Volume 4 Chapter 10 – Original Sin

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Translated by Rain

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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It was the worst.

Everything was a mess.

The female new high councilor wrapped her head in her hands without realizing it.

Although not much time had passed since she became a high councilor, she was a person who had experienced every kind of pandemonium throughout her life.

She had defeated countless enemies, crushed powerful political rivals, and received both fear and respect from everyone.

And now, by becoming a high councilor, she sought to pursue nameless honor and achieve endless devotion.

To her, the high councilors were such people.

The Supreme Executive Council was such a seat.

Those who worked while dedicating everything not for themselves but for the Luoyang Sword Family, without even revealing their faces and names, or enjoying power and glory.

Those who had successfully operated and grown the Luoyang Sword Family, which had fallen into a crisis after the Patriarch’s absence.

Those who stood above the family laws yet did not wield their authority recklessly, thoroughly achieving fairness and balance to be recognized by all.

And even just until dawn today, there had been no shaking in her belief.

At her age, looking toward the twilight of her life, she had believed there was nothing new left for her.

However, at this very moment, in this place.

She was feeling that belief shake from its very foundation.

* * *

The two new high councilors were individuals who had ascended to the peak of the rare clan called the Luoyang Sword Family.

They realized immediately after the word original sin came out of Yeon So-hyeon’s mouth.

The fact that they were the only ones who had been swept up by Yeon So-hyeon, getting angry and talking their fill until now.

The fact that they were the only ones who objected when Yeon So-hyeon requested the high councilors to lift his seclusion.

And the fact that they were facing a terrible truth.

She asked in a trembling voice.

“…Original sin? Would someone explain?”

Before anyone else, Yeon So-hyeon spoke.

“Do you still not know since when the meetings I attended did not leave a record, or rather, could not leave a record?”

“…I at least know that it is related to that thing called original sin.”

Just as Yeon So-hyeon was about to speak again, the Chairman’s voice rang out.

“…This council, we could not leave our meetings with the Eldest Young Master in the records from the very beginning.”

“From the very beginning…?”

“The Supreme Executive Council has been established up to the present through a single lie.”

Yeon So-hyeon snorted.

“Chairman. Don’t you think it is grossly insufficient to express it as a mere lie?”

“…It is indeed so.”

The Chairman readily admitted.

He spoke toward the two new high councilors.

“It is the story of those who committed an unacceptable rebellion through an unforgivable fraud.”

That was an original sin they could never dare turn away from, no matter when it might be.

“A fraud…?”

“A rebellion…?”

Even with the modulated voices, the agitation of the two new high councilors could not be concealed.

“It was arrogant and foolish. It was an act of preposterous greed, and indeed, it was utterly shameless.”

The female new high councilor could not bear it any longer and pressed the Chairman.

“…What on earth happened?”

The Chairman asked a question instead of answering.

“Do you know when this Supreme Executive Council was first formed?”

The new high councilors replied.

“…Was it not established in accordance with the Sword Family Law Code when the Patriarch lost consciousness? It is a guideline in preparation for a situation where there is no supreme decision-maker in an emergency.”

“I heard that the initial name was not the Supreme Executive Council, but the ‘Emergency Council’.”

“Yes. That was it.”

The Chairman looked up at the ceiling as if recalling that time.

“Everyone was bewildered, and everyone was confused. The Patriarch was like an uncollapsible mountain range, and his absence approached even us who had gathered in the Emergency Council as a terrible void…”

The two new high councilors also recalled that time.

“Yes. I also remember that time. The thirteen pre-designated elders gathered, and all the armed forces remaining in the main family guarded that place tightly.”

“…Most who did not grasp the situation at the time suffered extreme confusion and fear.”

The Chairman nodded and asked.

“In that situation, what would have been the first thing we had to do?”

“…Should we not have established countermeasures before announcing the Patriarch’s condition to the entire family?”

“To do that, shouldn’t we have started by deciding on the supreme decision-maker?”

“Then, at least according to the protocol rank, making the Eldest Young Master the acting Patriarch would be…”

“However, I heard that the Eldest Young Master refused the position of acting Patriarch at the time on the grounds that he had been ordered into seclusion by the Patriarch. So the Emergency Council at the time…”

“Don’t tell me…?”

Fraud.

Rebellion.

Original sin.

Shameful history.

The reason their meetings with Yeon So-hyeon could not be recorded from the start.

Yeon So-hyeon, who mocked them, calling them thieves, even though they claimed to have obtained their positions legitimately through lawful procedures.

The words they heard in this place today seemed to strike the heads of the two.

“…It is not true, right? Chairman. Please tell me that the hypothesis that just popped into my head is wrong.”

“Chairman…”

While no answer came back from the Chairman, Yeon So-hyeon wore a twisted smile.

“Do you understand now? What kind of talk transpired from the very beginning when I was summoned to this council, such that you could not even leave a record.”

The two new high councilors could not take their eyes off Yeon So-hyeon, their faces turning deathly pale.

“You stripped me of my legitimate rights. You usurped the position that should have rightfully been mine.”

The smile that had risen on his lips twisted even further.

“…The Supreme Executive Council system? Lawful procedures? Legitimate status? Excellent results all this time?”

The contempt and hatred he had harbored for a long time finally revealed itself on his face.

