BW C57

Chapter 57

At that voice, Hoeun’s breath stopped dead. After a brief freeze, he jerked upright.

“G-… General?”

Hoeun blinked rapidly. His vision cleared, and he saw Taemuk sitting at one side of the cot.

A blank-faced Taemuk, the black blanket beneath him, and himself lying on the cot.

Realizing this, his body suddenly grew very heavy—as if his whole body had turned to stone.

“Ah…”

Hoeun hunched his shoulders. He also edged back in tiny, halting scoots. It was a paltry, pitiful escape. But if he bolted, it felt as though Taemuk would gape his jaws like an enraged beast and devour him, so he could not.

“…”

Taemuk, features drawn tight, stared at the trembling Hoeun without a word. The gaze tormented Hoeun; he bowed his head low. Then, with sidelong glances, he searched for a way out.

But he soon realized there was none. Someone like him could not possibly slip past Taemuk and out of the tent. Even if he got outside—then what? This was Jeokudae’s garrison. In other words, a space entirely within Taemuk’s grasp.

What was more, to get home he would have to ride hard for a full ten days. The man-eaters that did not die even to gunfire would be swarming; he would be torn to pieces by them in less than half a day.

At that thought, Hoeun’s face was washed in despair. There was not a single way to flee Taemuk.

Then Taemuk reached a hand toward Hoeun—more precisely, toward the hair that covered his face entirely. Hoeun flinched and hunched as small as he could.

“D-don’t… don’t…”

He didn’t even know what Taemuk meant to do, yet those words came out first. It was because touching him, his hand approaching, terrified him to the bone.

“…”

Taemuk said nothing. The silence frightened Hoeun so that even his lower lip trembled. He had learned well what Taemuk’s blank face, his silence, his disregard led to.

Suddenly, Taemuk rose. Hoeun squeezed his eyes shut and made himself even smaller.

He could feel Taemuk moving. He could feel him breathing, feel his Adam’s apple work as he swallowed, hear the brush of his clothes as he moved. Each of these struck Hoeun like a lightning bolt.

But then—Taemuk began to move away. Hoeun cracked one eye and peeped through his hair.

Taemuk was heading for the entrance of the tent. Is he going out?—and indeed he went out. It did not take long for his presence to vanish completely.

“…”

Slowly, Hoeun straightened his body. He craned his head to make sure Taemuk had truly gone. Thankfully, he did not reappear.

“Haa…”

Pushing his hair back behind his ears, Hoeun let out a breath of relief. As he did, he glanced absently around the tent—and saw the table by the cot piled high with things.

A basin filled with clear, rippling water; a clean cloth draped over it; a bowl of decoction; a spoon laid beside it; and various medicines of unknown use or origin.

They were familiar things. When he fell ill, his parents would tuck such items at their side and sit vigil by him.

“…”

For a while, Hoeun gazed at them in silence.

He woke to throbbing pain and a vile foreign sensation. Unlike before, his vision was clear—not because his body was well, but because the tent interior was bright. Lamps and lanterns glowed on table, cabinet, and oil stand alike.

Staring blankly at them, Hoeun belatedly realized that one of his legs was hoisted in the air. As he shifted his gaze to the leg, in that moment—

“…”

“…”

His eyes met Taemuk’s.

Taemuk was kneeling between Hoeun’s thighs. His hand held one of Hoeun’s legs, and Hoeun’s crotch was spread shockingly wide. Of course, there were no trousers.

“…”

Confronted with a scene too much to accept at once, Hoeun went rigid. His face slowly turned pale. He shook his head, his jaw chattering.

“D-don’t… Please don’t. Don’t…”

One of Taemuk’s brows lifted slightly.

“What is it you don’t want.”

“…”

At the cool reply, Hoeun’s lips worked soundlessly. Receiving a Military God was a duty a guide ought to fulfill, but he could not do so now. With this body, this mind, this feeling—if he accepted him, he would surely die. Whether by Taemuk’s hand, or by his own, either way—he would die.

