Chapter 17
“What? What do you mean by that?”
Startled, Yoon Seol responded to Hye-rim over the phone.
Hye-rim let out a quiet sigh.
“There’s no helping it. It’s already been decided.”
She sounded just as troubled.
Yoon Seol glanced at the document beside her as she listened.
It was an official notice requesting cooperation in the search for the elixir of immortality in Seogwipo.
And it had come directly from the Beijing branch in China.
The Beijing branch of the Great Museum governed the vast Chinese continent. In truth, this wasn’t a request for cooperation—it was a unilateral order in disguise.
“You know this too, unni. We’ve searched Jeongbang Falls several times, but we never found the writing left by Xu Fu. And there’s no proof it’s connected to the elixir of immortality. It’s just a legend.”
Yoon Seol protested in confusion.
Hye-rim agreed.
“I know. I think so too. But the other curators don’t seem to agree. And more importantly, if the writing Xu Fu left behind is real, there’s a high chance it’s a primordial script.”
Primordial script.
The moment she heard those words, a thought flashed through Yoon Seol’s mind.
“So that’s why they issued the order… because the scholars of the Hou family are connected to Jeju Island.”
“Exactly. They can interpret primordial script.”
Hye-rim calmly explained the situation.
“I was caught off guard too since the order came so suddenly. But you know this, right? Because of what you did last time, there’s been a lot of internal discussion. It’d be better if you at least pretend to cooperate.”
At those words, Yoon Seol fell silent.
She couldn’t deny she bore some responsibility.
Not long ago, she had been completely deceived by Zhu Han and caused a disturbance at Jeju Airport.
She had blatantly violated the Great Museum’s first principle: concealment.
As expected, the strange behavior of animals had spread through the media and the internet.
Fortunately, the museum had intervened behind the scenes, and it was concluded as animals reacting abnormally to seismic activity—but from the perspective of someone managing the Jeju branch, it was a clear failure.
Even if she were ordered to step down immediately, she’d have no excuse.
Hye-rim tried to comfort her.
“This is just a search. It’s not like you must find it. And if even the Hou family scholars fail to locate Xu Fu’s writing, the museum will have no choice but to give up.”
“The problem is… the most troublesome member of the Hou family is in Jeju.”
Yoon Seol pressed her forehead.
Hye-rim asked,
“You still haven’t found Zhu Han?”
“No. We’re searching, but there’s no trace of him.”
“Then it’s one of two things. Either he’s hiding so well even you can’t find him… or he’s already dead.”
Yoon Seol shook her head weakly.
“If he were dead, there’d at least be the smell of a corpse. But there’s nothing. That means he’s hiding somewhere… or he’s already left Jeju.”
“If it’s the latter, that’s a problem.”
Zhu Han was someone who would cause trouble wherever he went.
At least Jeju was surrounded by the sea. Otherwise, no one would know where he might appear next.
“Anyway, we’ll know more once Wenling arrives. She’s a curator from the Shaanxi branch and a scholar of the Hou family. She might know something.”
Yoon Seol replied as if she had given up.
Hye-rim added,
“Don’t worry. The Seoul branch director personally went to pick her up.”
“What? Then that means—”
—Flash!
A bright light suddenly burst forth.
Yoon Seol instinctively shut her eyes.
Hye-rim’s voice came through the phone.
“Yeah. They’ll arrive in three seconds.”
Seeing the light, it was clear the Seoul-Gyeonggi branch director had already moved.
Such speed.
“They’ve already arrived.”
“As expected of our boss. Fast as always. Anyway, do your best, okay?”
With that, Hye-rim hung up.
Yoon Seol stared blankly at the disconnected line before gathering herself.
The order had already come. There was no avoiding it.
At the very least, she had to act like she was cooperating.
She had worked too hard to claim this jurisdiction.
That thought sparked a stubborn determination in her.
She took a deep breath and flung the door open.
“You’re here?”
As expected, Eul-dong was standing in the yard of the Jeju branch.
Silver-white hair, towering over two meters tall, and skin as pale as snow—his appearance was always otherworldly.
