"I haven't drawn my sword yet, so this is a negotiation."
I kindly explained just how gentle a person I am, yet for some reason, the reaction wasn't all that great.
"…So you're saying I should just figure it out myself."
"That's a bit harshly put. I'm saying there might be a way for all of us to resolve this peacefully."
"…"
The Lust Demon silently glared at me. I continued speaking to him in a calm tone.
"Think about it. A war with the Demonic Cult is going to happen anyway."
"Well, that doesn't seem like it'll be my war."
"The Demonic Cult has no intention of leaving you alone, so it will soon become your war."
I gestured with my chin toward Dan-yul, and the Lust Demon's killing intent grew ever thicker.
At this point, even a martial artist on the edge of Second-Rate would have no choice but to come to their senses.
Dan-yul's fingertips twitched, and his closed eyes slowly began to open.
"L-Lord? What… who are these people?"
"Shh. Go back to sleep for a little while longer."
The Lust Demon reached out with gentle hands to press Dan-yul's acupoints, so I flicked my finger and blocked him with a gust of wind.
"Well, since I'm already awake, it wouldn't hurt to have a word with the party in question."
"Excuse me? The party in question? I'm not sure what you mean, guest."
"Come now. I know everything there is to know, so don't worry."
A body curled up as if frightened. Eyes darting about as if surveying the situation. And feet that kept shifting, adjusting their angle, checking the escape route so that he could bolt at any moment.
It was the movement of a fairly skilled spy, one who hid a certain sharpness beneath a bumbling exterior.
Of course, it wasn't enough to fool the eyes of a Harmony Realm martial artist.
The Lust Demon would have noticed it before long as well. He knew, yet he continued to watch in silence.
But a problem couldn't be swept under the rug forever.
He glanced at the Lust Demon, whose cold expression seemed to say no more, then opened his mouth.
"Dan-yul. Or perhaps that's not even your real name. Regardless, I know you're a spy for the Demonic Cult."
"What?! No, that's not true, Alliance Lord! I have nothing to do with the Demonic Cult!"
Dan-yul jumped at my words and shook his head desperately toward the Lust Demon. His frantic appearance almost made him look genuinely wronged.
"The Lust Demon already knows as well, so there's no need to keep up the act."
"Please don't frame me! Alliance Lord! A spy? Is that what you think of me?! It's really not true, I—!"
"That's enough."
"…Yes?"
"Let me explain the situation briefly. The White Moon Sword Lord already knows that you're a spy for the Demonic Cult, and he's come to prepare for war against them."
"I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean…"
"He wants me to firmly stand on the side of the Black Alliance—no, to be precise, on the side of the Central Plains before the war begins."
"W-wait a moment. Is this because I mentioned earlier that the Demonic Cult has as many wondrous Grand Rituals as they have advanced Sorcery? I absolutely didn't say that with any such intention! I only recalled something I'd heard before because Lord Ru seemed to be troubled by many worries!"
"I'm sorry. He said that if I don't decide here, he'll cut us both down… Honestly, I don't have the confidence to face him. That man is a monster. Judging by his track record so far and the killing intent he radiates, he's someone who follows through on what he says."
"How embarrassing. I'm not quite that impressive."
"Young hero Cheon. Young hero Cheon. That wasn't a compliment."
Tang So-wol, who had been quietly stepping back behind me, whispered softly to hold me back.
As an obedient betrothed, I had no choice but to keep my mouth shut.
I did rest my hand on the sword hilt, though.
For some reason, Dan-yul flinched and cautiously raised his head. There stood the Lust Demon, wearing the same unchanging expression with a bitter smile.
"Yul-ah. I'm sorry. It seems I won't be able to grant your request after all."
"…Alliance Lord?"
"But whether I die at the hands of the Heavenly Demon or the White Moon Sword Lord, my death won't change either way. Will you be satisfied with that?"
"…"
"I don't know much about what the Demonic Cult is like, but a spy who fails to do his duty is bound to be disposed of eventually. However, there's no need to go that far—the danger is right here, right now. I have no choice."
"…"
"I've done things worthy of death. Many things, at that. But you haven't. If I had to name it, you deceived me… I'll forgive that. So live."
"For… give?"
Dan-yul, who had been listening with his mouth tightly shut and a bewildered expression, his eyes flared up at the word forgiveness.
As if he had heard something he shouldn't have.
"Did you just say. You forgive me, Alliance Lord?"
