The Elder Council's Trial
“Heh heh heh. So you’re the boy who gave those old fossils on the Elder Council a proper thrashing.”
The man who had come from the Elder Council belonged to the faction that supported us. With a kindly face he explained the current situation among the elders.
“If you need the core of the Human-Faced Spider, you must receive the Elder Council’s approval. Right now the votes are deadlocked. Under normal circumstances the stalemate would have lasted until the Clan Leader returned.”
“You’re saying things are different now?”
“Inside the Dang Clan itself, the Dang Geoho incident and Dangga Pungun have stirred up a storm. The elders are worried that if they keep ignoring your existence, they could lose control of a clan already in chaos. So they have a proposal for you.”
The Elder Council was the body that led the clan whenever the Clan Leader was absent. Losing face and authority in such a chaotic climate would be a disaster for them. Exactly what I had been aiming for.
“What kind of proposal?”
“Prove before the Elder Council that Dang blood flows in your veins. If you can demonstrate that your name deserves a place in the line of succession, they will hand over the Human-Faced Spider’s poison core. Of course… it will not be easy.”
I had no reason to refuse.
The next day I was summoned before the Elder Council.
The chamber was shaped like a small circular theater. The moment I stepped inside, countless people—elders and onlookers alike—surrounded me, every eye fixed on me alone.
At the far end, seated like judges on a high bench, the members of the Elder Council waited for me.
What a atmosphere. Feels like I should bellow my résumé like some gladiator in the arena: My name is Kang Yunho! Husband of Moyong Sang-ah, childhood friend of Cheon Sal-seong, proprietor of Daseogak, author of Dangga Pungun under the pen name Hopil, and companion to a dying Dokin. The moment Hwarin dies I will have my revenge!
I snorted softly at the ridiculous thought and opened my mouth.
“You gentlemen are remarkably hard to get an audience with.”
I started bold. Looking straight at the elders who were glaring at me with open displeasure, I spoke in a low, deliberately irritated voice.
“This is not a stage built for your sarcasm! Answer only the questions we put to you!”
An old man who appeared to be the chairman of the council roared at me. So that was Il-jangro, the First Elder—leader of the faction that backed the Young Clan Leader.
“By all means, ask.”
“Before we begin! If what you claim is proven false—if it is confirmed that no Dang blood runs in your veins—then no matter who you are, no matter whose protection you claim, we will not overlook the crime of spreading the clan’s secrets, nor the crime of throwing the Dang Clan into chaos!”
I already know. My neck has been on the line ever since the day Daseogak put up the temporary-closed sign.
When I showed not the slightest sign of flinching, Il-jangro continued with a sour expression.
“We will start with the book that caused all this trouble. Are you or are you not the author who wrote the clan’s secret history of twenty years past?”
“Hardly a secret any longer, from the look of things.”
“Answer only what you are asked!”
“Yes. I am Hopil. I wrote Dangga Pungun based on the stories my mother told me.”
In truth I only lifted the contents of Hyang-ah’s diary, but if I admitted right now that no Dang blood flowed in me, I’d become the next human experiment subject in the Dang Clan’s secret laboratories. So the truth stays buried.
“It is true that very few people knew that story. But that alone does not prove you carry Dang blood. Isn’t your little friend the daughter of the lust-mad man involved in that very scandal twenty years ago?”
The way he talks about Hwarin… I almost snapped right then.
“Do not speak of my friend that way! The name of the friend you people abandoned to die is Dang Hwarin. And how exactly is Hwarin supposed to know the story of Dang Jeong and Du Eung-hyang?”
“She is the child of that lustful man. She could easily have heard the details from those around her.”
That doesn’t even make sense. Being the child of a lecher suddenly means you know the Clan Leader’s old love affairs?
Just as I was about to fire back, shouts rose from the other side of the council.
“First Elder! Do you truly believe that is reasonable?!”
“First Elder! How can you twist things so far?”
I turned my head. The faction supporting me was openly furious. At least I wasn’t completely alone and surrounded. That was something.
