The Eldest Daughter of the Sichuan Tang Clan Protects Her Family

At those words, Sohwa lowered her gaze again. The bloodstains on Hanwon’s black uniform hem were spreading wider and wider. Pressing tightly against his side, he spoke.

“Have you heard the news that Yoonjin has disappeared?”
The Black Tiger Unit carried out the Clan Head’s unofficial missions. They could never know what orders their comrades had received, nor were they supposed to. Life or death also remained uncertain, so they lived together in a single hall, confirming each other’s presence.
If someone was absent for about a week, they would quietly report it to the Unit Leader. Usually, it meant the missing member was on a mission, and soon enough, that person would return, so there was no commotion.

This time was different.
When Yoonjin’s absence was reported, the entire Black Tiger Unit’s quarters were thrown into chaos.
The Unit Leader, who had recently shown Yoonjin particular favor, was so alarmed that he tracked his schedule. But since returning from Namgung, Yoonjin had not been given any assignments.

Sohwa nodded, confirming that she had already heard the news of Yoonjin’s disappearance.
“Most likely, the Unit Leader will summon you tomorrow, Miss. Aside from the Clan Head, you’re the only one who has ever given Yoonjin orders.”
“That would make sense.”

Sohwa fixed her eyes on Hanwon’s mouth.
Now would come the real reason he had come to the inner courtyard this night.
Expecting it to be no ordinary matter, she listened closely.
“The moment I heard Yoonjin had disappeared, I went after those loafers always hanging around him. But they had all left Tang territory.”

“How strange.”
Hanwon nodded gravely.
“Yes. It was as if they had never stayed at all—nothing left in their lodgings. So I went around the city, looking for the one who’d introduced them. But the old man who’d arranged work for them had left Sichuan long ago, and others had already taken his place.”

“What kind of people were they?”
“A group that did the same thing—introducing laborers. They linked workers to odd jobs, sometimes distributing small tasks to locals. Just a small placement agency.”
Hanwon gave a bitter laugh, as if the absurdity still weighed on him.

“When I said I wanted to meet the owner, they led me underground. And down there, men were already waiting. They came at me. They weren’t ordinary.”
Shame tinged his voice—he had been assaulted by those who were not even proper martial artists—so he painted them as exceptional.
Sohwa understood the excuse. Surely they weren’t common workers. After all, even the Tang Clan’s elite Fourth Guard had been struck down.

Hanwon pressed his side as though sealing an acupoint and continued.
“I tore the place apart, but there was nothing. Strangely, the director’s room was covered in bloodstains on the floor. But it wasn’t from a fight.”
He tilted his head, as if even he couldn’t believe his own words.

“They’d been wiped around, smeared here and there, but the spacing where the blood pooled was regular, almost as if someone had written calligraphy with it. And more than anything, the walls were clean. If there’d been a brawl, blood would have splattered against them. It was… strange.”
“Blood?”
At this new detail, Tang Sohwa furrowed her brow.

“Yes.”
Hanwon gave a short reply, then glanced beyond the inner courtyard wall. Turning back to her, he bowed.
“I should go. I only stopped by to tell you before reporting to the Unit Leader.”
“Why did you come to me first?”

“To assume every bloodthirsty pervert is tied to the Blood Cult might be ignorant, but those men seemed connected to them… and…” He hesitated, then finished.
“You were the one who foresaw Yoonjin might fall victim to the Blood Cult and tried to protect him, Miss—not the Unit Leader.”
Sohwa fell silent.

She couldn’t answer right away. His words meant he trusted her more than his own superior.
The candor of his confession, the sincerity unclouded by suspicion, made Sohwa decide to trust Hanwon—at least a little.
This had been gnawing at her for some time, so her words came out quickly.

“Could you obtain some of that blood from the agency floor? Even a floorboard soaked with it will do.”
At once, Hanwon pulled a pouch from his breast.
Inside were a blood-soaked dagger, a hair tie, a torn scrap of cloth, and a piece of wood. Hanwon handed her the wood fragment.

“Collecting evidence from an investigation site is standard practice for the Black Tiger Unit.”
“Thank you.”
“Think nothing of it.”

His face twisted in pain. The wound must have been deep.

Even though she technically belonged to the Medical Division, Hanwon had not asked her to tend his injury. He had made sure to tell her what he had seen first.
That was the loyalty unique to the Fourth Guard.

And now, he was turning it toward her, instead of the Clan Head.
It felt strange.
Sohwa was about to hand him some salve, but the moment she received the wood piece, Hanwon vanished.

Staring for a moment at the empty window, she slowly shut it. Then she returned to her desk, covered with a cloth.
With a small knife, Sohwa scraped the wood chip and sprinkled the shavings into a jar.
But still, there was no reaction.

“What in the world…”
She gazed into the black surface, lost in thought.
Was it lack of samples? Or that it simply didn’t respond to all blood?

Or—
‘Does it only react to my blood?’
She closed her eyes.

No.
That was impatience.
She had compared no more than a dozen Blood Cult corpses, and all the blood had been drawn postmortem. To be leaping to conclusions already was far too premature.
She tried not to let anxiety overtake her, but it seemed she was more shaken than she cared to admit.

Covering the jar again, Sohwa lifted her eyes to the great embroidery design hanging on the wall.
Recently, she had heard astonishing news.
The Bright Sky Merchant Group had withdrawn from trade.

