TBML 26

To think he could sleep so soundly in a place like this, in such a state.

Though the drowsiness had long since left him and he had been awake for quite some time, Yeon did not stir—lying there like a corpse.

As clarity slowly returned to his mind, he briefly considered firing his matchlock into the air. Surely someone would hear the shot and come investigate? But after scouring the pit with his eyes, the powder pouch was nowhere to be seen. Even that sliver of hope crumbled away.

He could tell whether it was night or day by the light filtering into the pit, but he had no way of knowing how long he had been asleep. The light was bright—had he slept an entire day? Or was it only a brief nap? There was no telling.

He tried to gauge the passage of time, but soon gave up. What was the point? There was no need to trouble his mind, and besides, his entire body was in too much pain to think.

It wasn’t even comparable to when he’d once tumbled down the mountain while fleeing from a leopard.

His left arm had gone completely numb, and every other part of his body ached.

The nails that had come off throbbed with delayed pain, and even breathing—which had felt manageable before—was starting to become laborious.

He had never thought of himself as particularly frail, but misfortune after misfortune had worn him down to nothing.

Yeon simply blinked, motionless and quiet. Like a beast hibernating through the winter, he curled up tight and ceased all movement but for the faint breath that kept him alive. Perhaps this was just survival instinct. If he was going to starve to death in this pit anyway, he might as well conserve what little energy he had.

Of course, Yeon had no intention of lasting that long—but fate seemed to mock his resolve. Before long, thirst clawed at his throat. Whether he’d given up or not, his body still hurt, he was still hungry, and now unbearably thirsty.

Caw, caw. Caw—

Drip. Drip.

He had been staring blankly at the dirt walls and tangled roots that surrounded him when the cry of a crow reached his ears. Before that haunting sound had even faded, something cold and wet splashed against his cheek. Instinctively, Yeon wiped it with his hand and brought it to his lips.

The dirt and blood on his skin tainted the taste, but the clear liquid—it was water. Barely a few drops, but even just moistening his lips brought a measure of relief.

The cold sting against his face jolted him to fuller awareness. Was it rain? He looked up at the roofless sky. But the moment he tilted his head back, the light overhead blinded him. Though he was already lying down, dizziness swelled within him, making the world tilt and blur.

Squinting hard against the brightness, he barely managed to lift his gaze—and there, silhouetted against the dazzling light, a shape hovered. A human-like figure.

A person?

No… it truly looked like a person. As if someone was peering down at him from above.

Yeon jerked upright in shock, but his strength failed him and he collapsed, his face smacking into the dirt. His heart surged, but his body did not follow. So instead, he screamed.

“Help me…! Please, help!”

Just that movement sent a wave of pain radiating through every part of his body connected to his injured arm. Gritting his teeth through the agony, Yeon forced his voice out. Light returned to his face. He could get out. There was hope.

He endured the dizziness and the searing pain and looked up again.

But instead of a person—what stared back down at him was the massive head of a tiger.

“…A person…”

The light that had briefly returned to his face drained away like a receding tide. His expression twisted when he saw what the shadow truly was.

“I’m still alive, so get lost…! I said get out of here!”

His throat, raw and cracked, finally let out a hoarse roar. It was ridiculous. Shouldn’t the iger be the one to rage at him? The beast that had killed its mother and now stalked its life as well?

Yet here he was, shouting at it like a fool, as if the blame belonged to the tiger.

Whenever the black tiger peered into the pit, Yeon was overcome with shame and self-loathing. He knew, logically, that the tiger couldn’t leave either if it fell in. That it was only circling because there was a trapped prey inside, tempting and helpless.

But even so, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the tiger was mocking him.

He was projecting, of course. He knew that. But still—what was the point of circling a meal you couldn’t even eat? The mere sight of it filled him with revulsion. He shook his head and pressed his face back to the ground.

The tiger’s looming shadow kept drifting over him. He tried to ignore it, but it was no use. With each sweep across his face, he clenched his eyes shut and cursed bitterly under his breath.

Thud. Thud.

Something new struck him—this time not water. He snapped up, furious, ignoring the pain—and saw them: small, round yellow fruits. Nobak berries.

They often clung to the trees into late winter, a favorite for pecking birds.

Hunters would cut off the branches and take them back. When the yellow skin ripened and split, it revealed bright red seeds inside.

They tasted awful, but steeped into tea, they eased pain and treated injuries to bones and muscles, even inflammation.

He tried to pass it off as coincidence, thought maybe the branch had just fallen by chance—but then, thump-thump-thump, an entire cluster of nobak berries rained down from the sky. A whole branch, still heavy with unripe yellow fruit.

“…Hell with this…”

Yeon picked up the twig, thick with clustered berries, and let out a string of curses and a long sigh.

That black tiger—didn’t it almost seem like it knew what it was doing?

He hurled the branch to the ground with all the force he could muster, then looked back up. The tiger’s head, once fixed like a dark spot against the bright sky, was nowhere to be seen.

Do I look like I’d eat that?

Yeon slammed his fist down on the scattered berries, crushing them one by one.

Truthfully, the one who had any right to be angry was the black tiger—but he took his frustration out in spite and pettiness.

Caw—caw, caw. Caw!

The cry of a disgruntled crow stabbed into the ear—quite literally.

Ja-oh, sharp with rage, had driven his beak into the black tiger’s ear and was squawking away. Not just stabbing into the ear, but practically gouging it.

The black tiger, half listening and half ignoring him, finally swatted the noisy crow away. Ja-oh went tumbling across the dirt in a pathetic heap. The tiger then sat back on his haunches and buried his nose in the mess of objects strewn before him.

They were the things dropped by a human he had deliberately scared into running. The man had been carrying quite a load, but when the tiger had leapt out of the underbrush with a thunderous roar, the human had thrown everything in the air, pissed himself, and scrambled away on all fours like a dog.

The black tiger batted at the abandoned items with his paw. As he did, his limb slowly elongated, fingers splitting out—until it became a human hand.

“The human isn’t eating.”

—Leave it alone.

“What should I feed him?”

—Not telling you.

“Would he eat a pheasant if I brought one, like last time?”

—I said I’m not telling you!

The tiger thought back to the time he had ended up with pheasant feathers stuck all over his mouth, trying to bite into a still-fluttering wild pheasant. From what he’d seen, that hadn’t gone over well. But Ja-oh was being stubborn, repeating the same line like a broken record: he wasn’t going to help.

It had been a day since the little human had fallen into the pit.

The black tiger knew that pit well—because it was he who had driven off the men digging it. No wonder he was familiar with it.

After tailing Yeon for so long, the tiger had observed how he used that fire-spitting stick—again and again. He’d come to understand that a matchlock wasn’t some magical killing stick that always meant death. It took time to use again after each shot, and it wasn’t omnipotent.

With that much figured out, the tiger had concluded that while the matchlock was dangerous, it wasn’t something to be blindly afraid of.

On top of that, he’d come to understand Yeon’s hunting methods.

Why Yeon hadn’t fired that fire-spitting stick at him in the woods, why he had suddenly shouted, where he had hoped the tiger would run—everything was clear to him now.

Yeon’s intentions shone plainly in the tiger’s mind.

Of course, Ja-oh’s constant nagging had helped.

He’d known the little human had tried to make prey of him—but he hadn’t been angry.

Instead of rage, he’d felt a mischief stir within him. So he’d decided to toy with the human a bit, to show, ever so politely, who the true apex predator was.

He even thought he’d behaved rather kindly—maturely, even—throughout the process.

Ja-oh, of course, had screamed that he should’ve just eaten the human already.

Truthfully, the black tiger had found it fun.

Like a game of chase.

Once the little human realized his place, he’d planned to pull him out. That pit? He could dig through it in two strikes of his paws.

But then, things had gone differently than expected.

The human, instead of crawling out whimpering, was hurt far worse than anticipated. He’d thrashed, raged—and then suddenly burst into laughter like a madman.

The tiger had been waiting for ‘Yeon-ah’ to tire himself out, but the human began cursing him instead. The tiger couldn’t understand it.

He’d thought he understood humans quite well by now, but every action from the human baffled him anew. He was forced back into contemplation.

When the pit fell quiet, the tiger peeked in, wondering if it was time to pull the human out—but Yeon had fallen asleep, groaning in pain.

So he’d left him alone, figuring rest was needed. But even after the sun rose, the human just lay there, unmoving, even with his eyes open.

The tiger had crept closer, worried now that something was seriously wrong. But Yeon didn’t even scream anymore. He just ignored him—completely.

That troubled the tiger far more than any shouting or flailing had. His whole body twisted with unease.

He’d even drawn water himself, changing his form, and poured it into the pit—but the human had paid no mind.

Worried about hunger and pain, he’d picked some berries and dropped them down—but not only did the human show no gratitude, he’d gotten angry.

Was it because I gave him something humans can’t eat?

He asked Ja-oh, but again, Ja-oh just repeated that he wouldn’t say.

So the only way to find out something about humans… is to ask a human.

With that, the black tiger ran off at full speed to the mountain trail frequented by people.

Which led to… this.