Iseon gently stroked the damp corners of her son's eyes.

She met his eyes, so like her own.

“If you too... had carried... all the memories... you wouldn't... have been able... to endure even this much....”

At last, a single tear rolled down from the corner of Eunwol’s eye.

Iseon’s slender hand wiped his tear away.

Iseon believed that Eunwol did not remember the time before the regression.

After the regression, Eunwol had been no more than three years old.

She had thought that returning at such a young age would keep him from remembering his previous life.

That guess of Iseon’s was half right and half wrong.

In truth, after the regression, Eunwol remembered all the memories of his former life.

However, as a person grows, one naturally forgets everything from before the age of three.

Right after the regression, he had returned carrying all of his mother’s death and all of that grief, and had ached beneath it, but as time passed he had gradually forgotten the memories of his previous life.

Yet the unconscious is a truly strange thing, and without realizing it, Eunwol shunned his father and ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) followed his mother.

That was why Eunwol had not obeyed Blood Demon even once.

“My son....”

Every time, she felt both grateful and sorry toward her son, who grieved her death as if it were the first time.

The fact that she had made him suffer the pain of losing his mother yet again tormented her.

“I... love... you....”

A single tear traced down from the wrinkled corner of Iseon’s eye as well.

Blood Demon’s words were, to a certain degree, correct.

Humans cannot be grateful for what they have, and only after losing it do they realize its worth.

Every time her death approached, she realized that truth again before her son’s tears, and yet even in this life Iseon regretted that she had not been able to love him with her whole heart.

“Again....”

Tears streamed ceaselessly from the corners of her eyes.

“Let’s meet again....”

The hand that had been caressing her son fell limply away with a soft THUD.

The faint breath that had barely been continuing stopped, and her wrinkled eyes never opened again.

PLIP, PLIP....

Clear drops of tears fell on her motionless face.

The tears he had been holding back with all his might soaked his mother’s cheek.

‘I love you.’

Eunwol carefully stroked his mother’s face.

With hands that were shaking uncontrollably, he carved his mother’s face into his heart.

‘Let’s meet again.’

His mother, living a life like hell over and over again.

She had said it was a relief that she did not carry the memories of the regressions, but for Eunwol that was what hurt the most.

Because it felt as if he could not be with her in her pain and sorrow.

Because it felt as if he had lived merely as a simple, innocent child.

Eunwol’s hand traced along the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, then down the bridge of her nose, her cheeks, her lips.

To his eyes, that wrinkled face, drained of all life, was more beautiful than any other woman’s.

Eunwol stayed by his mother’s side for a long time, for a very long time.

*****

Before leaving, Eunwol examined the formation, wanting to know what had driven his mother to her death.

But he found nothing.

The only thing left was the trace of something that had once sat at the center of the formation; the room itself was empty.

Carrying Iseon’s corpse out, Eunwol laid her neatly upon the bed.

Once the attendants found the body, they would take care of what followed.

Right now, there was still something Eunwol had to do.

‘This... deliver this to that child....’

Eunwol looked down at the red cloth in his hand.

It was an ordinary strip of red cloth used to tie up one’s hair or fasten one’s collar.

Eunwol wrapped it twice around his wrist and tied it, then pulled back up the mask he had lowered before his mother.

The corners of his eyes, which had been weeping in grief, were faintly tinged red, but the man standing there was the Great Blood Cult’s finest killer, the owner of this blood token—Eunwol.

For an instant, Eunwol’s gaze sank into a cold gleam.

He picked up the sword he had set down, left the room, and walked down the corridor.

The long corridor was still, and he could not feel the slightest trace of human presence.

Even Eunwol’s steps, accustomed as he was to hiding his presence, made no sound at all, so the corridor felt as if it were completely empty.

Eunwol stopped before the door that led into the pavilion.

For a moment, his gaze fixed on the flicker of shadows visible through the gap at the bottom of the closed door.

KRRRRK-KRAK!

Something came pouring through the door toward him.

At the same time, Eunwol kicked off the ground and leaped upward.

Dozens of throwing knives drove into the wall behind where he had been standing without leaving a gap—KRAK-KRAK-KRAK!

BOOM—CRASH!

At last the door shattered and dozens of masked men poured in.

“Find him! We can’t let him get away!”

“Tear the place apart! He’s still in here!!”

The masked men stepped into the corridor and immediately searched for Eunwol’s position.

But Eunwol was nowhere to be seen.

“H-His not here!”

“He has to be here! Keep looking!”

The masked men split into groups and began scouring the interior of the pavilion like hounds after a rat.

Yet even as dozens of masked men spread out and ransacked the pavilion, Eunwol did not appear.

Then one of the masked men, searching along the corridor, stepped into Blood Demon’s room.

As he walked into the room, the masked man involuntarily came to an abrupt halt.

There was an old woman’s corpse on the bed.

