RHDWK 3

Chapter 3

The moment I spotted Sima Jin blankly staring up at the sky, my feet froze automatically.

Why did I come back here?

Shouldn’t I take this chance to run away while this bastard is out of his right mind?

Or maybe he’s deliberately acting like an idiot, waiting to see when he can devour me.

Just as I was stepping backward, thinking I should run away right this instant—

“Ah, young lady.”

At the sound of footsteps hitting the ground, Sima Jin turned his head.

Damn it.

“W-What are you doing here? I’ve received the herbs, so you may leave now.”

Shoo, shoo! Ultimate villain who is going to kill me, hurry up and get lost!

I showed Sima Jin the medicine box I received from the herbal merchant, doing my absolute best to hide my wariness.

If he realized I was guarding against him, Sima Jin might kill me on the spot.

“I was fired.”

At my words, Sima Jin shook his head weakly.

“Pardon?”

“I was fired from the escort agency, so I have nowhere to go.”

‘What do you want me to do about it!’

Unable to blurt it out loud, I shrieked inside my head.

What do you mean you have nowhere to go? The Mount Ten Thousand, the headquarters of the Demonic Cult, is right over there—well, a bit far, but it exists!

I stared at the somber Sima Jin and began to reflect.

Come to think of it, it wasn’t just a bit far.

The place where I lived was Anhui Province, the main setting of the novel where the Namgung Clan was located.

And the headquarters of the Demonic Cult should be far away in Xinjiang.

It wasn’t just a bit far; it was ridiculously far.

‘Seriously, how on earth did this guy end up all the way in Anhui? Is he already trying to expand into the Central Plains?’

With a chaotic mind, I looked down at Sima Jin, who was just sitting there blankly.

Then, I slowly scanned him from head to toe.

‘Wait, was he always this dumb-looking? Uh… I don’t recall him being like this.’

Despite his innocent-looking features, Sima Jin’s sharp eyes used to be terrifyingly overwhelming—to the point where just looking at him made me want to take a step back.

Yet the current Sima Jin radiated a subtle aroma of idiocy, not only from every single word that tumbled out of his mouth, but also from his blank, dazed eyes.

The eyes of the Sima Jin I faced during my first transmigration were definitely not like this. They were undoubtedly cold and icy like glass.

This could also be a tactic of his, but somehow, I felt this wasn’t an act.

Of course, I wasn’t stupid enough to trust him completely.

“I feel a little hungry.”

While my head felt like it was about to burst from complicated thoughts, he casually patted his stomach and muttered.

I caught a glimpse of his build underneath his clothes.

They said he was frail when he was young, so unlike my expectation that he would be skin-and-bones and sickly, he didn’t look particularly weak right now.

The original novel explicitly mentioned that his illness was cured only after he consumed the White Snake, so he shouldn’t be cured yet.

Before getting cured, there was only one single time he descended from the Demonic Cult’s headquarters…….

Ah! The only time Sima Jin descended from the Demonic Cult’s headquarters was right now!

Idiot! How could I forget this!

I felt a sudden urge to smack my own head hard.

I didn’t know why he came to Anhui, but the female lead, Namgung San-san, was supposed to find him like this and take care of him with all her heart.

And that tender care became the seed of his obsession toward Namgung San-san.

Anyway, I was pretty sure that was how the story went.

Having barely managed to recall the plot of the original novel, I at least accepted the fact that Sima Jin was in Anhui Province.

If so, shouldn’t he be picked up by Namgung San-san and taken to the Namgung Clan? Why was he randomly picked up by an escort agency instead?

‘And he even got abandoned.’

Above all, the current Sima Jin was not the Heavenly Demon yet.

He was supposed to devour me in the future and become the Heavenly Demon of this era because of that, so I couldn’t understand for the life of me why he was insisting that he was the Heavenly Demon right now.

Well, the Cheonma [Heavenly Demon] Sima Jin was talking about wasn’t actually that Heavenly Demon [which literally translates to “Heavenly Hemp/Herb”].

While I had no way of knowing what Sima Jin’s personality was like in the past, it was certain that something was wrong with him right now.

“Where is your home?”

Regardless, Sima Jin was the guy who would eventually seek me out, kill me, and consume me.

I couldn’t just keep standing here like this.

I asked while playing dumb, fully prepared to bite off at least one of his fingers if he suddenly pounced on me.

