So What Am I Supposed to Do? (4)
“Ugh….”
Water.
He felt as though his throat were about to dry out completely.
“Huh?”
Jolting upright, he stared wild-eyed around him, his gaze sweeping the room in alarm.
Where am I?
When he opened his eyes, there had been an unfamiliar ceiling….
No, wait—that wasn’t it!
Hye Yeon looked around in a panic. He had been lying alone in a room that had still been empty of people.
“What… did I do?”
Only then did last night begin to flash through Hye Yeon’s head.
- “Kraaah! This monk really knows how to drink.”
- “Ooh, that’s right! That’s right! One more! One more!”
- “Wow! Now you’re even blowing the horn? Hehehehe!”
“Amitabha! Amitabha! Amitabha!”
Remembering the disgrace he had committed so vividly through the night, Hye Yeon’s face turned crimson in an instant.
The demon! A demon had possessed me!
No. No, that wasn’t it.
It wasn’t that a demon had possessed him; it was that he had drunk with a demon.
He remembered Chung Myung, cackling before him and forcing drink on him from the moment his consciousness had begun to slip.
Just recalling that wicked grin made his whole body tremble.
But this wasn’t something to blame on Chung Myung.
How could I not only break the precepts, but even forget myself entirely?
For a Buddhist disciple, it was absolutely unforgivable. It was one thing to break the precepts, but to lose himself over something done for the sake of learning!
Hye Yeon hurriedly straightened his robes.
What time is it?
In the dim light seeping through the window, it seemed the sun had only just begun to rise. If so, he should still have time to wash and compose himself before the others woke.
So thinking, he quickly made for the door and shoved it open.
But then he had no choice but to stop, mouth hanging open in shock.
“Hey, you idiots! Stop dragging your feet!”
“Keep your swings straight! Straight!”
“You can fall while holding your sword, but you can’t lose it! Where do you think you’re dropping a sword? A swordsman only loses his sword when he dies!”
“……”
Hye Yeon stood there dumbfounded, staring at the training yard.
All the Mount Hua disciples who had drunk themselves senseless with him the night before were now sweating like rain as they trained.
All of them, from this hour?
They had clearly been drinking until dawn yesterday, and yet from this early morning everyone was training as though it were the most natural thing in the world?
And with that level of intensity?
No, intensity wasn’t quite the right word. “Hardworking” or “passionate” was probably more accurate.
And this is Hwayeong Gate.
But that question was answered almost immediately.
Turning his head, he saw that beside the Mount Hua disciples rolling about in the yard, the disciples of Hwayeong Gate were also sweating profusely and training in earnest.
“Amitabha….”
Hye Yeon murmured the Buddha’s name without even realizing it.
How shameful.
No matter that it had been his first time drinking, the sight of everyone else acting as though nothing had happened and training as usual had shocked him deeply.
Mount Hua really is Mount Hua.
Hadn’t he been impressed by Mount Hua Sect’s skill at the martial arts tournament as well?
That level of skill could not have been gained for free. If they had not renewed themselves day after day and trained tirelessly, there was no way they could have become so strong.
What exactly have I been looking at?
He had thought the people of the secular world were different from those of them who walked the path of the Buddha in the mountains. So he had dismissed yesterday’s behavior as merely different.
But in essence, it was the same.
He was a Buddhist disciple, yes, but also one who walked the path of martial arts. There were no shortcuts in learning martial skill.
“Amitabha.”
Hye Yeon reflected on how he had allowed himself to grow lazy, even if only for a moment.
Then, careful not to disturb the training, he took a cautious step forward.
But Chung Myung, who had been grumbling at the very front, noticed him like a ghost and turned his head.
“Hehehehe. The monk’s out.”
Everyone’s gaze turned at once toward Hye Yeon. Under that attention, his face grew hot.
“D-disciple. About yesterday, I was so disgraceful….”
“Wow, monk. You really can drink, huh?”
“Look at him walk. That’s Hye Yeon the monk for you. If I’d drunk that much, I’d be crawling by now.”
