Translator: Wan ED/PR: Solarin
55. Stalemateless (12)
Hwang Myeong-ho’s great mansion.
As if he enjoyed laying out old stories, Hwang Jiho described the spar, where he first met Eun-ho in great detail.
Sometimes Jeok-ho would add a word, but most of it was a description of how much Hwang Jiho was laughing and counted his chickens before they hatch[1].
In retaliation for that, Hwang Jiho reenacted the rough words Jeok-ho used.
“Yes? Jeokho-nim said something like this?”
“Jeokho-nim always speaks politely to us!”
“Aay, there is no way that Jeokho-nim said something like this, right?”
Eun-ho’s descendants raised their voices, as they couldn’t believe it.
In the past, when Baek Ho-gun attacked Kim Sinrok to make him faint, I also felt the same the moment I saw Jeok-ho cussing, so I deeply sympathized.
‘If I didn’t see him curse at that time, I would think that the geezer was exaggerating.’
If I had to put it, it was as if that great personality was the same as in the past when it was related to his son.
But Kim Sinrok, who heard about Jeok-ho’s manner of speaking in his younger days, made a face as if he doubted his ears.
“….?”
Kim Sinrok looked back and forth between Jeok-ho and Hwang Jiho with a puzzled face.
Soon, as if he thought that he misunderstood Hwang Jiho’s words or that the geezer was exaggerating the tale to tease his close friend, he nodded to himself with his own understanding.
On the other side, Hwang Jiho, who saw Eun-ho’s descendants and Kim Sinrok’s reactions, laughed with a very satisfied face.
“Hahahaha! If we consider the manner of speaking alone, Jeok-ho changed the most among us. Jeok-ho was famous for his rough mouth and being a troublemaker.”
“Hwang-ho didn’t change at all. Cheong-ho always frowned, because he was always ready to laugh like this.”
Seeing how Jeok-ho didn’t refute, it seemed that everything Hwang Jiho said was true.
As instead of refuting, he attacked Hwang Jiho by adding a word, it seemed that the old personality was showing a little.
“… When I first meet Hwangho-nim, He was scary, but now He laughs a lot.”
“Hwangho-nim was like this since old times, huh!”
“Ah, I heard stories about Cheongho-nim from Cheongho-nim’s Disciples a few times! If other Ho tribe Members caused an incident, it would always be Cheongho-nim who helped Eunho-nim to resolve the situation.”
When Cheong-ho’s story came out, Kim Sinrok also added a few words.
“I don’t know much about events before I was born, but I remember that Cheongho-nim, who acted as my master, was always busy.”
“Cheong-ho helped Eun-ho a lot. Eun-ho tried to shift the position of the head to the me of that time, so I stayed away from Ho tribe’s work.”
I guess the geezer didn’t work like the chairman in PMH even in the old days.
But at the time he wasn’t the head.
“To distance himself from work, Hwang-ho caused incidents, and Eun-ho and Cheong-ho’s hands were full. Usually, Hwang-ho would behave comparatively meekly, but if he was ordered to work, he would play a prank each time.”
“Hahahaha! Even so, didn’t you always play along with my pranks?! Because Cheong-ho would always take Eun-ho’s side, and Baek-ho tried to avoid things that would annoy his dongsaeng.”
I guess Hwang Jiho and Jeok-ho played pranks, Cheong-ho and Eun-ho solved them and Baek Ho-gun took a step back.
As expected, worthy of my Playable Character, Baek Ho-gun didn’t go along with the geezer and didn’t take actions that would bring annoyance to his dongsaeng.
“But the pranks me and You caused were in vain desperation. In the end, didn’t You learn the work of the Ho tribe as Eun-ho intended?”
At Jeok-ho’s words, Hwang Jiho nodded.
“Yeah. Because Eun-ho completely figured out what I was thinking and played a move. He knew well how to make me carry that heavy responsibility.”
“What Eunho-nim did?”
“It would be a bit complicated to say what kind of incident it was. If I was to make a comparison, right…”
Hwang Jiho, who fell into thought for a while, abruptly looked at me.
As if he recalled something when looking at me, he opened his mouth:
“Let’s compare it to chess. It was as if Eun-ho played moves, using even himself as a chess piece. So even though I knew Eun-ho’s intentions, it was very difficult to fight back against that move.”
A type that would play moves, using even himself as a chess piece.
