White Rice
Yongbongjihoe Arena Construction Site.
The Third Young Master's camp.
A great peal of thunder rolled outside.
"…The decision of the Supreme Operations Committee, you say?"
The former sect leader of Jeomchang wore a dubious expression. So the Supreme Operations Committee's order forbidding hostile action for the time being is about to arrive… His gaze slid sidelong toward Elder Yu. And of all people, they chose an elder from the Fourth Young Master's faction as the messenger?
He was a man who, after the fall of the Demonic Cult, had sacrificed even his own sect to become an elder of the Sword Family simply to survive the upheavals of the age. Having roughly grasped the turn of events, he looked at Elder Yu again.
"Surely…"
His eyes trembled.
"The First Young Master has begun intervening here with the Supreme Operations Committee at his back?"
Elder Yu lit yet another cigarette and answered his question with cool composure.
"That is correct."
"……"
The tobacco that had been clenched between the old man's teeth dropped to the floor. It felt as though his breath had been cut off at the throat.
He who had once called the First Young Master a devil had volunteered for this place precisely to escape the rampaging Yeon So-hyeon. This is insane… And now that same First Young Master was stretching his hand all the way here.
It was a bolt from the blue.
"Then what exactly is the First Young Master after in this place—"
Just as the former sect leader of Jeomchang was about to speak, a presence approached the entrance where they stood.
"Halt! Ordinary martial artists are not permitted to approach the command—"
"Out of the way!"
One martial artist shoved aside the guards at the entrance and burst inside.
"We need additional medical support!"
With every step he took, rainwater poured from his thoroughly soaked armor.
"How long has it been since the report went up, and still there's no support?!"
Every gaze in the tent fixed on the man's shout. The former sect leader of Jeomchang and Elder Yu, who had broken off their conversation, looked toward him as well.
"……"
For the first time since she had entered this tent, the interior fell quiet.
"Whether it's our family's Medical Arts Institute or the Herbalist Sect—if the request went out, additional support should have arrived by now, shouldn't it?!"
The rainwater dripping onto the floor had a reddish tint, and it was not solely because of the oil lamps brightly illuminating the command tent. The martial artist himself was clearly wounded.
"Even at this very moment, our comrades are dying!"
At his plea the highest-ranking officers inside the command tent exchanged glances. It was not an expression of shame.
"…That one. Which subordinate branch is he from?"
Their subtly frowning eyes were searching for the officer responsible for the branch to which the martial artist belonged.
"What in the world is command thinking…!"
At that moment someone strode up to the martial artist and roughly seized his arm.
"M-Martial Uncle?!"
The man called Martial Uncle dragged him out of the command tent.
"What the hell do you think you're doing…?! In a place this important, spouting that kind of nonsense so freely…!"
"Th-That's not it, Martial Uncle. Outside right now people are dying—"
"Shut your mouth, you idiot…! In a downpour like this, do you think support can just arrive whenever you want it…?!"
"B-But…"
They passed by Elder Yu, who still stood near the entrance.
"But this and but that…! And right now every operation has been suspended, has it not…?! Why is a reserve like you even wounded in the first place…?! What the hell did you go and do…?!"
"They were recruiting people to go look for the comrades left behind in the blast zone, and I couldn't just sit still…"
"What?!"
"But instead we walked into an ambush…"
They had left the command tent, so no further conversation could be heard.
"Tsk, tsk."
The former sect leader of Jeomchang clicked his tongue. Of course, it was not the young martial artists' camaraderie or pity for the wounded that drew the sound from him.
"Those Mount Heng Sect bastards. Split in two, and they can't even teach their disciples proper manners…"
Disgusting man.
"……"
Remaining completely silent was the limit of Elder Yu's patience. As she quietly set the bamboo hat she had been holding onto her head, the former sect leader of Jeomchang asked,
"Wait, where do you think you're going—?"
Ignoring him entirely, she raised her voice to the assembled officers.
"An order from the Supreme Operations Committee forbidding hostile action for the time being will arrive shortly!"
At the words "Supreme Operations Committee," every gaze locked onto her. She calmly lifted a hand and pointed at the former sect leader of Jeomchang.
"For the details, listen to the sect leader!"
Having thrown the assembly into turmoil, she spun on her heel and headed outside.
"W-Wait?! Elder Yu! Where are you going? I still have many questions for y—?!"
The former sect leader of Jeomchang cried out amid the tide of people now surging toward him.
