Book 25 Chapter 8

Promise to…… Promise to…….

-Princess Ye Qing and Nine-Eared Dunoy

Boom!

Dunoy, who had been so strong just a few days ago, was lying on the ground, red blood gushing from his chest like a spring. Ye Qingyu rushed over and grabbed his hand, but his eyelids fluttered and he couldn't utter a word. It was because of the blood in his throat.

"Damn, I missed it."

Jang Hong and Hyorong, who had followed the assassin, returned in vain.

"He was very fast. He must have been quite skilled."

Had they gone after him faster, they might have been able to catch up, but he had already turned and started running the moment they opened the door. Distracted by Dunoy on the floor, they allowed him to flee the room. At that point, it was impossible to chase the already skilled assassin. He'd already made his escape route and disappeared. Jang Hong desperately tried to cover his tracks, but the man was nowhere to be found. If it was Salsu, he was a specialist.

"What about Dunoy?"

Bai Xiaochun frowned and shook his head.

"It looks like we didn't get to finish the job, but it's hopeless. His heart is out of the way, but his lungs have been punctured. We've given him first aid, but we don't know what's going to happen……."

"There is only one reason for an assassin to come."

Bai Xiaochun nodded in agreement with Jang Hong.

"He saw something he shouldn't have seen."

It was obviously sent to keep him quiet.

"We must have come to the right place."

"It's late."

The dead have no words. They needed a living Dunoy.

"Put more fire in the dagger, come on, we must save him, we must!"

Ye Qingyu shouted sharply. It was a very urgent voice. The woman who usually didn't show any signs of agitation was now shaking violently.

"Ah, yes, ma'am."

Bai Xiaochun hurriedly placed his palm on the dagger and began to inject qi into it. Dunoye's face, pale from the excessive blood loss, flushed for a moment, and her fluttering eyelids opened. The first thing his eyes found was Ye Qing's face, which was now ashen, but still beautiful. Dunoy's mouth opened with difficulty.

"Go, Princess……."

* * *

Nine-Eared Ten-Eyed Dunoy.

Kang Ho Lan, also known as Du No Ya and Du Da, is a top information trader. His original name was Dui. Dui, meaning second in the Du family. He hated the name and wanted to make it big, but he also wanted to be successful.

One day, he noticed that he had an uncanny "feel" for information, and realized that there was "something" to every story, and that something was graded according to the story.

It was a kind of odor. It was a smell that he didn't recognize. He didn't know why, but he had a gift for smelling it.

That's how he developed a nose for picking out the money-making stories from the scattered ones. He didn't always get it right, of course, but when he did, he was never wrong.

He used that power to do bad things. He thought he could do whatever it took to make money. One of the things he did was to sell false information by making it look real. Or, on the flip side, he would intentionally spread false information.

He was secretly commissioned to spread rumors in Jianghuoland and the Temple of Heaven. Most of the time, the rumors were designed to attack a single person to humiliate and undermine them. His targets were mostly people who had made a name for themselves in the Temple of Heaven. One of them was the black sword master Ye Qing, whose beauty, martial prowess, and temper had earned her a reputation.

At that time, she was the leader of the all-female Qigong family and was called the Ice Moon Princess Red Ye because of her temper. The name is short for "red-hot" because she was unforgiving once she laid her hands on them. Most of her fights were with wicked men, and she would defeat them on behalf of the women. She was unforgiving and often splashed blood, staining her white clothes and white sword red. So much so that she later changed to wearing red. This was to make her less conspicuous when she was bleeding, which meant she had many enemies. While the women of the city were overwhelmingly supportive of her, the men found her to be a nuisance, a bitch who crushed the bridge of their noses without even trying.

Among the women, some were jealous of Ye Qing for being so outspoken. She fought to ensure that the women were not ignored, but there were those who saw it as unnecessary interference. And so it was that a request was made to Du Yi, the Many-Eared Demon.

-Crush the bridge of her nose.

