An Interpreter! I Asked for an Interpreter!
“An interpreter! I said, an interpreter!”
The envoys who had been waiting for ages were beginning to feel their throats go dry. They glanced about the room — cups there were in plenty, but not a single water pitcher to be seen.
“No servants, no water — what shabby hospitality this is!”
His throat parched, the man who had come as envoy grew furious at being made to stand in line, and suddenly he shouted.
“Oh, dear.”
“What is it!?”
The man beside him gave him a pitying look, and the fellow choked up with indignation.
“Is this your first time here?”
“It is! What business is that of yours!”
“Whew…”
Without another word, the man walked over, picked up a cup, and turned on the tap to pour him some water.
Sshhaaaaaaa.
“Wha—? What is that?”
“Here, drink. This is how one has water here.”
“…”
There was running water installed right there in the room — the cups had simply been set out so that anyone could help themselves — but the newcomer had had no idea.
“Ahem. The least they could do is offer some guidance… My thanks to you.”
Embarrassed, he cleared his throat and thanked the man beside him. He was, after all, a civilized man of learning — a man who knew his manners.
“Also, there are proper latrines, so do not relieve yourself wherever you please. You could be banished permanently.”
“Hm?”
In those days, Rome's aqueducts and public toilets had all vanished under the influence of Christian culture.
To relieve oneself, one normally used a chamber pot in a corner of the room and dumped it out the window, or made do behind bushes and trees.
“What is a latrine?”
“A place where one relieves oneself and washes.”
“What on earth is that?”
It was simply beyond anything his common sense could grasp.
A latrine? In a Europe ruled by a faith that branded bodily pleasure a sin and dismissed excessive bathing and adornment as worldly vanity, such a thing could not exist.
“I must see it at once!”
“Step outside and turn left — you'll find a board with a figure of a man on it. Go and see.”
The man leapt up at once and dashed for the latrine — and it was absolutely not because his business was urgent.
No, he went to see with his own eyes just how degenerate this place truly was.
“Wha—?”
And the latrine was paved with smooth polished stone, smelled of nothing at all, and — no exaggeration — was cleaner than his own bedchamber.
“This is the latrine?”
He looked around it cautiously. He had at least seen a tap before, so that much didn't faze him.
Shwaaaaaaa.
“Gah! What was that? The water swept everything away? A well? But why does the water drain off like that?”
As he stared in wonder, he noticed a picture drawn in front of him. Something on the floor, it seemed — with the figure of a person squatting over it.
“Ah… so it isn't a well…”
The illustration was remarkably intuitive. He relieved himself and stood up.
“So the water was for carrying away the waste…”
Degenerate, indeed — his business concluded most refreshingly, he returned to the waiting room and sat down again.
And so the wait stretched on. And on.
“Haah…”
“Damn it…”
People had begun to sigh.
The newcomer, too timid to ask anything outright, sat watching for his opening — and just as he was about to speak—
Paht!
He had assumed the room would be dark, the sun being well down — and yet it was growing brighter?
“Gah! What is this!”
“A lamp? Or a 'lamp of lightning,' or whatever it's called — a light, in any case.”
“It's this bright!? Did they conjure the sun itself?”
Compared to oil lamps or torches, an electric light was blindingly bright. And it gave off no smoke whatsoever…
At first sight, it was the kind of thing one could only attribute to a demon's trickery or divine grace.
“Just think of it as an ordinary lamp.”
“Gah…”
The reactions of everyone seeing an electric light for the first time were all alike. Then people began to gather up their belongings.
“Hm? Where is everyone going?”
“We must return for the day.”
“But we haven't been granted our audience yet!”
“They'll be along shortly to tell us business hours are over and we're to go home.”
“What!?”
They had come all this way as envoys — surely they wouldn't be denied an audience and left to fend for lodgings and meals without so much as a courtesy? That was how it had always worked everywhere else, and to him it was utterly baffling.
“So I'm expected to come back tomorrow?”
“That's right.”
