Night Visitor - 5
"Th-that... what on earth are you saying?"
Kang Yunho, an illegitimate son of the Tang Clan Head? Unable to trust her own ears, Im Hayeon asked the branch chief in a trembling voice.
"A few courtesans happen to have overheard the Seocheon Escort leaders discussing it over drinks."
A golden rope of fortune had descended upon Yichang. This young man is the Tang Clan Head's illegitimate son, come to light for the first time in some twenty years—see that he wants for nothing. Thus had the Seocheon Escort Agency's branch chief solemnly charged the escort leaders who commanded his warriors.
That Kang Yunho was the Tang Clan Head's blood was a secret that could never be spread openly. Still, it beat the alternative: escort leaders blundering into Yunho in ignorance and leaving him to deal with the aftermath.
The escort leaders were perceptive enough to keep strict discipline among themselves—though no gag order could police what spilled out of drunken mouths.
"The Seocheon escort leaders actually said that?"
"Kang Yunho was dragged off to the Tang Clan not long ago, remember? Supposedly that's when the truth came out."
"Couldn't it just be the lot of them spouting nonsense over their cups?"
Information that arrived through the Haomen was, in truth, not especially reliable. It was true that countless Haomen members sold whatever they overheard, but mixed in with the genuine articles were boasts, drunken babble, and groundless rumors—reports whose veracity no one could begin to confirm.
Confronted with news she flatly refused to believe, Im Hayeon would rather believe exactly that.
"Doesn't it happen now and then? A man sows his wild oats with some young courtesan in his careless youth, and one day a grown son appears at his gate insisting, I am your child."
"The Tang Clan Head is renowned throughout the Jianghu for his chivalry. And a man like that fathered a child by a Joseon courtesan? It makes no sense at all."
Even Im Hayeon had heard of the Tang Clan Head's illustrious name. More than that, he was famously devoted—since losing his wife, he had never taken another.
A chivalrous hero like the Tang Clan Head, with a bastard child by a courtesan?
And this, in a world where black hair was despised. The overlord of the Sichuan capital, head of the Sichuan Tang Clan—if word ever spread that he had sired a child on a lowly black-haired barbarian, whoever opened their mouth might well find themselves quietly dragged off to the clan's poison-testing grounds.
"He's a man, isn't he, the Clan Head? Drunken men spouting nonsense—that much I'll grant you. But the thing is, I believe it's true. You see, I'd been sitting on one other piece of intelligence, sure it was nothing but ravings."
With a shrug, the branch chief spread a second sheet of paper before Im Hayeon's eyes.
"Information?"
"Apparently, before Kang Yunho was taken to the Sichuan Tang Clan, he ate an entire pineapple pizza in front of the whole Tang Clan."
"That thing is deadly poison?! But Manager Kang is black-haired!"
"That's exactly why I took it for a madman's ramblings, or false intelligence angling for a payout, and simply wrote it down and filed it away."
"Impossible..."
Im Hayeon could not shut her gaping mouth.
"Oh, it's entirely possible. Anyone carrying the true blood of the Sichuan Tang Clan could manage it. I was only half-convinced before, but with sworn testimony from the staff of the Seocheon Escort Agency—an outfit the Tang Clan itself runs..."
Information arriving at Haomen's ears was unreliable on its own. But information that left Haomen's mouth could be trusted—because the seemingly farfetched pieces were cross-checked against one another until they converged on a single conclusion.
Stacking together the separate documents, each bearing its own strand of intelligence on Kang Yunho, the branch chief declared his verdict with full confidence.
Im Hayeon could not hide her bewilderment.
"Something was off, you see. Everyone knows the story of how those arrogant Tang Clan folk hauled the manager of Daseogak off like a stray dog. And yet when he came back, they treated a mere bookstore manager with deference. Doesn't that strike you as strange?"
"Not because they were sorry for the misunderstanding—but because his parentage had come to light?"
