The Bear Awakens
Club in hand, Hong-wi looked down at the soul-drained Irongha and flashed a thin smile.
"My thanks for leading me straight to my lady. You've spared me a deal of trouble."
Irongha murmured, drained of all strength.
"Thank me for what..."
At that very instant, the club came crashing down on Irongha's head.
Without so much as a cry, Irongha tumbled head over heels down the slope.
Tung Jugang spat on the ground.
"Filthy wretches."
"Who in the world are these men?"
"Kunaha's men," Wolyeong said.
Igonahap—!
Hong-wi's and Tung Jugang's eyes met.
Setting aside what madness had driven Igonahap to come all this way and raise a hand against them, just thinking about how they would clean up after this was enough to make Hong-wi's head ache.
Tung Jugang spoke.
"What the Grand Chief will do with these dogs is his affair—he'll know what to do well enough. More to the point, we should hurry back. You heard that sound earlier, didn't you?"
"I did."
Wolyeong nodded as well.
Tung Jugang muttered anxiously.
"We need to reach somewhere safe, and fast. The road was rough, so we left our horses partway. Can you manage to walk?"
"A little, at least."
The next moment, Wolyeong cried out urgently.
"We have to find Oun-yeong!"
"Oun-yeong?"
Tung Jugang's eyes narrowed. Then he quickly asked,
"Where is she?"
"Over there... she was fighting two of Kunaha's men."
Hong-wi and Tung Jugang whirled toward the sound.
Tung Jugang spoke.
"Listen, Temusi-i."
Hong-wi was supporting Wolyeong.
"What is it?"
"Take Wolyeong with you. I must go save Oun-yeong."
"No need to shout, I heard—"
"Then it'll be too late. My horn shattered earlier. I leave Wolyeong in your hands."
"Wait a moment!"
Wolyeong stopped him.
"I'm coming too. I must see with my own eyes whether Oun-yeong is safe."
"That's out of the question," Tung Jugang said firmly.
Hong-wi cut in.
"I agree—charging in alone would be dangerous."
"Two ruffians are no trouble for me."
"That is, if Kunaha truly brought only four men this far."
Tung Jugang faltered. Hong-wi's point was not without merit.
"Then I'll come as well. Should it come to a fight, two blades are better than one."
"We can't just leave Wolyeong here."
Tung Jugang was uneasy—the roar they had heard earlier weighed on his mind.
Hong-wi nodded.
"Of course not. I'll carry her."
He lifted Wolyeong onto his back. A faint flush crept across her face, but Hong-wi had no leisure to notice.
"Let's hurry."
The three of them rushed off.
Oun-yeong was gasping for breath.
The strength was draining rapidly from the arm gripping her club.
Her opponents plainly knew it too—cruel, fishy smiles were spreading across their lips. In truth, for some time now they had been unmistakably toying with her, drawing the fight out for their own amusement.
No matter how formidable a woman Oun-yeong was, fending off two armed men with a single wooden club was beyond her.
Even Igonahap had never witnessed a spectacle like this.
A single wench holding her own against two grown warriors—who had ever seen such a thing?
But what gnawed at him was something else entirely.
What is that sluggard Irongha even doing?
Igonahap scowled.
The thought that Irongha might actually lose Wolyeong never once crossed his mind. She was, after all, just a girl, and Irongha was a seasoned hunter whose specialty was pursuit through the forest. He had committed plenty of foul deeds trailing after Igonahap, but he was by no means skilled at hunting women alone.
"Muhashan, Pannu. Enough playing about—finish it."
Igonahap finally bellowed, unable to bear the wait.
The desperate struggle of one woman against two men was a spectacle he had never seen before, true enough. But they could not afford to waste any more time. No matter what became of that handmaiden, they absolutely could not let Onyan Wolyeong slip away. He had no idea what Irongha was doing, but at this point they would have to go in search of her themselves.
At their master's command, Muhashan and Pannu wore faintly disappointed looks. They had toyed with women plenty of times, but an experience like this was a novel one. Still, the end had to come sooner or later.
The two men began slowly fanning out to either side.
So this is the end, then...
Oun-yeong knew in her bones she could not hold out much longer. The fact that she had lasted this long at all was a feat of superhuman endurance. She had learned the martial arts from Elder Kushinu, so her fundamentals were sound, but there was a limit to everything now.
She counted herself fortunate they hadn't simply loosed arrows at her.
In a moment like this, one face rose unbidden in her mind.
Oun-yeong's lips curled into a faint smile.
So this is when I'd end up thinking of my lord...
She steeled her heart.
If only I could see his face again, even from a distance!
And at that very moment—
A thunderous voice rang out.
"Three grown men ganging up on one woman—have you no shame?"
Oun-yeong started. Her longing was so desperate she wondered if her ears were deceiving her.
But it was no hallucination. Igonahap and his men were also startled, glancing about in every direction. A phantom voice could hardly have reached all four of them at once.
Oun-yeong's heart pounded wildly.
"Lord Tung Jugang..."
"Wh-what? Who's there?" Igonahap shouted.
"So you don't know my face. But what does that matter? We'll come to know each other well enough in a fight."
Tung Jugang strode boldly forward.
At the sudden intruder's arrival, Muhashan and Pannu retreated warily behind their master. Even at a glance, they could sense that Tung Jugang was a formidable opponent indeed.
"Oun-yeong!"
"My lord...?"
Wolyeong, leaning on Hong-wi's arm, threw herself toward Oun-yeong. Oun-yeong rushed to meet her and caught her up.
"How did you...? You found Lord Tung Jugang and Lord Temusi-i!"
"A great mercy, truly."
Wolyeong nodded again and again.
Hong-wi spoke.
