HWARANG Rewritten✅

12. Secret is safe

Chapter 12.
Secret is safe.

The five boys waited for Jae-won to wake up. No. It wasn't Jae-won. It was Sa-do. She was Park Sa-do. All of them were lost in their own thoughts, trying to figure out and make sense of what had happened. How did they miss the signs?

Ji-dwi remained tense. He just remained on the bench, clenching and unclenching his fists every now and then. He hadn't spoken a single word since he caught an unconscious Sa-do in his arms. Not when he rushed her to Ah-ro. Not when Ah-ro treated her wounds and declared that it had been emotional exhaustion and fear and she should wake up soon. Not when the other boys speculated and tried to piece together the story. He didn't say anything. His mind was whirring.

The image of Park Young-shil slapping her and shoving her were playing on repeat. His anger surged. How dare he hurt her like that? And she called him 'father'. But seeing as no one had known of her existence, he must have kept her hidden away her whole life. She had been forced into a secretive life much like his own then and the realization made his heart clench.

Also, that day when they sneaked out, she had asked him if parents could forget about their children. She must have been upset because of this man. He swore to take down Silla's Gakan when he became king. And he would do it with Sa-do's help since she was so interested in bringing her father to ruins. She had said so at Dayiseo too.

Right now however, he just wished she would wake up. Not being able to see her eyes and not knowing whether she was actually alright or not was putting him on edge. He needed to hear her voice, hear her say that she was fine.

To be honest, Ji-dwi had known from the start that Jae-won was a girl. Or strongly suspected it, at the very least. Something about the experience of living under an alias and hiding oneself from the world had given her away at Dayiseo that day. She may have been able to fool other people but she hadn't lasted in front of Ji-dwi's experience. He hadn't been entirely confident and hadn't confronted her about it though. A soft groan caught his attention and silenced the others too.

Sa-do opened her eyes to once again find herself in the, now familiar, medical room. Her head was aching terribly, but the memory of recent events floated through her murky thoughts. She tried to sit up, but her elbows screamed in pain as she tried to lean on them making her fall back down. Groaning, she sat up carefully and examined herself. Her elbows and knees were just scraped, nothing too bad.

She turned her neck to stretch the stiff and aching muscles and that's when she noticed them sitting on the bench near the wall. "Oh my! You scared me," she complained, placing a hand over her now palpitating heart. All five of them were there. Ji-dwi, Seon-woo, Soo-ho, Yeo-wool and Ban-ryu.

"You are awake," Yeo-wool stated observationally. Their serious expressions didn't look promising. Sa-do was in trouble. Big trouble.

Soo-ho's next words only proved her thoughts. "Care to explain yourself?"

"Do I have to?" she whined, not feeling up to the emotionally tasking challenge just yet.

"You are the daughter of my stepfather and I didn't even know about you till now. Of course you have to explain," Ban-ryu said firmly, just short of a demand, as he folded his arms across his chest. He seemed deeply troubled and Sa-do felt bad for him.