Rouge
I had expected to be stuck at the inn for a day or two, but by dawn I was released without incident.
"You did well. Go back and rest."
"What about my shift?"
Jo Gyeong-jik let out a short sigh, his tired face looking as though it had aged several years overnight.
"There’s no suspicion on you, so come in on time as usual. Are you thinking of quitting?"
"No."
I didn’t want to get tangled up in something like this, but if I backed out now, I’d only invite suspicion and hostile looks.
I still had to live in Seochon, and if I ended up with a sour relationship with Yongcheon Escort Agency, life would become troublesome in a dozen ways.
Besides, I had already made a promise to the chief escort. I’d need to stay at least a month.
I changed clothes and left Simhyangru. The main building was quiet, as if the night’s drinking had finally burned itself out.
Even the blue lanterns hanging thick beneath the eaves were all extinguished, but several escorts were still standing watch around the place.
I ignored the strange looks from the day shift gatekeepers at the front entrance and made my way out through the wide alley.
Industrious merchants were already opening their shops here and there, waking the pale, brightening morning.
It was still early enough that the sun hadn’t even risen, yet the street was already stifling, as if today intended to be even hotter than yesterday.
The Black Night Gang thugs who had been making a scene yesterday were nowhere to be seen. Whether they were still sleeping or had died in the night, I couldn’t say.
I’d been resting comfortably at the lodging until I clocked out, but my mood stayed unsettled all the way home.
Even after washing up and sleeping, then waking again in the afternoon, I still didn’t feel any better.
Because the weather was brutal, I skipped saber practice and headed to Poongcheon Inn instead.
Gu-sam came over holding a teapot, his eyes unusually bright.
"I heard one of the escorts died at Simhyangru last night?"
"Who told you that?"
"The rumor’s all over the market. Everyone’s talking about nothing else whenever they gather."
There had been more than one witness, so even if people were told to keep their mouths shut, word getting out was inevitable.
But from the sound of it, this didn’t feel like a rumor that had spread on its own.
"They say it was the same murderer who took out the Black Night Gang guys? And that he was even challenging Yongcheon Escort Agency?"
"I don’t know."
"Some people say one of the Ten Great Masters of the Heretical Faction came to Seochon. Others say they saw Ak-sal."
I paused with my mouth rinsed clean by the lukewarm tea.
"Ak-sal? One of the Three Great Evils?"
"Yes. The killer who tears people apart with that savage blade. They say he’s the most vicious of the Three Great Evils."
"Why would Ak-sal climb over the wall of a backwater town like this?"
A dry laugh escaped me.
The rumor had probably come from the chief escort, but mentioning a monster like Ak-sal as the culprit sounded more like the idle nonsense of people who liked to dress up a story.
After eating enough to stop my stomach from complaining, I left the inn and headed to work.
Even after the chaos of yesterday, two escorts were still standing guard at the entrance to Simhyangru.
They ought to have greeted me when I came to relieve them, but both gatekeepers pretended not to see me.
The same was true of the escorts guarding the lodging. They had been talking loudly enough to be heard outside, but the moment I stepped in, their conversation cut off cleanly.
"Has it already gotten this late?"
"I’d better head back to the escort agency."
Neither of them met my eyes as they hurriedly slipped away.
Only one taciturn middle-aged escort remained, the man who would be taking Bang Jo-in’s place on the night shift with me.
"Go on."
Until I clocked out that morning, more than a dozen escorts had been swarming around the inside of Simhyangru.
Now there wasn’t a single escort anywhere in the main building, let alone in the rest of the place. Even the lodging had only held two a moment ago.
"Doesn’t it seem like the security’s been reduced even more than usual?"
When I stared at him and waited for an answer, the escort finally spoke, sounding put upon.
"This morning, Escort Leader Jo got called in by the rouge and told them to pull everyone out. Says it’s bad for business. Internal patrols are suspended for now, too."
From the rouge’s point of view, that made sense.
When the security at a pleasure house was too tight, even the important guests would turn around and leave, and malicious rumors would start flying every which way.
If the killer who had murdered Bang Jo-in was Yi Yun-jae, or one of the guests staying in the annex, then the rouge probably already knew.
In that case there was no further danger, and no reason to keep up the heavy security.
Would the rouge really call for me?
The chief escort had sounded certain, but even if she asked me in just to hear what happened, would it change anything?
"Was the culprit caught?"
"No idea."
The middle-aged escort had always been a quiet man, but now he looked even less inclined to talk.
Come to think of it, ever since I’d been isolated in the lodging alone last night, nobody had spoken to me.
I hadn’t known them long enough to have any close friends among the escorts, but we’d at least exchanged greetings coming and going. Now even that had vanished.
