Chapter 1: The Blue Eyes of the Fallen Nation

The Kingdom of Mokju.

Located at the eastern edge of the continent, it was a land where the climate was mild year-round, the sea never froze even in winter, and farming flourished so well that its colorful peonies were as famous as its grain—but now, this nation had vanished from history.

Song Bi Yeon knelt on the bare ground with his back to the miserably crumbled castle walls, his forehead pressed against the earth.

Of all places, where he had been pushed down was not dry soil, but a spot where mud had pooled from the heavy rains of the past few days.

The squelching sensation beneath his palms and knees was horrific.

The scorching sun blazed down on his prostrate back, and everything before his eyes was pitch black.

It was no different from the future that was about to befall him.

[—Therefore, Mokju shall henceforth be annexed as a province of Horyu. Won Ho, who insolently fought against His Imperial Majesty and caused the deaths of many soldiers, deserves death for his crimes; however, considering he realized his place at the end and begged for surrender, he is appointed as the Lord of Mokju Castle. Lord Won Ho, offer your gratitude to His Imperial Majesty.]

A thunderous voice echoed over his head from a distance.

It was Su Jae Mun.

For a mere general, he had the audacity to call the King of Mokju Won Ho, Won Ho, as he pleased.

Anger flared within Bi Yeon, but there was nothing he could do.

He felt his blood pressure rise just by hearing the voice of that man, who sounded as if he had swallowed a megaphone.

Though he was over fifty, he was a man of immense physical strength.

Contrary to his bandit-like appearance with a thick beard covering his lower jaw, he was incredibly meticulous and sharp-eyed; Bi Yeon had always been tense whenever he met him as a diplomatic envoy.

Su Jae Mun was the very person who had changed Bi Yeon’s prejudice that martial officers are ignorant to the prejudice that martial officers are ‘generally’ ignorant.

True to form, he had played a massive role in the fall of Mokju today.

Bi Yeon bit his lip.

‘Son of a b*tch.’

As Su Jae Mun’s booming voice ceased, the plump young man kneeling in front of Bi Yeon straightened his back and threw both hands into the air.

Then, in a hoarse voice, he screamed at the top of his lungs.

“Long live His Imperial Majesty! Manse, manse, manse!”

It looked as if strings were tied to his wrists, pulling them up jerkily.

He stretched his arms so desperately straight that he seemed anxious that the distant Emperor might doubt his surrender.

At that ridiculous sight, faint laughter began to ripple and break out among the Horyu soldiers standing behind them.

Bi Yeon glared only at the ground.

He did not need to look to know.

Their Emperor, sitting on a high chair in a luxurious temporary residence far away, must have burst into laughter.

Otherwise, there was no way the soldiers would dare to jeer so freely.

Because he could not lift his head, all he could see were the tips of the shoes and the large backside of the King he had served for ten years, but Bi Yeon deeply hoped in his heart that he was trembling with rage rather than fear.

If he could, Bi Yeon wanted to give that massive backside a hard kick.

But what use was that now?

Behind him, five generals and a thousand soldiers were kneeling in the same position, their foreheads slammed into the mud, and the unrecovered corpses scattered everywhere were beyond counting.

When they had first set out for battle, exactly twenty times that number had been alive.

‘Pathetic bastard.’

He had screamed until his throat bled that they should not send the soldiers into the valley, but to Won Ho, whose anxiety had reached its peak while surrounded, Bi Yeon’s words were apparently too difficult to understand.

In the end, the King of Mokju did what he should never have done.

He pretended to agree with Bi Yeon to his face, but behind his back, he sent the soldiers into the valley anyway.

If he was going to do that, he should have at least succeeded; what kind of nonsense was it to come crying to him the moment they failed?

–Chancellor, you’re still here, so things will work out somehow, right? Because the Chancellor is smart… right?–

The only reason Bi Yeon had not strangled Won Ho to death back then was simply because his hands were tied.

He had never been more grateful for that fact.

If a King were murdered by his Chancellor on the battlefield, it would go beyond immediate disgrace and become a laughingstock for generations to come.

An incompetent King and a treacherous Chancellor—it is the kind of story people love.

All the reputation he had built up would crumble in an instant, and people would only repeat the worst of his final chapters.

They might even say he harbored wicked intentions because he was born of low status.

Bi Yeon could not tolerate his name being mocked in such a way.

In the end, it was he who regained his reason and advised Won Ho to surrender.

After all, the Emperor of Horyu had said he would not kill those who surrendered.

It was a plea born of desperate hope.

However, seeing that bastard Won Ho shouting Manse three times as if he had prepared for it, Bi Yeon could not help the blood vessels in his eyes bulging.

‘You piece of sh*t, if you were going to stab me in the back, you should have at least told me in advance.’

If he had, he would have looked for another way to survive.

