Han Seol and Lee Ahn were walking together through the inner courtyard of the Ice Palace.
Han Seol had been tasked with discovering for whom the brewer had made the Incense Snow Ice Wine, but in truth, she was at a loss.
‘Who should I ask?’
This was not a matter of being clever or foolish.
It was a matter of experience.
She had never once investigated a case before.
Still, she had no intention of giving up.
Asking her mother for help was also not an option.
“First, let’s go back to the Hundred Wines Snow Courtyard.”
Her attitude toward Lee Ahn had become a bit more respectful.
Until now, she had treated her as a subordinate of the Young Cult Master, but now she was beginning to treat her as the daughter of the Fist Demon.
Though she was an adopted daughter, one could not treat the daughter of a Demon Sovereign carelessly.
“That’s a good idea.”
“Why do you say so?”
“When I saw the late brewer’s room, a thought occurred to me. Ah, this was a person who truly loved making wine. He probably spent more time in the Hundred Wines Snow Courtyard than at home. So, shouldn't the answer we seek be there as well?”
At Lee Ahn’s words, Han Seol nodded slightly.
‘Everyone is so clever.’
This time, Geom Mugeuk, the Drunken Demon, and Lee Ahn had completely shattered her prejudices about demonic practitioners.
She had always thought of demonic practitioners as cruel, violent people who did not hide their desires.
But these three were not the Young Cult Master, the Demon Sovereign, or the subordinate she had imagined.
‘Still, I can’t lose to them.’
Since the Drunken Demon had found a clue by examining the letter, she had to show something too.
Not to the Young Cult Master.
She wanted to show her mother.
The image of a daughter who could overwhelm them.
She was someone who had never cared about looking good to others in her life, but that feeling still remained when it came to her mother.
It wasn't that she liked her mother.
No, perhaps she was the person she hated the most.
“You’ve come again, Young Palace Master.”
The temporary brewer of the Hundred Wines Snow Courtyard greeted the two, but Han Seol had not come to see him.
There, Han Seol met a man named Jo Myeong, who was in charge of the ingredients used to make the wine.
Jo Myeong was extremely tense at Han Seol’s visit.
“I have something to ask you.”
“Please, speak.”
“You must be busy, so I won’t beat around the bush. Did the late brewer ever request ingredients to make Incense Snow Ice Wine?”
“No, she did not.”
Jo Myeong’s voice trembled, perhaps from nervousness.
“This is important. You must not deceive me.”
As Han Seol stared at him coldly, Jo Myeong bowed his head.
Just then, Lee Ahn stepped forward.
“I think you probably made a promise with the brewer. Not to tell anyone.”
Jo Myeong, with his head bowed, said nothing.
“We suspect that the brewer died because of that wine.”
The moment she said that, she could feel Jo Myeong flinch.
“Isn’t it more important to find the ones who caused the brewer’s death than to keep a promise?”
She could feel Jo Myeong’s hesitation.
His relationship with the late brewer must have been deep, too deep to flatly deny it.
He was not the type to deceive someone without batting an eye.
Jo Myeong raised his head and asked cautiously, “Did she really die because of that wine?”
“We believe so.”
The Young Palace Master followed Lee Ahn’s words.
“Opportunities don’t always come. If you miss this chance, there will be no other occasion to look into the brewer’s death.”
Though spoken in a rather cold tone, the words were effective.
Jo Myeong no longer concealed the truth.
“She quietly called me over and asked me to get the ingredients to make Incense Snow Ice Wine. She said it was a wine secretly requested by a precious person. She asked me to keep it a secret, so I did. I am sorry.”
“Who did she say she was sending it to?”
“That, I do not know.”
“Was there anyone who was close to the brewer?”
“There is no one I can particularly mention. She usually preferred to be alone.”
As there was nothing more to ask, Han Seol stopped her questions.
“You touched the wine ingredients and left no record, so you will be disciplined.”
“I am prepared for it.”
She could feel that he had respected the brewer.
After all, that must have been why he secretly gave him the ingredients.
Lee Ahn warmly comforted the man who had spoken honestly.
“The brewer would surely be grateful.”
The two then went outside.
The words telling her not to punish him rose to Lee Ahn’s throat, but she did not say them.
He might be punished simply because she brought it up, even if there was an intention to forgive.
“You’re quite kind to people for a demonic practitioner.”
At that, Lee Ahn asked, “In this martial world, who survives longer, the heartless or the kind?”
“That’s obviously…”
Han Seol didn’t finish.
