WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Oblivious

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Murim in my Hometown ◈

Chapter 44: Clothes

──────

After finishing my morning training, my clothes reeked of sour sweat.

I opened the wardrobe to find something to change into. It was empty.

When the weather was hot, I washed my martial outfits at the well every two or three days.

Now, the well water was icy cold, and I could not bring myself to put my hands in it.

Since I had kept changing clothes without washing them, my two remaining outfits had both ended up in the laundry pile, giving off a musty smell.

Most wandering martial artists lived like wild animals. They rarely washed and hardly took off their clothes, as if they had become one with their bodies.

I had been the same. I had lived a rootless life, drifting like duckweed, and had not cared about a little smell.

But now that I had settled down and was living fairly comfortably, the foul odor bothered me quite a bit.

Even if I washed them now, it would take several days for them to dry. I should buy a few more martial outfits.

I did not know how cold this winter would be, so it seemed like a good idea to get a cotton-padded quilted outfit as well.

Small fabric shops only dealt in cloth. They did not have ready-made clothes. To get proper clothing, whether martial outfits or long robes, I needed to find a larger shop.

Fortunately, Seochon had a suitable fabric shop.

“Goodness, it’s been a long time, Great Hero.”

Bang Yongseong, the owner of Bang’s Fabric Shop, welcomed me with friendly chatter.

My first meeting with Bang Yongseong had been rather tense. If the misunderstanding had not been cleared up in time, I might have cut him down right there.

Fortunately, that did not happen. As his eldest son Bang Hojin became friends with Gusam, I was now able to come and go without issue.

“I came to buy clothes.”

“Please come in and have a look. Our shop may not be the largest in Seochon, but we carry the widest variety of clothing. I’m sure we’ll have something that suits your eye, Great Hero.”

Bang Yongseong’s boast was no empty claim. All kinds of clothes hung densely from the walls and ceiling inside the fairly spacious shop.

Ordinary clothing was the most common. Clothes for martial artists were displayed separately along one side.

Dull long robes. Bright martial outfits worn by women...

There was also a wide variety of martial outfits to suit different tastes. Sleeves that were long or short, wide or narrow. Collars that rose high enough to cover the entire neck, or sat low...

I preferred sleeves that were moderately narrow and short. The fit also needed to be somewhat loose in case I wore a Pigskin Vest underneath.

I chose two martial outfits and a thickly quilted winter outfit. All in black, so dirt would not show.

As I took out my purse, I noticed a pile of martial outfits carelessly stacked in one corner.

“Are those for sale too?”

“Of course.”

“They don’t look new.”

“They were worn by someone else, but they’ve been thoroughly washed and are in good condition. Would you like to take a look?”

I picked up the black martial outfit at the top and unfolded it.

It showed signs of use and the color had faded slightly, but it was not in bad condition compared to what I was wearing now. There were no tears or holes, either.

It seemed comfortable enough to wear while practicing my saber art.

“How much is this?”

Bang Yongseong named a price. It was one-third the price of a new martial outfit I had just bought.

It was too cheap for its condition. There was always a reason something was cheap.

The clothes were all black, so it was hard to see, but a closer look revealed long stitched seams.

They would sit around the lower abdomen when worn. The left side had been sewn up too.

They had not torn naturally over time. They were marks left by blades.

I raised the martial outfit to my nose and smelled it.

Perhaps it had been soaked in lye for a long time to remove the scent of blood, but a smoky odor still lingered.

The other martial outfits were the same. Chest, back, arms, waist. Only the locations of the stitches differed.

One large dark-blue martial outfit, clearly worn by a massive man, was in terrible condition.

Its chest, stomach, back, waist, and sides were covered in hideous stitch marks, as if centipedes had been plastered all over it.

Whoever had worn it must have been surrounded by several people and hacked at in a frenzy.

“Where did all these come from?”

Bang Yongseong glanced at the door before lowering his voice.

“You know about that huge fight between Black Path factions in the mountains outside Seochon a while back, right?”

The night the Hao clan had targeted Choi Estate, the Blood History Gang and Heaven-Breaking Sect, who had joined hands with Choi Sadeuk, had gone after the Black Night Gang. They were caught in an ambush in the mountains and nearly wiped out.

“These came from there.”

So these had belonged to martial artists from the Blood History Gang and Heaven-Breaking Sect.

“Why are they... here?”

