Chapter 231
Chapter 231
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 231
Chapter Title: Mount Nogun
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The villagers gazed at Mok Wan-ah with sympathy.
'He seduced her to take her as a concubine, and now he's keeping his distance?'
Yet no one scolded Dang Mujin. To the people of Mount Nogun, he was an irreplaceable benefactor.
They were prepared to cover up any incident, even if he killed an innocent person, and keep their mouths shut. Seducing one woman was hardly a blemish. It didn't even look forced.
'A vigorous young man and woman full of youthful energy. These things happen.'
The villagers exchanged knowing glances.
Don't spread word of what they just saw. If the two wanted to stay overnight, make up any excuse to give them just one room. That was the message in their eyes.
Dang Mujin asked Pyo Chung.
"Elder, I heard there's been an illness going around the village lately."
"That's right. A physician from the village down below came by once, but there was no real improvement."
"May I take a look right now?"
In truth, Dang Mujin was a bit suspicious of the situation.
Hadn't Fairy Hwayeon been scheming all sorts of petty plots lately to pair him off with Mok Wan-ah?
Coming to Mount Nogun with Mok Wan-ah at Fairy Hwayeon's request—it was all too convenient.
Dang Mujin even suspected the villagers' illness might be feigned.
But Pyo Chung led Dang Mujin and Mok Wan-ah along without a hint of hesitation.
"Come this way."
While the villagers prepared a clean room and warm bedding for Dang Mujin and Mok Wan-ah, the two followed Pyo Chung into a nearby house.
Inside lay a couple in their early thirties side by side, and they didn't stir even as the three entered.
"Nearly twenty people suffering from similar symptoms."
"I see."
Dang Mujin sat beside the husband among the two patients and began with a visual inspection.
'His face is flushed red, breathing labored. Limbs look slightly swollen.'
Dang Mujin took the man's wrist.
'The pulse is rapid, but not excessively strong or weak.'
When Dang Mujin cautiously pressed the man's abdomen, the fellow grimaced in pain despite his muddled consciousness.
Next, Dang Mujin placed his hand on the unconscious woman's belly. The same reaction came.
Pyo Chung seemed about to say something, rummaging through his memory for a moment before speaking.
"The physician who came before did much the same. He gently stroked the abdomen and named the illness, but I can't quite recall it."
"Wasn't it heart and abdomen blood piercing pain?"
"Ah, yes, that's it."
"He probably prescribed Daegunjung Decoction or Danggwi Geunjung Decoction."
"Spot on. You speak as if you saw it yourself."
Not just Pyo Chung—even Mok Wan-ah at his side widened her eyes in surprise.
Mok Wan-ah's medical knowledge was no less than that of any ordinary physician.
But while she had accumulated knowledge, she lacked hands-on experience examining patients firsthand, so she couldn't rattle off a diagnosis as swiftly as Dang Mujin.
Pyo Chung asked.
"Was that physician's prescription wrong?"
"Not at all. Any physician seeing these symptoms would diagnose the same. But since I now know they didn't improve with Geunjung Decoction, I'll look a bit deeper in another direction."
Of course, Dang Mujin himself wouldn't have jumped straight to heart and abdomen blood piercing pain.
But there was a reason he defended the previous physician's prescription.
Diagnosing that from these symptoms meant the man had solid skills worthy of a competent physician.
Dang Mujin hoped the villagers didn't dismiss that physician as a quack. If patients didn't trust their doctor, the doctor couldn't perform at even half strength.
Dang Mujin pried open both patients' mouths and examined their tongues.
Sure enough, the insides were coated in thick, dark brown black moss—not the common white coating.
Dang Mujin clicked his tongue.
"It might be an internal abscess."
"Internal abscess?"
"It's called an internal abscess when a boil grows inside the body without surfacing."
Pyo Chung's face darkened.
Even external boils threatened lives. How much more dangerous would one growing inside be?
"Is there a way to treat it?"
"First, we need to confirm if it's truly an internal abscess."