"Hmm…"
On the contrary, the Lust Demon began to fumble as if he had misspoken.
That reaction seemed to snap her back to her senses. She had flinched, but then, as if she had made up her mind, her expression changed completely.
A young courtesan who was both flustered and afraid. She had learned martial arts, but it was nothing more than protection — she was weak, nothing more.
From that position, she cast off her anxiety, leaving behind a perfectly expressionless face.
From Dan-yul's lips flowed a voice as dry as a withered old tree.
"So you knew all along."
"That's…"
"You knew everything, and yet you still spoke of forgiveness to me? Telling me to live? Now, of all times?"
"W-wait, calm down, Yul. I can explain everything."
"What explanation is there? Ah, is that it? The usual story of guilt finally catching up with you now?"
"At least hear me out first—"
"Do you think that changes anything?! Do you think that makes what happened simply vanish!"
Her eyes, blazing with poison energy and malice, flashed—and then Dan-yul's arm shot out, aiming for the Lust Demon's neck.
Whether she had hidden it in her sleeve, a small Flying Dagger glinted in her hand.
Of course, with her clumsy movements—never having properly learned a martial art—she couldn't possibly harm the Lust Demon.
It was an act born of pure desperation. A near-suicidal move, yet…
Surprisingly, the Lust Demon simply caught Dan-yul's Flying Dagger with his bare hand, making no further move.
Without striking back to kill the one who had sought his life, nor even breaking her arm to subdue her.
He simply repeated the motion of trying to say something with his blood-dripping hand, only to stop each time, swallowing empty breaths.
His pitiful appearance was like that of a fish stranded on land, as if he had forgotten how to breathe.
At this, the Aura of Dan-yul, who had been prepared to die, wavered for a moment.
"Hm."
Thwack!
Struck on the back of the head by the sword swung still in its sheath, Dan-yul's head drooped forward as she lost consciousness.
"White Moon Sword Lord…!"
"So he's not dead."
Of course, it was the Lust Demon who had noticed my movements, but perhaps because his mind was elsewhere, he failed to react properly.
Letting out a deep sigh, I shook my head as the bastard—radiating a murderous aura as if he were about to lunge at me at any moment—checked on Dan-yul.
Only after confirming she was unharmed did the Lust Demon finally let out a sigh of relief.
Rubbing my throbbing temple, I spoke.
"Now that I look at it, this wasn't even a situation where I could fight properly. Call him a lust demon or whatever—how did a martial artist who reached the level of an absolute master end up as a toothless cat?"
"…First, let's lay this child down inside, and then we can talk."
"Do as you please."
Though he was called a lust demon and underestimated in terms of martial prowess, Beomcheon Saekma was still a martial artist of the Harmony Realm.
If he so wished, he could easily become the ruler of an entire region, and with just his Protective Qi raised, no martial artist below the Transcendent Peak could oppose him no matter their numbers.
Moreover, this was a man who had survived to this day while living as a fugitive from the Unorthodox Sects' martial world.
His strength was by no means weak, and his temperament was by no means timid either.
There had to be a reason he was showing such a listless appearance now.
Unless I uncovered that reason and did something about it… even if the Lust Demon were to fight on the side of the Black Alliance, he wouldn't be able to display his true skill.
I returned the sword I hadn't yet drawn back to my waist and continued speaking from my seated position on the ground.
"So? At this point, don't you think it's about time you explained yourself? What happened, and why you're shielding someone you knew was a spy for the Demonic Cult."
"So you want me to speak while this is still a negotiation, not a threat."
"You know me well."
"Now that I think about it, I'm starting to get a sense of what kind of martial artist the White Moon Sword Lord is."
The Lust Demon forced the corners of his mouth upward and patted the spot beside him.
"The bed is wide, so why not sit here instead of that hard floor?"
"…I'm comfortable here."
"Hehe. I was only joking."
The Lust Demon wore a weary smile, his voice so thin it didn't sound like a man's no matter how many times you heard it.
After a moment of silence, he finally spoke.
"Yul-i. That child is the son of a man I once loved—and a man I destroyed."
"I see. Though the blood isn't shared, you treated him like your own… wait. A man?"
"And what of it?"
"…I thought you, the Lust Demon, preferred women. Your fondness for men was only ever a means to reclaim your lost treasure."
"Oh my. You believe everything the world spreads about me? How naive."
"What?"
"I spread those rumors on purpose."
