Chapter 318 - Burying The Truth-II

Seoyeon's heart felt as if it sunk into her own stomach all of a sudden. The pureblood wily smiled at her as if he took amusement from her shocked face. 

"What kind of suicide?" she then asked. She recalled Haneul did say she chose suicide but claimed that it was after a few times before her that she learned that it might be easier to take her own life to end the sufferings. She didn't say she had killed everyone on her own.

"Well various. Drinking poison, stabbing their own heart, and well... it would be grotesque if I explain it all, right? I gave you the idea," Lee Young pushed the chess pieces as he had ended the game with his victory.

"It wasn't Haneul..." whispered Seoyeon. It was the catalysts themselves who had took their own life!

"Haneul?" Lee Young asked with interest, moving forward, "Why do I feel like you know a little more about the catalyst than you display yourself to be?"

Seoyeon had questioned, and those questions were about the man who sat in front of her now, "What will you do by knowing, Mr. Lee?"

"Depends," the man answered without tricking the human girl. "I am someone who value knowledge the most. Didn't you notice anything when you came in this house?"

Seoyeon drew her brows, "Books?" and... "Scars.."

A shock passed by Lee Young's face as quick as a butterfly's wings, "Your eyes are very perceptive. Correct, people who came and work as my servants all have the same scars on different part of their bodies. Some scars almost brought them to the realm between life and death. That's when I enter. Being someone who have the most knowledge even amongst the pureblood, I took the seat as their savior."

"You like experiments?" Seoyeon asked and the man nod.

"I found it to be the most entertaining in my hundred years of life," he answered. "Tell me about the catalyst and I will promise you another batch of knowledge... anything you would like to know."

Seoyeon weighed her choice, she couldn't describe how tempting Lee Young's offer was. The man knew a lot about witches and possibly more than that. She nodded, "Can you please tell me what is happening outside the world first?"

"Oh, right. I forgot to tell you about that. Your uncle came to the Associate, knocking on the gate and yelled about you. Exposing about the catalyst inside you."

Uncle? He did...?! Seoyeon had thought that after the scare Jung Hwa gave her uncle, he would lay low for now. Never could she guess her uncle would come to the Associate to reveal about her. Why now? Was it normal for her uncle to know about Associate too?

Something was wrong and Seoyeon could tell.

Away from her, Jung Hwa stepped inside his room through the window. He took the shortcut he always use since young and jumped like a cat inside his room, "I knew you would come," and Jung a Hwa looked at his grandfather who had spoken.

A smile spread on Jung Hwa's lips, "Likewise, I knew you would be here waiting for mek grandfather."

"You still dare to call me grandfather?!" Grandfather Jung rose on his feet, walking toward his silly grandson and raised his hand to knock his head only to stop and sigh. "Dodge it!"

"I do deserve the hit," Jung Hwa said and he saw his grandfather scrunching his brows, an expression of shock and confusion slapped the old man.

"Good Heaven, did someone switched your soul? When did my grandson became a sensitive person who could know his mistake?"

Jung Hwa rolled his eyes, "I am not going to come back for a few days," he said, leaving the slit he stood earlier and pulled a bag he stored inside the closet. The bag was heavy as if he had prepared his own kit to leave the house with his belonging, somewhere expecting there would be a day for him to leave. 

Seeing the bag, a ball of emotions lunge Grandfather Jung's throat. "Is there no way for me to stop you?" The older man still felt guilty for not telling the truth to Jung Hwa that there are witches in this world and indeed his mother had been poisoned by the witch. Because of his decision to keep Jung Hwa in the dark, it resulted in him being shunned by others and even blame for his family's death as a killer.

The worse thing he had done was to close his eyes and turn away in the moment his grandson was blamed for what he never did.

"No," Jung Hwa answered, pulling the bag to his shoulders and turning to his back, he watched his grandfather's expression and pulled a smile, "Like you, I have someone who I can risk my life for but not risk to lose her. I will be going for her."