“Well, earth…… I suppose.”

“Earth…… Earth? The earth I’m stepping on right now?”

I stomped my foot on the ground a couple of times and asked repeatedly.

“To be precise, the fertile soil of the high-mountain regions.”

Sima Jin raised his index finger and spoke in a firm, resolute tone.

I’m really sorry because you look so dead serious, but I have absolutely no idea what kind of bullcrap you are talking about.

“R-Right, let’s just say it is. What is your name?”

“……I remember nothing. Only the name Cheonma feels familiar. Yes, I must undoubtedly be a vegetable that transformed into a human.”

Sima Jin, who had been shaking his head, suddenly opened his eyes wide and gave a single nod of conviction.

This man has been spouting utter nonsense since a moment ago.

“Therefore, young lady, since you ordered Cheonma, please take me in.”

Placing his hand over his chest, Sima Jin looked up at me. And with sparkling eyes, no less.

The gaze he gave me when he killed me before had not a single trace of life in it.

Is this man really the Sima Jin who is going to kill me? He’s been saying weird things since earlier—should I just drop him off in front of the Namgung Clan’s main gate right now?

Just as I was thinking that, Sima Jin pressed his hands against his knees and stood up from his seat.

“Well, even if I used to be a vegetable, I’m fairly useful with physical strength, so you won’t lose out.”

Of course you’re good with physical strength, yeah.

He was a person who lived in the Demonic Cult—where people went crazy over becoming stronger—and he was destined to become the Heavenly Demon of his era.

Sima Jin turned his head and carefully observed the signboard of the medicine shop.

“Baek Medicinal Shop [백약방].”

Muttering the characters written on the signboard, Sima Jin opened his eyes wide and turned back to look at me.

“Oh, it seems I can read Chinese characters. Young lady, I must have been quite a smart vegetable.”

Now, I felt absolutely nothing toward the words spilling out of Sima Jin’s mouth. He just looked like an idiot who would eat dirt off the ground.

To think that the man I had been shivering in fear of was like this!

It was truly anticlimactic.

“If this is a medicine shop, you must be well-versed in vegetables used as medicinal herbs, like myself.”

I pulled an awkward, unenthusiastic expression at Sima Jin’s words.

It seemed he now genuinely believed himself to be a vegetable.

Even though I tried hard not to drop my guard, listening to this insane talk made me feel like my own brain was turning inside out.

Where on earth did he hit his head to end up like this?

In my opinion, it wasn’t that Namgung San-san found Sima Jin and saved him, but rather that she stepped on his head as she walked past.

No matter how large the discrepancy between the novel I read and the actual world was, this couldn’t be right. What kind of novel turns a cool, badass ultimate villain into an idiot?

Without such an accident, it was hard to understand Sima Jin’s current state.

“Ah, well…… I suppose so.”

“Then there is no one who knows me better than you. Haah, what a relief.”

Why are you sitting there looking relieved, you crazy bastard?

“By the way, do you really think you’re a vegetable……? In my opinion, the Cheonma you’re speaking of is…….”

I stopped mid-sentence as the words slipped out casually.

When I first faced Sima Jin, I was terrified about what to do and whether I should run away immediately, but thinking about it now, this might actually be a stroke of good luck.

Considering the situation so far, it seemed Sima Jin currently had something wrong with his head.

If he lived like an idiot like this and died at a young age without ever finding the White Snake, it would be a huge relief for me.

Although I hoped we would never cross paths again in the future, I thought it would be best never to blurt out words like ‘Cheonma, Demonic Cult, or Sima Jin’ to him while he had lost his memories.

“Why did you stop talking?”

“No, it’s nothing.”

I shook my head.

“Young lady.”

Before I knew it, Sima Jin stepped right up to me and suddenly folded both of his hands over mine.

“W-What are you doing?”

Flustered, I tried to pull my hands away, but Sima Jin tightened his grip on them.

“I wish to turn my fellow vegetable comrades into humans, just like me.”

“……Pardon?”

I admit it, Sima Jin.

Your talent for bewildering people with every single sentence you speak is truly extraordinary.

“Therefore, I wish to learn medicine from you, young lady. No—Master.”

“…….”

“Please accept me as your disciple.”

……Excuse me?

Was the title of the novel not The Treasured Daughter of the Namgung Clan, but something like The Heavenly Demon is a Genius Pharmacist?!