Episode 248: An Unwelcome Companion (4)
“Ah.”
The moment I saw Namgung Bia’s face, I let out a sound without realizing it.
She had been waiting at the entrance ever since she arrived at the campsite.
‘Since when…?’
Just how long had she been waiting?
Come to think of it, I don’t think I told her I was leaving.
‘…How could I have?’
After all, even I hadn’t expected Moyong Huia to show up out of nowhere instead of Gu Yangcheon.
Namgung Bia’s face, confronting me, was cold as frost.
I could sense a subtle shift in her slightly upturned eyes and tightly pressed lips.
Given that Namgung Bia rarely showed any change in emotion over ordinary matters.
For her, this meant something quite serious.
“…Well, you see.”
What excuse could I possibly come up with?
No, did I even have anything to excuse in the first place?
If anything, I was the victim here.
‘But I can’t tell her everything.’
When I recalled Moyong Huia from that night.
My mouth simply wouldn’t open easily.
The world can go to hell over some bead.
Right now, I’m the one about to be destroyed.
I moved my lips, hoping to somehow smooth things over, or at least pretend to.
But the words wouldn’t come out easily.
Meanwhile, Namgung Bia was looking at me quietly, without saying a word.
She seemed to be waiting for me to say something.
‘What should I say?’
Time passed.
It had probably only been a few seconds at most, but it felt hundreds of times longer.
Instead, Namgung Bia, silently waiting for me even in that gap, felt frightening.
Because I had no idea what lay at the end of this silence.
My head felt as if it had broken down.
I needed to spit out something, anything.
But it wasn’t as easy as I wished.
Then.
“Please go in first.”
“What?”
“Young Master Gu. You are busy, are you not?”
Moyong Huia, who had stepped slightly forward, spoke to me.
She’s telling me to just go in like this?
‘That really seems like it would backfire, though?’
If I do that, won’t it look like I’m running away after listening to Moyong Huia?
Contrary to my thoughts, Moyong Huia continued, looking at Namgung Bia.
“Geommuhui, too. Wouldn’t it be better for you to talk with me rather than the young master? I feel as though we have things to discuss.”
“…”
At Moyong Huia’s words, Namgung Bia chose silence once again.
She furrowed her brow slightly, as if displeased.
But still, she said nothing else.
“Am I wrong?”
When Moyong Huia asked again.
Namgung Bia averted her gaze slightly, then looked toward me.
It was a strange gaze.
I wondered if she wanted me to do something, or if I shouldn’t go.
“…Go… and come back.”
I reflexively froze at the words Namgung Bia uttered.
“You’re telling me to go?”
“…Yes.”
Because she said it with such a calm, settled expression.
I hesitated, wondering if I really should go.
“It’s fine… But instead… when you come back… tell me.”
Perhaps that was her own form of compromise.
Having said that, Namgung Bia turned her back and walked away.
Judging by her direction, she seemed to be heading toward a sparsely wooded forest.
As Namgung Bia walked slowly.
Moyong Huia soon followed after her.
“Young Master Gu.”
“…Hm?”
“I enjoyed myself this time.”
“That’s a rather ambiguous thing to say?”
At my words, Moyong Huia smiled, covering her mouth with the fan she held.
For some reason, her reaction looked delighted.
‘…What is it? Could she have done that on purpose?’
I wondered if Namgung Bia being here was also something Moyong Huia had orchestrated.
But there was no proof.
Only a hunch.
After Moyong Huia finally followed Namgung Bia and left.
Left alone, I was staring only at the direction where the two had disappeared.
“…Did I survive?”
If I survived, perhaps I had.
For some reason, I felt quite uneasy.
After following Namgung Bia for a short while.
As expected, they entered a forest with few people.
Because there were so few signs of life, Moyong Huia felt an inexplicable sense of crisis.
‘Should I have brought some guards?’
She didn’t think for a moment that Geommuhui would harm her.
Though Moyong Huia didn’t personally like her for her own reasons.
As a rational and calculated person, Moyong Huia at least knew that Namgung Bia was not someone who would do such a thing.
Namgung Bia, who had been walking slowly ahead, stopped.