“You and Hye Yeon the monk are the same?”
“That’s exactly why I’m saying it.”
With attention pouring in from every direction, Hye Yeon didn’t know what to do and kept darting his eyes around helplessly. Thinking that everyone here must have seen the disgrace he’d made of himself last night, he felt like hiding in a mouse hole.
But Chung Myung only laughed, shoulders shaking.
“That bald head was red from all the fun yesterday, and now he’s embarrassed.”
“Ahem. What kind of language is that with a monk?”
“Then… now he’s embarrassed?”
“He’s bald! Bald is the problem! You can’t talk like that to a monk with a bald head! How humiliating do you think it is for the poor bald head hearing all this?”
“……Stop emphasizing it, Sasuk.”
Sometimes Baek Cheon seemed like the worse one.
In any case, Chung Myung came back over to Hye Yeon, still snickering.
“Sleep well?”
“Y-yes, I did. But how I ended up in that room… I’m not quite sure.”
“How else? You drank until you collapsed, so people carried you.”
Amitabha.
Hye Yeon squeezed his eyes shut. Then he thought that if he could return to yesterday, he would rush over to his drunken self and smack him across the face. Why on earth had he drunk so thoughtlessly?
“How was it?”
“……Pardon?”
“Wasn’t it fun?”
“……”
Hye Yeon stared at Chung Myung with a somewhat dazed expression.
Fun?
Fun.
“……I….”
Chung Myung grinned. As if to say he didn’t need the answer right now.
“If you’re going to stay here, then relax a little. You didn’t come all the way here to go through the same nonsense you had back at Shaolin, did you?”
“Amitabha.”
Hye Yeon nodded quietly.
“What the disciple says is correct.”
At the sight of Hye Yeon’s face growing a little brighter, Chung Myung smiled as though pleased.
“First, eat a good meal. You still need to earn your keep today, don’t you?”
“Yes!”
Hye Yeon answered, brighter than ever.
“……”
Seated before the meal tray, Hye Yeon’s mouth twitched helplessly.
Everyone else was eating with obvious delight, but he couldn’t even pick up his spoon.
Meat.
And more meat.
Still more meat.
Beef, pork, lamb, and chicken—an entire feast fit for a tiger was laid out before his eyes.
H-how am I supposed to…?
For someone like him, who could not eat meat, it was nothing but a picture of a cake in the sky.
No, do normal people even eat like this?
He knew it wasn’t like Shaolin, which completely forbade meat and followed a vegetarian diet, but this was the first time he had ever heard of someone eating rice with every kind of meat piled together.
Just as he was completely at a loss, unable to decide what he should do about this situation….
“Ah, that feels good.”
Chung Myung, having returned from the bath, shuffled past and then suddenly jerked to a stop, turning his head sharply.
His eyes flicked back and forth between Hye Yeon and the table before him.
“Huh?”
Chung Myung froze for a moment in obvious disbelief, then let out a roar.
“Sahyuuuuuuung!”
“W-what is it now?”
Yoon Jong came running over, startled.
“Why?”
“No! Which lunatic puts meat right in front of a monk?”
“……Huh?”
Yoon Jong, too, saw the bowls in front of Hye Yeon and was horrified.
“A-ah… this….”
“There isn’t a single vegetable! Not one! If you’re going to think of raising a goat, at least feed it grass! Why are you shoving meat at a monk? Are you trying to make a joke out of him or something?”
“I-I’m sorry, monk. We just didn’t think about it.”
“N-no, it’s fine. It’s fine.”
Chung Myung and Yoon Jong were reacting so wildly that Hye Yeon himself became flustered, bowing his head over and over in embarrassment.
“I’m sorry for being picky when I’m being fed. If there’s even a bit of leftover rice, I can just—”
“Bring him some vegetables! Vegetables!”
“Just shut up already! You’re making my head spin!”
Hye Yeon kept reciting the Buddha’s name over and over.
