From Today, Your Name Is Chunsik
Hanam was an ordinary back-alley thug of Beijing.
He was the action captain of a thug outfit called the Bukmyeong Faction.
His martial skill was so pitiful that even calling him third-rate felt generous—yet that was nothing to be ashamed of. Every thug in the Beijing factions sat at roughly the same level.
And right now, Hanam and his crew were raising hell inside the Beijing main branch of Caffa Tea Garden.
Ordinarily, the idea of third-rate street trash making a scene in a shop run by a major martial sect would be pure nonsense. Yet, ironically, precisely because this was Beijing, such things could happen.
Beijing was the city where the Emperor resided. Martial artists who might one day turn into rebels were forbidden from settling here. The proud orthodox Nine Sects and One Gang and the Nine Great Noble Families, of course, but even the demonic Sado Alliance—said to be as vicious as evil spirits—could not set foot in the capital. Every attempt by martial artists to seize Beijing’s interests had been crushed again and again. Only assassin sects still operated in the shadows, and only because politics sometimes required them.
These days the only martial folk left in Beijing were a handful of families and individuals who put their identities as political martial artists first and actually held government posts: the Jegal Family and Sima Family, who had produced many civil officials; the Beijing Yang Family that controlled the Embroidered Uniform Guard; the Hebei Paeng Family that had repeatedly produced grand generals; and various bureaucrats who had once been secular disciples of the sects.
But the absence of true martial artists did not mean the absence of violence. Naturally, low-life thugs like Hanam—men who would never dare raise their heads in any other city—sprouted like bamboo after rain and seized the back alleys. Of course the Beijing garrison was not stupid; they conducted periodic purges. In other words, Hanam’s gang was so pathetic that they had never even made the list of targets worth purging.
Truth be told, Hanam himself had not wanted this job. When the boss ordered him to go cause a scene at the newly opened tea house and drive the customers away, he had tilted his head in doubt.
“But Boss… is this really okay? Isn’t that tea house run by martial artists? And ones favored by the Emperor, no less…”
When Hanam looked uneasy, the boss boasted with absolute confidence.
“Quit worrying. So what if they’re martial artists? The moment they so much as point a blade at a customer in Beijing, their whole business is finished that very day.”
“Still…”
“Hey. I’m only telling you this, but do you know who ordered this? The wife of a ridiculously high-ranking official. What do you think that means? Even people like that are unhappy that the Sichuan Dang Family is sticking its nose into Beijing.”
Despite the recent uproar over the failed assassination attempt on Hwi-yeom that had turned the political world upside down, someone was still manufacturing this kind of provocation. Clearly one reckless fool with no grasp of the larger situation had acted on impulse. The boss soothed Hanam by implying that a high official was their backer. He did not mention that they were nothing more than disposable pawns—that if they merely spread a few ugly rumors it would be fine, and if they melted into a handful of poisonous water under the enraged hands of Hwi-yeom, no one would care in the slightest. Lately Hanam had begun to threaten the boss’s own position, so whether the man died or returned with a fat reward, the boss was content either way. His cunning rivaled that of any demonic cult leader.
And so Hanam and his gang had hurled coffee cups, overturned trays, and bellowed at the top of their lungs—until a mountain of a man radiating the unmistakable aura of a true martial artist came strolling toward them with the air of an angry tiger. At that moment they realized something had gone terribly wrong.
“What kind of worthless riffraff are you? Hey. Did you suck so much opium that your brains turned to mush?”
Paeng Sang, built like a fortress in true Paeng Family fashion, approached with a swaggering gait. He had not even circulated his internal energy, yet the sheer pressure crushed Hanam flat. They were supposed to be the ones causing trouble, yet this thing—man or giant gorilla, who could tell?—looked perfectly capable of turning them into well-kneaded meatballs with his bare hands even if he left his massive greatsword behind. The five-tiger crest embroidered on the chest of his black martial uniform, proof of direct lineage of the Hebei Paeng Family, only reinforced that fact.
Hanam wanted to cry.
