Fabre in Sacheon’s Tang Novel - Chapter 204

Chapter 204
The woman’s face cycled through a spectrum of emotions in reply to my question.
Frustration, confusion, weariness, and pure irritation passed over her features like signals on a rotating light, delivering an unmistakable message. Though her feelings were mixed, the outcome was plain—she was thoroughly annoyed, and I was the reason.
I still couldn’t fathom why.

After venting her anger with clear intensity, the woman finally raked her hands through her hair and dropped backward onto the ground. She began waving her arms and legs in the air, making no effort to hide how irritated my response had made her—like a small child having a meltdown in a market after being denied a treat.

‘What in the world is happening?’
I had been anticipating seeing my daughter fully grown, but instead I encountered this unfamiliar woman with a perplexing attitude.
And to make it worse, she was angry with me.
‘She has to be the Venom Dragon, but then where is Hyang? How did some unfamiliar Venom Dragon get inside my mind?’

There was solid ground for my suspicion.
Up to now, the only beings I had bonded through Beast Heart Art were Cho, Hyang, Bini, and Hwayang.
Looking back, when I first registered them as young creatures, there were no major shifts or sensations.
When I bonded Cho, Hyang, and Bini, nothing like this mental space appeared.
We could only speak mind to mind through an open channel, nothing beyond that.
But if a young Venom Dragon matured, or if I formed a bond with an adult one, a mental landscape like this would form.
It occurred when Cho and Bini reached adulthood, and again when I registered Hwayang in her fully grown state.
Therefore, the woman currently acting like a frustrated child could only be the Venom Dragon.
The human form she’d assumed seemed to be a woman in her early twenties—noticeably older than my other creatures.
That tracked.
Cho and Bini had only recently left their juvenile stages, and even Hwayang seemed about that age. This woman, however, looked considerably more mature.

‘But what really occurred?’
The woman was now lying still, her arms thrown over her face.
I sat down next to her, lost in thought, attempting to reconstruct events.
‘I clearly stabbed that Five Venoms Sect assassin in the ear… Wait. Is it possible? Was there poison on that blade? Could it have been some kind of spiritual toxin?’
For a moment, it even crossed my mind that those Five Venoms fiends might have consumed the Venom Dragon.
‘No, in that case, this woman—no, this Venom Dragon—wouldn’t be staring at me as if I were the source of her aggravation. She would be thankful.
Right now, she looks completely fed up… Why?’

I crouched down, mentally retracing my final moments of awareness.
If there was any hint to be found, I needed to locate it.
「Sssss. ‘Dad! Dad!’」
Hyang had undoubtedly been calling out to me…
「Rumble.」
‘Ah, the earth was shaking then! I recall sand and dust swallowing me.’
「Ssss. ‘It’s too bright…!’」
‘Yes! Hyang said it was blindingly bright at the very end!’
As I recollected those last instants before blacking out, things began falling into place. The ground quaked, and Hyang cried out about the light.
‘The shaking means something enormous was either drawing near or rising from below… But why would Hyang say it was too bright?’
It was still night when I fell.
Hyang shouldn’t have been dazzled by anything.
But if something emerged from below the earth and gave off a radiant glow, then it would all make sense.
‘Now that I consider it, spiritual beasts don’t typically fight each other. Is it possible it came to assist us and became entangled in the situation?’
Hyang mentioned it was too bright, so what could shine that intensely at night?
Wait—
‘Scorpions.’
Scorpions naturally fluoresce under moonlight.
‘Damn. I was passed out, and a spiritual venomous beast just stumbled right into me?!’
The enormous Camel Spider had already made the ground tremble with its size, and yet it had steered clear of this thing’s domain.
And now, a Scorpion.
I could feel my hands shaking with anticipation.
That could only mean… A giant scorpion had arrived.
When I first got here, I’d thought the Five Venoms Sect was breeding Deathstalkers— lethal scorpions known as ‘Death’s Pursuers.’
But they had no symbols or markings to support that.
That guess had been incorrect.
This time, though, it wasn’t an imitation.
It was authentic.

I slowly turned to look at the woman lying there, arms hiding her face as though she had surrendered to it all.
Gray hair, weathered clothing.
Her body was mapped with scars, evidence of countless battles.
‘Unbelievable!’
I was quivering with exhilaration as I observed her.
Noticing my shift, she lifted her arm slightly and peeked out at me.
Her expression changed to one of puzzlement when she saw my face.
“?”
I must have been beaming like a fool again.
I’d been teased about it before when I livestreamed videos of venomous creatures I adored.
‘Damn, I probably came off like a creep.’
I quickly corrected my expression and tentatively asked,
“…Was it you who saved me?”
Her eyes went wide, and then she immediately sat up and nodded.
“You saved me, but because of that, something happened to you, and now you’re angry, exasperated, and totally done with all of this?”
The scorpion placed her hands on my shoulders and nodded again.
Seeing her confirmation, I started with a polite introduction.
“It’s good to meet you. I’m So-ryong. Thank you for saving my life.”
Even with a spiritual beast, a proper greeting was essential.
First impressions mattered.
The scorpion watched me with a slightly stunned look before slowly nodding once more.
I hurriedly asked about Hyang.
If a giant scorpion had rescued me, she was likely safe, but I needed to be certain.
“Before you arrived here, did you happen to see my daughter? A little centipede, around this size—there were many enemies nearby… You did? She’s unharmed?”
The scorpion nodded eagerly at my question.
Since she had clearly saved her too, I thanked her again.
“Thank you for protecting Hyang as well.”
Right after I spoke, the scorpion abruptly lifted her red-tipped fingers and pointed diagonally toward the sky, almost like she was striking a disco pose.
“…What?”
She kept gesturing upward at that angle.
I had a sense she was asking how to exit this place, so I smiled and sought confirmation.
“Ah! You want to know how to leave here?”
The scorpion seized both my shoulders and nodded emphatically.
She must have been just as bewildered as I was about being pulled into this suddenly.
I gave a reassuring smile and replied,
“Yes, so all you need to do is hold me close and kiss my forehead.”
Remembering how it worked when I registered Cho, Bini, and Hwayang, that was the method of the Beast Heart Art contract.
The scorpion tilted her head at my words.
‘Why the reluctance?’
Then it dawned on me—
She was a scorpion.
Had she ever kissed anyone before?
It looked like I would have to show her.
I motioned for the tall scorpion to bend her head down a little.
Then, I gently kissed her on the forehead.
“Just like this. That’s all it takes.”
At that instant, my sight grew hazy.
The final thing I saw before everything went dark was the scorpion’s astonished face.
‘Oh, so it works both ways.’