“Amitabha. I apologize. I really don’t want to cause everyone any trouble, but….”
“Really?”
Chung Myung, who had been making a racket the entire time, suddenly lit up a little at that and tilted his head.
“……Then want to try eating it?”
“No, you crazy bastard—seriously?”
“As if he’d want to try when there’s a problem with everything!”
“Does it even make sense to feed a monk meat? Use your head, you punk!”
Baek Cheon and the other disciples, who had already rushed over, began railing at Chung Myung all at once. Chung Myung snapped back, offended.
“You were all happily stuffing yourselves with booze yesterday, so why can’t he eat meat?”
Thud.
Chung Myung’s words stabbed into Hye Yeon like a blade.
“Is that the same thing?”
“What’s the difference? Whether it’s booze or meat, if you’re stuffing your face with anything, you’re still just a bald monk!”
Thud.
This blade was even sharper.
“Yoon Jong.”
“Yes, Sasuk.”
“Take that away.”
“Yes!”
At Baek Cheon’s order, Yoon Jong and Jo Gul flanked Chung Myung from left and right and dragged him off into the distance.
“Let go! Hey, let go, you idiots! What did I say that was wrong?”
Even while being dragged away, Chung Myung’s mouth never stopped, and Baek Cheon let out a deep sigh.
“I’m sorry, monk. We’ll prepare a proper meal for you right away, so please wait just a moment.”
“Ah. Thank you, disciple.”
Hye Yeon let out a faint, exhausted breath.
The road to becoming accustomed to Chung Myung still seemed far too long and difficult.
“You said we’d be touring Xi'an?”
“Yeah. Why? Don’t feel like it?”
“How could that be? It’s just….”
“You feel embarrassed going out where there are people?”
“……”
When Hye Yeon lowered his head slightly and answered with silence, Chung Myung clicked his tongue.
“As far as I know, Shaolin puts saving all beings first. That right?”
“That is correct. To cultivate the Buddha’s law and become a Buddha oneself is an excellent thing, but it cannot compare to guiding others to the Pure Land of Paradise.”
“Then how are you supposed to save people if you don’t even meet them?”
“……”
Hye Yeon flinched as if Chung Myung had struck a sore spot.
“You’ll just end up back at Shaolin, shut away in that deep Songshan Mountain, meeting only pilgrims. But the people you’re supposed to save are out here. Aren’t they?”
“……What the Daoist says is right.”
“If you want to gain what you couldn’t get from Shaolin, then you’ve got to do the things you didn’t do at Shaolin.”
Hye Yeon nodded vigorously. Chung Myung’s words felt truly right to him.
“Then get ready. Let’s go.”
“Yes!”
At last, Hye Yeon nodded with a face full of resolve.
What a strange person.
They were just throwaway remarks, and yet there was always something essential hidden inside them. He never dressed them up, never seemed to intend to say anything grand, and yet for some reason, they always struck home.
How much can I learn from that person?
As Hye Yeon was trying to settle his fluttering heart, Chung Myung was flicking imaginary beads on a counting frame behind him.
We can probably still take about fifty more.
Disciples had flooded in like mad, but the place was still not filled to the limit Hwayeong Gate could handle.
If he dragged Hye Yeon around Xi'an a bit, more people would naturally become interested.
There’s no way someone with a red robe and a bald head doesn’t stand out.
Chung Myung smiled with satisfaction and hurried Hye Yeon along.
“Come on, get ready already.”
“Yes, disciple!”
But Hye Yeon, ignorant of Chung Myung’s true intentions, remained only bright and earnest.
Not long after, Hye Yeon and the Mount Hua disciples left Hwayeong Gate.
“Why are we going out, anyway?”
“Might as well do a few things at once.”
At Jo Gul’s question, Baek Cheon shrugged.
“We need to take in the atmosphere of Xi'an from time to time. And haven’t we already learned this? Just because Hwayeong Gate has been established in Xi'an doesn’t mean we can stay inside it all the time. If we do that, all that will happen is that we’ll become just another ordinary martial hall. If we want the name of Mount Hua to spread through Xi'an, we need to be more proactive.”
