Failed Possession Chapter-101

## Ch-101.

—

This was not a defeat.

No matter how many times he thought it through, the very condition of a Poisoned Body forbidding poison and killing techniques in a fight made no sense. Even if it had been Tang Seo-jin himself who set those terms, once he actually fought under them, they were absurdly unreasonable.

And besides, this was a spar. Not a life-and-death duel.

“…”

No matter how he strung together thoughts to rationalize it, his fury would not subside. Without withdrawing the surging poison aura, Tang Seo-jin glared at Yuri.

“Ugh…”

His poisonous aura continued to spread. Among the surrounding crowd, those of lower Rank gradually saw their complexions darken.

“Young Master.”

At this point, Tang Mu-seok had no choice but to intervene. Approaching quietly, he lowered his voice.

“If you release any more poison…”

“Ghk.”

Tang Seo-jin bit down hard on his lower lip and withdrew the poison.

This city housed the White Tiger Sect. They were not a rival powerful enough to stand against the Tang Clan and the Salho gate—but if a massacre occurred here, it would escalate beyond the White Tiger Sect into a matter involving the Orthodox Heaven Alliance.

“But… bringing those bastards to the Tang Clan…”

[Young Master.]

Tang Mu-seok transmitted his voice and gestured subtly.

On the rooftop of the port authority building stood a red-haired woman with a greatsword on her back.

At the sight, Tang Seo-jin’s expression stiffened.

[Catastrophic Tempest?]

[Yes.]

He had heard rumors that she had been seen during the cleanup of the Alderan Magic Exposition riot—but why was Catastrophic Tempest here?

[Did Maybeld assign her as an escort?]

[They arrived on their airship. That seems likely.]

That Pride’s Alnair Maybeld—had she shown them enough favor to assign the Martial Zenith as their escort?

Tang Seo-jin swallowed and looked up at the rooftop.

Their eyes met.

Catastrophic Tempest smirked and waved her hand lazily.

Do not cling foolishly to pride—withdraw.

There was no choice but to withdraw.

If Tang Seo-jin won, they would go to the Tang Clan together.

If Yuri won, they would not.

It was a trivial promise that could be crushed by force.

But it must not be.

Not merely because Catastrophic Tempest was watching—hundreds had witnessed the declaration. The honor of a prestigious house rested upon it.

“…Impressive.”

Now the question was how to settle this well.

“You were far stronger than I expected. To the point I thought, if this continued, I might die. Hahaha.”

He did not wish to trample his own pride too thoroughly. So Tang Seo-jin praised Yuri’s martial prowess.

“I apologize for drawing out my poison unconsciously. When my emotions run high, it leaks out on its own. Hahaha—that’s how much you made me feel threatened.”

You bastard.

“I, too, received a valuable lesson from you. Learning truly has no end. Someday… yes, someday, I hope our acquaintance deepens and we may call each other brother.”

What nonsense is he spouting?

“Then… if not now, next time, please be sure to visit the Tang Clan—”

“Brother.”

Tang Seou looked at him with a twisted smile.

“What exactly are you saying right now?”

“…”

“Have you forgotten Father’s words? He instructed us to bring Aunt Tang Yu-ryeon and the other guests without fail.”

“I will explain to Father.”

Forcing a smile, Tang Seo-jin glanced at her.

“And Father did not say to bring them ‘by force’…”

“Aunt Tang Yu-ryeon?”

There was no need to listen to that bastard’s words to the end.

Tang Seou snapped her head toward Haryeong.

“You heard, didn’t you? It was Father who summoned you! The Dark King himself—one of the Three Tyrants beneath the Martial Zenith—has called for you!”

Dark King Tang Yu-shin.

Haryeong had never once called him “Brother.”

The gaze he had directed at her carried nothing but contempt and hatred—as though she were filth. Though they were half-siblings, neither had ever regarded the other as family.

‘Lowly thing.’

She had heard such words since she was toddling. To Haryeong, the Dark King’s cold gaze was a sticky nightmare clinging to the very beginning of her memories.

“…”

She clenched Yuri’s robe in her arms.

This man had shown her a side different from what she had known. When she said she did not want to go to the Tang Clan—he made it so.

“Ha. Ha. Ha.”

Her laughter came in broken intervals—self-mocking.

The man she had once ridiculed as pathetic had become someone she now had to look up to.

And what had she done until now?

Yuri had fought the spar. Yuri had refused.

“Tang Seou.”

When she was still in the Tang Clan, she had never once spoken down to Tang Seou. Though older by several years, she had always addressed her as “Miss” and endured contempt.

“‘Seou’?”

Tang Seou’s smile twisted.

It was the proper form of address—but she did not take it that way.

Back then, that wench had not even dared meet her eyes or step on her shadow.

The memory was vivid as yesterday—sticking needles into that body during poison practice, shoving insects into her mouth.

Had twelve years erased all that?