***

“So-ryong!”
“So-ryong!”
The moment So-ryong vanished into the darkness, Hwayang and Seolpyo charged forward without a second thought.
The Five Dragon Peaks followed close behind.
Cho took to the air, while Bini and Yo-hwa sprinted fiercely beside Hwayang, plunging directly into the blackness.
Though the Wind Tunnel left no marks on the grass, the deep groove carved by So-ryong’s body being pulled along was plain to see, making the path easy to trace.
Whenever they grew weary, Cho and Bini carried them, leaving the Five Dragon Peaks struggling to keep up as they raced ahead relentlessly.
By sunrise, they had reached the Barren Lands.
A lengthy track was gouged into the crimson soil, extending toward the northwest.
It appeared So-ryong had been pulled a great distance.
They paused briefly at the edge of the wasteland, breathing heavily.
Taehwa, who had kept pace just behind them, spoke between labored breaths.
“Huff… Huff… The trails out here… will fade fast when the wind picks up. We have to move quickly.”
The marks were more distinct than on the grass, but they could disappear in an instant.
Without delay, they continued their pursuit of So-ryong.
“Unni, I’ll track from above with Cho. You follow on the ground with Bini.”
“Understood! Hwayang!”
And so the chase resumed.
They followed the long trail across the barren grounds, tracking So-ryong’s path until dusk.
By nightfall, they had reached the edge of the desert.
But there, the wind had scoured away all signs of So-ryong’s passage.
Hwayang, who had landed from the sky, stared in despair at where the tracks had been.
“…The trail is gone…”

***

The first sensation that returned to me was searing pain.
A sharp, stabbing ache radiated from my side.
“Ugh…”
Sssss.
As I curled inward from the hurt, Hyang slid close to my face, asking if I was all right.
Inspecting my side, I spotted what looked like a piece of stone stuck to the injury.
“What’s this?”
It seemed to be staunching the blood flow.
Just then, a low, vibrating growl rose from beneath me.
— Grrrr.
The resonant sound seemed to indicate that it had stopped my bleeding.
Startled by the noise that shook the ground, I glanced down.
Hyang and I were lying on top of an enormous rock.
Even in the daylight, we were shaded. Looking up, I saw a large stone pillar angled above us.
Sensing something unusual, I surveyed the area—
That’s when I finally detected the faint, constant vibration.
Now that I considered it, Hyang and I were riding on a giant stone that was swaying gently as it journeyed across the desert.
The pillar above even blocked the sun, offering relief from the heat.
“What the—! Ugh…!”
Crying out in surprise, I grabbed my throbbing side and shifted slightly.
I had good reason to be shocked—
This wasn’t a rock.
It was a colossal scorpion.
A scorpion almost five meters across, with a body as tough as stone.
My mouth fell open.
Cho and Bini were lengthy, but not thick-bodied.
This one, though, had a rounded, massive build, resembling a perfectly formed, giant five-meter boulder.
‘I knew it would be large… but this is enormous.’
Still amazed by its scale, I turned to Hyang to ask what had taken place.
She had been conscious the whole time I was out.
“Hyang, are you hurt? What actually happened?”
Ssss! Sssss!
“Cheongwol unni saved us!”
Hyang was referring to the giant scorpion as Cheongwol—likely because its eyes gleamed like the moon.
Before I could even give it a name, Hyang had already chosen one.
And from the warm sensation below, it seemed Cheongwol approved of the name.
Well, I figured I could allow it.
Hyang’s talent for naming must have been inherited from her dad.
As I listened further, I learned that after I was injured by the Five Venoms assassin, Cheongwol had rescued both of us.
Somehow, I had wound up with another amazing Venom Dragon under my care.
As I contemplated the uproar this would cause, a deep growl echoed from Cheongwol.
— Grrrr.
At the same time, I spotted Cho diving out of the sky toward us.
From within Cho’s grasp, Hwayang’s astonished voice cried out.
“So-So-ryong! A Ten-Thousand-Year Stone Armored Scorpion—where in the world did you find one?!”
Ten-Thousand-Year Stone Armored Scorpion.
Now that was an impressive name.