Don’t Bow Your Head. (2)
Two days passed.
And in those two days... the Shaolin monks did not move a single step from where they had first stood.
Not one of them sat down. Not one of them left the spot. They only glared, eyes bloodshot with strain, at Maehwado and at the fleet of Saperyeon ships blocking the way between them.
The stillness was absolute, as though nothing in the world had changed, yet within them, their hearts were being shaken more violently than ever before.
As people lived through the world, there came moments when each and every one of them had to struggle with the gap between reality and ideals. To live was to go through those moments again and again, until one found their place between the two.
But the Shaolin monks here had been denied even that ordinary process.
Shaolin’s threshold was too high, and the ideals they had been taught too noble, for them to simply agonize like ordinary men.
“...Bangjang.”
One of the Shaolin monks could bear it no longer and turned bloodshot eyes on Beop Jeong.
Hye Bang.
He was the monk who had once visited Mount Hua to deliver the invitation to the martial arts tournament. A voice that sounded as though it had been crushed forced its way from his throat.
“Will you... just stand there and watch?”
“...”
Beop Jeong did not move, his gaze fixed ahead. It was impossible to tell whether he was even listening.
But Hye Bang went on as if that did not matter in the slightest.
“Will you really let the Namgung Family die right before your eyes?”
Beop Jeong’s throat muscles gave a faint twitch. Hye Bang’s voice rose at last.
“Bangjang!”
Only then did Beop Jeong slowly turn his head. He met Hye Bang’s blazing stare head-on.
“Then what would you have me do?”
“...”
“I ask you in return. What would you have me do?”
“...”
“Do you think we should throw ourselves against Saperyeon like this? Into a battlefield stacked against us, while ignoring the enemy’s overwhelming advantage and the fact that our side is already being forced back? Is it right to leap into that river and die?”
Hye Bang bit his lip hard.
There was nothing wrong with Beop Jeong’s words. If they jumped into that river now, it would be no different from charging into a fire while carrying kindling on their backs.
And yet...
Hye Bang lifted his head and looked straight at him.
“Is that foolish?”
“Hye Bang!”
“You’re the one who taught me that, Bangjang!”
At those words, it was Beop Jeong who fell silent. His eyes wavered ever so slightly.
“Shaolin must protect the Central Plains. It must pursue the Buddha’s way, yes, but it must not lose the path of righteous loyalty either. You said that very thing.”
“...”
“Is this the way to uphold the Buddha’s way? Or is this the way to uphold righteous loyalty?”
“Enough...”
“Were those just empty words, Bangjang?”
“Will you not shut your mouth?”
The one who snapped this time was not Beop Jeong, but Beop Gye. He glared at Hye Bang with a face full of fury.
“You can spit out your resentment and be done with it. But Bangjang must make a decision that risks the lives of everyone here!”
Hye Bang bit his lip until it nearly bled.
“Can you, for the sake of your precious righteous loyalty, drive your brothers and juniors to their deaths and call it right? Can you say that with your head held high?”
Hye Bang could not answer. In the end, he lowered his head.
Beop Jeong closed his eyes tightly.
In this situation, where they could move neither this way nor that, everyone here was twisting slowly from within, festering. As time passed, it would only get worse. Like a wound that left a deep scar after it had suppurated, perhaps even after this was over, the mark might never disappear.
...Jang Il-so.
This was why Jang Il-so was terrifying.
Jang Il-so had already won.
Even if Shaolin leapt into the river and, with heaven’s favor at their backs, somehow managed to save all of Namgung, the scar burned into their hearts would never heal.
The Shaolin that had once moved forward without hesitation, armed with both the Buddha’s way and righteous loyalty, might no longer exist from this moment on.
To realize that all of this had come from the mind of a single man was enough to send a chill through him and make breathing difficult.
When Beop Jeong opened his eyes again, an involuntary sigh slipped from his lips.
He could feel it. The eyes of his disciples looking at him were no longer the same. The agony and distrust taking root in them were laid bare in the way they looked at their abbot.
And then, as if by luck, something happened that might have been a relief for Beop Jeong.
Zhongli Xing, who led the Huashan swordsmen, and Ja O-gae, who had rallied the Beggars’ Sect beggars, arrived.
“What in the world is going on here?”
“...Amitabha.”
Looking at the ships blocking Maehwado, Zhongli Xing could not hide his frustration.
“On that island...”
“Yes.”
Beop Jeong nodded weakly.
“There are Namgung survivors.”
At that, Ja O-gae’s eyes narrowed slightly.
Survivors.
It was not the wrong word. But wasn’t that usually a term used for the few who lived on after a force had been reduced to near total ruin?
It was a painfully strange choice of words.
“Those despicable bastards!”
These men were sect leaders themselves, so it was only natural they understood exactly why Saperyeon had blocked that place off and left Namgung alive.
“Are we too late?”
“...We came as quickly as we could, but by the time we arrived, Maninbang had already seized the river.”
“Th-this... How could Maninbang, all the way out in Gwangseo, move so quickly...”
Zhongli Xing’s face darkened visibly. Maninbang and the Water Bandit Sect alone were already strong enough that the people here would struggle to oppose them.
And if those forces had secured boats and taken control of the river, there was no way to imagine how many sacrifices it would take to break through.
Zhongli Xing asked, “...Is a breakthrough possible?”
