Chapter 165. The New Chunmong Inn
While I was eating…….
The owner of Chunmong Inn, the cook, and even the waiter came to bid me farewell before leaving.
I felt bad, but it couldn’t be helped.
Still, perhaps this sort of thing was not all that flustering to him, for the owner said he would take the cook and waiter on a trip for a few days with the money I had given him. Was this why the inn’s name was Chunmong, Spring Dream, expressing the fleeting vanity of life?
He was an owner whose attitude toward life suited the name Chunmong rather well.
In any case, I forcibly sent the working staff on vacation, got a job at Chunmong Inn all by myself, and ate my fill of the perfectly decent food the cook had made.
After finishing the food and leisurely sipping my wine, I could hardly tell whether this place was Chunmong Inn or Jaha Inn.
No pursuers came.
There were no customers.
And since there was nothing in particular I had to do, I carried the bowls to the kitchen and started washing the dishes.
I may not have any talent for cooking, but I’m fairly good at washing dishes, so after tidying up the kitchen neatly, I took a towel outside and wiped the tables for the first time in a while.
There are times when you feel oddly proud after cleaning things up nicely, and this was one of those times.
Suddenly, as I looked at the towel I had been using to wipe the tables, a thought occurred to me.
‘Is this an occupational disease? I suddenly went and did some crazy shit.’
I put the towel down and set the mood again.
A day at Chunmong Inn with nothing to do.
The leisure of Dukang wine and dried snacks.
It wasn’t bad.
If I had bought enough time for Murong Baek and Leader Hwang to return without incident, then a bit of dishwashing and mopping had its own meaning.
As I chewed on the dried snacks, I took in and memorized the positions of the tables, the texture of the floor, the pillars, the broom, the distance to the kitchen, the size of the furnishings, the location of the kitchen knife, the feel of the dirt, the height of the roof, and so on.
I memorized everything I could, then soon forgot it all again.
I sat in the waiter’s exclusive spot, which had a good view of both roads, put my legs up on an empty chair, and closed my eyes for a while.
If nothing happened until sunset, I intended to close the shop and head for the Black Rabbit Gang. Drowsiness crept over me, and just when I could no longer tell whether I had slept for half a gak or half a shichen, the sound of extremely steady footsteps woke me from my sweet nap.
When the sound of footsteps continued four times, I opened my eyes and stared ahead.
A man of the jianghu wearing a bamboo hat on his head slightly raised his face to look at me, then sat down at an outside table and said,
“Will you take my order?”
I looked at the eyes and jawline barely visible beneath the bamboo hat, the posture with his back straight as he sat, and the sword he had placed on the table, then answered.
“All we have is wine.”
“That’s fine.”
“Pay first.”
The man took a common silver ingot from his robe and flicked it toward the pillar beside where I was sitting. The silver ingot cut through the air and embedded itself in the pillar.
Thuk!
I looked at the silver ingot stuck in the pillar, then said to the man in the bamboo hat,
“Throw it gently, you son of a bitch.”
“…….”
“What are you doing, making it annoying to pull out? Dumb bastard. Tsk.”
I went into the kitchen, brought out Dukang wine for myself and some cheap wine for the man in the bamboo hat, set the Dukang wine on my table, and took the cheap wine over to him.
“Should I throw the wine too? Huh?”
I considered hurling the wine at his face, then clicked my tongue and set it down on the table.
As I returned to my seat, my back prickled a little, perhaps because the bastard in the bamboo hat was glaring at me.
“What an unlucky bastard.”
Watching such an unlucky customer made my throat dry, so I poured myself a cup of Dukang wine and drank it. While I was drinking, the man in the bamboo hat took out a silver needle and dipped it into his cup.
A snort escaped me on its own.
“Go on, do your bullshit. If you don’t want to drink, just don’t, you dumb bastard.”
The man in the bamboo hat drank a cup of wine, then stared at me silently.
“…….”
Perhaps his gaze held a blade, for it was extremely murderous. I could hardly tell whether he was glaring at me or slashing at the empty air with his eyes.
I waved the edge of my hand here and there through the air, pretending to block the man’s unlucky gaze.
The man in the bamboo hat asked me,
“Do you have any dried snacks?”
I stuck my pinky into my nose and replied,
“How about…… this, at least?”
The man in the bamboo hat, who had taken another mouthful of wine, spat it out.
“Ptooey!”
I chewed the dried snacks I had prepared on my table and glared at the man in the bamboo hat. I waved a finely cut piece of jerky toward him, then swallowed it myself.
Suddenly, the man in the bamboo hat and I looked at the road at the same time.
A woman dressed elegantly in garments of alternating light pink and red, like palace attire, was approaching with a white Buddhist horsetail whisk in her hand.
