I'm an Unknown Actress, But Everyone Knows Me

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[♨Please don’t let it end let’s stay here together forever Strange Tales Episode 14 live-thread♨] (9221)

— Is it really goodbye next week...? This is the end for us...?

— Ha f*ck I’m losing my mind I don’t want to say goodbye TT_TT give us more TT_TT

— You can continue it as Myungdo-tree Seoryeong-hooked and I’ll pretend I don’t know please f*ck T_T

With only one week left until the final episode, the live-thread was loud as ever. Even before it started, people kept refreshing and reopening new threads as they waited.

“Ah.... It’s starting....”

Chapter 14

Masked Ghost

As the overlapping sounds of ritual instruments grew louder, letters were carved onto the dark screen.

There was no time. That fact made both Seoryeong and Myungdo anxious.

This was not a curse that could be handled with the divine power they had left. Yeomga’s vicious curse was eating away at Seoryeong’s life.

“If the Grand Prince has begun searching for me, then nothing has happened to the Crown Prince yet. However... we don’t know where he has gone.”

“Damn it. The place where you and the Crown Prince separated is the exact opposite direction of Jinchyeonji, the final place we have to go.”

There was only one place left where defiled energy remained. There, Seoryeong would have to release the binding seal.

But the moment she released it, it would only be a matter of time before Yeomga detected her location.

“It would be good if the Crown Prince were at Jinchyeonji, but as things stand now, the probability is....”

“....”

Would Yeomga come looking for Seoryeong, or would she wait near the palace? There was no way to know.

What was certain was that both the King and the Crown Prince were in danger. Before Seoryeong severed the binding seal, someone had to enter the palace. There was no telling how far Yeomga’s wrath would reach.

“Then... you would—.”

“...If we do that, you will be left alone.”

There was only one option left. Myungdo would return to his original position. As a royal attendant, he had no choice but to find the Crown Prince and deliver the warning.

While Seoryeong went alone to the final location, Myungdo would have to take the opposite path.

Even though they both knew it, neither of them opened their mouth.

Just then, a small figure came running toward them from afar, flustered and desperate, as if she had been waiting for them. The moment the child reached Seoryeong, she burst into tears.

She was a young shaman girl whose divine power was too weak to perform spells or use talismans, but whose single ability—prophecy—was outstanding. She clung to Seoryeong and begged desperately.

“Please save me, please save me.... Please, please.”

The girl, who seemed half out of her mind, clutched Seoryeong’s collar as if it were a lifeline and cried.

“I know who you are.”

The child’s eyes were bloodshot. She looked about six or seven years old. Judging from that level of desperation, Seoryeong guessed there had to be a story behind it.

“Explain briefly.”

Grand Prince Seonghwi was tightening the noose around their necks. If this continued, they might fall into his hands before even meeting Yeomga.

All the money that had been allocated to the isolated regions had been divided up between corrupt officials and Grand Prince Seonghwi.

Where else would all that money have gone? Seonghwi was already preparing his next move in case he could not inherit the throne peacefully.

He had raised private troops, waiting for the right moment.

For the day he would swallow the throne whole.

“I belong to a wandering performance troupe. On days when a market opened... I would sometimes tell fortunes and receive payment.”

The child’s past resembled Seoryeong’s in many ways. A young age, astonishing ability, and a guardian with no blood relation.

“Word reached someone powerful that I was effective, sob.... and they told me to cast a curse, to send a curse....”

Seoryeong could guess the rest. The child, who did not have the power to curse others, would have refused—and the official who didn’t like that answer would have resorted to threats.

What had tormented this child so badly? Seoryeong’s face hardened as she listened.

“They took our leader away.... beat him without giving him even a sip of water. They said they would keep doing it until I sent a curse....”

The child collapsed to the ground and sobbed. She rubbed her filthy hands against the dirt and bowed her head again and again.

“After suffering for three days and nights, the leader died in prison. Even then, when I still couldn’t use a single talisman, they took the leader’s son this time.... They said they would arrest the entire troupe until I sent a curse....”

Tears streamed down the child’s face like madness.

Seoryeong closed her eyes tightly. If she helped this child here, everything might go wrong. Dealing with Yeomga required extreme caution.

