Flames of Vengeance (Part One) (4)
May 5th. 5:00 p.m.
The endless afternoon of Children's Day stretched on and on.
On the lawn beside my castle, dry timber had been stacked high. Oil was poured over it, and the pyre was lit.
Whoosh…!
Precautions had already been taken to keep the flames from spreading to the grass. Thanks to that, the carefully piled wood — and the body with it — burned cleanly. Ash rose and drifted toward the sky.
I had wrapped the remains of her horrific death in cloth with all the reverence I could muster and laid her atop the timber, so that no one else would have to look upon them.
And so Seo Hyejin burned within the flames, her terrible end exposed to only a single person.
I stood before that blazing funeral pyre.
Behind me: a vast crowd. The residents of my territory. The four who served as my officers. And the grief-stricken members of Hope's Wings — the guild that had stayed with Seo Hyejin until the very end.
I watched the flames burn, calm and still, as the sunset slowly painted the world in orange light.
"…Seo Hyejin was one who never stopped striving."
I opened my mouth to offer a final testimony for the dead.
"Every time I met her, she was in crisis. She nearly died captive to orcs. She nearly died surrounded by skeletons. Even the reason she came here was a crisis — the threats and coercion of selfish men. And yet she never once…"
I fixed my eyes on the shape within the flames, a form that had already nearly vanished without a trace.
"…gave up. She often said it herself. That she was inadequate. That in this terrible age, she was so weak she could not even kill a single zombie. And yet, even while she felt her own frailty down to the bone — even while she felt inferiority toward those who stood at the opposite extreme of that frailty — she never gave up, not even at the very last."
Huh. The smoke rising from the fire was… stinging? My eyes were burning quite a bit.
No. These were tears.
Tears for the precious person I had lost were streaming down my face.
Even Lawful Good could not stop them. My true feelings had finally broken through.
"And now… she is vanishing into ash. The woman who lived with everything she had until the very end has become a body that can never return to our side. She entrusted her final moments to me only so that she would not become something even more terrible than this."
"Kh-hh…!"
"Hic… Hyejin unnie…!"
The sound of people weeping reached me. For an instant, the world spun. My body swayed; I nearly toppled over. My mind went blank, and a violent surge of emotion crashed through me.
For the briefest moment, the impulse to drop to my knees like the rest of them and wail openly actually moved my body.
Of course… Lawful Good had no intention of allowing even that attempt. My body remained rigidly upright.
What a capricious set of values. It placed no restraint whatsoever on my wet eyes.
"I… was not someone who had known her for long. At most, a little over a month spent struggling to survive together in Gyeonggi-do. And yet I can say with certainty that I saw her true heart up close. I can say with certainty that I heard her innermost feelings with my own ears. Even as she confessed her own limits… she was someone who never abandoned the sincere desire to protect the people who followed her."
I had no talent for singing a funeral dirge.
Nor any talent for reciting a fitting poem for the dead.
But… at the very least…
"And now she has become this — thrashing and fighting until the final moment without ever casting aside that conviction. It is horrific, and yet it was an end worthy of her."
At the very least… I…!
"I do not wish to accept her death like this."
I did not want to remain the kind of man who simply grieved before a death and nothing more.
"Why did she have to suffer this fate? Why did someone who strove harder than anyone, who clawed for life harder than anyone, who fought for others harder than anyone… have to meet such a wretched end? I do not wish to simply shrug and accept that injustice."
My eyes and my head turned slowly.
Toward the place far beyond the northern edge of Yeouido, where dark clouds hung heavy.
Gangbuk. That damned nest of bat bastards. I ground the words out through my teeth as I stared at it.
"Seo Hyejin… she was bitter. She poured out her resentment. She unleashed her fury before me — why she had to die like this. And I…"
I turned my gaze. I looked at the countless people watching me.
"…took that deep will into my heart. And I made my resolve."
Then I shifted my eyes to the four who had always supported me.
Han Sora looked utterly drained, as if she had cried herself empty. Her face was a hollow shell.
