Sword Empress's POV
Thud!
"What did you just say?"
"Haha! Oops, my mistake. It's Dan Yuseong. Yes. Just a slip-up."
He waved his hands hurriedly, making excuses, but the damage was done. I'd heard it clearly. Not "Dan Yuseong," but "Yuseong Dan." The reversal hung in the air like a poorly veiled lie, unraveling the fragile certainty I'd clung to.
"…"
"Why… why are you staring at me like that?"
Now that I thought about it, something felt off. His dantian was indeed destroyed—I could sense the void in his core, a hollow echo where qi should flow. But wasn't there more to the sin Soyeon committed against him? In a way, it was an even greater crime than shattering his dantian, yet he hadn't mentioned it once. Not a whisper of that deeper violation, the one that twisted the knife beyond physical ruin.
"Are you… really the Dan Yuseong I know?"