Tilting her head slightly, Tang Seou answered:

“—Yes, Aunt.”

“Yes, Seou. Fuck off.”

Haryeong replied flatly.

“…What?”

Tang Seou’s mouth hung half open.

“What did you just say?”

“I said fuck off, Seou.”

“…”

“I’m not the aunt who used to run your errands. Whether your father called or not—I’m not going to the Tang Clan. If that brother of mine misses me so much, tell your father to come find me himself.”

“Have you lost your mind?”

“Probably not.”

Tang Seou’s smiling lips trembled as she glared.

The wager had been made by Tang Seo-jin. Tang Seou did not care.

“I am the hidden youngest child of Poison King Tang Ji-hu and the sister of Dark King Tang Yu-shin. I wasn’t silent for the sake of Tang Clan honor—but it’s not some glorious matter to boast about either. I don’t know why you, a Tang Clan member, are babbling about it. In any case, the fact that you call me ‘Aunt’ means that whatever rotten intentions you harbor, you’ve acknowledged me as such on the surface. So you, a junior of lower generation than me, don’t try to stop this aunt.”

Before Tang Seou could respond, Haryeong declared it.

Among her lengthy words were more than a few that stabbed at Tang Seou’s chest. Especially the final insult—“low-ranked bitch”—which shook Tang Seou’s smile.

“Miss.”

Tang Mu-seok observed her anxiously.

Of the two direct siblings, the one he most feared was not the elder brother—but the younger sister. Even Tang Seo-jin himself was cautious around her.

Obsidian Flame Serpent Tang Seou.

Though only Fifth Rank, she possessed something beyond Rank.

If she lost control in rage, even if she were killed afterward, at least several thousand civilians in Guangxi would die.

Knowing that, Tang Mu-seok could not understand the Clan Head’s intention.

Why send a ticking bomb like Tang Seou here?

“It would be best to withdraw for now.”

“…Understood.”

Tang Seou answered, suppressing her emotions.

Abduct them outside the city?

They had the strength—Tang Mu-seok, a collateral master, and seven First-Class assassins.

But even if it were just Cloud Dragon and that wench, the background of Sword Dragon could not be ignored.

For now, it was rational to leave the city and send word to the Tang Clan.

After all, they had not been told to bring them ‘by force.’

‘Never once did we imagine she would refuse.’

Just as the Tang siblings had assumed—so likely had the Dark King.

She was a wench cast out twelve years ago and sent to the Tiger-Slaying Gate like discarded trash.

They had thought that if called back, she would wag her tail like a dog.

“If Aunt dislikes it that much, as her ‘niece,’ I cannot force her further.”

Since she had decided to withdraw, Tang Seou did not wish to face that wench any longer.

She lifted the parasol she had set down onto her shoulder, composed her expression, and smiled brightly.

“We are family. Someday, we’ll meet at home. Won’t we, Aunt?”

“Yes. Fuck off.”

Haryeong enunciated the words firmly.

Tang Seou’s carefully arranged expression trembled again.

Without waiting for the Tang Clan to leave, Haryeong turned first.

“Do you think they’ll follow?”

“Perhaps.”

Answering Estor’s question, Yuri glanced back.

The hundreds who had initially encircled the Tang Clan were already beginning to disperse quietly.

The Tang Clan had already declared their withdrawal, and provoking them further now might only invite misplaced retaliation. Perhaps someone lacking that awareness might still poke at them and end up swallowing poison—but that was no concern of Yuri’s.

“What do you think, Haryeong-nim?”

Yuri called out to the back of Haryeong’s head as she walked slightly ahead. Still holding his robe in her arms, she paused briefly before replying.

“I do not know how you felt, but Tang Seo-jin is more principled than he appears. Unless he received direct orders to bring us by force, he will not act recklessly without considering the consequences.”

“And his younger sister?”

“Tang Seou was raised like a princess within the Tang Clan—she is emotional and violent. But even she understands propriety. Whatever else may be said, the two of them are direct descendants of the Tang Clan. From childhood, they were educated to control their emotions.”

“For someone raised that way, Tang Seo-jin fought rather emotionally.”

“That is because he did not learn an assassin’s martial arts. As a direct descendant, there was no need for him to become an assassin.”

Yet Haryeong—youngest daughter of the previous Clan Head, equal in generation to the current one—had been made to learn assassin techniques.

Even those she had not been allowed to learn fully.

From that alone, it was not difficult to imagine how she had been treated within the Tang Clan.

“Tang Seou is someone who may lose control and rampage. But Tang Seo-jin stands beside her, and Tang Mu-seok as well—a collateral master. However willful she may be, she cannot ignore the judgment of those two and act alone.”

“So there will be no pursuit?”

“Yes. Most likely, they will wait for instructions from the Tang Clan at a Salho gate hideout.”

Salho gate hideouts existed across the continent.

