BW C243
by berryChapter 243
“Here… water. Please drink some water.”
Carefully lifting the wounded soldier’s head, Hoeun brought the brass bowl to his lower lip.
The soldier weakly opened his mouth.
Each time he swallowed, blood bubbled up from the deep hollow torn into his chest.
Hoeun desperately tried to ignore it and focus only on the man’s face.
But halfway through drinking, the soldier suddenly coughed up blood.
Startled, Hoeun dropped the bowl and instinctively caught the blood with his hands.
Warm, thick clumps of blood quickly filled his palms.
Hoeun swallowed hard.
This wasn’t a wound that could be fixed with “treatment.”
Even without medical knowledge, he knew that much.
“Is… is this an Iin-related injury…?”
Hoeun asked as he met the soldier’s eyes.
For a moment, the soldier’s gaze emptied completely.
Then his focus drifted upward toward the sky.
A single heavy tear rolled down from the corner of his eye.
That one tear contained so much tragedy that Hoeun could no longer ask anything else.
Silence fell heavily.
Unable to move or speak, Hoeun sat there holding the blood the soldier had coughed up.
Each drop that slipped between his fingers and hit the ground made his shoulders twitch.
Then—
Bwooooooo…
The sudden blare of a war horn shook heaven and earth.
Hoeun jolted and looked around.
“YAAAAAAAH!”
A thunderous battle cry followed.
Dudududu, dududududu—
The pounding of countless horse hooves shook the ground.
Hoeun shakily stood and looked downhill.
The reinforcements that had looked impossibly far away just hours ago were now racing along the mountain’s side.
Without even stopping to catch their breath after the long journey, they charged straight into battle.
They stormed in a sharp triangular formation and slammed into the Shikgoe with a thunderous crash.
BOOOOM.
Some pierced Shikgoe skulls with massive crossbows.
Some lashed them down with whips—or ropes.
Others fired guns.
Bang! Bang-bang!
Others smashed Shikgoe skulls with axes.
All of them looked skilled at killing Shikgoe.
Their movements, their stances—
These were elite soldiers, clearly as formidable as Jeokudae.
And behind those five thousand soldiers came massive wagons.
Gigantic wagons, each carrying over a dozen cannons.
Positioned at the rear, they fired shell after shell without even unloading.
BOOM! BOOM!
The cannons varied widely.
Some shells flew in heavy arcs.
Others shot straight ahead in flat trajectories.
But regardless of how they flew—
Their target was the same.
Dozens of shells rained down upon the Shikgoe crossing the river.
BOOM! BOOM!
Explosions erupted with deafening force.
The river water shot high into the sky and scattered like rain.
The Shikgoe exploded like shattered porcelain.
The overwhelming force of the reinforcements instantly changed the tide of battle.
The Shikgoe that had pushed past the defensive lines and reached the foot of the mountain were now being driven back.
From above, it was easy to see the flow of momentum shifting.
Hoeun didn’t know if this could be called a spectacle.
But no other word fit.
Only now did it feel like the real battle had begun.
“Ha…”
Watching it, Hoeun finally released a sigh of relief.
It would be okay now.
Everything would be okay.
They only needed to save the wounded.
Clenching his jaw, Hoeun turned back to tend to the injured soldier—
“Please move aside.”
Someone approached him.
“Ah, yes.”
Hoeun assumed it was a medic and quickly stepped back.
But once he moved aside, something felt strange.
The newcomer wasn’t wearing a military uniform.
Instead, he wore a long white coat.
A doctor’s coat.
Neither the old man nor Jeokudae’s medics dressed like this.
Who was this?
Tilting his head slightly, Hoeun examined the doctor’s face.
And something about him felt strangely familiar.
The tired expression.
The pale skin of someone who rarely saw sunlight.
Thin glasses that looked fragile enough to shatter at the slightest touch.
As Hoeun stared—
His eyes slowly widened.
“Ah…”
It was him.
The doctor from Ramjae-eup.
The one who had treated Jeongwoo’s leg.
The same doctor Jeokudae had later escorted to Myeonghwa-eup.
Hoeun stared at him in disbelief.
