Chapter 59

Hororok.
He quickly brought the warming tea to the corner of his mouth and slid it down his throat before it turned cold. The hot tea was warming his body.
“You mean you don’t have any simmani?”
At my words, the North Sea man with the pale skin and tightly set eyes nodded.
My gaze fell on the North Sea man’s stomach. The winds of the North Sea are so fierce and cold that even a man who had been born and lived there for more than thirty years was protected by layers of clothing and even the skins of animals that had adapted to the sea. His pale complexion and sunken cheeks made him look like he hadn’t eaten much.
Assuming it was an excuse, I asked.
“Why isn’t …… there?”
“It’s because the nations took him away.”
The countrymen.
The government troops had come here.
“……The Guan Army?”
“Guanjun?”
The North Sea man shook his head in disbelief and asked what a guanxi was.
“I didn’t say ‘nations’.”
“I think there’s a misunderstanding. I don’t know how the word is received by the Zhongyuan, at least not here in the North Sea.”
The North Sea man stretched out his finger and pointed to a spot. There was nothing but a field of pure white snow, whipped by a northerly wind.
I raise an eyebrow, not quite sure what he’s asking me to see.
“……!”
The shadows cast by the occasional blizzard thinned out to reveal a massive citadel.
“There they are, the nations of the North Sea.”
No way.
I looked at the Beihai and spoke.
“Is that the place called the Beihai Ice Palace?”
“Oh, you know the nations?!”
The Beihai’s face lit up with delight. It was me. The Beihai Ice Palace was the Beihai Ice Palace.
But how come he didn’t complain, complain, or even wonder why the Ice Palace had taken all the Simurghi.
“That’s because the Bing Palace is famous even in Zhongyuan.”
“Hmph, that’s right, your reputation is well known.”
“But how long has it been since you’ve taken the Simmanys and herbalists with you?”
“I don’t know. I’m sure they’ve been taken for a reason, my lord, and I’m sure it’s for a good cause.”
I felt embarrassed by his words.
I thought it was the same as if there were a Southern Palace in Anhui Province and a Northern Ice Palace in the North Sea.
The Southern Palace does not treat its subjects lightly. They especially don’t do anything coercive, such as taking away the Simmany.
But this was a different mindset. The North Sea people in front of them were blind.
As my gaze settled on the outline of the ice bow through the fading snowstorm, I sensed a sense of dullness. It was simply not part of their culture.
* * *
“They must be sleeping by now.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ve mixed it up in their teacups.”
“Do you know how surprised I am.”
“What.”
“Why the Zhongyuan would suddenly appear here.”
“Didn’t you know? The nations said so. The Zhongyuan are always trying to take what is ours. They must have come here from the North Sea to get a piece of the action.”
“So it is!”
A single torch was lit beneath the hut, and in the hands of the huddled group were weapons of sharpened stag antlers, bear fangs, and beast claws.
“There were five of them.”
“Split up, five men each, and decapitate them all.”
“What about the throats. We need to silence them and report back to the nations!”
“Uh-huh! Chun Shik’s already gone to report to the rulers.”
“I see! It’s good to have a younger man with quick feet!”
“Come on, let’s all have children!”
As the men scrambled to deal with their respective charges.
“Well, well, well. I was told to be careful with ice bows, but I wasn’t told to be careful with North Sea men.”
The young man’s voice sent a chill down the North Sea men’s spines in the cold chill of the darkness.
“I almost got killed in my sleep by a rat or a bird.”
“Uh, how.”
The eyes of the North Sea people turned puzzled. The North Sea’s famous iceweed could only be quenched to a barely noticeable degree when it began to dissolve in warm tea water. It was a poisonous herb that even the nations called extremely poisonous.
“I told you it was strange that you greeted us as if you had been waiting for us.”
Donghui nodded at Black Ho’s words. His survival instincts alerted his companions to the strangeness he felt as soon as he drank the tea, and he would have been poisoned if he hadn’t simultaneously driven out the poison with his inner strength.
“There were some who said they hadn’t seen us in a while and ran away as soon as they saw us.”
Looking at Donghui and the young man crushed beneath Kang Wu-moon, the Beihai were stunned.
“Chun Shik!”
“Ah, ah……!”
The young man called Chun Shik was crushed by Donghui and Kang Woo-moon, unable to speak or move his limbs. The Beihai had already lost the will to fight at the sight of the young man, who had been blocked from moving due to his blood points.
“What have we done wrong that we should think of attacking them?”
At my words, the Beihai, a Beihai who had offered me a cup of tea in my favor, stepped forward. He was presumably the father of the child named Chunsik. His eyes were bloodshot and he stared at the young man.
“……The Zhongyuan have always coveted and taken from us.”
He hadn’t heard of it, but he needed to hear more.
“So we, too, intend to punish and warn the Zhongyuan according to your words.”