The answer was so clear that she felt no need to say it.
However, Lee Ahn’s thoughts were different from hers.
“I’m on the side that believes kind people survive longer.”
Kindness? It was a feeling Han Seol had never experienced.
She had never received kindness, nor had she ever treated anyone with kindness.
In any case, Han Seol did not agree with her words.
Talking about kindness in this heartless martial world?
Just then, Jo Myeong ran up to them and said, “A moment ago, I was too nervous to think, but I remember seeing the brewer drinking with Elder Seo a few times. He wasn’t one to associate with others, so it remained in my memory.”
Jo Myeong bowed and went back.
Lee Ahn smiled and said to Han Seol, “This is also a result of kindness.”
Despite her joke, Han Seol’s expression had grown serious.
“What is it?”
“It’s nothing.”
But Lee Ahn could feel it.
The moment she heard the name Elder Seo, something had bothered her.
Lee Ahn calmly said to her, “Wasn’t it the Young Palace Master’s condition that there should be absolutely no secrets?”
‘You shouldn't hide anything, but I will.’ Surely you're not thinking that, are you?
When even Lee Ahn’s eyes asked this, Han Seol finally spoke the words she had hesitated to say.
“Elder Seo is the person my mother trusts the most.”
Elder Seo was a person of great influence within the Ice Palace and could be called the Ice Palace Master's greatest supporter.
“In that case, the brewer might have felt at ease and granted his request.”
He was a person who fit the condition of making it for someone trustworthy.
Elder Seo was also a man of excellent character.
But in a situation where the Incense Snow Ice Wine was thought to be related to her death, the target was Elder Seo?
It was a problem if her mother knew, and a problem if she didn't.
Kind people survive longer?
“Elder Seo is also the only person my mother treats with any kindness.”
*
Whoooosh.
The wind grew stronger, but I continued to walk.
The reason it was originally difficult to walk here was not just the strength of the wind, but the terrifying cold carried on it.
It was a cold that no human could withstand, so the consumption of inner energy to block it was enormous.
Inner energy used to keep from being blown away, inner energy used to block the cold.
It required a double drain of inner energy.
On the other hand, right now, I didn't have to worry about the cold and only needed to focus on the strength of the wind.
After already becoming immune to heat and cold with the Heavenly Qi Pill, and then consuming the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng, its effects were truly mysteriously astonishing.
This biting cold, fierce enough to freeze blood, felt like nothing at all.
So I thought I could reach it easily.
With each step forward, the wind became more ferocious.
The sound of the wind changed with every step.
I can guarantee it.
No one but the chosen can ever pass through this place.
I am also a chosen person.
After regressing, I gained an immense amount of inner energy and learned the Nine Calamities Demon Art and the Heavenly Demon Body-Protecting Art.
On top of that, I have even consumed the Ten-Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng.
Even I doubt if I can make it to the end, so who on earth could break through this place?
‘Why were they looking for an Extreme Cold Body?’
For a moment, I wondered if it was to break through this place, which was one of the reasons I had tried to come.
But now that I was actually doing it, that was definitely not it.
They were undoubtedly plotting something else.
As I advanced a little further, the wind blew so strongly that I could no longer afford to have any other thoughts.
The inner energy I possessed and the distance to the end.
The increasing strength of the wind.
I calculated all of it.
I couldn't just draw out my inner energy to the extreme without a plan, nor could I afford to conserve it, lest I be blown away.
In addition, I calculated the minimum amount of inner energy needed to protect my body when I was blown away from exhaustion.
As I walked using only that calculated amount of inner energy, pain began to set in.
It hurt.
It really hurt.
I never imagined the wind could be this painful.
But I couldn't draw out more inner energy to escape the pain.
A greater pain would be waiting for me later.
I had to endure this pain to get there.
It took more inner energy than I had expected.
I had to generate inner energy to protect my eardrums.
The sound of the wind was so loud it could have damaged my ears.
That consumed inner energy returned as pain.
Whoooooooosh!
‘Why am I even trying to go there? What if I get an internal injury from this?’
The desire to avoid the pain endlessly tempted me.
If it hadn't been for my life before regression, I would never have been able to advance like this.
Back then, I was plagued by so many temptations.
Give up.
How can a human possibly regress? Let’s just give up now and live my life.
Because I overcame that endless temptation, and because I walked that lonely path alone.
‘I can walk this path too.’
I walked and walked.
The vast amount of inner energy in my energy core was already showing its bottom.
‘Just a little, just a little more.’
