Tiger Hour. It was the time when most living things went to sleep. Perhaps that was why, even though many outsiders were staying there, the night at the Tang manor was quiet.

The sound of bamboo leaves being buffeted by the wind felt loud.

With every step he took into the dark forest, Namgung Hyun felt weight settle onto his feet.

He had already walked this path once, and the person he was going to meet was the same, yet fear went ahead of him as if he were facing a road he was seeing for the first time in his life.

At that moment, a red light flickered in the distance.

Perhaps having sensed the approaching presence, someone lit a lantern in one of the first-floor rooms.

With his eyes accustomed to the darkness, the outline of the pavilion came into view.

Now that he °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° thought of it, it did look different from the pavilion he had seen before.

The study that had once been full of the smell of ink had become a massive pavilion filled with the scent of incense.

Unlike that day, the windows of the pavilion were not open, so he could not tell what was happening inside.

Namgung Hyun let out a sigh and stepped into the pavilion of his own accord.

At the Clan Head’s request, he had not left with the Namgung Clan but remained at the Tang manor. And the Clan Head had quietly asked the now-solitary him a question.

It was whether, by chance, the antidote for the Blood Cult’s Dokgo was made from blood.

Because it was something he had never heard before, he could not answer, and the Clan Head, as if realizing he had made a mistake, changed the subject. He began to talk about something else instead.

He said he would like the pavilion from headquarters to be restored to what it had been.

Namgung Hyun thought he had managed his expression well, but it seemed the Clan Head had read doubt in his face.

There had been several attached excuses, but none of it was important.

Though the Clan Head had left things unsaid, inwardly it seemed he believed Tang Sohwa had left a secret book in the study.

Namgung Hyun guessed that Tang Sohwa had told the Clan Head as much.

And unlike the Clan Head, he had not believed her words.

Step.

Namgung Hyun came to a stop in front of the door from which red light was leaking out.

The shadow cast on the paper door came into his eyes.

The faintly flowing scent of incense and the neat lines disturbed his heart. He still could not be certain what that feeling was. Whether it was fear toward the person who had killed him, betrayal toward someone who had disguised affection, or some other feeling entirely.

Facing the thin door, Namgung Hyun realized that whatever his feelings might be, he could no longer avoid her.

With a heavy touch, he slid open the paper door.

Clatter.

Inside the narrow Medical Division, Tang Sohwa was standing. Having carefully shut the windows, she had her gaze fixed on the wooden bowl placed on the window frame.

Droplets of water were falling, drip, drip, and filling the bowl. It was an object used to measure the passage of time. Not much time had passed yet; the water’s surface had not even crossed a single red line. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

Namgung Hyun felt a sense of his strength leaving him.

He had wondered if she, too, might be nervous like he was, but it was as if he did not exist in her mind.

He had even thought she would speak first, but she said nothing.

He could not tell whether she meant to torment him or simply kill time.

Was retrieving the study truly her only goal? Had she really had no feelings for him at all? Had she approached him only to use him?

Namgung Hyun knew that, rather than agonize over it in such a complicated way, there was a simple method: he could ask first. But he remained silent for a long while.

It was not that he was being stubborn.

It was because every time he tried to make a sound, fear surged up out of nowhere.

There was an answer he absolutely did not want to hear.

In the end, unable to break his silence, Namgung Hyun once again chose avoidance even in this situation.

He sat down on the floor and unpacked the bundle he had brought.

Rustle.

Refined characters were drawn on the wooden floor.

He intended to finish the task he had promised the Clan Head and then go back.

“There is still one more person who is supposed to come.”

Only then did a voice sound.

Namgung Hyun’s gaze slowly rose.

He asked stiffly. His voice sounded oddly twisted, as if his mood had been thrown off.

“Who is supposed to come?”

Before Tang Sohwa could answer, Namgung Hyun spoke the person he himself guessed.

“Is it the Crimson Blood Hall Lord?”

“No.”

For an instant, some subtle tension left Namgung Hyun’s face. It was a change even he himself had not yet noticed.