“The officials stripped them off. Not personally, of course. They brought in merchants to collect everything. Weapons like swords and sabers are worth the most, but I heard martial outfits bring in a decent profit too.”

“How do you plan to handle the repercussions?”

“It’s the officials’ business. What trouble could there be? I don’t know whether the martial outfits had faction names on them, but even if they did, they would have removed them all. As you can see, they’re clean. Just like any other martial outfit.”

“Did you wash and repair them yourself?”

Bang Yongseong gave a hollow laugh and waved his hands.

“Oh, goodness, do I know how to do that? A business that handles leather did it. I simply receive the goods, add a reasonable margin, and sell them, so I don’t know the details.”

I had spent quite a long time living as a wandering martial artist, but this was a first for me.

Taking the belongings of the dead was common in the martial world. Sometimes people even stripped off their clothes.

I had not known where all those clothes went. I had assumed they were roughly washed and worn, but I had not expected this.

The dead martial artists’ outfits piled high looked as bleak as a grave. It was strangely chilling, as though the skin of martial artists, those beasts, had been stripped and tanned.

If I were stabbed somewhere and died, the clothes I was wearing now would be stripped off and piled here too.

The pointless thought left my mind unsettled.

“...Do people buy these?”

“Of course. They’re so cheap that we can barely keep them in stock. Half the shipment has already been sold.”

Clothing was not as expensive as weapons, but it was not particularly cheap either. Poor people who had little had to endure both the blazing summer sun and bitter winter cold with a single set of clothes.

Even wandering martial artists who felt uncomfortable touching bloodstained clothes from the dead might close their eyes and buy them if they had been repaired this cleanly.

When those people died, their clothes would be stripped off and brought here again. Passed down in that way, until they became rags that could no longer be worn...

* * *

Seven days later, the woodcutter brought more firewood as promised. Seeing the storeroom filled with fuel, I finally felt at ease.

The smell of opium coming from the woodcutter’s body remained unchanged.

I paid for the firewood without complaint. Neither of us mentioned what had happened at the Wandering Swordsman Inn.

Nothing good would come of knowing more, and it was not my business to interfere.

“If you need more firewood, come back to where I was before.”

“Are you there every day?”

“I’m there during the day.”

“Understood.”

I answered, but I did not think we would meet again. I had enough firewood, and by the time the storeroom was empty, the woodcutter would likely no longer be there.

After training, I stopped by Pungcheon Inn in the late afternoon as usual.

Pungchil had left a few days earlier to do day labor, so there was no one at the inn.

I wondered whether the inn could stay open with business like this, but there were many guests, and it did fairly well in the evenings. I heard that nearby merchants also came in the mornings for simple bowls of rice porridge, keeping the place busy.

Gusam’s eyes sparkled as he poured tea into my cup.

“Great Hero, did you hear the news?”

“What happened now?”

Seochon was fairly large, with no shortage of martial artists, so not a day passed quietly.

A corpse or two turning up in the back alleys was no longer much of a topic.

Most people who got stabbed and collapsed were useless martial artists. When they died, the only ones who cared were hungry animals in the mountains.

“I heard there’s someone selling opium in Seochon. Apparently, the Black Night Gang is itching to pull out their organs while they’re still alive if they catch them.”

I recalled the middle-aged martial artist who had sold opium to the woodcutter at the Wandering Swordsman Inn.

I did not know where that person got the opium or what gave them the nerve to sell it, but they would probably meet an unwelcome end soon.

Even fierce swordfighters who bragged that they could not sleep unless they bathed in human blood every day knew how to control their tempers before the factions and sects that ruled a neighborhood.

No matter how capable they were, if dozens of people surrounded and stabbed them, they would become chunks of meat at a butcher shop.

A master who had reached a higher realm might create legendary tales of valor, like a wolf thrown into a flock of sheep, but wandering martial artists were all roughly equal in skill.

They had sold opium in someone else’s territory, so they would not die peacefully if caught.

Having their neck cut and body chopped apart would be the minimum. They would probably be impaled on poles and displayed in the street for everyone to see, with their own entrails or arms clamped between their teeth.

A warning had to be as horrific and brutal as possible to be effective. If they responded weakly after someone invaded their territory, others would inevitably bare their teeth from every direction.

“Food’s ready!”

At the cook’s call, Gusam hurried off to bring the food.

Steamed rice, stir-fried vegetables, and a clear soup with chicken.

