The three of them bickered in hushed tones while the room continued to debate the nature of the holy sword’s judgment.

  The older officials spoke in stiff voices, throwing around words like “obedience,” “national responsibility,” and “proper image.”

  They spoke of the “Chosen One” as if he were a weapon they could command.

  Mu Yichen remained silent, his expression as polite as ever. But his gaze lingered on Aseok from time to time, as if noting every twitch, every breath, every flick of the eye.

  The room was alive with murmurs and negotiations.

  Gilded with authority, heavy with formality, and filled with the arrogance of power, the conference room buzzed with the voices of guild masters, military commanders, and high-ranking officials, each speaking as if their opinion would steer the world.

  But Lee Aseok sat there like he was carved from stone.

  Not participating.

  Not even listening.

  Just… existing.

  His posture was relaxed, fingers loosely resting on the arm of the chair, his long hair cascading slightly forward to frame a face absent of expression.

  His gaze had no interest. His presence had no warmth. He was just there, like a ghost watching a scene that no longer belonged to him.

  Kang Juwon kept smiling. But his eyes had narrowed slightly.

  To everyone else, it looked like a polite gesture, as befitting the guild master of the Moon Guild. Always collected. Always pleasant. Always soft-spoken and intelligent.

  But inside his mind, something was crawling.

  Ever since the holy sword had reappeared, Kang Juwon had been plagued by strange dreams. No, not dreams. Nightmares.

  He would wake up drenched in sweat, his chest hollow as though something had been ripped out of him.

  An ache like loss, sharp and dull all at once. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t recall what he had lost.

  It was like a memory had been erased.

  A memory that mattered.

  And now… this newly chosen one, Lee Aseok.

  From the moment Aseok walked in, Kang Juwon had felt something prickling at the back of his neck. Something old. Something rotten.

  It wasn’t the sword.

  It was the boy.

  That face.

  That blankness.

  Those eyes, if you could call them that, looked at the world as if it had already ended.

  There was no light in them. No ambition. No hunger. No fear. Not even hate.

  Just… silence.

  It was like looking into the eyes of something long dead.

  Kang Juwon’s smile twitched.

  What are you?

  Across the room, the various leaders continued to speak as if Lee Aseok weren’t even there.

  “..He’ll need to undergo training, of course. Even the chosen must be evaluated.”

  “And integrated into one of the main guilds. Preferably one under government supervision.”

  “We’ll assign an escort team. I recommend rotating schedules..keep the boy from doing anything ruckless”

  Mu Yichen, seated at the edge of the room with his usual serene expression, said nothing.

  His fingers rested lightly against his temple, his other hand drumming faintly on the armrest. His silver eyes, half-lidded in thought, flicked toward Lee Aseok every so often.

  Beside him, Seo MinHyun leaned in dramatically.

  “Are we all just gonna pretend the guy with a floating holy sword next to him is a decorative lamp?”

  Park Taegun grunted. “Keep your voice down.”

  “I am keeping it down. This is my ‘whispering-in-elite-meetings’ voice.” He gestured toward Aseok. “He hasn’t moved in half an hour. Is he alive? Blink if you’re alive, Chosen One.”

  Lee Aseok didn’t blink.

  Seo MinHyun sat back, mildly unnerved. “Okay, that’s either stoic or deeply concerning.”

  Taegun muttered, “You’re deeply concerned.”

  “Thank you for your honesty, Sergeant Buzzkill.”

  A few seats down, another voice chimed in, one of the military representatives, a woman in a grey coat.

  “He seems uncooperative. Perhaps a psychological evaluation is in order?”

  Another nodded. “It could be stressful. Being chosen must come with pressure.”

  One of the guild leaders scoffed. “Pressure or not, we can’t delay operational decisions. He’ll need to comply.”

  Another added, “If he refuses to act, we’ll have no choice but to treat him as a liability. The sword may have chosen him, but that does not give him supreme authority.”

  It was strange.

  They spoke about the “Chosen One” like he was an item. A weapon. A resource.

  Not once had they asked for Lee Aseok’s opinion.

  Not once had anyone turned to him and asked, What do you want?

  Time ticked by.

  Minutes bled into thirty. An entire half-hour of strategic discussions, tactical assignments, political maneuvering.

  And Lee Aseok…

  Did not say a single word.

  Just sat there, as relaxed as someone waiting for a bus.

  Like none of this mattered.

  Like none of them mattered.

  He didn’t speak, didn’t glance at anyone, didn’t even seem to know where he was. His presence, though, was impossible to ignore. Not because he demanded attention.

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  But because he refused it so thoroughly.

  They all noticed eventually.

  The strange stillness of the one person who should’ve been the main character of the room.

  It had been more then a hour since Lee Aseok had entered and promptly decided the meeting was irrelevant to his continued survival.

  Thirty-two minutes of political maneuvering, resource planning, training schedule proposals, and escort arrangements, none of which received so much as a twitch from him.

  And then came the moment.

