Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
⟨Chapter 13⟩
Even while he was chatting without a break, Yu Dan couldn’t keep up with his speed. While lightly getting ahead on the sidewalk lined up with the streetlights, the warrior kept urging him. Because he was gasping for breath, he tried to suggest taking a little break while drinking some water, but it was no use.
“Doth Thou mean that there is a well around here somewhere? Let’s not make a cry and hasten our steps then.”
How long did he walk on that night stroll?
They walked around and around the main street, and finally arrived at a secluded neighborhood.
It was about five hours since he left the Banwoldang. He had no idea how the hell much he walked on foot. Yu Dan couldn’t feel his legs.
“Are we there yet?”
“Young lady is gradually getting closer. It seems we’re almost here.”
“You kept saying that for a while now.”
“I mean it truly.”
The warrior closed his eyes. He was very diligently concentrating, as if he was feeling something invisible, and then pointed at the residential area on the opposite side of the road.
“It seems that the young lady lives straight from here. She lives there!”
It was an attitude full of confidence.
Was the ending at last in sight? Yu Dan hastened his footsteps.
After entering the alley, it started to turn gloomy. The cats, which were peeking into the trash cans, were startled and ran away. The warrior turned his head left and right, while checking around with a deep caution.
“That’s the very place!”
Then he ran fast like a shooting arrow towards the house at the end of the alley.
“Young lady! Young lady! Art Thee still okay?! I’m coming!”
In excitement, he thoughtlessly knocked on the door. The main gate shook, and at some house a dog started to bark restlessly.
“What are you doing?!”
Yu Dan grabbed the warrior.
“Do you think they will open if you do that? We have to aim for an opportunity. If we wait, someone will come in or come out, at that moment we will sneak in and meet with the young lady.”
“We have to do it like that?”
The warrior stared at the main gate. His face was anxious.
“Understood. Young master’s words should be right. We will wait.”
Then he sunk on his knees with a thud.
“What are you doing sitting in front of someone’s house? They may call the police… a passing shaman or spiritualist! I mean, don’t make trouble even for me! Come here!”
Yu Dan dragged the warrior behind the electric pole at the side.
“Ooo, are we going to wait together? As expected, my eyes were not wrong. As I thought, Thee has a lot of heart, directly opposite of His appearance.”
“Don’t delude yourself! I suspect that if you don’t manage to meet young lady, you will find me the next day and torment me! It’s clear you planned to do it!”
Yu Dan hid at the warrior’s side and glared at the house.
Soon the midnight passed. Anyhow, there may be no one to come in or out. Because many would be in their beds at this hour.
Fortunately however, that didn’t seem to be the case.
A light illuminated the elegant house behind the wall. All lights in every room were turned on, and even the bathroom light was on.
“As expected of our young lady’s residence. Even at this age, She keeps a candlelight burning bright in every room.”
The warrior mumbled.
Inside the house was so quiet it could be a Buddhist temple. It didn’t seem like they were watching a TV, so what were they doing this late at night? Were they perhaps waiting for someone? He thought like this, when he sensed someone coming from the alley’s side.
“Come here!”
He pulled the warrior into the shadow of the wall and hid.
He heard the sound of small footsteps walking closer. Soon, someone appeared in the dim light of the streetlight.
A middle-school female student holding a bag was walking towards this home.
“Is this perhaps the young lady?”
“Hmm. No.”
The warrior shook his head.
The female student pressed the doorbell. The main gate opened without even a question, ‘who is it?’. The entrance door also suddenly opened from the inside, and the woman appeared.
“Young lady!”
The warrior shouted. Yu Dan found it absurd.
“That’s not a young lady!”
Even when seeing her just for a moment, it was certain that the woman was a mother. Her face and atmosphere matched that exactly.
“It’s our young lady, for sure.”
The warrior couldn’t take his eyes off of her and mumbled.
“A very long time passed, but young lady grew up like this and even has such a pretty daughter-nim in her care? Doth that means the people I have to protect increased to two? I know not what to say, because of my pounding heart. Isn’t it a truly warm and beautiful mother and daughter family?”
Bang! The main gate shut in front of their eyes. Yu Dan shouted.
“We missed a chance to come in!”
It wasn’t only that. The sound of argument started to come out from behind the main gate
“And it isn’t warm at all!”
The mother and daughter raised their voices and were fighting.
The warrior’s complexion changed. It seemed that he couldn’t believe this situation.
“How come young lady is angry?! What in hells happened?!”
Yu Dan leaned in his ears. From the words that came out, he was able to roughly figure out the situation.
