Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
37. Ruins of myth (1) [1]
The age of myth, when Heavenly God’s voice clearly reached the Korean Peninsula.
When the sacred tigers[2] weren’t yet able to obtain their True Names as Jin people, let alone being treated as mythological beings.
As Korean Peninsula was barren, the Ho tribe and Ung tribe had to combine their forces to face against foreign enemies, who were neither humans nor beasts.
The Ho tribe and Ung tribe sensed the existence of foreign enemies, and two leaders asked Heavenly God for mercy, and before long the words came down:
[I shall bestow a new power to the one, who will eat only this and won’t see sunlight for 100 days.]
Together with those words, twenty pieces of divine mugwort and garlic descended from the sky through the Heavenly Sacred Tree.
Seeing the amount, the leader of the Ho tribe, Eun-ho realized that at best two warriors could receive the power from Heavenly God.
After consulting with the leader of the Ung tribe, they decided that each of them will choose one among their brethren to receive the power.
With such reasoning, Eun-ho passed the words he heard to the called warriors, who were fit to be bestowed with Heavenly God’s power.
“’Endure 100 days without sunlight and only eat mugwort and garlic’? I won’t. Even without doing that, this one is strong.”
Hwang-ho, who had no patience, shook his head.
“I think the same as Hwang-ho.”
Baek-ho spoke arrogantly as expected.
“I’m tempted by the power bestowed by Heavenly God. However, I don’t like leaving Sinin’s side for 100 days. These days, because Sinin’s dongsaeng[3], I can’t hang out with Him that often.”
After contemplating, Cheong-ho answered like that.
“I just hate it.” [4]
Jeok-ho replied like that without any particular thinking.
As there was no one among the four who volunteered to do it to receive power, Eun-ho spoke to the tiger who he selected in his mind beforehand.
“Jeokho-nim, didn’t You hide in Pongbaek-nim and Usa-nim’s abode not so long ago? I know that it was Jeokho-nim who put white powder on their faces without a mouse or bird knowing.” [5]
“How do you know that?!”
“And I also know that You secretly hid the tea set Unsa-nim cherished to make trouble.”
Eun-ho was absurdly weaker than those warriors, but he always handled them well.
Even the Ho tribe’s biggest troublemaker, Jeok-ho was no exception.
“Please, endure only for 100 days. If I open my mouth, they will hang dark clouds and pour rainstorm above Jeokho-nim’s head for 200 days. Isn’t the shorter annoyance better?”
Jeok-ho was dissatisfied but was convinced by Eun-ho’s words.
Someone had to pass Heavenly God’s test and only those four warriors representing the Ho tribe were worthy of receiving Heavenly God’s power.
And Baek-ho and Hwang-ho already possessed the power to match their arrogance, and Cheong-ho, who lead numerous disciples, had no thoughts of leaving Sinin’s side.
“Got it. Pretend not to know about the pranks I make on those three, even if I target them in the future.”
“I’ll think about it. It’s okay with fickle Pongbaek-nim and Usa-nim, but I don’t like gentle Unsa having trouble because of Jeokho-nim’s pranks.”
Jeok-ho headed to the cave deep in the divine realm together with Eun-ho, who said a lot to soften him.
Inside the marvelous cave overflowing with divine energy, Jeok-ho faced fate.
“Ungnyeo of the Ung tribe greets Eunho-nim and Jeokho-nim.” [7]
The fate Jeok-ho faced was Ung tribe’s best talent, Ungnyeo.
Because the Ung tribe’s head cherished that brilliant talent, he even declared that only she could use the name ‘Ungnyeo[6]’ in the future, a name that was pretty common at the time.
‘There was such a noble and beautiful being on this Korean Peninsula, huh?!’
Jeok-ho lost his mind to the elegant and enchanting Ungnyeo.
Inside the dark cave, which sunlight didn’t reach at all.
Jeok-ho actively courted her.
“It’s difficult to favor a man who uses coarse language.”
Jeok-ho immediately changed his speech tone.
While recalling Eun-ho’s soft tone, the polite vocabulary used by Pongbaek, Usa and Unsa, and Sinin’s sonorous[9] voice, Jeok-ho desperately tried to change himself.