Dang Mujin drew the longest needle from his needle case.
He thrust it into the epigastrium below the husband's chest.
Up to then, Pyo Chung and Mok Wan-ah thought, 'Dang Mujin must be using acupuncture to cure the illness.'
But the two soon paled in shock. Dang Mujin had plunged the needle far too deep.
Acupuncture sufficed to regulate the channels—no more than a shallow prick, without drawing blood.
Yet Dang Mujin's needle had burrowed deep into the patient's body. More than half the long needle vanished beneath the skin.
"Is acupuncture normally done... that deeply?"
"This isn't for treatment. It's to check for a boil."
Dang Mujin gently twisted and withdrew the deeply embedded needle, then sniffed the tip. No telltale stench of pus. Just a tiny drop of blood beaded at the puncture site.
"If it were an internal abscess, yellow pus would have gushed out by now, but there's none accumulated inside. So it's not an internal abscess either."
"Then what is it?"
"Looks like poison."
An internal abscess wouldn't spread person-to-person, so the odds of it striking many at once were slim.
That left some unknown illness or poison Dang Mujin didn't recognize, and he leaned toward poison.
"What kind of poison?"
"I don't know."
"There's poison even you don't know?"
"It doesn't seem like a common one."
Mount Nogun teemed with all manner of toxic things.
Poisonous plants. Fruits laced with venom. Poisonous insects, snakes, moths, and more. Hundreds, even thousands of varieties.
But having hundreds or thousands of poison types didn't mean they all carried distinct venoms.
These toxins grew in one region. Plants and creatures from the same soil varied in potency, but their poison types numbered only a dozen or two at most.
Crucially, Mount Nogun's people knew most poisons they might encounter nearby.
Even locals familiar with toxins couldn't confirm poison because they'd never seen one causing these symptoms before.
This puzzled Dang Mujin too.
He might have shrugged it off if it were some foreign poison from elsewhere.
But Dang Mujin had spent months here with Nangong Myeong.
Like the villagers, he knew roughly all the poisons that could appear around here.
'Where the hell did this poison come from?'
Dang Mujin pondered quietly before speaking.
"I heard the illness started last autumn. How many caught it?"
"About thirty or forty. Some got it twice, others three times."
Multiple infections meant few deaths.
"How long does the illness last per bout?"
"About half a month unconscious, then another month bedridden."
"Any common traits among the sufferers?"
"Mostly folks who went deep into the mountains gathering toxins and herbs."
"Hmm."
That painted a clear picture. Some poison previously hidden had surfaced somewhere.
"I'll have to check myself. I'll scout for suspicious toxins and return, so take it easy till then."
As Dang Mujin and Mok Wan-ah stepped outside, Pyo Chung hurried after them.
A woman who'd prepared their soft bedding approached too.
Pyo Chung said to Dang Mujin.
"You've come a long way—why not rest overnight and go tomorrow?"
Dang Mujin glanced at the sky. The sun was still high.
Too early to call it a day.
"I'm fine. Better to move now."
"Don't you need a soft bed?"
"I haven't slept rough under the stars in a while, so camping out tonight's no hardship. Lingering in an open spot now and then is its own pleasure, no?"
"Hmm. Outdoors... Youth really is a blessing..."
Pyo Chung and the nameless woman shared smiles heavy with meaning.
*
Mount Nogun divides neatly into two: the craggy peaks above, and below.
Few trees crown the peaks, and venomous creatures or beasts are scarce. No restless nights from stifling humidity or bugs.
That's why old-timers built homes atop the peaks, traversing cliffside paths. Rare travelers crossing Mount Nogun stuck to the heights too.
Below teems with dense trees untouched for centuries.
Exotic blooms fill the shadows.
Sounds ideal at first glance, but there's good reason folk lived above.
Below crawls with every insect and beast imaginable. An ordinary person wouldn't last ten days.
Humidity defies belief.
Half a double-hour's walk soaks clothes to the skin in sweat and moisture.
