At first, it yielded no results, but Valeri seemed determined to continue her research and investigation on her own.
After that, I spent some time at Valeri's workshop.
I needed to learn more about what we had retrieved from the tomb.
It was the day after I heard Valeri talk about Behemoth.
I carefully took out the ancestral robe I had tucked away.
'It doesn't seem ordinary.'
A long coat with white patterns on a black background.
I hadn't noticed it in the tomb, but now that I looked closely, the patterns were quite intriguing.
They resembled overlapping hexagonal shapes, like a turtle shell, packed tightly together.
I ran my hand over the surface and my eyes sparkled.
'It's definitely not embroidery.'
It didn't seem like it was made from normal fabric in the first place.
I had a feeling that the patterns weren't just decorative either.
'Should I try it on?'
Rustle!
The moment I slid my arm into the sleeve, I flinched in surprise.
The garment moved.
'Was that just my imagination?'
No, it couldn't be.
I clearly felt the sleeve tightening.
I cautiously inserted my arm again.
Rustle!
The long and wide sleeve shrank to fit perfectly.
It felt as if the clothing adjusted itself to my size.
I put in the other arm and draped the robe fully over my body.
Rustle rustle!
There was no need to adjust the fit.
The robe naturally clung to my body and transformed into the most flattering shape.
"This is… kind of amazing."
A piece of clothing that adjusts its size on its own?
I had worried it might be clunky like traditional attire often is, but it fit perfectly, eliminating that concern.
It was also stretchy, making movement surprisingly comfortable.
Just then—
BANG!
Valeri burst through the door.
"Hey! What do you wanna do for dinner tonight? Wanna get chi—wait, what the… hehe!"
Valeri covered her mouth with her hand and laughed, shoulders shaking.
"Well, I guess it's that time. Turning in front of the mirror, admiring yourself—15-year-olds do that kind of thing. Last time I asked you to go shopping with me, you were all shy, and now look at you… huh? Huh?!"
Valeri, who had been chatting away in a teasing tone, suddenly widened her eyes.
"What's that robe you're wearing?"
She blinked and approached, quickly reaching out to grab the hem.
"What are you doing? All of a sudden."
"W-Wait a sec. Let me see that!"
As I tried to pull away, Valeri grabbed the robe tightly and channeled magic into it.
"T-This…"
Her jaw dropped as if it might fall off.
I swatted her hand away.
"Why are you infusing it with magic? What's with you?"
"Where did you get this? Don't tell me… you went to get this?"
"Why are you so shocked? Do you know what this is?"
I didn't even know myself, but Valeri clearly seemed to recognize something.
Her eyes trembled.
Then she spoke again.
"This is… definitely Heavenly Silkworm Thread (Cheonjam-sa). The markings on it are clearly some kind of spell. There's no resistance to magic either. It's real—I'm sure of it!"
"Heavenly Silkworm Thread?"
"You don't know what that is?"
I had never heard of it.
Reading my expression, Valeri spoke in disbelief.
"It's thread produced by a mystical creature that looks like a celestial silkworm. I heard it barely produces a single strand in decades, and this—this was made into a robe?"
Valeri couldn't believe her eyes.
"It's that valuable?"
"Valuable doesn't even begin to cover it."
She stepped toward me, eyes glazed as if she were drunk.
I instinctively stepped back.
"If that whole thing is made of Heavenly Silkworm Thread, then it's basically Celestial-grade equipment!"
"Celestial-grade?"
By some twist of fate, I did happen to have the Celestial-grade weapons Mujin and Heukya, but in truth, such items were unimaginably rare in the world.
Even Sacred-grade artifacts were treated like national treasures—Celestial-grade ones were on another level entirely.
"Are you sure you're not exaggerating? When I looked at it with my Mystic Eye, I didn't sense any particularly special power."
Although I did feel a strange energy I had never experienced before, it didn't seem to possess a special power worthy of being called a top-tier artifact.
Then, Valery smacked her lips and replied.
"Of course not. Celestial Silkworm Thread isn't a finished material on its own. It's a thread that grows along with its owner. And on top of that, it's so incredibly rare that, at best, shamans use it as a medium for rituals… and you made clothing out of it. This is equipment the likes of which humanity has never seen and never will again!"
Valery's eyes gleamed with greed.
I instinctively summoned my mana.
"Just once. Let me see it just once, properly. No, wait—since you've got a lot, it should be fine, right? Let me just take a single strand. Just one strand is enough…"
Flash!
Valery's eyes sparkled.
In those eyes, filled with nothing short of madness, I felt my life was in danger.
Thud!
I instinctively stepped back, but my back hit the wall—there was no room left to escape.
Valery's twitching hand reached all the way to my face.
***
In the end, Valery didn't manage to take even a single strand from my ancestor's robe.
"No way… it recognized its master? It already has a soul! This is insane—totally insane!"
Even though she failed to get what she wanted, Valery was more excited than ever.
She went on rambling for quite a while and only calmed down about ten minutes later.
"Feeling better now, Valery?"
"Yeah, yeah… sorry."
I was in Valery's laboratory.
She pulled out a very old book from her library.
—Compendium of Divine Artifacts
"Here. Read this."
Flipping through a few pages quickly, she handed me the book.
It showed a picture of a single thread.
—Celestial Silkworm Thread.
—A mystical creature that grows by absorbing mana in places where Yin and Yang are balanced. It lays eggs once every ten years and becomes a cocoon after twenty. The cocoon is melted in a spiritual elixir called Heavenly Nectar…
The contents were complex. As I carefully read through, my eyes stopped at the next part.
