Return of the Mount Hua

What is it you desire? (2)

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“You brought back quite a lot.”

“….I was lucky.”

Kharkhan [하르한] answered with an emotionless face.

In truth, he had been lucky. One wrong move, and he might have become a bear’s meal. When winter drew near, even the bears came down south as if driven by the cold. If one encountered a bear grown ferocious before hibernation, one could give up the chance of a clean death.

“Still, it seems risking your life was worth it. With this much, you won’t be short for getting through the winter.”

“That’s right.”

Kharkhan glanced back at the hides he had carried in. They were roughly prepared, but there were quite a few of them.

To survive the winter, fur hides were needed. A great many of them, at that.

A bear could simply go to sleep for the winter, but people could not help but remain active. And these fur hides were their only weapon in fighting against the great god of winter.

Just as one could not win a war without enough weapons, one could not survive winter without enough fur hides.

Fortunately, this harvest had been rather good. With this much, they should be able to pass through this winter without trouble.

The middle-aged man, who had been looking at Kharkhan’s hides with envy, caught sight of the pure white one laid on top and suddenly his eyes lit up.

“This is?”

“Yes.”

Kharkhan nodded.

“I intend to give it to Elder [원로(元老)*] Jan.”

The middle-aged man nodded with a satisfied expression.

“Hm, children these days seem to lack respect for him. I’m glad you’re not like that.”

“I have received much from him, after all.”

“Yes. If one forgets a debt of gratitude, one is no man of the white land. Go on, then.”

“Yes.”

Kharkhan bowed his head deeply and entered the village.

A small village lined with little wooden houses. It was the place where Kharkhan had lived his entire life. A land of brutal cold where, once winter came, the whole world was covered in white, and even gray wolves that wandered in search of people to tear apart would freeze solid overnight.

After quietly looking around the village once more, Kharkhan stopped in front of the smallest and shabbiest house among them all and knocked on the door.

“Are you inside, Elder?”

Instead of an answer, he heard the sound of a worn down cough. Kharkhan did not wait, but went inside and quickly shut the door.

Because he knew that the wind carrying the chill of the approaching winter was more than deadly to an old man like Elder Jan.

“It’s you, Kharkhan.”

“Yes. I’m here.”

He untied the pure white hide laid at the very top among the hides he carried on his back. Then he carefully set it down before the old man, who sat leaning against the wall with several layers of fur over him.

“It is a hide from a recent hunt.”

The old man’s face was deeply wrinkled, and his eyes were somewhat clouded. At a glance, he seemed to have not many days left to live. The old man stared at the fur Kharkhan had set down, then slowly shook his head.

“Take it back.”

“Elder.”

“I won’t make it through this winter anyway.”

“Please don’t say that!”

Kharkhan’s voice rose sharply.

The elder was the greatest man among all those he knew. He was also the man who had raised Kharkhan into a proper warrior after he had lost his parents to a bear during a hunt.

How could he bear to see such a man appear so weak?

“You are a strong man, Elder. A mere winter cannot do anything to you.”

“…”

“Is that not why all of us believed in you and followed you? Even though your skin color and appearance were different from ours.”

At those words, a brief flicker of regret passed through the old man’s eyes.

The old man lifted the kettle that had been set over the brazier. When he poured the warm water, the lump of dried tea that had been prepared in the cup began to steep, giving off a strange fragrance.

“Drink. It will warm your body.”

Kharkhan silently accepted the tea the old man offered him.

To be honest, Kharkhan did not particularly enjoy this tea. It was entirely different from the White Labrador tea [백산차(白山차)] or Chamaenerion tea [이반차 or Ivan tea] they usually drank. Its fragrance was exceedingly distinctive, and it seemed there were quite a few among the villagers who had actually become captivated by the tea the elder served them, but Kharkhan, at least, was not one of them.

“It seems you still have some left from before.”

“I saved it… When one passes through his final winter, he begins to crave tea.”

The old man quietly looked at the tea set before him, then opened his mouth.

“Kharkhan.”

