Bachelor Swordsmanship Remastered [EN]: Chapter 335

335. Nightmare

Il-Ayoung asked back, her eyes wide with surprise.

“Pardon?”

“I heard you were shouting for me to come out every day.”

*Swish.*

He covered his mouth with a fan and said,

“So I came. I am the person in charge.”

Il-Ayoung blinked.

It was unexpected that someone would suddenly appear, and that this seemingly delicate nobleman was the person in charge of such scary people.

“Oh… really?”

Il-Ayoung, who hadn’t really thought he would come out, asked cautiously.

Mun-Wang smirked.

“Why? You were shouting for me to come out, and now you’re scared when I actually appear before your eyes?”

His coming here was a whim.

In the midst of anxious and tedious waiting, he suddenly thought he should see the face of the Blue Dragon Sword Master’s niece.

In any case, the Blue Dragon Sword Master was his adversary who had defeated him.

“Scared? What are you talking about!”

Il-Ayoung burst out.

“Why are you suddenly appearing? Are you trying to scare someone?”

“Indeed, you started by shouting.”

Mun-Wang sneered.

“I simply walked here. It’s you who didn’t notice me.”

Although he held the power to sway the world, physically Mun-Wang was just an ordinary person.

So the fault lies with Il-Ayoung for not noticing.

“Ahem. I, I’m sorry for shouting.”

Avoiding his gaze, Il-Ayoung cleared her throat.

“But are you the person in charge?”

“Yes.”

“Where is this place?”

“Do you think I’ll tell you?”

At Mun-Wang’s words, Il-Ayoung frowned.

“I’m asking because I don’t know if you’ll tell me or not. Where is it?”

*Swish.*

Lightly waving his fan, Mun-Wang replied.

“I won’t tell you.”

“Why did you kidnap me?”

“Because I need you.”

“Oh, you answered that one. Thank you.”

Mun-Wang frowned.

“Thank you? Giving thanks to the person who kidnapped you—are you crazy?”

“What’s wrong with that? Is it normal to kidnap someone and then give them advice?”

Mun-Wang was speechless.

Well, if you look at it that way, they were both peculiar in their own ways.

*Swish.*

Il-Ayoung held out her hand.

Mun-Wang looked down at her hand and said,

“What is it?”

“Give me back my ring.”

“I don’t have it.”

Il-Ayoung frowned.

“Really?”

Mun-Wang sneered again.

“Do I have a reason to lie?”

“Ah, really… I told you I’m asking because I don’t know. You really don’t have it?”

After a moment of silence, Mun-Wang replied.

“…Yes.”

Mun-Wang’s voice was low and cold.

The warriors standing next to him realized that Mun-Wang’s mood had turned sour.

And that Il-Ayoung’s life was hanging by a thread.

“You are…”

“Why don’t you just stop here?”

Mun-Wang didn’t understand her sudden words.

“What?”

“The kidnapping. I don’t know what you want, but this isn’t going to work out.”

Mun-Wang’s eyebrows twitched.

“This way?”

That was a word that greatly offended Mun-Wang’s pride.

It sounded like he was resorting to such cowardly acts because he couldn’t beat Un-Hyun [Il-Ayoung’s uncle and a powerful swordsman].

No, that was a clear fact.

Mun-Wang, who was already psychologically cornered and anxious, reacted more violently than usual.

“What do you know!”

Il-Ayoung was startled.

Mun-Wang had even put down his fan and was angry.

“Who do you think you are to dare utter such words in front of me!”

Mun-Wang’s anger grew even greater.

In his eyes, the figures of Il-Ayoung and Blue Dragon Sword Master Un-Hyun were overlapping.

“Who are you to, dare to!”

The hand holding the fan trembled, and his face turned red in an instant.

Mun-Wang’s anger was so great that even the warriors’ faces changed.

However, Il-Ayoung was the type of person who bounced back the more she was suppressed.

“Why are you suddenly shouting and making a fuss?”

Il-Ayoung said, as if not wanting to back down.

“If you’re so confident, don’t shout and speak clearly! You’re doing that because you have nothing to say anyway!”

Il-Ayoung said in a sharp voice.

“Is all you can do as a man is shout at a woman? How childish…”

*Smack.*

A sharp sound rang out.

Mun-Wang had slapped Il-Ayoung’s cheek.

Il-Ayoung, whose head had turned from the slap, gritted her teeth.

“You… !”

It was when Il-Ayoung, who was furious, looked at Mun-Wang…

“Cough.”

…that Il-Ayoung saw a completely unexpected sight.

Mun-Wang was holding his own hand and trembling.

He was clutching his own right hand, which had slapped Il-Ayoung’s cheek, as if it were a separate creature.

“I, I, I…”

Mun-Wang looked down at his own hand as if he couldn’t believe it.

His eyes, wide with shock, were turning red in an instant.

“What, what is it? I’m the one who got hit, so why…”

Il-Ayoung muttered in confusion.

Just then, a subordinate appeared from behind.

“Let’s go, my lord.”

The subordinate grabbed Mun-Wang’s shoulder.

It was an impoliteness that would never have been allowed under normal circumstances, but Mun-Wang couldn’t even pay attention to that.

At the subordinate’s signal, the warriors standing next to him quickly closed the door.

*Thud.*

The door closed in front of Il-Ayoung’s eyes.

The person who was flustered by the sudden situation was none other than Il-Ayoung.