It wasn’t that they thought I was the killer who had murdered a coworker and were keeping their guard up. They just found the whole thing distasteful and wanted to keep their distance.
Jo Gyeong-jik had said I’d been cleared, but once people started talking to me there was no telling what kind of trouble might follow.
Lightning always struck the unlucky man standing beside the wicked one.
It was the same principle as when a violent martial artist barged into an inn and pointed a blade at someone; the people eating nearby would all panic and scramble away from the table.
By evening, several carriages had arrived. As usual, servants ran up and led them toward the main building.
By the time the moon had risen above the roof of the pleasure house, Jo Gyeong-jik called for me.
"The rouge is asking for you. Go."
While the servant who had come to fetch me stood nearby, Jo Gyeong-jik gave me a silent look. It meant to mind my words and not make a mistake.
I nodded to show I understood and left the lodging.
As I followed, carefully replaying the conversation I’d had with the chief escort the night before, the servant led me somewhere other than the main building.
"Where are we going?"
"The rouge has asked for you to be brought to her residence."
"Her residence?"
What exactly was she planning to ask me that required bringing me to her quarters?
We passed the place where Bang Jo-in had collapsed, then entered the annex area hidden behind the wall.
The brick wall was too high to leap over. In the dark, I couldn’t even see any footholds.
It looked impenetrable at a glance, but with a rope and grappling hook, it would be easy enough to scale. Bang Jo-in may even have gotten over it that way.
"Who’s staying in here?"
"I don’t know. The servants who manage the annex are separate."
The passage between the walls split in two at the end.
"There are more than one annex here?"
When I asked, the servant spread his palm wide, looking proud.
"There are five in all. Even famous pleasure houses in the capital might only have one or two dressed up decently, but all five of ours are top-tier by any standard."
"That must be hard to run."
"As you can see yourself, Escort Officer, the guests never stop coming. And they’re not random riffraff either; most of them are generous, important guests who don’t worry about the price at all."
"Impressive."
As I made the right noises at the right times, we eventually arrived at the annex where the rouge stayed.
The servant politely knocked three times and announced our business.
"This is Cheongbok. I’ve brought the escort officer you requested."
A moment later, I heard the bolt being drawn, and the wooden door opened inward.
A young man with a face so pale it seemed almost bloodless appeared.
At a glance he looked like some pretty boy living off a pleasure house, but what showed on his face was not powder.
The stern aura of a sharpened white blade sent a chill down my spine.
Confronted by the sudden appearance of a true master, I swallowed hard and took a step back. Instinctively, I gripped the scabbard at my lower back and shifted my hand toward my waist.
As I tensed up, the man’s eyes narrowed too.
"Are you Escort Officer Jeong Dae-cheon?"
"I am."
"Please come in."
The man stepped back and opened the door fully. The servant bowed and left. I couldn’t do the same.
I forced myself to calm down and moved my feet.
Once I crossed the threshold, I noticed the sword hanging from the man’s waistband as he stood off to one side.
A swordsman, then...
I didn’t want that kind of troublesome master at my back, so I kept my distance. The man closed the door and walked ahead.
"This way."
I followed behind him with plenty of room to spare.
My instincts hadn’t been wrong.
The man’s movements and stride were eerily light and measured.
Even when he was showing me his back, there was almost no opening to be found.
Despite the fact that a stranger armed with a sword was behind him, the man never once looked back.
The attitude felt like an outright display of martial superiority, and for some reason I found it insulting. My competitive spirit started to stir in spite of myself.
Maybe the martial artists staying in the other annexes weren’t this ridiculous.
The inside of the annex was larger than it had looked from the outside.
Passing through a garden elegantly arranged with different stones and trees, the man stopped in front of a building lit by lanterns.
"Rouge-nim. Escort Officer Jeong Dae-cheon has arrived."
"Show him in."
"Please leave your weapon outside before entering."
The man stepped aside and held out a hand.
So he was a guard...
They kept a master like this in a place like Simhyangru?
On top of that, the man’s proper, respectful way of addressing his superior showed that the hierarchy here was as strict as any orthodox sect’s.
At this point there was no helping suspicion. What exactly was Simhyangru? It couldn’t possibly be just a pleasure house that sold drink and entertainment.
I handed over my Willow Leaf saber and went inside.
The rouge was waiting for me in a spacious, lavish reception room.
I bowed my head slightly in greeting, and she told me to sit.
"Have a seat. Sorry to trouble you."
"Not at all. I’m on duty anyway."
"I see."
I sat across from her at the round table, and the rouge lifted a jade teapot to fill my cup.
When I raised it and took a sip, a rich fragrance bloomed across the inside of my nose like flowers opening.
It was a superior tea, nothing like the cheap stuff served at inns.
Unfortunately, I had no room to enjoy the aroma or taste.