Hebei Paeng Family…! Why the hell are the Emperor’s personal butchers hanging around a tea house instead of drinking barrels of wine in some pleasure house where they belong…!
Beijing was the seat of the Paeng Family’s main house. Naturally a Beijing local like Hanam found them far more terrifying than the distant Sichuan Dang Family, whose dread was hard to feel from so far away. With a half-paralyzed jaw trembling, he forced the words out.
“Y-y-y-young Master, we are c-customers… Threatening customers…”
“Customers, my ass. Trash like you who barge into someone else’s shop, cause a scene, and try to shake them down for protection money aren’t customers. You’re just ‘cus-tombs.’ Want me to cut off your wrists and shove them down your throats?”
The bloodthirsty words were nothing like what one expected from a rising star of the orthodox path. Hanam felt his bladder threaten to empty. That low, rumbling voice like a tiger’s growl made him long for his late mother.
I should’ve listened to Mother and lived a decent life…!
A sidelong glance showed his underlings in the same state. A foul smell suggested at least one of them had already wet himself, but Hanam could not bring himself to scold anyone. In the end he had no choice but to retreat. If the boss threw a fit over it, he was fully prepared to settle the matter with the boss once and for all. That option was about twenty-five thousand times more realistic than fighting the monster in front of him.
That bastard sent me on purpose to get rid of me, didn’t he?!
Only then grasping the boss’s true intent, Hanam immediately tucked his tail between his legs.
“We’re sorry! We’ll stop making noise and leave right now…!”
“Leave? Who said you could leave? Clean this mess up first.”
“We’ll clean it right away! Yes, sir!”
Thinking he had finally spotted a way out alive, Hanam hurriedly straightened his back to get to work—when a gentle voice stopped him.
“Excuse me.”
A handsome young man with a kind, soft face caught him by the arm, smiling. It was the sort of face and presence that made tension melt away without one’s noticing—especially when he stood right beside Paeng Sang, who until a moment ago had looked like a tiger deciding whether to fry, stir-fry, or boil this particular piece of meat. The contrast could not have been sharper.
The young man—Hwi-yeom—spoke in a warm voice.
“Would you by any chance be interested in working at my shop?”
Hanam hiccuped.
“Pardon? Me? Here?”
After roughly grabbing Hanam by the scruff of the neck and tossing him to the personnel team, Hwi-yeom returned to the table of the Nine Dragons and Seven Peaks, personally pulling a handcart piled high with mountains of tea and snacks as an apology and token of gratitude.
“Because it is my own shop, if I had stepped forward myself it might have looked as though the owner was bullying customers, which would have been rather awkward. Young Hero Paeng’s intervention spared me that worry. You have my sincere thanks.”
At Hwi-yeom’s praise, Paeng Sang waved a large hand.
“Ah, it’s just that my temper is naturally fiery. I can’t stand the sight of cocky riffraff strutting around, so I stepped in. Think nothing of it.”
“Still, those fellows must be complete fools. Did they not even know this tea house is run by a direct branch of the Sichuan Dang Family? You should look before you leap.”
No one said it aloud, but everyone thought the same. Namgung Sang-min in particular was privately sneering, They made enemies of those gloomy poison-users and still didn’t realize they might melt into a handful of toxic water? Absolute idiots.
When Hwangbo Seol of the Hwangbo Family gave a derisive snort, Jin Mu of the Wudang Sect asked in a quiet tone,
“But why did you take those lawless brutes in?”
“Ah. They still have their uses. They need to become living billboards.”
“Billboards?”
Cheong Am of Mount Hua tilted his head.
“You mean you want rumors to spread that you subdued the ruffians causing trouble in the shop and then reformed them?”
True enough, such a story of reformation would be praised under Confucian ideals. And if word got around that the thugs had been completely overpowered, it would also deter other riffraff from trying the same thing. But the collective reaction of the Nine Dragons and Seven Peaks was still a quiet Was that really necessary?
Only one person, Jegal Eun-ryeo, understood Hwi-yeom’s true calculation and spoke.
