Weapon-Eating Bastard [EN]: Chapter 87

The history of the Sungmoo Yi Clan begins with its first patriarch, Yi Hyul-hyun.

However, much like how no records related to the founder Yi Hyul-hyun remain, there weren’t many records of the Sungmoo Yi Clan from that time either.

In fact, even among scholars studying the family’s history, it was speculated that Yi Hyul-hyun, the founder, led a force but did not call it the Sungmoo Yi Clan.

Indeed, the name Sungmoo Yi Clan began to appear in ancient records from Yi Hyul-hyun’s next generation.

In other words, the Yi family’s bloodline began to be known to the world as the Sungmoo Yi Clan from Yi Hyul-hyun’s children’s generation.

The patriarch who practically made the name Sungmoo Yi Clan known to the world and established the form of a noble family.

The 2nd patriarch of the Sungmoo Yi Clan, Yi Hyang-seon.

Now, he has appeared before me.

“…….”

I took a deep breath and calmed my heart.

This place is a tomb prepared for our ancestor.

If so, that must be Ancestor Yi Hyang-seon.

‘But how on earth…….’

His appearance was so lifelike, as if he could move at any moment.

It was impossible to see him as the corpse of someone who died over a thousand years ago.

Although I couldn’t feel any vitality or presence, it wouldn’t be strange if he were alive.

I calmly took another breath and examined the ancestor sitting before me.

He was sitting on the floor with only his right knee raised to his chest.

His right arm was hanging limply over his knee, and a sword in its scabbard was held in his arms.

‘Not an illusion or a spirit…….’

The ancestor’s remains were definitely there.

I slowly supplied mana to my Mystic Eyes.

Wooong!

The sunset-colored energy surged over my eyes.

Only then could I examine the tomb chamber in detail.

The space was easily 5 meters [approximately 16.4 feet] in length, width, and height.

And on the walls of that vast space, numerous talismans, golden threads, and shamanistic murals and patterns were drawn.

‘What on earth is this…….’

The Mystic Eyes read their meaning.

It was some kind of seal.

It was made to prevent something from escaping this room.

‘What is this seal for?’

I traced the still faint lines of spiritual and magical power with my eyes.

All those talismans and patterns were connected in one direction and soon converged on one point.

The center of this room, where the ancestor was sitting.

‘A hole?’

There was a pit of unknown depth, like a well, where the ancestor was sitting, and the ancestor was sitting on a lid that covered it.

Dugun!

My heart leaped wildly.

That was it.

The strange sense of crisis I had felt since before entering this place.

The reason exists below.

Tuk!

As if waiting for me to enter, the power of the seal, which had been precarious as if it would break at any moment, finally broke.

“Suddenly, wha…….”

My words were cut short.

Kwaaa!

Black mist spewed out of the pit like fog and instantly covered me.

And consciousness faded away.

* * *

The air fluctuated.

I felt my body swaying and slowly opened my eyes.

There was a mirror in front of me.

It was a mirror I often saw.

It was the mirror in my room in the main family’s residence, the one I used to tidy my appearance before going out.

In it, the figure of a small child was reflected.

No, it was a figure that had already grown too much to be called a child, but the way it was hurt and cowering was exactly like a young child.

“…….”

The figure reflected in the mirror was ‘me,’ but at the same time, it wasn’t me.

The past me.

The me from my previous life.

The helpless me who could only be taken from without strength.

Consciousness becomes blurred as if sinking into a deep swamp.

I tried to clear my mind, but a tidal wave of countless memories swallowed me.

Continuing situation.

“What on earth are you doing!”

Mid-teens. It was me during my cadet days.

‘I’ was huddled in a corner, being bullied by other cadets.

All the senses of that time and place, the smell of the air I breathed, even the sound of training coming from beyond the wall, began to flood into my head.

“This bastard of a son! You can’t do anything like a bug!”

“I’ll let you off if you crawl between my legs, you know? Why can’t you understand, youngest young master! Hahaha!”

At that time, I was just curious.

What on earth did I do wrong to deserve this?

How could I escape this situation?

The emotions of that time are naturally felt.

I learned at too young an age that no matter how hard I tried, it wouldn’t work.

Still, I didn’t stop training.

But even while training, I knew that my reality would not change.

“You can’t even use magic properly, what kind of direct line are you? Pathetic bastard.”

A cadet laughed and threw a punch.

My head snapped around from the punch.

‘It hurts.’

It was too realistic of an illusion.

No, it feels like memories are being replayed, not illusions.

The distinction between the past me and the present me gradually blurs.

All the smells of the air, the appearance of the cadets, and even the pain in my body are felt realistically.

Thud!

I rolled on the ground from the cadet’s kick.

And as I staggered to my feet, the surroundings changed again.

The figure of my nanny sitting in front of me.

The nanny teared up and applied medicine to my wounds.

“Young master. Nanny believes in you. You are a valuable person.”

The nanny told me this very often.

I was able to find strength even in the midst of hardship.

And.

“……Therefore, Moon Ga-hwa, the nanny of the ninth, Yi Cheol, is ordered to resign. This is a formal order from the Council of Elders. You should be grateful that it ends with this.”

“Th, then what about our young master…….”

“It’s none of your business to worry about, since you’ll be an outsider now.”

The nanny was falsely accused of something ridiculous.

The charge was embezzlement.

It meant that she had embezzled the family’s support money paid to me.

It was absurd.

There was no word as incompatible with the nanny as embezzlement.

But I couldn’t do anything.

It’s not that I didn’t try.

I rebelled and resisted, but I didn’t achieve any results.

Effort doesn’t always produce results.

And there was nothing as futile as not getting results despite making an effort.

That day, I felt the helplessness of not having the power to protect what was mine.