Then, on a certain day, he heard singing outside the cave.
The tribesmen frequently put the news about Heavenly God and Sinin into rhymes and songs to spread them wide.
[Sinin asked Heavenly God to not hold back the power for the warriors, who took hundred days ordeal, and to cut the price!]
At the lyrics that said that Sinin showed interest in Ungnyeo, Jeok-ho’s heart[8] sunk heavily.
Beautiful and gentle, Sinin had no wife, and Ungnyeo wasn’t his lover.
Jeok-ho nervously asked:
“Ungnyeo what do You think of Sinin?” [10]
“I have no thoughts.”
In the dark cave, Ungnyeo, who closed her eyes for a moment and fell into thoughts, replied to Jeok-ho.
“However, I have thoughts about You.”
When he realized the fact that Ungnyeo covered her body in a red cloth, a cloth of Jeok-ho’s color, from a certain day, and Heavenly God took on Sinin’s request, and the cave was opened after twenty-one days and not hundred days as was promised to Heavenly God. [11]
After that, Jeok-ho and Ungnyeo received the power from Heavenly God and stood at the front lines crushing the foreign enemies.
The two formed a relationship while crashing all foreign enemies and made a promise to each other, but that promise couldn’t be fulfilled as shortly after the Ung tribe boldly took the side of foreign enemies, who went against Heavenly God.
After a long struggle ended, the Ho tribe, which achieved peace on the Korean Peninsula by taking down all foreign enemies and beating down the Ung tribe.
Heavenly God came down from the open sky to congratulate that Ho tribe.
After Heavenly God asked for sacred tigers’ wishes, they replied:
“So I can go everywhere.”
“So I can exist everywhere.”
“So I always serve Sinin.”
After Baek-ho, Hwang-ho and Cheong-ho, Jeok-ho thought hard and then stepped out saying:
“So the Ung tribe is forgiven.”
Heavenly God accepted the three tigers’ wishes straight away, but he agonized about Jeok-ho’s wish for a long time.
“I also wish for the same thing as Jeok-ho.”
At that moment, Eun-ho stepped out and bowed his head, and Sinin also gave Eun-ho and Jeok-ho’s his hand.
After long worries ended, Heavenly God accepted that wish and informed the Ho tribe and Ung tribe members, who were standing under the open sky.
[All of your actions will remain as myth of this land. Your bodies and souls will leave the confines of humans and beasts, and be reborn as beings called ‘Jin people’. I shall gladly infuse the True Names you obtain with my power.]
Ungnyeo, who he met again after Heavenly God disappeared and they became Jin people, was wearing a red wedding dress.
Heavenly God said that after they become Jin people, it would be difficult for them to have a child, but the crystal of the two’s love was born.
But that fortune obtained with such difficulty scattered like dust.
There were not many things for Jeok-ho to protect.
And even that, of which was so little left, faced a threat.
“Zhu Ganglie, are you listening?”
“Naturally! I’m all ears!”
The Don tribe’s stronghold, Zhu Ganglie’s bedroom.
Jeok-ho, who hid his body with Red Smoke, couldn’t believe his ears.
He sincerely hoped he heard that wrong, but his hope was destroyed as someone on the other side of the screen repeated their words.
“You have to kill Kim Sinrok of Eungwang School. For certain.”
“I understand Your words well, but… we don’t have many people planted at Eungwang School right now, so even if that teacher is killed, there is no manpower to replace him.”
“That’s not a problem, I need him dead. Because in any case, it would be difficult to corrupt Jeok-ho and Ungnyeo’s son.”
Jeok-ho stared at the screen Zhu Ganglie was looking at with red eyes.
On the other side of the dim screen, from which the machine-modified voice was coming from, only long fingers were visible.
As the ill will was poured in front of his eyes on the child, which suffered hardships just because he was born as his son, Jeok-ho trembled in helplessness.
***
‘That guy’ started moving, and Zhu Ganglie’s possible movements were also confirmed to a certain extent.
They were aiming for Kim Sinrok.
The reason was unknown.