“If the group had simply died it would be one thing, but if they are alive and well—and working in Young Master’s own shop, no less—then from the perspective of whoever sent them, it must feel extremely uncomfortable.”
“Exactly that. As expected of Lady Jegal.”
Only then did the Nine Dragons and Seven Peaks grasp Hwi-yeom’s design. By keeping Hanam alive, he intended to pressure the “someone” who had commissioned them. Of course, anyone who would use minnows like Hanam for such a childish stunt in the current climate was clearly not a high-level player. But by beating the grass to startle the snake, flushing out that flimsy backer and squeezing him might just hook some bigger fish connected to him. In the spiderweb that was Beijing politics, if you wanted to connect the dots, you could always find a way.
And even if they stay completely silent, I lose nothing.
For the crime of wrecking the shop and smashing the furniture, Hanam and his crew had been put on unpaid labor starting today. From Hwi-yeom’s point of view there was no downside at all.
The head of the manpower team—no, the personnel squad leader—took one look at the rough-faced, heavily built members of Hanam’s gang and decided kitchen work or waiter duties were out of the question. He found them a more suitable workplace. Thus they were assigned to Michelangelo’s workshop.
Hanam had planned to play along obediently in front of the martial artists and then run for it at the first opportunity. That plan died the moment the craftsmen handed him an iron ankle ring connected to a chain and a headband that read, “I committed a crime and am atoning through unpaid labor.” He could hold it in no longer and exploded.
“You bastards think we’re rice sacks just because we kept quiet?! You think we’re easy?”
He seized the collar of the somewhat shabby-looking red-haired foreign craftsman standing right in front of him.
“Oh?”
Michelangelo gave a short snort of laughter.
“If you don’t let go of that, you’re gonna do a somersault in mid-air courtesy of my fist. Capisce?”
“What, you need a beating before you learn manners? You think I won’t hit you? Huh?!”
The moment he saw the craftsman grin, Hanam realized something was wrong—and then he was flipping through the air and slamming into the floor. He blacked out briefly. When he came to, every last member of his gang was being flung about like stone blocks by the sculptors’ brutish hands, and he could no longer tell whether this was a Beijing teahouse sculpture studio or the kitchen of Shaolin Temple.
Sculpture originally required raw physical strength, so many sculptors were powerful men. Artists in general tended toward eccentricity and toughness, but sculptors—thanks to the nature of their work—were even more so. If other artists felt like white-collar types waving brushes, sculptors felt like laborers in work clothes, covered in stone dust, carrying chisels and hammers. And these particular sculptors had learned the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art, the supreme guardian martial art of Tibetan esoteric Buddhism that granted monstrous external power and divine strength.
A pack of third-rate thugs who only knew how to bully commoners stood no chance against them.
And so, in the end…
“Hey, Chunsik! Haul that marble block over here!”
“I keep telling you, my name is not Chunsik!”
“Yeah, whatever. From today your name is Chunsik.”
“You…!”
“What’s with those glaring eyes? Want me to dig them out with a chisel and stick them on a statue?”
“Ah, something just got in my eye… Aren’t my eyes red?”
“Keep talking nonsense.”
Chunsik—no, Hanam—swallowed his tears and silently repeated a saying he had once heard: A man’s revenge is never too late even after ten years.
Then he stopped dead in front of the stone block he had been ordered to move.
“Squad leader… you want me to move this?”
“Yeah.”
“Me?”
“Yeah.”
“This?!”
When the squad leader wordlessly raised his hammer, Hanam scrambled to the stone and clung to it. He began heaving with every ounce of strength he had ever possessed, including the strength he had suckled as an infant. One of the sculptors watching him muttered,
“Kid must not have eaten even watery gruel. Frame looks fine, so why’s he this weak?”
Hanam wanted to cry.
Well, as always, regret arrives too late no matter how early it comes.
Meanwhile, at that very moment, in a certain place in Beijing, Vice Minister of Revenue Cheon Sang-hun was shouting at his wife.
“Why the hell did you go and do something I never told you to do and make this mess bigger?! Why?!”