But the answer Tang Sohwa gave doubled the tension.

“The Blood Demon will be coming.”

Click.

As if she found it a waste to let the dying smoke go out, Tang Sohwa placed a bowl over the incense so that it would burn more slowly.

A voice as slow as her movements followed.

“He tried to divert the Martial Alliance sabers in order to enter the Tang manor, so I sent them away quickly. It seems he still cares about the eyes of the world, so I think he will come either tonight or tomorrow night.”

“Why am I.......”

“I thought that if I kept you by my side, he would come closer to me.”

Tang Sohwa’s eyes, which had been fixed on the water bowl, flowed toward him.

“Would he not think that I am trying to turn back time?”

For a moment, Namgung Hyun failed to control his expression.

He had no idea what his face looked like, and he had no time to think about it.

It sounded to him like she meant to kill him, and all thoughts were wiped away. The grievances and sense of betrayal he had been holding back burst out as their latch broke.

“What...... what did I do so wrong?”

He was not someone who often revealed his emotions, but even to his own ears, his unstable voice rang through the room.

“What exactly did I do wrong that you killed me, and now you say you might kill me again...... and you say it without so much as a change in your expression?”

Namgung Hyun’s face twisted sharply.

“I took on every risk because I was afraid something would happen to Young Lady Tang, and I even broke my promise with the Blood Demon. Yet what sort of ill will does Young Lady Tang harbor toward me that you use me like this and now intend to use me again to lure the Blood Demon?”

Namgung Hyun’s body trembled finely.

He was angry.

No. It was not a feeling that could be defined so simply.

The other side was treating him like an object.

It felt as if his heart were being torn to shreds.

It was not that his pride was hurt or that he simply felt like a fool who had been deceived.

The way she casually insulted him as if kicking a stone by the roadside loomed far too large.

It felt as if he had once again become a nothing.

And it was with the person he had most wanted to be special in the eyes of.

He had thought that as long as he had that person’s acknowledgment, nothing else mattered, but when she treated him like an object, he could not come to his senses.

Namgung Hyun was someone skilled at managing his expression. Yet now he could not even perceive how the muscles of his face were moving. It was as if all sensation had melted away in the heat, and he could feel nothing except that his face was hot.

Facing the words and expressions Namgung Hyun was spilling out, Sohwa slowly opened her mouth.

“You and I were husband and wife.”

Namgung Hyun flinched greatly.

His face had changed in a way of a different kind, but Sohwa did not give him the time to collect himself and continued speaking.

“You entered the Tang Clan under the Blood Cult’s command. Even after becoming the Tang Lord, you aided the Blood Cult for many long years, and just as you wished, you became Clan Head of the Namgung Clan and, in your later years, regained the Namgung surname.”

At her calm, flowing words, Namgung Hyun closed his mouth.

He did not doubt Tang Sohwa’s words. In fact, that had been his goal, and it was the very reason he had sought out Tang Sohwa.

“In the previous life as well, the Blood Demon sent demonic agents to Sichuan. But the timing was different. It was after the Tang Clan had been expelled from the Martial Alliance and after you had become Namgung Clan Head, so there was still a long time left before that day would come.”

Tang Sohwa’s gaze moved toward the window.

“At that time, you, who had become Namgung Clan Head, ignored my father’s plea for help, and the Tang Clan was annihilated by demonic calamity.”

After checking the water bowl, she continued without any ripple in her voice. As if she were talking about someone else’s story, in a calm tone.

“The Tang manor that had gone through the demonic calamity was very different from now. All the pavilions had been reduced to ashes, and the corpses of familiar faces were piled up like a tower.”

“That cannot be...... There is no way I did that.”

When Namgung Hyun muttered, Tang Sohwa let out a smile whose meaning was unclear.

“Whether you believe it or not, this life as well is a life you wished for.”

“A life I wished for? This?”

Namgung Hyun raised his voice as if it were absurd. But Tang Sohwa nodded.

She answered calmly.