Moyong Huia, who had been following, also halted.
It was the hour when the sun was gradually rising past dawn.
Namgung Bia turned around and met eyes with Moyong Huia.
Her dark azure pupils, bluer than her own, were like jewels.
‘A beautiful person.’
If one were to describe Namgung Bia, those words would suit her best.
Her hand gestures, her footsteps, even her breathing.
Namgung Bia was like a flower in full bloom of beauty.
‘And yet infinitely strong. And also dignified.’
She possessed many things that Moyong Huia dared not hope to have.
Moreover.
‘A person who possesses what I desire most.’
To Moyong Huia, Namgung Bia was such a person.
She seemed similar to herself at a glance, yet completely different.
She seemed to lack something important.
Yet she possessed everything Moyong Huia had wanted.
Moyong Huia had to define the emotion rising in her chest as she thought of Namgung Bia.
Jealousy.
Yes, this was surely jealousy.
Turbid and dark. An unpleasant, filthy feeling.
This was definitely jealousy.
“Will you only keep looking?”
“…”
“Geommuhui, you called me because you had something to say to me.”
Moyong Huia suppressed those emotions with effort.
Namgung Bia, whether she knew of them or not, still said nothing and only looked at Moyong Huia.
It was stifling.
Why was she keeping silent?
She had hoped Namgung Bia would say it.
Don’t approach that man.
Don’t covet what’s mine.
We are already engaged and will be married soon.
Don’t dare set your eyes on him.
She had wanted her to say that.
Because it stemmed from her own anxiety.
She wanted to realize viscerally that Namgung Bia was not as perfect as she seemed.
“Geommu—”
“…It’s not… me.”
Just as Moyong Huia called out to Namgung Bia in frustration.
Namgung Bia cut her off.
“…You’re the one… who has something you want to say to me.”
The quietly spoken words rode on a brief gust of wind and invaded Moyong Huia’s ears.
Those words felt especially deeply embedded in her body.
“Isn’t that right…?”
“…What do you mean by that?”
Moyong Huia forced out a reply.
But she could feel it herself.
That her insides were completely shaken.
By just that one line.
Me?
The great Moyong Huia?
It was absurd.
“Are you saying I have something to say to you?”
At Moyong Huia’s words, Namgung Bia met her gaze piercingly.
In that dignified, colorless gaze, Moyong Huia felt as if something had been seen through.
She mustn’t waver.
She mustn’t collapse.
“I… have no such thing.”
“…Yes.”
Namgung Bia simply nodded at Moyong Huia’s words.
She didn’t argue, asking if there really wasn’t.
She simply seemed willing to accept the answer and move on.
For some reason, that demeanor displeased Moyong Huia.
How can you act so nonchalantly?
You saw what I’ve been doing until now.
You must know what feelings I harbor for him.
There’s no way you don’t know.
So why…
“Are you only looking at me with those eyes?”
She disliked it.
She had from the first moment she saw her.
Her appearance as if she lived in a different world altogether.
The way she shone more brightly when wielding a sword.
Her peacefulness as if she had no troubles in this world.
The fact that the one occupying his narrow heart was Namgung Bia before her.
All of it.
Moyong Huia disliked it.
“Don’t you dislike it?”
“…Hm?”
“Me, who is trying to take him from you as I please.”
At Moyong Huia’s words, Namgung Bia’s eyebrows furrowed slightly.
This meant there was a reaction.
Seeing that, Moyong Huia continued.
“Me, who is trying to ruin your place of rest as I please. Don’t you dislike me?”
“I do.”
“…!”
It was the first time.
The first time such firm words had come from Namgung Bia’s mouth.
In the past year, they had never had a conversation alone with each other.
Ever since their relationship had collapsed, starting from when Namgung Bia began receiving heat from Gu Yangcheon due to her constitution.
Furthermore, because the feelings Namgung Bia harbored for Gu Yangcheon were not light.
And because Moyong Huia had also given her heart to Gu Yangcheon before she knew it.
There was no way the distance between the two could be bridged.
As expected, you dislike—
“But it doesn’t matter.”