Hearing those words, I also recalled an old event, though it wasn’t an event as old as the one involving the tigers.
The event when the kind junior used himself as a chess piece and destroyed his family was like that.
Eun-ho’s manner of speaking described by Hwang Jiho, and the hint given by the Transcendent Universe, made me associate all of them with that junior.
I felt my throat go dry at that thought, but Hwang Jiho poured me another cup of báiháo yínzhēn tea just in time, as he continued the story.
“Then shall I tell the story of that day? The event after Jeok-ho was cruelly defeated by Baek-ho, and that Baek-ho listened to Eun-ho’s nagging for a while.”
“You will talk about the moment when You were defeated by Eun-ho even more thoroughly than me, eh?”
“Hahaha! It wasn’t as serious as you.”
Considering that both of them miserably fell on their face while talking about finals and victory, both were the same.
Both tigers looked similar, but they started a strange competition of pride.
Hwang Jiho and Jeok-ho started to describe whose loss was worse, but from my perspective, it was the same.
But thanks to the two tigers’ competition, the description became even more detailed and vivid, so I didn’t say anything.
I enjoyed listening about how my main Playable Character won in front of the Heavenly God.
But even then, a certain hypothesis kept becoming stronger in my head.
‘… the hypothesis I made may be true.’
I leaned my ears to find more clues in the tigers’ story.
In the story, the gentle Eun-ho, who possessed amazing hand skills to even make Baek Ho-gun’s weapons.
In my memory, my sociable junior, who had good hands.
The two kept coming to mind and overlapping.
* * *
The sparing ground where Heavenly God’s light descended.
Each weapon aimed at Hwang-ho’s vital spot gleaned sharply.
All weapons made personally by Eun-ho hold delicate and extraordinary sharpness as if they were made from iron needles.
‘I may be able to make a barrier by moving qi, but it’s impossible to block them all with just Bō martial arts.’
He could think that the fact the usage of qi was blocked was unreasonable, but it was the same for the opponent.
It seemed that Eun-ho in front of his eyes right now also knew how to use qi, so if he used qi, it was clear that he would capture Hwang-ho with another marvelous move.
Fighting any longer than this was useless.
Hwang-ho, who had hundreds of weapons above the destroyed sparring ground aimed at him, raised his hand.
“… I lost.”
At Hwang-ho’s declaration of defeat, cheers rang out.
Hwang-ho, who crushed other Ho tribe members with irresistible force and climbed up to face Eun-ho, who climbed up by narrow victories.
From what anyone saw, Hwang-ho was superior in the terms of overall power, but it was Eun-ho who won.
The audience couldn’t suppress their surprise at this unexpected victory.
Paaa…!
Soon Heavenly God’s light descended over Eun-ho’s head.
Eun-ho, who was illuminated by the light congratulating the victory, smiled brightly as he spoke.
“I’m glad. If Hwangho-nim didn’t acknowledge the defeat, I wouldn’t able to help it but hurt You.”
Hwang-ho was a bit angry at those words, but currently his eyes were busy twinkling, as he observed the traps[2] installed by Eun-ho.
Eun-ho, who didn’t move a step after the spar started, took one step forward and dismantle the traps he installed one after another, freeing Hwang-ho, who looked like a tiger caught in a trap.
Hwang-ho, who was released from the bindings, touched the traps, and then asked without taking a breath, while examining Eun-ho.
“What move on earth did you use when I was counting to five? What happened during the five seconds I yield?”
Before the spar started, Eun-ho made a certain suggestion.
The suggestion was that if Hwang-ho didn’t move from the place for 5 seconds, Eun-ho won’t move a step after those 5 seconds until the end of the spar.
Those words sounded extremely questionable, but Hwang-ho, who couldn’t endure the curiosity of what kind of move on earth Eun-ho would play, agreed to the suggestion.
And he was miserably caught in the trap and defeated.
“Hm, thinking about it, your spars were somewhat unnatural. While fighting all those spars, were you preparing the traps to use in the spar against me?”
Hwang-ho recited a plausible hypothesis.
Then, even though Eun-ho didn’t tell him the detailed method, he didn’t deny the hypothesis itself.
“I didn’t break the rules. As Hwangho-nim also used the floor broken by Baekho-nim to attack while fighting, we’re similar.”
“… something doesn’t feel like it, but it’s similar, eh?”
