Free Web NovelMy first private meeting with Tang Muheok.
I’d seen him now and then at family meals, but we never spoke.
Tang Muheok acted like I didn’t exist, so there was nothing I could do about it.
If our eyes met, he looked at me the way you looked at trash—what was I supposed to say to a man like that?
And now that man was summoning me alone. Before I even got there, worry gnawed at me—what could he possibly want to say?
When I arrived in front of the Clan Head’s Hall, the guard warrior shouted loudly toward the inside.
“Clan Head. The youngest Young Lady has arrived.”
“Let her in.”
At the reply, the guard opened the door for me. I slowly climbed the steps.
The moment I entered the office, I saw Tang Muheok as always—buried under stacks of documents. I greeted him formally. freēwebnovel.com
“You sent for me, Clan Head.”
Even after my greeting, the bastard didn’t lift his head. He went straight to the point.
“Prepare for marriage.”
“...What?”
The sharpness in my voice burst out in spite of me, but Tang Muheok didn’t care in the slightest. He spoke like a machine, only saying what he wanted to say.
“A man who will become engaged to you will be arriving at the Tang estate soon. You must receive the betrothal letter, so hold your hair-pinning ceremony tomorrow.”
He wasn’t even asking for my opinion—just announcing it.
The urge to spit a string of curses rose up on its own.
Even if I’m a bastard he doesn’t treat as his kid, isn’t it too much to just sell me off out of nowhere? Am I supposed to be grateful he bothered to call me in and tell me now?
When I didn’t answer, Tang Muheok lifted his head in irritation and met my eyes. His brow furrowed as he spoke coldly.
“Don’t ruin it.”
“I...”
“You’ve been fed and clothed up to this age. Now serve your purpose. That is all. Get out.”
Before I could even respond, he cut me off and shoved his face back into the pile of documents.
It was his way of telling me to get lost.
My lips parted, then closed again. Swallowing my curses, I turned around.
First, I needed to talk to Grandfather.
*****
Tang Jung wore the expression of a man who’d been waiting for this day to arrive.
“As long as you use the Tang family name, you cannot avoid a political marriage. That’s what this clan is. If you have to do it anyway, choose a meek one you can handle.”
“There’s no option to not do it?” freewebnøvel.coɱ
“Sohae, you are the Clan Head’s daughter. If you were only an elder’s daughter, I might have been able to block it... but for me to block your marriage would be overstepping.”
I like overstepping. A lot.
My mouth tasted bitter, but I understood Tang Jung’s position.
Because I knew now that the reason he’d moved the Elder Council to bring me into the registry... had been a break from his own principles.
Grandfather’s authority inside the clan was greater than even the Clan Head’s.
He was an unimaginably senior elder, and one of the most formidable masters in the martial world—no one dared oppose him.
In a way, he stood in the perfect place to completely wreck the Tang Clan’s entire power structure.
So unless it was something that threatened the Tang Clan’s survival, Tang Jung didn’t interfere in the clan’s affairs.
I couldn’t make him move because of my selfishness.
Watching his face, I hedged.
“Still... even pouring cold water has an order to it. Shouldn’t Juhee, Older Sister, and Chohui, Older Sister, go first?”
“Both of them already have betrotheds, so it is your turn.”
...They did?
I scrapped my plan to cling to my sisters’ skirts at record speed.
At the same time, hope surged up.
That meant... I could get engaged and still delay the marriage. If I got lucky, I might even be able to break the engagement!
“Enough. If you knew what you’d have to do to get an engagement broken, you wouldn’t be thinking that.”
Tang Jung clicked his tongue, stopping me like he’d read my mind. That only made me more curious.
“What would I have to do to get it broken?”
“Do you have the confidence to act even crazier than Juhee?”
“...No.”
“Then endure it.”
“Yes, sir.”
So even Tang Juhee didn’t get her engagement broken. Okay. That’s not happening.
Arms folded, Tang Jung continued.
“Still... it seems he is watching my reaction, so he said he would give you a choice. There are likely a few candidates—meet them. You should at least see their faces before you choose.”
So... a formal meeting. A matchmaking interview.
In the middle of all this, I get to choose what my husband looks like?
I’d never even been on something like this as a working adult, and now I was doing it at sixteen.
My life was a disaster.
When my expression didn’t improve, Tang Jung soothed me.
“If the face of the man meant to be your husband displeases you, Grandfather will swap him out. Don’t worry. Choose.”
Grandfather. Could you please not talk about my future husband like you’re picking potatoes at a market?
“I looked into it, and it seems the Clan Head has the third son of the Yuzhou Merchant Guild in mind. Grandfather doesn’t think it’s bad. If he’s the type who only sat at a desk and used his head, he won’t have much strength—he’ll be easy. Martial families’ sons are violent and hard to handle.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. When martial-family sons come in as husbands living with the wife’s family, they tend to get an inferiority complex. Even if they act proud, they’re still men—so it eats at them. Living in the wife’s house makes them feel like servants, and it wounds their pride.”
It is basically being a servant, though...
I remembered the Poison King Hall Master’s frail husband.
I couldn’t even remember his name. Tang Onjeong’s husband never had a day when ink wasn’t on his fingertips—because he had to write down his wife’s experiment records every single day.
It was the kind of environment that made you understand why he kept running off to Xi’an.
When I smacked my lips, Tang Jung tapped the floor with his fingertips.
“I refuse to watch you put up with someone’s rotten temperament. Bring in a meek one. If he’s a merchant guild’s son, he won’t dare treat you carelessly, will he? And if he gets cheeky, you can beat him a little.”