"My duty as messenger is finished."
Elder Yu spoke to him with an impassive face.
"I have some small skill in medicine myself, so I believe I will be of more use outside than in here."
Like a gust of wind she slipped out of the command tent, leaving only a long trail of cigarette smoke behind her.
"Elder Yu! Elder Yu!"
What greeted her outside were the groans of the wounded and the screams of those who had lost comrades.
"……"
A wretched sight. Yet she felt no urge to rebuke those who made them wail so. Her gaze turned toward the innermost heart of the encirclement, revealed only when lightning flashed in the distance. …The truly horrific place will be over there.
The cigarette, soaked through in an instant despite the bamboo hat, went out; she spat it away and turned her steps toward the wounded.
The fortified shantytown of the destitute laborers.
An inner street.
Even if the enemy had not been a sword unit composed solely of the absolute elite, what did it mean to face a group professionally devoted to the exercise of force? And to face them at the level of destitute laborers who had risen up simply because they could not get enough to eat.
Yeon So-hyeon was witnessing the result with his own eyes.
"……"
A middle-aged woman of shabby appearance opened a pot. Steam billowed richly from the freshly cooked white rice. Yet her expression was anything but joyful. She only swallowed hard, over and over, as though she might scoop up even a single spoonful at any moment—yet somehow she merely filled a gourd bowl heaping full with the rice using her paddle.
She offered Yeon So-hyeon, who stood aside at the entrance, a brief nod of greeting as she passed and stepped into the hall next door. Yeon So-hyeon quietly followed her.
"Aigo, aigo!"
"Old man! Open your eyes, old man!"
The broad space that had been meant to serve as a waiting room before entry into the arena was filled with the wailing of countless people. If the air itself was thick with the heart-rending agony of those who had lost family and friends, the floor was packed solid with corpses. Every time lightning flashed outside, the straw mats covering the bodies turned pure white.
Yeon So-hyeon's face, soaked through by the rain, shone with an especially deathly pallor.
"……"
In those fleeting illuminations the number of mats appeared to exceed several hundred.
"Ahh, my husband—!"
Looking at how the straw mats covering the corpses were staining the floor red, one did not need to see the state of the bodies beneath them to know.
"…Here it is."
A gaunt old man accepted the gourd bowl heaped with rice that the middle-aged woman had brought and offered endless thanks.
"Thank you! Thank you so very much!"
Then the old man set the bowl at the head of the mat he had been guarding.
"Come now, eat!"
Tears streamed without cease from the eyes of the old man as he bowed toward the corpse.
"Even in the underworld, eat your fill, you fool!"
The old man's wailing voice cracked and broke.
"This is the white rice you wanted so badly! Eat until your belly bursts!"
The middle-aged woman who had carried the rice pressed her palms together beside him.
"…May you attain Buddhahood."
That was it. Because it was rice for a funerary offering, neither the middle-aged woman nor the old man had dared to touch it with their own mouths.
"……"
Yeon So-hyeon looked around. At every corpse he could see a rice bowl heaped high with white rice set out as an offering. Having finished her prayer, the middle-aged woman came to stand beside him.
"…Even if only in this small way, knowing that the First Young Master walks with them on their final road will have brought them all comfort."
She had abruptly addressed Yeon So-hyeon as First Young Master, yet he showed no surprise.
"…I am sorry."
At his words she shook her head.
"No."
She looked at Yeon So-hyeon and smiled. That smile was heartbreakingly desolate.
"I am only grateful that even a single living person has come to attend."
At that moment lightning struck outside once more. And Yeon So-hyeon woke from the vision the Jeam Jincheon Scripture had been showing him.
"……"
Instead of the hundreds of corpses that had been laid out in neat rows, a vast pit yawned in the floor. In the successive flashes of lightning, the corpses packing that great hole dug into the ground were revealed. At the very least the depth of the pit could not be guessed, but even what was visible already numbered more than a hundred. …A mass burial, is it.
Rain leaking through the unfinished ceiling streamed down into the pit. The smell of corpses already beginning to rot in the warm air was enough to make one's nose fall off. …They wouldn't even have the strength left to properly recover the bodies.
Yeon So-hyeon dropped to one knee and closed the staring eyes of the middle-aged woman lying beside him. It was the corpse of the woman who, in the vision, had been carrying rice.
"……"
There is no afterlife. Knowing it was meaningless, Yeon So-hyeon still pressed his palms together toward the pit, then stepped back out of the hall.