It was confirmed they weren’t simply targeting him, because he was the 1st year class 1’s homeroom teacher or Earthly Wings Council’s advisor.
‘If so, why is the Dark Mastermind targeting him?’
There were some particular people, which Dark Mastermind was targeting persistently.
They borrowed hands of others and made plausible reasons as if hiding their intentions, but in the eyes of all the Players who had played the game, it was plainly visible.
Why that bastard troubles themselves to persistently try to corrupt or kill those characters?
There were gains if they made those characters like that, but if I thought about Dark Mastermind’s ultimate goal, those gains seemed nothing but trivial.
‘A representative character of this is Sawol Seeum.’
Sawol Seeum, who is rescued by Ju Su-hyeok.
His Gwangrim needs special conditions to activate and the one who met those conditions was Ju Su-hyeok.
And the very moment the scene of Sawol Seeum using his Gwangrim was revealed to the press, Dark Mastermind moved Nabiryeong to kill Sawol Seeum.
With Sawol Seeum’s death, Eungwang School’s power was cut and Ju Su-hyeok’s party was caught by the ankle, but was it necessary to go as far as Nabiryeong having to step out personally?
Nabiryeong said something as if throwing a hint:
[It ended up like this because that messenger boy was too nice. Because That Person had thought that if that child suffered for a few years, he would be ruined or corrupted, but he didn’t change.]
From those words it sounded as if he would have survived if he was corrupted.
‘That means ‘You have to kill them if you can’t corrupt them’. And Kim Sinrok is among one of the targets, huh?’
Hwang Jiho, who heard Jeok-ho’s report, said to him:
“Jeok-ho, you are forbidden from going into the Don tribe’s base in the future.”
“Ho-However….!”
“’That guy’ on the screen pierced through the Red Smoke, which was reinforced by me. I can’t let you get hurt when you’re scatterbrained. Think how fortunate you were, they were only watching through the screen.”
Hwang Jiho spoke, while raising his hand, as if stopping Jeok-ho who was about to refute.
“If you disobey those words, it’ll be your descendant who receives a punishment instead of you.”
“… Understood.”
“Instead, let’s give you other choices. Stay on the stand-by in the mansion or guard your descendant from his side. Choose.”
If you give such choices, won’t he naturally say that he will guard Kim Sinrok?
However, unlike I expected, Jeok-ho closed his eyes for a moment and fell into thoughts in worry.
“That child doesn’t go out of the divine realm unless it’s a school activity, correct?”
“Yeah. He can’t come out, because he is busy with work.”
“If so, then I’ll stay at the mansion…. Because that child is uncomfortable if I’m too close to him.”
An unexpected answer came out.
I guess the relationship between the father and son was more twisted than I thought.
“Instead, when he ends up going outside of the divine realm, please let me accompany him.”
“I’ll think about it.”
Jeok-ho’s eyes were fierce, but he dropped his head.
It seemed that he judged that he wouldn’t be able to communicate through words with the current Hwang Jiho.
‘Looking at him, he will unconditionally accompany Kim Sinrok if he goes out of the Eungwang District, huh?’
After Jeok-ho closed his mouth and sat down, Hwang Jiho looked towards me.
“Jo Uisin, you predicted first that ‘that guy’ will target the youth training camp, right? Did you think they would target Kim Sinrok?”
I couldn’t know about it.
Because at the current point of time, by the game standards, Kim Sinrok was already dead for half a year.
“No. Currently, there are many things different from ‘what I knew’.”
“… ‘what I knew’.”
Hwang Jiho repeated my words once.
Even while I listened to that low voice, the thoughts in my head were turning complicated.
I needed to organize them again to match the changing situations and the new things I learned.
“There is a lot to talk about today, huh?”
Hwang Jiho, who looked at my expression, spoke like this.
In the end, I didn’t get a wink of sleep that day and talked with Hwang Jiho, Baek Ho-gun and Jeok-ho.
When the new day shined, dozens of holograms opened above the drawing room’s table were full of maps and summaries.
“It’s nice to eat with Uisin oppa in the morning!”