“How dare mere bands of thieves and a handful of swindlers…!”

Although Yeon So-hyeon insulted them and desecrated the council, none of the new high councilors could open their mouths this time.

“You did not even inform me that my father had collapsed! Instead, you publicized the false fact that I had renounced the order of succession first!”

He vented his rage.

“Then you pushed my father away into the position of Grand Patriarch as you pleased, and appointed yourselves as the temporary acting Patriarchs!”

Not a handful of internal energy was embedded in his shout, but it was filled with a spirit more sharp and chilling than the momentum unleashed by any master.

“You believed that if you did so, I, who was in seclusion during that chaotic situation, would not be able to move recklessly! I still remember when I was first summoned to this council!”

He cried out as if spitting blood.

“You told me on that day! Not to dare act rashly while the main family is in a chaotic state! That if I went around talking carelessly, a civil war would break out, so I should wait quietly!”

The two high councilors gasped.

That was a terrible threat they could not even dare to imagine.

“You promised me on that day! That if I waited just a little, the confusion would subside, and when that time came, you would hand the seat over to me!”

Yeon So-hyeon stepped out of the sunlight illuminating the center of the cave.

“That was the very first promise you made to me!”

Stumping into the darkness, he drew close to the high councilors.

“However, you soon transitioned the main family to the Supreme Executive Council system and began to operate it in earnest!”

In the darkness, his eyes seemed to flash icy blue.

“And I have waited ten years from that first promise until now!”

He cried out as if roaring.

“Can you keep that promise, even now at this point?!”

All the high councilors fell silent.

They hung their heads and groaned.

It was a promise that could no longer be kept.

It was a reality where the promise could not be kept.

Because it was an impossible demand at this point when the other successors had grown sufficiently and expanded their forces.

* * *

Yeon So-hyeon stood in the darkness, looking up at the ceiling.

Yeon So-hyeon was one who knew from the start that they could not keep the promise.

He cut off his interest in them.

While everyone maintained silence, he brushed off the fine dust on his white cotton clothes.

The dust rose in a blur, leaving ugly yellow dirt stains on his cotton clothes.

The Chairman’s voice rang out once more.

“…On that day when the Emergency Council was first held. Someone said, we can do much better than a kid who is not even ten years old.”

The silence descended even more heavily.

“That this massive family must no longer be swayed by a single person.”

The Chairman continued with difficulty.

“…I still do not know who first brought up that opinion. However, it did not take long for that opinion to become everyone’s opinion.”

Only the voice of an old man echoed gloomily in the stone cave.

“We somehow convinced ourselves that if several of us gathered our opinions, we could develop this family further.”

The old man’s shadow clenched a gaunt fist.

“…Thus, at the time, we announced that the Eldest Young Master of the main family had declined the position of acting Patriarch.”

It was a terrible lie.

It was a massive, irreversible lie.

They had effectively confined Yeon So-hyeon, who was living in seclusion, to Pavilion of Perfect Enlightenment in that manner.

The male new high councilor shook his head.

“I, I cannot accept this. Are you saying that those who were renowned in the main family to the point of belonging to the Emergency Council committed a rebellion for merely that kind of reason…?”

The Chairman wore a bitter smile.

“…What was dominating us at the time was not greed for power. It was an ugly jealousy. It was the end result of a defeatist mindset.”

“Don’t tell me, during the Bloody History…?!”

When the word Bloody History came out, Yeon So-hyeon, who was standing in the darkness, turned around.

He returned to the sunlight and looked up at that light.

“…Yes. We were the survivors who lived through the Bloody History back then. We were unable to escape its aftermath at all.”

The Chairman covered his face.

“Were the elders purged back then not obvious enemies of the family?!”

“Moreover, the reality of that matter was only known to some among the uppermost echelon, and no one else knew, did they not!”

The Chairman hung his head.

“…Nonetheless, we could not escape the fear that so many powerholders of our main family were defeated by, no, toyed with by a single child.”

He muttered like a soliloquy.

“…So we wanted to prove ourselves. That is how we ended up committing such an irreversible, preposterous act.”

It was theft.

It was a fraud.

They did not even inform the son that his father had collapsed, and they stole the family from that son.

The new male high councilor cried out like a scream.

“E-even so, except for not asking the Eldest Young Master’s intent at the time, was not everything afterwards conducted legitimately?!”

At those words, Yeon So-hyeon burst into laughter.

“Have you still not noticed?”

“W-what do you mean…?”

Yeon So-hyeon pulled an object out from his sleeve and held it up.

That object glinted golden under the sunlight.

It was the Patriarch’s Seal of the Luoyang Sword Family, the Sword Family’s Golden Seal.

“Why I, who was in seclusion, possessed this and still legitimately own it now.”

“…!”

The Chairman’s voice followed.

“…The Patriarch had taken measures beforehand so that the Patriarch’s Seal could be delivered to the Eldest Young Master in an emergency.”

Yeon So-hyeon bared his teeth.

“Moreover, there were certainly words that my father used to say habitually.”

The Chairman nodded weakly.

“…The Patriarch always told us, who were closest to him, like a habit.”

He spat out the Patriarch’s words like a lamentation.

“…If anything happens to me unexpectedly, everyone must remember.”

He wrapped his face in his hands.

“…That in this Sword Family, there is Yeon So-hyeon.”