“Q-quiet, all of you! The point remains that this is not conclusive proof. Therefore we must conduct a test.”
Il-jangro, looking flustered, tried to restore order.
“What test?! Just hand over the poison core already!”
“We must verify whether the words of the Medical Pavilion are true. Bring it!”
At Il-jangro’s shout someone wheeled a cart up in front of me. A pure-white tablecloth covered it. On the cloth sat a large plate, and over the plate rested an oversized lid that completely hid whatever lay beneath.
I have a very bad feeling about this. Please tell me it isn’t what I think it is.
The man who had brought the cart glanced at my face once, then carefully lifted the lid as though he were opening a bomb crate and bolted away at top speed.
The moment the lid came off, a cloying sweetness stabbed my nostrils.
I had hoped my prediction was wrong. Of course it wasn’t.
“Pineapple pizza…”
The dish sitting before me was the infamous pineapple pizza that only people of the Dang Clan could supposedly eat.
“This is no ordinary pineapple pizza. The pineapple topping has been increased fivefold.”
Il-jangro spoke with forced confidence, though his eyes twitched slightly. Even you think five times the topping is overkill, don’t you?
“Ha.”
I was so dumbfounded a sigh escaped me.
Can this even be called pizza? Can it even be called pineapple pizza? It’s basically hot fruit with flour dough dumped on top.
“If it is too difficult, simply say so. We will send you straight to the dungeons.”
Il-jangro looked down at me as though I were already finished. Could you eat this yourself? Even the turtles living in New York sewers would turn this down.
“What’s difficult about it? I’ll eat it.”
Without hesitation I began committing gastronomic sacrilege against pizza. Ugh. Soggy. This is seriously bad. The moment I bit in, sweet fruit juice soaked the flour dough and left my tongue half-numb.
If there were an Italian martial artist nearby I’d present this to him as ‘authentic pizza’ just to watch his reaction.
“He can actually eat that?!”
“Impossible. I enjoy pineapple pizza as a delicacy myself, but once you add that much topping it stops being human food!”
“So direct-line blood really does flow in him!”
“Th-this can’t be…”
“Do you finally feel like admitting it?”
After finishing two slices in a row I wiped the corner of my mouth and asked the speechless, wide-eyed Elder Council with calm defiance.
“Keugh! No! I refuse to accept it! I have looked into the matter. Those black-haired barbarians from Joseon eat pineapple pizza like medicine!”
“What kind of nonsense is that?”
“Pineapple originates in hot regions. Eating it on warm pizza purges the liver and large intestine and is especially effective at regulating inflammation. It is written in the Joseon medical text Donguibogam.”
So the Donguibogam that somehow knew about the DHA in tuna also contains a passage about pineapple pizza?
I turned an incredulous look toward the elders supporting me.
“Is that true?”
“It is true.”
There is no such passage in the Donguibogam. And that doesn’t even seem to be the real reason they’re stirring.
Something was off. My side refused to look at me and only whispered among themselves. There was a strange little smile on their faces. They didn’t seem to be enjoying the trap they had set for me… exactly.
As long as they kept murmuring among themselves, I couldn’t count on help.
I would have to break through this alone.
“Then what about this? Will you deny this as well?”
Even if they rejected Dangga Pungun, even if they rejected the pineapple pizza, I still had a trump card. I raised my hand high and displayed the bracelet on my wrist—the one engraved with a wild goose—for everyone to see.
“Bulmanghwan!”
“The Forget-Me-Not Bracelet that only a direct descendant of the Dang Clan can bestow!”
“So the rumors were true after all!”
The chamber erupted into noise in an instant. Yes. This would be hard to dismiss.
“Silence! I have already heard that you carry an unregistered Bulmanghwan. It is true that a Bulmanghwan is a token of gratitude that only a direct descendant of the Dang Clan may grant.”
Il-jangro spoke to me with a grim expression; even he found it difficult to deny the bracelet.
“Twenty years ago my mother received this Bulmanghwan from a direct descendant of the Dang Clan who was hunting the lustful man. And twenty years ago there was only one direct descendant hunting that man.”
