Chapter 4: The Cold Wind That Shears the Fleeting Dream (2)
Mok-young no longer even thought of pushing Hae-gang away, as if he had grown used to it. He tried shifting his body slightly, but Hae-gang sensed it like a ghost and tightened the arms around him, pulling their bodies closer, so that all Mok-young could do was tilt his head a little farther back.
Hae-gang was growing steadily less reserved with Mok-young. Embracing him was ordinary now, and it had reached the point of trouble — he tried to cling to him at all hours. And yet, seeing as he hurried straight home every day after finishing his duties, Mok-young hardly seemed to mind.
What would the harmony of yin and yang be, if not this? From the very first moment they touched, their bodies had responded before their minds did, and the two no longer denied that they were drawn to each other. Whether it should be called the affection of bodies, or a husband and wife learning their affection for each other, they did not yet know — but this much was certain: they were a perfectly matched pair.
Perhaps everything had been plainly evident all along, and only now had they come to accept it. No — it was not mere acceptance. If it had been, Dan Mok-young, to whom "seeking yang energy" had once been something strange and unfamiliar, would still have been unable to acknowledge his wife. But Go Hae-gang’s knocking had thrown open Danmok’s gates.
Had it been mere knocking, he would not have spared it a glance — but how could he resist when it came bearing such blazing yang energy as a dowry? Without even realizing it, Mok-young was coming to think himself fortunate that the one who knocked — the one fate had bound to him in marriage — was Go Hae-gang.
"You came home a little late today. Was there much work?"
Hae-gang asked, tugging at the laces of Mok-young’s leather bracer. The gesture, too, had become something taken for granted, and Mok-young said nothing; once Hae-gang had the bracer off, he held it in one hand and once again wrapped his other arm around Mok-young’s waist, burying his face in his nape. The coolness of Mok-young’s skin against his cheek was in itself enough to make Hae-gang feel good.
Since the Vermilion Bird essence dwelling in Hae-gang’s body had manifested, there had been one more change: the two had come to feel far more in each other’s bodies. Beyond mere cold and heat, touching each other’s yin and yang energies brought comfort in itself, filling their inner selves with calm. At times it summoned strong desire, and in ordinary moments it filled them brimful with steady warmth.
How, then, could Go Hae-gang bear to be parted from his wife for even a moment? All the more so now, while he was in training to master the awakened power of the essence and bring it into harmony with his body — the craving for that calm was all the greater.
Mok-young was Hae-gang’s stabilizer itself. The one and only being who could keep the divine beast’s energy dwelling within Hae-gang from running wild.
"I stopped by my family home."
Mok-young’s answer was short, and Hae-gang let out a soft "Ah."
"Is your mother well? I have heard nothing from her in so long — I hope she isn’t worrying." Hae-gang’s question sounded perfectly natural — as if inquiring casually after someone he knew well. Mok-young was now certain Hae-gang had been visiting the family home often, and he did not hesitate to ask his question.
"When did you get so close with my mother? It took a while because she loaded me down with a whole cartful." Mok-young’s words edged toward a scolding. And exaggerated at that — before he had even gotten around to asking whether his wife had dutifully eaten her way through all the food his mother kept sending.
"With a heart so generous, your mother is sure to be blessed." Whether he did not know what was in his wife’s heart or only pretended not to, Hae-gang answered glibly. Then he nuzzled his face against Mok-young’s nape, and Mok-young’s eyebrow twitched as if about to jerk.
"So did you gobble up every bit of that generous heart?" This time in a somewhat sterner tone, Mok-young at last raised a hand, seized Hae-gang by the scruff, and pulled him slightly away. Hae-gang offered little resistance, drawing his body back and lifting his head. Blinking up at Mok-young’s face, he looked for all the world like a great dog caught by the scruff by its master.
No — no. He mustn’t see him as something so cute. How many times had he let himself be charmed by that fine face and let things slide? Thinking so, Mok-young narrowed his brow and put force into his glare.
That his mother was generous of heart, and that the son-in-law gratefully gobbled up her devotion — neither was a wrongdoing. But worry came first, and so he bristled. Even that unflappable, taciturn general could not help a certain fussiness from rearing its head before his wife.
"She enjoys it — what would you have me do?" Hae-gang’s mouth softened as the answer slipped out, almost offhand.
