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◈ The Hunting Genius of the Japanese Colonial Era

Chapter 4

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Father and Son

The sun had already tilted toward the horizon.

In Sebeom Valley, a mountain village, showing up at this hour was flat-out rude.

"Hunter Han! You in there or what?!"

The man in suit trousers who kicked through the wooden gate was exactly that kind of rude.

Go Tae-chon. Thirty-seven years old. One of the men who represented the people of the Lower Hamlet.

The Lower Hamlet people were a different breed from ordinary slash-and-burn settlers. A few years ago, when new road construction opened up, riffraff came rolling in. Now they had ties to Inje town and lived as a mongrel mix of brokers and peddlers.

"What brings you here at this hour of night?"

Han San stepped onto the porch first and asked. He was clearly wary, but Go Tae-chon beamed when he saw him.

"Oh, San! So, did you think about going to Gyeongseong?"

The moment he heard that, Han San's face twisted up like a wrinkled potato.

[Ajusshi! Please let me call you uncle!]

[Wouldn't Uncle Tae-chon be basically an honorary police constable? I heard you even skip the constables and drink with military police officers. Really... I respect you.]

[I really want to go to Gyeongseong! Does it make sense for a young guy like me to rot in this mountain backwater forever? Like this, I'm like this! I'm begging you, Uncle Tae-chon!]

Before his return, Han San had envied Go Tae-chon. Unlike his earth-smelling parents, this man slicked back his hair with grease, wore suit trousers, and tossed around words like "Gyeongseong" and "the Mainland." It had all looked so mo-dern.

But now Han San knew exactly what kind of man Go Tae-chon was.

Drinking with military police?

Sure, military police were in Inje right now. But that bastard probably hadn't even seen the detachment commander's face once.

A leech who failed to stake a spot in Inje town, then rolled all the way into Sebeom Valley to feed off slash-and-burn settlers. That was the accurate assessment of Go Tae-chon.

Remembering all the clownish, unfilial garbage he had done after swallowing this man's bluster whole was enough to make even a seventy-four-year-old mind burn with shame.

"Gyeongseong? What Gyeongseong! So when San threw a fit this morning about Gyeongseong and the Mainland, that was you putting wind in his head again, Go!"

Ham Ssang-sim flared up. Go Tae-chon swung the worn pocket flashlight in his hand and puffed himself up.

"What do you mean, put wind in his head? The young man's got ambition, huh? He asked me for help, so as an intellectual, I gave him some adva-ice, and you're gonna talk like that? Harsh, huh?!"

"Adva... what? More of that twisted talk nobody can understand! And that hair of yours reeks like greasy tripe!"

"What tripe smell! You don't know poma-de? Ah, forget it. Why am I talking to some mountain wife. San, move. And hey, Hunter Han!"

Go Tae-chon shouted straight into the room.

"Wolves! Wolves showed up!"

A moment later, Han Man-seok got to his feet.

"No, honey, why are you getting up...?"

Ham Ssang-sim fidgeted anxiously, but Han Man-seok lightly motioned for her to step aside.

"Wolves?"

"Yeah, wolves! A whole damn pack!"

With Han Man-seok in front of him, Go Tae-chon waved the pocket light in one hand and slicked back his oiled hair with the other as he launched into another loud fuss.

According to him, some beast had snatched his chickens.

According to him, the tracks made it obvious it was wolves.

According to him, not just one or two, either.

"Hunter Han, I heard your name used to carry weight. We all live in the same village, right? Now wolves show up. If you're gonna keep slipping out of communal work like picking corn kernels one by one, shouldn't you show your skills at times like this? Duty to the community, huh?"

He made it sound grand, but Han San could see right through him.

You coward. You want it handled, but you're too scared to do it yourself, so you'll shove my father in front.

Did Ham Ssang-sim not see that too? She snapped and jabbed a finger at him.

"Y-you filthy bastard, listen to that mouth! You know damn well this man's leg is bad, and that's what you say?! Communal labor? That's why I went two, three extra times and did our share!"

"Auntie Ham. A woman helping in the fields and a man doing his own share, huh? Can those be the same? People talk in this village for a reason, you know. Or what?"