As he said that, Baek Cheon glanced subtly at the back of Chung Myung’s head.
Though that one seems to have other ideas.
But trying to guess everything Chung Myung was thinking was an utterly futile task, and Baek Cheon knew better than anyone that it was close to impossible.
As they walked along the broad main road stretching through the center of Xi'an, Hye Yeon kept looking around with obvious wonder.
“What’s got you so amazed?”
“Ah. I’m sorry, Daoist. It’s just that I’ve never been anywhere like this before.”
“Huh? There’s Luoyang right next to Shaolin. Luoyang should be bigger than this place, no?”
“I’ve never been to Luoyang.”
“Eh?”
Hye Yeon said it with an innocent smile.
“In my life, I have hardly ever left Shaolin. This is the first time I’ve truly seen a city this large.”
“Good grief. Tsk tsk tsk.”
Chung Myung clicked his tongue.
Places called great orthodox sects usually stood deep in the mountains, far from the footsteps of ordinary people, so they could devote themselves entirely to training. And as the number of disciples increased, a world of their own naturally took shape inside those walls.
Before long, disciples who had entered at a young age ended up living their entire lives within the sect.
So this is what happens.
Perhaps that was better for lofty cultivation of the Dao and enlightenment of the Buddha’s law. But what meaning could there be in a path of one’s own, cut off from the people of the world?
Whether it was the Dao or strength, it only mattered if it was used where it was meant to be used.
“Right. What do you think of seeing where people actually live?”
“It seems busy.”
“……Well, that’s a lovely impression.”
Incredibly obvious, too.
But the kind of busyness Hye Yeon was talking about seemed different from what Chung Myung had in mind. Hye Yeon continued.
“I had thought that fervor only truly mattered when one struggled against oneself. But I can see now that the people living in the marketplace have their own fervor as well. So this is what it means when they say the Buddha is everywhere and the Buddha’s law exists everywhere in the world.”
“……Huh?”
He turned to look at Chung Myung. The pure, sparkling light in his eyes made Chung Myung flinch.
“So this is what the Daoist wanted to show me!”
“……Yeah. R-right. Of course.”
Yeah.
That’s right.
But so what? What did Buddha have to do with it?
“I truly thank you, Daoist.”
“……Yeah. Sure.”
……Well, if he’d gotten the message, that was enough.
With a somewhat sour expression, Chung Myung went on.
“If you think about it, living cooped up in the mountains learning martial arts and cultivating the Dao isn’t all that impressive. For people who spend every day just trying to make a living, that’s no different from playing at immortals.”
“Ah….”
“Once you live in the world, all sorts of things happen that you could never experience in the mountains. For example….”
Crash!
At that very moment, with the sound of something shattering violently, a person was flung out of the house ahead and rolled across the street.
“Huh?”
“……See? That kind of thing.”
Chung Myung snorted and looked ahead with interest.
Now then, what kind of mess was this….
“Hm?”
Suddenly, Chung Myung’s eyes narrowed.
From the house where the person had been thrown out, someone emerged with their hands clasped behind their back, strutting out arrogantly.
Up to that point, there was nothing particularly strange.
The reason Chung Myung frowned was that the one walking out was Nam Ja-myeong, the sect leader of Seowol Gate, someone he had seen a few times before.
“I keep running into that old man. What a nuisance.”
Nam Ja-myeong also seemed to have noticed the Mount Hua disciples, because he frowned in turn. Then, as if deliberately making sure they heard, he muttered,
“These people, who don’t know their place, keep showing up in my sight.”
“No, but that bastard—?”
Just as Chung Myung was about to flare up, the Mount Hua disciples grabbed him quickly from behind. And before he could explode, Baek Cheon stepped forward first.
“What is the meaning of this?”
Baek Cheon’s gaze met Nam Ja-myeong’s in midair.