A Day in the Life of the Ancients (2)
Wake up in the morning, weave cloth all day, sleep at night — the wheel spins round and round, but it's a peaceful routine.
This is what an ordinary day looks like in this era.
And honestly? I don't hate it.
"Ha-eun, come eat."
Tonight's dinner was roasted potatoes. That faint smoky whiff of slightly charred skin rising from the fire — I love it.
Knock, knock.
"Hm? Who could that be?"
"Stay seated, dear. I'll go see."
It was Daka, the lady of the house, heading for the door. Through the gap, I glimpsed the village chief outside. I couldn't make out their words, but the mood looked a little serious...
What could it be? When Daka came back after the conversation, her face was dark.
"Whew..."
"What's wrong? Did something happen?"
"The bandits from the west have been prowling around. The chief says to be careful at night, and if we hear a horn or a whistle, hurry inside the fortress."
Whistles and horns were the main signaling tools of this era. The fortress probably had a great big horn, the kind whose sound carries for miles.
Bandits from the west... those wouldn't happen to be the guys who kidnapped me, would they?
Not like I need sleep anyway, so I decided to stand watch. If they come, I'll punch a hole clean through their skulls.
I waited until Daka drifted off, then slipped quietly up onto the roof.
Clack, clatter.
I'd fished out a handful of pebbles to fling at any suspicious characters with my telekinesis — and, well, fidgeting with them turns out to be weirdly addictive?
Tap, tap.
Every little while, Daka would come out and add firewood to keep the hearth warm. Such a devoted woman, truly.
Fweee... fweee...
Hm? Faint, but that's a whistle, isn't it? Not a horn... Did something happen?
Tap.
Sounded like it came from the west. Off I go!
Creeping along, keeping low, I spotted a light flickering in the distance — probably a torch carried by one of the patrol squads.
"Who goes there!"
Fweet—fweet—
"Fall back!"
"!#%!@"
Six patrolmen faced off against a mob of twenty-odd primitives.
Maybe I could help. I'll just stand back here quietly. Numbers matter, after all. And the whistle keeps blowing — sounds like they're calling for reinforcements.
"^@#$%#"
"@#$!"
Wait, that's the same language as the guys who kidnapped me? So it is them. Now they're pointing fingers at me in the torchlight, raising a ruckus. Maybe I shouldn't have come after all?
Well, we've already locked eyes, so no helping it. Hey there, boys! Yes, it's me! Remember your big sister?
"Hm? Who's that?"
Finally, someone glancing behind him. Your friendly neighborhood ally, at your service~
"Ah, right. I'm staying at Daka's house."
"Oh! I know. You're the newcomer, aren't you?"
"More importantly, what do we do about those guys?"
"Hmm, hard to say."
Good lord, these men are simple souls. If they get ambushed like this, it's going to hurt. If it were me, I'd have cracked a few skulls first and negotiated after.
Huh? Oh — they can't understand each other...
"Can you actually talk to them?"
"There are one or two among them who understand a little, but they keep demanding we hand something over."
Hm? Could it be... me? Did they come to kidnap me back?
How far away are they... Are these lunatics serious?
I'd pulled out nice round pebbles for cracking skulls, but apparently I need sharp ones instead.
Try anything funny, and you lot won't be making it home in one piece. How's that?
"Um... could that person be you, miss?"
"Sorry, what?"
"That evening around autumn... when you were roasting potatoes by the road..."
"Uh... oh?"
Right, that guy was a scout, wasn't he? Hey. Hey! Why are your eyes sparkling like that again?
"W-well... who's to say?"
You came back just to find me, didn't you! I was supposed to play dumb...
"I knew it!"
Haha. Cover's blown. Blown to bits. I need to move houses soon.
"@%@$"
"@!!^!^&"
The enemy grew louder and raised their spears — the atmosphere had turned ugly.
Hm? The older man I was talking to has turned around and is staring straight at me...
"Um, miss? Do you... happen to know them?"
"Er... I'd know them, yes."
I couldn't recall every villager from that place, but yeah, that was the general vibe.
"They say they've come to take you back?"
What kind of bullshit is that?