The brief was to do whatever it took to humiliate her, to undermine her. He was paid handsomely. He did what he always did. The methods for putting a woman down and humiliating her were much the same as they were then.

-Bing Yuehui Ye Qing is a bitch.

-Bing Yuehui Ye Qing purrs like a pussycat at men because she misses them.

-Bing Yuehui Ye Qing's pretense of being an advocate for women's rights is only a facade, and she's secretly extorting money from women behind their backs. She's a simple bitch.

The rumor mill began to churn.

That level of infighting was not uncommon in the Black Sea.

He didn't feel too guilty about what he was doing.

"Everyone else is doing it, so why not?!

That's what I thought.

Then one day.

Shhhhhhhhh!

The door to his office had been sliced cleanly into thirds. Behind the crumbling door stood a woman in red.

"Is that you, the scumbag who goes around spreading lies with the tip of his tongue?"

At that moment, a dazzling smile crossed Ye Qing's lips.

"There's a saying that you should be prepared to slit your wrists if you're going to write malicious comments about others, and when you insult people with a thoughtless slip of the tongue, you do it because you're prepared."

I didn't think about it because I wasn't thinking about it in the first place, so what can he say?

"No."

That was all I had to say.

"Oh, yeah, I guess I'll have to fit in more then."

The smile on his face grew even brighter.

"Off!"

In return for spreading false information and malicious rumors, he had to pay with his life. How he survived that day is a mystery to him. Perhaps he would have indeed ended his life that day if his young son, Duchil, hadn't heard the strange screams and asked, "Dad, what are you doing?

"You only see the wounds you've inflicted, not the ones you've given, because my body looks fine to you. You think it doesn't matter because you can't see them? Physical wounds heal over time, but emotional wounds don't, and some people may have to live with them for the rest of their lives."

The corners of his mouth, where his bright smile used to shine, were now tinged with sadness.

"If you're going to sell stories, sell honesty and credibility, not filthy words and falsehoods; don't defile them with your tongue; aren't you ashamed of your children?"

Her clear eyes looked as if they were about to burst into tears.

"……."

I had a hundred, no, a thousand mouths to feed.

"I'll spare your life, not for you, but for your children. But I will watch, so be good, and give me something other than hurt."

And she left.

Then he changed course. He couldn't stay the same. His children were watching, Ye Qing was watching, and he had to change. He had to change.

Since then, the bad rumors about her have died down.

It wasn't until a few years after her graduation from the Academy that rumors of her once again began to circulate in the Jianghuolandao and the Heavenly Pavilion. It was because of her marriage. To everyone's surprise, she had chosen to marry Nie Bai Tian, a martial artist decades older than her. The whole city was noisy, and the loudest of all was at the Temple of Heaven and at Kang Ho Lando. There was all sorts of talk about marriage. There were tales that Na Baiqian was a horny man who only revealed himself to young women, and there were tales that Ye Qing was greedy for status and fortune and had made the first move. Moreover, it had been more than half a century since he'd been widowed, so there was bound to be a lot of fuss.

Shortly after hearing the decision, Dunoy had a chance to meet Ye Qing. She came to visit.

"It's been a while. I came to say goodbye."

Ye Qing smiled.

"Bad things are going to be said about this marriage. Even now, people are already talking about it. They say it's for status, they say it's an arranged marriage……."

"I don't care what anyone says, I have no regrets about this decision, I made it, I'm doing it, I'm marrying the best man, age is just icing on the cake."

"But……."

"Kukukuk, you didn't spread that rumor Dunois, did you?"

Dunoy jumped.

"Nonsense, there's no way I would do such a thing, I'm an information trader who sells honesty and trust, I'm not Yidagui Dui anymore, I'm Guixian Du Nodai."

"I know, I was just kidding, that's all right, I'll leave."

"Are you going?"

"Yeah, before I go, I wanted to leave 'my truth' with you, because you're the only one who should know my truth, because you're an honest information merchant who sells the truth, right? Goodbye, then."

With a wave of his hand, Dunoy waved back as she drifted away.

