Magnificent Romance of the Three Kingdoms - Chapter 1
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“Take it out!”
Hwang Mi-gyeong’s face was fiery red and her breath hitched as she whispered, practically right into Jang Se-ryeong’s ear—she couldn’t dare shout in the plane cabin.
“What’s the rush? You’re enjoying it.”
Se-ryeong shot back with a sleazy grin, his finger still busying itself inside Mi-gyeong’s knickers.
“I’m going crazy! Just take it out, now!”
“Come on, just let yourself go!”
Mi-gyeong tried to grab his hand and pull it away, but Se-ryeong’s other hand instantly pinned hers down.
They struggled, but Se-ryeong’s hand kept up its frantic work, making Mi-gyeong’s face grow even redder and her breathing even more desperate.
“Ah, I’m losing it!”
“Darling! Honey!”
The sweet, thick smell of her passion wafted from her mouth as she twisted and whispered into his ear, utterly unable to scream.
And then, finally.
“Ah… ugh… ooh…!”
Mi-gyeong’s body began to tremble violently, seizing up completely.
“See? That was good, wasn’t it?”
“You absolute menace.”
Mi-gyeong glared at him, but her eyes were clear and there was no real anger in them. Her tense gaze swept the cabin, then relaxed; everyone was either asleep or preoccupied.
But that peaceful moment was fleeting.
Suddenly, the plane gave a massive, sickening lurch.
They were flying through the clouds high over the Pacific Ocean.
“Aaaah!”
“Oh, my God!”
“What the hell was that?”
The cabin exploded with screams and total panic.
“Darling! We’re going to be okay, aren’t we?”
“Don’t worry, it’s probably nothing.”
Se-ryeong replied dismissively, but Mi-gyeong’s face was white as a sheet.
BAM!
As if to call him a liar, the plane suddenly felt like it had slammed into something, and the entire fuselage pitched sharply forward.
“Agh!”
“You stupid b****rds! Fly the thing straight!”
Angry shouts mixed with bulging neck veins. The cabin became a total free-for-all, with possessions raining down from the overhead lockers.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve hit a small patch of turbulence—”
CRASH! KA-BOOM!
The flight attendant’s explanation was abruptly cut off.
With a sound like thunder, the aircraft was tossed about violently and began a terrifying nosedive.
“Shriek!”
“Aaaaaagh!”
A symphony of screams, the same in every language.
FSSSSSH! RRRROAR!
A deafening roar, as if part of the fuselage had been ripped open, assaulted their ears.
They both understood that death was right there, beside them.
“Darling!”
Her poignant smile, as she cried out his name, sent a terrible, aching pain through his chest.
He gripped Mi-gyeong’s hand tightly, saying his last goodbye.
“I was happy with you.”
“Darling!”
A single word, whispered with an expression of profound sorrow.
He felt the very soul of her clinging to him with all its might.
“I’m sorry!”
EXPLOSION!
He didn’t hear her reply.
His mind went blank.
His body was torn into a million pieces.
No, even his dreams, his ambitions—they were all shattered into dust in the void.
2
The Greater Khingan Mountain Range.
Where its powerful ridges race across the land before stopping abruptly, scattered far and wide.
In this nameless stretch of mountains, winter still held its icy grip.
The peaks were home only to groves of conifers—birch, fir, and spruce—and the stark, bare forms of deciduous trees. The only noises were the occasional whoosh of falling snow, the sickening groan of branches snapping under their own weight, and the sound of the razor-sharp wind. All of it proclaiming this place as the far north of the continent.
The black water of the Heilongjiang River rushed beneath its sheet of ice, and the whole world—earth and sky—is nothing but a white blanket of snow.
Across this vast, white wasteland, one by one, dark figures began to appear.
These silhouettes emerging across the endless expanse of the snow country were undeniably human.