‘What... who is this...?’

Wasn’t this the Cult Master’s residence?

Why was there the corpse of an aged woman in a place like this...?

It was then.

SWISH—

A black shadow fell behind him.

It was Eunwol, who had been watching the masked man from the ceiling.

The masked man did not sense any presence until the shadow was directly behind him.

Then, in the next instant—

“...!”

The masked man realized it too late and hastily turned his head, but—

CRACK—

His neck was twisted first.

THUD—

Eunwol dropped lightly to the floor.

Then, after a quick glance outside the door, he dragged the masked man’s corpse to a place where it would not be immediately visible from outside.

‘Twenty. Thirty at most.’

As he roughly counted the presences of the masked men who had entered the pavilion, Eunwol’s gaze sank low.

Once more, he pulled his mask up to cover his face.

In the very next moment—

TAP—

Eunwol’s figure vanished without a trace once again.

*****

“GURK-!”

“K-Kugh!”

THUD—THUD—!

That made twelve.

The number of masked men who had died by Eunwol’s hand had already passed ten.

Eunwol checked the face of the masked man whose life he had cut off by driving a throwing knife into the back of his neck in a single motion.

The ones he had killed with his own hands had been Great Blood Cult assassination-squad members who had been following him only that very morning.

‘....’

It was not that he considered his subordinates particularly precious or cherished them.

As in any killer group, one never knew when they would die or when they might come for his own life, so he had not allowed himself to grow attached.

However. Even so.

This situation, in which he had to personally kill those he had regarded as subordinates, was not something he could welcome.

Eunwol closed the assassin’s eyes himself—eyes that had died without even being shut—and pulled his own throwing knife from the man’s neck.

At the same time—

“He—...!”

SWISH—THUNK-!

“Khugh...!”

The knife he had just pulled free pierced through the neck of another masked man who had appeared around the bend in the corridor.

TAP—

Before the masked man’s body could collapse, Eunwol stepped in and caught him.

Then he grabbed the man’s arm and waved it toward those running from beyond the bend in the corridor.

“Seems there’s nothing this way.”

“Let’s check over there.”

The two masked men approaching from the same direction saw the hand signal and turned away.

Eunwol waited until he had confirmed the presences of the two masked men had fully receded, then lowered the dead one to the ground.

“There’s a corpse over here!!”

“Damn it! I told you he’s still in here! Don’t move alone! Search for him in groups of three or more!”

From a little ways off came the confused shouts of masked men who had found the bodies of their dead comrades.

“...”

Eunwol looked toward the window of a nearby room.

‘It’s impossible to take care of all of them.’

No matter how much weaker they were than he, if three or more of them were together, it would be difficult to cut off their breath in a single instant as he was doing now.

If he caused a commotion, the rest would obviously swarm in.

No, even if he could handle them all, there was no benefit in wasting time here.

If he was delayed, that man would certainly appear.

‘...Mother.’

Eunwol rolled up his sleeve and looked at the red cloth tied around his arm.

Now that his mother was dead, he had no more business in this rotten Great Blood Cult.

All that remained for him was to carry out his mother’s last will.

For that, he would escape this place no matter what.

“...”

Lowering his sleeve and adjusting his mask, Eunwol moved toward the window.

“Hurry up and find him! Move!”

The interior of the pavilion was in an uproar.

No, the masked men had formed encirclements not only inside the pavilion but outside as well.

TAP—TATAT—TAP—

The black shadow slipped past their gazes and left the pavilion at speed.

It was a ghostlike movement that did not make his name, Eunwol—Hidden Moon—seem the least bit wasted.

*****

TAP—TATAT—

After leaving the pavilion, Eunwol plunged into the nearest mountains and began to run.

His destination was MARTIAL ALLIANCE.

He did not know exactly where Namgoong Seolhwa was, but at the very least, at MARTIAL ALLIANCE there was her grandfather, the Sky-Dragon Sword Emperor, Namgoong Mucheon.

He was someone Namgoong Seolhwa trusted.

If circumstances did not allow, he intended to hand the item over to him.

CRACKLE—SCRRCH—

As he ran, thinking he would keep going like this without rest all the way to Wuhan—

SWISH—

“!”

WHACK-!

A sharp throwing knife flew at him from straight ahead, and Eunwol reflexively twisted his head aside to avoid it.

And then—

SWISH—SWISH—SWISH—!

THUNK! THUNK! THUNK!

Three throwing knives flew at Eunwol in succession.

Dodging the knives, Eunwol slipped behind a tree for cover.

Soon, he felt someone approaching from the direction he had been running.

Whoever it was did not even seem to think of hiding their presence, walking out with fearless, heavy steps.

WHIRL, TAP—WHIRL, TAP—

The sound of throwing knives being tossed and caught rang out.

Just from that sound alone, Eunwol realized who the attacker was, and his expression turned cold.