WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Incarnation of the Malevolent Star ◈
Chapter 57: Part 1 - Whispers of the Dark Brother (57)
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#57.
It was not particularly rare for the riding stable to accept trainees Onik's age.
Schools near the stable often offered riding lessons as hands-on learning combined with physical education classes.
So even when the stable manager made a fuss after receiving a call from an official in the Provincial Government's Livestock Policy Division, talking about the wishes of someone important, the stable employees did not expect anything unusual.
“I mean, even if they asked us to cooperate as much as possible with whatever that side wants... they said the kid is learning to ride for the first time today, right? What could they possibly ask for? They'll be struggling just to get through the basics.”
“You never know. They said he's a broadcaster, so he might get carried away trying to make content. If he insists on doing something dangerous, we'll have to stop him.”
“Mm. Internet broadcasters will do anything to get attention... I just hope he doesn't get upset that we won't do whatever he wants and start bothering the Provincial Government.”
That was about as much thought as the riding instructors, the people doing the actual work, put into preparing for their guest.
That did not mean they prepared carelessly.
They were always thorough when accepting underage trainees.
The most important preparation was checking the horses' condition.
Half of riding safety depended on the horse's condition, and the other half depended on following safety rules.
Horses were living animals. Their mood and condition could differ from day to day.
If one seemed sensitive, they would soothe it with treats or anything else that worked, or simply exclude it from the lesson. If one had too much energy, an instructor or groom would ride it first and take the edge off before the trainees arrived.
The certified riding instructors prepared the gentlest horse in the stable, in the best possible condition.
Naturally, they thought nothing unexpected would happen.
That belief shattered the instant the boy and horse met.
“Hello? I'm Jo Onik! Nice to meet you!”
The instructor holding the reins was startled by the strange reaction of the normally gentle horse.
‘Why is this one so tense?’
After the safety briefing, the first step of riding instruction was bonding with the horse the trainee would ride.
It was the process of a rider and horse, strangers to each other, becoming familiar.
Accidents were more likely when either side was afraid of or wary of the other.
Calling it bonding made it sound grander than it was. The trainee only needed to stroke the horse properly.
Horses were intelligent animals. They would observe the person and smell them on their own.
Then the trainee would take the reins and slowly lead the horse around.
The horse the instructor had led out was very familiar with that process.
Which was why the instructor could not understand its reaction.
‘What? It's terrified.’
To tell whether a tense horse was angry or frightened, one only had to look at its tail.
The horse whose reins the instructor held had tucked its tail between its legs.
The muscles in its neck, back, and face had all gone stiff.
It kept scraping at the ground with its hooves, shifting from side to side, tugging at the reins, and even backing away to put more distance between itself and the boy.
Its eyes, opened wider than usual to show much of the whites, never looked away from the boy for even a moment.
The wrinkles around its eyes had deepened, and its nostrils kept flaring.
All those actions meant one thing.
The boy before it was terribly frightening.
‘...Why?’
A horse knew it was stronger than a human.
It often used that fact to be crafty.
Even if the boy was well developed for his age, he was still a student. It was strange for a horse to fear him.
When something weaker than itself felt threatening, it should have tried to bite, ram, or kick it with its hind legs.
In other words, the horse saw the boy before it as a predator stronger than itself.
“Hmm...”
Onik stood quietly and watched the horse back away while the instructor tried to calm it. Then he smiled.
“This one's name is Yeon-ri, right? Yeon-ri is really scared of me!”
The frightening boy did not need specialist knowledge to recognize the horse's fear.
Ordinary people rarely sensed anything strange from him.
That was because the boy himself held a very strong belief that people should not be killed carelessly.
The strangeness within him was firmly suppressed beneath his will and restraint.
His killing intent almost never leaked out toward people.
Even the twenty-three-year-old idol who had sought life advice from the frightening country boy beneath a star-filled night sky had only felt a brief shiver.
Only in that moment, when the frightening boy's eyes, darker than night, shone as he spoke of “people who seem to deserve to die.”
Animals were different.
Onik did not even meet people's eyes carelessly, but he looked animals in the eye without hesitation.
His belief that they should not be killed carelessly was weak, or absent altogether.
At the same time, the larger an animal was, the more tempting a target it became to the frightening boy.
Killing a mole was more enjoyable than killing an ant. Smashing a feral dog's head was more fulfilling than killing a mole.
And driving an axe down with all his weight into the hard forehead of a wild boar was more satisfying still.
