The Bastard First Prince Doesn't Want to Die

[Translator - Jjescus ]

[Proofreader - Starfall ]

Chapter: 188

In the dream, I was trapped by Jincheon. In reality, I spent my days idly.

From time to time, I sought out Sannyeong to ask how the preparations were going, but nothing seemed to change.

At this point, was it unreasonable to suspect that they simply didn’t want to let me go?

They had to know I’d find this suspicious, yet they kept me waiting in silence. It was baffling.

And so, nearly a month passed.

Then, one day—an incident broke out in the village.

"Aro!"

From within the thick mist surrounding the outer boundary of the shrine, figures emerged.

It was Hwang Danyo and Hwang Gongyoung, the siblings.

By chance, I was outside in the courtyard with Aro when they arrived, and the moment they stepped into the shrine’s domain, they spotted us.

"H-Huh?"

Perhaps recognizing Aro first, they called her name, but soon after, their eyes landed on me. Their faces stiffened in surprise.

"W-Why are you here…?"

Hwang Danyo took a few hesitant steps forward, speaking in a stammering voice.

Sitting on the wooden floor, I quickly stood up, awkwardly adjusting my posture while my mind raced for an excuse.

…But did I even need one?

I hadn’t done anything. I had simply come here.

The last time I saw Hwang Danyo in the village, I had been looking for an excuse to shake off the old man Jawoon and head to the shrine with Aro alone.

The villagers had probably assumed I had simply disappeared.

As for Aro, her mother, Sannyeong, was here, and although her grandmother—the village chief—had already passed away, she, too, had resided in this place. It wouldn’t have been hard for them to guess where she had gone.

Wait—hold on a second.

Did these two… really come here alone?

Given their miserable excuse for hunting skills, wandering through the perilous wilderness together was a reckless decision.

"Did you come here by yourselves?"

"No,” Hwang Danyo answered.

Then Hwang Gongyoung added, "Jawoon Grandpa came with us. He couldn’t come inside, though…"

He glanced over his shoulder, as if regretting that Jawoon had to remain outside.

This was bad news for me.

I’d had plenty of chances to reveal my abilities and whereabouts to Jawoon, yet I had never done so.

Truthfully, not wanting to make him uncomfortable was just my own selfish reasoning.

From his perspective, I had deceived him by keeping my abilities a secret.

And that was the last thing I wanted.

It would be ideal if these siblings kept my secret.

But I doubted they would.

Their bond with Jawoon was much deeper than anything I had with them.

To me, this was an unexpected complication.

"…So, how exactly did you get in here?"

Hwang Danyo’s sharp gaze bore into me, as if I had somehow tricked my way inside.

I scoffed.

"None of your business."

My response only seemed to confuse them further.

After all, this was a place that only ‘we’ were supposed to be able to enter—or at least, according to the village chief’s words.

But I had never once considered myself one of them.

I had never included myself among the village people when using the word ‘we.’

The siblings weren’t just confused anymore—they looked utterly dumbfounded, as if they’d just been struck over the head.

I shrugged indifferently and sat back down.

"…I have my doubts, but that’s not the main issue. Where is the chief?"

Hwang Danyo’s voice was firm.

Here it comes.

I had known this would be discovered eventually.

No secret lasts forever.

Especially not when the village chief had suddenly gone silent during a time when monster attacks were rampant.

There was plenty of reason to be suspicious.

"What about Lady Sannyeong?"

Hwang Danyo looked around anxiously.

Aro, face pale, hesitated to respond.

I, too, had nothing to say.@@novelbin@@

All I could do was remain silent.

Of course, silence wasn’t necessarily the best choice either.

"Where is she?"

When neither Aro nor I answered, Hwang Danyo strode forward and grabbed Aro’s small shoulders with both hands, demanding a response.

Her shadow fell over Aro’s face, and beneath it, she looked terrified.

"Uh… uh…"

Only then did Aro hesitantly open her mouth. But she still seemed conflicted, unable to bring herself to say the truth.

"M-My mother is…"

Her face turned pale as she trailed off, unable to finish her sentence. Clicking my tongue, I stepped in—if only to divert their attention.

"Instead of badgering the kid, wouldn't it be better to search the shrine and see if you can find someone else?"

Hwang Danyo lifted her head and looked at me.

"So Lady Sannyeong is here?"

I nodded. At that, she released Aro’s shoulders and straightened up. Though she still seemed displeased, she at least recognized that Aro wasn’t to blame.

"And the chief?"

I couldn’t answer that question.

Was the chief still here?

Even I didn’t know. Sannyeong had forbidden entry to most of the rooms within the shrine’s halls.

