Chapter 74. [The One Who Gathers Death. (3)]

Translator: thursdays Editor: Sasha

“Milord..”

Preta looked up at me carefully.

“Experiencing 112 deaths is excessive. Even now, you’ve become so emaciated in the last few days that it’s hard to recognize you..”

“Huh? Did you become so loyal that you’re worried about my body?”

Preta hesitated. She seemed to be agonizing over how to answer me.

Would it be better to use flattery? Or should she reveal her innermost thoughts?

“..When the lord disappears, I will disappear too.”

Preta opened her mouth.

“I will no longer be able to live in my little paradise. My life, my memory, my meaning, and everything will disappear. Everything depends on you, milord. I am concerned about myself, so I am concerned about milord’s body as well.”

“It’s nice, to be honest.”

The corners of my mouth rose.

“How about you? Are you living all right these days?”

“Excuse me..?”

“You ended up living in Estelle’s village. The people whom you valued more than your life have also returned. So how are you doing?”

After gaining the right to monopolize the 20th floor, I released Preta to the village. Other than when I needed her to do something like right now, she would continue to stay in the village. It would be the same in the future as well.

Preta replied with a nervous look.

“I’m.. I’m doing fine.”

“Anything special?”

“If we’re talking about something special.. Ah.”

Preta blinked.

“There was a time when people called Hunters came in. They said that the secret to how the Death King suddenly became stronger and the five top guilds’ secret treasure were hidden here.. However, the Witch whom you brought in and the Hunters who follow her prevented it from becoming a big fuss.”

Indeed, it was the Black Dragon Guild. Their follow-up services are top-notch, for sure.

“There are no more whispers from the minor lords of the neighboring kingdoms. They’ve been contracting measles from the nomads they brought in to fight us.. And even if that wasn’t the case, both the empire and the temple declared my village a holy place. Sometimes the Lizardmen and elves come and give gifts..”

It seemed that things in that world were going according to order.

“Well, but.. For me, the abilities that I used to possess have disappeared.”

“Hmm.”

“There are sick people who heard rumors about me and come to visit.. In addition, after the village was declared a holy land, pilgrims who wish for a miracle have come together, and I’m not sure what to do with them.. For now, the Hunter priests who follow the Heretic Questioner whom milord introduced us to are taking care of them..”

“Don’t worry. I have something in mind.”

Specifically, I planned to build a new pharmacy for the Alchemist on the 20th floor.

‘Since she said she would only take in new clients through me.’

After this expedition is completed, the Alchemist’s position would be solidified.

‘I have to make sure that the traffic is organized.’

As it was a place where patients constantly visit, she would be able to gain experience with various diseases.

‘The Alchemist won’t be able to handle the workload alone. Some staff would need to be hired. It would be okay to have Preta as an assistant, and it should be good to have pharmacist-wannabe hunters as her disciples. Then, the size of the pharmacy will naturally increase..’

It wouldn’t take a long time for the new pharmacy to be recognized as a branch of the Alchemy Castle, and then the branch will be converted to its headquarters.

‘I have to take care of my people.’

I smiled.

“Anything else?”

“Other than that.. Oh, Dazena, Dazena is the head of the school in my village. I think she liked the tteokbokki that the hunters brought us. And Garchoff, the old man who takes care of the orchard, handed out the fruit grown by him to the Black Dragon Guild’s hunters who stood guard in the village, and the Black Dragon Hunters gave him the fruit from milord’s world—”

The wind blew.

Snow fluttered, and the moonlight quietly faded with the scattering snowflakes. Preta’s voice flowed like snow. Under the moonlit night, I listened to the story that continued up until its end.

Preta bowed her head.

“—And that’s the situation.”

“It sounds like you’re living well.”

Preta replied carefully, “Yes. I’m living well.”

I nodded.

“We should improve the lives of people in this world as well.”

“....”

“Come on, go and collect the bodies.”

Golden hair flowed down to her shoulders. Preta bowed again. A sound spilled from her lips.

“As you command.”

3.

There is a saying that goes: The right man for the right job.

Summoning Preta and entrusting her to collect the bodies had very good results.

She was one of the lower constellations. She had been called [The Devil King of Fall Rain] and had destroyed the world at least once. She knew how to reap death.

“I will start looking for a town or city where the government offices are located.”

Thousands of skeletons moved at Preta’s signal.

“Because it is a workplace for officials, there should be a map. It will be just a clumsy map, but it should be enough to compare the geography. I’d like to combine the fragmented maps to explore remote rural and fishing villages.”

Three days after the search began, Preta delivered the zombies to me. They were not the bodies of those who had learned martial arts. They were just ordinary farmers and peasants. They were that sort of bodies.

“I will bring back the corpse of a mother who hung herself because she could not bear to see her children go hungry.”

The skeletons’ bones were white. White bones lined up and brought over the corpses. In the middle of the snowy field, it was difficult to distinguish between the white of the bones and the white of the snow. So, from a distance—It seemed like the bodies were moving on their own and gathering in front of me.

“The children who opened their eyes in the morning to discover their mother’s bodies. I will also bring the corpses of the children who died while crying beside their mother, withering like the wild grass.”

The procession of corpses continued.

The deaths were listed.

“The people in the village who cursed the mother for dying, unable to fulfill the duties of a parent.”

“The one who hid in a well to avoid the epidemic, but couldn’t escape from the well in the end.”

“A prisoner who starved to death without even the chance to escape.”

Preta carefully separated and chose the poor corpses.

She was like a servant paying only the most precious tributes to the king.

At the end of the week, Preta again knelt on one knee in the snow.

“I brought them. Milord.”

I looked at the snowfield.

-Guoooh..

-Euh, wooahhh!

-Kwooo..

historical

Numerous deaths were arranged on the field.

The zombies were struggling against the hold of the skeletons, who held onto their limbs. Some corpses looked old. Others were young. Hunger did not discriminate by age.

“....Good.”

I untied my tie. I took off my suit and threw away my underwear. It was a dark night. With my bare skin exposed under the sky, I gave an order to the skeletons.

“Let them go.”

At that moment.

As soon as the corpses caught by the skeletons were released, 112 zombies rushed forward. It was their instinct telling them to come to the place with the strongest scent of flesh.

Toward where I stood.

“Come.”

I smiled.

“All of you, come!”

Chomp!

A young corpse jumped at me. It bit my calf. When terrible pain was about to rise up from my calf, the pain ended halfway. It was because an old corpse ripped off my thigh. The pain from the calf ended in the thigh, then, again, thickened and soared to my stomach.

“-.”

Perhaps I screamed. But I couldn’t hear the scream. Because a zombie tore off my ears.

My lips were eaten. My tongue was eaten. I couldn’t hear, couldn’t speak. I just looked at the sight of the countless shadows burrowing into my body.

[You have died.]

I looked up at the night sky.

The moon was white, as if it was a land where snow fell forever.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

The moon that the old man looked at before he died was exactly the same as it was now.

All his life, he was a small-time fisherman at the river. When a Jiangshi bit his finger, the old man was not shocked. He drove the ferry calmly.

-If I die in this boat, it won’t cause discomfort to the rest of the world.

The old man’s wooden boat, within sight of the village, bobbed and shook in the river.

The old man lay on his stomach. It was as comfortable as lying in a casket. It would be good to die as the boat was overturned by the waves. It would be good to die as if he was just falling asleep.... The old man considered it happiness to be born on the river and die in the river.

The last moon he looked up was peaceful.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

He didn’t know how the world had changed so much.

That was what the young viceroy thought as he strolled along the city walls at night. This wasn’t even his hometown. He was once a student who just memorized a few lines in the writing room. However, the viceroy died, his people died, and the people’s servants died.

One death led to another like a polite request to be passed on. At the end of those requests, the one standing was himself.

-Town leader-nim.

A soldier approached him and spoke. He wasn’t always a soldier. He had been a pimp at the inn. Even though he was testy, his head was put on right, and he was useful.

-What is it?

-The granary is empty. After half a month, there will be no millet in the warehouse. Fishermen sometimes catch fish, but they are not good enough. What will you..?

-Reduce the grain ration for the elderly.

The young viceroy said.

-There are countless Jiangshi. We have to save those who can still fight. Reduce the food that goes to the elderly and children by one-third.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

The viceroy in front of him was cold-blooded. Sometimes, it seemed like he was colder than the Jiangshi. The soldier was sometimes puzzled how this geek, who had only recited Confucius’ teachings at the entrance of the village his whole life, gained such guts.

-The backlash will not be small..

-Reduce the food you give to young people by half. There will be those whose reductions are greater than others, but so long as everyone is getting less, it will be bearable.

-Still, won’t they be dissatisfied and argue?

-I will starve first.

The viceroy said briefly.

-I’ll fast completely. If I, as the leader, do not eat anything, the complainers will lose their strength.

-....Is that alright?

-I won’t last long anyway. What difference does it make to me if I starve for a few days?

The moon that he saw on top of the wall was lonesome.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

-We’ll all starve like this!

The kid shouted urgently. It was a young girl. As a beggar of the Everdirt, now that the distinction between the poor and the rich had disappeared, she had become the head of the children of her age.[1]

-The town leader’s telling us kids not to eat. He’s telling us not to live!

-Then, what should we do, Sister..?