"Exactly. According to what the escort leaders heard, even the reason he was taken in Author Hopil's stead was that it was a matter only the man himself could settle."
"Because revealing the secret he'd kept—that he was the Tang Clan Head's illegitimate son—was the one thing that could save his life?"
"Now you have it."
The Haomen branch chief nodded at Im Hayeon in satisfied approval. She had reached the same conclusion he had.
In truth, it was not a flawless conclusion. But there was nothing to be done about that.
What the Seocheon escort leaders had actually overheard was only the matter of Kang Yunho's bloodline—spoken of for the sake of their mission. The affairs of Hopil, Dangga Pungun, and the Poison Human remained top secret even within the Tang Clan. The Seocheon branch chief, out of an abundance of caution, had deliberately fed his escort leaders false information about Hopil.
And that information had flowed straight into the Haomen's ears.
Countless scraps of intelligence, cross-verified until they converged on one conclusion—it was Haomen's pride and strength. But when there was little to verify against, or the source material itself was false, that same method could just as easily arrive at the wrong answer.
Not that such fine points of accuracy mattered much to Im Hayeon.
The fact that Kang Yunho had been born the illegitimate son of the Tang Clan Head and a courtesan—that mattered far more.
Kang Yunho... the Tang Clan Head's child?
Come to think of it, it had been strange all along. The people of the Sichuan Tang Clan, that colossal martial dynasty, turned respectful only in front of Kang Yunho—despite it being Author Hopil who wrote Dangga Pungun, and Kang Yunho being nothing more than a shop manager.
Then was his story about coming from Joseon a lie?
He had certainly claimed he'd lived in Joseon before crossing into the Central Plains. That he had drifted and begged his way through them to claw out every scrap of the success he now had. If he was the Tang Clan Head's son, had he lied to her face?
No. He said the truth only came out after they dragged him to the clan, so his story must hold.
The drifting and the hardship would have been real. Im Hayeon gave a small shake of her head. He wasn't the sort of man to lie about a thing like that.
Without ever quite realizing it herself, she had—on the strength of a trust in Kang Yunho that had taken root somewhere along the way—sealed off at the source any possibility that he had deceived her.
An illegitimate son born of a Joseon courtesan.
Im Hayeon pictured Kang Yunho's face, his black hair bound tightly back.
Had the Tang Clan Head ever set foot in Joseon? Whatever had happened in the past, there was no way of knowing now. But one thing she did know, beyond all doubt.
He was born lowly, just as I was.
As a courtesan's daughter, Im Hayeon could guess more easily than anyone what sort of life he must have lived.
It was an old, familiar story. A woman shares her bed with a man who visits the pleasure quarters, and is discarded. Her belly swells. The courtesan delivers a child that no one, living or dead, will ever bless.
A daughter is the fortunate case—she is at least merchandise; she can become a courtesan. A son is another matter entirely. He grows up in no proper environment, and a decent education is beyond imagining. If only his own mother doesn't abandon him, that alone passes for luck.
The bastard children of courtesans rot away day after day in the alleys around the pleasure quarters, forced to choose: become an underworld predator bleeding the life out of others, or be cast out to beg.
And most of them choose the former.
In that instant, Im Hayeon remembered the conversation she had shared with Kang Yunho only a short while ago.
"If you hate becoming a courtesan, and you hate becoming a thief—then why not simply run away?"
"All I have ever learned in this life is thieving and a courtesan's trade. If I run, what would you have me do?"
He wasn't speaking blind. He knew exactly what he was saying.
Im Hayeon bit her lip without meaning to, at her own staggeringly foolish assumptions.
Why had he left a comfortable life in Joseon for the Central Plains? She had never thought to ask. But now she understood.
He had refused to accept the fate he'd been cursed with.
Casting aside everything—reducing himself to drifting and begging if he had to—he had left in order to forge a destiny of his own.
And she had gone and misunderstood him so carelessly.