“The Wudang Hall Master Yeon-a now is your lover. On the day Sichuan suffered demonic calamity, she pitied me, gathered reinforcements, and personally went to the Tang Clan to fight. Though she lost her life on the battlefield, thanks to her, we were able to stop the demonic sect’s advance eastward.”

Sohwa’s gaze flowed toward Namgung Hyun.

“After the demonic calamity ended, you lost your mind over Yeon-a’s death. Saying you would turn back time, saying you would bring Yeon-a back to life—you said such strange things, but in the end, you did not manage to turn back time. Instead, as if holding me responsible for Yeon-a’s death, you tried tirelessly to inflict pain on me.”

Her eyelids closed slowly as if pressing something down, then rose again.

“And about a year later, I killed you, who had become Clan Head, and all your household, and then I took my own life.”

“......”

“I knew nothing of your secret and did not wish to turn back time, but as you can see, I ended up trapped in a time sorcerer’s punishment like this.”

Namgung Hyun could not say anything.

A sorcerer’s punishment. Even within the Blood Cult, there were not many who knew about it.

Hearing that term from Tang Sohwa’s mouth, he could not deny her words even if he wanted to.

“I was lucky enough to meet an advisor who has turned back time hundreds of times by his own hand. I realized many things. For me, this one chance is enough, so I have no intention of turning back time again. If I fail......”

Letting out a short breath, she said,

“I plan to accept it, thinking I have simply had a long dream.”

Her voice was calm.

It was not so much lethargic as light.

The voice of someone who had once already resolved to die.

It seemed there was more relief than lingering attachment.

She even consoled the sorcerer.

“In the previous life, I died without pain, and in this life, you have achieved what you wanted.”

Under her chilly gaze, the softly curved line of her lips fixed itself in Namgung Hyun’s eyes.

“The Yeon-a you loved so much is alive, and has not the Namgung Clan’s attitude already changed?”

As if coming to his senses, Namgung Hyun refuted her.

“Perhaps in the past I loved Hall Master Yeon-a and did not give up on my goal of becoming Clan Head, but that is not the case now.”

“Yes, perhaps that is not the case now.”

When Tang Sohwa so easily agreed, Namgung Hyun furrowed his brow.

“I do not want the future you spoke of in the slightest. I have not the slightest intention of living that way. I am...... different from the person you saw! I am different, I tell you!”

His drawn-out voice, almost a sob, dug into her eardrums.

Sohwa watched him for a moment.

The thought she had continued to feel in this life came back to her through his voice.

Sohwa could not deny Namgung Hyun’s words.

“Yes, the you of this life may be a different person from the previous life.”

“Then why on earth do you still look at me...... with those eyes?”

Namgung Hyun spoke as if appealing his injustice.

Sohwa did not deny Namgung Hyun’s words, but she still did not waver. Neither her expression nor her tone had changed.

She merely answered his question calmly, like someone who had finally found her own answer after long deliberation.

“Because I am the same person.”

Her composed voice cut through the silence.

“I remember everything. Not only you, but I am seeing every day with my own eyes that the others are not the people I knew. And yet......”

Strength entered the hand gripping the cup. Her knuckles stuck out and her fingers turned stark white.

Soon, a voice forced through suppressed emotion came out.

“You and the others all forget everything and dream a peaceful dream, but I still cannot escape from the nightmare. I have to thrash about in fear of a hell that could come at any time......”

Tang Sohwa closed her mouth.

To the Namgung Hyun of now, it was something he could not understand.

As he had said with his own mouth, he had not experienced it yet.

So he could not know the depth of that resentment.

Sohwa drew in a deep breath and opened her mouth again.

“From now on, be wary of the Alliance Leader.”

Her voice had changed in quality. It was a statement so out of the blue that its intent was impossible to know.

But Tang Sohwa did not add more.

There was no time to.

Turning her gaze toward the window, Sohwa checked the water bowl, then lifted the cup in her hand and set it aside. The faint smoke began to deepen.

“In this life, there will be no occasion for me to kill you.”

With that short sentence, she pushed out all her emotions.

“Just remember that for today.”