WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 104: Subjugating the Mountain Lord (5)

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The moment the Mountain Lord was absorbed into the talisman, I sensed it had something to do with a contract.

So I stole the contract first.

It wasn't difficult.

I'd even stolen the fire snake's contract using the power of Marchosias, the beast demon. Why wouldn't I be able to steal the contract of a Mountain Lord that was on the verge of being contracted?

The instant I stole the talisman's forced contract, I felt disgust beyond words.

This talisman wasn't ordinary.

It was an evil object made by feeding on the blood and souls of far too many people.

It was so vile that it felt worse than the Mountain Lord, who had devoured hundreds of people.

Whoever made this couldn't be an ordinary bastard, but the North Korean sorcerers didn't seem foul enough to have made something like this.

Had someone else made the talisman?

"Tiger, do a somersault in place."

【Yes, my lord!】

At my command, the Mountain Lord showed off by doing a backflip on the spot.

"Roll forward."

【Yes, my lord!】

Thud!

"Roll backward."

【Yes, my lord!】

Thud!

"W-what is this...?!"

Ri Gicheol turned to Cha Hyeran in alarm.

"What's going on here?!"

"I-I don't know either! Just as I was about to contract it, someone stole my place as the contracting party!"

"That's... possible?!"

Ri Gicheol spun around and glared at me.

"What? Why? What can you do about it?"

"...!"

Ri Gicheol frowned and tried to intimidate me.

"Can you handle the consequences, even after obstructing an undertaking of the Republic?"

"What are you talking about? Lord Choi, they're threatening me right now."

"Your bullshit flows like a stream. Those beggars can't even earn a small city's yearly budget, yet they go around hollering 'Daddy, Daddy' about their Great Leader. Have they lost their minds?"

In other words, what could penniless beggars do to us?

Wait, Lord Choi said something like that?

"Unlike those northern donors, we're private citizens. Dragging a petty dispute into affairs of state makes no sense."

"They're too uneducated to know that. With the teachings of gentlemen cut off, how could those mangy brats know the proper way to behave?"

"Y-you sons of bitches!"

Ri Gicheol ground his teeth.

As he looked ready to fight on the spot, Lord Choi opened his fan.

"Are you confident? You Red bastards used to get beaten senseless under the military regimes. Have you grown a little since then?"

Back when North and South Korea had been openly snarling at each other, private exorcists had also been mobilized for the conflict.

There were things like ghost drops.

They would unleash evil spirits upon the North to commit terrorism, spirits for which even mines along the Military Demarcation Line posed no obstacle.

It had been an era when people did every terrible thing imaginable, but South Korea had unquestionably held an overwhelming advantage in the world of exorcists.

Lord Choi and Seon Master Unjeong had both played major roles during that period.

"Will you leave quietly? Or should we beat you senseless, then announce that the Mountain Lord killed you here?"

"Lord Choi. You shouldn't take lives so carelessly."

"Does killing them have to be the only answer? Even if we just capture them and throw them into an underground prison, how would those Reds ever find out?"

The two traded chilling words, and they were both powerful enough to make them real.

Cha Hyeran and the other sorcerers began to waver once they realized they were at a disadvantage.

"C-Comrade Lieutenant Colonel..."

With the Mountain Lord stolen from them, there was nothing they could do.

Even if they fought to get it back, they'd only get beaten like dogs.

They still seemed reluctant to decide, so I decided to deliver the finishing blow.

"Tiger, roar."

【Grrrraah!】

The Mountain Lord growled, and the numbing low-frequency sound made the North Korean sorcerers collapse to the ground.

Even proud Ri Gicheol couldn't control his trembling legs when he took the Mountain Lord's fear head-on from that close.

"Ugh... You bastards!!"

Cursing was the only thing he could do.

What can you do about it?

* * *

The subjugation of the Mountain Lord was complete.

The moment the Mountain Lord contracted with me, the Chang-gwi stopped fighting all at once, and we took control of Taebaeksan.

"Whew. That ended sooner than I expected."

"That's incredible, Gari Bodhisattva. You solved a problem that had dragged on for months in just two days."

Bang Seoryeong and Scholar Yoo, who had been buying time against the Japanese Army Chang-gwi at the foot of the mountain, appeared to be uninjured as well.

"Then let's take a look at the Chang-gwi too."

The Chang-gwi were waiting at the Taebaeksan Hotel.

Their numbers had been cut in half during the battle, but there were still over three hundred of them.

"Tiger. Is this all of them?"

【Yes, my lord! These are all the ghosts this servant commands!】

Japanese Army Chang-gwi...

It left me with complicated feelings. They were invaders from the Japanese occupation era, but they had also been conscripted and brought here against their will.

They had been part of the invading force, yet they were also victims who had become Chang-gwi and been sealed alongside the Mountain Lord for nearly a century.

"Let them go. They've been bound to someone else's land for too long."

【These Chang-gwi could be of great help to you, my lord...】

"I said that's enough."

When I gave the order again, the Mountain Lord didn't say anything more and simply growled.

The Chang-gwi looked as though they had been freed from invisible shackles.

【A-arigato...】

The Chang-gwi thanked me in Japanese.

I didn't know much Japanese, but I knew arigato.

"Speak Korean, you bastards."

Though they had been Chang-gwi for a hundred years, they immediately passed on to the afterlife and disappeared once the Mountain Lord released them.

The tiger's control had apparently been the only shackle binding them to this world.

"Whew. Does that settle one thing?"

"Not quite. We failed to seal the Mountain Lord itself."

"What are you planning to do with that Mountain Lord, Yohan?"

Bang Seoryeong, Lord Choi, and Seon Master Unjeong approached.