“Yes. Elder.”

“I am not as strong a man as you think.”

“…What do you mean? Elder, you are the strongest and bravest person I know.”

“I am not brave.”

The elder slowly shook his head.

“I am a fugitive.”

“Everyone in the village knows that you are someone who committed a crime in the Central Plains and fled here. But something like that is…”

“No. That is not it.”

“…Pardon?”

The old man looked straight at Kharkhan and spoke calmly.

“I have never committed a crime.”

“Th-Then?”

Kharkhan stared at the old man with a bewildered expression.

The villagers all knew the old man as a fugitive. As someone who had fled from that far southern land called the Central Plains and drifted all the way here.

“I merely… ran away. Unable to overcome my fear, I ran and ran until I ended up in this distant land… I am nothing more than a wretched coward.”

Kharkhan simply could not believe it.

‘A coward?’

If he had been asked to choose the word least suited to the old man before his eyes, Kharkhan would have thought of that word without hesitation.

The elder was a man who knew no fear.

Not only could he beat a bear the size of a house to death with his bare hands, but when a neighboring tribe invaded, he had not hesitated to charge into the midst of dozens of warriors with a single spear in hand.

That was why, despite the difference in skin color, everyone had accepted him as one of the tribe, and even held him in the highest respect.

But as if proving that these words were no lie, the old man’s eyes filled with deep emotion.

“……I ran away.”

“Elder……”

“I watched the Master I revered like a father being torn to pieces, and the martial brothers I cherished like family trampled to death like insects – yet I lacked the courage to stand and fight, so I fled. I was afraid, and so I ran, and ran. I ran until I collapsed from exhaustion, and when I awoke, I kept running once more.”

The old man’s hand, holding the teacup, trembled faintly. As though he still had not shaken off the shadow of that time.

“And so I could not bring myself to return. Because even the thought of setting foot on that land again felt far too shameful. Even after I belatedly learned that they were no longer there on that land…”

The old man turned his gaze to the small window facing south.

It was clearly the same window, and yet it felt as though what the old man saw through it was different from what Kharkhan saw. The very weight of his gaze was different.

“If I seemed brave… it was not because I truly was. I merely imitated it.”

“Imitated what?”

The old man did not answer.

He seemed as though he no longer wished to say anything more. But Kharkhan could not possibly let this conversation end here.

“What was it that frightened you so much?”

“…”

“Someone as fearless as you, Elder, what in the world…”

But Kharkhan, who had been continuing his questions, had no choice but to let the end of his sentence trail off. It was not because he thought his question would wound the old man.

It was because the old man’s eyes, those eyes that seemed to be looking somewhere behind Kharkhan rather than at him, were filled with a silent scream.

Kharkhan trembled without realizing it. It was the most violent terror he had ever seen in his life, and it felt colder even than the winter of this land.

The fear, like a seizure, only barely subsided after a short while. The old man spoke in a hoarse voice.

“Kharkhan.”

“Yes?”

“You need not know. No, you must not know.”

“…”

“It is better not to know. You must never learn of it.”

Then he closed his eyes. The meaning was clear: he did not want to speak any further.

Kharkhan let out a deep sigh.

Perhaps the old man had truly sensed his own death. Otherwise, there was no reason for him to reveal now the secret he had hidden throughout nearly a hundred years of his life.

“At any rate, I will leave this hide here, so…”

“Elder! Elder Jan!”

At that moment, someone hurriedly knocked on the door.

“Uncle [or must mister/sir]?”

Bang.

Soon the door was flung open roughly, and a man whose face had turned bright red thrust himself into the house.

“Y-You have to come out for a moment!”

“What is the matter?”

“Something I’ve never seen before is…!”

“Never seen before?”

“A-Anyway, please hurry and look!”

Kharkhan furrowed his brow. At the unusual sight, the elder, too, threw off the fur blankets without another word and rose to his feet.

“Let me see.”

“This way, quickly!”

As the old man was about to go outside, Kharkhan swiftly draped the pure white hide he had brought over the old man’s shoulders.

