Renovating the Abandoned House - 7
I was sure I'd only meant to tap it down lightly.
Whumm. The sledgehammer sliced through the air and came crashing down on the firebox like a missile.
KWA-BOOM!
With a detonation like an explosion of gunpowder, the firebox shattered into powder.
And that wasn't the end of it. Crack, rumble-rumble-rumble! Fissures spiderwebbed across the cement-paved floor surrounding it.
"I'm this strong?"
It wasn't as though I'd ever lacked for athletic ability, but I had certainly never possessed superhuman strength like this.
"This makes no sense."
Fine—maybe my senses had grown sharper since forming the bond with the cat. But gaining monstrous strength was something I simply couldn't wrap my head around.
Don't tell me the problem was with the sledgehammer itself?
I was just reaching for the hammer, still embedded in the wreckage of the firebox, when it happened.
Ssssaaa. The rat snake came slithering out through the debris.
"The—the guardian snake?"
So the guardian had been coiled up inside the firebox all along, right in the passage where the ondol fire once flowed.
"You really shouldn't live here anymore."
Ssssaaaa. The guardian snake emerged completely from the firebox ruins, lifted its head, and stared at me.
I'd felt it before, but the guardian snake seemed very close to being a true spirit creature.
Its presence was overwhelming.
Especially with those deep brown eyes on either side of its head boring straight into me—it felt as though they could see all the way into my soul.
Strangely, the snake seemed to feel intimidated by me as well. It turned its head slightly to avoid my gaze.
"Um, er—that thing just now wasn't me trying to attack you... I was trying to get you to move somewhere safe. Ugh!"
Flick-flick! Suddenly the snake thrust out its forked tongue and raised its head stiff and tall.
Every time that black tongue darted in and out of its mouth, its brown eyes quivered.
"It's like it's trying to tell me something..."
I swallowed hard and crouched down—which is how I ended up perched on the shelf mounted to the kitchen wall.
The shelf, where the dented tin dishes had rested, must have been so rotten it was only barely holding together.
It couldn't bear my weight and collapsed outright.
CRASH! CLANG!
Down came the shelf with me, and the tin pots and cracked jars smashed and crumpled on the way.
Ssssaaaa. Only then did the snake give a slow, deliberate nod before slipping out through the back door.
"Ah, my heart. That took ten years off my life."
What on earth had it been trying to say to me?
I could converse with spirits and ghosts, even malevolent ones—yet communicating with my own guardian snake was impossible.
"Yoonho, my boy!"
Hearing the noise, Carpenter Jang came rushing into the kitchen.
"Good heavens—what in the world happened here!"
I gave a careless shrug.
"You said the firebox wouldn't break, didn't you?"
"Of course it wouldn't. It's stacked stone with cement over it, and... uh... hoh?"
The sight of the firebox crumbled to powder made his words trail off.
"How is this even possible?"
"It shouldn't be."
The workers all clicked their tongues too.
One of the older workers, in his sixties, spoke up. "Fifty, sixty years of wood fires would've hardened that thing to steel. And yet... don't tell me you broke it like this with one swing of the sledgehammer?"
"It broke, all right."
"That's impossible, boss man. I beat on that thing for dear life. It didn't budge an inch."
The foreign worker gestured wildly, complaining that no matter how many times he'd brought the sledgehammer down, the firebox simply wouldn't crack—he'd been done wrong.
"I know, it's fine. It's not your fault."
While Carpenter Jang was soothing him, the sixty-something worker spotted something among the shards of the broken jars and pointed.
"Carpenter Jang, there's something over there."
"Huh?"
Between the shattered pieces of the jar, a coin purse rolled up tightly in cloth came into view.
I opened the coin purse.
"Gold rings?"
Inside were a baby's gold ring—the kind given as a first-birthday gift—and a single woman's gold ring.
"The coin purse is so old the cloth's practically falling apart, but there's not a single scratch of wear on these rings."
"Well, what do you know?"
Carpenter Jang examined the rings with fascination.
"Former village head Jeon owned this house, so they must've been his wife's, right? But why would she have buried them in a jar?"