  The silence that slipped between two proposals, like a breath forgotten.

  Qin Yue, the guild master of the Shadow Guild, stood.

  Her movements were sharp, deliberate. Her presence was undeniable, like the whisper of a sword unsheathing in a quiet room. She wore no extravagant ornaments, only the minimalist black of her guild, but when she moved, people shifted.

  She was known for many things, efficiency, cold logic, a blade-like mind.

  And being Mu Yichen’s mother.

  Her gaze slid to Lee Aseok like a scalpel searching for weakness.

  “Lee Aseok,” she said, her voice devoid of warmth. “Why have you not yet formed a connection with the holy sword?”

  The hum stopped.

  At once, all other voices quieted.

  People began to murmur again, more focused now.

  “She’s right…”

  “He hasn’t even touched the sword yet…”

  “The sword responded when he entered, but the bond, it’s not complete…”

  “…Does he even know how to activate it?”

  Seo MinHyun, slouched dramatically in his seat, leaned forward and whispered to Park Taegun, “I told you this was coming.”

  “You also said he was going to slap someone.”

  “Well, that’s still on the table.”

  Taegun frowned. “I don’t think he cares enough to slap anyone.”

  Seo MinHyun glanced at Lee Aseok and visibly shuddered. “Yeah. I think we’re all just NPCs to him.”

  Mu Yichen, seated one chair down from Aseok, let out a quiet sigh.

  He glanced at his mother. Her face was unreadable as always, her arms folded neatly as she stared down the uncooperative chosen one like she was questioning a particularly malfunctioning piece of equipment.

  Then he looked at Aseok.

  Still in the exact same position.

  Still staring vaguely into the air like this entire gathering was an extended dream sequence he didn’t feel obligated to participate in.

  Mu Yichen smiled, quietly amused. The smile was gentle, but there was an edge behind it….

  Ah. So it begins.

  Qin Yue, undeterred by the silence, stepped forward again.

  “You’ve had the holy sword’s recognition for four days now," she said. “And yet you haven’t established a proper bond. Why?”

  Still no response.

  Lee Aseok didn’t flinch.

  Didn’t blink.

  Didn’t even pretend to be listening.

  He remained seated in the relaxed posture of someone waiting for a bus that may or may not exist.

  One of the generals leaned toward Qin Yue. “Should we assume he doesn’t understand how to initiate the connection?”

  Another scoffed. “No. The sword clearly acknowledged him. He just hasn’t completed the contract.”

  “Which means he’s deliberately ignoring it…”

  “What kind of chosen one doesn’t even touch the holy sword?”

  Seo MinHyun glanced at his father, who was watching quietly, his expression unreadable.

  MinHyun looked away quickly, whispering to himself, “Oh no. Dad’s doing the calm-disappointment stare.”

  Park Taegun muttered, “Better than your loud-disappointment voice.”

  “Shut up, spreadsheet.”

  The meeting room, filled with the most powerful guild leaders, military officials, and government representatives in the nation, had descended into a quiet state of anticipatory tension.

  The chosen one was sitting in the very center, shoulders relaxed, limbs slack, face blank.

  And still… not talking.

  Lee Aseok looked less like a legendary hero and more like a high schooler forced into a parent-teacher conference he had no interest in attending.

  Mu Yichen, seated to his right, glanced sideways at the boy who was drawing every pair of eyes in the room.

  The tension was thick, voices having faded into wary silence as the elephant in the room finally pressed its full weight onto the table.

  The holy sword, glowing faintly gold, continued to float in the air beside Aseok, untouched. Unacknowledged. As though it were just some hovering decoration.

  As expected, Lee Aseok, the supposed “savior of the era,” was currently staring into empty space like he’d just disassociated mid-meeting.

  Mu Yichen’s lips curved gently. He didn’t seem bothered. In fact, he looked rather entertained.

  He leaned in and gave Aseok’s shoulder a soft pat, as if waking someone from a pleasant nap.

  Lee Aseok blinked slowly.

  Once.

  Then again.

  As if reality had just returned in patches.

  His head turned, languid and mechanical, and for the first time, his gaze swept across the room. Over two dozen powerful figures, heads of guilds, military elites, the highest branches of the Hunter Association, and all of them were staring right back.

  Lee Aseok paused.

  “…?”

  The silence dragged.

  And then, he pointed.

  Right at the floating holy sword beside him.

  And in a calm, deadpan tone, he said:

  “I don’t want it. You can take it back.”

  It was said with the same energy as a child refusing to eat broccoli.

  Another pause.

  Longer this time.

  Someone coughed. Another adjusted their chair. A pen dropped and rolled across the floor like it was fleeing the conversation entirely.

  Seo MinHyun looked like he’d just inhaled a bug. He jerked in his seat, his mouth twitching into an incredulous grin. “Oh. My. God.”

  Park Taegun, sitting beside him, covered half his face with his palm.

  Mu Yichen, the picture of calm nobility, smiled softly.

  Not a word was spoken for five full seconds.