"Why would they want me? Aren't those men criminals?"
"According to them, their bride ran away."
"Excuse me?!"
Ah, this is absurd.
"I was traveling, and while I was asleep those creeps kidnapped me and... (omitted)... so I smashed the place up and... (omitted)... ran!"
Whew! That was so frustrating I could barely get the words out.
"Oh? That's impressive. Then we should drive them off. Everyone, take up your weapons!"
Mr. Squad Leader... you're a bit too soft in the head. They outnumber you six to twenty, no?
Even with better weapons, a fight starts with numbers. Honestly...
Spears were raised on both sides, and it felt like battle could break out at any moment.
.
.
.
"!@#!"
"Get lost!"
Hold on. These gentlemen are... fighting with words?
Excellent strategy I have. Outnumbered, you say?
Fweee! CRACK!
First strike wins the war!
Hit them first, and winning gets so much easier.
Whoosh! Thwack! Whoosh! Crack! Whoosh! Crunch! WHAM!
Oh! One shot! One kill! And a two-for-one special too? Wait, it ricocheted off and hit the guy behind him?
In the blink of an eye, the stones I'd flung — four of them — had laid five men sprawling in the dirt.
"..."
The enemy, apparently unable to see in the dark, stood peering down at their fallen comrades.
"..."
Our side, standing right behind me, stared at the woman who had just thrown something.
"Whoops? My hand slipped."
It totally slipped. Yep.
"AAAAH! !#%!#"
One of them had come to his senses. He screamed and charged, but for some reason his run looked awfully wobbly.
"Snap out of it! Weapons up!"
The squad leader's roar. Maybe throw something while she's at it—
RATATATATAT.
While everyone was distracted by the enemy, I hurled a whole volley at once. There was no point letting them get close — catching a stone spear hurts, you know?
In an instant, skulls cracked and primitives toppled like dominoes. In the end, only four even made it within charging distance of us.
Meanwhile, we're still six strong over here.
The sight of them slinking backward, though — that was pretty funny. Still, they've got loyalty, I'll give them that. Blood streaming down their faces, doing their best to carry their wounded comrades! Aww~
"Wow..."
Somebody catch the flies going into those scouts' mouths.
"That was incredible."
"No wonder you escaped on your own."
"Right..."
"And by the way, you should never let armed men get that close. Don't you carry a bow?"
One thing that bugged me — no bows. That's rough.
"We usually carry spears and daggers. When someone blows the whistle, the archers come running with their bows."
Huh. They've actually got a whole manual. Good for them.
"I see..."
"Still, from what I saw, your stones work well too. You've taught me something valuable."
Hm? Are they seriously planning to fight with rocks? Mine hit every time because I steer them with telekinesis, but for regular folk that can't be easy...
"So what do we do about those men now?"
"We'll have to push the patrols farther out."
"You don't have nearly enough men for that."
"Then we'll have to make a request to Sinsi."
Hm. Sounds like Sinsi functions as the central authority. That's a relief, actually.
"Goodness! Ha-eun, I heard what you did!"
"They say you threw stones like a master!"
The next day I went out to weave, and the women were in an absolute frenzy. The scouts had apparently come by the house and blabbed every last detail.
Daka and I had felt a little on the outside of the workshop crowd, but overnight we were certified influencers.
"They say you cracked thirty bandit skulls yesterday!"
"Hm? I heard fifty?"
"What? Wasn't it a hundred?"
Ah, these blowhard old men. Is this what the military is always like?
"My goodness~ how do you throw like that with such thin little hands?"
Should I teach them the sling? It'd be good for the women to have a weapon of their own. Bows need serious strength to draw — hard for most women, no?
"Um... a sl— I mean, there's a way for women to throw stones hard too. It's called stone-slinging. Want me to show you?"
"There's such a thing?"
Luckily, this place had plenty of cord and cloth, so a sling would be easy to make.
"Watch. You put a stone in this cloth, grip the cords, and swing it around like so."
VMMMM VMMMM VMMMM.
The sling whirled with a truly menacing sound.
Wow. Even I'm a little scared spinning this thing...
"My... such slender arms, and such power!"
"Amazing, isn't it?"