When Onik heard the news that bear encounters in neighboring Japan had led to a string of human casualties, he had felt the urge to pack his hunting tools and leave for Japan at once.
‘They're huge... Their organs must be huge too... It sounds like they'd be fun to tear apart and kill...’
Of course, no matter how large the prey he killed, it would not bring the spiritual fulfillment of murder.
He had not killed every animal in the world, but the dark, reddish-black strangeness told him so in black whispers.
Even if he killed a whale, it would still not compare to a person.
Because the most precious thing to a person was another person's life.
Still, the greater satisfaction gained from killing larger things would help him endure his murderous urges.
In that sense, the horse's size was quite tempting to the boy...
Onik shook his head inwardly.
“Geez. This isn't the time for that!”
Pulling himself together, the boy wondered what to do.
「Snort! Snort!」
“Easy, easy!”
Yeon-ri, the riding horse, snorted harshly.
The instructor holding the reins was too busy calming Yeon-ri to spare any attention for Onik.
Watching this, Onik took a long stride forward and reached out with a swift hand.
“Excuse me!”
Cheerfully saying so, Onik's outstretched hand snatched up the reins in a strange yet gentle motion.
The instructor did not even realize the reins had been taken until they were gone. With the resistance in their hand suddenly gone, they staggered.
Then, half a beat later, their eyes widened.
“Huh?”
If there had been a martial artist present, they would have been unable to hide their admiration at Onik's move.
「Seizing Hand Technique! The principle of yielding has reached its peak. What an exquisite technique!」
But there were no martial artists in Onik's world.
Neither did martial arts or the martial world exist.
What was China even for without wuxia?
It was a country with no use at all. It would be better off collapsing and disappearing...
“Wait, hey, that's dangerous!”
The instructor was horrified, but Onik had already pulled the reins close and erased the distance between himself and the horse.
“Good, Yeon-ri. It's okay, Yeon-ri. It's really okay. I won't kill you. I won't hurt you either.”
Onik was the sort of model student who believed in preparation and review.
Before coming here, he had studied the basics of riding.
Calling the horse's name again and again in a gentle voice.
Tenderly stroking the center of its forehead, its cheeks, and its chin.
Holding out the back of his hand so it could smell him.
Onik took the right actions to lower the horse's guard against him.
「Snort...」
From the moment the frightening boy took hold of its reins, the horse had gone completely stiff.
It looked less like a horse than a water deer caught in car headlights at night.
Yet fear decreased in inverse proportion to familiarity.
Fear that became familiar could easily turn into submission.
That was true between people, but even more so between people and animals, or animals and animals.
Legal Hunter's hunting dogs were proof of that.
To the hunter's dogs, the frightening boy ranked first in the pack, the hunter's wife ranked second, and Legal Hunter himself was only third.
Onik held the back of his hand near the horse's nostrils, then used that hand to take a sugar cube from his pocket.
He gently unwrapped the small paper package, revealing a high-quality brown sugar cube.
Onik held it in front of the horse's nose. It was a powerful temptation for a horse.
“Here, eat this! I brought it because I heard you guys like these!”
Horses were animals that went crazy for sweet things.
Most people thought of carrots when they imagined a horse's favorite treat, but horses actually preferred sweeter things far more, such as fruit, honey, and sugar cubes.
「......」
The horse's harsh breathing slowly calmed.
Having caught the caramel scent of brown sugar with its sense of smell, far superior to a human's, the horse rolled its eyes and began to watch Onik cautiously.
For a person, it would have felt something like this.
‘Can I... eat it...?’
The frightening thing in the shape of a boy was still scary, but in the experience of a riding horse that had lived at a stable for a long time, there were rarely bad humans among those who gave it sugar.
After watching him for a while, the horse picked up the sugar cube with its lips and pushed it into its mouth.
Crunch, crunch. The sugar cube crumbled between its molars and spread over its tongue, giving the horse's taste buds a blissful sweetness.
Onik wiped his spit-covered hand and smiled brightly.
“That's it! Good job, Yeon-ri!”
Horses were intelligent animals. After spending a long time alongside people, they could more or less understand words of praise directed at them.
It had only eaten something tasty, yet it was being praised. That instinctively told the horse that the frightening thing shaped like a human boy meant it well.
Onik gently pulled the reins forward.
“Come on, shall we walk together?”
This was what lesson horses did all the time.
Yeon-ri, the riding horse the instructors had trained well, immediately understood the boy's intent and began walking carefully.
The small but terribly frightening thing was treating it kindly. Yeon-ri did not particularly want to oppose it.