Won Ho, whom he had grown up with since childhood, was moderately gentle, kind, and stupid.

As long as someone like Bi Yeon looked after him, he would have been an above-average King who governed the people reasonably well, even if he was not a legendary monarch.

Bi Yeon would have made it so, even if he had to drag him by the collar.

Bi Yeon was a man who, born as the illegitimate son of a humble family, had struggled and clawed his way to the position just below the King in twenty-eight years.

But now, just as he was about to enjoy a little power, everything had come crashing down before his eyes.

Bi Yeon felt like he might cry, not because the country had fallen, but because he was so devastated by what he had lost.

“Silence!”

It was then.

Suddenly, Su Jae Mun’s thunderous voice sliced through the air.

At the same time, with a sharp snapping sound, everyone’s posture stiffened.

The soldiers who had been laughing and chatting at Won Ho’s ridiculous appearance instantly snapped to attention.

Bi Yeon tried to roll his eyes up as much as possible without moving his head to see what was happening, but unfortunately, he could see nothing but the feet of the enemy soldiers.

He could only tell that someone was walking toward them from a distance.

What was going on? His body tensed up.

After a moment, a pair of mud-stained military boots stopped right in front of his head.

A deep shadow fell over Bi Yeon’s body.

The owner of the shadow spoke.

“Is it you?”

“……?”

Bi Yeon did not know how to answer such an abrupt question, so he just kept his head down.

Then, with the rasping sound of a blade leaving its scabbard, a sharp sword was pressed firmly against the side of Bi Yeon’s left ear as he lay prostrate.

Bi Yeon shuddered at the cold touch of the metal, but the other person asked again without even caring.

“Are you the one who was the Chancellor of Mokju?”

“……I am.”

The malice of asking in the past tense was nasty.

The man’s voice was low, and although the wind blew fiercely beneath the ruined walls, that voice pierced clearly into Bi Yeon’s ears.

The moment the man spoke, everyone shut their mouths and did not even make a sound of breathing.

Bi Yeon realized instinctively.

‘It’s the Emperor.’

Thinking so, he rolled his eyes to the right, and sure enough, he saw Won Ho’s hands, which had been raised for the Manse cheers, trembling violently as he gripped his red robes.

He was surely terrified.

At the same time, the sharp sword casually grazed the side of Bi Yeon’s ear.

“……!”

Along with a sharp pain, he felt a flash of hot heat in a straight line.

Bi Yeon gasped.

Fortunately, it did not seem like his ear had been cut off.

Then, from beside him, Won Ho spoke in a trembling voice.

“Pe-Perhaps, Your Majesty. You said if we surrendered, you would spare us…….”

“To be sure, I said I would do so for the King of Mokju…… no, the Lord of the Province.”

The blade whizzed through the air above Bi Yeon’s head as if playing a game.

Then, the flashing metal suddenly thrust right under the nose of Bi Yeon, who had his head buried in the ground.

For a moment, Bi Yeon’s heart nearly stopped.

Reflected in the flat blade, stained with bloodstains and dust, his blue eyes were wide with terror.

It felt as if time had stopped.

Then, the sword suddenly moved and tapped his forehead.

It was a command to raise his head.

Bi Yeon took a deep breath to steady himself.

Before the cold steel could pierce straight through his Adam’s apple, he slowly raised his head following the tip of the sword.

And Bi Yeon looked straight up at the Emperor.

Or rather, he tried to look up.

The sunlight reflecting off the bright blue sky was boasting a brilliant radiance behind the man, as if celebrating his victory.

Because of it, Bi Yeon almost went blind.

After staring at the dark ground for hours, looking at the sky so suddenly made him feel dizzy.

Red and blue spots intensely blocked his vision.

However, even if he were to shed tears, Bi Yeon did not want to look weak here.

It was his last bit of stubborn pride.

He could not see the face of the damn Emperor at all because of the backlight.

Instead, his voice came through clearly.

“But, should I show such mercy to a mere prisoner as well?”

“Pe-Perhaps, Your Majesty, mercy!”

He heard Won Ho shouting in a trembling voice from the side.

A pathetic fellow to the end.

At this rate, it would be difficult for Won Ho to make even a single decent ally while governing the country—no, the province—in the future.

The generals did not lose because they lacked courage.

They lost because they were unlucky and because they did not have a strong monarch.

There was no need to show such a groveling appearance.

Bi Yeon put more strength into his body.

Having his arms and legs bent for a long time made his whole body feel numb to the point of madness.

Moreover, because he had been sitting in the mud for so long, his arms and legs had stiffened slightly, making him feel like a person stuck in a swamp.

His navy-blue clothes were already so soiled he could not tell if they were blue or the color of dirt.

Then, out of the blue, the Emperor muttered.

“A peculiar color.”