Father began preparing the fish.
With practiced hands, he removed the fish’s innards and scraped off its scales. Hwi watched from a short distance away, fidgeting anxiously.
“I’ll do it, Cult Leader.”
“It’s all right.”
At a time like this, I couldn’t not put in a word.
“Even your loyalty in trying to stretch the fish longer can’t do anything about my fishing skills, Uncle.”
I had won the contest against Father to catch the biggest fish.
“It was the natural result. Just because Father is holding a wooden sword doesn’t mean he can’t kill an opponent holding a treasured blade, does it?”
Father glanced at Hwi.
Can’t you do something about that mouth of his? At the look on his face, Hwi smiled awkwardly.
Father was serious about cooking.
As if to prove it, he reached out toward the carriage again.
“What is it this time?”
Then the leather pouch opened, and something else flew out from within. They were several small bottles. Amazingly, they were bottles filled with seasonings.
I was moved all over again. Father had even prepared seasonings in anticipation of cooking on this journey.
The dish Father made that way was truly excellent.
“It’s delicious. Truly, to my palate, it tastes better than anything the cooks make.”
A proud satisfaction could be felt in Father’s expression. Somehow, he looked as though praise for his cooking pleased him even more than praise for his martial arts.
That night, we camped outdoors.
We lit a bonfire and lay down, and of course, this little prank couldn’t be left out.
Unlike the first night, I spread out my bedding far away from Father.
Then Father glanced at me.
“Didn’t you say you’d endure the fishy smell and sleep?”
“Did I say that?”
“If your nose disappears, the smell should be a bit less noticeable, shouldn’t it?”
Father found and picked up the dagger he had used to prepare the fish.
When Father turned toward me, I had somehow already moved my bedding right beside him and was lying there.
“You’re not going to sleep?”
Father smiled faintly. In that fleeting smile, I could feel that Father was enjoying himself.
Father also lay down side by side with me. Compared to when we had gone hunting, the distance between Father and me had become much closer.
“Actually, there’s no smell at all.”
“I know.”
Just as he would dispel the effects of alcohol, Father had already released his qi and scattered the fishy smell into the air.
Lying down, I turned my head and looked at Father. Father was silently gazing up at the night sky. What was he thinking about right now?
What else would he be thinking about? A revenge match.
“Let’s have another round with night fishing.”
I laughed loudly. If Father had been defeated in martial arts, he would never have any lingering attachment. But fishing was different.
“Are you serious?”
“This time, we’ll compete by number caught. But we switch rods. That old East Sea Fisherman—I disliked him from that moment on.”
This was Father. Not someone who looked for better conditions because he had lost, but someone willing to accept a disadvantage when asking for another match despite having lost. I liked this side of Father so much.
“Very well.”
Father and I rose and gathered up the fishing rods. Father took the rod I had made, and I took the East Sea Fisherman’s rod. Light, yet fitting perfectly in my hand—an artifact was indeed an artifact.
“Uncle Hwi. You may be sick of it, but tomorrow morning’s breakfast will be fish cooked by Father again!”
* * *
The next morning, Father was preparing fish.
The night fishing had also been my victory. Truly, whenever I cast the line, I caught a fish. I caught so many that we kept only what we could eat and released the rest.
“The East Sea Fisherman’s rod in my hand is akin to the Heavenly Demon Sword in Father’s hand.”
I teased him on purpose. If I didn’t tease him like this, Father might genuinely have his pride wounded.
“I know you deliberately let me win. If you left the cooking to me, you would have had to eat a tasteless breakfast. Isn’t that right?”
Father’s dagger, which had been cleaning the fish, stopped. From far away, Hwi shook his head at me, telling me to stop. If that dagger came flying at me, it wouldn’t be carrying only the fishy smell.
When I shut my mouth, Father’s dagger began moving again.
“Today, it’s grilled fish.”
I said loudly,
“I’ll light the bonfire.”
And so, we ate fish Father had grilled himself for breakfast.
You might say grilled fish is grilled fish wherever you go, but if you have never tasted grilled fish made by the Heavenly Demon, don’t say such things. Father’s skill at grilling fish was also top-notch.
Just as we were nearly finished eating, our gazes turned in one direction.
We had sensed someone approaching us.
Father stopped Hwi from rising.
“Stay where you are.”
Father had already finished assessing an opponent who wasn’t even visible.
A short while later, someone appeared there.
The man who emerged, limping, looked as though he was on the verge of collapsing.
“Water… Please give me some water.”
Seeing us, his tension eased, and he sank to the ground as if collapsing. Three martial artists encountered in a remote place—if anything, it was a situation where he should have been more tense, yet he was in no state of mind to grasp the situation.