The frightening boy beamed.
“Aww, what a good horse. Yeon-ri is such a good horse.”
Horses were herd animals by nature, and their sense of rank was very strict.
The highest-ranking horse decided the herd's direction and led its movement.
Horses also considered the humans who looked after them part of their herd.
That was why having first-time trainees take the reins of the horse they would ride, lead from the front, and walk it around was an important process.
It was not only how a prospective rider and horse became familiar with each other. It was also how the horse came to accept that trainee as higher-ranking than itself.
Sometimes that step did not go well, and they had to change horses.
Until just a moment ago, the instructor had been thinking of calming Yeon-ri down and replacing it with another horse. Now, unable to understand this sudden change, they blinked.
“Tut, tut, tut.”
When the boy clicked his tongue, Yeon-ri walked along the track with light hoofbeats.
No matter how they looked at it, the country boy who had calmed a terrified horse and was now leading it so skillfully did not seem like a beginner...
Even as Onik held the reins and led the horse, the lead rope attached to the bridle remained in the instructor's hand in case of an accident.
Since Onik was following the prescribed process without being taught, the instructor slowly followed while holding the rope and asked Legal Hunter.
“Is this really his first time learning to ride? I don't know about anything else, but he seems extremely familiar with horses themselves.”
“Of course! Isn't he amazing, even though it's his first time? He says he studied beforehand by looking up all kinds of materials and videos.”
“No. That isn't the kind of aura a kid gets just from studying...”
“Hahaha! That's just how Onik is, so you should take it in stride.”
“That is how he is? What do you mean by that?”
“Ha, it's hard to explain. If you subscribe to our YouTube channel, 「Onik Uncle and the Hapless Chief」, you'll understand.
“You'll get the idea of how amazing he is after watching just a few videos! Please subscribe, like, and turn on notifications!”
“Ah, yes...”
The instructor's expression immediately cooled. They gave a halfhearted reply to Legal Hunter's sales pitch and kept their eyes on Onik and Yeon-ri.
After circling the beginner safety track three or four times, Yeon-ri accepted the frightening boy as a creature of unquestionable higher rank.
To a herd leader, being frightening was closer to a virtue than a vice.
The stronger the leader, the better.
It only mattered that the leader's frightening nature did not show itself as cruelty toward the herd.
Though it was Onik's first day dealing with horses, he had become familiar with the habits and awareness of herd animals through Legal Hunter's hunting dogs.
Once he confirmed Yeon-ri no longer rejected him, Onik turned his head and let his gaze pass over the instructor's shoulder.
“Can I ride Yeon-ri now? I think it's time!”
“Ah, yes. Wait a moment. I'll help you up.”
“It's fine, I'm just getting on! I studied how to do it, so you don't have to help me! Yeon-ri is being so nice!”
“No, no, wait!”
Before the instructor had time to approach, Onik stepped into the stirrup and climbed up lightly.
The onlookers blinked once, and the boy was already sitting in the saddle with a bright smile.
“Wow! It's high!”
The horse carrying the smiling boy on its back was gentler than ever, as though its fear of him earlier had been a lie.
Shaking their head because they had no idea what was happening, the instructor moved on to the next step.
But Onik cleared the next step far too quickly as well.
At the instructor's direction, he repeatedly rose and sat using the strength of his thighs, matching the rhythm of the horse's walk.
Not long after beginning that step, Onik tilted his head.
“I think I'm starting to get the hang of this! I can probably just ride now!”
Then, with his back straight, he showed stable coordination through his pelvis and whole body that matched the horse's movements.
Riding was actually a delicate sport that required high-level coordination of the whole body.
Even learning how to move with a horse's sway at a walk normally required several weeks of lessons at minimum.
That was the ordinary beginner curriculum.
To move on to a trot and canter safely, one needed at least three additional months of training. That was the intermediate course.
To ride freely alone, one needed a full year of training.
Only at that point did a person earn the right to call themselves a rider.
If one did not want to open their eyes and find themselves staring at a hospital ceiling, they should never rush.
Riding was a dangerous sport. With bad luck, one might go straight to the afterlife without ever seeing a hospital ceiling...
Of course, the time needed to learn could be reduced.
Children tended to learn faster than adults, and people with better athletic ability needed less training.
If the connection between horse and rider was unusually good, it could have a powerful additional effect alongside other factors.
Leaving all that aside, one could simply increase the frequency of lessons.
But the speed at which Onik learned defied ordinary explanation.
“Ha.”
The instructor narrowed their eyes.
