Free Web NovelThe voice tickling my ear carried a hint of laughter.
Feeling my feet touch the ground, I slowly opened my eyes. The one who had caught me was a face I knew well.
“Young Master?”
A roar came ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) down on me at once.
“How impudent! ‘Young Master,’ you say—who are you trying to insult?!”
I flinched at the booming shout from the man beside us. His lungs were annoyingly powerful, just like his big, solid frame.
“Tsk. Geunmyeong, that’s enough.”
“But... Understood.”
The man who’d been about to say more meekly shut his mouth when the boy knit his brows.
Seeing him subdue someone with just a look, our Little Young Master might be someone higher up than I’d thought.
You’d have to be at least the Clan Head’s son to call an adult man by name and order him around like that. freeweɓnovel.cøm
...Is he really the young clan head?
I hurriedly reviewed whether I’d made any mistakes toward the Little Young Master so far.
Like a thief flinching at his own footsteps, I suddenly got nervous. I didn’t say anything weird, right?
The Little Young Master who had let me go asked,
“So where were you going this time when you got lost?”
“They told me to clean the training grounds.”
“The training grounds in the inner estate? You’re being bullied pretty badly too. Come along.”
The Little Young Master gave a faint laugh and started walking ahead. When the man flinched and tried to follow, the boy waved a hand.
“Geunmyeong, you stay here.”
“Yes.”
The man called Geunmyeong glared at me. His sharp eyes seemed to say I’d better behave myself.
I didn’t do anything. Go yell at your Young Master.
When I just stood there, gauging the mood, the Little Young Master urged me on.
“What are you doing? You’re unbearably slow.”
I could feel Geunmyeong’s piercing stare on my back, but I pretended not to notice and started walking.
I don’t know anything. I’m only going because the Little Young Master called me.
****
The pond where I’d gone the wrong way turned out to be in the rear garden of a pavilion ten rooms wide. And of course, that just had to be the Little Young Master’s quarters.
“These quarters are not a place a maid can wander in and out of as she pleases. Be careful.”
Just as he said, a black flag forbidding entry hung at the pavilion entrance. I nodded.
No wonder that Geunmyeong had yelled at me. I’d done the perfect thing to be mistaken for an intruder.
I’d nearly died right there.
Letting out a sigh of relief, I reevaluated the boy.
Instead of punishing the maid who’d barged into his quarters, he was personally taking me all the way to the training grounds. Our Little Young Master was surprisingly generous.
Just as my favorability toward the kid was about to go up again, he opened his mouth once more.
“By the way. Do you really not know the paths, or are you just pretending to be lost?”
“Excuse me?”
My face automatically scrunched at the sarcastic question. Why the hell would I do something like that on purpose?
I was about to snap at him—what are you talking about—when I caught his chilly expression and shut my mouth in a hurry.
His eyes, calm and still, were fixed on me, sharp as if they were trying to see straight through my insides.
Under that cold gaze, my knees went weak like I’d turned into prey in front of a predator. My whole body shook; it felt like I’d be less cold if someone dropped me in the middle of Antarctica to shake flippers with penguins.
No joke, it really was hard to breathe. An enormous invisible pressure was crushing down on me.
Was this the killing intent martial artists gave off? Instinct screamed that I needed to run.
“I can’t quite figure you out. You seem like just an ordinary maid...”
Tilting his head, he reached out and lifted my chin. Even though he held it lightly, the jaw he grabbed throbbed with pain.
“But you also seem like some suspicious spy.”
I am absolutely an ordinary maid, you know!
His hand turned my face this way and that, rough. What mistake had I made? I had no idea why he’d suddenly flipped to hostile.
Tears from pure physical pain dripped down my cheeks.
“Ah.”
Surprise flashed across his face when he saw the tears. I could feel the strength slowly drain from the hand gripping my chin.
But my body still had no strength in it. The moment he let go, I dropped straight down to the ground.
The pressure that had been crushing my whole body vanished, but the helpless terror remained vivid. Tears and snot streamed down so hard I could taste salt on my tongue.
Only now did it really hit me that I’d fallen into the martial world.
This was a world where even a kid I thought I was friendly with could suddenly look like he was about to kill me.
As I trembled and wiped my face, I heard an embarrassed mutter.
“I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
I raised my bloodshot eyes and saw him awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck.
“Tsk. Even your crying face looks like Hwayeon. It gets on my nerves. Can you stand?”
Is that seriously what you want to say right now? Who do you think put me in this state?
I sniffled. The more miserable I felt, the more the sobs kept leaking out.
“Hh... hhh...”
“Good grief.”
The damn Little Young Master let out a deep sigh. Afraid I’d offend him, I clamped both hands over my mouth, but he shook his head. freeωebnovēl.c૦m
“Just cry. Holding it in will only make you sick.”
So you give me the disease and then the cure?
The Little Young Master, wearing a troubled expression as he watched me hiccup, bent down.
For a moment, a flicker of longing passed through his dark eyes. It wasn’t a feeling aimed at me. Looking at me, he was remembering someone else.