Even back when Dang Mujin wintered here, he rarely descended.
Yet people ventured below now and then—for toxins and herbs grew only there.
Those suffering from this mystery poison had likely encountered it below, nine times out of ten.
The depths do have one merit: milder temperatures than outside.
Unlike the chill outside—too cold for true spring—below felt like full or late spring, comfortably warm.
Mok Wan-ah asked Dang Mujin.
"You don't know the destination, right?"
"Not that there's no destination—there just isn't one. The villagers don't know where they got poisoned. We'll wander till we spot something suspicious."
They started side by side, but soon Dang Mujin kept at least five paces ahead.
Humidity and sweat plastered their clothes skin-tight, making mutual glances awkward.
Days were short this season, and shorter still in the mountains.
Just two double-hours from the village, and dusk fell.
Dang Mujin halted a bit early.
"Let's rest here tonight."
"Mm."
Trailing Dang Mujin, Mok Wan-ah clutched handfuls of twigs she'd gathered.
Not bone-dry, so they'd smoke plenty, but beggars couldn't be choosers.
They kindled a fire and sat across from it.
Village snacks filled their bellies roughly, but the hour was just past dusk—maybe early evening at latest.
Fire between them, they chatted at a distance.
Familiar territory. They'd shared many such evenings back in the Demonic Cult.
They began with plans ahead and directions.
As darkness deepened, topics shifted. Nights stir the heart.
Talk drifted slowly to the past—from Dang family life, to Demonic Cult days, then further back.
Mok Wan-ah asked Dang Mujin.
"What's your dream?"
"Right now, raising the Dang family. Later, when I'm older, step back and live quietly as a physician."
Mok Wan-ah shook her head at his answer.
"No, not goals—dreams."
"Aren't they the same?"
"Fairy Hwayeon said goals are things you deliberate over, but dreams come naturally from childhood."
Dang Mujin thought quietly. What had he wished for as a child?
Something surfaced.
"It's common."
"What?"
"I wanted a family."
Mok Wan-ah nodded.
"Plain, but nice. Not too lofty."
"There's a key part. No one missing."
Dang Mujin tossed a branch into the flames and continued.
"Our house had no mother, right? I can't complain with Father around, but I envied homes with both parents."
"How'd your mother pass?"
"Couldn't survive childbirth. They said she was petite."
Common enough. Dang Mujin never felt specially cursed.
But longing for what's absent lingers.
He thought of Dan Seolyeong and Dang Yeong.
"Take a wife, have kids. By your reckoning, I've already achieved it."
Dang Mujin was content. Much left to accomplish, but this life held no regrets—at minimum.
Mok Wan-ah hesitated, then spoke.
"Can't I join that dream?"
Dang Mujin looked sheepish.
"Doesn't it feel a bit off? Husband and wife, parents and children—that's normal. Other families exist, sure, but that wasn't my dream."
The topic felt prickly, so before Mok Wan-ah could press, Dang Mujin changed it.
"What's yours?"
"Mine..."
As a child, survival was all she knew.
Unlike the other cave children who died, Mok Wan-ah had endured till now.
But was mere endurance a dream fulfilled?
No. She didn't count it as one.
Hard to explain, but it felt more like a goal. She'd had no true childhood.
To survive, she hurried to adulthood. To preserve her life, she learned to nudge others toward death subtly.
The day she escaped that cave childhood behind—
It might sound odd, but Mok Wan-ah felt her brilliant youth finally dawning. Belatedly, she could dream.
And Mok Wan-ah believed she'd already achieved it. Dang Mujin had been at her side that day. Hard to imagine grander.
Her dream was Dang Mujin. She knew dreaming of a person was strange.
But that's how she felt.
Tonight, though, Mok Wan-ah realized her dream couldn't coexist with his.
So she smiled playfully.
"Who knows, I don't remember well. But I think I've achieved mine too."
Even a moment's walk alone together was fortune enough.
So she thought.