Born into the lowest station, yet he had never chosen the filthy road that others in his place took, never drowned in decadence and pleasure, never wallowed in the self-destruction that swallowed so many of them.
Wandering and begging though he was, he had fought his fate head-on, and in a foreign land ten thousand li from home become a man whose story would be told as an inspiration.
Better still, he had not become someone who looked only to his own gain, but a man who gave freely to others and never once turned his back on those who came to him for help.
"A little more digging and I could classify this as top-grade intelligence. And fetch an absolutely staggering price for it..."
"I'll go look into it."
"Where do you think you're going! The carrier pigeons' chicks have barely hatched—we still have to—Hey! Im Hayeon!"
Me, of all people. Just who was it I misunderstood? My head is spinning. What must he have thought of me?
Of her—the girl who had grown up happy beneath a father and mother, and who now agonized over her choices from circumstances far better than his.
The feelings she had spewed out in that attic pressed down on her now, doubly heavy.
Ignoring the Haomen branch chief's shouts, Im Hayeon plunged back into the night.
If there are days when a night visitor arrives without warning, then there are also days meant for seeing off a guest who has stayed long.
"The printing of the Dangga Pungun volumes for the Sichuan Tang Clan is complete."
The day after the night visitor's arrival, I stood in the printing workshop, surveying the mountain of Dangga Pungun—several hundred volumes deep—as I addressed Tang Pae, martial artist of the Sichuan Tang Clan.
"Finally finished, then. As for payment, I'll draw up a promissory note bearing the Sichuan Tang Clan's official seal."
The sum Tang Pae named was, if anything, lavish for the number of books being carried off.
"You only need to take back three volumes. Are you sure that isn't rather a lot of luggage for the road home?"
Ordinarily, three volumes would have been the whole of it—the rest could simply be run off on the clan's own press once they arrived.
"Books printed at Daseogak, the holy ground of Dangga Pungun itself, are surely a cut above. Why, more than one or two people at the clan have already insisted I bring back copies printed at Daseogak and nothing else—so think nothing of it."
"Haha! Frankly, as long as my revenue climbs, I hardly mind."
I nodded along at the perfectly reasonable justification.
Though among the other reasons, no doubt, was the matter of fattening the sales of a shop run by the Tang Clan Head's illegitimate son—still, it hardly gave me cause to refuse.
"The books are printed, and we plan to depart for the Sichuan Tang Clan the moment our preparations are complete."
Without my noticing, the Tang Clan's martial artists were closing in on two full months in Yichang. Even the clan's people, who had been showering me with courtesy under the convenient pretext of the three volumes of Dangga Pungun, had at last reached the hour of their departure.
"Knowing that only a few days remain before we see each other's faces, I find it truly a shame."
I said it wearing precisely the look of wistful regret one wears for a departing colleague—a regret that is genuine right up until the goodbye, and which involves absolutely no plans to keep in touch afterward.
"If it's such a shame, why not return to our home with us?"
"Haha. There is still much left for me to accomplish in Yichang, so I must decline."
Crawl back into that deathtrap of my own free will? I refused, lightly but with iron underneath.
"If the Clan Head himself couldn't bend that stubbornness of yours, what hope have I? The gifts brought from the clan that we couldn't unpack at Daseogak have been laid out in the printing workshop's inner residence. Come along, and I'll walk you through each of them."
Ah. So the baggage they'd never unpacked, citing Daseogak's lack of room, had all been carted over here. Well, fair enough—they couldn't keep it warehoused at the Seocheon Escort Agency forever.
Tang Pae led me to the inner residence and explained the gifts from the Tang Clan one by one.
"I really can't imagine ever having use for things like these."
Writer or no, a concealed weapon disguised as a calligraphy brush—one that fired poison darts the moment it was swung—looked altogether too dangerous for my taste.
"Kept at hand, they will surely prove their worth one day. And while we're on the subject—what would you say to moving your residence to the printing workshop's inner quarters?"
"To the inner residence?"
