Translator: Wan ED/PR: Solarin
55. Stalemateless (9)
Cheon Dongha’s dongsaeng, Cheon Eunha.
Among the characters making up Cheon Seong-heon’s name in this world, it was the character ‘Eun’ that I was the most bothered about.
There were several meanings to ‘Eun’, but according to the origin explained by Hwang Jiho, the character used in Cheon Eunha’s name was meant ‘silver’.
As I thought about in conjecture with the Silver Light (Eunhwi) Building pointed out with the hint by the Transcendent Universe, I was even more bothered.
Besides the name itself, when I thought about the origin of it, it was even more bothersome.
‘Cheon Dongha is so outstanding, but because it’s a family of few children, he is treated as bronze (dong) on the reason he was born first?’
Hwang Jiho, who beat around the bush for a while, continued to speak.
“After Cheon Dongha learned of Cheon Eunha’s existence, not much time passed when he came to the Hwang Myeong Research Institute. There were probably two reasons to choose Hwang Myeong Research Institute. The symptoms shown by Cheon Eunha were related to a subject at the Hwang Myeong Research Institute, and the Cheon clan has a connection with the Hwang Myeong Group.”
At the words that the Cheon clan had a connection with the Hwang Myeong Group, I recalled the words Hwang Jiho said before.
— During the T and C’s divorce incident, we gave strength to the C’s side.
— Cheon faction gained many debts of gratitude to our side during the divorce incident… As I can use both our strength and Cheon family’s strength, it’s not difficult to obtain TC’s inside information.
The T and C divorce, the divorce of the Taocheon Group’s founding pair, didn’t simply end with the legal divorce of the chaebeol families, but became hot-topic for days.
This divorce incident was similar to the confrontation of the two chaebeol families, who were holding hands at that time, the ‘Ju-Oh Split’, but it had very clear difference.
In the Ju-Oh Split the problem was who will take the leadership rights of Ju-Oh, but in the T and C divorce incident, the key case was with what kind of method to divide the companies and assets.
In other words, unlike the Ju-Oh Split where in the end even when the Ju-Oh’s stocks hit the bottom and whether the shareholders had a mental breakdown or not, the group itself didn’t divide, the T and C legal divorce started the fight because of the dividing of the Group itself.
This incident had a more violent aspect to it than the Ju-Oh Split, and because of the head-on confrontation between the top chaebeol families of that time, Tao and Cheon’s head-on confrontation, flurry of derivative incidents broke out and the articles were unceasing.
After the divorce legal procedure ended, the head of the TC Group became Tao, but the Cheon, who was at an overwhelming disadvantage, succeeded in taking out considerable amount of assets like real estate in Seoul key centers and a few key affiliated companies.
‘Hwang Jiho probably interfered when Cheon was tilting towards defeat.’
Thinking from Hwang Jiho’s standpoint, he wouldn’t consider ‘Taocheon’ as a good name.
So he would watch the two clans swung their blades at each other, and stretch out his hand towards the one which was losing to achieve what he wanted.
That was the Cheon, and it seemed to be Cheon Dongha’s family.
‘I thought it was surely not, because of the surname’s rarity, but at this point wasn’t this incident mentioned because that Cheon really was Cheon Dongha’s family?’
As if my prediction was right, Hwang Jiho added a word.
“I told you I interfered in the TC Group’s T and C’s divorce incident, right?”
“I remember.”
When I answered while nodding, Hwang Jiho spoke with a powerful tone, as if trying to convince me.
“In other words, Cheon Eunha received my approval and is under Hwang Myeong Research Institute’s protection. So you can speak comfortably.”
It seemed that the reason Hwang Jiho recited Cheon Dongha’s secret history line after line was because of that.
This sharp-eyed geezer guessed that I’m worried about Cheon Seong-heon and that ‘Seong-heon’ I spoke about before is the same person as Cheon Eunha.
‘It can’t be helped as I said Seongheon-yi’s name a few times in front of him.’
Even though Hwang Jiho openly sent a signal that he recognized the relationship between Cheon Seong-heon and Cheon Eunha, I couldn’t easily open my mouth.
It wasn’t that I couldn’t trust Hwang Jiho.
Cheon Seong-heon and my identity would be very different in this world.
I hesitated to reveal that big secret without Cheon Seong-heon’s approval and without the person concerned being here.