“Where in the world is such treatment acceptable!”
“Right here.”
Already resigned to it — this was hardly the first time he'd watched this play out — the man's matter-of-fact explanation made the newcomer's blood boil.
“Bah!”
“Hey! Control yourself! You'll be thrown out!”
As the first-timer kicked back his chair and made for the door, the men around him grabbed him and held him back.
“I have never received treatment like this in my life!”
“None of us have. Endure it, and go unpack your things.”
Come to think of it, more than a few among them had brought along simple provisions and bedding.
The man sat back down, fuming — it was all so bitterly unfair.
They said Daehan held wondrous foods and rare treasures. He had come expecting that, as an envoy, he would be lavishly received and showered with gifts.
Instead, far from any presents, it looked as though the fortune he'd spent outfitting this embassy would simply go up in smoke.
The marvel of the glowing light had long since been driven clean out of his mind.
“Audience hours are over. Unfortunately, please come again tomorrow.”
“Haah…”
“Haah…”
“Blast it…”
On the faces of the men trudging out with heavy sighs were painted despair, rage, grief, and resignation in every shade.
The ones who filed out of the castle gates scattered to the inns nearby, secured rooms, and settled down to eat.
“Hmph! As if the food of Daehan could amount to anything! I'll have a look at it, at the very least.”
The rookie, on his very first day of waiting for an audience, ducked into the nearest establishment, took a room, and ordered a meal.
“Oh? They say there's liquor too?”
“No, sir.”
“Hm? What do you mean?”
“It is medicinal wine. Medicine, sir.”
“Huh?”
According to the explanation, it was an infusion of medicinal herbs steeped in spirits.
It was a thin fig leaf of an excuse, to be sure — but one drank such medicine only in small doses, for one's health, and surely God would forgive him that much. He ordered the liquor as well.
“So this is their famed stir-fried pork with rice?”
“Yes, sir. Enjoy your meal.”
“Right. My thanks.”
And he began opening the boxes one by one.
The food came packaged, since a runner from the establishment sprinted off to fetch it the moment you ordered.
“Hm? What a sweet fragrance?”
Sweetness was the emblem of wealth. He sneaked a bite — and dropped his spoon.
Clang-clatter!
“Ohh….”
Good heavens. Pepper and sugar lavished without restraint, a mysterious savory depth and saltiness, the pungent bite of garlic and a charred, smoky aroma flooding his entire mouth — it was simply too delicious.
“This gentle heat! And on top of it, this marriage of sweet and salty — what is this!?”
The fury he'd built up through a full day of waiting was melting away, bit by buttery bit.
Mmm—
Then he ate it together with the rice, and the rice's own sweetness piled on top. This was no longer any occasion to worry about dignity or decorum.
“Ohh….”
He wolfed the food down in a frenzy and finished with a sip of the so-called medicinal wine.
“Gah! And what in the world is this!”
Since when could liquor be this fragrant — this sweet?
He tipped the whole cup down his throat in a flash.
“Have I truly been possessed by a demon?”
And so, dragging his leaden feet up to his room, he spent the whole night in prayers of repentance.
“Ahh… still, that liquor was awfully good…”
What exactly was muttered in the middle of those prayers, only he and God would ever know.
The next day, the man rose with bleary eyes from his night of prayer and headed for the castle gates.
The line had thinned considerably yesterday — so he harbored a faint hope that today they might simply start from the front of the queue.
“What the—!”
But the area before the gates was swarming with people. They had lined up early to claim their numbers.
“There are more than yesterday!”
A rough count put it at a hundred and fifty at least. And what if still more kept arriving?
He couldn't very well give up now, so he ran to take his place in line.
It seemed his day would be anything but smooth sailing. Again.
“Whew…”
Sitting quietly in the waiting room, he found himself starting to understand Daehan a little.
There was only one person to see, after all — and weren't there thousands upon thousands of nobles across Europe?
The envoy had passed through the stage of rage and entered the stages of acceptance and understanding.
“So that's why everyone was so calm.”