I could not tell the identity of the man in the bamboo hat who had arrived first and taken a seat.
But I knew who the woman holding the horsetail whisk was.
It was Yao Xianzi.
Without sending even a glance toward the man in the bamboo hat, Yao Xianzi sat far away and looked at me.
As I chewed on the jerky, I said to Yao Xianzi,
“What are you looking at, crazy bitch? Stop glaring and place your order.”
A Buddhist horsetail whisk was originally a ritual implement used by practitioners to brush away worldly afflictions. Since a woman who looked as if she killed people as casually as eating meals was holding one, she could only look like a crazy bitch to me.
Yao Xianzi let out a short sigh, then waved the horsetail whisk here and there as if shooing away flies and muttered,
“What kind of bugs are these…….”
As I chewed the dried snacks, I looked at Yao Xianzi, then at the man in the bamboo hat, and let out a belch with a buuurp.
In the meantime, Yao Xianzi and the man in the bamboo hat did not look at each other and only kept watching me.
I pointed at my face with a finger and asked the two of them,
“Am I that handsome? Are you about to fall head over heels?”
Yao Xianzi responded by pretending to vomit.
At that moment, Yao Xianzi suddenly frowned and grabbed her nose. While she kept waving her hand in front of it, a beggar approached with dragging steps, his feet scraping along the ground.
As I looked at this beggar bastard, such a thought occurred to me.
The fellows in the Beggars’ Sect were all beggars, but not every beggar under heaven belonged to the Beggars’ Sect. This beggar, who did not belong to the Beggars’ Sect, also sat down far away from Yao Xianzi and looked at me.
I said to the beggar,
“You beggar bastard, who told you to sit when you don’t even have money?”
When the beggar looked at me and smiled, his yellow teeth were revealed.
“You waiter bastard, if you’re so confident, try throwing me out.”
I pointed at the beggar and said,
“Remain seated.”
The beggar chuckled and laughed.
A slight sigh escaped me.
“There are rather a lot of guests today.”
Yeop Yahong, who had arrived by unfolding his lightness skill in the time it took me to drink a cup of Dukang wine, burst into laughter.
“Haha… Ah, good day to you all.”
No one acknowledged Yeop Yahong, so I did it for them.
“Young Hero Yeop, we meet again.”
Yeop Yahong answered with a smile.
“Oh? So we do.”
“Why did you come? Here to die?”
Yeop Yahong looked me straight in the eyes and replied.
“Surely not. I came because I don’t want to die.”
I pointed to the seat in front of me and said,
“Come over and have a drink. We know each other, don’t we?”
Yeop Yahong held out a hand.
“I’ll decline.”
Still, seeing someone I knew made me feel oddly glad, so I asked him a question.
“Any more guests?”
With a tense expression, Yeop Yahong took a Forget-Worry Grass from his robes, put it in his mouth, and answered.
“Who knows? What would I know? Wait and see.”
As Yeop Yahong lit the Forget-Worry Grass and began exhaling smoke, Fairy Yo, who was standing some distance away, once again moved her fly-whisk here and there.
Meanwhile, the man wearing the conical bamboo hat had been glaring at me all this time.
I flinched in surprise and opened my mouth.
“Fuck, you scared me. At least blink while you glare, you son of a bitch. Wow, that really startled me. I can’t even see your damn eyes properly because of that hat.”
I clicked my tongue and looked around at the guests.
A madman glaring at me from under a bamboo hat, a madwoman swinging a fly-whisk, a beggar’s footwrap, and Yeop Yahong grinning like an idiot… The guests at an inn were always so varied.
I pointed at the sky and rambled however I pleased.
“If I have sinned!”
“……”
“Then it can only be the sin of performing chivalrous deeds. Who knew the life of a chivalrous hero would be this hard? Fucking hell.”
No one responded to my words, but I said what I wanted to say.
“This is all because I read the wrong book.”
Yeop Yahong asked me with a smirk.
“What sort of book did you read?”
“In the end, Young Hero Yeop is the only one willing to talk to me.”
Yeop Yahong nodded with a smile.
“Go on, then. I’ll listen.”
“I killed a bastard they called the Gambling King, and there was a book I found at his dwelling. In it…”
I chewed on some dried snacks and continued.
“It said the strongest people under heaven are chivalrous heroes.”
“Oh, really?”
“Anyway, line after line, it went on about how chivalrous heroes are the strongest. They were words left behind by an incredible master.”
Yeop Yahong snickered as he replied.
“Why would such nonsense be written there?”
“Exactly.”
“So you believe that idiotic nonsense? You’re more innocent than you look.”
I answered in a serious tone.
“Of course not, you dumb bastard. How could I believe that?”