“Is punishment and warning to take our lives?”
“…….”
I frowned as I looked at the speechless North Sea man. Something was definitely broken somewhere.
Even the North Sea man in front of me, and the nearly thirty other North Sea men, including the young man named Chun Shik, all had sullen faces, hollow eyes, sunken cheeks, and calloused hands.
“…….”
I glanced at my uncle and the black tiger. They both nodded, sensing something was wrong. Black Ho began to look around at the huts between the villages, while Eunuch Eunuch weaved between Chun Shik and the other Beihai, except for the Beihai in front of him, and grabbed his wrist to start a vein.
“What, what are you doing!”
Hearing the startled Beihai’s voice, I spoke up in a calm voice.
“Don’t be alarmed, I’m just trying to see how you’re doing.”
“You were a councilman, of ……?”
“Something like that.”
Having reassured the North Sea men, I turned to Black Tiger, who was leaping out from behind the pacing uncle. I opened my mouth to speak when I saw what he held in his arms.
“That’s a lot.”
“There was one identical sack in each house.”
“Each house? All the same thing?”
“Yes. There were some roots, like arrowroot, and what appeared to be potatoes, judging by the scent. They don’t look like much food, but…….”
Black Tiger is from Salsu. Because of that, his senses and sensitive nerves are far beyond those of others, but that’s about it.
As a Salsu, he had learned and mastered a lot of background knowledge, as well as the geography of the mighty martial forests, various poisonous herbs and spiritual herbs.
But when he saw the contents of the bag in front of him, he shook his head.
“It appears to be an unusual poisonous herb that only grows in the North Sea.”
“What makes you so sure it’s poisonous?”
“It gives off a strange scent, and it’s the same stuff that’s in the tea cup.”
“……Hmm.”
Even if I knew it was poisonous, I wouldn’t eat it.
No way.
I picked up the potatoes and what appeared to be food next to me and looked at Black Lake.
Black Tiger nodded.
“……These are poisonous herbs, too.”
“Damn.”
The old man’s gaze was cold as he stared at them.
“Every single one of them is poisoned. They’re weak, and there’s a strange energy that drains them. If we don’t treat them soon, they’ll all collapse.”
I clenched my fists. I clenched my teeth at the malice that Huang Bo Xue and the rest of the Beihai Ice Palace had sown toward the weak and helpless.
“……I think.”
Black Lake scattered what appeared to be potatoes and various vegetables and sighed.
“I think they’re testing them.”
“Testing?”
“The amount of poisonous herbs given to each house is consistent, and they’ve only picked out what looks like food. That means they must be hoping for something.”
I looked up with a sinking feeling, and there it was, the citadel of the North Sea Ice Palace, the outline of which I could see whenever the blizzard cleared.
“They’ve taken all the Simmany.”
“They must have something up their sleeve.”
I forgot about the cold in the north wind and snow. The five men clenched their teeth, fueled by the anger they felt at those who would mock their homes and test their greed.
“Troublemakers everywhere, I see.”
“……What would you say?”
“Just when I thought we’d finally gotten rid of the jingling bandits.”
“There’s a lot worse than bandits.”
“It’s a big world, and there are more assholes.”
* * *
To be admitted to the great citadel that is the North Sea Ice Palace is to be among the most recognized of the North Sea’s members.
And so it was.
It’s why I feel so proud just looking at the snowy grounds of the Beihai Ice Palace, standing guard in the midst of a fierce blizzard.
“It’s not just that, it’s also the fact that you’re wearing these fine furs and bear pelts that keep you warm.”
“Cancer, of course, giggle.”
While the two guards of the Northern Ice Palace were laughing and showing off their winter gear, a boom!
The sound of footsteps crunching through the snow made one of the guards’ eyes light up and he raised his spear.
“Who is it!”
Who dares to come to the ice bow.
The sentry’s loyalty was boundless.
“My lord, it’s us!”
“……What is it. It’s Chunsik.”
As the Beihai looked at the obedient young man, Chunshik, his father, and Kangseok pulled a cart designed to move easily through the snowy terrain. Behind them, another villager, Surnut, followed, apparently bringing a tribute.
Still, the contents remained to be seen.
“I don’t doubt you, but I have my own business to attend to, so you must understand.”
“Amyo, amyo, what can we do while you’re at work?”
Chun Shik’s head bowed low, and the sentry with the satisfied look on his face stepped forward and opened the wrapped items on the cart, layer by layer.
“Yes, what are the contents.”
“It’s…….”
As the two guards removed the wrappings from the cart, layer by layer, they looked at Chunsik.
“……Why is it floating like that?”
“It’s because…….”
Sensing something was amiss, the guards raised their eyes and saw the shadows of the people they had mistaken for villagers, and the wrappers in the cart flew into the air, catching the guards like a net.