With a bitter smile, he slowly lifted me up—in other words, he slung me over his shoulder like a sack.
I squirmed at the precarious angle, sure I was about to crash headfirst into the ground at any moment, and he patted my back soothingly.
“Hold still. I’ll take you to the training grounds.”
Like this, being carried like a sack?
The absurdity dried my tears up on the spot. But I didn’t dare complain. I clutched tightly at the hem of the Little Young Master’s long robe so I wouldn’t fall.
If he’s personally hauling me because I said I couldn’t walk, he can’t be a bad kid... I just had no idea what exactly had rubbed him the wrong way.
Dangling like a scarecrow as he carried me along, I suddenly felt something missing.
“...Young Master.”
“Enough. Don’t say anything.”
“No, I mean—sniff—I left the broom behind.”
“...”
The Little Young Master stopped and looked back. Far off, the broom was lying abandoned all by itself. He let out a hollow laugh.
****
“Eat.”
“Yes.”
“And eat this too.”
I nodded and popped the rice cake he handed me into my mouth. As he stared fixedly at me chewing, the Little Young Master pulled out another piece of rice cake.
My stomach was already full, but I couldn’t bring myself to say I couldn’t eat any more. It was obviously food—no, snacks—he was giving me as an apology.
...Exactly how long are you planning to keep feeding me?
I swallowed the question rising up my throat and watched the Little Young Master busily rummage through his sleeves.
The way things kept coming out of his sleeves, they were starting to remind me of a magician’s hat. I wouldn’t even be surprised if he pulled a pigeon out of there next.
Honestly, maybe a Tang clansman’s true calling is actually stage magician.
How did he even fit all that in there? Part of me wondered if he had one of those cartoon four-dimensional pockets stuffed inside his sleeve.
When I lifted my head in fascination, I saw suspiciously colored powders drifting in the air.
They were probably poison powder, but I didn’t bother to ask. Getting confirmation would only make me feel worse.
That’s right. We were waiting near the training grounds for the training to end.
From beyond the wall came the sound of blades smashing together and people shouting.
“I won’t let you get away with this!”
“Third Young Master, you’ve been saying that for days now. You need to dodge a little faster.”
“You Unit Captain, you bastard...!”
The grinding of teeth was loud enough to hear. I glanced toward the wall at the murderous shout, and the Little Young Master shrugged.
“Looks like we’ll have to wait at least another half-hour.”
With Third Young Master over there snorting and rampaging like a rhino, I think it’s going to take longer than that.
Smacking my lips, I swallowed the snack I’d been chewing.
I hadn’t known, but it turned out cleaning the training grounds was only allowed after everyone’s training was finished. The reason was that martial artists couldn’t show their training to others.
So if you wanted to clean, you had to wait until the Tang clansmen’s daily training was done. If you were lucky, you’d clean while the sun was still up, but if you were unlucky, you’d wait forever and end up cleaning in the middle of the night.
If that’s how it is, shouldn’t the people who use the training grounds be the ones to clean them, you Tang bastards? Do it yourselves.
It was ridiculous, but there was nothing I could do. I was a powerless maid, so I had to sit and wait quietly.
At that moment, something came flying at me fast. My body moved on reflex before I had time to think.
“Ho. You’ve got pretty good reflexes.”
Sounding genuinely impressed, the Little Young Master straightened his posture and looked at me. I followed his gaze down.
There was a throwing knife in my hand, one I’d never seen before.
Huh. What the hell is this?
As I registered the throwing knife, a stinging pain spread across my palm. Where I’d snatched it out of the air, the skin had been scraped and tiny beads of blood had formed.
My eyes flew wide. Had a throwing knife just come flying at my face from the training grounds?
I almost died just now, didn’t I?
I yelped and flung the throwing knife away, and the Little Young Master snickered.
“You caught it just fine and you’re still whining.”
But I couldn’t laugh along with him.
What had just happened was basically a warning that if my luck was bad, I could drop dead on the street from a flying hidden weapon.
Is this kind of terrible working environment even acceptable? Shouldn’t you at least be paying hazard pay?
As I opened and closed my mouth in disbelief, the Little Young Master tapped me.
“You won’t die from a scratch like that. Hey, kid. Let me see your hand.”
I hesitantly held it out, and he rolled up my sleeve and felt for my pulse.
When he pressed his index and middle fingers lightly into my wrist, a strange energy sank into my body.
It felt a bit like dipping my fingertips into warm water, and a bit like soft jelly was wrapping around my hand.
The energy that had flowed in through my fingertips traveled along my veins and spread through my entire body in an instant.
The sensation of something feeling around every corner of my body made me gag. Unable to endure it, I clapped a hand over my mouth, and he patted my back.
“You’re pretty sensitive to energy. You’ll build inner strength quickly.”
His voice sounded oddly proud.
The Little Young Master slowly drew the energy back and spoke.
“Hey, kid. Do you want to learn martial arts from me?”
“...What?”
...I had the distinct feeling I’d just heard something weird.