Of course, it wouldn’t be difficult to go inside. All I had to do was open a door.

I had once shared this thought with Aro, and she had advised me to follow Sannyeong’s words whenever possible. While it was partly because of the preparations to leave the wilderness, there seemed to be another reason as well.

"Why aren’t you answering?" Hwang Gongyoung asked, his voice carrying both fear and naïveté.

I simply shrugged again.

"Just tell us the truth."

"And what if I lie?"

I deliberately avoided addressing the key issue, which only made Hwang Danyo’s face darken with growing irritation.

Then, with a sharp turn, she spun around, her robes swishing.

"Sis? Where are you going?"

"To find Lady Sannyeong and the chief."

Even her footsteps betrayed her frustration.

I watched the siblings walk away for a moment before turning to Aro.

"…What do we do now?" The moment our eyes met, she asked in a trembling voice.

Her fear wasn’t so much about Sannyeong’s concealment of the chief being exposed—it was about what would happen after the truth came out.

In other words, she was afraid of the responsibility that would inevitably fall on her as the chief’s successor.

One could call it selfish, or even cold, but I didn’t blame her.

For now, we needed a plan.

Escaping without Sannyeong noticing wouldn’t be difficult. With the siblings keeping her occupied, it would be even easier.

But Jawoon was waiting outside the shrine.

And the last thing I wanted was for him to discover my abilities.

Ultimately, though, my concerns turned out to be meaningless.

Aro gently tugged at my sleeve and made a suggestion.

"Uncle."

"Yeah?"

"…I think we should go see my mother, too."

Why?

Instead of answering right away, I asked, "When was the last time you saw her?"

"The day before yesterday."

Was it really that long ago?

My sense of time had become hazy.

Day and night had already blurred together, and now, that boundary was almost nonexistent.

Even when I slept, my dreams were filled with endless movement beneath a bright blue sky. There was no moment to register the darkness and stillness of the night.

"Alright. Let’s go."

I rose from the wooden floor and started walking.

But since we had no idea where Sannyeong was, we had no choice but to search the shrine.

"It’s been a while since we came this way…"

Only the spaces we actively used had been kept clean.

The rest were thick with dust.

The floorboards in the dim, heavy air creaked beneath our steps.

Each time Aro set her foot down, she visibly tensed, shrinking her shoulders as if the sound itself unsettled her.

"Why is this place so worn down?"

It might have seemed like an odd question, but it wasn’t.

The shrine was aging at an alarming rate. I could notice the landscape changing day by day.

No answer came from anywhere. I sharpened my dulled senses, straining to detect any presence beyond the doors lining the corridor.

"This way?"

Letting out a quiet sigh, I moved toward the subtle shift in the air—toward the end of the hallway. Now that I had reached the corner where the corridor turned, if this room was empty as well, we would have to keep searching for a while.

Aro followed closely behind me.

Her footsteps were already quiet by nature, but ever since I had taught her how to mask her presence, they had become nearly imperceptible. So much so that I found myself glancing back frequently to make sure she was still following.

"Doesn’t seem like the right place."

"That’s what I thought..."

I tilted my head back, looking up at the ceiling. Faint rays of light seeped through the wooden beams, illuminating specks of dust floating in the air.

This space, eerily silent as if time had stopped, carried a sense of unease that couldn’t be explained by age alone.

"...Feels like something might come out."

"Don’t be ridiculous."

Despite my dismissive words, I felt the same way.

The shrine was brimming with an eerie presence. It had been that way for a while, but after the chief passed away, it seemed to have intensified.

It was different from the mist-covered world outside. The outside was a void, devoid of presence or life, while here, it felt as if something was holding its breath, watching.

But the strangest part was how familiar this feeling was.

When had I felt this before?

I searched my memories, but the answer remained just out of reach.

"If we go this way, we’ll reach the inner courtyard."

"I know."

We stepped through the door connecting the hall to the outside and descended the stone steps. Beyond them lay a covered walkway, and past that, a wide open space.

At the center of the courtyard stood a weathered stone structure that looked like an old altar, surrounded by the scattered remains of ancient ornaments.

"That doesn’t seem like it was always in that state."

Aro nodded in agreement.

But it didn’t seem like Sannyeong had disturbed it, either. How could she have toppled such heavy stones?

I approached the fallen ornaments and statues, running my fingers over their surfaces.

There was no moss growing on them, which meant they hadn’t been lying there for long.

Just as I lifted my head from my inspection, a sudden scream rang out.

It was unmistakably the voices of the siblings—Hwang Danyo and Hwang Gongyoung.

[Translator - Jjescus ]

[Proofreader - Starfall ]