In the original future, within a few years they would have joined the Imperial Court’s trade, and a marriage proposal would have been sent to Yehwa. That future had now been overturned.
It was as shocking as when she had heard, months ago, that Guangdong’s brothel district had disappeared.
Before she could even cut them out herself, they had pulled back on their own.

Sohwa could not help but suspect the Blood Cult’s hand in the tragedy that awaited Yehwa and Yuhwa as well.
Though there was no proof, her conviction told her otherwise.
Many now claimed the Blood Cult had been completely eradicated, their attitudes turning complacent, but she knew the truth.

The Martial Alliance had not stopped the Blood Cult’s resurgence—they were falling for the Cult’s deception, clean and simple.
Not a single word of suspicion had been raised against Namgung Hyun.
Steeling her heart, Sohwa picked up the book she had left open. The still-damp ink glimmered faintly in the lamplight.

It was filled with meaningless records, things she had been unable to learn.
Still, she had no intention of giving up.
Once again, Sohwa lifted her brush and wrote down what she had newly discovered.

[Age unknown, sex unknown, no reaction – time of blood draw unknown.]
Beside that line, she added another note.
[Bloodstains remaining on the floor of a labor agency in Sichuan City]

Could it be that in the past there had also been a Blood Cult base within Sichuan City?
If so, then they must have continuously placed Cult members within Tang territory. But now, that was no longer possible.
Change was not always something to fear.

To notice change was a privilege unique to her.
Sohwa intended to gather together all the differences from her memories, to uncover another truth.
It might take a long time, but when she thought of the man who had spent over twenty years tightening the noose around her throat, there was nothing she couldn’t endure.

No—in fact, patience was the best stratagem she had learned from him.
Sohwa spent her days alternating between her duties in the Medical Division and tracking the Blood Cult.
The schedule was so busy she barely had time to sleep, yet the fruitless, repetitive days dragged on without gain.

Months passed like that.
“Hanwon.”

Setting down the white jar, Sohwa turned her gaze toward the window.

Hanwon, now stationed as her guard after the strengthening of the inner courtyard’s defenses, stood there.
“Have you heard the rumor that the Sichuan branch is reducing the number of men in the search unit?”
“Yes.”

After Yoonjin’s disappearance, the Clan Head had reinforced the inner courtyard’s guards. Thanks to that, Hanwon could now interact with Sohwa without arousing suspicion. On days like today, she would quietly give him orders under the guise of casual remarks.
“From here on, the Martial Alliance’s search unit will find nothing.”
“Why do you believe that, Miss?”

“Because now each sect and clan will start recalling their own men. Our Tang Clan will be the first to do so.”
Click.
As she closed the lid, Sohwa lowered her gaze again.

Because of the Blood Cult’s swift response, cutting out their own flesh so cleanly, the Martial Alliance had quickly grown complacent.
Even now, the Cult was surely mocking them, watching every movement of the Alliance.
The situation was drifting more and more toward disadvantage.

After tidying away the jar, she picked up a small chest and carried it to the window.
“I’ll be going out often on personal business. Since I can’t come back and forth every time, buy a carrier pigeon and secure a house near the branch.”
Inside the chest were two gold ingots.

Hanwon did not refuse. Bowing with both hands clasped, he accepted the chest.
Since Yoonjin’s death, his hatred for the Blood Cult had only deepened.
“At daybreak tomorrow, I’ll look for a lodging near the branch.”

Sohwa nodded.
“Even if it takes time, don’t overdo it. They may be lying low now, but in the end they’ll move. Even catching the smallest change is a great gain, so don’t be greedy—be cautious.”
“Yes.”

Lifting his head, Hanwon asked carefully,
“Should I also secure a house near the blind man?”
He was referring to the servant who had once cleaned the Medical Division.

For that man, it had been sheer luck.
Using illness as an excuse, he had gone back to his hometown, and at that very time the Tang Clan’s poison leak had been exposed.
Her father had ordered that servant found at all costs, but in the end he never was.

Because ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) Sohwa had already spirited him away, using Namgung Jin’s hand.
Now Hanwon was asking if he should also secure a residence in Anhui.
Sohwa shook her head.

“No. If you travel back and forth to Anhui, your tail will be stepped on. If Father discovers the servant, matters will become complicated. Leave it as it is.”
Through one of Namgung Jin’s trusted aides, Sohwa occasionally heard news of the blind man.
He lived quietly in a small cottage. He had no will to flee, nor did anyone visit him.

But Sohwa could not believe such peaceful behavior.
Perhaps he acted so because he knew he was being watched.
Was she the one watching—or the one being watched?

Sohwa realized she needed someone to help her discern the truth of the information she gathered.
Someone like… a traitor from the Blood Cult.
“Miss?”

Hanwon’s call made Sohwa lift her head.
She had fallen into thought again.
Chiding herself for the foolishness of relying on luck, she stopped thinking along those lines and dismissed him.

“You’ll be busy preparing, so you may go.”
“Yes. I’ll see to the carrier pigeon first and then return.”
He gave a brief bow and left the inner courtyard.

Sohwa set aside her foolish hope and devoted herself to what she could do.
But despite her efforts, time passed without gain—so much so that people began to say perhaps the Blood Cult really had been annihilated.
Yet before long, fortune brushed against Sohwa’s time.

On the first day of the sixth month, three years after the Martial Alliance had organized its search unit—
News arrived that a disciple of the Mount Hua Sect from the Shaanxi branch had fallen to the Blood Cult.