A Name

Our next destination was Namchon.

Namchon, the southern district of the capital, was where Hwang Bong-bong had lived before entering the palace. It was quite a long trek. By the time we crossed the Cheonggyecheon stream and finally reached our destination, my short toddler legs were throbbing with dull aches.

"Excuse me, children. Do you know where Scholar Song's house is?" Seol-hyang asked a group of youngsters engrossed in a game of folded-paper tiles on the street corner.

"See that big willow tree over there? It's the tiled-roof house right to the left of it!"

"I see. Thank you for telling us."

The household of Scholar Song that Seol-hyang had mentioned was the neighbor of Bong-bong's family. It was home to the mistress who had supposedly looked after me after my older brother vanished without a trace.

"That must be Scholar Song's house. Which means..." Seol-hyang, clutching my hand tightly in hers, guided me past the modest tiled-roof residence. "Here it is. This must be our Bong-bong's home."

I stared at the house where I had supposedly lived with a peculiar, unplaceable emotion.

It was a tiny thatched cottage. Two cramped rooms, a lean-to kitchen, and an outhouse in the back were all there was to it. To put it generously, it was rustic; to be blunt, it was utterly wretched. Just as Court Lady Han had warned, the place was entirely devoid of human warmth. The woven-brush gate let out a stiff, grating shriek as it opened, and a thick, pale layer of dust coated the wooden floorboards of the open veranda.

I walked around, taking in the desolate surroundings, until my gaze drifted toward the narrow veranda running along the inner quarters. Wait... what is that? Amid the thick coating of dust on the wooden boards, a single spot was conspicuously buffed and smooth. It was the unmistakable mark of someone having recently sat there.

Who could it have been? Since the cottage had stood vacant for so long, had some vagabond or wanderer taken shelter here for a night? No... if someone had been lodging here, there would be other traces of habitation. But there's nothing else...

"Who goes there?" a sharp voice called out.

From the house right next door, a middle-aged woman emerged. The moment her eyes fell upon me, her brisk steps carried her straight over.

"My goodness! Child, what on earth brings you here? What is the meaning of all this today?"

This woman had to be the wife of Scholar Song—the neighbor who had supposedly fed me when I was on the brink of starvation, a woman I was supposed to consider my savior.

"Hullo, Ma'am," I greeted her politely.

"Well, well! But wait..." Her eyes widened until they threatened to pop out of her skull as she scanned me from head to toe. Taking in my fine silk garments and the ornate norigae pendant hanging from my waist, she was clearly struck dumb with astonishment. "Good heavens, child! It seems your fortunes have truly blossomed! Heaven must have looked down upon you with mercy! To think a penniless orphan like you would return looking so precious and grand. You must be living in luxury!"

"Yesh. I'm doing well. Fank you for looking after me when I lived here."

When I bowed my head in polite gratitude, the woman's mouth split into a wide, self-satisfied grin.

"So you do know how to be grateful, do you? It may sound harsh for me to say, but if not for me, you would have starved to death in the gutter or been sold off to some courtesan den! But still..." Her gaze drifted down once more, greedily taking in the lustrous sheen of my silk dress. "For a child who claims to know gratitude, you come empty-handed? Dressed in such fine clothes, no less. Tell me, is that pendant hanging from your waist made of genuine amber?"

Her eyes gleamed with undisguised avarice.

"Yesh... probably," I muttered.

Her abrupt shift in demeanor made my skin crawl, but considering I truly had arrived without a gift, I merely brushed it off with an awkward, childish smile.

"Ahem." Sensing the strange turn in the conversation, Seol-hyang promptly stepped between us. "Greetings, Ma'am. I should have looked after the courtesies on this young child's behalf, so please pardon our coming empty-handed today. I will be sure to bring a proper gift the next time we visit."

The woman turned her gaze toward Seol-hyang, sizing her up with a frown. "And who might you be, young lady?"

"I am a palace maid who looks after Bong-bong."

At those words, the woman's expression twisted into an odd, baffled scowl.

"Bong... what? Bong-bong?"

"Yes. Is there a problem?"

"Oh. Is that what they call the child in the palace?"

