The Mak Jade
The black-clad man who emerged from the alley melted into the sullen night streets.
The sun had gone down, and the mountain wind was carrying away the day’s heat, but it was still too early to sleep.
The drinking houses were noisy, though the road was set a little apart from the busiest part of town and there were few passersby.
I sheathed my willow-leaf saber and followed after him in silence.
The man in black didn’t stop at any tavern. He went into an inn, came back out a short while later, and kept walking.
He even stopped by a shabby fortuneteller’s stall tucked into one corner, and later banged on the door of a physician’s office with the lights out until he woke the man and went inside.
After wandering Seochon’s streets like that for a long while, he finally slipped into an alley between the buildings.
I kept after him, and after we turned the corner a few times, a heavy stillness settled over everything.
By the time all I could hear was the sound of my own footsteps, I knew something had gone wrong.
Trying to make as little noise as possible, I carefully drew my willow-leaf saber.
I glared at the corner where the man in black had vanished and stepped back.
Maybe he sensed my hesitation, because a black shape slowly emerged beside the corner.
From the shadows, eyes flashing white, he fixed me with a hard stare.
“I wondered how far you’d follow me. You’ve got some sense after all. Did Pan Ho-yang send you?”
The voice was faintly murderous, strangely familiar and yet not.
“Do we know each other?”
“If you can get out of here alive, maybe we’ll get to know each other next time. But that won’t happen.”
Before I knew it, the black-clad man had already drawn his sword and kicked off the ground.
He closed the distance in an instant and went straight for my shoulder without a word.
I met the strike calmly with my willow-leaf saber.
With that same momentum, I tried to bring my blade straight down from above, but the deflected sword twisted oddly like a snake and slipped over my edge.
Startled, I jerked my weapon aside and lashed out with a kick aimed at the bastard’s groin.
The black-clad man twisted his body and let the kick slide past, then came at my ribs.
I gritted my teeth and knocked his sword away with my willow-leaf saber, but this time a sharp slash came pouring down at my thigh from a perfect angle.
Driving him back viciously with the fiercest finisher among the forms of the Nameless Saber Art, I stepped through the footwork and barely escaped the killing line.
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
After exchanging five blows in the blink of an eye, both of us took several steps back at the same time.
The black-clad man shook off the remaining force with a swing of his sword, and the bloodlust in his eyes grew thicker.
I was just as shocked.
How the hell are there so many experts in a backwater town like this?
I clicked my tongue inwardly as the black-clad man tried to seize the advantage, pointing his sword at me and circling slowly to the side.
Moonlight fell at an angle, revealing his face beneath the bamboo hat.
So that was it. I hadn’t heard wrong after all.
He was a swordsman I’d met before.
What was his name again…
“Won Seo-gang?”
Apparently I’d gotten it right, because the swordsman flinched and glared at me.
“So you really are one of Pan Ho-yang’s men.”
“I told you, I don’t know that man. Didn’t you once get a free bottle of liquor from me? At that tavern across from the gopae den in the back alley. On a rainy day.”
I also stepped back a pace and let the moonlight fall across my face.
He didn’t seem to be the sort who forgot old grievances easily either, because he recognized me right away.
“...Jeong Mo?”
“Jeong Dae-cheon.”
Only for a moment, though. Won Seo-gang’s voice turned cold again.
“You’re with Pan Ho-yang?”
“I don’t even know who you mean, and I’ve never even seen his face.”
“What were you tailing me for?”
“You climbed over the wall at Simhyangru, so I figured something was up and followed you.”
“How did you know I’d even go over the wall?”
“I saw you from inside.”
“Inside?”
“I work there.”
It seemed too dark for him to make out my escort uniform.
When I pointed to the two characters for “Yongcheon” on my left chest, Won Seo-gang narrowed his eyes and looked me over again, his expression turning sour.
“...You’re an escort?”
“I only started not long ago. I’ll probably quit before I’ve even been there a full month.”
Won Seo-gang gave a quiet laugh, as if he’d seen me in a new light, and slowly lowered the tip of his sword.
“I thought you were nothing but a blade-for-hire, but you’re actually living decently enough.”