I gave him water first. Perhaps he had been wandering through the mountains, for his clothes were torn and his appearance was a mess. In particular, his injured ankle was swollen badly.
“How long have you gone without eating?”
“Three days? Four? I’m not sure.”
I shared rice and the leftover fish with him.
“Chew thoroughly as you eat.”
“Thank you.”
Driven by hunger, he ate without hesitation.
After he had eaten, I examined his body. Father silently watched me.
“You’ve injured your leg.”
Then the man said to me,
“I hurt it after misstepping in the mountains.”
“It seems it would be difficult to reach a village on that leg. Let me take a look for a moment.”
Fortunately, no bones were broken. I treated his sprained ankle and splinted it with tree branches. As much as my skill helped, his expression also became more at ease.
“Thank you. Truly, thank you.”
Only then did the man feel relieved. He had finally escaped the fear that he might die.
“How did you come to lose your way?”
“It happened while I was searching for medicinal herbs.”
No matter how I looked at him, his appearance did not resemble that of an herb gatherer.
“Is someone in your family ill?”
“No.”
His circumstances were something I had never expected.
The man’s name was Im Gye. He said he ran a school in the village where he taught children letters.
“My father worked as a martial artist in the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult and retired this year.”
This place, not far from the main headquarters, was within the territory of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.
His father had never learned proper martial arts, so he had spent his entire life as a low-ranking martial artist before retiring.
And this year happened to be his father’s sixtieth birthday.
Im Gye wanted to invite the leader of the branch his father had belonged to for his father’s birthday and make him happy. He thought his father would truly rejoice if the branch leader came to the sixtieth-birthday feast and congratulated him.
“But they said it would require fifty nyang to invite the branch leader.”
“Who said that?”
“There is someone in the village who has connections to the branch leader. That person told me so. He said even inviting a renowned guest to a banquet costs money. The amount differs according to the value of the person’s name, and according to how long they stay. He said it would cost fifty nyang for the branch leader to come briefly, offer congratulations, and leave.”
I glanced at Father and asked,
“How much do you receive, Father?”
At my question, full of mischief, a sneer formed at the corner of Father’s mouth.
Would Father move for a hundred thousand nyang? Would he move for a million nyang? He was someone you couldn’t summon even if you offered ten million nyang.
In that sense, if this journey were converted into money, the amount would truly be beyond imagination.
“Even if you gave that money, the branch leader probably wouldn’t come.”
At my words, Im Gye asked in surprise,
“What do you mean?”
“If it were discovered that a high-ranking figure of the Cult had moved privately after receiving money, not only would he be dismissed from his position, he might even be imprisoned in the dungeon. There’s no way he would move for fifty nyang.”
“Ah, I see. I have spent my whole life only studying letters, so I’m ignorant of the ways of the world.”
He lowered his head. Just seeing how he believed my words immediately made that clear. Did he even know who he was trusting?
“That person will pocket the fifty nyang and later say this: that the branch leader suddenly had an important matter on his schedule. Then what will you do? Go and protest? Even if you do protest, will he return the money?”
It was a world overflowing with people who swindled money from such innocent folk.
“When your own heart is good, you think others’ hearts must be good too. But reality isn’t like that, is it?”
Im Gye’s sigh deepened.
“My father lived diligently all his life for our family. I wanted to do something for such a father, but time only passes, and things are not as easy as one wishes.”
“Even so, is there a need to overdo it and invite the branch leader? Even if he came, it’s not as though he would sincerely congratulate him.”
“You’re right. The branch leader probably doesn’t even know my father’s name.”
That was reality. There were hundreds of martial artists in a branch, so how would he know a low-ranking martial artist at the very bottom?
“Then why?”
“Whenever my father had a cup of wine, he would say this like a habit: Though I live as a mere bottom-rank martial artist, though I am only at the bottom. Though my role is not a great one.”
From those words, I could feel the sorrow of a man who had wanted, at least once, to boast proudly before his child, but had ultimately never been able to.
“So I wanted to let a high-ranking person come so that Father could boast in front of me just once. I wanted him to be able to speak proudly in front of our family, relatives, and the villagers. More than words telling him he had worked hard, I simply thought that was the path for Father’s sake.”
How could I not understand his heart?
In wanting to do something for our fathers, he and I, who had come on this journey, were not so different.
“I heard that if I dug up a hundred-year snow ginseng, it would easily be worth over a hundred nyang. Even though I knew something so precious would never appear before my eyes, I couldn’t just stay at home.”
Tears gathered in his eyes.
“I will be going now. Today is my father’s sixtieth-birthday feast, and if I hadn’t met such honorable people, I might not have even been able to attend. You are the benefactors of my lifetime. Truly, thank you.”
He bowed his head several times in thanks, then left the place where we were.