His grandfather stared back at her and seemed as if he had reflected to his own thought and nodded, "I won't stop you but call me everyday."

"I will remember to do so and keep the wolf with you, would you?" His grandfather nodded in agreement, Jung Hwa was about to walk out of his room when his mind caught something, "About the book that I gave you last time, can you give it back to me?"

"The witch's book," Grandfather Jung nodded and brought him to his room where he then passed the book to Jung Hwa. The old man stared at him and settled his hand on his shoulder, "Protect her well. I was afraid that I have ruined your life."

Jung Hwa raised his brows, he crooked one side of his lips, "I am not easy to be ruined."

"Take my wise word when one loses their love ones especially their lover, they would be ruin. It is their end," grandfather Jung took a seat on the chair near the book shelf. 

Jung Hwa noticed something deeper in his grandfather's words, "But I don't lose her and you didn't cause me to lose her."

"I almost, didn't I?" Grandfather Jung raised the question.

Jung Hwa's smile slowly fade from his face, understanding what his grandfather was speaking of. "You know the two people you buried in the garden is her parents. Since when? Did you brought her there to show the cemetery? On purpose?" His brows drew together automatically.

"No. I just learned it a few days ago. Hans told me about it that Seoyeon asked to see the cemetery alone. That's when I came and noticed the rings were gone. The marriage rings gang belong to the late witches," Grandfather Jung sighed and Jung Hwa watched him slumping over the couch, pulling his hand over his face. "So I was right... they are her parents."

Jung Hwa didn't answer and heard his grandfather continue, "I never regret killing others. Not when my life on line but I do regret what I did that day. Those two witches. They never show their will to fight it was as if they prepared themselves to die. Rather then looking at them, I was too focus and absorbed with my anger that I let myself kill them out of rage."

Jung Hwa walked nearer to the seat and he reached out his hand, recalling the time on his past where he did the same but in the end retracted his fingers. But now, he settled his hand on his grandfather's shoulders, showing comfort that was unexpected even for Grandfather Jung himself.

"Don't blame yourself. She doesn't blame you and she understood it. People lose themselves in anger. It isn't right but then no one has ever been right in this world. We never knew the lightest action we chose can even become a dagger that kill others and perhaps we have done it naively. It is the situation we have to blame. We cannot undo what we've done all that's left is to make it up to the people we've wronged," and while speaking, Jung Hwa found himself speaking to himself, recalling the moment he had took the lives of his two closest family. 

A feather of warm touched back his palm on the end of his word and he shifted his gaze to find his grandfather showing a smile, "You are right. Bring Seoyeon here when everything has been solve. Knowing you, I trust that you will be able to end whatever problem you face now."

Cheekily, Jung Hwa grinned and winked, "Of course, this is me we are talking of. Take care of yourself."

Back in Lee Young's house, Seoyeon explained what she saw and her conversation with Haneul, receiving a long humming from Lee Young and his complex expression. She had heard his words but now looking at him, she learned that the man was much more invested in knowledge than what he claimed. She saw how bright his eyes at the mysteries he found which was something strange for her as she didn't like mystery as much as he did.

"Fascinating. You talked with her," Lee Young chimed, "What do you thing you talked with? Was it the catalyst's ghost? Her soul? Her visage?"

"I don't know," answered Seoyeon. She didn't question it but now upon being asked by Lee Young, it had turned to a question in her mind. True. Who was she talking of.

"But it was a person whom I talked with and I am sure it is Haneul. She was the same as how I see her talking in the lucid dream."

"Posed more questions and a delicious mystery for me," Lee Young seemed to have taken the mystery as a pleasure for him to solve.

A knock then came across the room and the butler whose face was scarred bowed when meeting Lee Young, "Master, there are guests."

Guests? Wondered Seoyeon.

"Well, who?" Lee Young questioned and turn to Seoyeon, "I rarely welcome guests but it appear that now I will be having a lot of guests due to you. Not that I am against of. Who is it?"

"It's..." the butler hesitate and it caught Seoyeon's brows to a knot.. "The Hunters."