"Tell her you cannot eat what you cannot eat." Mok-young let go of the hem of Hae-gang’s robe he had been holding and said it. In his position he could hardly explain his illness in detail — he knew he might have to say something disagreeable to refuse — but life mattered more, so there was no helping it.
"My wife, you mustn’t make your mother feel slighted now that you’re married." Hae-gang, too, unwound the arms holding Mok-young and clasped his hands lightly behind his back. The corners of his mouth lifted a little more — he was clearly enjoying this moment. That Mok-young was fussing over him so unusually, and that he could use it as an excuse to take his wife’s side and tease his mother for being an unfilial son — all of it.
"Don’t get so full of yourself."
Mok-young naturally saw through Hae-gang’s mischief and shot a word back at him. Hae-gang then laughed aloud, a touch more merrily, and turned toward the table.
"Goodwill is goodwill, no? She keeps sending such precious things — I can even share them with the household staff." Hae-gang said, setting Mok-young’s bracer down on the table. Put that way, Mok-young could say no more. If he was dutifully eating his way through it all to honor his mother and share precious things with the servants — what greater gentleman could there be?
Mok-young could only let out a shallow sigh. He himself paid a great deal of attention to caring for his soldiers, so in a way he understood Hae-gang’s heart. And so his own heart felt all the more petty. What was this perversity, that ahead of his mother, ahead of caring for the household, only worry for Hae-gang came first?
This much feeling was still unfamiliar to Mok-young. Had anyone else seen it — had Minister Hong seen it standing beside them — he would surely have said it was the character "affection" in "intimacy" and told him to be at ease, but the damned thing called affection was new to the general, and it was only difficult for him.
Still, apart from feeling small-hearted, he felt a satisfaction at his wife’s generous heart. He could not help finding it admirable, and so Mok-young decided to step back a pace.
"Don’t overdo it."
That one word was all he managed to throw out. Mok-young, who had come to Hae-gang’s side before he knew it, raised a hand, removed his mask, and set it neatly beside the bracer Hae-gang had put down.
Mok-young’s gaze lingered there a moment. The things he had always worn as one body with himself, to hide himself — he had come to remove them naturally before Hae-gang now. He blamed it on Hae-gang’s habit of always taking off his bracer for him, but the mask he had always removed with his own hands.
He could never bring himself to say that he felt a strange liberation in it. Probably he never would say it to Hae-gang directly. The word "liberation" was packed tight with thirty years of Danmok’s life. It seemed a small, simple act — what could be so special about it — but for Mok-young it was no different from a moment of showing himself whole.
When he removed the mask, he was no longer the fearsome being called the "Ghost King"; when he removed the bracer, he was not the "impure being." Before Hae-gang, that was so. In this seemingly unremarkable moment of daily life, Mok-young was simply "Dan Mok-young."
It had become so before he knew it. Appearing abruptly before him as if by chance, shaking a man so that nothing went as he wished — and now Go Hae-gang had become the only person who faced "Dan Mok-young."
That he did not dislike Go Hae-gang’s glibness was all because of that. His shamelessness made him forget the weight that came with being Northern Wei’s great general and the "sovereign" who had completed the Hyeonsin art.
"Thanks to that whole cartful you hauled in, dinner should be lavish tonight." Hae-gang said, looking at Mok-young. For all the scolding not to get full of himself, mischievous playfulness still lingered on his grinning face. Mok-young watched Hae-gang’s face a moment, then let out a hollow laugh. Better to die groaning. How could he ever beat this man?
"Since it was so hard to haul in, eat every last bit and leave nothing."
"Eat every last bit and leave nothing, and then…"
At Mok-young’s playing along, Hae-gang’s spirits rose further; leaning toward Mok-young and bringing his face close, he was about to utter something sinister. About to, indeed — but when Mok-young pressed his lips firmly shut and looked at him coldly, Hae-gang closed his mouth midway and only smiled sweetly.
Worried as he always was about marital quarrels, Hae-gang knew well how to needle his wife — but he also knew when to exercise discretion. Now was such a time, and he sidled up to Mok-young, wrapped his arms around him, and leaned his forehead against his shoulder.
"I’ll be careful. I swear it."
"Get off."
"I’ll find a way not to hurt your mother’s feelings."
"Hmph."
"Ah. You’re warm, Mok-young."
How should he chastise this cunning fellow so that word would spread that he had been well and truly chastised? Thinking so, Mok-young still did not push Hae-gang away. Pushing would not move him anyway — it would only waste strength.
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