It was true we had bought the estate as a printing workshop, but subtracting the workshop floor and the Seocheon Escort warehouse, plenty of it remained perfectly livable. The inner residence in particular, having once housed the branch chief, looked considerably more comfortable than my attic.
"The printing workshop is ground the Seocheon Escort Agency guards at all hours, is it not? If you were to move your lodgings here, Young Master Kang, the agency would hire on servants expressly to wait upon you."
"I'm a hopelessly lazy man by nature, you see. Somewhere close to Daseogak suits me best."
Soul-crushing commutes, delayed buses, typhoons, blizzards—when waking up and walking down a flight of stairs put me at my workplace, there was no earthly reason to move.
"I have watched you toil without resting so much as a single day since you arrived in Yichang. Your jests grow excessive, Young Master."
"One must work hard, so as to live without shame."
Tang Pae, apparently having no intention of pressing the proposal, nodded readily enough.
"If there is any other help you require before we depart, you have only to say the word."
Lend me money to buy out a courtesan's contract.
The words leapt straight into my head—and were smothered just as quickly.
Asking the Sichuan Tang Clan for help means walking a line. I must not cross it.
The Clan Head's illegitimate son was rescued when his life was threatened. The Clan Head's illegitimate son published a book, and the clan bought it by the crate. The Clan Head's illegitimate son opened a business, and the clan graced the occasion with its presence.
So far, so good. The line had held. All of it could pass for ordinary goodwill.
When the clan's martial artists went home and traded tales of their exploits, they would earn praise for it, and there would be nothing for anyone to pin on me.
But this time was different. Taking the clan's help for this would sound like a chaebol family's bastard son buying himself a Gangnam high-rise with company money.
The bastard son is using the clan's assets. The bastard son has never let go of his claim on the clan.
Now that the Young Clan Head had risen from his coma, such talk could be read as a challenge to the entire balance of power within the Tang Clan. Cross that line, and who could say—some ordinary morning, in the middle of a workday, I might abruptly poison over and die under very suspicious circumstances.
And even granting that the mighty Sichuan Tang Clan could shell out a fortune without blinking an eye, there was still a problem.
No—a problem far bigger than the clan's internal politics.
"What? Yunho paid a fortune to buy a courtesan?"
"That's right—the very moment he arrived in Yichang, he went and purchased a beautiful pure courtesan on the spot?"
"KANG YUUUUUUUUUNHOOOOOOOOO!"
Hwarin.
You told me yourself, didn't you—that as long as your own side never ached, it was fine for me to keep company with a woman. I never dreamed it would ache. And yet the very moment I arrived here, it did.
It hasn't been a year since I reached Yichang. Not even half a year. A little over a single month—and I bought a courtesan in one lump sum.
You'd understand... right?
Simply imagining it was horrifying.
I could all too easily picture the report arriving: the enraged Poison Human had torn her way out of the Sichuan Tang Clan and was now bearing down on Yichang, known to all the world as the Poison Butterfly.
Even if it's bound to happen someday, better to put it off.
Im Hayeon aside, there were already three women whose fates had become entangled with mine. If only to postpone, for as long as humanly possible, the event of my head being popped off like a two-shot injection mold, the news of each of them needed to stay far, far away from the others.
"Young Master Kang?"
I had been turning the gifts over in my hands, lost in thought, when Tang Pae called out to me.
"Forgive me. These are rarer treasures than I expected—I lost myself admiring them."
"Is there truly nothing else you need our help with?"
Help, was it.
There was, in fact, something I had been turning over all through the night. Even if an outright request for money was out of the question, it could hardly hurt to have several schemes prepared in advance for resolving Im Hayeon's problem.
The trouble was that they were, at best, indirect measures—and that I would need Im Hayeon's consent besides.
But hesitation was a luxury. The Tang Clan was leaving soon.
"Then would you grant me one small favor?"
For now, let me have every usable tool prepared and waiting.