You all know who that is, don’t you? Anyone who knows the secret history of twenty years past, anyone who has read Dangga Pungun, will have only one face rising in their mind.
I looked at Il-jangro with a triumphant smile. But he returned a smile of his own and shattered my logic.
“That Bulmanghwan was never officially reported.”
“What do you mean? Are you saying this is a fake?”
This is the genuine article guaranteed by Uigakju himself—made in China, made by the Sichuan Dang Clan.
“If a member of the Dang Clan bestows a token of gratitude, it is protocol to report it to the clan. For example, we received a report that a token was given to a Taoist of the Wudang Sect who once aided the Medical Pavilion. Yet the Clan Leader has never officially spoken a single word about an unregistered Bulmanghwan.”
“Stop playing word games. Saying it isn’t official only means that unofficially there are people who know. Bring anyone who accompanied the Clan Leader back then. They will testify at once.”
Uigakju knows the truth. Anyone who traveled with them at the time would know as well.
“The people involved at that time were unable to attend today for various reasons.”
One corner of Il-jangro’s mouth lifted. He deliberately prevented them from coming. Blocking even the witnesses… this is some modern-style courtroom farce.
You elders who support me—are you just going to sit there? I looked toward my faction, but the earlier uproar had died down. They simply watched in silence.
Why are they watching with such interest and saying nothing?
I felt like a circus beast performing tricks inside a tiger’s den, fully aware that fate could not be avoided.
No need to be afraid or shrink back. To survive in the tiger’s den you have to wear the tiger’s skin. I already knew there were no true allies in this room.
“Does long exposure to poison turn every member of the Sichuan Dang Clan into a cripple?”
I stared at Il-jangro with a face of pure disbelief.
“What?”
“You have ears yet you do not hear; you have eyes yet you do not see. I might as well be speaking to the deaf and the blind.”
Like a young tiger challenging an aging one, I pressed forward aggressively.
“You little bastard! How dare you insult the Elder Council!!!!”
You’re the one insulting a sacred trial. Even if someone shouted ‘Objection!’, used wiretaps, committed illegal entry, and called a psychic, once the evidence is collected it has to be accepted. What kind of court just buries everything?
“You decided the conclusion first and now you’re forcing every situation to fit it. Is this the way of the Dang Clan?”
“You little bastard! Your mouth is as base as the barbarian blood in your veins! We prepared this place because you demanded it, yet the crimes of throwing the Dang Clan into chaos, of recklessly spreading its secrets, and of falsely claiming Dang blood cannot be overlooked! There is every possibility that you are connected to Dang Geoho and his cabal! We will uncover the truth through interrogation!”
Interrogation? He means torture.
Not a chance.
Internal energy surged from the depths of the dantian, carrying the fury of having left Hwarin abandoned and of being dragged this far.
“You dare, with nothing but suspicion, attempt to interrogate me—who carries the blood of the great Sichuan Dang Clan?!”
A tiger’s roar shook the entire Elder Council chamber.
Even I was startled by how much power I had poured into my voice. The thunderous cry that rolled through the room left every face staring at me in shock.
“I… I cannot acknowledge that the blood of the Sichuan Dang Clan flows in you.”
Startled by the force of my voice, Il-jangro answered in flustered tones.
There is still a chance. I have plenty of cards left to play. Plenty of stories still to pull out. Which one next? My mind raced. Find a way to survive. Find a way to save Hwarin.
Just as I was closing in on a conclusion—
Clap. Clap. Clap.
A single round of applause cut through the air.
“I acknowledge him.”
The voice came from the very center of the faction that supported me.
I turned my head toward the source of the sound. There stood a face I had never wanted to see again… and yet, somehow, had also wanted to see. He was smiling at me.
“Uigakju?”
“I, Uigakju Dang Mugi, who twenty years ago witnessed every secret of that affair and who has watched over this boy since then, hereby guarantee that the blood of the Dang Clan flows in Hopil—Kang Yunho.”