TBML 11

As though to express his thanks, the black tiger blinked and walked away, and Yeon collapsed to the ground. Now that he’d come back to his senses and replayed what he’d just done, he thought he really must have gone mad. He must’ve gone mad from a life too harsh to bear.

Yeon sat there for quite some time before finally steadying his trembling legs and making his way down the mountain.

By the time he reached the village outskirts, caked in mud and looking like a complete mess, he looked no different from the lowest of the low. Even the rattle of his identification tag seemed meaningless in that state.

Instead of heading straight into the village, Yeon turned toward the house of the largest butcher at the edge of the butcher quarter. Though technically a commoner, Yeon stood outside with his pack still on, not daring to step over the threshold. A familiar face stepped out to greet him. The butcher, dressed rather gaudily for someone of such low status, was someone who had a hand in Yeon, a commoner, taking up the trade of butchering.

He was something like a pan-in—a person historically attached to the royal Confucian academy who often dealt in meat—and he had been the one to show Yeon firsthand that slaughter could be profitable. He supplied meat to noble households and government offices for banquets, earning a decent income, and because his status was low, he only paid partial taxes. He was a wealthy butcher whose greed had flourished.

Maybe because the noble families in the village were all so unpleasant, Yeon’s village, despite everything, was somewhat more lenient toward butchers. Unlike wandering groups of outcasts or criminal types, the village’s butchers had settled and lived quietly, and the other commoners, while not exactly warm, didn’t openly harass or scorn them either.

Of course, that didn’t mean there was no discrimination^[1]—just that it wasn’t blatant. Even so, compared to other places, it wasn’t the worst.  

The man’s eyes lit up when he saw the carrier on Yeon’s back filled with spring rabbits. Since Yeon, a commoner, couldn’t sell meat ^[2]directly in the marketplace, he would come find this man whenever he needed to sell his game.

The man, who often visited noble households, was generous with his payments for Yeon’s catches. Unlike the crude mountain hunters, Yeon’s methods were neat, resulting in good-quality pelts and meat.

Though the weather had warmed considerably, the sudden spring chills still lingered. With wet nurses still seeking soft rabbit fur,^[3] Yeon showing up with a full haul made the butcher grin automatically.

“Could you spare a bit of cow’s milk?”

Yeon passed him the last rabbit and deliberately deepened his voice to ask. He didn’t want to be treated like a helpless girl again and get swindled, so he spoke with an air of aloofness, though his mannerisms were still overly cautious.

The butcher raised two cows and would sometimes trade their milk for game instead of coin. Animal milk was a delicacy fit for a king’s table. Today, Yeon planned to make a porridge with milk.

Milk porridge was a nourishing dish meant to strengthen the weak. His mother, unable to even swallow meat broth, had weakly suggested it in a moment of worry. She’d likely only be able to take a few bites before throwing it up, but Yeon still wanted those few bites to be something that could help.

The wealthy butcher returned with a bowl filled about halfway with milk—enough for a richly cooked porridge.

Worried about spilling even a drop of the precious white liquid, Yeon accepted the bowl with both hands and tied it securely in the cloth that had been covering his face. He thanked the man with a few more coins added to his payment and said he’d be back.

With the bowl tightly pressed to his chest, Yeon finally stepped into the village and stopped first at the apothecary. The physician, familiar with him by now, looked over as Yeon said that lately, she hadn’t been able to keep down even a spoonful and had started coughing—most times with blood.

The man’s long eyebrows twitched. They used to say long brows were the sign of someone fated to be eaten by a tiger, and this doctor certainly had long ones.

The apothecary gave the expected answer—that the illness had worsened—and added that they’d have to include more ginseng in the medicine. He watched Yeon’s reaction carefully. Ginseng wasn’t cheap. But Yeon nodded silently.

With his carrier lighter but his arms heavier from the milk and herbs, Yeon deliberately avoided the main marketplace, taking a longer route home. It would’ve been much quicker to cut through the stalls, but there was no good reason to show his face in a crowded place.

If he went, he’d only run into people demanding repayment for debts they’d lent his father, or women who clicked their tongues and whispered about him behind their hands, or men who leered at him with disgusting eyes. And if not that, it would be the arrogant house slaves of noble families who looked down on Yeon as if he were beneath them, puffed up on their master’s authority.

There was nowhere to rest his heart. He wasn’t a wandering vagrant, nor a rootless weed, so why did it feel like there was nowhere for him to plant his feet? It was truly exhausting. While silently lamenting this as he passed along the quieter street, a familiar voice called out to him.

“Yeon-ah!”

Startled, Yeon turned around at the sound. A short way back down the street, Du-soe and a few other young men were crouched together. Seeing him, Du-soe beamed and waved, forgetting even his own size.

Glad to see him, Du-soe quickly approached, then noticed Yeon’s disheveled state and turned pale.

Yeon, however, calmly answered as though nothing had happened—no sign of the trembling fear he’d shown before the black tiger. He said it was nothing, just a little fall. But the rough, red marks from thick rope still lingered on his hand, the one carrying the medicine.

“What happened to you?”

“I fell.”

“What? Are you hurt?”

“It’s nothing. Just slipped a bit.”

Though Du-soe’s face clearly showed how much he wanted to keep talking, Yeon only gave a glance at the men sitting behind him and then turned away, letting a cold wind blow between them. Sensing Yeon’s discomfort, Du-soe didn’t try to stop him.

As Yeon’s figure grew distant, Du-soe, planning to head in soon after lingering for a bit longer, turned to bid farewell to the young men he’d been chatting with. Or rather, he meant to—until the jeering, filthy jokes that followed made him clench his fists instead of raising his hand.

“How much longer d’you think he can keep that up?”

“Barely hanging on, I’d say. In the end, it’s all the same lowly filth. Better to beg with your legs spread than live that miserably, don’t you think?”

“You think spreading your legs is easy? Folks’ll be lined up at the door till the threshold wears out.”

“Does it matter which way you roll in the dirt? One way or another, he’s bound to end up rolling with beasts.”

“Exactly! They say he goes wild for hairy men—who knows? Maybe if we throw on a lion mask, he’ll roll around with one of us too!”

At the vulgar, filthy talk that made his vision darken and his face flush red and pale by turns, Du-soe’s first instinct was to check on Yeon. He feared that Yeon might’ve heard those disgusting words trailing behind him. Thankfully—or perhaps not—Yeon, who had turned away without the slightest hesitation, walked on quickly without turning back, seemingly having heard nothing.

Relieved, Du-soe turned his eyes back to the men still snickering at Yeon’s back and stepped in front of them. When his thick legs blocked their view, the one who’d mentioned the lion mask frowned and looked up at Du-soe.

“What did you just spit out of that mouth of yours?”

“What? Can’t a man joke around?”

“Joke? You bastard, I’ll tear that filthy mouth right off!”

Du-soe, not someone easily ashamed, couldn’t bear the man’s insolent look as he swept his eyes up and down him like he was some curiosity. Without another word, he lunged.

The two grown men rolled across the dirt with a thud, thud as yellow dust billowed into the air. Du-soe threw his fists like a wronged man, furious, with all his might.

The man who took a solid punch to the face tumbled across the ground, covering his battered face with both hands. The others, who’d been sitting around just moments ago sharing tobacco pipes with Du-soe, were stunned as the usually laid-back ox of a man charged in like a maddened bull. They were a beat too slow trying to hold him back.

Even with two grown men hanging off his arms, Du-soe didn’t stop punching. He landed another clean hit, and the man let out a shriek, twin streams of blood gushing from his nose.

“You chasing after Yeon’s ass like that—aren’t you just hoping to bed him yourself, Du-soe? You pathetic little eunuch.”

The words drained the strength from Du-soe’s fists. The power that had him charging like a wild bull vanished, and his raised fists went slack, held down at last by the others.

Seeing Du-soe hesitate, the man who’d taken the beating puffed up, proud that his words had struck a nerve, and shouted even louder:

“Peh! Just ‘cause you’ve got the parts don’t make you a man! You could follow Yeon around sniffing for a hundred days, and that little thing ain’t giving it up even once!”

“Enough.”

The ruckus had grown loud enough to draw the village elders. They said there was nothing more entertaining than watching a fight, and sure enough, people began to gather in twos and threes. The men, who had been all too loud and bold just moments before, now grew sheepish under the eyes of the onlookers and rushed to shut up the loudmouth.

But the man, still burning with resentment at having been beaten, bit down on the hand silencing him and kept on barking.

“Don’t go pretending to be all high and mighty! You and me—we’re the same damn filth. That Yeon bastard’s gotta get sold off as a whore one of these days, and maybe then you’ll finally get your swing with a leather whip!”

The villagers had known people gossiped cruelly behind Yeon’s back, even as they pitied him, but they hadn’t realized it had gotten this shameless. What enraged Du-soe even more than being treated like a lust-crazed animal was the realization that his own behavior—lingering by Yeon’s side—was helping to twist the way the other men looked at him.

Grinding his teeth, Du-soe raised his fist once more.

“You filthy son of a—!”

Just as the fight seemed to settle, a dull thud rang out, and it all flared up again. Onlookers and those trying to hold them apart got tangled in the chaos, yelling and shouting in a frenzy.

***

“You’re one to talk. What happened to your face?”

Yeon returned Du-soe’s earlier question right back at him as he watched the man shuffle through the gate of his house, face puffed and bruised like a child after a brawl. Du-soe, one eye swollen like a bee had stung it, gave a dopey grin and blurted out something completely unrelated.

“Yeon-ah… what if you really dropped everything and just went off to live alone in the mountains? Couldn’t you?”