Being struck by the rain that poured down in mad torrents actually eased his heart a little.
"…Heh-heh."
At a sound that might have been weeping or laughter, Yeon So-hyeon's head turned that way.
"……"
Chomp, chomp.
One destitute laborer sat leaning against a wall, cradling a gourd bowl and shoveling the rice inside into his mouth. The wind was so fierce the eaves meant nothing, so half the contents of his bowl were already rainwater. Moreover, the hand gripping the bowl was missing several fingers; the filthy cloth binding the stumps was soaked in the watery rice. Yet he paid it not the slightest mind, scooping rice with his bare hand and cramming it into his mouth.
"Heh-heh…"
Independent of the moving hand, his gaze fixed on empty air had no focus. A crudely made spear lay rolling beside him.
"…Give me that hand."
Yeon So-hyeon took hold of the hand that gripped the bowl. Perhaps mistaking him for a physician or something of the sort, the man surprisingly yielded his hand without resistance.
"…If we bind it like this, at least you won't have to cut the whole hand off later because it rotted."
The destitute laborer's wandering gaze finally found Yeon So-hyeon, who had given him proper first aid.
"Physician sir."
He lifted a hand and pointed beside him. That hand was now wrapped in fresh cloth torn from Yeon So-hyeon's own plain cotton clothes after the wound had been treated.
"Could you take a look at this friend too?"
The one leaning there with a spear in his grip had already breathed his last.
"…I have many more urgent patients just now and am in a hurry, so I'll come back and look at him soon."
The man bowed his head low.
"Thank you, physician sir."
Then he held out his rice bowl toward Yeon So-hyeon.
"I don't have anything else, but if you're hungry, maybe at least this…"
"I'm fine. My belly is full, so you who are hungry should eat plenty first."
Yeon So-hyeon patted the man's shoulder and rose. As he left, the destitute laborer's voice followed him.
"Of course. A full belly is the best thing there is. When was the last time I got to eat white rice like this until I was stuffed…"
Yeon So-hyeon gave him a slight nod and looked around.
"……"
"……"
Under the eaves of the surrounding streets, people sat with spears across their knees, each cradling a gourd bowl and eating rice, without exception. So they distributed rations after the fighting that took place around that explosion… It would have been a decision by the leadership of the risen destitute laborers. A decision made to raise morale, yet the effect did not seem particularly great.
"……"
Even inside the nearly completed buildings, packed densely together, the soldiers scooping rice with bare hands already had dead eyes. Their stamina has already reached its limit.
"Sir."
Someone sitting nearby approached holding an empty bowl.
"Are you with the murim people who've been helping us, and their party?"
Perhaps he had seen Yeon So-hyeon tending the laborer who had lost his mind. His manner was quite respectful.
"They're all gathered over at the command post on that street, holding a meeting."
Those murim people would mean the members of the Spring of Luoyang.
"…Thank you."
"Not at all—we're the ones who should be grateful. Without you murim sirs, we wouldn't have lasted even a single day."
After bowing his head to Yeon So-hyeon in thanks, the destitute laborer pointed behind himself.
"They're serving food back there. You ought to eat something at least…"
Whether a man had lost his mind or was barely clinging to it, none of them failed to speak of rice.
"…I'm fine."
Having suppressed the emotion that had briefly surged up, Yeon So-hyeon continued.
"You make sure you eat your fill."
The destitute laborer gave a bitter smile with his blackened, emaciated face.
"If I can fight and die after eating white rice until I'm full like this, that wouldn't be so bad either."
Yeon So-hyeon, who had nodded and was about to turn away, suddenly stopped in his tracks.
"…Sir?"
When Yeon So-hyeon turned back, the man looked at him with a puzzled face. Toward that man Yeon So-hyeon said,
"You people will ———."
At that moment the wind and rain grew fierce and a thunderbolt crashed down, so that Yeon So-hyeon's words could not be properly heard.
"Pardon? What did you say?"
Yeon So-hyeon opened his mouth and spoke once more.
"……!"
The eyes of the destitute laborer who heard Yeon So-hyeon's words went round as saucers.
"So take good care of yourselves."
Leaving that farewell, Yeon So-hyeon set off toward the command post. The destitute laborer holding the empty bowl could not, for some reason, take his eyes off the boy until his figure vanished into the rain.
He opened his mouth and repeated the words the boy had spoken.
"…That from now on he would not let a single one of us die in vain?"