“If we knew You were staying for a sleepover, we would have snuck into Your room…”
I did stay over, but I didn’t sleep.
I just smiled vaguely and cleared all endive leaf wraps[12] and mung bean beef porridge made with finely ground rice and mung beans.
“Then I’ll go back to the dormitory to change to school uniform.”
“I have a few spare uniforms.”
“The size won’t match, you know?”
“I have uniforms that match you.”
As Hwang Jiho could control his age, the same was with his height.
Do you possess school uniforms in all sizes to match that?
“It’s fine. I have to go get my school bag.”
I turned to the entrance to leave like this, but I felt something missing.
After finishing the discussion with the Ho tribe, I prayed to see Snare, who hid in the hideout placed in the living room, but Snare didn’t forgive me to the end.
Did you really hate the Nok tribe’s elixir that much?
Thinking about it, it was worth hating.
Thinking about that hell swamp I also swallowed before, my resentment towards Hwang Jiho, that ruined bastard, automatically soared.
In the end, forget about a walk with Snare, I left Hwang Myeong-ho’s main mansion without being sent off by it.
‘This is the road I originally walked with Snare…!’
When I embraced the painful heart and returned to the dormitory to change into the school uniform.
Ding.
Together with the message notification, the morning greeting sent by my disciple, Yeom Junyeol, arrived.
But the start of the greeting was very different from usual.
[Yeom Junyeol] Hello, master-nim.
[Yeom Junyeol] My deepest apologies.
[Yeom Junyeol] (link)
Yeom Junyeol attached a link.
There were two things in the attached link.
One, the results and game recording of the match against Cheon Dong-ha yesterday.
The remaining one was final exam ultimate rankings after the grade correction.
It was an announced ranking of the places from 1 to 10 for each year.
Among them, Yeom Junyeol was 2nd year’s second place.
*~*~*
[1] Ruins of myth — ‘Ruins’ here can refer to something being extremely damaged and destroyed or can refer to a corpse (probably heavily damaged or where there is not a lot of left) or a body which soul left (living corpse). It also means to be harsh towards other people and objects. Myth has quite a few meanings. It could mean turning into a god, the mysterious powers of god, it could also be a fire that burns the body, or the fire that lit up suddenly, without reason, or it could be a person’s endless greed/desire. It also refers to an official during Joseon dynasty, who supervised the management of gardens.
[2] tigers — 범 (beom) — it’s a pure Korean word that refers to tigers and leopards. Throughout this entire chapter whenever ‘tiger’ is used, beom is used in raws. 범 (beom) would also stand for hanja meaning ‘criminal’.
[3] dongsaeng — ‘younger sibling’. I decided to use it as it will be less confusing for some things (probably).
[4] Jeok-ho’s speech tone in the past — Jeok-ho at first uses casual speech, not like now when he always uses formal speech. It changes with Ungnyeo.
[5] Eun-ho’s speech tone — Eun-ho almost always uses polite speech. I’ll make a note if he doesn’t.
[6] Ungnyeo — Ungnyeo translates to ‘Bear woman’.
[7] Ungnyeo’s speech tone — Ungnyeo uses a formal tone in those memories.
[8] heart — in raws: chest
[9] sonorous — for the voice to be very clear and nice, or for something to be very bright
[10] “Ungnyeo what do You think of Sinin?” — From this point onward, Jeok-ho uses a formal tone.
[11] 21 days and not 100 days — Here it’s different from the Dangun’s myth. In it, the tiger wasn’t able to endure 100 days, but the bear did endure for 100 days and became Ungnyeo. There was no cutting short. There were also no ‘foreign enemies’ in that myth. For now, the only actual names that cover up with Dangun’s myth are Ungnyeo, Pongbeak, Usa and Unsa, as for other things, only the conditions for the ordeal are the same. Heavenly Sacred Tree is also a constant.
[12] endive leaf wraps — such wraps are usually filled with rice, vegetables and pork.
Translator’s note: I wonder if endive and a mix of white rice and dark color beans were chosen because endive leaves look as if they’re turning black, and the beans would turn the rice powder dark …
Did you see a mistake? 🐞
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