Though Haryeong had effectively been severed from the Tang Clan and sent to the Tiger-Slaying Gate, she had never received assassin training from the Salho gate itself, nor visited their hideouts.

But she knew how Salho assassins carried out their assignments.

“If the Dark King orders them to bring us by force, then the Tang siblings will do so. But I do not believe he will give such an order.”

“Why?”

“If it were a matter requiring force, they would not have sent so few people. With only that much…”

Her voice trailed off.

She bit down lightly on her prickling tongue and returned Yuri’s robe.

“The Dark King has no need for me. He has no reason to. Nor can I guess one.”

Twelve years she had been sent to the Tiger-Slaying Gate—and never once had he sought her out.

Even after two years since she crossed to the Western continent under Heavenly Thunder’s commission, not a single letter had come from the Tang Clan.

“That is why I am perplexed. I never imagined they would come to greet me personally. I must have become rather famous. All thanks to you, Yuri.”

Wearing her usual expressionless face, Haryeong turned to look at him.

“As expected, joining you was the correct decision. My reputation has risen. I obtained an elixir—and martial arts as well. In the life plan I envisioned, it would have taken several more years before the Tang Clan took notice of me.”

“Haryeong-nim.”

Yuri draped the robe back over himself.

“So what should we call you?”

“…?”

“You have many secrets. Had this not happened, I likely would not have heard your real name for a long time. Perhaps not even then.”

“I do not like that name.”

Though Tang Yu-ryeon was indeed her given name, she had seldom been called by it.

“Haryeong is the name I chose for myself. And it is the first name I told you. Just as you introduced yourself to me as ‘Yuri’ and have remained Yuri ever since, I am the same. I am not Tang Yu-ryeon. I am Haryeong. So please continue to call me Haryeong.”

At that answer, Yuri found himself grinning.

“To think Lady Haryeong is the Poison King’s daughter.”

Estor, who had been eagerly scanning the Eastern streets, muttered.

Yuri suddenly realized something and turned toward him.

“Hey. Do you know how old those Tang siblings are?”

“As far as I know, Dark Soul Venomous Dragon is thirty-three. Obsidian Flame Serpent is twenty-nine.”

“I see…”

Nodding, Yuri quickened his pace and moved ahead of Haryeong.

“What is it?”

She frowned slightly at his stare.

“So, if the twenty-nine-year-old Obsidian Flame Serpent calls you ‘Aunt,’ what exactly is your age?”

“….”

“I guessed you were older than me, but don’t tell me you’re over thirty? You don’t look it.”

“Yuri. Keep that up and you might actually die.”

“We’ve heard your real name—what’s a little age matter? Since we’ve come this far, why not just say it?”

This was all because of that damned Tang Clan—and that wretched Tang Seou.

Calling her ‘Aunt’ and buttering her up with a title she had never once used in the past.

“…Twenty-six.”

“Oh…”

Which meant she had been twenty-four when she first met Yuri.

And even then, she had already been Fifth Rank.

To reach Fifth Rank at twenty-four with incomplete martial arts—such talent was monstrous, comparable to most possessors.

‘No wonder.’

Had she been born into an ordinary martial family, that talent would have blossomed fully, and she would have been cherished.

But not Hatyeong.

Within the Tang Clan, that very talent had likely become a reason for persecution.

“Are you not going to ask about anything else?”

Haryeong stared at him.

Her mother.

The reason she had been expelled from the Tang Clan.

There was much she had never spoken of.

“Not now.”

Yuri shook his head.

“If you wish to tell me, I will listen gratefully. But I have no desire to pry into what you do not wish to say.”

“I did not wish to say my age either.”

“That’s different. Different weight. In any case, if you do not wish to speak, you do not have to. I am a remarkably considerate martial artist.”

“Ha.”

Despite herself, a small laugh escaped her.

“Hm.”

At some point, Estor had purchased a heap of grilled skewers from a street vendor.

“Even if they may not pursue us, something troublesome might happen. It would be better to leave the city immediately. I wished to experience Eastern cuisine here—but that can wait. See? I am a swordsman of depth.”

Grinning, he handed skewers to both Yuri and Haryeong.

Yuri agreed. Not only the possibility of pursuit—but the commotion in the middle of the street.

Especially now that it was known she was the hidden daughter of the former Clan Head, the Poison King.

Trouble was likely to follow.

“…”

Haryeong stared blankly at the skewer in her hand.

The easiest path would have been to ignore her feelings altogether. Her refusal to return to the Tang Clan was, ultimately, a personal matter.

But Yuri had not done that.

And Estor had voiced no complaint over Yuri’s unilateral decision. In fact, it had been Estor who flared up first before Yuri stepped forward.

“Yuri. Estor.”

Haryeong felt the corners of her lips loosen from their usual neutrality.

“As you likely guessed, my mother was the Poison King’s concubine.”

She thought it right to say at least this.

“And my mother… is a possessor.”