From the look on her face, the rouge seemed to be in the same mood.
Someone had died in her own establishment, and the culprit hadn’t been caught. She couldn’t possibly be pleased.
With a master like that serving as her guard, there was no threat to her safety, but it was obvious as day that the business and reputation of the pleasure house would suffer.
Anyone with sense would be angry and ask what the escort agency was even doing.
Despite the faint makeup, the rouge’s face was strikingly elegant, her beauty so refined it hardly seemed to age at all.
Since she wasn’t smiling, she felt less like a seasoned courtesan and more like the mistress of some wealthy merchant house or clan.
No, there was something even stranger than that.
It was our first meeting, and yet for some reason her voice had lingered in my memory.
Where had I heard it...?
It was definitely a voice I knew.
After keeping the silence awkward for long enough that I’d start feeling the pressure, the rouge finally spoke.
"Then let’s hear exactly what happened."
I repeated my statement as briefly, clearly, and honestly as I could, just as I had done in front of Jo Gyeong-jik and Du Ja-ryeom.
The only difference was that I added in the agreement I’d made with the chief escort.
The rouge, who had been listening quietly, tilted her head.
"A man in black with a face covering... Has his identity been revealed?"
"As far as I know, not yet."
"Hmm..."
The rouge narrowed her eyes and toyed with her teacup. She didn’t seem pleased with the escort agency’s handling of the matter.
"Anything else?"
"Anything else?"
"Anything unusual at the scene. Something different from normal. Something you saw."
"...Well."
"Even something small is fine. Just speak freely."
Her tone was calm, as if it were no big deal, but the rouge was persistent. There was a cold glint in her steady gaze as she measured my reaction.
So that was it...
That was why she had called me here even after hearing everything from the chief escort.
I hadn’t really seen anything, but what was it that I should have noticed? Or what should have been there?
"I didn’t see anything special. It was dark around me, and then someone died all of a sudden. I was rattled, so I didn’t have time to look carefully."
"...I see."
The rouge nodded as if she understood, took another sip of tea, and leaned back in her chair. With a light sigh, her shoulders dropped a little.
Only then did I finally realize it. The rouge had been tense too.
It made sense that she’d feel relieved I hadn’t seen anything, but why did that relief come mixed with a strange trace of disappointment?
So the culprit really was Yi Yun-jae, or one of the guests in the annex.
If the goal was to protect them, maybe this would just drag on for a while and end with an awkward compromise somewhere acceptable to everyone.
After a few more cups of tea and some back-and-forth questioning, I was finally sent outside.
Only after passing through the garden and reaching the gate did the guard return my Willow Leaf saber.
I left the closed door behind and started walking.
Then, as I absentmindedly looked up at the moonlit annex, I finally remembered where I had heard the rouge’s voice before.
The night of Yi Yun-jae’s celebration. A woman humming a cradle song from the Hubei region. There had been no lyrics, but that voice was unmistakably the same as the rouge I had just met.
The next day, Yi Yun-jae had sung that same cradle song while looking up at the moon, and Bang Jo-in had hummed it too.
If the three of them had met in the same place...
All sorts of theories and guesses tangled messily in my head. Every one of them was the kind of thing that would bring trouble if I said it out loud.
"Huuuu..."
I let out a long breath and tore my eyes away from the rouge’s quarters. Turning back toward the lodging, I stopped in an unexpected place.
In a tucked-away corner of the wall, about five jang from where Bang Jo-in had collapsed and died, something glimmered faintly like a cat’s eye.
I pushed through the weeds and picked up a small jade fragment about the size of two knuckles.
I didn’t know what shape it had once been, but there were patches of yellowish color on it, as if gold had been mixed in.
Who would leave something like this...
I was holding the shard up to my eye when something skimmed through the edge of my vision.
Startled, I spun toward the outer wall at the far end of the opposite annex.
Something swayed hard, and then someone landed atop the wall.
The figure revealed beneath the moonlight was the back of a black-clad man wearing a bamboo hat.
Before I could blink, he vanished over the wall.
I tucked the jade fragment into my chest and sprinted after him.
The secret behind the black-clad man’s astonishing lightness skill was a pine tree slanting up alongside the wall.
Using the trembling trunk as a stepping point, I climbed up easily enough and reached the top of the wall.
The black-clad man was hurrying out of the alley outside Simhyangru.
I was dumbfounded.
So this was why the chief escort had mentioned a man in black with a face covering.
I didn’t have time to call anyone, and not a second to hesitate.
I checked the ground outside the wall, then turned and lowered my stance. Hanging from the wall to reduce my height as much as possible, I let go.
The moment my feet landed safely on the ground, I drew my Willow Leaf saber.
Hiding the blade’s cold glint in the darkness beneath the wall, I went after the black-clad man.