It didn’t sound like mockery. He seemed genuinely surprised, as though he’d expected me to be rock bottom and found out I wasn’t quite that bad.
It wasn’t exactly a pleasant reaction.
“Do you know an escort was murdered inside Simhyangru’s wall last night?”
“I heard.”
“Know anything about it?”
“It has nothing to do with me.”
“How about those three Black Night Gang men who dropped dead two nights ago?”
“That does have something to do with me.”
I looked at him like I’d found the culprit, and Won Seo-gang frowned.
“I didn’t kill them. I only witnessed the killing. He showed no mercy. Cut all three of their heads off right there.”
“Pan Ho-yang did that?”
I was making a guess from what he’d just said, but Won Seo-gang didn’t deny it.
“If you’re going to keep talking, let’s go somewhere indoors. Even the night has ears, don’t they say?”
Won Seo-gang looked up at the buildings over the wall, then sheathed his sword.
“Fine.”
I put my willow-leaf saber away as well.
“This way.”
Keeping a sensible distance between us, I followed Won Seo-gang out of the long alley.
The quiet night streets opened up before us. We went into a nearby tavern and sat down in a corner.
Won Seo-gang ordered liquor and took out his purse.
“You treated me well last time. I’ll buy tonight.”
“I can’t stay away from my post too long.”
“I’m not planning on getting drunk either. I’ll just wet my throat until we’re done talking.”
I poured us each a cup from the liquor the server brought over. Won Seo-gang and I both lifted our cups and drank in silence.
Letting out a breath with the harsh bite of liquor still burning down my throat, I finally felt the last of the adrenaline from our fight begin to ebb.
“You were the guest staying in the side quarters?”
“A guest… not exactly, but I suppose I can’t exactly argue with that.”
“What’s the hobby in climbing over a wall when there’s a perfectly good gate?”
Won Seo-gang gave a snort and started rambling nonsense.
“Have you ever heard the saying, ‘The great road has no gate’? For the man who walks the great road, ordinary rules are useless. The path I take is the gate, and the road itself.”
“So you just hate running into the gate guards every time you come and go through the front?”
“That too, if I’m being honest. Hold on a moment.”
Won Seo-gang took a small bamboo tube from inside his robe.
He pulled out a rolled sheet of oil paper and unfolded it.
It was a portrait of a middle-aged man with drooping eyes and fleshy cheeks.
His name, age, and physical features were written in detail beside the face.
Pan Ho-yang, forty-five…
“Have you seen a man who looks like this?”
“Never. Is he someone you need to kill?”
“Dying won’t be the end of it.”
There was a seething weight to the emotions stirring in Won Seo-gang’s cold, sharpened eyes.
There’s a saying that once a man begins living as a martial artist, half his life is spent doing things that earn him enemies, and the other half chasing those enemies down to settle the score.
Won Seo-gang claimed vengeance belonged to him, but like any martial artist, there was no shortage of people who held a grudge against him and waited for a chance.
He would grind himself to the bone pursuing his enemy, drive a blade into that body, and cut the throat out just as he had always done, only to meet the same end one day himself.
When you solve everything with force and violence, it feels satisfying in the moment, like you’ve won. In the end, though, it always turns out the same.
Like bloodstains that can never be washed away, no matter how hard you scrub, hatred only piles up the more you kill.
If you survive to the end, you’ll end up standing alone atop a mountain built from corpses, something no longer quite human.
No loved ones, no family, no friends, not even a neighbor to exchange a few words with.
Of course, it wasn’t really any of my business. My own life wasn’t all that different.
“What about the other guests in the side quarters?”
“What about them?”
“The escort who died yesterday seemed to have been stealing something. If he was stabbed straight through the heart, his opponent was probably a martial artist.”
Won Seo-gang had just lifted his cup when he let out a short laugh.
“Then that must’ve been the little bastard who used to prowl around the side quarters and got a proper beating for it. He hasn’t come sniffing around since. If he was caught climbing the wall and got himself killed on the spot, he’d have gone straight to the ruju and reported it proudly. Why would he hide it after catching a thief?”
“How many martial artists are staying in the side quarters?”
