C1733. What is Right. (3)
Sometimes people drink alcohol.
Some do it out of joy, others out of sadness, and some out of bitterness. The strong scent of liquor caresses everything without asking questions.
But on a day like today, when the bright moonlight falls on one's sleeves, the liquor consumes the person.
Drip.
Chung Myung reached out and poured liquor into the cup in front of him.
On an old eave. In a place where the aroma of ancient tiles slips. Although many were together, it seemed as if only two people existed in the world.
Drip.
The cup full of liquor floated gently in the air. But at that moment, a slender hand gently lowered it.
"Leave it."
"……."
The cup slowly descended to the ground again. Then, Baek Cheon extended both hands and gripped it.
It wasn't an easy task.
Baek Cheon's trembling hands showed how difficult it was for him to lift that small cup with both hands.
However, Baek Cheon managed to bring the cup to his mouth. More than half of the liquor spilled, and in that brief moment, cold sweat broke out on his forehead.
"Hmm..."
After swallowing the liquor, Baek Cheon carefully lowered the cup.
"It's alright."
"……."
"Losing my martial skills has its upside. I can't remember the last time liquor felt like fire."
Chung Myung let out a faint laugh at those words.
"Then you should have drunk before."
"It's not possible."
Baek Cheon shrugged his thin shoulders.
"I can lift a cup, but lifting a bottle is hard. I need someone to pour for me."
"You could control over a hundred people with a finger."
"True. But."
Baek Cheon spoke with a slightly bitter voice.
"Those looks scare me."
"……."
"Those looks that don't know what to do while they watch me."
Baek Cheon let out a short laugh.
If Chung Myung said something at that moment, the words that would follow would be too heavy, so he simply refilled Baek Cheon's empty cup with liquor.
The moon reflected in the full cup.
The same moon he had seen in the past. The same moon that hadn't changed. But now, it was a moon that had to be different.
The world doesn't change. Still, the world seems different because the person looking at it has changed. What will the world be like for Baek Cheon now? Will it be the same as the world he knew?
"You found me."
"What?"
"That I was there. You, who can no longer sense anyone's presence."
Baek Cheon laughed and held the cup again. With his still thin hands.
"I didn't find you."
"……."
"I just thought you'd be there."
The liquor in Baek Cheon's cup emptied into his mouth.
Chung Myung also grabbed his cup and drank the full liquor.
A slight warmth remained on the tip of his tongue.
But that was the taste of liquor that Chung Myung felt, different from what Baek Cheon was feeling. Although they were in the same place and sharing the same liquor, they were drinking different drinks.
Chung Myung's gaze briefly turned under the eave. His eyes could see. No, his senses could feel. Although they had been expelled after hearing the eviction order, they couldn't stay away from Baek Cheon's residence and just lingered around.
"They're hopeless idiots."
"……."
"What a fuss they make, really."
And it seemed Baek Cheon knew it too. He didn't need to see it with his eyes or feel it with his senses.
But Chung Myung just looked at Baek Cheon without saying a word. With an expressionless gaze that revealed nothing.
"It's empty."
"Hmm."
Chung Myung lifted the liquor bottle and refilled Baek Cheon's empty cup.
Drip.
Although the cup was filled again, this time Baek Cheon didn't touch it. Instead, he raised his head and looked at the moon in the sky.
"What do you think?"
"……."
"Will you also try to convince me?"
Chung Myung let out another slight laugh at those words.
"It was Sasuk who invited me for a drink. 'I didn't.'"
"Yes. That's true."
Baek Cheon smiled faintly.
"So? Just because circumstances change doesn't mean your mind will change."
"Who knows."
Chung Myung deliberately didn't respond.
He didn't need to search for deep reasons or great wisdom. He just knew. Some types of decisions depend solely on oneself. No advice, no help, matters.
He had seen it.
In an era when death became numb. In an era when wounds were considered a blessing. Those who had to cling to broken swords and shed tears in that ruthless world.
What had Chung Myung told them back then?
"I have no right."
"…."
Baek Cheon looked down and gazed at the liquor in his cup.
"Right…"
Baek Cheon's dry fingers stroked the cup.
"Since we started this war."
Perhaps calmly, perhaps desolately, or perhaps bitterly.
Baek Cheon's voice slowly slid.
"How many people have died?"
"…."
"I realized something. Each of them… they all had something."
Things that shouldn't be lost.
"But... I didn't value their deaths so much."
Several victories and defeats.
In war, the meaning of death fades. Although they knew each one couldn't be light, they couldn't mourn every death despite what they preached.
"So it's ridiculous."
Baek Cheon took the cup with his trembling hands.
"Losing an arm, what does it matter? Losing my martial skills, what does it matter?"
"…"
"So…"
What would the words that followed be?
Is it all fuss over nothing? Or is it so painful?
Chung Myung didn't know the answer. And he couldn't ask. He just watched with dark eyes as Baek Cheon brought the cup to his lips.
Baek Cheon stroked the empty cup while Chung Myung watched him. The confrontation between them, though not really a confrontation, continued.
"Chung Myung."
"Yes."
"Do you know when I feel most tired?"
"…."
A bitterness appeared on Baek Cheon's lips.
"It's not when those damn Sajae tell me to go to the Southern Edge Sect, nor when Tang Soso cried silently outside my door after treating me. It's not when the Sajae who once looked at me with pride can no longer meet my eyes, nor when the Sect Leader, who had never cried before, embraced me and shed tears. It's not even when I can't lift a spoon and have to bury my face in the plate like a dog to try to survive."
