Return of the Mount Hua

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Whether out of shyness – or because she still hadn’t dropped her guard – the girl stubbornly refused at first, but in the end she couldn’t overcome her hunger and took the food Chung Myung has offered.

“I-It’s delicious… I can’t believe food like this existed.”

“Eat slowly.”

“I-I’ve never had this before, either. Oh my, how do you even make something like this?”

“…Slow down a little.”

“What a strange taste. Keh! Khehkheh!”

“Eat slowly! For once, listen when someone tells you something!”

This is why kids are the worst! The ones back at Hwasan, and this one here, too! Why does every last one of them refuse to listen?!

“Ah. I’m sorry. Taoist-nim, you eat too.”

“No. I’ve eaten a lot.”

“Then I can’t eat, because I’ll feel bad.”

At the mildly scolding tone, Chung Myung let out a snort.

“Fine.”

Picking up a roasted chicken leg, he began eating as well, watching the girl resume devouring her portion.

“By the way, where did the adults go?”

The girl’s hand froze midair.

“There aren’t any.”

“Why? Where did they go?”

“They passed away.”

“…”

Chung Myung glanced down at his own hand. Would it be better if he just smacked himself across the face with this?

“Th-Then… the bandits you mentioned earlier?”

“No. Before that. From illness.”

“Wait, then you’re living here alone?”

“Yes.”

“…Here?”

Chung Myung stared at the girl, dumbfounded.

“How long have you been living here alone?”

“Not that long. Um… about a year, I think?”

“A year? A whole year?”

Chung Myung’s mouth fell open as he looked again at the desolate scenery outside the door.

‘What kind of kid is this?’

It was so deep in the mountains that even a grown man would be afraid to look outside once night fell. And a child this young had been living here alone?

‘Come to think of it…’

It wasn’t just that her clothes were shabby. Even looking at her hands, she was all bones – pitifully thin. She probably hadn’t been able to eat properly for an entire year.

“No… Living alone in the mountains isn’t something just anyone can do. Wouldn’t it be better to go to the city instead?”

“I think so, too.”

“Then why?”

“My mother said it’s dangerous for a girl to go out into the world alone, so I should live here until I’m a little older.”

“That’s not exactly wrong.”

“She said with my personality, if I went to the city carelessly, I’d fall for some wicked trick and end up suffering for it.”

“…”

“She said anyone who comes up to you talking nicely and offering you something good is a con artist, a bad person. Especially the ones who share food……. Huh?”

“Uh?”

Chung Myung’s and the girl’s gazes dropped at the same time to the food spread out on the floor, then met again in the air.

“People who give you food are…”

“They’re not.”

“…bad people?”

“I said they’re not.”

“Then are you, maybe… a swindler?”

Smack!

“Kwaaak!”

The girl flopped face-first to the ground after Chung Myung’s fist landed squarely on her head, then rolled around clutching the crown of her head.

“I’ve had just about enough of this! Calling a Taoist a swindler!”

“If you’re not one, just say you’re not! Why are you hitting me!”

“Sheesh.”

A sigh slipped out of Chung Myung’s mouth. Why was it that every person he ran into ended up like this?

He’d thought maybe the parents had been a bit hopeless, but the truth was, they had a point. With a bratty personality like that, she was just the type to draw people’s attention.

‘For people with no one to rely on, the world isn’t easy.’

Shaking his head, Chung Myung asked again, more gently.

“Anyway – what did you mean about having to get the plum blossom back?”

“Ah, well.”

The girl turned her head to the side. The door stood wide open. Beyond it, a high slope could be seen – one of the few spots in this dense forest where warm sunlight spilled down. Looking closer, there were two small burial mounds there.

“…”

He hadn’t noticed on the way in, but now that he looked again, the mounds were very well kept. The girl must have been quite diligent. Or perhaps, in a mountain this remote, there was little else to do.

“It’s where my father and mother are buried. That flower was originally stuck into my father’s grave.”

The girl’s gaze grew a little distant.

“My father loved plum blossoms when he was alive. Sometimes he would just stand there, staring at them absentmindedly.”

“…”

“Even to my young eyes, he looked strangely sad. That’s why I still remember it clearly – his back as he looked at the plum blossoms.”

Without a word, Chung Myung looked at the mound where weeds had started to grow.

“After my father died, one day my mother went to the market, and she bought that white plum blossom and placed it on my father’s grave. Later, I found out: to buy that flower, my mother saved money by barely eating properly for a whole month.”