The old man nodded faintly, then left the house.

By now, the sun had almost set. The frozen earth was now drenched red in the vivid sunset glow.

“What is it you want me to see?”

“O-Over there, I mean, there.”

With eyes that had already lost half their light, the old man quietly gazed northward where the middle-aged man pointed.

All that could be seen was the dense coniferous forest, the deep green not yet stained white…

Then, the old man’s eyes slowly widened, and his pupils trembled.

“Ah…..”

The dark forest was swaying.

No, it was not the forest itself. Something was surging endlessly through the dense woods.

At last, the moment he faced the true nature of that surging mass, the old man could not hide his astonishment.

Watching beside him, Kharkhan spoke in a low voice.

“They are people. There should hardly be anyone living to the north, so how are there suddenly so many people in worn black robes…”

“Ah, aaah……”

“Elder?”

“No. No… No. This is a dream. It has to be a dream.”

“…”

“Auuugh. Aaahhhh……”

A groan escaped the old man’s mouth, something that could hardly be called human. It sounded like the cry of someone cast into hell and driven to despair, or the wailing of a ghost from the underworld.

Kharkhan did not even dare ask why he was acting like this.

He stared blankly at the forest. Something was slowly emerging from it.

“Those are…”

Suddenly, a question crossed his mind. Could those things truly be called people?

The faces of the humans wrapped head to toe in black cloth had neither color nor emotion. They could only be seen as people because they were slowly walking towards this place.

Kharkhan felt his throat tighten.

Though they were so gaunt and emaciated, seemingly unable to properly catch even a single rabbit, Kharkhan suddenly wanted to flee at once. Far away, without looking back. Anywhere at all would do, so long as it was somewhere they could not reach.

“In the end, in the end…..”

“E-Elder. First, please calm down and…”

Kharkhan tried to reach out a hand to calm the old man. But at that moment, the old man instead seized Kharkhan’s shoulder. His grip was astonishingly strong.

“Go, Kharkhan.”

“Yes?”

In contrast to the force in that grip, the hand clutching Kharkhan’s shoulder was trembling violently.

“…To the Central Plains. Go to the Central Plains. Go and…”

The old man bit down on his lip. As though he were forcing himself to recall a memory that would not readily come to mind.

“The Beggars Sect… no! No! Find a place called Hwasan. You must tell them.”

“Hwasan? What in the world is that…”

“There is no time to explain!”

“…”

“Run until your heart bursts. Even if you collapse from exhaustion along the way, do not stop. As long as breath remains in you, run and run more. And tell them. Tell the Central Plains, tell Hwasan!”

Because the old man’s voice and gaze were so terribly desperate, Kharkhan could not even think to question him and simply nodded.

“In the end… Tell them that, in the end, the Cult has returned. Tell them that.”

“The Cult…”

The old man shoved Kharkhan away forcefully.

“Go! Take as many people with you as you can and run! Right now!”

“Elder! Rather than me, you should…!”

“I have already run away once.”

“…”

“And so I cannot run away twice.”

The old man reached out and grasped the old spear that had been leaning against his house.

“Go and tell them. Tell them the world will turn into hell once more.”

“Elder…”

“Go!”

A thunderous roar burst from the old man’s mouth. Without understanding why, Kharkhan turned and began to run with all his might.

Main Story Chapter 1923 >>>

Special Spinoff Chapter 41 >>>

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*Not Elder like in a sect (장로), but more like a senior person respected for their status, someone having a high status in a community. 

About the name. Kharkhan – хархан – is a Mongolian word. The meaning of it is: quite black; somewhat dark/black. An affectionate/endearing form referring to something black or dark-colored. The suffix -хан (-khan) / -хэн (khen) often adds a sense of affection, endearment, tenderness, or smallness. So хархан is not simply “black.” So the use cases of this word I’ve found are smth like this: хархан нүд = beautiful dark eyes, lovely black eyes, dark little eyes (affectionately); хархан бүсгүй = a dark-haired beauty (depending on context).

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