Chung Myung closed his eyes.
Not because he couldn't look, but because it was too heavy. The person he was seeing. The world he had to face.
"It's just when I wake up."
"……."
"At that moment, I forget everything. So, without thinking, I raise my hand to rub my face. But…"
Baek Cheon let out a sarcastic laugh.
"My arm doesn't move."
"……."
"The hand I manage to lift is dry and withered, as if it's not mine. The moment I see it, I remember again. Ah, this is how I am now."
A dry laughter escaped from Baek Cheon.
And Chung Myung couldn't respond to that dry laughter. He simply refilled the empty cup with liquor in silence.
How many rounds of liquor had passed?
After observing Baek Cheon's increasingly trembling hands as he drank more liquor, Chung Myung broke the long silence.
"Sasuk."
"…What?"
"Don't you plan to go to the Southern Edge Sect?"
"……."
Baek Cheon raised his head and looked at Chung Myung.
Even Chung Myung couldn't decipher what was in his eyes.
"Of course, Sasuk has a deep affection for the Mount Hua Sect…"
"Affection?"
"……."
"Is that what you think?"
"Sasuk. I…"
"A hundred times."
Chung Myung's vague words were covered by Baek Cheon's voice.
"No, maybe more than a thousand times. I've decided to go to the Southern Edge Sect."
"……."
"But I'm still here. Do you know why?"
"I don't know."
Baek Cheon's gaze turned downward.
What he saw were the ancient pavilions of the Wudang Sect, but it wasn't those pavilions he was looking at.
"I'm afraid."
"……."
That answer was unexpected for Chung Myung too.
"Are you afraid of going to the Southern Edge Sect?"
"No."
Baek Cheon slowly shook his head.
"I'm afraid of facing it."
"……."
"I followed your footsteps."
"Sasuk."
"I don't want to admit it, but I wanted to be like you. Not break, not retreat, be able to do anything."
"I'm not that kind of person."
"I know. But what matters is that I believed it. And… I wanted to be like that."
A laugh escaped again from Baek Cheon's lips.
He also knew that Chung Myung wasn't as strong as he seemed. That what he saw was a small human being erecting thorns to protect himself from being hurt, with sharp edges.
But even that he wanted to imitate.
"And at some point I realized. Someone was watching me… Yes, they were watching me as I watched you."
"……."
"And that's why I'm afraid."
Baek Cheon took the cup. His trembling hand seemed terribly precarious.
And Chung Myung saw it. Baek Cheon's slightly slanted eyes were red. So Chung Myung closed his eyes. There are things in the world that should not be seen.
"Going to the Southern Edge Sect?"
Baek Cheon laughed. With the saddest face in the world.
"So those who watched me as I watched you will know. They will know that in the Mount Hua Sect there is nothing more important than martial skills. That our time together, our words, everything, does not weigh as much as a single sword strike."
"……."
"That I, who spoke of more important things than martial prowess… They will see me while I say those things."
A low sigh escaped from Chung Myung's lips.
"Sasuk."
"To have to live."
"……."
"Going to the Southern Edge Sect and regaining your martial skills means nothing. The problem for me is what comes after. Just being alive will be a burden for the Mount Hua Sect. I will live as proof that all the right words I said were nothing more than the indulgence of the strong."
Baek Cheon's bloodshot eyes met Chung Myung's serene eyes.
"I… I can't bear that, Chung Myung. I can't bear to be a burden to the Mount Hua Sect, nor for the Mount Hua Sect to be a burden to me. I don't have the courage to face those looks."
Chung Myung glanced at the distant sky.
A dark sky. In that sky, someone was watching Chung Myung.
"I don't know if you'll understand."
He knew it. Too deeply. That's why he couldn't help but ask.
"…So are you going to let yourself rot?"
Baek Cheon softly laughed.
"There are things that are only understood when they're lost."
"……."
"I think I understand how the Ancestors of the Mount Hua Sect felt when they died. They wanted to flee. They wanted to escape. They wanted to leave everything behind and breathe freely."
Chung Myung closed his eyes. The person who had lost was before him again.
"But they couldn't. Because their lives were a beacon for those who watched them. Because there was something more important than their own lives and miseries."
"…"
He didn't know.
Those who died crushed by the weight on their shoulders.
Those who trembled in fear but never retreated.
He didn't know that someone understood their feelings now, feelings that not even Chung Myung fully understood.
That's why it's sad. That's why it's pathetic.
For them, there was a release called death. But Baek Cheon's suffering was just beginning.
A person bound with shackles they cannot escape. No, someone who has shackled their own ankles. And someone who must keep groaning endlessly.
The world calls such people specters.
Chung Myung is a specter bound to the eyes of the dead. But Baek Cheon is destined to be a specter bound to the eyes of the living.
Which is more painful?
"Are you going to stop me?"
Chung Myung opened his eyes and looked at Baek Cheon.
The specter who died looking at someone who will die in life.
Chung Myung silently poured liquor into Baek Cheon's cup.
The cup filled as it did at the beginning. As if the numerous rounds of liquor had not happened.
So, the two drank in silence.
But Baek Cheon didn't know.
He may bear his own shackles, but someone else might not bear the shackles on their ankles.
The shocking news of Baek Cheon's expulsion arrived two days later.