“Hmm….”

It wasn’t an extraordinary story. To Chung Myung, it simply meant that the flower carried that much meaning for them.

Wait. A month? Chung Myung, who had been looking at the burial mounds with a faint pity, snapped his head around.

“A month, you said?”

This house was so old it was a wonder it hadn’t collapsed already. The girl had said her mother died a year ago, which meant it had probably been the same even before that. In other words, this mother and daughter had been so poor they barely had money to eat and stay alive.

“A month… how much did she buy it for?”

“Huh?”

“That flower – uh, how much did she pay for it?”

“Well… it was a long time ago… I think I heard… um… two coins?”

“Two… two coins? She bought it for two copper coins? Two? Not two nyang of gold, not two nyang of silver – two measly coins?”

“I think so.”

“Uuughhh….”

Chung Myung clawed at his own face with both hands.

“Two coins… Hwasan’s sacred relic… the Great Hwasan Sect’s sacred relic, for two coins…….”

No matter how useless it might actually be, it was still Hwasan’s sacred relic. A hundred years ago, people wouldn’t just have paid ten thousand gold for it – there would’ve been crowds ready to pay fortunes beyond counting. Because in exchange for returning that relic, you could have asked Hwasan for a favor.

And that relic – what? It got sold off for two copper coins?

“H-Hwasan’s sacred relic treated like a beggar’s cracked bowl…”

Clear tears welled in Chung Myung’s eyes.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes…… fine. So? What happened to the flower?”

The girl stared at him, puzzled, then tilted her head and continued.

“Then one day, people came all the way out here into the deep mountains. Probably… they’d committed a crime somewhere and were on the run. Otherwise there’s no reason to come this far in.”

“That’s likely.”

“And they…”

– Doesn’t this look kind of expensive?

– It’s crude at a glance – looks like something a woodcutter slapped together. Why would anything valuable be stuck here?

– You don’t know what you’re talking about. In a big city, there are plenty of idiots who go crazy for stuff like this. Let’s take it for now.

“I wanted to stop them.”

The girl’s eyes shook.

“That was… something I couldn’t lose like that. Because it was something my mother gave to my father. So I had to stop them. I had to, but…”

Her hand trembled slightly. Then, almost reflexively, she grabbed her own leg.

“But I… I….”

“You weren’t foolish. That’s all.”

“…”

Chung Myung cut her off.

“If you’d worked up your courage then, the one here right now wouldn’t be you – it’d be your corpse. That’s not courage. That’s what you call reckless bravado. Real courage is knowing how to endure.”

“But…”

“But, my foot.”

He frowned sharply. Men like that didn’t see people as people. If you caught their eye for no reason, you’d better be prepared to lose your head.

“Anyway, I get it up to that point. But that getup of yours… don’t tell me you were planning to get it back?”

“Yes.”

“And you know where those bastards are?”

“…I thought they might come back.”

Chung Myung looked at her with a doubtful expression.

“Does that make any sense?”

“There’s no guarantee, but…”

The girl pressed her lips together, then spoke.

“If they hid all the way out here, then they’re criminals, and people like that end up committing crimes again sooner or later. Even if this is just a thatched hut about to fall over, they know it’s a place where they can hide. So I thought… sooner or later, they might come back to take shelter.”

“…”

“Wouldn’t they?”

“…That actually sounds plausible.”

“What?”

“Now that I hear it, there’s some logic to it.”

Chung Myung tilted his head, his brow furrowed slightly. Wasn’t it reasonable, in its own way?

“Right?”

“Yeah. I guess… no, wait – that’s not the point!”

Chung Myung snapped back to his senses and shouted.

“That’s not what matters. So what? If those assholes come back, what are you going to do? Fight them with that stuff?”

“…”

“Great, great. Two graves aren’t enough for you – you’re trying to bump it up to three?”

“But… if I don’t, I won’t be able to get the flower back.”

“So what if you can’t?”

The girl bit her lip hard, gripping the hem of her clothes so tightly her fingers turned white.

“Don’t say that so easily.”

“It’s nothing but a two-coin flower at best.”

“It might be ‘at best’ to other people, but it’s not to me.”

“Maybe not. Value is something you decide for yourself.”

Chung Myung shook his head with a displeased look and went on.

“But it’s not more precious than your life.”

“…”

“If you die doing this, do you think your parents over there would applaud and say ‘well done’? Or what – if you get an arm chopped off and bring the flower back, are they going to dance in their graves because their daughter’s so filial?”

