Traveling by carriage along the Eastern Road, Euyn studies the uneasy arrangement of his companions: Mikail sits close to Sora and seems genuinely drawn to her; Aeri sits with Royo; and Euyn is left beside Tiyung (Ty), with whom he shares mutual discomfort. Euyn notes Ty watching Mikail and Sora with an intensity that suggests jealousy.

Euyn privately connects Sora to an older case: he becomes convinced Count Seok was the nobleman who bought Chul’s daughters, based on their distinctive names and their northern origins. Euyn reconsiders Chul’s account—threats against Chul’s family, allegedly forged indentures, and a magistrate filing them—and decides Seok’s influence could have made such corruption possible. Euyn keeps this from Sora, recognizing that admitting he hunted Chul and heard the father never stopped searching for his daughters would shatter trust and risk political fallout with Ty, the southern count’s son.

Euyn confronts Ty quietly, naming what he sees: Ty is in love with Sora, and Sora hates Ty. Ty admits both and speaks with resignation. Their conversation turns to Rune’s claim that Sora’s body is poison; Ty says he does not know if it is true, but acknowledges that the belief protects Sora from men.

Ty explains his father’s poison school is gone because it was too costly and unprofitable: from twenty children, only three assassins resulted, and one later died on assignment. Ty emphasizes Sora’s value as a “poison maiden,” calling her one of only two in the country and a gift to Euyn. Hearing this, Euyn feels relieved he did not reveal Chul’s connection, yet he also feels uneasy at treating Sora as a political asset while telling himself he will reunite her with her father after success.

Alone with his thoughts, Euyn admits fears he cannot share: he worries that at coronation he might turn to ash and be exposed as an impostor. He recalls that four years earlier his mother confessed on her deathbed that the old king was not Euyn’s real father, and in a surge of rage Euyn killed her by snapping her neck, leaving him without the truth of his paternity. Euyn links his subsequent cruelty—beginning to hunt prisoners a week later—to his guilt, and he refuses to confess any of it to Mikail, convinced even Mikail’s love would have limits.