Come to think of it, this entire operation had been meant to seal the Mountain Lord.

But instead of sealing it, I'd made it my familiar, so the original objective had technically failed.

"Should we seal it now?"

【My lord?!】

The Mountain Lord looked horrified, but I honestly didn't care.

"Would that be all right? That Mountain Lord would surely make a formidable familiar."

"It swore obedience of its own will, and the talisman is extraordinarily powerful. It won't be able to escape while Yohan is alive."

"The fact that it'll be released when I die is a problem too. Let's just seal it, then."

【My lord!!】

The Mountain Lord looked stunned. But I meant it.

A familiar as powerful as the Mountain Lord would be nice, but it wasn't like I was desperate for one.

Gari alone was a being far above the Mountain Lord, and I also had Eight-Foot Sister and plenty of other well-behaved familiars.

"I don't particularly want a familiar that ate people."

【My lord!!】

At that moment, the Mountain Lord prostrated itself right in front of me and shouted.

【How can you call yourself a gentleman yet show not even a shred of mercy! Was it such a crime that I killed a few Japanese bastards who trespassed on my territory in self-defense?!】

"Well..."

【If I am a criminal, then every patriotic martyr who fought for this land's independence is a criminal too! My only crime was defending my own land!】

"Did this bastard just bring up independence activists?"

Still, the Mountain Lord's defense didn't seem entirely wrong.

It had lived on Taebaeksan for a long time, and the Japanese Army had come to invade its home under the pretext of subjugating it.

The Japanese Army Chang-gwi had ultimately lost a territorial struggle, so it was hard to say the Mountain Lord had been entirely at fault.

"You! What slippery words you speak!"

It was Lord Choi who shouted.

The end of his fan pointed at the Mountain Lord.

"Is killing a few Japanese bastards the only crime you committed?"

"..."

"During all your years on this Korean Peninsula, were Japanese bastards truly the only people you harmed? Does living in luxury like a wild beast erase your sins?"

The Mountain Lord growled and shot back at Lord Choi's accusation.

【They entered my territory!】

"So does that mean you can devour anyone who sets foot on your mountain? That's pure sophistry!"

He meant twisting unrelated points to make an argument seem valid.

"Dragging in only what benefits you and forcing it into a pretense of righteousness is something only a beast would do. It's obvious that you've oppressed countless weaker beings under the law of the jungle, and now you're using the names of patriotic martyrs as a shield? How dare you!"

Well, every word was right.

I should seal the Mountain Lord after all...

【I-I have never eaten a person!】

Oh, that was a fresh claim.

"You've never eaten a person? Where do you get off lying, you..."

"Sir, gentleman mode. Gentleman mode."

"Ahem!"

Lord Choi cleared his throat at Bang Seoryeong's intervention.

The Mountain Lord seized the opening and continued defending itself.

【Why would I need to catch and eat people? There is food everywhere even if I don't eat humans!】

"How are we supposed to believe that..."

【I expected this, so I kept several Chang-gwi behind! I will call them as witnesses!】

"Huh? You left Chang-gwi behind?"

【I kept not only soldiers but a few onmyoji and ninjas. I thought perhaps the gentleman might change his mind.】

More likely, they were witnesses it had kept for a situation like this.

This bastard was more sly and self-serving than I'd thought.

Once we heard testimony from the remaining Chang-gwi, it really did seem that the Mountain Lord hadn't eaten people.

A Japanese Army subjugation force had come after it back then, but it had never caught and eaten a human.

"Wow, that's unexpected."

【Could you eat a fish or beast that spoke like a person?】

"Uh... I guess that'd feel a little wrong?"

Even I might find it hard to eat a fish that spoke and begged me to spare it.

The Mountain Lord seemed to have a similar feeling.

"Ahem! It seems you weren't the worst monster after all. But! It is still true that you harmed many people!"

【If you speak of benevolence and righteousness, are you all truly without stain? Can you confidently say that you have never taken a life? Is it a crime when a beast harms a human, but benevolence and proper conduct when a human harms a beast? Can that truly be called the proper way of a gentleman?】

The Mountain Lord defended itself so logically that even Lord Choi and Seon Master Unjeong seemed at a loss for words.

"For a tiger, it's remarkably logical."

"Tell me about it."

【My lord! I swear I will never harm people again! I promise! Under your command, I will follow the path of saving people!】

The Mountain Lord lay before me with confident eyes.

At this point, it seemed to believe there was no logical justification left for sealing it.

"Look at those bright eyes."

【My lord?】

"I don't know anything about the way of a gentleman. I only know that you stink."

【My lord! Wait!】

"Let's seal you up cleanly and be done with it. I hope you live kindly after you're released someday."

【W-wait! Wait!】

I took a painting from inside Gari's mouth.

Pastor Kim's Collection <Korean History Series No. 21 Dream Journey to the Peach Blossom Land>.

"You stay in there for about a hundred years. I'll think about the rest after that."

The time flowing inside it couldn't even be compared to time in reality.

It should have an effect similar to sealing.

If the Mountain Lord still seemed beyond hope a hundred years later, couldn't I just bury the whole Dream Journey to the Peach Blossom Land somewhere?

【Waaaaait!】

"Tiger, you're being too stubborn. Be a man and accept it cleanly."

"...A man?"

Just as I opened Dream Journey to the Peach Blossom Land and was about to put the Mountain Lord inside the painting, that was when it happened.

【I'll convert! I'll become a Catholic and receive Christ's teachings!!】

"Ah..."

"Huh?"

For a moment, I had no choice but to stop at the Mountain Lord's declaration of conversion.

The conversion card, now of all times?

Footnotes:

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