“That’s not it………”

“Enough. Put all that crap down right now. Unless you want to get in trouble.”

“Who do you think you are, Taoist-nim – ah, no, wait. Hold on. You’re not going to hit me again, are you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Y-You’re a Taoist. Are Taoists allowed to beat people up?”

“Yeah. We are.”

“That’s not… true, I think.”

“What do you mean it’s not? I’m a Taoist, so I’d know.”

“…Still, I don’t think that’s right.”

Looking sulky, the girl pouted and slowly set the axe down.

Chung Myung glanced again at the burial mounds and let out a deep sigh.

‘A man who liked plum blossoms……..’

Well. Was it really as simple as just liking them?

Chung Myung’s gaze fixed on the wooden sword the girl was fussing with as she unstrapped it. A wooden sword worn smooth and glossy from constant handling. What meaning could a wooden sword have in mountains like these? It would be nothing but a stick that couldn’t even skin a mountain beast.

Or maybe not. Maybe there had been a man who had to let go of the sword, but in the end couldn’t bring himself to throw it away. In these mountains, struggling just to live, and yet still, to the very end…

“Got it.”

Chung Myung straightened up and rose from his seat.

“More importantly, if you keep living out here, it’s dangero-… huh?”

Chung Myung whipped his head around. Beyond the door flung wide open, a thick, rough voice rang out from far away.

“Do we really have to come back here?”

“How many times do I have to say it? That pawnbroker bastard said he’d pay big money if we find out where this flower came from.”

Chung Myung’s mouth twitched. When he looked at the girl, she was staring back at him too – she must have heard the voices as well, her face pale and tense.

“What would some backwoods bumpkin living in these mountains know? She probably just picked it up somewhere.”

“Then make her come up with some convincing story.”

“Ah, why not just make one up ourselves!”

“Don’t be so dense. If it really comes down to it, we can just sell the bitch off somewhere. From the look of it, she’s got no kin – no trouble afterward, either.”

“So that was the plan from the start.”

“Heh-heh. Come on – let’s go.”

The girl trembled visibly, having heard every word. Watching her, Chung Myung clicked his tongue. It was almost fascinating – scum like that were always unnecessarily diligent and persistent.

“They really do work hard. So damn hard.”

“Run, Taoist-nim.”

Even with her face drained of blood, the girl picked the axe back up.

“They’re terrifying people. I-I saw them before. They knocked down a huge tree with a single punch.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Hurry. You have to run right now.”

Chung Myung let out a snort.

“Then we should run together.”

The girl clenched the axe in her hand hard enough to crush it.

“I… if I run away from here, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. I have to get it back no matter what…”

Chung Myung suddenly grabbed the back of her collar and yanked her towards himself.

“T-Taoist-nim.”

“Listen carefully.”

“…Yes?”

Crushed under Chung Myung’s powerful presence, the girl froze with her eyes widened into perfect circles.

“Regretting something for the rest of your life isn’t what’s scary. What’s truly scary is not even getting the chance to regret it.”

“…”

Letting go of her, Chung Myung let out a short sigh and tapped the girl on the head once.

“So sit your butt down, brat. This is an adult’s business.”

As a strange mix of pity and pride crossed through him, the men the girl had called bandits spotted her outside the door and shouted.

“There she is.”

“Look at that – she didn’t even run.”

“Where would a kid go, anyway?”

“Come on, over here. Now.”

The girl reflexively lifted the axe in her hand. Seeing that, the burly men burst into loud laughter.

“And what are you going to do with that? Try to fight us or something?”

“That’s cute. Really cute.”

It was just as the girl grit her teeth and raised the axe higher.

“Yeah. I think so too.”

Chung Myung patted the girl’s shoulder and strode forward. Then he looked at the burly men and broke into a wide grin.

“Cute. The way you behave.”

For an instant, bafflement crossed the men’s faces. They probably hadn’t expected anyone else to be here besides the girl.

But that emotion vanished even faster than it had appeared. In its place came thick sneers full of contempt.

“Well, look at that. There’s another brat here I’ve never seen before?”

“Yeah. I thought I’d be thrown off because there was an adult – huh? A brat?”

Chung Myung’s brows twitched sharply.

“What’s with that little runt?”

“Looks like they’re friends. Kids playing together – how cute.”

“…”

A vein bulged on Chung Myung’s forehead.