As I was slowly backing away, the Lust Demon let out a snicker and spoke.
"It was because I wanted Yul to believe that if he were me, he could deceive me, and so stay by my side."
"…What?"
As I and Tang So-wol looked at each other in confusion, blinking, the Lust Demon's explanation continued shortly after.
"Everything began around the time I reached the Harmony Realm and started being called by the alias, Lust Demon."
At the time, the Lust Demon was in the middle of kidnapping and seducing a Shaolin monk for the sake of pure yang energy above all else.
But the monk was so stubborn and strong-willed that things didn't go as she pleased… but in the end, she succeeded.
However, even though the Lust Demon had extracted the yang energy after long endurance, she couldn't simply rejoice at having achieved her goal.
What satisfied the Lust Demon wasn't the surging yang energy—it was the very fact that she had connected with the monk.
"Uh, so…"
"I only realized it myself for the first time back then."
"R-right, I see."
I widened the distance a bit more, heading toward Tang So-wol. She too stepped in front of me with a resolute expression.
At that, the Lust Demon let out a bitter smile and waved her hands as if to say there was no need to be wary, continuing her words.
"Anyway, after that day, I meditated for a long time and eventually had no choice but to admit it. That my tastes had changed without me even noticing."
By acknowledging the self she had been unconsciously denying, she finally ascended to the complete Harmony Realm, or so she said.
As for what happened afterward, well, as is widely known, he returned the monk to the Shaolin Temple, and once the events of that time became known, he came to be called the Lust Demon.
But that is only the story of the Lust Demon as it circulates in the world. Even the monk who was kidnapped has his own tale to tell.
Whether it was because the incident was too great a shock, it is said that he destroyed his own Dantian and requested to be expelled from the order. He claimed he could no longer live as a monk of the Shaolin Temple.
What followed was not much different from the fate of others who had suffered at the hands of the Lust Demon.
Returning to the secular world, he found himself unable to forget the Lust Demon yet unable to admit it, so he did as others did—he took a wife and fathered children.
…But how well could a family life without love truly hold together?
Before long, his household fell apart completely. In the end, Dan-yul's mother, in a fit of rage, ran away from home and met her death at the hands of the Green Forest bandits.
When Dan-yul's father learned of this belatedly, he blamed himself for having caused his wife's death, and consumed by guilt, he fell ill and eventually died of his sickness.
And so, left alone, Dan-yul, having endured all manner of hardship at the hands of the unorthodox scoundrels who had come demanding the Shaolin martial arts left behind by his father, a renowned monk, had fled all the way to the Demonic Cult.
Dan-yul believed that the root cause of his ruined life was the Lust Demon having violated his father.
"So you hid yourself away to take revenge on me. …Not even realizing you'd been found out from the very start."
"I see…"
He had met the first person he ever truly loved in his life, but unable to be with her, he had left.
Yet because of that, his life had been shattered beyond repair, and he had died a painful death from illness.
The only child he left behind, burning with a grudge, had become a spy for the Demonic Cult and infiltrated the Silver Flower Pavilion.
Having learned all of this, the Lust Demon decided to pretend he knew nothing. Even knowing that the end of it would not be pleasant. Because…
"Because if I laid a hand on her, everything would be destroyed, just like that child's father."
"…"
He had thought the Lust Demon was bewitched by Dan-yul. But the truth was entirely different.
The reason he had died at Dan-yul's hands before the regression was because—not only had he spared the life of a spy whose cover had long been blown, but he had also gained recognition within the Demonic Cult, and in the end, he had even been willing to hand over the internal energy he had built up over a lifetime.
He had not died because he was deceived.
He had offered his neck because he had chosen to be deceived.
All for the sake of giving Dan-yul the best possible chance to survive the coming calamity.
I do not know whether to call this maternal love or paternal love.
But… if there is one thing that is certain, it is that what matters is the sincerity of the Lust Demon's heart, not the name attached to it.
As I nodded with complicated feelings, a sudden sense of dissonance made me speak.
"Wait. So you, the Lust Demon, had a child you thought of as a daughter on your bed… Are you insane?"
"Huh? I don't know what you're thinking, but I only performed the Marrow Cleansing."
"…Marrow Cleansing?"
"Surely you didn't mistake me for having laid a hand on Yul-i. White Moon Sword Lord. You might have a talent for being a lust demon yourself."
"…"
I have no need for such a talent.