Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
45. If it doesn’t rain during Chushu (1) [1]
Starting with Woo Gihwan, the zombies, which one didn’t know if they were primitive men or seniors landed on the shore one after one.
They were difficult to recognize when only their heads were sticking out above the sea surface, but as they were all wearing the school summer gym uniforms, they seemed to be our school’s 3rd year class 0’s bastards.
More than anything else, looking at the teacher’s expressions confirmed they were our acquaintances.
Even Kim Sinrok, who was an over five thousand years old descendant of the Ho tribe seemed to be flustered by this situation.
“… Gihwan-ah? Kids-ah?”
At those words, Woo Gihwan swiftly turned his head and looked in the direction where the teachers, including Kim Sinrok, were.
When humans are pushed to their limits, they become steered by their basic and primitive instincts.
They were psychological desires driving them to find the food, clothing and shelter in order to survive.
Among those psychological desires, the eyes of Woo Gihwan seemed to be full of the determination to satisfy the ‘appetite’.
As if guided by the smell of the food, Woo Gihwan’s head turned with a swish.
Through the teachers who gathered on the beach, past the 1st year class 1 and 2, his gaze at last stopped at our class of about ten people.
“Uh? He is looking in this direction…” [2]
“What, why is he looking here?”
“Geurin-ah! Hide behind me!”
Among the groups here, the 1st year class 0 had the smallest number of people.
But in contrast, thanks to the divine cooking skills of forever chef Hwang Jiho, our surrounding was overflowing with the smell full of delicious meat.
Just at that moment Hwang Jiho generously applied the special herb sauce he personally made and placed the whole chicken filled with pilaf on the grill.
After the ‘sizzle’ sound of boiling oil spared out, Woo Gihwan shouted.
“Charge!”
“Waaaaaaa!”
Following Woo Gihwan charge command, the primitive men ran towards our class 0 to plunder for food.
Between the teachers and class children who were at a loss what to in that absurd situation, Hwang Jiho moved fist.
In the instant Hwang Jiho jumped forward and elegantly waved the barbecue skewer he was holding.
Paat!
The shining golden superpower wave converted into mana and covered the 1st year class 0 with a barrier.
As if they detected the barrier’s power even in the trenches of their desire for food, Woo Gihwan’s gang immediately halted their advance.
“Hahaha! Not anyone can taste the food personally made by this one!”
It wasn’t a sound a bastard, who always volunteers to cook, should make.
Even Han Yi, who grabbed the s’mores made from marshmallows sandwiched between graham crackers buttered in the peanut butter, and was about to flee from Woo Gihwan’s gang, looked at Hwang Jiho with a face saying ‘What is this lunatic suddenly acting like he is a luxury?’.
Midst of it, the target of the 3rd year class 0’s senior bastards’ plunder changed.
“Go!”
“Waaaaaaa!”
The new plunder target was Bang Yunseop, who was in charge of delivering the Gangwon Province glutinous corn bread, because of the failed smoking attempt in Hongcheon.
The Bread Shuttle, who was carrying bread to distribute them as a snack to eat during the barbecue, was raided.
“Ack, what, zo-zombies? Why are there zombies on Ju-Oh Island… Aa-ack! I was bitten by a zombieeack!”
“Student Bang Yunseop!”
The situation was settled thanks to Bang Yunseop’s homeroom teacher, teacher No Yeongmi coming to the rescue.
Teachers rebuked the 3rd year class 0’s senior bastards for attacking their junior, but Woo Gihwan’s gang was too busy devouring the bread they stole from Bang Yunseop to reflect.
Even so, as if they pitied the disciples, who sank on the ground and stuffed themselves with bread while sniffling, the teachers grilled some meat and shared it among the 3rd year class 0’s bastards.
As it came to this, seeing the teachers who worked very hard to take care of the students, I suggested:
“Let us also share food with seniors-nim.”
“I agree with Uisin’s words! Those People are class 0’s seniors-nim!” [3]
“Hahaha…. It seems that if we just leave them alone, they will starve.”
“It may be, but nobodies can’t eat this one’s cooking.”
Excluding Hwang Jiho who spoke like this, the class 0’s children prepared food for senior bastards to eat.
The senior bastards, who ate their fill without a word of thanks, even though we gave them food we had as a group effort to help, collapsed on the sandy beach tired of eating.
Per the barbarians, they plundered, ate and went to sleep.
But as if the chief of the barbarians, Woo Gihwan, had some strength remaining, he had his eyes opened.
“Woo Gihwan, what happened? Where is teacher Im Yeonhwa-nim?”
Teacher Ham Geunhyeong-nim, who had the highest position among the teachers, who appeared, asked as a representative.
Woo Gihwan reacted at the word ‘Im Yeonhwa’ and tears started to drip from his eyes.
In the middle of the flustered teachers, Woo Gihwan cried his eyes out without caring about muscle loss.
“When the typhoon came, because our food storage was destroyed… we became self-sufficient…”
They survived by themselves on an uninhabited island?!