While Hoeun was frozen with fear, Taemuk adjusted his grip on Hoeun’s leg. Then he reached for Hoeun’s rear. Only then did Hoeun break free of the ice and swim backward in panic.

“Don’t touch me!”

But Taemuk seized his ankle and dragged him straight down. Just as he had when he had rammed himself in at random. Recalling—no, returning to that moment—Hoeun’s breath caught as if he might die. With his characteristic blank face, Taemuk said,

“Not enough applied yet.”

But the words did not reach Hoeun.

“N-no… Let me go. Please…”

Tears welled big in Hoeun’s eyes. He strained to pull his leg free of Taemuk’s grasp, and Taemuk, frowning, threatened—no, coaxed—him.

“Keep still. I’ll let you go when it’s all applied.”

“W-what—what are you applying…”

Only belatedly sensing something odd in Taemuk’s words, Hoeun looked down. Taemuk, as if to show him, plunged his fingers into a jar set by his knee. It was half-filled with a white, slick, viscid substance. An ointment.

“The old man said to apply it morning and evening.”

Rubbing his fingers together to shed the excess, Taemuk spoke.

“The old man… meaning…”

“The physician.”

“…”

Hoeun carefully repeated his words. Old man, physician, ointment—and his torn rear. His face, already pale, lost the last of its color.

“S-someone—someone else saw my rear?”

“No. I didn’t show it.”

“…”

It was a strange answer. He ought to have said either yes or no. In any case, he must not have shown it. He had not the slightest desire to show such a place to anyone else. He would sooner die of pain; that was out of the question.

Then Taemuk’s hand touched the torn wound. A sharp, knifing pain shot down his spine.

“Ah!”

Off guard, Hoeun let out an unvarnished cry. He hunched his neck and gripped the blanket. At the sound, Taemuk’s hand stopped. Looking back and forth between Hoeun’s twisted face and his rear, he muttered to himself,

“What’s so damned painful about this measly thing.”

“…”

The words were so infuriating they passed outrage into absurdity. Hoeun had been about to say, “How can this be measly? Has the General experienced it himself?”

But as he opened his mouth, he remembered Taemuk when his body had been made to rags. Bones broken, flesh torn, skin split.

Not only him—Dongja, her collarbone half-eaten; Gilsang, with a monster’s finger buried in his shoulder; the soldiers seen in a wretched state at the binding rite; and the soldier at the hospital, whose shoulder to arm had been ripped off in one piece.

Over more than ten years on the battlefield, Taemuk must have suffered and seen such wounds countless times—worse ones, even.

Compared to that, indeed, it was “measly.”

“…”

Hoeun stole glances at Taemuk’s body, clad only in a robe. His great body looked merely robust. No wounds, no scars. The wounds that had been healing moment by moment were no dream, it seemed.

How could wounds heal so quickly?

Hoeun felt he now understood why Taemuk was called undying—how he could have no scars despite killing so many monsters. A man who had endured such pain felt truly extraordinary.

But that and the present situation were separate matters. Hoeun, sharpening his gaze, twisted the ankle Taemuk held.

“Yes. What’s so painful about this measly thing. So there’s no need for any ointment. Let me go.”

He meant to show he was angry. He forced down his fear and lowered his voice.

“No.”

Taemuk was unmoved. He did not even look at Hoeun. His gaze remained fixed on Hoeun’s rear. He seemed intensely focused on the torn opening. He was excessively careful, unnecessarily meticulous.

At that, Hoeun felt a shame beyond words. Taemuk had seen every unseemly sight over the past two days, and yet showing him his rear was still hateful.

“Then I—I’ll do it.”

“How? Going to squat and try to look under yourself?”

“I-I’ll manage.”

“Keep still.”

“But…”

As Hoeun began to speak, Taemuk’s hand touched the wound. At the heavy sting, Hoeun groaned. But Taemuk continued to work at the wound. There was no ill intent—but the pain was unavoidable. The clear corners of Hoeun’s eyes crumpled. Cold sweat beaded on his brow, and his thin hands clutched the blanket tight.