"Yes. Her name is Bong-bong, so naturally we call her Bong-bong. Did something go wrong?"

Faced with Seol-hyang's sharp question, the woman blinked repeatedly in disbelief. "Well, that is quite something. This child's name is not Bong-bong at all."

"Excuse me?"

...Wait, what did you just say?

"Her name isn't Bong-bong; it's Bong-mok! Hwang! Bong! Mok!"

Good heavens. What in the world was this? I had come to visit my old childhood home, only to stumble upon an earth-shattering revelation!

To ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠tell the truth, when I first learned my name was 'Hwang Bong-bong,' I had internally cursed this body's biological parents for giving their daughter such an absurd, ridiculous name. But to think my actual, true birth name was Hwang Bong-mok all along!

"Bong-mok, not Bong-bong? That is... utterly baffling," Seol-hyang stammered.

Yeah. Tell me about it. I'm having an existential crisis over here.

For once, Seol-hyang and I were in complete, horrified synchronization.

The woman nodded as though putting the pieces together herself. "The court lady who came to take Bong-mok away must have misheard her name. She seemed terribly rushed at the time..."

"And none of us had any idea, so we've been calling her Bong-bong this entire time. It's even written down as Bong-bong in the official palace registry!"

While Seol-hyang and the woman exchanged flustered remarks, I stood there, rolling my newly discovered name over and over in my head.

Hwang Bong-mok... Hwang Bong-mok... I am Bong-mok. My name is Bong-mok...

Ugh, it feels so weird. It doesn't roll off the tongue at all. Honestly, Bong-bong sounds way better.

Giving up on trying to get used to the name, I turned back to the woman to ask the question that had been weighing on my mind the most.

"Um, Ma'am? There's shomething I want to ashk."

"Well, go ahead and ask, Bong-mok."

"Do you... happen to know anything about my mother?"

"Your mother?" The woman's brows furrowed in pity. "Aigoo, poor little thing. You were so young that you have no memory of her at all, do you? Your mother passed away while giving birth to you. And your father passed away when you were barely a year old."

"Ah..."

It was no great shock to hear. I had already known that both parents were long dead.

"You were raised entirely by your older brother's hands, Bong-mok. You remember that much, don't you?"

"Yesh..."

"Your poor brother went from door to door begging for breast milk, carrying you on his back every single day just to keep you alive."

"Then what about my brother...?"

Though I had been told countless times that he was presumed dead, I desperately wanted to hear it confirmed from someone who had known him.

"Your brother..." For a fraction of a second, the woman hesitated. She subtly swallowed a dry lump in her throat, though her face quickly smoothed back into casual indifference. "He must be dead. We never found his corpse, but if he were still breathing, he would have returned to this house at least once by now."

"..."

"So don't fill your head with unnecessary worries. Just focus on serving well and bury your bones in the palace. Look at you! You get to wear fine silk, receive an official stipend, and eat three full meals a day. How wonderful is that? There are countless children starving to death out here in the world."

"Yesh. Of coursh."

"Speaking of which..." The woman's expression underwent a sudden, dramatic transformation. Her eyes narrowed into an oily, conspiratorial squint. "Your coming here today is quite timely, Bong-mok."

"Timely?"

"Think about it. Your brother is dead, and you reside inside the palace walls, meaning you have no real use for this house, do you? So how about selling this cottage to us?"

"Pardon? Sell the house?"

"Yes! It works ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out perfectly, doesn't it? Take this opportunity to press your mark and settle the deed before you leave. Out of neighborly affection, I'll even offer you a generous price."

"Hmm..."

In truth, the cottage held no personal sentimental value for me. Nor did I ever expect to return to live in this place in the future.

"Then how much would you give ush?"

"Twenty nyang. How about that? A handsome sum, wouldn't you say?"

Twenty nyang.

Hmm...

Honestly speaking, I had no accurate grasp of monetary values in this era. While I had majored in Joseon history, historical currency fluctuation was hardly my area of expertise.

Just then—

Pfft!

A loud, contemptuous snort cut through the air.

"Good grief, Ma'am. Are you joking with us right now?"

