Thud. Drip, drip…
Thick teardrops fell endlessly. Seolhwa shed large tears, not even aware that she was crying.
“Ha….”
The feeling as if her heart was being wrung out wouldn’t go away. It felt like she had just crawled out of the thick, sticky darkness that had coiled around her entire body. For Seolhwa, the final trial of the formation was the most agonizing.
Not physically, but mentally. It was a suffocating sensation, as if trapped in a bottomless swamp, where struggling only dragged her deeper. Clutching her chest, Seolhwa looked at the person standing before her.
Through the dense mist of the formation, the scarred bamboo-hatted man stood directly ahead.
“Why did you show me this?”
Was it to make her pity the Blood Demon? To make her accept the reason why Jeok Yeonhwi had no choice but to become the Blood Demon?
“After seeing this, do you think I’ll… forgive that man…?”
“I didn’t show it to you for forgiveness.”
“….”
“I showed it so that you would simply know. Since you have decided to face Jeok Yeonhwi, you must know who he is, what kind of person he is, what he thinks. Is that not so?”
“….”
“That was the reason I first began constructing this formation. At one time, I sought to understand that wretch and find an answer within it… but.”