As Carpenter Jang and I put our heads together over the puzzle, the older worker chimed in. "The old couple who lived here have long since turned to bones, wouldn't you say? So the rings ought to go to you, young man."
"What? Me?"
"They were found in this house's kitchen. They might as well have lived in it along with the house."
"Whoa, boss man landlord—you just hit the jackpot! That's a windfall!"
"Hahaha."
The foreign worker's remark set everyone laughing, but I couldn't join in.
Did the guardian snake show me these gold rings on purpose?
It seemed I needed to find out exactly who these rings had belonged to.
"My sister-in-law never once wore a thing like a gold ring in her whole life."
That evening, I visited the village head's home and showed him the rings.
He told me the rings didn't belong to former village head Jeon's wife—his own sister-in-law.
"Our eldest brother who lived in that house is a full twenty years older than me. His wife and our big brother were the same age. Think about it, son—what do you suppose this remote mountain valley was like back in their day?"
They'd been so poor that even touching gold was out of the question.
Apparently it got so bad they would strip pine bark, boil it, and steam it alongside potatoes to eat.
"When the two of them grew frail, they moved to Seoul ten years ago. Big brother was eighty-two by then. Hardly the age to be wearing gold trinkets around."
"Aigoo, they lived such hard lives and went off like that. It's heartbreaking, really."
Mrs. Han Su-ja climbed up onto the wooden veranda carrying a steaming pot.
She'd said she'd catch a chicken and stew it for us tonight.
Had she caught the hen that roamed free in her vegetable garden?
A terrifying woman.
I'd once watched her chase down chickens all over Gangwon Province while helping me look for a house. Better not to have known, honestly—but the slow-stewed native chicken had been genuinely delicious.
When Mrs. Han Su-ja lifted the lid, the distinctive aroma of pine mushrooms mingled with the smell of stewed chicken and set my mouth watering.
"Back when I married into this village, I used to sigh and wonder if I could really trust a man with just two coins to his name. Yoonho, my boy—even if that ring was something your big brother bought with the coins he squirreled away, you just keep it."
"You—you want me to keep it?"
"If you go calling his nephews trying to return it, every last one of them will claim it's his. Right, old man?"
At her words, the village head nodded emphatically.
"That's exactly what worries me. What if the nephews, who've all gotten along just fine, end up at odds with each other over a pair of gold rings? That's my point."
"You know what they say—seeing is wanting. Just keep it, Yoonho. And if it still feels wrong, give them to me. Hohoho."
"Why, you—!"
The village head shot her a sidelong glare—absolutely not, apparently. Mrs. Han Su-ja pouted.
"Can't even joke around? Besides, come to think of it, I don't have a pure gold ring either, do I? Back when you co-signed that loan to become village head, all the money I had, or didn't have—"
"Ahem. Looks like rain. Did I close the window beside the vinyl greenhouse or not?"
As the village head tried to slip away, Mrs. Han Su-ja barked at him.
"Dinner's ready—where do you think you're going?"
"She's right! We need to play a round, and quick."
Mak-sun Halmeoni, who'd been dozing off in front of the TV, sprang up and went to fetch a blanket, declaring they should play hwatu card games.
"Grandma, eat your supper first, then play. I simmered chicken-baeksuk with plenty of pine mushrooms."
"Just chicken. No mushrooms."
"See? I told you!"
The village head grumbled that pine mushrooms and chicken were best eaten separately.
He seemed to dry out the unmarketable pine mushrooms and brew them as tea—which was probably why the pine mushroom baeksuk felt so neglected.
Oho! Then that whole pot full of pine mushroom baeksuk is all mine?
I lifted my bowl with both hands and spoke up to Mrs. Han Su-ja.
"I love pine mushroom baeksuk. Pile it on for me, please."
"See, that's why our Yoonho's such a charming boy. Anyone who doesn't want it can go without. They can eat later when they're hungry—or boil up some ramyeon instead."
"I want ramyeon,"
Mak-sun Halmeoni said, swallowing audibly.
"Neogyuri?"