  Then a guild leader, an older man with a thick scar running down his cheek, finally leaned forward, voice careful. “What… Do you mean to take it back?”

  Lee Aseok blinked at him.

  Then looked again at the sword, which still floated loyally at his side.

  His finger jabbed toward it once more.

  “I don’t want to wield it,” he said, flatly. “It’s not my type.”

  A stunned beat.

  “…Your… type?” another official echoed, dazed.

  Lee Aseok nodded seriously, as if explaining the concept to children. “Too shiny and I don’t like swords.”

  Another silence.

  This one came with a new flavor: panic.

  “You do understand,” a government advisor said, trying hard not to raise his voice, “that this is the holy sword. The relic of the hero. It chooses its wielder once in a generation..”

  “I know.”

  “Then..!”

  “I’m saying I don’t want it.”

  The advisor inhaled sharply, as if he’d just been personally insulted by the sword rejection.

  A woman in military uniform stood up. “Are you saying you’re refusing to become the hero?”

  “Yes.”

  The word landed like a hammer.

  Seo MinHyun pressed a hand to his chest. “Why does that somehow hurt more than my rejections in high school?”

  “You reject yourself every time you open your mouth,” Park Taegun replied dryly.

  MinHyun flared. “Excuse me..?!”

  Taegun looked at him with the kind of dead calm that came from military training and extreme patience. “Excused.”

  “Yah, you..!”

  Mu Yichen gently lifted a hand, silencing them both.

  He turned toward Aseok again. “Are you sure?” he asked, voice quiet. “Even if it means giving up the path others would kill to walk?”

  Lee Aseok glanced at him. “It’s just a sword.”

  Mu Yichen paused.

  Then he laughed softly.

  There was no mockery in it. Just a tired understanding.

  “Ah,” he said. “You really are different.”

  The others were not so calm.

  There was a strange, brittle silence hanging in the meeting room.

  Everyone had heard Lee Aseok’s words, I don’t want it. You can take it back…..and now they were stuck in a kind of mental lag, blinking at the boy who had just casually rejected the most sacred relic in the world like someone returning a bad order at a restaurant.

  Some were shocked. Others stared at him as though he’d sprouted a second head.

  One of the guild leaders, Guildmaster Rhee from Azure Fang, even muttered under his breath, “Is he crazy?”

  Mu Haejoon, seated at the head of the long obsidian table, let out a heavy sigh, rubbed his temples, and slowly leaned back in his chair. “This meeting… is going to be a long one.”

  Kang Juwon, the scholarly-looking head of the Moon Guild…, watched Lee Aseok with open interest.

  His usual gentle smile remained, but his eyes were sharp behind his glasses, almost amused.

  He leaned forward slightly, resting his chin on his hand, like someone about to watch a play.

  And what a performance it was becoming.

  The murmurs began again, tentative, at first, then louder.

  “He must be overwhelmed.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t understand the implications.”

  “Teenagers go through strange phases.”

  “It’s clearly a trauma response.”

  Soon, voices filled the room, and the so-called “discussion” began.

  It was less of a meeting now and more like a desperate intervention.

  “Lee Aseok,” began an elder guild master with a warm, patient voice, the kind used for kindergarteners and lost dogs, “You have to understand, this isn’t just about you. The world is on the brink of collapse.”

  “Countless gates are opening,” another added solemnly. “Dungeons spilling out into cities. Monsters evolving.”When the Hell gate opens,,” a government official said. “You’re the only one who can stop it now.”

  They all spoke as though they were trying to explain the concept of death to someone who just ate their crayon.

  One of the military officers, a grizzled old man with gray streaks in his crewcut, stood up from his seat. His medals shimmered on his chest as he pounded a fist on the table.

  “If the Hell Gate isn’t stopped, humanity will be destroyed!” he barked. “The sword chose you! That means it’s your duty!”

  Everyone fell quiet, waiting for Lee Aseok’s response.

  Surely now..surely, the gravity of the situation would sink in. Surely he would come to his senses, accept his destiny, and..

  Lee Aseok moved.

  Slowly.

  Gracefully.

  The lazy posture he’d maintained all this time, sprawled like a housecat under a sunbeam, straightened with eerie precision.

  His spine aligned, his shoulders squared.

  And his eyes…

  His eyes, which had until now been dull and lifeless, shifted. They sharpened, like frost creeping across a windowpane. Cold. Unreadable. Calculating.

  The temperature in the room dropped several degrees. It felt like someone had opened a door to winter.

  Mu Yichen, seated beside him, subtly stiffened. He turned to look at Lee Aseok, startled.

  In all their interactions, no matter how brief or bizarre, he had never seen this expression on the boy’s face.

  Seo MinHyun blinked. “...Oh. He has a second form?”

  Park Taegun didn’t speak, but his posture changed. Alert. Tense.

  Lee Aseok’s eyes swept the room slowly, gaze flat and dangerous. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table, and asked in a voice that cut through the air like a blade:

  “So what?”

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