—Celestial Silkworm Thread possesses a soul, recognizes its master, and absorbs mana. It is like a living being—if cut by a blade, it restores itself by absorbing mana. It doesn't get wet, and even if it burns, it returns to its original state from the ashes. No other divine artifact like this exists in the human world.
—It holds the principles of Yin-Yang and the Five Elements and grows according to its master's will. It must not fall into the wrong hands…
I set the book down and looked at Valery.
"You mean the equipment has a consciousness?"
"Not exactly, but close enough. What's important is that it has no limits. Gathering the material alone is insanely difficult, and crafting it? Even harder. I've seen it used to make thread, but clothing? That's unprecedented."
With trembling hands, Valery stuck a cigarette in her mouth.
"There was zero mana resistance. Not low—just none. Even wearing raw mana as clothing wouldn't be that extreme. Even a third-rate shaman could become first-rate with just that. Damn! If it weren't already bonded, I might've gotten just one strand!"
Valery exhaled smoke in frustration.
Sorry, but bonded or not, I wasn't about to give her even a single thread.
This was an heirloom from my ancestor—I had no intention of sharing it with anyone.
I glanced down at the robe I was wearing.
I knew it was special, but not this special.
'This is an incredible gift.'
I silently gave thanks to my ancestor.
"What's it called?"
"Eunhan," I replied.
I showed Valery the letters stitched in white on the inside of the robe.
Eunhan—a word that means Silver River, or the Milky Way.
A soft black background, with white patterns throughout.
There couldn't be a more fitting name.
Valery sighed, clearly still hung up on it, but then she gave a small smile.
"Well, it suits you."
As I watched Valery puff on her cigarette, I ran my hand along the hilt of Heugya at my waist.
A sword that held the black of night, and clothes that held the stars of the galaxy.
Not a matched set, but they suited each other as if they were.
'I've gained something precious.'
Not a finished piece of equipment, but one that would grow with me.
I adjusted the collar of Eunhan and felt the lingering sensation at my fingertips.
***
Finding out what Eunhan really was had been an unexpected but huge gain.
But the real reason I had come to Valery's workshop was something else.
It was because of the Heugyarok.
'This is taking longer to decipher than I thought.'
I opened the upper scroll of the long bamboo scroll set made of three parts.
It was written in ancient classical Chinese, making it hard to decipher.
I could've asked Valery for help, and she probably would've interpreted it easily, but I couldn't show her anything tied to my family's secrets.
'Still, the books she got me have been a big help in decoding it.'
The books Valery had prepared for decoding the stone tablets were proving useful.
One way or another, I owed her a lot.
'I'll repay her properly someday.'
I organized my thoughts and began interpreting the Black Night Records step by step.
— I leave these words to my descendants.
That was the sentence with which the book began.
The one who wrote the bamboo scroll in a flowing yet powerful script was none other than the second head of the family, our ancestor Lee Hyang-seon.
— Leaving behind stories about the Black Night was against my father's wishes. However, I believed it was necessary for future generations to know. And so, I leave this record.
— Even I cannot be certain that this record will safely reach future generations. If… were to… then it would…
"What… is this?"
I focused and examined the bamboo scroll.
Just as I had written moments ago, the scrolls had no visible damage—yet some parts of the content appeared smudged, as if crushed or blurred.
It felt like ink had bled and spread over them.
"Everything else is intact… so why just these parts?"
Except for a few specific characters, no other writing was smudged.
This couldn't have happened unless someone had deliberately erased them.
"Could someone have entered the tomb before me?"
No, that couldn't be.
There were no signs whatsoever of disturbance in the ancestor's tomb.
"Besides… did Ancestor Lee foresee this?"
The part that mentioned how the record might not survive.
I spread open all three volumes of the Black Night Records and carefully examined each one.
"It wasn't just in one place. Certain words have vanished in multiple spots."
I tapped the desk for a while, thinking, but it was a problem without an answer.
For now, I continued reading the next part.
— What I write here is the hidden history of the Black Night.
The middle volume contained an explanation of the sword.
There wasn't as much written about the seal as I had expected.
Just about as much as my eldest brother had discovered and revealed publicly.
There was a lack of interpretation, sure—but I felt that even Ancestor Lee had been unable to record more.
"So even Lee Hyang-seon wasn't chosen by the Black Night."
Which is why he didn't know the full details of the seal.
Other than the three initial seals I had already undone earlier, there was no additional information.
"So my brother hadn't deliberately hidden anything. It simply wasn't written beyond that."
Anyway, the contents of the seal were something I could uncover myself as I continued unsealing it.
In the latter part of the middle volume—
I slowly interpreted and read through the Black Night Records.
And as I steadily made progress, I suddenly stopped reading.
— The Black Night was a sword forged by a god to … and …
A god.
I hadn't misread it.
The word "god" was clearly written there.
I doubted my eyes for a moment.
A sword forged by a god?
What could that possibly mean?
"What the…"
As I sat there, puzzled—
Vrrrrrrr!
A vibrating sound rang out.
It was the vibration of my smartphone.
And at this moment, there was only one person who could be contacting me.
"Jeong Jin-soo? Why now?"
— There's a problem. I'd like to meet with you briefly.
The short message said just that.
[T/L: Read extra chapters on my ko-fi page "Pokemon1920" : https://ko-fi.com/pokemon1920 ]