“She was messing around and broke a window at school, and the homeroom teacher called her home…”
The warrior tilted his head. It seemed he couldn’t understand what he heard.
“So, she was playing around, shattered the glass door in the seodang[1], and the head teacher sent a message to her home…”
“Aha!”
It didn’t seem like those words matched his era, but it looked like he roughly understood. The warrior smiled.
“So She is a warrior lady? As expected, isn’t it worthy of the young lady’s daughter?”
In the middle of it, the voices inside grew louder and quieter. As he didn’t know what they should do, he just concentrated and observed, but then the entrance door, which were shut tightly, suddenly opened.
“I’m leaving!”
The daughter ran out.
“Where is She going at this hour?! Can’t we come in right now?”
“What are you going to do if you don’t enter now?!”
The mother hastily put on her slippers and followed her out.
But the moment she saw the thick darkness of the yard, she hesitated and stepped back. The daughter was on the brink of getting out through the main gate. After she ‘hmph!’ed towards the mother and glared at her, she turned around and…
And then she froze.
An enormous shadow stood in the corner of the alley. In the darkness of the night, it moved in secret and was darker and more ominous than the darkness. When it discovered a person, it formed a shape as if made out of crawling bugs, and started to approach with big strides. The girl’s face turned white.
“Um, mom!”
The main gate opened with a bang. The mother, who couldn’t distinguish between front and back, rushed out, saw the enormous shadow hovering over her daughter and was terrified.
“Young lady! Please don’t worry! I’ll protect Thee!”
The warrior shoot out.
But something, which was a bit faster than him, flashed.
The next moment, the mother covered her daughter with her whole body. Rather than a mother and daughter, the mother was so very short and petite the two could be sisters, but the look in her eyes was fierce.
“Go away!”
The mother stomped her foot with a ‘thump!’ and shouted with all her might.
That was some outstanding courage.
The unidentified thing that was approaching a moment ago shrunk back at that moment. Then it merged with the darkness again and disappeared in the distance.
The mother and daughter gasped for breath with pale faces. They seemed shaken by the situation that happened a moment ago.
“Mom, what was that just now?”
“I don’t know.”
The mother embraced her daughter, and looked around the dark surrounding. Her expression said she couldn’t believe that she won by herself.
Color gradually returned to her face.
“Even the darkness… is nothing special.”
She mumbled. While she straightened her shoulders, it seemed as if her height abruptly increased.
“It was probably just a wandering dog. Let’s head back.”
She grasped her still stunned daughter and turned around.
Seeing the main gate close in front of his eyes, Yu Dan suddenly returned to his senses. He quickly looked at the warrior.
“Now! Follow them!”
The warrior just stood motionlessly. While looking at the mother and daughter who returned inside, he mumbled blankly.
“Young lady changed…”
He quietly nodded to himself.
“Of course. A person, who has something to protect, will become stronger. Our young lady became stronger. She has no need for me now, eh? I should leave.”
Yu Dan doubted his ears.
“Leave? After you had so much trouble to find your way back to her side?”
“Yes.”
The warrior turned around.
“I’m done now.”
As his body began to shine quietly and turn transparent starting from the edges. Yu Dan was flustered.
“Wait a moment! At least press the doorbell…”
“I’m done.”
He shook his head.
“I can be at peace now. With the determination to protect the young lady, I endured such long life, but… I think I’ll put that old promise to rest now.”
A soft night wind blew from somewhere. As if the wind carried his heart, the warrior calmly recited.
“Young master will also have something to protect someday. Other people or some kind of belief. Even when the time comes when Thee will be frightened. Young master will be able to overcome it well.”
And then he bowed politely.
“Thank to Thee I can put my heart to rest and leave. I’m truly thankful, young master Yu. For treating kindly such a small one as me.”
“I was never kind! And you…”
The warrior smiled calmly.
“I’m truly thankful if Thee didn’t think much of it, as Thee said.”
Everything turned into a dazzling light. And then…
Crack!
There was a sound of something breaking.
Yu Dan looked down at the ground.
A broken clay doll scattered into pieces.
A warrior doll.
The face made with clumsy hands seemed to be smiling under the moonlight.
“… That’s what happened.”
Yu Dan unfolded a cloth.
Baek Ran carefully examined the pieces of the broken doll.
“It’s Dogū[2].”
“Dogū?”
“Also called Toyong[3] sometimes. Like its name, it’s a doll made out of clay. It was made in the past, in particular during Silla dynasty. It has shamanistic usage like praying for good harvest or fertility, or was buried together with a tomb’s goods when burying a dead.”