He was beginning to grasp the hearts of the seniors who'd waited before him. Getting angry here accomplished nothing but expulsion, after all.
“Unhand me! Do you have any idea who I am!?”
THUD!
“…”
Look at that one. Threw a tantrum, and a guard knocked him cold with a single blow and hauled him out.
Outside the bounds of the rules these people had set, they were truly merciless.
Noble or not — indeed, even if a king himself were to come — the treatment would surely be identical.
“Come to think of it… everyone really is equal…”
Before he knew it, he was on the verge of voicing the thought that perhaps king and commoner alike were simply human, all of them equal — and he froze in horror, clapping a hand over his own mouth.
It was a dangerously subversive notion — the kind that could shake the very foundations of their class-bound society, root and branch.
“Gah! The lights!”
“Gah! The latrine!”
“Gah! The water!”
There was a fresh rookie every single day. Watching them all,
“I had my moments like that too, once…”
he murmured, taking out his lunch box — already his fourth day waiting here.
This business of an audience was genuinely brutal. The crowd only ever growing was the worst problem of all.
And then, at last, the day came.
“Number thirty-five!”
“Yes! That's me!”
Never had the words number thirty-five sounded so sweet. Good heavens…
After days of waiting, at last — his audience.
Granted, he'd liked his lodgings and loved the food, so he hadn't exactly suffered. He'd made a surprising number of friends along the way, too.
“Right this way, please.”
“Thank you.”
And there, seated in the chamber he entered, was an honest-to-goodness angel.
With the sunlight streaming in from the window behind her, it almost seemed as though a halo ringed her head.
Wait — which raving lunatic out there dared call this girl a demon, a witch?
“Greetings. I have come as the representative of François I of France.”
“!#$!#$!”
“…Pardon?”
He was genuinely, thoroughly flustered. What language even was that?
He looked around — and saw that the chamber held only himself and the angel.
“Do you… perhaps not speak French?”
“!#@!#%”
“Oh, dear God…. No….”
A dreadful thought flashed through his mind: this girl understood no French whatsoever.
In truth, Haneul did know a smattering of French — but nowhere near fluent enough for conversation.
“Huuuugh…”
His heart felt as though it were being torn in two. And what could he possibly say — why don't you know French?
One look at that beautiful, utterly harmless face, and somehow everything felt like his own fault.
The truth was that Haneul, worn ragged from meeting a seemingly endless parade of envoys, was already more than a little irritated and thoroughly drained.
And when Haneul made a troubled face, the man somehow ended up blaming himself — for not bringing an interpreter, for never having learned Daehan's language.
“Please, I beg you — call for an interpreter!”
“!$!@#?”
To her it was gibberish, but Haneul gathered: Ah, another one who can't communicate has shown up.
“An interpreter! An INTERPRETER!”
Certain he was about to be thrown out at this rate, he shouted as though in the grip of a fit. And the girl's face went wide with alarm.
“Uh? Ah! No! No, no! That's not it!”
BANG!
The door flew open and guards rushed in.
“No, wait — please, just fetch an interpreter!”
Suddenly, he remembered the guide — the one who had escorted him to this room, the one he could talk to. Surely they could just bring him.
“!#$!#$”
“!#$!”
THUD.
Unfortunately, not a single soul present knew a word of French.
Haneul, who had caught a little of it, played dumb—
“Honestly. If you've come to Daehan, speak Daehan's language. What even is all that?”
As Haneul grumbled, sulking slightly,
“We'll carry the young lady out, my lady.”
“Yeah. Thanks.”
The soldiers hauled the unconscious man out like a sack of luggage.
He was out cold, of course — and even if he hadn't been, he'd have understood not a word of what Haneul said.
And a short while later, when the man came to on the lawn before the castle gates, the tears came at last.
“Goddamn it all. Why don't you know French…? No, wait! Couldn't you have just called the person who showed me in!? Hhk—hhk—”
Too aggrieved for words, he wept like a madman on the lawn before the castle, for a very long time.