Chapter 11.2 - Lady of YeonSung 11 (Each Other’s Truths) part 2 (1/2)

The Crown Prince exited through the prison doors and began to snicker. Things were just starting to get fun. When he first brought that Yeha brat into the Silver Nation, he only did it to pacify Jewol. There was no other reason. But when did things in life go as planned?

“Your Highness.”

Jewol, who had been sitting in his room, got up anxiously. How could his face look so beautiful even as it was filled with anguish and sorrow? The Crown Prince approached Jewol, grabbed his cheek, and brought him into his embrace.

He could feel the tension in Jewol’s body. It had been different in the past. Back then, Jewol was like a young angel. There was a time when he looked at him with clear eyes, no speck of dirt in sight. And the one who had dirtied and shattered those eyes was none other than himself.

Neither you nor I can be rewarded for our feelings.

Jewol was unaware of the Crown Prince’s feelings and merely looked up at him with a pale face.

“What are you worried about?”

“That is…”

Are you worried that your falcon will get hurt?”

“……No.”

Jewol had been lying more lately. The Crown Prince chuckled and pulled away.

“The only way to domesticate a wild falcon is to keep it caged.”

Jewol didn’t say anything in response. He was now pretty good at reading the Crown Prince’s temperament. Jewol knew how quickly he could become cruel and ruthless.

“The falcon will only come to you if you starve it just before it dies. You need to make it reach its limit in order to make it yours. If you can’t do that, you will never become the falcon’s master. You will become its servant instead.”

The Crown Prince walked over to the other side of the room and picked up a bow. He pulled on its string. Now that he thought about it, that brat was the one who had shot the arrow that struck down the Red King from such a far distance. The arrow rode the wind and flew at a frightening speed before piercing through all that armor and almost striking his heart.

The Crown Prince walked over to Jewol, whose brows were furrowed.

“Don’t become weak, Jewol. Doesn’t ChungMae belong to you already?”

“But……”

“Break her spirit. Don’t worry about hurting her. If you try to humor her too much, she will begin to think that she is the master.”

Jewol silently gazed at him.

“Does that mean you’ll let her live?”

“Didn’t I say that she belonged to you?”

As if he were doing Jewol a favor, the Crown Prince began to lightly pat Jewol’s cheek.

“Take your wife and go home. And then find the guibin. The nine seals are now in our hands. Once we find hers, we will be able to obtain everything we want.”

The map.

That was what the Crown Prince wanted.

The three-legged crow’s seal that marked the location of the holy sanctum of the extinct nation of Paran. Once those ten pieces were gathered together, the map of Paran would be complete. Then they wouldn’t have to struggle in this battle. Honestly, the Crown Prince wanted more than the Silver Nation. Like the ancient kingdom of Paran, he wanted an empire that ruled over the whole world.

But then that guibin bitch went ahead and deceived the eyes of the emperor, and her sins were too great. Her death would definitely get rid of the Red King and Muyeo, who were thorns in his eyes.

If any one of these things ended up in the hands of Garan, he’d basically be giving him the resources to amass a lot of influence and power.

That must never happen.

A crisis could turn into an opportunity.

They needed to find her. No matter what.

“How can we continue to live like this in the wretched Silver Nation? It’s a great nation in name only, but it shrivels up when it comes to the south. The lands are always ravaged by floods and droughts. The national coffers already hit rock bottom a long time ago. All the wealth belongs to the noble families. The emperor is no different from a paper tiger. With the way things are, how much longer do you think we can last?”

The Crown Prince’s eyes were filled with ambition. Those fools in Yeha didn’t even know what was hidden within their lands.

Underneath all that horse stool and cow manure of the tribes of Yeha, there were so many stores of iron and gold. And they didn’t know anything about it. The three-legged crow’s seal would point them to the location of those veins of precious metal.

Those resources would make him the greatest emperor of all time.

“All of that will be ours, Jewol.”

The Crown Prince laughed in satisfaction.

“The possibilities would be endless. With that as our prize, why should we be reluctant to get rid of anything that gets in our way?”

A forced smile stretched across Jewol’s lips.”

Inside the carriage taking them back to the princess’s residence, Yujo didn’t say one word. It was raining, just like the day she had first arrived at YeonSung. But nothing seemed to be the same.

As she watched the glimmering sights through the red curtains, how easy had YeonSung seemed to her back then? Yujo closed her eyes. She recalled the man in black that she had seen back then. The rude soldiers who had carried her shaking palanquin. Garan was one of them*. A scoff left her lips.

“Since when did you work for the Crown Prince?”

Jewol flinched when he heard her hollow voice and looked at her. Yujo still wasn’t looking at him.

“Yujo.”

“Answer me, Jewol.”

She didn’t want to call him ‘brother’ anymore.

“I……”

“Why did you hand over Brother Yuha? Why did you betray us?”

He was someone she had trusted. They treated him like their own flesh and blood for seven years. But now she couldn’t trust him at all. She couldn’t trust him with anything. Since when? When did it all go wrong?

“…From the very beginning.”

Jewol whispered from the shadows of the carriage.

“The very beginning?”

“Yeah, from the very beginning.”

“What do you mean? When you returned to YeonSung? When the war started? When we met you for the first time?”

He said he had been attacked by thieves. He had been treated so wickedly. His face, his body… It had been covered in bloody wounds and bruises.

He had looked so pitiful, and he seemed to be in so much pain. For two months, he received Yeha’s protection, and Brother Yuha treated him like a brother. But Jewol deceived them after all this.

“Even before then……?”

She couldn’t believe it.

Yujo’s teeth began to chatter as she gazed at him.

There was a saying that some repaid kindness with evil. Those words were used to describe someone like him. Yujo wanted to leap up and snap his neck right this instant. She wanted to kill him and then run off to save her brother.

“The Crown Prince will never kill your brother.”

“Are you joking?”

Yujo realized that Jewol wasn’t in his right mind. Yujo asked back in disbelief.

“At least, he won’t kill him while I’m looking for the guibin.”

“What did you say? How can I trust you?”

“If you don’t trust me…!”

Jewol shouted out in a strained voice as he looked at her.

“If you don’t trust me, what else can you do?”

Yujo glared at him with cold eyes. The audacity of this man…

How could she trust a man like him?

Jewol endured her glare and whispered.