. Tell the Fourth Seat he is someone who knows every detail of the vault, and the Fourth Seat will gladly go with you to Geumeunsan and help you plunder the Black Tortoise Pavilion’s vault.”
The Vice Hall Lord blinked, failing at first to grasp her intent. But Sohwa did not wait for his understanding and continued.
“Are you naturally that bad at noticing things? Last time, you couldn’t even tell a watermelon from a pumpkin. How long would it take you to find someone who can distinguish medicinal herbs?”
Bridling, the Vice Hall Lord glared.
“That was because the Hall Lord took the note and I got confused and sent both! Do you think I’ve spent all these years eating for nothing at a merchant guild? I can tell a watermelon from a pumpkin! I can distinguish medicinal herbs as well as most physicians!”
“Good. The Black Tortoise Pavilion’s garden is full of medicinal herbs. I’ll write down their names and locations, so bring those back as well while you’re there. If time is too short to collect them, don’t be greedy—just turn over the earth around that area.”
“If there’s no need to bring the herbs back, why disturb the ground at all?”
“So it’ll be clear that it was by my order—and the Blood Demon will come looking for me instead of going to the Northern Sea.”
“Young Lady Tang.”
Namgung Hyun, who had only been listening until now, cut in as if to stop her.
As if worried the explanation would grow long, Sohwa blocked his words by explaining her reasoning.
“We need to know where the Blood Demon will head in order to respond. Rather than wasting our energy waiting anxiously while not knowing where he’ll go, it’s better to know he’ll come to me and prepare accordingly. Where are the brush and ink?”
Cutting off his concern, Sohwa asked for writing tools.
The Vice Hall Lord hurriedly rose, brought over a box by the window, and took out the Hall Lord’s brush and ink.
She wrote down the necessary medicinal herbs and their locations on one sheet. Then, on a new sheet, she began writing something in smaller characters than before.
“There are many Northern Sea Ice Palace records in the vault, so if you go there, Northern Sea people may covet them and waste time. Since the man from the Black Tortoise Pavilion knows every record in the vault, persuade them well that taking just that one man is enough. Be careful so the Ice Palace people don’t end up lingering at the Black Tortoise Pavilion and getting captured.”
“Is this a plan to lure the Blood Demon back to Geumeunsan?”
Sohwa nodded.
“So let one of them escape and carry the news to the Blood Demon.”
At that, the Vice Hall Lord spoke in a doubtful voice.
“But if the Hall Lord remains at the Sun Palace, won’t an even bigger problem arise when the Blood Demon returns? The Hall Lord is too stubborn to leave the Sun Palace, and facing a Blood Demon provoked even further could be even more dangerous.”
Sohwa calmly cut off his worry.
“I’ll send someone to bring the Hall Lord to the Central Plains, so don’t worry and go. The faster you lure the Blood Demon, the higher the Hall Lord’s chances of survival.”