Seoryeong’s lips trembled.

“In the future you see... what does it say? That I help you?”

Seoryeong’s divine power was still sealed. On top of that, she had already forced her power while wearing the binding seal, leaving her current reserves almost completely depleted.

Even Seoryeong, who could see the past, still could not clearly see the future.

An opaque future. But one thing was certain—this Yeomho Kingdom would be torn from Yeomga’s grasp.

“I don’t know. All I know is that you would arrive here.”

The child’s sniffled answer resembled something Jeongan had once said.

“The future branches into many paths. There are more uncertainties than certainties. What I can discern is the great current, not the smaller branches.”

Jeongan’s voice echoed in her mind.

不動如山, unmoving, steadfast like a mountain,

“Hoo....”

After letting out a short sigh, Seoryeong knelt down and extended her hand to the child crouched on the ground.

She could not bring herself to pretend she hadn’t seen this.

As she had traveled through isolated places, she had seen far too many people trampled by officials. The powerless were crushed, and not a single person stepped forward for them.

A sense of responsibility as a shaman stirred deep within her heart.

There were things in this world that only Seoryeong could do.

“Where is the leader’s son being held?”

For that reason, Seoryeong made her decision. After this matter, she would go to Jinchyeonji alone.

It was time for Myungdo to return to his role as a royal attendant. He could not keep turning away from it forever.

Still, he wanted to hide, under the justification of helping the weak, his desire to stay together just a little longer. Within that kindness was an unmistakable affection.

當仁不讓, if it is the righteous path, do not yield.

Myungdo looked at Seoryeong, who had taken the child’s hand, with startled eyes. Seoryeong helped the child to her feet, then met Myungdo’s gaze.

明道照徹, the bright path shall shine through to the very end.

As if the road they would walk together was not frightening at all.

* * *

The King lay with his eyes closed.

The bed, covered with thick blankets, was shrouded in darkness. From both sides, the scent of burning medicinal herbs spread, filling the air with ominous smoke.

“This was the best option.”

Seonghwi, kneeling before him, murmured with a self-mocking smile.

“If you had only passed the throne to me, none of this would have happened....”

In the end, Seonghwi had even sent a curse against the King. Tormented by defiled visions that appeared in his dreams night after night, the King collapsed. Weakened, he could no longer rise from his bed.

Yunhwi’s whereabouts were unknown, and the King lay fallen—an ideal moment to become the new sky.

“May you have pleasant dreams.”

Seonghwi raised the backs of both hands to his forehead in mockery, then bowed twice in succession.

His disciplined posture truly looked as though he were mourning the King’s final moments.

Seonghwi left the King’s bed with leisurely steps. The paper-covered door closed quietly.

“....”

Once Seonghwi was gone, the King’s closed eyes opened.

“Attend me.”

In a flat, emotionless voice, the King issued a command to someone he had seemed to be asleep before.

A guard who had concealed his presence behind a folding screen stepped forward.

“Prepare the troops.”

He was a warrior sent by Yunhwi. The guard bowed in acknowledgment and took something from within his robes.

It was Yunhwi’s talisman.

Yunhwi’s past surfaced on the screen.

“Inform the palace.”

At dawn, tormented by nightmares, Yunhwi stood before a sheer cliff, drawing in a breath as if making a vow. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

“Tell them I will be recuperating here. Add that my body and mind seem weakened.”

After sending one guard to the palace, Yunhwi seemed to hold the handshake unusually long.

“Make sure you deliver it properly to Father.”

It had not been a simple clasp of hands. Something had been pressed into the guard’s palm.

Hidden within the long sleeve was a talisman. Yunhwi sent Jeongan’s talisman with the guard. Hoping the King would be safe, Yunhwi cast himself back into the nightmare.

“We must show them that this is a place where defiled things dare not tread.”

The King tore the talisman apart after receiving it.

From the beginning, the King had never been tormented by defiled things.

When the sky collapses, the people collapse.

Yunhwi knew this well.

He had endured until now with an upright heart. Even if more painful days were added, nothing would change.

He did not use even a single talisman for himself. Only for a peaceful nation. For an unfallen sky. For his people.

He was a Crown Prince willing to sacrifice himself.

Everything had been bait—laid to catch Seonghwi.