"She means ramyeon, dear."
Mrs. Han Su-ja answered my puzzled look.
"The ramyeon they hand out at the township office is the mild Ansung and the spicy kind. That's why she calls it that."
She tore off a chicken drumstick and placed it in Mak-sun Halmeoni's bowl.
"No fussing about ramyeon. If you finish all of this, I'll make you ramyeon tomorrow. Deal?"
"You promise?"
Only then did Mak-sun Halmeoni start in on the pine mushroom baeksuk.
The village head plopped down in his seat and added his own two cents.
"Can we all just agree—no shiitake or pine mushrooms in ramyeon, ever. Ramyeon's tastiest with nothing but the soup packet, and that's final."
"So when exactly are you buying me that gold ring?"
"Why do you keep going on about gold rings!"
"You co-signed that loan and sold off every gold ring and gold necklace I had, that's why!"
The village head and his wife raised their voices at each other.
Hoping to snag a second helping before the atmosphere turned truly combative, I blew on the hot broth and drank it down.
"Ahh. So this is what it tastes like with plenty of pine mushroom in it, huh?"
Truthfully, the chicken was a mere supporting act—it was all pine mushroom flavor.
Not that it was bad. I sweated buckets and thoroughly enjoyed my dinner.
The village head had already washed the eel dishes and wire grill from yesterday spotless, so I insisted on handling the dinner dishes.
Perhaps the sight of me squatting at the tap washing up tugged at her heart, because Mrs. Han Su-ja rolled up her sleeves.
"Step aside. I'll do it."
"No, really. I'm good at dishes."
"Goodness, such a sweet boy."
"Aw, come on now."
As the head of the Women's Association, Mrs. Han Su-ja kept a watchful eye on the village's elderly—caring for them attentively so that not a single one should die alone and unnoticed.
It was thanks to how fondly she regarded me that all the village elders treated me kindly, without a trace of prejudice.
So this is the woman who can out-talk even the village head.
Which was why I made my request carefully.
"Um... Madam President, still—if you could look into who owned those gold rings."
"They have to go back to their owner, do they?"
"With a baby's first-birthday ring in there too, I feel like there's a story behind them."
"All right. I'll look into it quietly, on the sly."
Mrs. Han Su-ja gave me a wink.
"Thank you."
"Oh, and speaking of which—I happened to run into Seo's father at the bank today. He's worried about his youngest daughter, the one who isn't married yet..."
Mrs. Han Su-ja seemed determined to match me up with Seo, the teller at the Nonghyup.
"Whoa, my legs are falling asleep! Madam President, tonight's pine mushroom baeksuk was seriously incredible. Thank you so much. Next market day, if I see a pretty scarf, I'll buy it for you."
The moment I rose smoothly and tried to slip away, Mrs. Han Su-ja's eyes narrowed into triangles.
"Where do you think you're going! Aren't you getting married?"
"No, I'm not."
"What do you mean, why not? Are you a eunuch?"
"Myaong!"
No. 1, curled up asleep at the far end of the veranda, jolted awake with a start and leapt to his feet.
"Come on, No. 1, let's get you to bed."
I scooped up No. 1 and fled through the front gate.
The next day, Carpenter Jang and the crew pressed on with the renovation.
With the earthen walls all torn down, the plan was to gut the floors entirely, then reinforce the roof insulation and the main beams.
"Hey there, Yoonho, my boy! If there's heavy lifting to be done, feel free to holler!"
I scratched the back of my head at Carpenter Jang's offer.
"My arms are kind of sore, actually. Haha. Guess I can't help out."
I had no idea how strong I actually was now, and I certainly couldn't go flaunting it in front of everyone.
First, I needed to figure out where this monstrous strength of mine was even coming from.
"Right! Yesterday, our Khun beat on that thing half to death, and you smashed it in one swing. And that thing does not break easy, mind you."
"Yes, I suppose so."
After offering my usual greeting of thanks for the day's work, I gathered up a few pieces of equipment and headed for the Back Mountain.
It seemed high time I put my superhuman strength to the test.