“If you want to know, ask the ruju.”
“What exactly is Simhyangru, anyway?”
Won Seo-gang looked at me with a pitying expression, as if to say I must be an idiot for not knowing.
“What do you think a pleasure house is for? Rich men, idlers with nothing but money in their pockets—they spend their days drinking, singing, dancing, and enjoying themselves.”
“That’s too big for a simple pleasure house, though. And there are five separate side quarters. The ruju’s guards aren’t ordinary, either.”
“If you’re really that curious, ask the ruju.”
Won Seo-gang dodged the question and sipped his liquor.
It didn’t feel like he was avoiding trouble because he couldn’t be bothered. There was caution in his tone and expression, and a little fear too, as though he didn’t want to upset the ruju and was stepping back on purpose.
Martial artists were criminals who lived by their own brilliance.
Even street thugs would usually square their shoulders and throw a punch before their noses got broken.
The ruju I’d just met wasn’t some nobody who could make an expert like Won Seo-gang watch his mouth this carefully.
Then there was only one conclusion.
There was another true owner behind Simhyangru.
There were plenty of bastards in the martial world who would stomp on the weak, sink their teeth in, and fill their bellies with whatever they could get. But it wasn’t only the martial world like that.
No matter how powerful a wealthy family might be, if the master died and only his wife and young children were left behind, distant relatives, servants, and all manner of lowlife dogs would often strip the place bare and ruin it.
A pleasure house as large as Simhyangru couldn’t have been built by some half-famous courtesan alone.
The ruju was only the face the world knew. There had to be someone powerful backing it from the shadows.
I was wondering how to get this man to loosen up and spill the truth when Won Seo-gang asked with studied calm, “Do you work as an escort for the money?”
“Aren’t we all?”
“If you need money, how about working with me for a while?”
“I don’t think you and I are that close, are we?”
“In this line of work, don’t ten-year friends stab you in the back while the man you met today turns out to be your savior? Jeong Dae-cheon, my instincts say you’re not bad. That saber art you just used was decent too. I hadn’t planned on using killing blows when I wanted to subdue you and ask questions, but it did surprise me that I couldn’t draw a single drop of blood while we traded five exchanges. That kick for the groin was impressive too. Twenty taels of silver. What do you say? I’ll give you ten in advance.”
“You mean the Black Night Gang job? The enemy from earlier?”
Won Seo-gang nodded slowly.
“He’s tucked himself very deep indeed. I’m no slouch with a sword, but breaking in alone won’t be easy.”
“The Black Night Gang is that strong? I heard their leader was a rogue martial expert with a known nickname…”
“You mean the Black Killing Sword, Jeok Chu-yeong?”
“Sounds like him.”
“Hmph. He’s nothing more than a dark-hearted killer, just as his nickname suggests. We should cut his lifespan short as soon as possible and ease some of his karmic debt, otherwise he won’t even get reborn as an animal in his next life.”
“You met him?”
“Soon enough.”
Won Seo-gang answered with obvious displeasure and filled his own cup.
“So there are quite a few experts in the Black Night Gang?”
“They’re not what they look like. Besides Jeok Chu-yeong, there are a few others who are enough trouble to be annoying. They’ve got plenty of underlings too. For a black-path outfit in a place like this, their strength is considerable.”
“So even if it goes well, I’m still likely to get cut up.”
“You’re a martial artist who carries a blade. Since when are you afraid of getting cut?”
“I want to wash my hands of it.”
When I pointed to the escort agency’s name on my left chest, Won Seo-gang’s eyes clouded for an instant before clearing again.
Just like back then, when he’d seemed to be brooding over a bitter past in the middle of a rain-swept night, staring into an empty cup.
“...If washing worked that easily, I’d have quit long ago.”
Won Seo-gang shook his head and drained his cup.
“Anyway, think it over. You’ll be staying in the side quarters for the time being. If you say my name, those men won’t dare act carelessly around you.”
Won Seo-gang strapped his sword to his waist and put his bamboo hat on.
I emptied my cup and went back outside too.
I watched him disappear into the back alleys, then turned away.
By the time I reached the alley that faced Simhyangru’s main gate, I realized things had become a nuisance.