The excited boy was skipping over half a year to a year of ordinary trainees' progress in a matter of moments.
As he circled the safety track at a pace slightly faster than a walk, he had already surpassed the average warm-up ability of students in the intermediate curriculum.
And with every moment, that warm-up grew smoother and more natural.
Even an expert could not deny how natural it looked.
“...Under no circumstances should you let go of the reins. If you hold on tightly, even if you fall off, you won't land headfirst.”
After giving the boy a beginner's warning that they doubted would mean much, the instructor asked Legal Hunter again, still unconvinced.
“Are you really saying this is his first time? You're not faking his ability just to make good broadcast material?”
“Hey, I told you he isn't! Have you spent your whole life being tricked?”
“It sure feels like you're tricking me...”
“I'm telling you, you'll get it right away if you watch our channel's videos! He's just that kind of kid!”
No matter what the adults were saying, Onik was enjoying this moment.
He was in physical contact with something he could kill, yet the burden felt light.
The thick saddle acted as a buffer between them, and concentrating on riding and moving his body meant he did not have to scatter his thoughts elsewhere.
Moving while riding another living thing was even more fascinating than he had expected.
“Whoa!”
Onik pulled the reins and stopped Yeon-ri, then turned energetically toward the instructor. Once again, his gaze slipped past the instructor's shoulder.
“Instructor! I think I've gotten pretty used to it. Could you move those poles out of the way? I want to move around freely! I won't run around or anything!”
The circular track for basic instruction had been made by placing obstacles within a regulation indoor arena.
‘If today really is his first time, I obviously shouldn't allow it. I shouldn't...’
But the boy's aura as a rider was too unusual to simply refuse him.
Caught in cognitive dissonance as common sense and reality rejected each other, the instructor exchanged looks with the others.
Then, though they clicked their tongue, they had the circular track removed.
The call the stable manager had received from the Provincial Government's Livestock Policy Division had played a large role in that decision.
No one knew how high up the instructions had come from, but the official on the other end of the line had openly mentioned someone important while requesting their cooperation.
“Just do whatever he asks, as long as it's reasonable.”
The stable manager oversaw the stable, but had no specialist knowledge of riding.
If they did not want an unqualified superior to nitpick their work, the instructors had no choice but to manage things themselves.
The manager was desperate to curry favor with the important person.
The basic reason was that the manager was a local civil servant from an influential family.
The manager was a Grade 5 civil servant serving as the head of a township, and managed the stable as an additional post.
The employees in the management office, aside from the field instructors, were also civil servants on assignment.
Another reason was the riding association's terrible financial condition.
More specifically, after a certain athlete provoked the entire nation, all corporate sponsorship had dried up.
The riding world's image had become such a mess that no company wanted anything to do with it.
‘Damn it. Not my problem. If something goes wrong, is that my responsibility? It's the superior who gave the unreasonable order.’
The instructor assigned to the boy was glad their phone could record calls.
Whenever one had to accommodate the reckless demands of civil servants who were brave because they knew nothing, it was best to have a safeguard.
It was hard to make a living on this hellfire peninsula without a Korean-made smartphone that automatically recorded calls. Not one of those American-made apple phones.
“Yeon-ri! Let's go!”
The boy and horse moved freely through the rectangular arena.
They tried short stretches at a trot, changed directions several times in a row, walked backward, moved diagonally, and spun in place around the horse's hindquarters...
Throughout all this, the instructor followed them with the lead rope extended in their hand. Yet the dangerous moments they were preparing for never came.
Beginners often lost control of their posture and caused their horses to bolt while trying to steady themselves.
That was one of the important reasons instructors did not let go of the lead rope. A well-trained horse's speed could be controlled by pulling it.
But Onik was controlling his posture on his own before he even heard a single warning.
It was because his physical control was so stable that the instructors, uncertain and uneasy as they were, had removed the circular track.
The instructor, their brow deeply furrowed, asked Legal Hunter for the third time as he followed with a camera.
“Really? This? Today? First? Lesson? You're serious? This isn't a scam?”
“Really! Really! Really! I swear on my father and mother's honor!”
Legal Hunter's wife burst out laughing beside him.
The live chat was also flooded with viewers posting 「LOL」.
The viewers, who knew nothing about equestrianism, only found the instructor's expression and reaction funny.
Few of them properly understood how absurd the things Onik was doing were.
Without knowledge, just watching it made them think, ‘Hmm. Is it really that impressive...?’
© Tunguska#Tiijn
Footnotes:
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