The white rice I ate after training all day tasted sweet without even needing to chew it much. As the weather grew chilly, I kept reaching for spoonfuls of warm soup.

I was enjoying the meal with reasonable satisfaction when someone came looking for me. It was a servant employed by Geuk Hwan.

“I decided not to accept requests for the time being.”

“Someone who may know about Jeok Chuyeong has appeared. I was told to ask whether you might be interested.”

“Who?”

The servant approached and whispered.

“A guest from the Martial Alliance has arrived.”

“The Martial Alliance?”

At the unexpected news, I put down my chopsticks and asked the servant for details.

The Martial Alliance was the largest organization in the martial world, centered on the Nine Great Sects and made up of the Five Great Families and smaller and mid-sized factions throughout the Central Plains that styled themselves as orthodox.

The Hao clan might surpass them in intelligence, but the Martial Alliance overwhelmingly surpassed them in military strength and organizational power.

If the Martial Alliance mobilized only one or two strike squads filled with rising junior talents from the Nine Sects, they could erase most small factions in a single night.

I had heard they could not exert much influence north of the Yellow River or south of the Yangtze River, where the Unorthodox Faction held sway, but quite a few of them must have fought Jeok Chuyeong.

I hurriedly finished the rest of my food and headed to Simhyang Pavilion with the servant.

Geuk Hwan was waiting for me in the detached residence.

“Who has come?”

“An inspector.”

“Surely they didn’t come to inspect the Hao clan?”

Geuk Hwan shook their head with a cool expression.

“Of course not. Our clan is not part of the Martial Alliance.”

What did affiliation matter? This was the martial world, where those with power forced their will through.

I had heard there were more than ten inspectors because the Martial Alliance was so large. I did not know how high their positions were within the Alliance, but even the Hao clan could not treat them carelessly.

“They requested our clan’s cooperation. There are no sects affiliated with the Martial Alliance in Seochon, so they came to us.”

“Is there a reason you called me?”

“They wish to meet the guest retainers of our clan. Great Hero Won and the others said they had other business and could not come, so we sent word to Great Hero Jeong.”

“Will I be able to ask about Jeok Chuyeong?”

“Ask them yourself.”

“Good. Let’s go.”

Two guards wearing Martial Alliance uniforms stood watch at the entrance to the inner room where the inspector was staying.

“Sir, someone from the Hao clan has arrived.”

“Let them in.”

When we entered the inner room, a tall middle-aged figure stood by the window with their hands clasped behind their back, looking up at the sky.

Even from behind, the figure looked like a real inspector.

I had seen mid-ranking Martial Alliance officials a few times in Henan Province before. They all wore dark-blue silk Martial Alliance uniforms embroidered intricately with gold thread.

The inspector’s clothes were the same.

They wore a hero’s cap decorated with jade and carried an ornate sword at their waist.

They were only a middling official, but it was obvious they had spent lavishly from head to toe in an effort to project the authority of a high-ranking position.

Even after Geuk Hwan and I entered, the inspector did not take their eyes from the sky.

They did not seem deaf. They simply appeared to have the nasty habit of making people wait over nothing.

Speaking up at times like this would only have the opposite effect.

Geuk Hwan and I watched silently for a moment when an unfamiliar sense of discord caught my eye.

About a span below the inspector’s nape, there was a vertical stitched seam in the center of the upper back of their uniform.

Thinking I had seen it wrong, I narrowed my eyes and stared closely. I had not. It was clearly the mark of needle and thread.

About three finger joints long. Would a sword not leave exactly such a tear if it went in and came back out?

The threads along the cut had loosened slightly. It seemed the tear had been stitched up not long ago.

That meant the inspector had fought recently...

The inspector was a martial artist, so their clothes could have been torn by a blade or they might have been injured.

The problem was that it was a vital spot. If someone was stabbed there, even shallowly, their spine would be severed. They could never survive.

Had I seen it wrong?

Perhaps a sword had merely grazed the inspector. Or perhaps a dagger had fallen onto clothes they had taken off...

As I shook my head to dismiss my suspicions, I suddenly remembered the martial outfits of dead martial artists I had seen at the fabric shop recently.

“Ahem.”

The middle-aged figure cleared their throat, lowered their hands, and turned around. He had a solemn, seasoned face with an impressive beard.

The unidentified man wearing a Martial Alliance inspector’s clothes stared at me and asked,

“Is there an opium dealer in Seochon as well?”

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