Ja O-gae replied flatly, “Breaking through itself isn’t the hard part. If we throw in every bit of force we have, what’s the problem?”
“Then...”
Zhongli Xing brightened, as though he had found hope. But in the next instant, Ja O-gae snuffed that light out.
“But this isn’t a battle to smash through a siege line. We have to break through the position they’ve occupied, reach Maehwado on foot, rescue Namgung’s survivors, and then cross the river again.”
“...”
“In other words, we’d have to fight the same battle twice. The second time, we’d be carrying people one by one on exhausted bodies.”
Cold sweat began to bead on Zhongli Xing’s brow. Only then did the sheer absurdity of the situation come into full view.
“W-what if we regroup our forces on Maehwado first?”
“Then we’ll only be surrounded along with them. Do you think they’ll sit back and let us regroup?”
“...”
“Then what about securing boats ourselves?”
Ja O-gae let out a snort.
“Do you think the Tyrant Lord didn’t consider that? There probably isn’t even a single ferry boat within a few hundred li of here. And if you go farther away to find one, by the time you bring it back, there won’t be a Namgung surname left on this Yangtze River.”
Beop Jeong nodded. Ja O-gae was cynical, yes, but as an elder of the Beggars’ Sect, he had grasped the situation quickly and accurately.
“Th-then what are we supposed to do?”
“What else?”
Ja O-gae looked at the ships arrayed before them—more precisely, at the people within them, though his stare seemed to pierce straight through the hulls.
“Either squeeze out every last ounce of force we have, gamble our lives on rescuing Namgung... or stand here and watch them die.”
“D-die...?”
Zhongli Xing’s face went white.
W-what in the world is this?
He had imagined many possibilities while hurrying all the way to the Yangtze, but never anything this insane.
“A-abbot, what do you intend to do?”
Zhongli Xing found himself asking the question.
He could not possibly judge this for himself. Neither charging through that iron wall and causing countless deaths, nor standing by and watching Namgung waste away before his eyes, was something he could bear to do.
“...Amitabha.”
But Beop Jeong shook his head.
“I don’t think this is something we should decide on our own.”
“Th-then...”
“The Mount Hua people still haven’t arrived, so I think it would be better to make a decision after the Peng Family head gets here as well.”
“Th-that... seems right.”
Zhongli Xing nodded vehemently.
But those words were not spoken because he had truly judged Beop Jeong’s reasoning to be right or wrong. He was simply relieved that the moment of decision—the one that might determine the fate of his sect—had been pushed back even a little.
In truth, if he thought about it for even a little while, there was no reason to feel safe at all.
Zhongli Xing looked back at the bewildered disciples of Mount Hua, who still had not fully grasped the situation.
Dammit...
There was too much time.
Three days remained. Too short a time to decide a fate, yet far too long a time to spend gnawing at oneself before this situation.
From now on, they would have to agonize violently over ideals and reality as though being sentenced to punishment.
What kind of absurd situation was this?
Watching Zhongli Xing struggle helplessly, Ja O-gae frowned.
Wrong.
Decisions were supposed to be decisive. A choice dragged out and delayed this long could hardly be the right one.
More than that, after hearing what they had just said, he had a sense of what their decision would be.
And yet... Ja O-gae did not particularly want to blame them.
It could not be denied that there had long been subtle tensions between the Nine Sects and One Gang and the Five Great Families. Did these men truly have enough loyalty to risk their lives for the sake of saving Namgung?
To put not only their own lives, but the fate of their sects on the line?
Even Ja O-gae would rather avoid such a thing.
He turned away from his own cynicism and self-disgust and fixed his eyes on Maehwado.
Family Head of Namgung. What a foolish thing you’ve done.
A deep sigh escaped him.
But even so, he could not truly bring himself to blame the Namgung Family Head. The people standing here already felt as though a knife were slowly scraping at their hearts; what, then, must it be like for Namgung, trapped on that island, watching all of this and enduring it?
For the price of a single mistake, it was hideously cruel.
Ja O-gae, who had remained silent until now, finally spoke with a face devoid of expression.
“There’s one thing I think you should remember.”
Beop Jeong and Zhongli Xing turned toward him.
“In the end, what choice you make is only a matter of your own hearts. But...”
Ja O-gae bit his lip slightly and continued.
“The world will remember the choice the two of you make here. And beyond the world, history will remember it.”
“...”
“I hope you make the right choice.”
Leaving those words behind, he turned away. He could no longer stand there and face them directly.
It was not because he despised those two men. It was because looking at them made his contempt for himself rise in a rush.
Who am I to speak?
Was he not complicit as well? Leaving the choice to them and offering only righteous-sounding words, he might be the most cowardly man here.
As Ja O-gae moved back, one beggar followed after him.
“Should I report the situation to headquarters?”
“...Yes.”
But if only three days remained, even headquarters would not be able to reach a decision easily. It was a truly cruel choice for the Beggars’ Sect leader, who had only a limited time left to live because of his age.
“Then I’ll do that.”
“Wait...”
At that moment, Ja O-gae bit his lip.
He knew perfectly well that this was something he must never say, and yet he had no choice but to say it. It was not a path the Beggars’ Sect elder should choose, but as a martial artist, he still found the words slipping out.
“...Where did you say Mount Hua was?”