WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Episode 1: Mumu (2)

──────

Mumu (2)

'Splitting them by hand would be faster.'

Crack!

Mumu, glancing around cautiously, picked up the axe and split the firewood. Every time the axe met the dry logs, they cleaved apart cleanly. The wood split so easily that anyone watching might think the grain had been scored beforehand.

'He really makes it look easy.'

Yu Yeop-kyung had chopped firewood himself now and then, back when Mumu was little. But after just a few minutes his hands and feet went numb and he couldn't keep going. Even though he'd grown much healthier since his exile, moving his body far more than he ever had at the National Academy, that was his limit.

'Has it been a full two hours already?'

That much time had already passed since Mumu started splitting wood. The boy hadn't rested even once, splitting log after log in a steady rhythm, and the pile already stood tall enough for two grown men to stand atop one another. More than nine A-frame loads' worth.

'...Unbelievable. Truly unbelievable.'

Would anyone believe the boy had been doing this since he was eight? Whenever Yu Yeop-kyung mentioned it as a joke to the peddlers who passed through, they told him to quit talking nonsense. Well, of course it sounded like nonsense.

'And that's barely scratching the surface.'

To tell all the stories about Mumu would take more than half a day. That was how different the boy was from ordinary children. When it came to strength in particular, he was extraordinary.

'He's already at eight.'

Earlier this year he'd cranked the adjustment screw up to the last setting, eight. And now the boy had grown strong enough to split firewood with his bare hands. Up until he was nine, two had been more than enough, yet his strength kept growing at an exponential rate. He wasn't even training his body in any particular way, which made it stranger still.

'Suspicious. Suspicious. Suspicious.'

A father's sharp instincts were telling him something. Something about his adopted son was off. The boy always honored him as his father and did as he was told, well, sometimes he looked a little put out, but even so he was an innocent, good hearted son. Yu Yeop-kyung trusted a son like that, but today, at least, he meant to uncover the boy's secret.

Crack!

"Mumu." "Yes." "That's enough now. Go and rest."

Truthfully, it had been enough long ago. While he'd been mulling over his doubts, even more firewood had piled up. The boy had only filled enough to hand over to the peddler caravan that would come later in the afternoon. Which was another way of saying the storehouse was already overflowing with firewood.

'Exile has become far too comfortable.'

When a man could afford to obtain and drink Xinyang Maojian, a tea that costly, it gave some idea of just how much wealth had been amassed from nothing but firewood. In his quarters there was Phoenix Single Cluster, and even Wuyi Rock Tea from Mount Wuyi. They were the one pleasure of his exile.

'Thank you, Mumu.'

All of this was thanks to his adopted son Mumu. When he'd first taken the child in, he had wondered what on earth he was doing, raising a boy in the middle of his exile, but by now the boy had become as precious to him as a son of his own blood.

"Father." "Yes, Mumu." "May I go play in the mountains?" "Go on. You know you can't go past ten li, don't you?" "Father." "What is it?" "I've wanted to ask every time, but doesn't that distance not count for me?" "...Are you trying to abandon your old man?" "No." "Then don't go past ten li." "Yes, sir."

So Mumu, thrilled, headed into the forest with a lighter step. Watching the boy's back as he went, Yu Yeop-kyung let out a soft chuckle. The boy was growing up, getting cleverer by the day.

'He's even learned to tease his old man.'

"Whew. All right then..."

Time to start getting ready. Yu Yeop-kyung pulled on his hiking shoes and made every preparation. Today, at last, he would find out for certain what that boy got up to when he went off to play in the mountains. He ran into the forest after Mumu, in the direction the boy had gone.

'Wait, what?'

He'd given chase right away, yet somehow the boy was already a tiny speck in the distance. Mumu was bounding up the mountainside, fast as a roe deer racing up a slope. Watching his adopted son, Yu Yeop-kyung muttered to himself.

'No use.'

The sooner you give up, the better. What chance did he have of catching up to that? Up on the mountainside, meanwhile, Mumu had stopped and glanced back. Far below at the foot of the mountain, he could see his adoptive father, Yu Yeop-kyung. Strangely, even across that great distance, Mumu's eyes could clearly make out the troubled look on his father's face.

'Sorry, Father.'

He'd bolted because his father would only nag him again if he tagged along. Luckily, perhaps because the distance was so great, his adoptive father, who had been staring after him in defeat, soon gave up and left the forest. Now he could head to his hideout. After running for a good while along the familiar mountain trails, something caught Mumu's eye. An empty clearing littered with broken trees. There, lined up in rows, stood everything from a thick wooden pole with massive boulders fixed to either end to countless other strength training implements.

'My treasures.'

These were Mumu's treasures. He had made them himself, ever since he was little, to train his body. At some point his adoptive father had come to hate his training and opposed it with all his might. Mumu couldn't understand why.

'He used to say a man should at least be able to protect himself.'

It was those words of his father's that had made Mumu start training. The truth was, training had made it easier to move his body. Mumu looked at the iron rings fixed around his wrists and ankles. His father called them Ki-Restraining Bracelets, and they were far heavier than they looked. The strange thing was that this heaviness applied only to Mumu himself.

'If it didn't, he wouldn't even be able to lie down on his bed to sleep.'

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried