WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 2: Regression
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“Idiot.”
“Moron.”
The boys giggled as they each tossed an insult my way.
The boy in blue and the boy in red looked so much alike that it was like looking into a mirror.
They were twins.
The words slipped from my mouth before I realized it.
“...Is this a dream?”
The boy in blue shook his head.
“Even getting drenched with water didn't sober you up, Luoyang city Brat?”
It had been a long time since I had heard that name.
Luoyang city Brat.
It had been the nickname I heard constantly ten years ago.
“Hic.”
A hiccup escaped me.
I had not even been drinking, yet I felt as though I had fallen into a vat of liquor and woken with a hangover.
I had no idea what was going on.
Then the boy in blue bent down and grabbed my hair tightly.
Squeeze!
“This Song JwaBaek of the Swift Hunan Double Daos is speaking. Are you still not sober?”
At that moment, my mind cleared.
“Song JwaBaek? Song WooHyun?”
“Looks like you're finally sobering up. You were pretending to be drunk so you could wriggle out of it.”
“Right. Right. We, the Swift Hunan Double Daos, won the wager.”
Wow...
This was insane.
The situation made no sense.
The boy in blue before me was Song JwaBaek, the older twin.
The boy in red, who kept chiming in with his slightly awkward way of speaking, was his younger brother, Song WooHyun.
It felt as though I were dreaming.
Even though it had been ten years ago, I remembered this moment vividly enough to draw it from memory.
Jingle!
Song JwaBaek shook a red pouch in his other hand and grinned.
“I collected it in advance in case you tried to go back on your word. It'll be useful funds for the Swift Hunan Double Daos' venture into the martial world.”
“Right. It will be useful.”
Song WooHyun echoed him in that awkward manner.
I could not understand what was happening.
Mo YongSoo's sword had clearly pierced me, and strange blue flames had spread across my body before I lost consciousness.
Yet when I opened my eyes, I saw the Black-and-White Twin Ghost as boys.
These were people I had never even spoken to outside this time.
Wait, could it be...
“What day is it today?”
“What nonsense are you spouting...”
“What day is it?”
Startled by my shout, Song JwaBaek frowned and muttered,
“The ninth day of the Ninth Lunar Month in the Year of the Wood Dog, I think.”
That was impossible.
The Year of the Wood Dog was exactly ten years ago.
It was too vivid to be a dream.
The pain from him gripping my hair proved it was real.
“Really... Really? The Year of the Wood Dog, Ninth Lunar Month?”
“What are you suddenly talking about? Did you think today was the Year of Gaphae or something? Did drinking that much scramble your brain?”
He looked at me as though he could not understand me at all.
Yet even that unpleasant face was so good to see.
“Hey, what are you doing? Don't tell me you're crying.”
He was right.
My vision had blurred, perhaps because my eyes had reddened.
I suddenly pulled Song JwaBaek, who still had a grip on my hair, into a hug.
“Hey, hey, is this bastard insane?”
“Seems like it.”
He looked flustered because I had hugged him while he was holding my hair.
But I did not care.
I felt so good that I could have flown.
Everything that had happened, from being kidnapped by the Blood Cult and used as a Spy until I died, felt as though it had never happened.
I felt like bowing to the heavens in gratitude.
Shove!
Song JwaBaek roughly pushed me away.
But laughter burst from my mouth as I fell from his shove.
“Hahahahahaha!”
I felt so good.
The twins stared at me as I sprawled flat on my back and laughed madly, as though I had lost my mind.
I did not care.
I had wanted to return to the past so desperately.
Even this time, when I was called my Clan's trash and the Luoyang city Brat, had become unbearably precious.
I would never again get tangled up with that damned Blood Cult...
“...The Ninth Lunar Month... the ninth day?”
The Song twins cautiously backed away as I abruptly stopped laughing and muttered in a grave voice.
I did not care when they whispered that I had truly gone mad.
What mattered was now.
“Fuck!”
At my sudden curse, the two boys reached for the daos at their waists.
Ignoring them, I sprang to my feet.
Then I looked around.
There were no guests on the first floor of the inn, for it was late at night, during the Ox Hour.
“Damn it! Ah-song? Ah-song?”
I did not care if the people on the second floor woke up.
At my shout, a half-awake man who looked to be in his early thirties, with drooping eyes, came out from a corner of the inn.
“Young Master, you'll wake everyone. Goodness, did someone throw a bucket of water over you?”
He was the servant who had followed me when I was driven from home.
He was the only close attendant who had faithfully served me since childhood, even when I acted like a scoundrel.
“Ah-song, where is my luggage?”
“It's in your room upstairs.”
The moment I heard that, I hurried toward the stairs.
