Dangga Pungun Volume 2 – 2
The pirate edition scandal surrounding Dangga Pungun had been both a curse and a blessing.
Thanks to the Daseo Club endlessly publicizing the counterfeiting case, there might still be people in Yichang who had never read Dangga Pungun, but there was no one left who hadn’t at least heard of it.
On top of that, every bookstore in the city had enthusiastically printed and sold illegal copies, so my book had spread among the masses of Yichang far more thoroughly than I could ever have managed alone.
Even if Hwarin and I had run our old press day and night, we never could have flooded the city with that many copies.
“Hwarin, I’ll handle this side.”
“I’ll take the other.”
Together we stacked the fresh copies of Dangga Pungun Volume 2 that the other bookstores had been forced to print for us as penance for breaking trade ethics. Yesterday’s record-breaking sales had emptied the display tables; now they were full again in no time.
I finally held the copyright for my own book in Yichang, and we had more than enough stock of Volume 2. Every bit of the novel’s popularity could now be converted straight into Daseogak’s profits.
“Yunho, let’s open up.”
“Got it.”
The moment I unlocked the door, unexpected visitors burst inside.
“Why didn’t you open sooner?! Do you enjoy watching people twist themselves into knots?”
“Exactly! The man who must spread Dangga Pungun to the world should be opening at the crack of dawn!”
“Gentlemen of the Daseo Club? What brings you here so early?”
These were the same people who had bought the first copies yesterday. They wouldn’t have come for tea before breakfast.
Behind them a long line of customers already stretched down the street—smaller than yesterday’s, but still impressive. Had they all come back for more copies of Volume 2?
To my surprise the Daseo Club members ignored the mountain of Volume 2 books and marched straight up to me.
“Hand it over.”
“Excuse me?”
Hand what over?
“Volume 3!”
“Give us Volume 3!”
“We stayed up all night waiting for it!”
They surrounded me with desperate faces. So they had come because of the teaser for Volume 3.
“Volume 3 isn’t out yet.”
I kept my face carefully neutral, hiding the glee of another successful cliff-hanger.
“Why isn’t it out?”
“Volume 2 just hit the shelves. How could Volume 3 already exist?”
“Urrrgh… Why… why is there no Volume 3?”
“Then when will it come out?”
“Same rule as last time—only when Volume 2 is almost sold out.”
I pointed at the towering stacks behind me.
“No… this can’t be…”
“Why did you stock so many?!”
The club members stared at the piles with faces of pure despair.
“If I could hibernate like a bear, I would. The second I finish Volume 2 I have to start waiting for Volume 3!”
“If Hopil can’t drop the next volume right away, he shouldn’t write so damn well! Why make it this fun and then withhold Volume 3?!”
“Exactly! If you’re going to be this good, don’t leave us hanging! Do we really have to wait forever to see those two sister swordswomen fighting over Dang Jeong?”
“Hopil must be a demonic cultivator.”
While the others lamented, one man made a solemn declaration. What new nonsense was this?
“What are you talking about?” another member asked, bewildered.
“He carves out people’s hearts by making them crave the next volume. How is that any different from a demonic art? He cut my heart out—yes, cut! He has clearly mastered the Heart-Severing Demonic Art!”
Thankfully there was no real malice in it.
“Hah! How dare you claim Hopil practices demonic arts? If that filthy rumor shocks him into writing ‘—Hopil’ again, can you take responsibility?”
“Still, we can’t call it a divine art when it rips our hearts out!”
“Urrrgh… true. Too vicious to be divine, too miraculous to be demonic. Let’s compromise and call it simply the Severing Art.”
“Sniff… why must he use the Severing Art on my heart?”
“Since the books have to sell out before Volume 3 appears, let’s each buy two more copies of Volume 2 and go get breakfast.”
“Shopkeeper! Can’t we buy ten each?”
“Two per person for the time being.”
“Urrrgh…”
Day two of Dangga Pungun Volume 2. Sales once again raced forward like a ship under full sail.
It wasn’t only the Daseo Club; ordinary readers also showed up the very next morning demanding Volume 3. Volume 2 was an enormous hit.
“Excuse me, shopkeeper. I’m looking for something…”
Of course, success also attracted the weird ones.
“Which book are you after?”
“Not a book… that spring aphrodisiac. If it’s real, I want to buy some.”
“Pardon?”
“I’ll keep it secret. If you can get it for me, I’ll pay this much…”
I had half expected it, and here he was. The man held out a promissory note for a substantial sum.
“Sir, this is a bookstore.”
People come here for books. This isn’t some place that throws in narcotics when you order fried chicken. Why are you asking me for aphrodisiacs?
“I already know everything.”
You know nothing. He stood there with the swagger of a professional complainant who believed that if he just insisted hard enough, the world would solve his problem.
“You’d have better luck inquiring with the Sichuan Dang Clan.”
I redirected him the way a public servant transfers a call to another department.
“So if I ask the Sichuan Dang Clan, I can get some?”
“Well… I can’t say for sure, but if you do obtain a spring aphrodisiac, I suspect members of the Dang Clan will start chasing you the same way they chase Dang Jeong.”
“Ah… right. I didn’t think that far.”
The man left looking disappointed.
I’d better put up a warning sign before more customers like him show up.
With the back-to-back success of Volume 2, the second floor of Daseogak was packed every day.
Members of the Daseo Club gathered in the conversation area and launched into heated discussion of the new volume.
“Triple Poison! When the protagonist said he had a plan, I thought he’d already prepared a poison-killing domain!”
“Same here. I expected the usual shady schemes from a Sichuan Dang man, but the hero laid out such a thorough strategy to escape the crisis.”
“When he said the poisons had already been administered, I thought for a second he’d abandoned Du Eunghyang. Scared me half to death!”