Snap! THUNK.
The moment I let go of one cord, the stone buried itself in the wooden panel of the workshop wall.
Huh? I expected it to bounce off? It's stronger than I thought.
"Gasp!"
"If we did that, we'd punch right through the board!"
Ah, right — these ladies' forearms are nothing to sneeze at. This really would be a lethal weapon in their hands.
From that day on, you'd have thought a swarm of bees had descended on the village. A vmmm here, a vmmm there — everyone was whirling slings in a mad rush.
Stones were easy to find, so they treated it almost like a sport.
The men took to carrying them too, as emergency gear — wrapped around the wrist like a bracelet, ready to use anywhere.
Worst case, stones are scattered everywhere — who's ever going to run out of ammo?
And so the western primitives' little incursion faded into a minor episode of village comedy.
Alongside my legendary tale of martial glory, of course.
The cocoons we'd been saving had finally run out, so today I was learning to weave.
Clack-click. Clack.
Raising the treadle lifts the threads, lowering it drops them; pass the wound bobbin through the gap and press it tight, and a little more silk is born, bit by bit.
"Wow, that's fascinating. It really takes a long time, doesn't it?"
"Is this your first time, Ha-eun?"
"Yes. Everything's my first time."
"You must be a young lady from some grand household, hm?"
Oops. She's right, isn't she? Am I really that obvious about never having worked? In this era, a woman's work is basically weaving and clothes-making, and nothing else.
"No, no. Haha."
"Mm-hm. Ho ho."
These aunties are sharp little information-gatherers. Razor-sharp.
Clatter-clack, clatter-clack.
This is way too monotonous. I'm going to lose my mind.
"Bluuuue skiiiies, endless streaaams~"
I'd better sing a little tune to keep myself sane.
"Oh? What's that?"
"Sorry, what?"
"What you just did."
"Ah — that's a song."
"It's lovely to listen to. Do go on, dear."
"Ahaha."
How embarrassing. And so a children's-song workshop began, quite naturally. I taught them the calf song, and before I knew it I'd sung well over ten of them.
The stiff air, once filled with nothing but clatter-clack, now hummed with people crooning little melodies.
Nobody seemed to know what the lyrics meant, but they must have liked it — their faces were full of smiles.
The children's songs of the modern age had become the work songs of the ancient one.
Well, if one song can make people that happy, I'll count it a win.
Lunch today was potatoes again. I seriously have to run a nutritional analysis on these whenever I get back to the modern era. What is in these things, that people can live well on potatoes alone? Don't they end up short on protein or vitamins? Judging by how buff everyone is, protein seems covered, but still...
"Ha-eun? Why are you glaring at your potato like that?"
"Everyone stays so healthy eating only this. I was just wondering how."
"Then you should be grateful — it's a gift from Haneul-nim."
Gulp.
So the religious activity continues here too. I don't see any chapel around, though — where do they even worship?
"You're right, of course."
"Keep a grateful heart always, Ha-eun."
"Yes. Of course."
After lunch, during the short rest period, everyone just sat around staring blankly at the sky.
This is exactly the kind of atmosphere that gives people depression...
I need to spread some simple games around.
I gathered up five nice round pebbles from nearby.
"Daka, play with me."
"What are we playing?"
"There's a game you can play with just five stones, like this."
Jackstones, of course. Five pebbles of the right size were plenty. Later on, once things developed, they'd carve them nice and round. Eventually.
Tak. Tak. Tak.
"Oh my? What is this?"
"It's a hand game. We call it gonggi."
Before I knew it, the aunties and young women had all gathered around.
"We could set little penalties or prizes to make it fun, you know?"
"Ooh~"
Apparently everyone had been bored stiff, because the crowd scattered in twos and threes, hunting for their own sets of stones. So they all wanted to play, deep down.
Tak. Tak. Tak.
Over here.
Tak. Tak. Tak.
And over there.
From then on, far fewer people spent the lunch hour staring vacantly at the sky and the fields. Should I make hanafuda cards next? Will gambling spring up too? Eh, they'll sort that out themselves.
And so it was the first stirrings of spring, as winter drew to a close.
PHWOOOOO—