Park Seeun's expression was locked in rage and despair. She still looked as though she could not believe Seo Hyejin was truly gone.
Kim Seyeon wore a face… remarkably similar to my own. Hardened. Rigid. And yet submerged in grief.
Of the four, only Yun Mina attended the funeral with anything approaching composure — and even that was only relative to the others.
"I have resolved to carry out a decision that some would cry out and call vengeance."
"For one person."
"And for the world she wished for… a world where people could live in peace."
I turned my gaze once more to the many who had gathered for the funeral, sincerely hoping my true feelings would reach them.
And at the same time, carrying the contradictory wish that someone among them might stand against this speech steeped in madness.
"Tomorrow, we will march on Gangbuk. To utterly destroy those monstrous bat-creatures who would drive people into despair."
May 6th. 3:00 a.m.
After the funeral ended, preparations for the expedition proceeded with astonishing speed.
The silver items and silver ingots recovered from the dungeon proved so effective that the word foresight barely did them justice.
We were able to equip the territory's residents, along with the combat-class members of Seo Hyejin's and Jung Yun's guilds, with silver armor and weapons.
On top of that, those with the Blacksmith class took the silver ingots and mass-produced decent silver weapons, armor, and consumables in no time at all. Silver arrowheads were among them.
In particular, the members of Hope's Wings — the guild Seo Hyejin had led — threw themselves into the preparations with something close to mania.
For the time being, the position of guild leader passed to Jung Miju, who had held the next-highest level after Seo Hyejin. Under her command, the guild members unleashed their specialties without restraint.
Cutting into their sleep, the Alchemists brewed explosive potions while the Blacksmiths forged weapons and armor. Some even volunteered for night watch against surprise attacks, eyes wide open and refusing to rest.
In those eyes, the flames of vengeance burned unmistakably bright.
And now, on the eve of tomorrow's departure, those same flames of vengeance were kindling in me as well.
The one standing night watch, staring toward Gangbuk, was me.
The one who had soothed the members of Hope's Wings and told them to rest well before we set out was also me.
And the one standing on the castle rooftop, gazing at Gangbuk with a heart emptier and more hollow than anyone else's… was also me.
Why?
Everything was proceeding exactly as I had planned.
The people had silently agreed with my proposal. Aside from a very small number, a combined total of fifty-five people — territory residents and the members of Jung Yun's and Seo Hyejin's (now Jung Miju's) guilds — had committed to the expedition.
Those remaining were a handful of low-level residents who simply could not be put into combat, three young children, and one elderly grandmother.
All or nothing. Succeed, and we could reclaim Gangbuk — no, all of Seoul. Fail, and everyone died. An operation that was essentially a pure gamble.
No one would have blamed them for running or refusing… and yet most people had simply nodded and gone looking for work to do, throwing themselves into the expedition preparations.
And I — I, whose speech was so badly crippled by that bizarre value system called Lawful Good —
I could not understand those people at all.
Creeeak…!
"I thought I'd find you here, Jeong Hoon-ssi. Please go inside and rest. You'll need to stand at the vanguard tomorrow…"
A voice came from behind me.
The person who opened the rooftop door and stepped through was Kim Seyeon. The one urging me to rest looked rather exhausted herself.
She had cleared the dungeon, rushed straight back, and then thrown herself into finishing the expedition preparations in a blur. Naturally, that meant cutting sleep short and working countless tasks deep into the night.
And yet here she was, still awake, telling me to get some rest.
Why…?
"…Anxiety is driving sleep away from me."
My mouth opened of its own accord and spilled the truth.
For a moment, I startled myself — surprised that I had spoken at all.
I had confessed my true feelings far too honestly. For a second I wanted to scold Lawful Good for vanishing on the job.
"That can't be helped. Tomorrow… we're fated to fight a truly critical battle. An expedition framed as vengeance — one that may well be our last."
Kim Seyeon came to stand beside me and looked out toward Gangbuk with me.