“Been well?”
“More or less. Don’t tell me you flew here again?”
Eul-dong grinned as he brushed his messy hair aside.
“Thanks for worrying. But don’t worry—I didn’t get caught on camera this time. I’m getting used to moving faster than camera frames can capture.”
He looked proud.
He was the very person who constantly violated the museum’s principle of concealment.
The fact that someone like him represented Korea was something Yoon Seol could never get used to.
“So where’s Wenling?”
Eul-dong looked around.
“Good question. I don’t know.”
He pointed to his empty side.
“I’m pretty sure I carried her here… but when I arrived, she was gone. Guess I dropped her somewhere. Hahaha!”
“What do you mean you dropped her?!”
Yoon Seol was speechless.
At that moment, a voice came from the corner of the yard.
“Cough…!”
Wenling was half-buried in the ground.
Spitting out dirt, she said,
“I… am over here.”
She had apparently tried to land and ended up crashing straight into the ground.
Eul-dong laughed brightly.
“There she is! Guess she’s not used to flying yet. Collapsing after such a short distance.”
“No one is used to your method of flying.”
Yoon Seol said weakly.
Most museum curators were far beyond normal human standards.
Naturally, their sense of normalcy was just as distorted.
Especially Kim Eul-dong, the Seoul branch director, whose mindset was famously several light-years away from common sense.
“Anyway, delivery’s done, so I’ll get going. Take care of the cooperation request from China.”
Eul-dong waved casually.
At the same time, his body shone brightly, and pure white wings sprouted from his back.
A divine, overwhelming presence.
Soon, a brilliant flash swept through the area.
When Yoon Seol opened her eyes again, he was gone.
“Heard about it, but seeing it up close is fascinating.”
Wenling, still buried in the ground, stared in awe.
Yoon Seol shrugged.
“Well, it’s not every day you see a Nephilim fly.”
“They have bodies different from humans, after all. Throwing people from hundreds of meters doesn’t bother them.”
“As long as they don’t get hurt, that’s all that matters to them.”
“Which is why no one finds it strange when someone ends up buried like this.”
“Anyway,” Wenling continued professionally, “as you know from the official notice, we’ve been assigned to conduct a search in Jeju, separate from tracking Zhu Han.”
“Stay still. I’ll get a shovel. Let’s talk after you’re out.”
Yoon Seol went inside.
Later
“Hou Zhuhan is still in Jeju.”
Wenling said firmly.
“So he really is here…”
Yoon Seol nodded, exhausted.
“This is the conclusion we reached in China. After the incident, I conducted a large-scale search with the Korean police. We checked every possible escape route. But there was no trace of him.”
“What about Japan? He could’ve escaped there.”
But Wenling shook her head.
“Japan already had a wide surveillance net set up to catch Baekryundang members. If Zhuhan had gone there, he would’ve been caught immediately.”
He hadn’t returned to China.
He hadn’t escaped to Japan.
Then there was only one conclusion.
“He’s still in Jeju…”
Yoon Seol groaned and buried her face in the table.
“My life… how does everything go wrong right after I become branch director? I should’ve just eaten him alive back then.”
“When you meet him again, please chew his legs first.”
Wenling said calmly.
“Anyway, Zhuhan speaks Korean fluently and is very cunning. If he decides to hide, he can disappear anywhere. He might even be walking around Jeju right now.”
After summarizing, Yoon Seol asked,
“What if he’s dead?”
Wenling’s expression hardened.
“Dead?”
Yoon Seol hesitated but continued.
“My sense of smell is extremely sharp. If he stayed in Jeju, I should’ve smelled blood. But it suddenly disappeared. That’s why I thought he escaped. But…”
She recalled his last state.
His body was rotting alive due to Solomon’s Ring, and he had suffered a fatal wound to the neck.
“He was on the verge of death. He might’ve hidden somewhere in the forest and died.”
“We’ve considered that possibility.”
Wenling replied calmly.
“My true objective isn’t just to capture him.”
There was something more.
“My real mission is to recover the S-rank artifact he stole—Solomon’s Ring.”