After that, I didn’t hear from the nanny.

Woo woong!

The world changes.

This time, I was standing in the chaotic administrative office.

It was my uncle Yi Tae-hong’s chief’s office.

All sorts of documents were complexly cluttered, and my uncle was bound by the constables.

“……It’s okay. Do you think this uncle will collapse like this? I’ll be back, so clean up here.”

I know that my uncle will not be able to return after this.

At this time, I was already old enough.

As I got older, I felt too well how terrible misery and helplessness were.

But I couldn’t do anything.

I lowered myself to pick up the documents rolling on the ground.

Woong woong!

When I raised my body again, the world reflected in my eyes had changed once again.

In a dark room.

My eldest brother, who has become middle-aged, is sitting in front of me.

In my hand were a few pennies in a borrowed-name account and a route for escape.

“Leave. I’ll hide you as much as possible, but as long as you’re a member of the Yi family’s bloodline, the family will continue to look for you. I sincerely pray that you regain your life.”

I couldn’t protect the nanny who was like a mother, and I couldn’t protect the uncle who was like a father.

And in the end, I abandoned my name and ran away as if being chased.

I wandered around here and there, running away.

I was nervous every time I heard footsteps coming from beyond the door of the inn room, and I felt like I was falling into a deep swamp every time.

I have no one, no name, and no life of my own.

There was no life of mine that my eldest brother wanted.

Not long after that, I heard news of the intensified competition for the position of head of the family.

“The third one did something. Hide yourself for a while. I won’t be able to contact you in the future. Just hold on for a moment. I will…….”

After receiving a call from my eldest brother, I headed to the den of wanderers.

I lived in a city full of smugglers, drug addicts, and murderers, holding my breath.

But in the end, I couldn’t avoid the family.

The visit of the Spirit Sword Unit member.

In the end, it was the third brother who became the head of the family.

Hwaak!

Eventually, that scene unfolds.

I was in an unexplored area.

Behind the corpse of a giant monster, my body was cooling in the wreckage of a broken sword and blood.

“To think that the bloodline of the Yi family would be so pathetic.”

It was the moment when I was taken and taken away, and even my life was taken away.

These memories were my past life’s trauma.

They were my weakest parts, sleeping deep in my unconscious.

They were the most fatal memories of the past that no human could ever deny or escape.

Then, once again, the world changed.

Blood was splattered, and cold corpses were rolling on the ground.

I was also bleeding, standing on top of those corpses and looking down at them.

Those corpses were not the faces of people I knew in my past life.

Aunt, Yi Seo-hyun, classmates from the cadet corps, Jeong Jin-soo, Valerie…….

The relationships I had built up after regressing were lying there.

I slowly got up from the pile of corpses.

“So…….”

These were my traumas and the fears I held.

So.

I scoffed and continued.

“I don’t know what you want me to do by showing me this.”

The traumas of the past, the memories I experienced myself, are known to me better than anyone else.

Those memories are a reality that cannot be denied even if I regress, and they were a painful past.

That’s why I never turned a blind eye to them in the first place.

I am who I am now because of those memories.

I have been fighting to no longer have everything I lost back then taken away.

I am who I am now because of the pain of my past life.

That’s why I didn’t care about this forest of corpses unfolding before my eyes now.

This scene would never unfold.

Because I’m going to make it that way.

I am sure of it.

Pajijijijijik!!

The moment I finished thinking that, the world I was seeing began to have noise like an old cathode ray tube.

“Ugh!”

I felt dizzy and nauseous as if someone was grabbing my head and shaking it like crazy.

All my senses were fluctuating up and down as if I was on a roller coaster.

The memories of the past and the illusions of the present overlapped and repeated, and the countless senses I saw in the illusions repeatedly rushed in and out.

Clang!

In an instant, all the worlds I was seeing shattered like pieces of glass.

All the scenery of the world was fragmented and scattered like fragments.

Whether it’s reality or illusion.

What am I seeing now?

In the midst of all the confusion, suddenly, black mist crawled out from between the breaking fragments.

‘That’s it.’

I could tell instinctively.

The being sealed in the tomb was this black mist.

I urgently used my Mystic Eyes in the mist that pulsed and writhed like a swarm creature.

And there, I saw a bizarre scene I had never seen before.

‘What on earth is that…….’

Beast. No, person. No, it’s not that either. Monster or spirit…….

It was an energy that could not be explained by any of them.

Numerous characteristics that I had seen with my Mystic Eyes were all mixed together.

I bit my lip as I looked at it.

I knew a power that was clearly different from that, but at the same time, so similar to that.

Black ki [life force/energy].

That black mist was the power that created this illusion.

It was the moment I thought that far.

The darkness surrounding me began to tighten again as if to swallow me again.

The black mist, which had climbed all over my body like a snake, began to constrict my whole body.

My head ached as if it would break, and again, all sorts of memories flooded in like a receding tide.

And.

Ugh!

As if it couldn’t wait any longer, black ki stretched out from around my heart.

The moment the black ki stretched out, the darkness that surrounded me was cut off.

Crunch! Crunch!

A noise like something being chewed and torn was endlessly continued in the darkness where it was difficult to see even an inch ahead.

Before long, the feeling of being bound by vines disappeared.

Teo-eo-eoong!

The dark world began to crumble from the end.

On the other side, I could see the scenery of the tomb chamber I had first entered.

And in that shattering illusion, I saw an unidentified scene.

-Someone has to be prepared for future generations. Seal me with that.

It was neither my memory nor my voice.

White hair, light brown eyes.

With a sword in his arms and old-fashioned clothes.

The 2nd patriarch of the Sungmoo Yi Clan, Yi Hyang-seon.

It was his memory.