Having been cursed at, Yeop Yahong sighed with an unpleasant expression and put the Forget-Worry Grass back in his mouth.
I continued speaking.
“It was my first time hearing such dogshit, too. But the important thing is that no one had ever said that kind of dogshit before. Important things always have scarcity value. That’s why verification is necessary. What would a wretch like you know? Whether what’s written in the book is true or not… you only know after trying it. Have you tried?”
Yeop Yahong replied with a startled expression.
“Ah, so that’s why you started acting like a chivalrous hero. Even beating down horse bandits. You really are something. Though I think you misread that book quite badly. This is my first time seeing someone perform chivalrous deeds just because a book said so.”
I nodded, then laughed.
“I may have read the book wrong, but it seems you people have misread the person.”
Yeop Yahong replied with a smile.
“Bullshit.”
When I suddenly sprang up from my chair with a clatter…
Yeop Yahong, Fairy Yo, and the beggar’s footwrap all started in surprise and shot to their feet at the same time. But the man in the bamboo hat, seated as he was, merely reached for the hilt of his sword and then stopped.
I sat back down calmly and said,
“You useless bastards, getting startled like that. Hahahaha…”
As I slapped my thigh and burst out laughing, the three of them sat back down with faces like they had chewed shit.
I praised the composure of the man in the bamboo hat.
“That cool-headedness of yours. I liked it.”
I suddenly yawned, then covered my mouth with my hand in case a hidden weapon flew into it.
This is what manners are.
I poured about half a cup of Dukang wine into an empty cup, then stuck a finger into it and infused it with ice arts. In an instant, the wine froze inside. Yeop Yahong, who was watching me, asked,
“What are you doing?”
I poured more normal wine over the frozen wine, then swirled the cup this way and that. The Dukang wine had become wonderfully chilled.
I raised the cup toward the idiots and said,
“This is ice wine.”
I drank down the ice wine and wiped my mouth.
“Ah… that’s the taste.”
I was debating whom to throw the frozen cup at when I set it down. A man in his mid-thirties was walking toward the Chunmong Inn while acting extremely busy.
He was a man with a monotonous expression and dull eyes.
He stopped for a moment in front of the inn, pointed at me, and looked at Yeop Yahong. Yeop Yahong said,
“Yes, that’s him.”
The busy-looking man nodded, then walked straight over and sat across from me.
The man rubbed his hands together, then abruptly asked me,
“Young man, why are you interfering with someone else’s business? You’ve inflicted enormous losses in lives and property on our business. How are you going to compensate for all of it? I don’t think your one head will be enough. Who is this fellow?”
Yeop Yahong answered,
“He is the sect leader of the Hao Sect, a rising sect based around the Namhwa region. Among his subordinate forces are the Heukmyobang, Heukseonbo, and Namyeonghoe, and separately, he has mainly killed underworld experts such as the Paegeom Society Leader, Great Rakshasa, Teacher Su, and Old Lord Iryong.”
“Any peculiarities?”
“He mainly has his subordinates focus on training, while he tends to move personally.”
After hearing the explanation, the man nodded slightly and asked me,
“Are you some kind of hero? Why do you act like that?”
Since this bastard was setting such a mood, I tried answering politely.
“But who are you?”
“……”
“At least introduce yourself before you start picking on me. You show up and immediately start spewing bullshit.”
I suddenly tried to sow discord between the one above and the one below.
“And I am not the Hao Sect Leader. What about a green youngster like me looks like the leader of a sect? The Sect Leader fled first, and I merely took his place……”
I looked at the man before me and Yeop Yahong with the most innocent expression I could muster.
‘……Did it work?’
The man before me glared at me, then asked Yeop Yahong.
“What is the meaning of this? He says he isn’t.”
Yeop Yahong answered in an even tone.
“He is the Hao Sect Leader. The madman is playing tricks, so please judge accordingly.”
I swept my hair back with my left hand and sighed.
“Caught that quickly, did you. You’re no ordinary lot.”
The man narrowed his brow and glared at me. Left with no choice, I sold out someone I knew.
“I know the Murim Alliance Leader too, so you’d better keep this reasonable.”
Out of habit from my days as a waiter, I shook my leg wildly and glared at the man before me. The fellow, who looked to be about a middle-ranking officer, tilted his head askew and replied.
“We’re on bad terms with Alliance Leader Im as well. You two know each other?”
I crossed my arms, then changed my tune.
“I know the Demonic Cult Leader too. So don’t get cocky.”
I was not joking.
The expressions of the man before me, Yeop Yahong, Yo Seonja, the bamboo-hatted man, and Beggar’s Footwrap all stiffened.
‘That worked.’
After setting the mood, I spoke in a dignified tone.
“That is me.”