Just hearing it, it would seem like a story full of romance, but if put in the situation when you aren’t prepared and don’t have knowledge or tools to live self-sufficiently, your meals would become quite miserable.
Even just thinking about a diet made up of drinking the distilled sea water, eating fruits you don’t know if they’re poisonous or not, and grilled fishes without any seasoning made my head hurt.
Woo Gihwan finished a story of his miserable life on an uninhabited island and got to the point.
“During the underwater training we discovered an entrance to the frozen otherworld, but…. When we broke the entrance, suddenly a poison came out…”
Entrance to frozen otherworld, poison.
The moment I heard those words, something came to mind straight away.
Frozen Otherworld.
A dominated otherworld which became inactive by being filled with cold and poison.
The Frozen Otherworlds, which were no different from ticking-bombs, were planted all over the Korean Peninsula.
‘The 3rd year class 0’s gang encountered a Frozen Otherworld…?! And it was a Frozen Otherworld planted close to Ju-Oh Island, huh!’
At most, I expected it to be a boot camp runaway drama.
If so, then what happened to the 3rd year class 0’s homeroom teacher Im Yeonhwa?
No way, did she sacrifice herself to let her disciples escape…?
“What happened to teacher Im Yeonhwa-nim?”
Kim Sinrok, who knew about the existence of Frozen Otherworlds, asked with a nervous voice.
Hwang Jiho also narrowed his eyes and looked in this direction.
Soon Woo Gihwan spoke with a grief-stricken voice.
“She said that we’re holding her back and left us behind and…. And then conquered that otherworld alone….”
… She overcame the superpower poison and conquered the Frozen Otherworld alone?!
Even Hwang Jiho endured the pain of his insides melting and ate Hyangrok’s antidote.
Was that strong homeroom teacher Im Yeonhwa really a human?
“The strong homeroom teacher isn’t even affected by the poison, kugh… how can we win? Damn… because of that we fought and escaped… But because we were too hungry… Heuk!”
Woo Gihwan talked gibberish as if his accumulated frustration was exploding and wailing.
“… You should have requested help from school or Association.”
“Then it would feel like we lost to the homeroom teacher!”
It seemed that even without requesting help, the 3rd year class 0 were awfully defeated by Im Yeonhwa.
Woo Gihwan, who cried and wrote down an entire report, soon fell asleep.
Hwang Jiho, who checked on the situation by moving his alter-ego, spoke in a low voice.
“She contacted the Association’s Im Jihwa. And said she thinks she discovered one of the Frozen Otherworlds. They said they’re controlling the information right now, eh?”
I guess the strong homeroom teacher Im Yeonhwa contacted her unnie and satellite management team’s leader, Im Jihwa.
‘It’s lucky that the two of them are sisters.’
If it was reported to the Player’s Association by an official route, it would be difficult to control the information.
As if thinking the same as me, Hwang Jiho seemed to be in a good mood.
“I didn’t think such an event would explode around the trip destination, but I would be happy if the samples to study increased. Ah, I should contact Im Yeonhwa and set up a meeting, eh?”
But the problem was that the teachers and class 0’s children heard Woo Gihwan’s nonsense.
Luckily, because at a glance Woo Gihwan wasn’t in the right mind, they didn’t seriously think about Woo Gihwan’s remarks.
While Kim Sinrok, who was among them, plausibly passed over what Woo Gihwan said and changed the topic, Ju Su-hyeok came to us.
“Teacher-nim! Should we move seniors-nim to accommodations?”
“Leave it to us. Sorry for this sudden incident. I’ll talk with the Ju-Oh Group staff.”
“Haha, no. In fact, I thought of also inviting the Military School’s kids. I prepared enough accommodations and food for them, so it’s okay.”
Ju Su-hyeok showed off arrangements worthy of the title hero.
After Kim Sinrok gave a look, I saw Yong Jegeon lift and move the 3rd year class 0’s senior bastards with space, even though he was annoyed.
* * *
After barbecue party ended, each class had free time to adjust to the accommodations.
The class 0, 1 and 2 had schedules together, but naturally and reasonably[4], the majority of the participants were of the opinion that on the first day the class children should have free time to spend together.
In the situation where we retreated to the resort, each class was allocated one floor, but perhaps because the class 0 had a small number of people, the floor felt spacious.
As teacher Ham Geunhyeong-nim and Yong Jegeon joined the search for Im Yeonhwa, whose location couldn’t be confirmed after contacting the Association, it felt even more spacious.
The children, who piled up board games each of them brought, spoke with disappointed faces.
“I planned to spend the entire night playing with teacher Ham Geunhyeong-nim!”
“That’s right. I wanted to pay back for the complete defeat the previous time. And I was curious how Dragon Teach-nim plays games….” [5]
“Me too. I wanted to play a game with teacher Ham Geunhyeong-nim…”
Min Geurin, who was close with Ham Geunhyeong even before coming to Eungwang School and heard fun stories about the outing on the Han River, was sad.
Looking at the sad appearance of my Playable Character, I thought if I should join the search for Im Yeonhwa and make teacher Ham Geunhyeong-nim quickly join the class children.
But even so, it was difficult for me to move right now.