"I will help Tung Jugang as well. Leave him to me."
Oun-yeong nodded. Hong-wi took up a spear and strode forward.
Igonahap recognized him too.
"Temusi-i... this cur."
"Ah, so you know my face. I'm honored."
Standing beside Tung Jugang, Hong-wi answered in a tone that was unhurried yet grave.
Tung Jugang whispered.
"Somehow that rubs me the wrong way."
"What harm is there in a man like that knowing your face?"
At Hong-wi's reply, Tung Jugang snorted.
"My aim is for every villain in Jianzhou to know my face and tremble at it."
"Then today Igonahap shall tremble indeed."
At that, Tung Jugang laughed.
"Good."
Igonahap was visibly growing restless.
Irongha, you imbecile...
But all was not yet lost. Olanggamokya and the rest of his men were still lying in wait, were they not?
He bit his lip.
The next instant, something absurd happened.
Kuuuwooo!
A black shape burst from the grassy field where the two sides stood at bay.
People stumbled backward in the rush of wind. The creature that had erupted out at terrifying speed rose up onto its hind legs and let loose a thunderous roar.
Igonahap's jaw hung open.
Then came a thunder of hoofbeats behind them. Startled, Igonahap spun around—it was the very horses they had ridden in on. Horses being such skittish creatures, the roar of the great beast had driven them out of their wits and sent them bolting.
"What in the—"
Tung Jugang muttered.
"...Why would that thing suddenly come out here?"
It was a bear—and not just any bear, but a brown bear, the most ferocious of its kind. Even at a glance it looked well over a thousand gwan in weight—some eight hundred pounds or more. Terror could make a frightened man see a beast twice its size, but even accounting for that, it was colossal.
"Ah... ah—"
"A bear!"
Igonahap's men were screaming too.
At the noise, the bear flinched. Bears are grievously nearsighted creatures, but blessed with extraordinarily keen senses of smell and hearing.
Tung Jugang shouted.
"Everyone, hold still!"
Then he called out again, toward Wolyeong and Oun-yeong. The two women had by now thrown their arms around each other in a tight embrace.
"You must not move! Never turn your back on the beast. Back away, slowly."
Hong-wi understood what Tung Jugang meant. Wild beasts were ferocious, but at the same time cautious. Confronted with a creature they had never seen before, they would never strike first. They charged without hesitation only when they had clashed with something before and learned it was easy prey—or else when they were starving, protecting cubs, or driven into some other desperate circumstance.
For this reason, turning one's back and running in the face of a great predator was an absolute taboo. It told the beast that you were nothing more than a frightened, helpless quarry.
That said, it only held so long as the beast did not recognize a human as game that was easy to kill.
Tung Jugang prayed with all his heart that this one had never taken a life before.
This was no longer a hunt. They were not the hunters but the hunted, and the only way out was to fight for their lives.
"Is this its territory?"
At Hong-wi's question, Tung Jugang shook his head.
"No... looks like a wanderer."
Not all great beasts attack humans indiscriminately. It happened when they were starving through the winter, when a mother carried cubs, when they had tasted human flesh and learned to like it—or when they felt their territory had been invaded. The wild folk knew this well, and when they chose hunting grounds they took care to skirt the beasts' territories. Bears, too, kept domains of their own, marked by claw scars on trees and tufts of fur rubbed against the bark.
But this one seemed different—a drifter, roaming without any fixed domain. A bear could cover dozens of li in a single stretch without breaking stride, so most likely the hunters had driven the game before it, and the bear had simply followed the scent.
"What do we do?"
"Best thing is to watch our chance and run if we can."
The two men glanced back at Wolyeong. Oun-yeong, arms braced around her mistress, was glaring at the bear with wide, unblinking eyes. Even in this situation, neither woman had let out so much as a single scream—they were holding steady, well aware that any cry might provoke the beast.
Tung Jugang silently marveled at their nerve.
"Wolyeong can't run. If she flees, it'll provoke the thing."
"Then we fight. Have you ever fought a bear?"
At Tung Jugang's question, Hong-wi shook his head.
"Never. Have you?"
"Once or twice."
Tung Jugang did not take his eyes off the bear.
"But only in winter, and even then it was no easy thing. Autumn—this would be a first."
An autumn bear was a fearsome thing. A bear roused fresh from its winter den in spring was drained of strength and vulnerable, but by the time summer passed and autumn came, it feared nothing under heaven. That was the season when a bear's temper turned cruelest, when it would charge at whatever crossed its path. It would fling itself even at the tiger, king of the mountains—and at times the tiger itself would end up as nothing more than a few meals for the bear.
"From the way it's moving... I'd say it's never met a man before. So if we just hold still—"
Fortunately, Igonahap's men seemed to understand this as well; not one of them had bolted. Even so, their legs were trembling like aspen leaves.
Tung Jugang murmured inwardly.
Go. Just go away, damn you...
Just as the words formed in his mind, the bear suddenly began sniffing at the air. Then it lumbered—unhurried, casual—toward one of Igonahap's men.
Tung Jugang saw the yellow liquid streaming down between the man's trouser legs, drop by drop.
The next moment, the man spun on his heel and tore off in headlong flight.
Another, startled, shouted after him.
"Stop! If you do that—"
For all that a bear looked endlessly slow and placid, it could move with terrifying speed when it wished. The beast closed the distance in a single rush and brought its paw down on the back of the fleeing Pannu's neck.
With a sickening crack, Pannu's head flew clean off his shoulders in one blow.
Gray-white brain matter spilled out into the open.
At the sight, Wolyeong bent double and began to retch violently.
The bear gazed for a moment at the man it had killed, then slowly turned its head—as though it had never once seen anything so easy to kill.