But as I repeatedly thought about it, my heart tilted towards ‘I have to say it’.
Cheon Seong-heon was dropped into this dangerous world defenseless, and the only place to lean on was his half-brother, Cheon Dongha, who would face danger of death next year according to the PMH scenario.
Even when I played the best moves I could to save my Playable Character, injured people always came out, but I couldn’t guarantee I won’t make even bigger mistakes.
‘I wish to make a connection between the Ho tribe and Seongheon-yi. In case something happens to me or Cheon Dongha…’
As I thought up this point, the hesitation disappeared.
“That’s right.”
No words were spoken after that for a while.
Instead of digging into what had happened, Jeok-ho and Kim Sinrok looked between me and Hwang Jiho, while trying hard to figure out the context of the conversation, and Baek Ho-gun remained quiet as usual.
Hwang Jiho fell into thoughts with complicated expression, and then opened his mouth.
“… Is that so, eh?”
I expected him to ask more questions, but Hwang Jiho didn’t ask about Cheon Seong-heon any longer.
Instead of that, he looked at me with unreadable eyes and then opened his mouth.
“I’ll tell you Eun-ho’s story. Opportunely, it seems that Eun-ho’s descendants finished cooking, I think we can talk after the Mountain Spirit has a meal, eh?”
At those words, the Mountain Spirit tried to flee in fright, but they were grabbed by Baek Ho-gun.
“Our apologies! We tried to make it, but there is only one portion left.”
“We heard that Uisin oppa is coming, so we worked diligently, but…”
“We prepared plentiful of ingredients, but because we kept failing… It’s only enough for one person to eat.”
Just at that moment, Eun-ho’s descendants appeared in the living room, with dying faces.
Eun-ho’s descendants were making kimchi fried rice, but even though they used white rice, it looked like they cooked with black rice.
Looking at the thing filling the bowl, I was curious how the inedible failed product looked like to make them say that.
Hwang Jiho soothed Eun-ho’s descendants, while pouring out words like clear water from green mountains, and shifting everything to the Mountain Spirit.
“Don’t worry. We’re just happy you prepared it for us. How about we feed it to the Mountain Spirit as you have suggested today? We will try on the next opportunity.”
“Yes! Mountain Spirit-ah, come here!”
“Yees! I want to quickly hear a story about Eunho-nim!”
The Mountain Spirit looked at me and imitated sobbing gestures with their hands and feet.
They seemed to be asking for help, but I ignored them.
It was because Baek Ho-gun looked at the Mountain Spirit coldly, so it seemed that they caused an incident in the meantime and made it hard for my main Playable Character.
“Then let’s make a new tea to match the story.”
Saying it, Hwang Jiho brewed the best among the white teas called ‘Báiháo Yínzhēn’ meaning ‘Silver Needle Tea’ [1], which was a tea with silver sheen on the surface.
“Among us, the one who knows Eun-ho best is Baek-ho. They had a brotherly relationship, so there’s probably a lot of history buried between the two. However, as you know Baek-ho isn’t a good narrator. So I’ll speak instead.”
It was good that he was talking about Eun-ho, but why is he roasting my main Playable Character?
I didn’t like it, but before I could say anything, Snare expressed the dissatisfaction with stood up fur over its whole body and tail.
“Hahaha! Look, even if provoked like this, Baek-ho doesn’t open his mouth? Before he lost his True Name, he was a punk, who would take and give back, whether it was right or wrong, but he became no fun.”
Hwang Jiho laughed excitedly, but Baek Ho-gun ignored Hwang Jiho, and took a sip of silver needle tea.
“When we first met it was on the competition ground.”
“… I remember that time. I was together with Hwang-ho.”
“At the time you also weren’t a bastard who used such a polite tone.”
Even while Hwang Jiho made longing eyes, his laughter showed energy[2].
Jeok-ho made an embarrassed face and glanced side-ways at Kim Sinrok.
Even though he wasn’t exactly embarrassed about the usage of crude language in the past, he seemed to be a bit bothered by mentioning his dark history in front of his son.
“I was pretty excited ahead of the sparring with Baek-ho, who was said to be the best martial artist of that period.”
“Yes, now as back then, Hwang-ho gets crazy[3] about fun things.”
As if Hwang Jiho personality was the same even in the old days, Jeok-ho added a word.