If the fellow who’d been summoned by the ruju simply walked in from outside, they’d think it was suspicious.
I should’ve asked Won Seo-gang how to slip back into Simhyangru unnoticed.
Then again, a part of me thought, what did it matter? None of them ever tried to exchange even a word with me anyway.
When I appeared, the two escorts guarding the gate looked at me in confusion. As expected, they didn’t ask why I was coming from that direction.
When I returned to my post, the escort who had been standing in for me yawned and moved aside.
“You’re back. I’ll head out then.”
The middle-aged escort narrowed his eyes and gave me a sidelong look, then shook his head.
I needed to go report to Jo Gyeong-jik about my conversation with the ruju, but I didn’t feel like doing that right now. If it was urgent, he’d call for me.
With the relaxed mind of a man who’d had a few drinks, I turned the whole thing over carefully. What had happened at the ruju’s residence. My brief exchange with Won Seo-gang. The information I’d gotten from him, piece by piece.
Questions and impressions twisted together like knots and gathered at a single point.
I turned around and looked up at the main hall, where the lamps burned bright with blue light.
What exactly was Simhyangru?
The next morning, after getting off work, I took the shard of jade I’d found near the side quarters and wandered Seochon’s streets with it in hand.
Seochon had grown a lot, but there still wasn’t a jeweler who dealt exclusively in gemstones.
After asking around, I found a shop that handled antiques like old books and porcelain.
The elderly man sitting in front of the store with a long pipe in his mouth, quietly watching the passage of time, recognized the jade shard at a glance.
“Well now. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen one of these.”
“Do you know what it is?”
The old man nodded.
“This is Mak Jade.”
“There’s a jade like that?”
I knew about jade like emerald jade and blue jade, but I’d never heard of Mak Jade before.
“It’s not a kind of jade. It’s jade carved into the shape of a creature called a mak.”
“What’s a mak?”
“Something that doesn’t actually exist. Like a qilin or a dragon, it’s a creature of legend. It’s said to have an elephant’s trunk, an ox’s tail, and a tiger’s legs, and to feed mostly on human nightmares.”
“So this is just a decoration?”
“As I understand it, these used to be used in the Hubei region. If you put one under your pillow when you slept, the mak would devour bad dreams and evil spirits, so people used to give them to newborn babies as gifts, praying for a long and healthy life.”
The old man held the Mak Jade close to his eyes and studied it carefully.
“This has been handled so much the jade’s worn down to almost nothing. You’d barely know it was a mak unless you looked closely. And with the cracks repaired in gold, it looks like something a fairly wealthy family used for a long time. Still, the jade itself is only mid-grade. The carving isn’t all that impressive either, but whoever bought it probably paid ten taels of silver for it.”
“How much is it worth now?”
The old man shook his head without much hesitation.
“Hard to say. I doubt there’s anyone who’d buy it even knowing it was Mak Jade. There’s nothing good about possessing someone else’s used Mak Jade. Since it’s a mak that’s eaten nightmares, people think it’s tainted and won’t touch it. Better to get rid of it quickly or throw it away. It may be superstition, but it’s easier on the mind to stay away from things that feel wrong.”
The old man handed the Mak Jade back to me and put his pipe in his mouth again.
He didn’t stop me when I left the shop, so he didn’t seem to be trying to cheat me on the price.
On the way home, I tried to guess who had owned the Mak Jade.
It wasn’t Bang Jo-in’s.
If he’d had something like this, he would’ve sold it as stakes at the gambling table long ago.
If it had been stolen, he would’ve tucked it together with the silver into his robe. The purse was still there, so it was odd that only the Mak Jade had been dropped.
It was more likely to be something someone else had lost.
Had the killer of Bang Jo-in dropped it while struggling with him? Or had some honored guest who visited Simhyangru been drunk and lost it?
Back home, just as I was taking off my clothes, I dropped the Mak Jade onto the floor. Fortunately, it hadn’t broken or even cracked.
Kneeling to pick it up, something suddenly flashed through my mind.
Gopae.
Where had the gopae gone that Bang Jo-in always held and fiddled with in his hand…?