Please don’t say barbaric things with that calm face. I do not want to become the wife who beats her husband.
“His age is just right too. Didn’t you say you liked them older? He is four years older than you—appropriate.”
“You remembered that?”
I did say that. I did, but...
That was me saying I wasn’t interested in kids.
Grandfather seemed pretty pleased with the conditions he’d found.
“Okay. I’ll meet him.”
“Good. I will speak to the Clan Head.”
And just like that, my first arranged meeting was decided.
*****
My first arranged-meeting candidate was a man named Gu Gyeongcheon.
They said he was the third son of the Yuzhou Merchant Guild, which had recently grown in Chengdu, but maybe because the family name had only just started to spread, there wasn’t much information going around.
Even Hwahong didn’t seem to know much, so he probably wasn’t the type to frequent taverns and courtesan houses.
Instead, I heard their eldest son was famous for exceptional merchant talent.
People said his ability to multiply money was absurd, and that if the eldest son inherited the guild in a few years, it would expand into a full merchant company.
There were even rumors that the days of White Wind Trading Company—Madam Im’s family—dominating Sichuan would become a thing of the past.
So that’s why the bastard is trying to tie a line early.
When you looked at it that way, even if his personality was trash, he was Number One Under Heaven at calculating profit and loss.
The portrait sketch the Gu Clan sent of Gu Gyeongcheon looked plain and tidy—not bad.
Of course, whether he was actually decent in person was something I’d only know after seeing him. I’d heard there were plenty of portrait-scam stories passed around in whispers.
Unlike the Gu Clan, who had carefully drawn and sent the groom’s portrait sketch, I didn’t draw one at all.
Grandfather had stopped it—asking what those insects would do if they didn’t like my face.
“Enough. If you draw one for no reason, you’ll only attract flies.”
Because it was Tang Jung’s order, the painter the steward brought couldn’t even grind ink before being sent back.
Between holding the hair-pinning ceremony and preparing for the arranged meeting, the sudden engagement preparations drained me dry.
As the day of Gu Gyeongcheon’s visit drew close, Songji spent all day obsessed with choosing clothes.
“Young Lady, which of these two do you like more? The pale sky-blue silk makes you look elegant, and the red silk is flashy—good for seizing the initiative.”
Songji. Who seizes the initiative at an arranged meeting?
I gave a hollow laugh and waved my hand.
“Can’t I just wear something, whatever?”
“No. Young Lady. This is the first time you’re meeting a man who might become your husband—you can’t show up in martial attire.”
I was thinking if I went out in martial attire, the other side might reject me first.
Wouldn’t they reject me?
I wish they would.
As I scratched my head and smacked my lips, Songji’s face crumpled like she was about to cry. I pretended not to notice and turned away.
“I’m going to do embroidery. Eat with Gyeonga.”
“Young Lady, at least try them on once—”
“Mm. Later.”
I slipped into the next room like I was escaping, and Madam Jin—who had been waiting—rose to her feet.
“You have come, Young Lady.”
“Hello, Madam.”
Lately she’d been coming and going from my annex to teach me embroidery.
Because dowry items had to include embroidery stitched by the bride herself.
Of course, I had zero talent for embroidery.
“Young Lady... what is this lump?”
“A peony.”
“...And what is this wild beast?”
“A phoenix.”
After stitching so much human flesh, my sewing itself was meticulous, but the embroidery patterns were pure nonsense.
At Madam Jin’s face—like her soul was collapsing—I watched her mood and spoke carefully.
“Do I really have to stitch it myself? We can just buy embroidered panels.”
“Even so, it is dowry—at least the minimum courtesy must be... Yes. That would be best. I will procure embroidered panels.”
Madam Jin pressed a hand to her forehead and nodded.
It seemed even she didn’t think she could fix my embroidery in such a short time.
“Then it’s done?”
“Yes, Young Lady. When the embroidery preparations are complete, I will come again.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
After sending Madam Jin off, I slumped over the table and let out a long sigh.
Bride lessons, when I wasn’t even fated for it... I wanted to train instead.
All I could do was miss the days when I’d sprawled in Tang Un’s residence reading books.
As I remembered the summer when I’d shared peaches with Tang Un, it hit me—I hadn’t seen him in a long ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) time.
When his condition was bad, he sometimes shut himself in, but this time the stretch felt longer.
“Deokju. Have you seen Brother Un in the last few days?”
“No. Shall I go find out if he is in his residence?”
“No. Let’s go now.”
A strange unease crawled over me.
If he hadn’t shown his face in nearly ten days, maybe he couldn’t move easily. With the cold, I worried his health had worsened suddenly.
Even the weather felt wrong today. When I stepped outside, snow drifted down from a dim, darkening sky.
It had been snowing for a while—everything was covered in white. On the path to Tang Un’s residence, my footprints and Deokju’s dotted the snow.
Carefully, I opened the door to the hall.
Tang Un was holding an oil-treated paper umbrella.
Maybe he’d been standing outside for a long time—the umbrella had a decent layer of snow piled on top.
I crept closer, planning to startle him, but Tang Un gave a soft laugh instead.
“Sohae, you came?”
“How did you know?”
“I can tell by your footsteps. When you walk, you step lightly, like a wildcat. If you want to hide your steps, you need more practice.”
He answered, then slowly turned around.
“Grandfather says that too. I guess I need to practice my footwork more.”
Grumbling, I hurried toward Tang Un—
And sucked in a sharp breath.
His elegant gestures, his gentle smile—everything looked the same as usual.
But something was different.
His clear, transparent eyes had no focus at all.