-Even if we die, we should die with some food in our stomachs. That way, we can become colorful and charming Jiangshi.[2]

The little kid fumed.

-There is a recipe I learned in the Everdirt. It’s called togwa. Literally, it’s a snack made out of mud.

-Mud snack..?

-It’s a cookie that you can make as long as you have mud.

Her eyes lit up.

-Listen! Children who know how to swim should keep catching fish. Don’t give it to adults unless they give something back, and we share it with each other. And the rest of you can go to the river and scoop soft mud.

-What are we going to do?

-I’ll show you.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

The children scooped mud from the river. The mud was mixed with grains of sand. The children kept the mud in the scoop, then took out the gravel and sand several times.

-Clump the mud together and spread it on a mat.

The little boss eagerly moved her hands. She lumped the mud together like a ball and threw it on the mat. And, as if she was spreading plaster, she spread the mud wide over the mat.

-Good. It’s done!

-What do you mean.. it’s done?

-Just dry it in the sun like this. Then the mud cookies are made.

The children were dumbfounded.

-You’re just baking the mud in the sun!

-How are these snacks!?

-Shut up. It’s a recipe that’s been handed down in Everdirt. Watch well.

The little boss pulled something out of her pocket. It was a bag of salt. Even normally, salt was precious, but now that everything was being rationed, each grain was worth as much as gold. Little by little, the kid mixed the mud with salt.

-There!

After half a day, the mud dried up.

-It’s done now. Each of you can have one! But be careful when eating. If you eat a lot in one bite, it won’t taste good! Savor it little by little.

The children half-heartedly started to eat the mud cookies.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

-..It’s surprisingly all right?

Some children scraped the mud cookies with their front teeth like a hamster.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

-I like it because it tastes salty.

Some children licked the mud with their tongues. Their eyes were round. It was like they were eating ice cream. Because of the children’s saliva, the fringes of the mud cookie got wet.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

-It tastes awful..

Some children just cried.

The little boss laughed.

-It’s okay. It just needs to be edible. In the future, we have to take care of all of our food. Eat togwa every day, and if we catch fish, we’ll eat fish as well. All right?

-Yes, Sister..

The children soothed their hungry stomachs with mud.

A person’s mouth was sly. The children’s throats accepted the salty mud as food.

The salty taste was to trick the tongue for the mud to be swallowed. So, when the children were eating mud, they didn’t bite it all at once. They tasted the salt while licking the mud with their tongues.

-Don’t lick too much! The taste will disappear. You have to eat pieces of it while licking.

By the river, children kneaded the mud every day.

-Yeah?

At the riverside.

-Look over there. It’s a body.

It was the same river where an old man had left on a boat.

The old man who was born on the river died in the river. The old man regarded it as happiness. He thought that using a boat as a coffin and dying was a way to do no harm to the world.

But there was something the old man didn’t think about. Drowned corpses sometimes washed up on the shores.

If it was the old man’s happiness to die in the river, it was the old man’s misfortune that his body had been pushed to this river, not the other side.

And it was everyone’s misfortune.

-The old man must have drowned.

-How sad..

-Is it a fisherman?

The children approached the old corpse with fear and curiosity.

-Huh?

It was a dark dawn.

-W, wait a moment!

-Yeah?

-It’s a Jiangshi! It’s not just a corpse!

The corpse wriggled as it smelled the tender flesh of the children.

-Run!

There were some children who ran away.

-Ah..

There was also a child who could not run away.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

That was it.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

The fortress along the river, which lost contact with the capital and the surrounding villages, was destroyed. The old man died. The last town leader died while fighting. A pawn soldier died trying to get past the town gates. The little boss died while holding her younger siblings.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

They tried to live.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

They struggled.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

Because they tried to live, they starved.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

The fingers of the children that they used to scoop up the wet mud by the river. Their hands spreading the mud dough on the mat. Their fingertips holding tightly onto the dried mud cookies.

[The trauma of the enemy who killed you is being reenacted.]

112 deaths.

There was no gesture that did not come from hunger among them.

[Trauma reenactment complete.]

[Confirming that the subject’s psyche is maintained.]

[The penalty is ending.]

I slowly opened my eyes.

“....”

The snowfield was deserted.

On this quiet night. I softly talked to myself.

“I wanted to learn how to prepare the bark..”

Reality surpassed my imagination. Was the bark of a tree not traumatized in a world that was nearing destruction? Humans could even eat mud when they were cornered.

“That’s right. Things like that happen, too.”

I stood up and dug into the snow. I wrapped Aura in my bare hands. Digging in the snow and digging again, I reached the frozen ground underneath the perpetual snow.

It was the first land I saw after falling into this world.

“Let’s see..”