Hwang Jiho smiled once, instead of refuting, and then continued.
“But I wasn’t able to fight with Baek-ho that day.”
“… What happened?”
“Could Hwangho-nim be brought down by chance?!”
“Someone among the two couldn’t go up and dropped?”
The eyes of Eun-ho’s descendants, who fed the Mountain Spirit, listened to their impression, and then came back, turned round and asked.
I guessed no good thing happened because Hwang Jiho paused to laugh.
“At that time, the victor was Baek-ho. Jeok-ho fought Baek-ho, but I wasn’t able to fight Baek-ho.”
Hwang Jiho spoke using ambiguous words, but the meaning was perfectly clear.
Hwang Jiho lost to someone before he could fight Baek-ho.
And at this timing, there was only one being worthy to appear and win against Hwang Jiho.
“No way, the one, who won against you was…”
Before I could complete my words, Hwang Jiho voluntarily declared.
“Yeah, the one who won against me was Eun-ho.”
At Hwang Jiho’s words, Eun-ho’s descendants burst out into cheers.
It seemed that Eun-ho’s descendants also heard that story for the first time.
“Wow! Eunho-nim against Hwangho-nim?”
“One moment, You said that the winner was Baekho-nim, so did Baekho-nim won against Eunho-nim?”
“Then the ranking was Baekho-nim, Eunho-nim and Hwangho-nim?”
Eun-ho’s descendants made a gut-punching sound.
That said, it was an arrangement that matched logic.
Before Hwang Jiho could confirm or deny those words, Baek Ho-gun and Jeok-ho each threw the words.
“Eun-ho wasn’t that strong. He read Hwang-ho’s personality, and using a trick he won the match according to the decided rules.”
“At that time, Hwang-ho’s expression and actions were truly worth seeing. He persistently asked Eun-ho for a rematch, and when Baek-ho appeared, he also asked for a spar with Baekho.”
Hwang Jiho truly was exactly the same now as in the past, huh!
Hwang Jiho chasing my device and sending messages while offering all kinds of things was exactly the same as his old appearance.
If I had to find a difference, it would be that it became a very little bit more polite and dignified perhaps because he was old now.
“Then did Hwangho-nim and Baekho-nim had an additional match that day?”
“No, before that, Cheong-ho showed her hand, saying to stop annoying Eun-ho. Hwang-ho lost again that day to Cheong-ho’s taehokwon. It was still just after the taehokwon was invented, so it was said it wasn’t refined.”
I guess before meeting Hwang Jiho and Jeok-ho, Cheong-ho was already acquainted with Baek Ho-gun and Eun-ho.
‘Then when did Cheong-ho and Sinin meet? Did they already meet at this point? Or not yet?’
I was curious, but it was difficult to ask because of the conversation flow, and as it seemed that the geezer would solve my curiosity if I listened to the old stories he told, I decided to shut my mouth and listen.
More than that, it was fun to watch Jeok-ho strike at Hwang Jiho with facts and relieved my feelings.
Hwang Jiho, who was quietly listening, refuted Jeok-ho’s words.
“I don’t specialize in body attacks. Because at the time according to the rules I could only use body arts, this body was at a disadvantage.”
“Hwang-ho, even though You knew that, didn’t You confidently step up? You said that You don’t specialize in using the body, but you could overwhelm them.”
“…”
The rebuttal instantly ended with a worthy re-rebuttal.
“… Okay, that day I lost to Cheong-ho with taehokwon, and was completely defeated by Eun-ho. Eun-ho’s strategy was brilliant.”
Hwang Jiho’s face didn’t hold any ill feelings.
Rather, it was a face of longing.
“That perfect victory was worthy respect for Eun-ho.”
*~*~*
[1] Silver Needle Tea — in Korean it’s called ‘백호은침 (baekhoeunchim)’, and as you might have noticed it contains both the word ‘Baek-ho’ and word ‘Eun-ho (if read backwards)’.
[2] energy — 신기 (singi) literally means a divine energy/qi, the energy that moves the universe, or a divine skill.
[3] gets crazy — Korean idiom ‘Can’t move his four legs’ meaning the person is so fascinated or captivated by something they can’t move. Generally, it means to be obsessed with something.
Translator’s note: I like how this chapter directly confirms that not only the author-nim but also Hwang-ho, the character in the story, is consciously matching teas with the situation and conversation topics.
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