At the last moment, the sound of the wind disappeared, and I felt my surroundings become quiet.
Could it be a hallucination? It would be a huge problem if I fell into an inner deviation from this.
If it was a premonition of that, I had to give up and turn back immediately.
That was the final temptation.
I steadfastly moved my feet.
What had always overcome temptation was that one steady step forward.
Gooooooooo!
The moment I overcame the temptation, I heard a wind sound I had never heard before.
And so, I finally reached the source of the wind.
The wind's strength had reached its peak.
I used all my conserved inner energy to manifest my protective energy and the Heavenly Demon Body-Protecting Art to their limits.
‘I’m here! Just this part! Please!’
Overcoming the pain of my whole body being torn apart, I took my final step.
The moment I passed through the wind valley and turned my body to the side, the pain vanished as if by a lie.
I had escaped from that tremendous wind.
“I did it!”
A gasp of, ‘I’m alive,’ came out on its own.
Wind was blowing through the valley I had just escaped from.
It blew so strongly that the ripples of the wind were visible to the eye.
The source of the wind was the sky.
A wind descending from the sky at a slant from far away was fiercely blowing towards the valley.
It looked like a demon sucking in all the air of the world with its mouth.
It was a truly mysterious, unfamiliar, and frightening sight.
And I realized.
That reaching this place itself was a greater fortuitous encounter than any other.
To break through to this point, I had exerted all my inner strength.
I had exerted all the potential of a martial artist.
After using up every last drop of my potential, I felt as if I could see myself as a martial artist with transparent clarity.
I felt as if my level of martial arts mastery had risen.
I also felt as if I, as a person, had become stronger.
It was a strange experience and feeling.
I was certain that this experience, felt for the first time in my life, would definitely influence my Nine Calamities Demon Art.
I turned my back to the demon's mouth that was sucking in the wind and slowly walked.
Far behind me, a massive cliff blocked the way.
It was so high that the top was not visible.
The ridges of the snowy mountain blocked the entire opposite direction.
As if it were a place one could not enter without breaking through that wind valley.
Before me, a spring landscape unfolded.
Flowers were blooming, and birds were flying.
Rabbits and deer saw me but did not flee.
They looked at me as if seeing a human for the first time.
A mysterious energy overflowed.
It was the primordial mystery of a place that had never let a human in.
And I saw it.
A single person standing in the middle of it all.
He was an old man, standing with his hands clasped behind his back.
An old man in a place like this? Of course, he couldn't be an ordinary person.
For a moment, a person came to mind.
Could it be? It couldn't be him, could it?
“Elder?”
I cautiously called out to the old man.
Then, the old man slowly turned towards me.
To my surprise, he was the very same old man who had sent me back in time.
“Elder!”
The old man smiled brightly and shook the wine bottle he was holding.
“Didn’t I say we should have a drink next time we meet?”
Those were the words the old man had said just before he sent me back in time.
So I had a feeling that the old man might appear before me again one day.
I just didn't think it would be today.
“I’m abstaining from alcohol right now. You came at this time on purpose, didn't you? To tease me.”
The old man laughed heartily.
“You’ve brightened up a lot since then.”
“Thanks to you.”
The old man, who was looking at me with deep eyes, slowly approached me and patted my shoulder.
“It's been tough, hasn't it? You're doing well.”
The moment I heard the old man's words, my chest tightened with emotion.
I try and try to express all sorts of things to others.
But it seems I wanted to hear it too.
I must have wanted to be comforted by the one person who knew my efforts from beginning to end.
That I've been living so diligently from before the regression until now.
So just tell me I'm doing well.
That one phrase is all I need to hear.
“Since you’re abstaining, let’s have that drink next time.”
“Are you leaving already?”
“As you know, many people are looking for me, so I’m very busy.”
Still, it sounded like he might come to see me again, which made me feel good.
Whoooosh.
A gust of wind blew.
The old man vanished with the wind.
Along with him, the paradise-like scenery around me also disappeared.
The trees, grass, and animals vanished with him.
Now, all around was only snow and ice.
He came and went in an instant, so it felt like a dream.
Did I see something that wasn't there? I had used up all my mental energy and inner energy to the point of collapse.
But that wasn't it.
The touch of the hand that patted my shoulder was too vivid.
I was so glad and happy to see him again.
Did you come to see me yourself because I forgot to look up at the sky these past few days? I'll look up often too, so please watch over me until the end.
Stop pretending to be busy all the time.
And… thank you.
Truly.