Chapter 5

“Father!”

Seeing the scene before him, Namgung Hyeonwon—the father of Sa-yeol—froze and gripped his sword hilt.

“Do NOT interfere!”

A mere sixteen-year-old girl…
was fighting evenly against the head of the Namgung family.

Even if Hyeonwon stepped in, he was one level weaker than the family head.
Nothing would change.

But before that—

Crack.

Namgung Huicheon’s pride shattered.

A filthy illegitimate child his son dragged in from outside…
If she had not been the remnant of the now-vanished Ice Palace bloodline,
He never would have accepted her in the first place.

The Ice Palace might have been considered heretical.
but no martial artist could ignore their mysterious arts.
Their martial arts passed only through women, generating deep yin and powerful cold energy.

If the women of Namgung could learn those techniques…

From the moment Hyeonwon brought in infant Sa-yeol, Huicheon had calculated exactly this.

Especially because Sa-yeol was born with strong yin energy—
white hair from childhood.

“If I join hands with the Jegal family and dissect her origins,
we may unlock the secrets of the Ice Palace.”

To him, she was never a daughter.
She was a lab rat waiting to be dissected.

But now—

A girl who had never been taught martial arts was suddenly using the Ice Palace’s techniques.

“Taking in that cursed bloodline was a mistake from the start!”

Huicheon swung his sword fiercely.

“I will end your lowly life right here!”

CRASH—! CRAAACK!

A single swing shattered massive icicles around him.

Hyeonwon shouted toward the outside:

“What are you all doing?!”

Huicheon had already ordered reinforcements.
Yet no one appeared.

The Namgung estate was enormous—
Dozens of guards should have responded immediately.

So why was it silent?

Hyeonwon rushed out to check.

And froze.

“H-How… how could this…?”

The corridor looked like a giant snake covered in blood had slithered through it.
The floor was drenched.
Nearby, the bodies of Namgung’s elite guards lay mutilated, torn apart beyond recognition.

Even if Sa-yeol had gained strength somehow—
Just a few months ago, Hyeonwon had seen with his own eyes that she could barely walk.

“Are you telling me she reached a level where she could silently slaughter experts… in mere months?”

Impossible.

Then, from inside the torn room, a cold voice flowed out again like winter wind.

“You are not answering.”

A chill crept up Hyeonwon’s spine.

“Then you are no longer needed.”

CRACK—!

Suddenly, something struck him from inside the room, launching his body across the courtyard.

He barely regained balance in midair before landing in the center of the garden.

Panting, he looked back toward the family head’s room—

“…No… no way…”

White cold air seeped out of the room.
Inside, he saw a gigantic block of ice.

Hyeonwon’s trembling hands drew his sword.

CLANG!

“That will be enough…”

A girl with glowing yellow eyes stepped forward.

“When did the Northern Sea Ice Palace disappear?”

Behind her, trapped in clear ice like a roaring statue,
was the frozen figure of Namgung Huicheon.

Hyeonwon no longer saw a daughter.
but a terrifying demon.

Sa-yeol gazed at the frozen Huicheon.
Then she extended her hand toward something sticking out of the ice—
the Namgung family’s most treasured sword, the Sky-Clear Blade.

In her small hand, the sword looked huge.
Yet she spun it effortlessly, as if it were weightless.

Then she reversed her grip and pointed the white blade at Huicheon’s lower abdomen.

Right at his dantian.

“H-He… he asked about that—because…”
Hyeonwon stammered, answering quickly.

“It’s… It’s been one hundred years!”

Her arm paused mid-stab.
Her yellow eyes shifted to Huicheon.

“One hundred years…”

“H-He vanished overnight. As for the reason—”

“The Heavenly Demon.”

She whispered.

“So that is the answer.”

“H-How… how do you know that?!”

The destruction of the Ice Palace by the Heavenly Demon
was a secret only a handful of people knew.

Only a few Ice Palace survivors had lived long enough to tell the tale—
and Sa-yeol’s mother was one of them.

Without her mother’s testimony,
Even the Namgung family would not know how the Ice Palace vanished.

But Sa-yeol answered calmly,
then laughed softly.

She remembered her friend of ice—
who had told her:

“Run. Live.
Cover your eyes.
Cover your ears.
Live foolishly.
Just survive.”

Seol-ah, Seol-ah…

Was it coincidence or fate
that she awoke again in a body with Ice Palace blood?

Crack—! THUD!

“No—!”

The treasured sword shattered the ice and pierced Huicheon’s belly.

Her thoughts echoed like a vow:

I will destroy the one who destroyed you.
I will take your lives and add them to my debt.

Cold blue energy poured from her hands like a furious serpent.
traveling along the blade and tearing apart the dantian of the man who had spilled his own blood to save hers.

A girl with not a trace of inner power a short time ago—
was now forcefully injecting her chilling qi into the family head’s core.

Hyeonwon knew what this meant.

If this continued, Huicheon would fall into deviation, and his dantian would shatter beyond repair.

He would never wield a sword again.

Gulp.

Sa-yeol’s terrifying, icy gaze fixed on Hyeonwon.
He froze, unable to move—
just holding his useless sword in trembling hands.

While he hesitated—

CRACK—! SPLAT!

Something burst inside the room.

It was clear what it was.

The ice melted—
and Huicheon’s lifeless body collapsed onto the floor.

In the span of a few impossible minutes,
The core of the Namgung family had been overturned by that girl’s hands.

Namgung Hyeonwon fell to his knees.

“Y-You… you… What ARE you…?”

His voice shook like a tree in a storm.

“A ghost? A human?
WHAT are you?!”

Sa-yeol smiled—a cracking, horrifying smile.

“I am…”

The blue moonlight washed over her pale face.
Shadow filled the inside of her gaping smile.

“I am the ghost that Namgung summoned.”

***

Aftermath

That night, disaster devoured the Namgung estate.

The official story was fabricated:

Namgung Huicheon, while cultivating using a secret pill,
fell into qi deviation, slaughtered his own guards,
and injured Jegal Hwangho, making him a cripple.
His son Hyeonwon finally subdued him.

Unofficially—

They hid everything.

Now seated as the new family head,
Hyeonwon had only one pressing problem:

How to negotiate with the Jegal family,
after their head’s dantian had been ruined.

Without his dantian, Jegal Hwangho could never use martial arts again.

Even if the Jegal family had other heirs,
Namgung had committed an unforgivable offense.

People pitied Hyeonwon—
forced to clean up the disaster the former family head caused.

When Hwangho was stabbed by Sa-yeol’s hairpin,
Hyeonwon had personally suppressed the situation.
So those present were kept silent.

“I have locked up everyone who was there.”

If he wanted to hide Sa-yeol’s existence completely,
the right thing would be to…
Kill them all.

Then—

From behind a folding screen painted with a golden bird—