‘These bastards, seriously…’

Some lowlifes who probably hadn’t even lived half as long as he had, kept calling him a brat, a brat! If he weren’t a Taoist, he’d have grandsons as big as them! No – wait……. would it be great-grandsons? Great-great-grandsons?

Just as Chung Myung was about to snap back at them, one of the burly men waved a hand as if it were annoying.

“Tsk. Fine. We’ll pretend we didn’t see you. Now get lost.”

“Yeah, killing one little fly just gets blood on your hands. Close your eyes and walk past, and nothing happens. I’m giving you a chance – take it and go.”

“So… What you’re saying is…”

Chung Myung’s head tilted slightly to the side.

“…that you’re showing me mercy?”

“Something like that. I’m not in a bad mood today.”

“Ah…….. yeah? I see. So that’s how it is. This is, heh………”

What kind of feeling was this supposed to be? He’d heard of a mouse worrying about a cat. But a mouse showing mercy to a cat? That was new.

Receiving treatment he’d never once gotten in all his life, Chung Myung’s thoughts started to twist up in confusion.

“But the thing is, I…”

“Didn’t we tell you to shut up and scram? We’re letting you go because you’re annoying, not because we like your face.”

“Yeah. Clamp that mouth shut and run the other way, unless you want to find out what color blood comes out of your heart.”

I think I actually know that… but you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.

So absurd it made him laugh, Chung Myung shook his head.

“Never thought I’d live to see the day bandit scum offered me mercy.”

“Bandits? Bandits, you say. Who are you calling that?”

One of the burly men snickered as he spoke.

“Yeah, I guess you’re still standing there because you think we’re just some random bandit trash. Listen well, kid. In this world, they call us the Twin Fiends of Shaanxi. If your ears work, you’ve heard that name, right? We’re not the kind of people who should be compared to some half-assed bandits.”

“Hold on. What did you say you’re called?”

“Are your earholes clogged up, you little bastard? The Twin Fiends of Shaanxi! The Twin Fiends!”

Twin Fiends? That part wasn’t the issue. Every thug and his buddy ran around with some ridiculous nickname like that.

The problem wasn’t that…

“Your puny nickname has ‘Shaanxi’ in it?”

Chung Myung let out a sigh so deep it seemed the ground might cave in, then dragged a hand down his face.

Usually, when a region’s name gets attached to a title, it means you’re someone the area recognizes, one way or another – good or bad.

The Twin Fiends of Shaanxi. Two rabid dogs of Shaanxi.

“You guys are really unlucky. If you were the Twin Fiends of Hubei, or at least the Twin Fiends of Xian, I might’ve let it slide. But why did ‘Shaanxi’ have to be stuck to that name of yours.”

“…What the hell are you talking about, you little punk?”

“Because Shaanxi is our territory.”

Chung Myung cracked his neck left and right. 

Crack. Crack.

“When trash like you has ‘Shaanxi’ stuck onto their name, it’s like you’re going around bragging to the whole world that we’ve done a lousy job managing Shaanxi.”

That was why, in the past, Sapas didn’t dare attach the name ‘Shaanxi’ to their titles. If someone so much as tried to wedge those two characters into their nickname, they’d flee to another province without looking back.

Or else, they’d simply disappear without a trace.

“Well, people get busy, right? When you’re busy, you can neglect cleaning up, you can skip doing laundry. That’s not what matters. But when you’re hurrying along and a huge piece of garbage drops right in front of your eyes, it’s hard not to pick it up and throw it out, you know what I mean?”

The Twin Fiends of Shaanxi exchanged looks, dumbfounded.

“What the hell is this bastard saying?”

“Must be some lunatic.”

“That kid is already crazy?”

“Does madness follow any order?”

One of the burly men burst out laughing and pulled a massive Dadao [大坎刀] from his waist.

“What a pity. I’m not feeling patient anymore.”

Watching that, Chung Myung scoffed, as if he found it amusing.

“You’d better put that away. Sure, it’ll hurt either way if you get hit, but wouldn’t it be better to get hit in a way that hurts a little less?”

“You little rat, I’ve heard enough out of you!”

The burly man rolled his eyes as if they might flip over and kicked off the ground.

Swaeaeaeak! 

His enormous figure shoot towards Chung Myung, blasting out a savage gust of wind. The terrifying force of it proved that the nickname attached to them was by no means an empty title.

“I’ll rip that mouth of yours into a thousand pieces!”

Final part of the side story >>>

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