It was not easy to dig into permafrost. I had to use Aura for this as well. I dug up a handful of earth, then heated it up as well as the snow with Aura. It was just like boiling soup. After a long time, the grains of dirt began to soften.

It was mud.

I picked out the grains of sand and gravel. I followed what I saw in my dream. The mud was kneaded into spheres. I took off my suit coat and used it as a mat, and I spread the dough on top of it.

“Yup.”

Time passed. The mud cookies were baked in the morning by the broad daylight. I carefully held the mud cookie, which looked just like an ordinary sweet, with both hands.

“....Thank you for the food.”

I cracked it with my teeth.

A crunching sound echoed in my mouth.

“....”

I licked the edge of the mud cookie with my tongue. The texture became a little softer. However, it was only soft at the tip, so when I put it in my mouth, the grains of dirt stuck to the roof of my mouth. My whole mouth felt that unpleasant texture.

“....”

A little later, I got the hang of it. This food was not supposed to be chewed with my molars. I had to gnaw it with my front teeth, then swallow it little by little. The warmth of the sun and the smell of the soil. I slowly ate the food that was made with those two treasures.

Mm-hm.

“....It really doesn’t taste good.”

I bit into it.

“It tastes bad.”

I ate it little by little.

“Really, it tastes bad.”

I swallowed.

“....”

My shoulders trembled.

My heart trembled.

An unspeakable emotion captured my whole body. Was it anger? Or was it sadness? Maybe it was hatred. Humans have probably come from the earth, so why can’t we just eat the land? Why was the scent and texture of the soil so unpleasant?

Why?

“....”

Before I knew it, my right hand was clenched. Emotions that maybe anger, sadness, or even hate gathered in my hands. Then, I realized. The emotions that could not be expressed by words were originally expressed through one’s hands.

They weren’t meant to be said; they were meant to be swung into motion.

Martial arts were just the swinging of one’s hands.

“....”

I should return.

I pulled out the Holy Sword. I pointed the tip of the blade at my neck.

I should return and show the Heavenly Demon my sword. No. It wasn’t my sword. It was the sword of the old man who died without a name, the soldier, the viceroy, and the children.

I hadn’t read the texts on martial arts, so I didn’t know the mysterious doctrine of yin and yang and the five elements. If there was any law to my martial arts, it was only their screams. If my blade followed any natural order, it was the gesture of the humans who were thrown away by the heavens.[3]

Because it is full of resentment, it is infernal.

Because we view the sky with our resentment, it is the infernal heavens.

I stabbed the middle of my neck with the Holy Sword. With the deaths of 112 people in my heart, I regressed. What I had to do was no different from the last time.

I asked the Heavenly Demon to accept me as a disciple.

Like before, the Heavenly Demon pondered over it for one night.

After one night, the Heavenly Demon presented me with a test.

“What is the test?”

“There.”

The Heavenly Demon pointed to the bottom of the pit.

“I threw a Jiangshi down there. He was once a well-known master in Gangho, one of the most promising people of our cult. Defeat that Jiangshi. Then, I will accept you as a disciple of the cult.”

Then, the Heavenly Demon said, “Fight while you are hungry. Fight the Jiangshi, but with only hunger in your heart. Only the pain of hunger must be in that place. Do not let any other emotions or thoughts other penetrate your psyche. Can you do it?”

I didn’t answer.

There was no reason to answer what could not be said with words.

Instead, I quietly jumped into the pit.

-Guoooooh!

One Jiangshi ran at me.

I looked at the Jiangshi with indifferent eyes.

“....”

The scent of mud in my mouth.

The texture of a lump of dirt in my hands.

With only the children’s hunger in my heart.

Infernal Heavens Demonic Art.

First form.

Sword of Starvation.

I swung my sword.

With the first strike, I cut both his legs.

The second strike, I cut off both arms.

The third strike sliced off the Jiangshi’s head.

There was no gesture that did not come from hunger.

The man who was supposed to be a high level master of the Demonic Sect was silenced in the bottom of the pit.

“....”

I looked up.

The Heavenly Demon’s mouth hung open. She was looking amazed, like when she first saw our party. Perhaps she was even more astonished. Her eyes shook. Seeing her eyes shake, I was sure that her heart would be swayed.

The meaning of life, when she had thought that all was lost.

It was because she saw it right before her eyes. A new beginning.

Because it became visible.

“Heavenly Demon-nim.”

I slowly opened my mouth.

“What kind of death will we master next?”

~~~

[1] Everdirt: Gaebang, or a self-governing body of beggars.

[2] Colorful and charming Jiangshi: Referring to the idiom that states that a ghost who dies after eating has color and charm.

[3] Natural order: The word used was chunri, or literally, heaven’s laws. It’s such a beautiful sentence.