The instant I heard Seol-hyang's icy tone, I knew. Our dear Seol-hyang had just slammed her foot onto the accelerator, going from zero to sixty in half a second.

"Twenty nyang? What kind of absurd nonsense is that? Even a passing dog would laugh at such an offer!"

"W-What? Twenty nyang is hardly a small sum of—"

"Hardly small, my foot! No matter how decrepit the structure is, land value is still land value!"

"W-Well, that's..."

Whoa, Seol-hyang... I didn't realize you were so sharp with real estate finances!

Only then did I recall the palace rumors that Seol-hyang and Sun-rye had pooled their court stipends together over the years to rebuild their family fortunes from the ground up.

"And here I thought you were a decent, neighborly elder, yet you're trying to swindle a helpless child out of her inheritance?!"

"Swindle?! How dare you speak so insolently to me! I saved this child when she was at death's door, and this is the venom you spit at me?! Do you think I showed charity just to be insulted by an arrogant maid?!"

"Charity is one thing, and business is another! Ha! Twenty nyang?! Twenty nyang wouldn't even buy you the outhouse in the back!"

Seol-hyang glared at the woman with eyes so fiery and venomous that the neighbor instinctively shrank back, averting her gaze in embarrassment.

"Bong-bong."

"Yesh, Hamanim."

"Do not ever sell this house. Real estate prices in Hanseong have skyrocketed lately, and government officials are desperate to buy up every plot they can find. If you hold onto it, the price will only keep climbing."

Oh... Seol-hyang. You're not just a maid; you're a real estate mogul in the making!

"This won't do. I'll speak to my father and have him clean and manage the property regularly. We can't have squatters moving in just because it sits empty." Seol-hyang threw a barbed, lingering glare back toward the neighbor woman before adding, "Nor can we allow opportunistic vultures to swallow this place whole for pocket change."

"Hah! As if I ever—the nerve!" The neighbor woman huffed indignantly, turning her back on us in a foul temper.

Wait... what should I do? There's one more thing I need to ask her!

I quickly scurried after the woman on my little feet. "Um, Ma'am!"

"What now?!"

"I'm shorry, but could you please tell me my brother's name?"

At the mention of my brother, the woman's face soured even further. No doubt Seol-hyang's verbal beating had left her thoroughly ruffled.

"What's the point of knowing a dead boy's name? It's Jin-gi! Hwang Jin-gi!"

"...Fank you."

I froze in place.

Hwang Jin-gi. Hwang Jin-gi...

I had definitely heard that name somewhere before. But where?

I racked my brain with everything I had, desperately combing through my graduate student memories, but nothing clicked into place. Then again, during my years researching history, thousands upon thousands of names had drifted past my eyes.

I must be mixing it up with someone similar. Hwang Jin-gi isn't an unusually rare name, after all.

Besides, there was no way the name of a fourteen-year-old peasant boy who had supposedly died in obscurity would be recorded in the annals of history. That was the only rational conclusion.

"Let'sh go now, Hamanim."

"Alright, let's head back."

Before stepping away, I took one final look around the cottage. The humble thatched roof under which Hwang Bong-bong—no, Hwang Bong-mok—had been born and lived until the age of four. I doubted I would be returning here ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠anytime soon, but still...

Hm?

At that moment, something caught my eye.

Wedged tightly into a narrow gap between the wooden floorboards in the corner of the veranda was a small, folded piece of paper.

Seol-hyang was currently looking toward the road ahead, gauging our path back to the palace. Seizing the moment, I swiftly pinched the paper and pulled it free. Turning my back to Seol-hyang, I unfolded the brittle slip.

Written across the yellowed, aged paper were the names of those who were clearly my family—including myself.

Cheok Yu-hwa...

The moment I read that name, a sudden, piercing chill washed over my entire body. It instantly brought back the grave question the King had hesitated so long before asking me:

'Could your mother's surname have happened to be Cheok?'

The answer to His Majesty's question had been resting right here inside this paper.

Yet what truly arrested my gaze was not the name of the biological mother I had never known. It was the single line written meticulously beneath the list of names.

Never forget. Remember this always.

...Just who on earth had left this note behind, and why?