* * *
Fortunately, Im Gye returned home before it was too late.
“Brother! What on earth happened?”
He had said he would be gone for a few days before leaving, but because it was behavior unlike his usual self, his younger sister had been worried all this time.
“I’m sorry. One thing led to another, and it turned out that way.”
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. The birthday preparations?”
“Our aunts came and helped.”
His father, Im Hak, looked at him and said bluntly,
“You’re here, so that’s enough.”
He had not known it in the past, but as he grew older, he could feel his father’s heart. His father’s worry and relief.
‘I’m sorry.’
He thought that perhaps wandering the mountains for several days had been not for his father’s sake, but for his own. To put his own heart at ease. To be able to say that he had tried this hard.
Family and relatives gathered, and the village people were invited as well.
But his father did not invite the people of the branch. Saying he would only burden his old colleagues for no reason, he did not invite them at all.
Im Gye could feel his father’s worry. Who would be interested in the sixtieth-birthday feast of a retired bottom-rank martial artist? If he invited them for no reason and no one came, it would be hard to endure that humiliation in front of his children.
And when many people gather, there is always someone like this.
“Looks like none of the Demonic Cult people came?”
He was the head of a martial hall in the village, and when his father had belonged to the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult, even if he was at the very bottom, this man had not dared treat him carelessly.
But once his father left the Cult, the man’s gaze changed, and his attitude changed.
“I deliberately didn’t call them. They’re busy working, so I’d only be causing them trouble for no reason.”
“It’s not that you called and they didn’t come?”
It was not so much that he bore malice toward his father; he was simply the sort of person who usually made such negative remarks. There are people like that, are there not? People who make even the same words sound unpleasant.
Still, he could have held back a little today. Even so, Im Gye could not show displeasure. The man was the head of a martial hall who had properly learned martial arts.
“It was a joke, a joke. Why so serious? As you get older, you’ve become timid.”
He made them feel unpleasant to the very end.
It was at that very moment.
The door opened, and a group of guests arrived. As martial artists wearing swords filed in all at once, the hall fell silent in unison.
Recognizing them, Im Hak was startled.
“Branch Leader!”
To his surprise, the Branch Leader and his fellow branch members had come to that very place. Im Gye and the villagers were all startled.
“Martial Officer Im, I heard it is your sixtieth birthday? We have come to congratulate you.”
At those words, Im Hak was so surprised and flustered that he did not know what to do.
The juniors he had worked with came to celebrate him. Among them were those he had been close to, but those he had not been particularly close with were there as well.
“Please, sit over here.”
“No, today you are the guest of honor, so take the seat of honor.”
The Branch Leader showed him great respect. While he wondered how this man had found out and why he was showing such courtesy, he also felt immense joy.
His son and daughter were watching. The villagers were watching as well. The Commander of the Martial Officers, who had run his mouth recklessly, watched this scene with a thoroughly cowed expression.
“If any problems arise in the future, contact me anytime.”
“Thank you, Branch Leader.”
Im Hak was delighted, yet at the same time, he could not understand the situation.
He had served as a low-ranking martial officer under many branch leaders, but he had never once exchanged a private conversation with them. It was the same with this current Branch Leader. This was a man who would not even have known his name.
That secret was now revealed. The Branch Leader too spoke cautiously with a puzzled expression.
“He somehow knew and sent this.”
The Branch Leader carefully took out a small box he had been keeping in his bosom.
Seeing his hands tremble, Im Hak grew nervous in turn. Just what in the world could it be?
“Here, take it and open it.”
Im Hak took it in a daze and opened the box.
To his astonishment, what lay inside was a hundred-year snow ginseng.
“To think you would give such a precious gift!”
The hands of Im Hak holding the box trembled violently. Im Gye and the villagers approached to get a look at the hundred-year snow ginseng.
But what would truly astonish Im Hak was only beginning now.
“It is not my gift.”
At the Branch Leader’s words, Im Hak unfolded the piece of paper that lay inside the box with the ginseng.
Im Hak’s eyes went wide as he read the contents. It was the first time Im Gye had ever seen his father so surprised. Im Gye, standing beside him, checked the contents and let out a cry. The villagers too gasped in shock.
Im Hak set down the box and performed a deep bow. Im Gye bowed together with him.
Tears streaming from Im Hak’s eyes fell onto the back of his wrinkled hand. Since joining the cult at seventeen, he had lived a hard life all his years.
To feed his children, he had endured no matter how much it hurt, living through suffering fierce enough to kill him. He had actually crossed the threshold of death several times.
And the brief words written on the slip washed away all the hardships of his past days.
To you who have devoted yourself to the main sect, I convey my heartfelt gratitude.
Geom Ujin, Leader of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.
Absolute Regression – Chapter 450.