And then he added:
“Moreover, according to folk stories, it was believed that if You knead a Dogū when having an earnest wish, that doll will grant it.”
“Grant a wish?”
“That’s correct.”
Baek Ran lightly grasped the doll’s broken head with his fingertips. All pieces started to shine brightly.
“Wolgwang (Moonlight). That’s the name of that doll. A long time ago, that girl gave that name to the Dogū she made herself, wishing it would protect her from the darkness.”
“Right. He said he promised to become her moonlight.”
“For a long time, the girl’s soul shattered to pieces and pieced itself together again countless times, but that Dogū remained as he was. But he found his way to this place and was locked up in the warehouse, but then discovered a person who could help him and promptly followed him.”
Yu Dan stared down at the shattered doll speechless. The face of the warrior, who stood in the moonlight and smiled slightly, was still vivid before his eyes.
“That’s it, huh? Then I worked in vain…”
“No.”
It seemed that this fox yokai knew everything about what Yu Dan was thinking.
“It wasn’t just that. You didn’t work in vain. You have done very well, because You helped to free something, which was tied to junk for thousand of years. But…”
He stopped mid-sentence and tilted his head.
“That’s strange, eh? It should be seriously hard. He was so rudely stubborn, and because of the different eras, You wouldn’t be able to communicate. You probably wanted to give up dozens of times, but You guided him to the very end? There is no way that was the case, but did your mind change to be a bit kinder, perhaps?”
“What are you talking about? Can’t I do well without it?”
Yu Dan shrugged and left the study.
After descending to the first floor, he suddenly ran into Heuk-yo. Even though he didn’t do anything, she was already fully on edge, and glared at Yu Dan sharply.
“Why are you making such a conceited expression?”
“What I’m now?”
“Just now! Didn’t you smirk unpleasantly!?”
Do-ssi caught a sight of it, he was about to secretly leave, but before he turned around, he was grabbed by the hem of kwaja[4].
“Older brother, where are You going? You have to organize the warehouse with me from the beginning again! You said that you can distinguish the antiques even with Your eyes closed, so how about You close Your eyes for real?”
“Huuu…”
The middle-aged dokkaebi sighed and pulled his hair.
“But that was truly an antique! I’m losing my mind from regrets. If I knew it would turn out like this, that young master-nim… No, I hate to call you young master-nim. I shouldn’t have sent that troublemaker into the warehouse.”
“What are you saying now?”
Yu Dan was confused.
“Did you say that everything in that warehouse was a real antique from the beginning? So the person shouldn’t touch them recklessly, while holding them…”
Do-ssi pretended he couldn’t hear and ran out through the back door with a clatter.
“Oui, dokkaebi! Explain what you mean!”
“Please let it rest.”
Chaeu’s eye twitched.
“Anyhow, You really did well. For a time being, You won’t end up being dragged to the warehouse. Because we can’t let real antiques follow young master-nim again.”
“Wait a moment. Then without knowing that those chests are full of antiques, I was just blindly being bullied?”
“Isn’t it useless to say that dokkaebi has a bad temper? Well, what should we do when considering the past events?”
Chaeu looked up at the evening sky outside the window.
“That’s truly romantic, You know? Did that clay doll keep his promise to that girl for thousand of years? Please look at that white moon there. You don’t know, perhaps that thousand years old moonlight transcended time and space and is shining on us now.”
“No, it’s not.”
Chaeseol spoke.
“I looked it up, the moon is about 380,000 kilometers from here. According to the speed of light, it would be exactly 1.2 seconds. So this moonlight is the moonlight from 1.2 seconds ago.”
And then she sighed.
“Aah, there is no romance.”
Chaeu smiled widely, shaking his head.
“No. Even so, the identity of the moonlight wouldn’t change. And even in the future, it won’t change at all. Isn’t that correct?”
The twins looked at Yu Dan with questioning eyes.
Yu Dan looked up at the lonely moon that hung beyond the window frame. After a while, he slowly nodded his head.
“Should be right.”
*~*~*
[1] seodang — a village school.
[2] Dogū — I’m using the Japansese name, considering it’s more well known under it, but in Korean it’s called ‘토우 (Tou)’. It means clay doll.
[3] Toyeong — toyeong refers specifically to dolls buried in tombs.
[4] kwaja — a type of baeja (a short sleeve outerwear worn over the hanbok) with a collar up to the neck.
Translator’s note: Yu Dan, I’m so glad you know nothing about science.
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