Hwang Jiho[3], who was somehow resentful, changed his mind.
And started to annoy Eun-ho.
While sparkling his pretty eyes, Hwang-ho chased after Eun-ho, who headed to leave the sparring ground.
“Let’s fight again. I request a rematch!”
Eun-ho just smiled vaguely, and didn’t give Hwang-ho the reply he wanted.
He acted even more annoying to somehow get the consent, but Baek-ho and Cheong-ho, who opportunely finished the spar and came, discovered it.
Hwang-ho’s eyes, which saw Baek-ho, twinkled again.
“Just on time, eh? Baek-ho, spar with me! This one specializes in the usage of qi, but let’s fight only using body arts according to the rules made by Heavenly God.”
“That’s an arrogant tone for a suggestion.”
Baek-ho blocked the way between Eun-ho and Hwang-ho, and glared at Hwang-ho with cold eyes.
“You couldn’t win against my dongsaeng, and you’re trying to fight with me?”
Baek-ho was about to take out a wooden sword, but Cheong-ho stepped out before that.
Cheong-ho lightly grabbed the handle of wooden sword with hand movement faster than Baek-ho, and shook her head.
“Baek-ho, did you forget Eun-ho’s words? There are too many eyes here.”
“… I hate to just leave that bastard because of that.”
“I’ll do it. Because it seems that if he is left like that, he will keep annoying Eun-ho.”
Hwang-ho, who was observing the two people’s quarrel, cut in straight away.
As it seemed that Baek-ho planned to face him, he probably couldn’t let go of this opportunity.
“The body arts you’re using are also fun. Even so, right now I want to fight Eun-ho or Baek-ho.”
Before Cheong-ho could say the word in absurd, Eun-ho stepped out first.
“Good. If Hwangho-nim wins against Cheongho-nim today, I’ll face You again.”
Hwang-ho’s eyes sparkled at Eun-ho’s suggestion, and he was satisfied.
It was because he was excited at the thought of fighting with Cheong-ho and having a rematch with Eun-ho.
Of course, that thought was completely shattered after his true defeat in the match against Cheong-ho.
When the defeated Hwang-ho gave a villain-like line ‘Hahahaha! I lost this time, eh? I won’t lose the next time!’ and was about to retreat, Eun-ho caught him.
“I and Baek-ho hyung-nim are planned to take the final round, come to watch.”
“… Aren’t you planning not to fight? It doesn’t seem like you, Eun-ho, will fight with Baek-ho.”
“Yes, I don’t plan to fight.”
Then what is fun in going to watch it?
When Hwang-ho showed an uninterested face, Eun-ho spoke as if calming him down.
“If it goes according to my guess, a precious Person will come down from the sky today.”
“Perhaps, Heavenly God…?”
“The sky have to open for Heavenly God to descend, so today is not that day. A different Person will come.”
Hooked with Eun-ho’s persuasion, Hwang-ho stayed to see the face of the ‘precious Person’.
And, in the finals when Eun-ho forfeited and Baek-ho’s victory was decided, the ‘precious Person’ came down from the sky.
“Because it’s hard for my father to directly convey His voice, I came down.” [4]
The sonorous voice of Heavenly God’s representative rang out at the site.
Behind the representative, three more stood beside him, and from the divine energy all of them had, they didn’t seem like ordinary beings.
Eun-ho, who saw them, was the first to kneel down.
“I welcome Heavenly God’s son-nim, Pungbaek, Usa and Unsa-nim.” [5]
*~*~*
[1] counted his chickens before they hatch — ‘drank kimchi juice’.
[2] traps — 함정 (hamjeong) literally means a pitfall trap.
[3] Hwang Jiho — like this in raws, could be a typo from author-nim.
[4] “Because it’s hard for my father to directly convey His voice, I came down.” — he is speaking using formal tone.
[5] Pungbaek, Usa and Unsa-nim — so ‘-nim’ could apply to all three of them, and was only used at the end to shorten the sentence, but it’s a very interesting choice…
Translator’s note: Now I’m starting to suspect that Hwang-ho’s speech tone was messed up in the previous chapter*, because it was Jeok-ho putting in his parts. Like, I knew that the narration in this novel is unreliable, but even thoughts in the third-person narration are unreliable, huh?
* Though that man is someone who tends to switch between three different speech tones in one dialogue bracket, so perhaps it’s on me for still being surprised by it.
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