"Congratulations on your marriage, princess."

Two tears fell to the ground at Dunoy's feet as he bowed his head.

For the next twenty years he did not see her. Some time later, however, he heard that she had given birth to a truly beautiful daughter. She seemed happy, and Dunoy was content.

* * *

Now, twenty years later, Dunoye was breathing heavily, covered in blood, in front of Ye Qing.

"Hmph!"

Breathing is labored. Intermittent breathing that cuts in and out, irregular heartbeats, and eyelids that open and close. Even when his eyelids opened, his pupils were blurry and unfocused. This was evidence that he was still unconscious.

"Dunoy, wake up, Dunoy!"

Ye Qing desperately called out to Dunoy. His eyelids, which had been fluttering open and closed in response to the call, opened completely. His gaze shifted slightly and turned toward Ye Qing.

"Princess……."

Dunoy muttered in a faint voice.

"Dunoy, are you awake? Dunoy, do you recognize me?"

"Princess… I promise… I promise… I promise……."

The old man's eyes were completely unfocused. He was losing consciousness.

"Dunoy, Dunoy, wake up!"

Pavabababat!

I tapped on the acupuncture points using the technique of chuqing over-acupuncture, and then placed the jangshim on the danjie and blew in the inner qi. However, since he had suffered a penetrating wound to his lungs, he had to be extremely careful because if he overdid it, the temporary acupuncture points might be punctured.

Slowly, light began to return to Dunoy's glassy eyes.

"Princess……?"

A moment ago, it was just a bunch of gibberish in a foggy consciousness, but now it's a targeted statement.

"Yeah, it's me. Do you recognize it?"

"Moo, of course, how could I not recognize the face of a princess, are you crying?"

"No, you're not crying, you're looking at the wrong thing."

Then Dunoy's old eyes twitched and he gave a faint smile.

"Oh, right, I was wrong, kulkulkulk."

Dunoy coughed once more, unable to hold it in.

"I am honored that you wept for me. It means I've sold you honesty and trust."

"I didn't cry."

"No, you didn't cry."

Du Noi said with a desperate smile.

"What happened to you, Dunoy?"

"I used to like to say that the god of information descended on my right, but then the grim reaper in black descended on my left shoulder. kulkulkulk. I'm not quite there yet……."

Dunoy didn't finish his sentence.

"Dunoy, Dunoy?"

Once again, Dunoy's consciousness began to fade. Bai Xiaochun, who was standing by, hurriedly injected his Inner Qi. However, it was too late to save him.

Stiff.

The bloody, cracked lips of the Dunoy twitched. As if squeezing out the last of its energy.

"Ma, go to the…… skyscraper. The culprit is…… the truth is there……."

It gasped its last breath.

"I sold honesty and credit and…… truth……. I kept my promise……!"

Dunoy's hand, stretched out toward Ye Qing, fell to the ground like a dry dead tree. He was dead. Dunoy, who professed to deal in honesty, trust, and truth, was dead.

Watching, Bi Ryuyeon quietly turned and walked out. Bai Xiaochun caught up to her and asked, "What are you doing?

"Where are you going, are you going to get scared and run away?"

Bai Chen's eyes were filled with distrust of Bi Ryuyeon. Then Bi Ryuyeon sneered.

"Scared? I can't think of anything scarier than losing Yerin."

"So?"

"I just have to go somewhere for a while."

"Are you crazy, do you really have time to do other things when it's one o'clock at night? Do you have the heart to save Na Yerin or not?"

She looked at me as if she didn't approve of such disloyalty. It was not unreasonable for a daughter who was so dear to him, but he had his own reasons that he could not tell her.

"To save Yerin. I'll be back."

Without asking, without asking for permission, she picked up where she left off and stomped forward.

"No, me, me, me, him!"

Behind him, Nie Baiqian could hear the sound of the road rushing by, but he shrugged it off. What he had to deal with now was far more important and dangerous than that.

'Maybe I should risk my life…….'