We had set the lights to keep shining around the perimeter so the vampires could not approach, and we had lit the bridges leading toward Gangbuk as well so they remained visible.
Those lights would be a hope protecting the people of the territory even while we were gone. Well — if we failed, the territory and the generators would both be rendered meaningless, and the land would return to lifeless ground soon enough. So it would only last a little while.
But for the moment, it was also a cityscape pleasant enough for lovers on a date to take in — if you ignored how thoroughly the gloomy darkness of Gangbuk spoiled the view.
"Oh my… Jeong Hoon-ssi?"
Ah. Without thinking, I had slipped my arm around Kim Seyeon's shoulder and drawn her against me.
No — correction. If anything… I had pulled her into my arms because I wanted to lean on her.
"I do not understand the reason."
"Pardon…?"
Having forced her close, I then started spouting nonsense out of nowhere.
"Why the people are so determined to follow me on this expedition… I cannot understand it in the slightest. I am leading them to their deaths right now."
"J-Jeong Hoon-ssi?"
Worse still, I kept talking — nonsense that completely demolished the image I had built up until now.
"No matter how many silver items we gathered, no matter how thoroughly we prepared… the gap between the vampires and us is absolute. This is a plan with a far higher chance of death — a plan that is, for all practical purposes, the same as dying. And yet I cannot understand why… people follow me without a single objection, as if they mean to come along. If I were in their position… I would rather hurl curses and choose the path of running awa—"
"Jeong Hoon-ssi…!"
Whump!
Kim Seyeon cut me off. She threw her arms around me. No — in a thoroughly dramatic fashion, we ended up holding each other.
"Don't… please don't say any more than that. Please… I don't have a clear answer either, but… at the very least, at the very least I know that you must not… say any more than that… so please…!"
Ah. So that was it.
I understood. She didn't have a clear answer either.
Perhaps it was precisely because she was so logical and intelligent that she couldn't understand it — couldn't understand how people had simply nodded and moved in silent obedience after my emotional, impulsive speech.
Perhaps it was some complex, subtle, fickle emotion that only certain humans possessed — something neither my mind nor Kim Seyeon's could easily grasp—
"Don't torment Seyeon unnie so much, Jeong Hoon orabeoni~?"
At the sound of a new voice, we instinctively let go of each other.
But we quickly realized there had been no real need to, and carefully turned our eyes toward the direction the voice had come from.
"Both orabeoni and Seyeon unnie are such serious people that I figured you probably wouldn't get it. Why people… even people who have ties to me… are all racing to agree with Jeong Hoon orabeoni's proposal and moving like that. Honestly, you don't understand it even a tiny bit, do you?"
Yun Mina.
Her words felt like an arrow driving straight into my chest.
"But you know, orabeoni… and Seyeon unnie. That kind of thing… isn't something you understand."
Carefully leaning her body and arms against the rooftop railing, her upper body stretched toward the interior of the roof rather than the outside, Yun Mina wore a triumphant smile.
No — astonishingly… it was a smile full of joy. The face of a child who had just seen the picture she wanted. A face that was happy.
"A very simple emotion. The desire to live. The survival instinct. That's the answer. And the people who entrust their bodies to that instinct and move… they don't understand. They accept. They simply accept. If even a thread of hope remains, they'll try to grab it. Everyone knows. That other than this, there is no method left. What else is there? Running away? Even if you run, the reality of monsters and zombies swarming everywhere doesn't change. But…"
Still in that pose, Yun Mina stretched out her right arm and pointed beyond Gangbuk as she spoke.
"Even if the odds are absurdly extreme… if we wipe out every last one of those bat bastards nesting over there, then at least the land we live on will know peace again. They know that. So they move. Because they've all realized in their hearts that it's the only method left. Not their heads. Their hearts. Their hearts. Their hearts are beating for that alone."
I had always thought it, but—
Yun Mina truly was a woman who, despite looking as if she lived in a world all her own—
understood human nature far too well.
And then…
May 6th. 7:30 a.m.
We took the first steps of what would be our first — and final — large-scale expedition.