“Even so, today is the first time ten children of the 1st year class 0 gathered! At last we have a double-digit!”
As Mok Uram joined, the people attending school from our class became ten.
But if I leave, it would become 9, a single digit.
So I couldn’t leave because of the happy Kim Yuri.
“Hey… Uram-ah? If you sit so far away, you won’t be able to play a game.”
“I think it’s the appropriate mental distance for me. Thank You for Your consideration.”
Even though he sat in the seat the furthest away from Kwon Lena and put distance from other children too, Mok Uram replied politely.
Whenever possible, Mok Uram wrote down possible questions that the children and especially Kwon Lena may throw, and prepared model answers for them, memorized them and practiced.
‘The fact that he could make such questions and answers, doesn’t that mean he has some common sense?’
It seemed extraordinary that instead of fixing the part of this mind that was broken somewhere and turning him crazy, Mok Uram made up his mind to pretend to be normal.
Of course, even though he imitated sanity like this, Mok Uram couldn’t hide his extraordinariness.
Mok Uram was openly strange, but the kind class children just let it go with the thought ‘That kid is particular, huh!’.
If it was usual, Song Daeseok would make some harsh sound at least once, but Song Daeseok was meeker than usual, and often closed his mouth and quietly observed the children.
‘… Are you thinking about satellites?’
I was bothered that Song Daeseok seemed to be searching for something among the children, as my Playable Characters became less corrupted after a such long time, I couldn’t make him uselessly pissed, so I also closed my mouth.
Moreover, when we started the games for real, Song Daeseok concentrated on the competition like a child, and I also seriously responded to him.
When we played over ten board games.
The children started to fall asleep one after one, and the remaining children started the board games that could be enjoyed even with a small number of people.
“Hahaha! Next turn will be the end, eh?”
“…”
Hwang Jiho and Han Yi engaged in a fierce battle of the 1 on 1 psychological board game ‘Ghost’[6].
It seemed that Han Yi was worried if she should advance forward a blue piece to penetrate Hwang Jiho’s formation or lay low to find Hwang Jiho’s red pieces.
Kim Yuri, who was still awake, was enjoying watching it, and Maeng Hyodon seemed not to know what was going on because he didn’t understand the rules just like before.
“It se-seems that She is cold, but…”
Mok Uram anxiously looked at the sleeping Kwon Lena.
Even though Mok Uram blocked the air conditioner’s wind with his own body so it wouldn’t touch Kwon Lena and covered her with two blankets, he still seemed uneasy.
“I’ll bring more blankets and snacks from the lobby.”
“Yes! Please!”
As a vice class president and a fossil, it was natural for me to take care of the class children and my Playable Character.
When I took the elevator and descended to the lobby.
“Uh, you’re still not sleeping?”
I ran into Yu Sang-hun, who seemed to come on similar business as me.
I was about to quickly greet him and pass him by, but before that, Yu Sang-hun opened his mouth.
“Let’s talk.”
*~*~*
[1] If it doesn’t rain during Chushu — It’s probably referencing the saying ‘If it rains during Chushu, the rice boxes will be empty’. That saying comes from the fact that the period after Chushu is a rice harvest season, so it’s a very dangerous period, because if it rains, the harvest will be destroyed. Therefore, not raining during Chushu is a good omen. Chusue is the 14th solar term of the Chinese calendar, signifying the end of hot summer (and the bad weather often associated with it) and beginning of the fall, it literally means ‘limit of heat’ and in Korean it’s called 처서 (cheoseo).
The homonyms of rain are: a monument, a broom, something wrong or incorrect, a queen, a bamboo basket, proportion or ratio, reins, a secret (something others shouldn’t know), deceased mother. It also reads like ‘B’ so anything you can think of related to the letter B also would count. And the literal translation of that title would be ‘If the rain doesn’t come during Chushu’.
* Fun fact about Chushu: During Joseon period and reign of Yeonsangun (one of the worst tyrants of that period), Chushu was called ‘Joseo (조서 meaning ‘warmth goes away’) instead of Cheoseo, because Cheo was forbidden from usage because of Kim Cheoseon, a high-ranking eunuch who was brutally killed by Yeonsangun for offending him. It was changed back to Cheoseo after Yeonsangun was dethroned.
[2] “Uh? He is looking in this direction…” — Sawol Seeum’s sentence.
[3] “I agree with Uisin’s words! Those People are class 0’s seniors-nim!” — Sawol Seeum’s sentence.
[4] naturally and reasonably — a fun word, more literally it means ‘to be made by Heaven’ or ‘because the Heaven operates orderly, all things grow well’.
[5] “Me too. I wanted to pay back for complete defeat the previous time. And I was curious how Dragon Teach-nim plays games….” — Sawol Seeum’s sentence.
[6] Ghost — probably referring to otherwise known as ‘Good & Bad Ghosts’, a board game designed by Alex Randolph. Here is a wikipedia link if you want to know the rules: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_%26_Bad_Ghosts
Translator’s note: Competitive Sawol Seeum… I’ll cheer you on. Go! Go! Little sparrow.
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