“…What did you say?”
“If that is what he wishes, it doesn’t matter.”
Namgung Bia’s eyes were still blue.
But for some reason, that light felt unusually intense.
“Don’t be mistaken.”
A cold yet firm voice.
Her usual clumsy way of speaking.
Her always drowsy, half-lidded eyes—all of it was gone from Namgung Bia.
She was filled with an inexplicable presence.
Moyong Huia bit her lip slightly as she looked at such a Namgung Bia.
“…What do you mean by mistaken? That I cannot steal Young Master Gu from you?”
At Moyong Huia’s words, Namgung Bia shook her head slightly.
Did that mean that wasn’t it?
Then what…
“He is not mine.”
At the words Namgung Bia spat out.
…
.
.
“Rather, I am his.”
Moyong Huia’s eyes widened.
Namgung Bia looked as though she was correcting an important part.
“He has a small vessel.”
And then she suddenly belittled Gu Yangcheon.
It was the kind of remark that would have made Gu Yangcheon cough repeatedly had he heard it.
Suddenly saying he’s narrow-minded, what was this all of a sudden…?
At the point where Moyong Huia could hardly understand what she was getting at.
Namgung Bia continued.
“His vessel is so small that it’s already full just with me inside.”
“…!”
His heart is narrow.
The words that it was already full with just Namgung Bia inside were, in a way, daring and filled with confidence.
But to Moyong Huia, they felt like a thorny barb digging in.
She was saying that she was already his.
That she had taken her place inside his vessel.
Moyong Huia wondered where such confidence came from, but it wasn’t something she could refute.
“…Geommuhui, you.”
“Therefore, whether he grows the size of his vessel… or takes me out to put someone else in. That is his choice.”
Even so.
One could feel her certainty that in no way would she completely be removed from that vessel.
How could she be like that?
Was she not anxious at all?
Because there was an engagement between the houses?
Was it the trust born from that?
To Moyong Huia, it was something she could not properly understand.
Words she did not want to understand.
However.
Even so, no words of rebuttal came out.
Thousands of arguments arose in her mind to cut down those absurd words, but unlike reason, the emotions writhing in her chest would not permit her to utter them.
No matter what she said, she knew all too well that she couldn’t overcome those simple, absurd words and convince herself.
Taking and exhaling a hot breath.
Toward Moyong Huia, who was trying to calm her trembling eyes, Namgung Bia spoke again.
“Therefore.”
Thud.
At Namgung Bia taking a step closer.
Moyong Huia reflexively took a step back.
She had neither drawn her sword nor emitted killing intent.
Yet for some reason, Namgung Bia felt overwhelming.
“Do not use that person for your own anxiety.”
At those icy words that struck down.
Moyong Huia shuddered.
It wasn’t out of simple fear.
It was because they were the words she had least wanted to hear.
“…These are the words I wanted to say to you.”
Namgung Bia, looking at such a Moyong Huia, soon left her last words and passed by her, walking toward the campsite.
Left alone, Moyong Huia stood blankly for a moment.
Then she sank down and remained there for a long while.
The front lines. The Gu clan’s campsite.
The commander’s tent.
Having left the two behind, I arrived at Gu Huibi’s tent.
I was roughly reporting on the status of the bead I had confirmed in the central area.
I was terribly worried about what kind of conversation Moyong Huia and Namgung Bia were having.
But on the other hand, I felt that if I got caught up in it, I might be crushed to death.
Above all.
‘If it’s Namgung Bia, she’ll handle it well on her own, won’t she?’
She was dense and slow-witted.
She wasn’t good at tearing people down with words.
I just hoped she wasn’t being swayed by Moyong Huia.
So I had resolved to finish the rough report quickly.
And go check, but then.
“…What?”
At the words Gu Huibi uttered, every thought in my head flew away.
“Who, who did you say came?”
At my question, Gu Huibi scrunched up her face as if troubled.
And I could only look at her with an extremely troubled expression.
After a brief silence, Gu Huibi opened her mouth.
“…Mother.”
Of the main Gu house.
“Mother has returned to the house right now.”
It was the news that the lady of the house had returned.