“Using three poisons at once and then shouting ‘You’re already poisoned!’—words fail me. Absolute peak.”
The reaction to the Triple Poison scene was as good as I’d hoped. Even Hwarin had asked how I, an outsider to the Dang Clan, had come up with that poison technique. Readers clearly found it just as ingenious.
“Damn, Volume 2 is insane.”
“Just looking at the pen name Hopil makes it shine.”
“Waiting for Volume 3 is torture, but I hope it keeps coming out exactly like this.”
“What if the next volume isn’t as good…?”
“Silence! Losing ‘faith’ is the same as death!”
“You dare doubt Hopil? Are you one of those infamous troublemakers we’ve only heard about?”
“I-I’m sorry. I won’t doubt him again.”
The over-the-top praise was getting embarrassing. Business was booming; maybe I should treat the club to free snacks.
“I was satisfied overall, but I was a little disappointed he didn’t finish it with the poison-killing domain Dang Jeong trained in.”
“Hahaha! This guy loves the poison-killing domain too much. No wonder he yelled ‘Welcome to my poison-killing domain!’ at night and got caught by his little sister, earning a look of pure disgust.”
“Th-that was supposed to stay secret!”
“Wait, I thought I was the only one!”
“So it wasn’t just me!”
“Exactly! Nothing to be ashamed of. It’s a legendary line worth trying at least once.”
“Heh heh. You’re right. Truly a classic. Shall we all try it together right now?”
“Hell yes! On three! One, two—”
“‘Welcome to my poi-son-kill-ing do-main!’”
Several of the younger club members struck what they believed were cool poses and shouted the line in unison. Passing women shot them looks of pure contempt.
Please stop. You’re creating black history you’ll never live down.
“What are you doing?”
Hwarin walked over while I was desperately trying not to listen to the live black-history festival happening in the club.
“Just listening to the reactions to Dangga Pungun.”
“Happy?”
She asked in a playful tone.
“Of course I am.”
Good reader reactions always make a writer want to dance. I smirked and answered without shame.
“I’m happy too.”
Seeing my smile, she smiled back and headed for the coffee station.
“I’ll make it. You rest.”
“I can do it.”
“You’re working hard enough. Rest when you can.”
The busier Daseogak became, the more Hwarin was quietly drowning in work behind the scenes—bookkeeping, inventory, printing, managing staff. Unlike me, who mostly stayed on the second floor during business hours, she had a mountain of tasks.
“What are you talking about? We’re both working hard.”
She made it sound like nothing even though she must have been exhausted. She sat on the chair beside the counter and watched me brew the coffee.
“Here. Coffee. Extra strong.”
“Thanks. So what are those Daseo Club guys ranting about now?”
She accepted the cup and jerked her chin toward them.
“I just can’t understand why the protagonist leaves those beautiful women behind!”
“Agreed! He already has Sichuan’s greatest beauty and Hubei’s finest courtesan in his arms—why chase some lust demon?”
“That’s what they’re saying.”
I relayed their excited voices to Hwarin exactly as I heard them.
“I’m curious about that too.”
“Huh?”
“Why does Dang Jeong abandon the women and leave?”
“Abandon? He never abandoned anyone. That’s a harsh way to put it.”
He would meet all of them again someday. Calling it abandonment made it sound like he was casting them aside forever.
“Anyway, why does he do it?”
“Because Dang Jeong is a chivalrous hero. If he were a man who only wanted a comfortable life, he never would have chased the lust demon in the first place. He’s worried that the clan’s secret techniques leaking out will harm innocent people. So he sets aside his own happiness for a while and goes after the demon.”
A true hero places certain values above wealth and glory. It wears the skin of a lust-hero story, but this is still Wuxia. You get that, right, Hwarin?
I answered her with a perfectly serious face.
“Pfft. You sound like a real chivalrous hero yourself.”
My sudden solemnity must have been funny; she started laughing mid-sip.
“An ordinary guy like me could never make that choice, but any true hero has to put something higher than his own happiness.”
“You talk a good game. Pfft.”
She kept watching me with amusement while she drank. It was a little embarrassing—like she’d just caught a glimpse of the pure martial-arts nerd I’d carefully hidden since arriving in this world.
I’d managed to keep a straight face even when my popular friends joked that a ninja protagonist’s ultimate move was the Rubber-Rubber Punch…
“You done talking?”
“Yeah, I’m done!”
While I was still wrestling down my embarrassment, a sudden roar erupted from the club’s corner.
“You bastard!”
“Who you calling a bastard?”
Every member of the Daseo Club shot to their feet and seized each other by the collars. Not one or two of them—the whole group. What the hell?
“Hwarin!”
“On it!”
Fists were about to fly. We sprinted over and forced our way between them.
“You were all getting along so well—what’s going on?”
We managed to shove them into two opposing camps and stood in the middle, demanding an explanation.
“Listen, shopkeeper! I can’t believe these people who don’t even understand the novel have been in the same club with us!”
“Look who’s talking, you vulgar bastards!”
“You little—!”
“Wanna fight? Huh? Wanna go?”
“Will someone please tell me why you’re fighting?”
I held them apart with both arms and asked again. What on earth had happened?
The furious answer that came out of a club member’s mouth was something I never could have predicted.
“These friends—no, these bastards!—are claiming Dang Jeong’s official wife isn’t that Du Eunghyang bitch, but Gu Sukjeong, Sichuan’s greatest beauty!”
“What? Bitch? You dare use that word for the official wife?!”
“A mere courtesan calling herself official wife? Know your place!”
The completely unexpected reason for the Daseo Club’s civil war:
The Official Wife Great War.
That day the Daseo Club split into two factions in the blink of an eye.