*Tap tap tap.*

Footsteps were heard from outside and soon faded away.

But Il-Ayoung couldn’t bring herself to open the door.

Il-Ayoung staggered backward and slumped down in front of the table.

“Aish, what is this?”

No matter how she thought about it, she couldn’t understand.

The fact that a nobleman came out as the person in charge, the attempt to negotiate somehow ended with them shouting at each other, and that she ended up getting slapped—this situation didn’t seem real at all.

“Ugh, I really need to do something about this damn personality…”

In fact, her heart was still pounding.

He was clearly a scary person if he was going to step up as the person in charge, yet she shouted back at him like that.

Maybe she was lucky that it ended with just a slap.

“I almost died.”

Muttering, Il-Ayoung raised her hand and touched her cheek.

*Sizzle.*

She felt a slight warmth, but it didn’t hurt much.

That nobleman, as she could tell from his appearance, didn’t have much strength.

“Was it your first time slapping a woman’s cheek?”

Il-Ayoung muttered.

Actually, it was Il-Ayoung’s first time being hit, so she didn’t really know.

In any case, the nobleman’s reaction seemed definitely serious.

To the point where Il-Ayoung herself felt like she had done something very bad.

“Hey, it’s me who got hit…”

Il-Ayoung felt wronged.

“Why are you even giving me a sense of guilt!”

She shouted, but no one answered.

***

He was a disaster.

The man who appeared in the village began to kill people without warning.

When he stretched out his arm, people vomited blood, and when he moved his hand, heads were cut off.

He didn’t discriminate between men and women, old people or children.

He killed everything that breathed, including animals and their young.

It was as if he was trying to erase the entire village.

*Whoosh.*

As the village was engulfed in flames, the man dragged a boy and his mother up the hill.

Under the dark night sky, the sight of the flames swallowing the village was pure terror for the boy.

The boy trembled and turned his head.

His mother was lying on the dirt floor.

Her disheveled hair and blood-stained face, her clothes torn and covered in dirt, and her soiled bare feet…

The appearance of his always neat mother was miserable.

Having already been struck by the man, she clutched her chest and vomited blood, but she didn’t take her eyes off the boy.

However, even in the face of his mother’s desperate eyes, the boy was just trembling in fear.

“Did you see it clearly?”

The terrifying man said to the boy’s mother.

The two exchanged some words, but the boy couldn’t hear them.

He was just afraid of the surging flames and the disastrous man.

Above all, the anxiety of losing his mother was weighing down on the boy.

“Hehehe.”

The boy’s mother laughed weakly.

“You’re a celestial being [a powerful, possibly divine being]?”

She said.

“Not even recognizing your own child?”

Those were her last words.

The man asked something, but instead of answering, she looked at the boy.

Her pitiful eyes, as if about to go out at any moment, were smiling at the boy.

Just like always.

*Thud.*

Her slender figure fell, making a small sound.

The boy’s mother no longer moved.

But the boy couldn’t do anything.

He couldn’t go to his mother, couldn’t cry, couldn’t even shed tears.

He was just watching the scene, crushed by fear.

“How old are you?”

The boy was startled by the man’s voice.

“T-twelve years old…”

The boy answered desperately.

He mustn’t defy this man.

Otherwise, he would die too.

Like his mother, who finally died from this man’s blow.

The boy looked at his fallen mother.

He wanted to see her face, but her disheveled hair was covering it.

“Will you come with me?”

The man suddenly asked.

The boy was startled and turned his head.

The man’s eyes, flickering like flames, were looking down at the boy.

The man didn’t wait for an answer.

“Let’s go.”

The boy squeezed his eyes shut as a large hand approached.

And when he opened his eyes again, his mother’s figure was quickly receding.

*Whirr.*

‘Mother.’

A surge of sorrow welled up.

The boy knew that this was the end.

That his mother’s kind smile and her soft touch were now over.

‘Mother!’

The figure of his fallen mother disappeared in an instant.

Under the dark night sky, red flames were engulfing the village and burning.

*Thwack.*

“Aagh!”

Mun-Wang screamed and sat up.

His whole body was soaked in sweat, and one hand was clutching his chest.

“Hah, hah.”

Catching his breath, Mun-Wang looked around.

It was his familiar bedchamber.

As his senses returned, the lingering effects of the nightmare slowly disappeared.

And at the same time, an old sense of loathing raised its head in his heart.

“Damn it…”

Mun-Wang gritted his teeth and spat out like a groan.

Since that day, Mun-Wang had not laid a hand on anyone.

He had taken countless lives, but he never killed directly.

Especially in the case of women.

No matter how much he hated them, no matter how angry he was, he would never lay a hand on them himself.

But he had slapped Il-Ayoung’s cheek.

The sensation at that time, and her surprised eyes, vividly came to mind.

Having taken so many lives, he was suffering from nightmares because of hitting one woman.

From a very old and persistent nightmare.

“Damn it!”

*Bang.*

Mun-Wang slammed the bed hard.

And the next moment, nausea rose up.

“Ugh.”

Mun-Wang bent over, but nothing came out.

After gagging a few times, Mun-Wang clutched his head with both hands.

A sense of powerlessness, self-loathing, and fear weighed down on Mun-Wang.

“Ugh, ugh, hic.”

A low sob escaped.

But no tears came out.

Just like that day, just like then.