Then the self-proclaimed Swift Hunan Double Daos blocked my path.
“Hey. Have you really gone insane?”
“Right. Are you crazy?”
I had no time to deal with them.
“Ha, damn it... You... You may think I've gone insane, but you should gather your things and flee this inn immediately. Otherwise, you might live like dogs for the rest of your lives...”
I had been about to say that they might live like dogs for the rest of their lives, but their circumstances were somewhat different from mine.
Still, I said it in hopes of saving their lives.
“Just run.”
“What are you talking about? Is this bastard still drunk? I am Song JwaBaek of the Swift Hunan Double Daos...”
Thud!
“Urk.”
My sudden punch made him clutch his nose.
“B-brother! You bastard!”
Song WooHyun, standing beside Song JwaBaek, tried to draw his dao.
I quickly lunged forward and swept his legs.
When he fell to the floor, I drove my elbow into his stomach.
“Ghk!”
He let out a sound like a pig being slaughtered.
“Y-Young Master.”
Ah-song stared at me with wide eyes.
No wonder.
Back then, despite being born into a prestigious martial Clan, I had been nothing but a greenhorn who knew neither Martial Arts nor even hand-to-hand combat.
It was only natural that Ah-song would be shocked to see me defeat boys who had received martial training.
It was not something to feel proud about.
Even if I had only been third-rate back then, I had still learned the basic external energy and hand-to-hand combat taught to Blood Cult warriors.
My body was not what it had been back then, but I could still defeat these naive twins.
“Y-you bastard... When did you learn Martial Arts?”
Song JwaBaek asked with intimidated eyes, clutching his bleeding nose.
“Forget it. If you want to live like human beings, run already!”
With that, I rushed up the stairs.
Perhaps their spirits had been crushed, because they did not try to stop me. They only stared after me in confusion.
Once I reached the second floor, I searched for my room.
“It's on the left!”
Ah-song shouted from below.
Since it had happened ten years ago, I could not remember which room I had stayed in.
I entered the room Ah-song indicated and found a bundle of luggage on the bed, along with a leather Short Sword with blue thread wrapped around its hilt.
“Ah...”
A moved sigh escaped me at the sight of the Short Sword.
I could have simply fled, but I had come back for it because it was the last keepsake my mother had left me.
Losing it that day had been my lifelong regret.
I needed to take it and run.
Snatch!
I gripped the Short Sword.
Then,
Kyaaaah!
“Gasp!”
Startled by the piercing scream that nearly tore my eardrums, I dropped the Short Sword.
My heart pounded at something so bizarre it made my skin crawl.
I stared down at the Short Sword on the floor as though it were a monster.
Wondering if it had been a coincidence, I reached out to pick it up again.
Kyaaaah!
“Argh!”
Startled, I hurled the Short Sword away without a second thought, keepsake or not.
It was not even the wail of a ghost. What in the world was that monstrous scream?
“Pant, pant.”
Goosebumps rose over my skin, and cold sweat trickled down my body.
I hesitated, afraid that I would hear that terrible scream again if I picked it up.
Riiip!
On a sudden thought, I tore the bedsheet, folded it into several layers, and covered the Short Sword.
Then I picked it up.
This time, I heard nothing.
I had no idea what was happening, but it seemed I would have to carry it this way.
I hurried from the room and ran down the stairs.
The twins were still standing in the same place.
“I told you to run!”
“My nose has not even stopped bleeding, you bastard! And what are you talking about? Why should we run?”
Song JwaBaek, the older brother, asked as though he could not understand at all.
Ah, forget it.
I was already too busy saving myself to look after these two.
“Fine. Do whatever you want.”
“What?”
“Let's go, Ah-song. Hurry...”
Before I could finish, a scream rang out from outside the inn.
“Argh!”
‘!!!’
The instant I heard it, my heart seemed to drop.
The joy of returning ten years into the past had long since vanished.
Of all moments, had I returned to the one I never wanted to experience again, even in death?
“W-what was that?”
The twins looked startled by the scream, and I spoke meaningfully.
“...The Blood Cult.”
“Eek!”
The two brothers recoiled in horror.
The Blood Cult was the most vicious organization in the force of evil, infamous enough to silence even a crying child.
The twins, born into a martial Clan, could not possibly be unfamiliar with the Blood Cult.
“Damn it...”
A despairing voice escaped me.
Why did it have to be today, of all days?
The ninth day of the Ninth Lunar Month in the Year of the Wood Dog.
The day I was kidnapped by that damned Blood Cult.
Footnotes:
Gaphae is an intentionally invalid sexagenary-year combination, emphasizing Song JwaBaek's accusation that the narrator is too drunk to think straight.
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