The doctor narrowed his eyes as he examined the wounded soldier, then muttered something in a foreign language.
Immediately, the nurse beside him—the same nurse from Ramjae-eup—began pulling medicine and supplies from a bag nearly as large as Hoeun himself.
“Is this man military?” the doctor asked while stripping off the wounded soldier’s clothes.
“Ah, yes. But this wound is from an Iin—”
Hoeun couldn’t finish.
The doctor poured disinfectant over the soldier’s chest and replied, “Even so, he can still live. Don’t worry too much.”
“Yes…”
Hoeun nodded numbly.
The doctor treated the soldier with practiced skill.
Hoeun watched his hands as if mesmerized.
Then finally asked, “But… Doctor… how are you here…?”
Myeonghwa-eup wasn’t terribly far.
Jeokudae had gone far north and then returned to the Amnok River.
Still, it made no sense for the doctor to be here.
“A doctor came to treat people. What else would I come here for?”
The doctor answered as if annoyed.
Hoeun silently stared at him.
He was grateful beyond words.
But he still didn’t understand.
Hadn’t these people already suffered enough?
The memory of Shikgoe reaching their town should’ve been painful enough for a lifetime.
Then why had they returned to a battlefield?
As Hoeun kept staring, the doctor stitched the soldier’s torn flesh and said,
“That money Young Master gave me at the hospital kept appearing in my mind.”
“…What?”
“You gave me money back then, didn’t you?”
Hoeun blinked rapidly.
Then he remembered.
Their conversation in the clinic at Ramjae-eup.
He had offered half the money he had on him as payment.
‘Thank you. This is for the treatment. Tell me if it’s not enough.’
But the doctor had shaken his head.
‘No need. In times like these, even if I hoard money, when would I ever get to use it? I might get eaten by Shikgoe tonight.’
Thinking back, the doctor had been deeply pessimistic then.
Understandably so.
And suddenly, Hoeun felt embarrassed for thrusting money at him so thoughtlessly.
“Ah… yes.”
“If I’d known I’d still be alive and healthy like this, I should’ve taken it right away. I regretted that for days.”
“…”
“But then one day, I had a thought.”
“…”
“The only reason I could regret something like that… was because I was still alive and well.”
“…”
“And once I thought that way, I realized just how grateful I was to Young Master and General Lee for saving me.”
“…”
“So I came.”
At that, Hoeun smiled faintly.
He felt deeply thankful.
This man had willingly come to the battlefield to repay kindness.
Because of him, many Jeokudae soldiers would survive.
Hoeun was about to bow in gratitude—
“When I came to collect the money I didn’t get back then.”
The doctor said something absurd.
“…What?”
Hoeun’s jaw dropped.
Collect… the money?
Here?
Uh… well… maybe that made sense?
But did he even have money on him right now?
He probably did—
Somewhere.
But he had no idea where.
Money was useless on the battlefield, so it had been stuffed into some storage chest.
Finding it would take time…
As Hoeun stood there blinking in confusion, the doctor smirked.
“I’m joking.”
The nurse beside him smirked too.
“Anyone could tell it was a joke. Did you really fall for that?”
“….”
Hoeun didn’t laugh.
He just stood there, stunned, as if slapped across the face.
The doctor jerked his chin toward the blood still pooled in Hoeun’s hands.
“Go wash your hands.”
“Ah—no, I’m fi-fine.”
“Bring back some clean cloth too.”
“Ah, yes!”
At those words, Hoeun suddenly spun around and ran off.
“Clean cloth, clean cloth…”
He muttered it repeatedly.
Then, like a fool, nearly slipped on the blood-soaked ground.
His silk ribbon fluttered wildly.
A passing soldier grabbed his arm and steadied him.
After quickly thanking the soldier, Hoeun took off running again.
“Clean cloth, clean cloth…”
The doctor watched his retreating figure for a moment, then spoke to the nurse.
“That Young Master is really strange, isn’t he?”
The nurse, pouring disinfectant over the wound, nodded.
“That’s true. Of all the nobles I’ve met, he’s by far the strangest.”
A subtle smile lingered on both their lips.