Go Tae-chon's gaze slid over Han Man-seok's left leg.

"So all that hunter talk was just bullshit, huh?"

"You...!"

Han Man-seok himself didn't move a muscle, but Ham Ssang-sim was so shocked she went speechless.

Han San didn't hold back anymore.

"That's enough."

"Enough? We're talking grown-up busi...ness..."

Go Tae-chon trailed off.

Han San had strode up, and his shadow swallowed him. The force coming off an eighteen-year-old male body in full prime was more than enough to overpower a half-baked pseudo-intellectual.

"From now on, I'll take our family's place in communal work. So don't say that kind of thing again."

Go Tae-chon flinched and took a step back. Until yesterday this brat had been bowing and scraping, calling him Uncle Tae-chon, Uncle Tae-chon, so what was this now?

"You understand, Go ajusshi?"

"Uh... ah, well, that... yeah."

Go Tae-chon hiccupped. But the great Go Tae-chon couldn't back down like this.

"Fine, that's that! What about the wolves, then? Han family, no, Hunter Han! Are you coming or not?"

Han San's fist tightened. Should he knock those slick front teeth clean out? Not now. Later, at a time no one would catch, quietly. Just as that thought crossed him—

Tap, step.

Han Man-seok came out. In his hand, at some point, was a long stick tightly wrapped in cloth, planted against the ground like a cane.

"I'll go."

"Honey!"

Ham Ssang-sim grabbed him, but Han Man-seok quietly raised a hand and waved her off. Han San had been about to stop his father too, but then he saw his father's eyes.

Those were not the eyes of a man being pushed out.

The eyes of a hunter answering a call were right there.

So Han San swallowed what he had been about to say.

He said something else.

"I'll go too."

Han Man-seok looked at his son.

Not for long.

"All right."

"No, both of you... oh, for heaven's sake..."

Ham Ssang-sim let out deep sighs. She knew how stubborn the men of her house were, so she couldn't bring herself to stop them anymore.

The youngest and last male of the Han family sprang up too.

"Hyung, Dad! I wanna go too!"

Before Ham Ssang-sim could say anything, Han San put a hand on his brother's head first.

"This is men's work, punk."

"I can run too..."

"One of us has to stay and protect Mother. Bada, you can do that, right?"

Han Bada hesitated, but Han San dropped to one knee and met his eyes. He looked at him with a You can, right? expression, and Han Bada inhaled.

"Yeah... I can do that."

"Good."

Han San gave a small smile, roughly ruffled his brother's hair, and stood up.

He went to the kitchen and grabbed a sickle first. Then he went into the main room and collected a few more things. Once he was done, he came over and supported one of his father's shoulders.

His father paused briefly, but didn't refuse.

Father and son then walked into the darkness with Go Tae-chon leading the way.

If Sebeom Valley's night were a person, it would be the kind who always arrived an hour early and waited. In a place where mountain shadow and dusk were hard to tell apart, night simply chose to come first.

That was why, once sunset passed, the people of Sebeom Valley didn't wander around carelessly. Let your mind slip for a moment, and darkness thick enough to hide even a foot ahead could make it hard to find your way home.

It might sound ridiculous to say it was dark enough to get lost inside a village. But the more ridiculous something sounded, the scarier it was for the one living through it. Maybe to forget that fear, Go Tae-chon kept flapping his mouth while swinging his pocket flashlight.

"I'm telling you, I've read books, right? Back when I was in Gyeongseong, huh? I went to libraries, kissaten, all that. Mo-dern boy! So when a man like me looks at it, it's wolves for sure! A whole pack!"

"..."

"Everything has warning signs beforehand. Ever heard that? O-men! Just the other day, when I went down to Inje town, there was a notice posted, yuu-gaichoushu! Harmful wildlife! In the Mainland language!"

"..."

"Good thing I can read some Mainland language, huh? Otherwise I couldn't have connected all those clues in my head, click click click, and gone, ah! Wolves did this!"

"..."

"And right then I felt it. There's this guy, Franchi-s Berg-mahn, right? A Frenchman. He said this: Knowledge is power! That's when I realized why people say that..."

While Go Tae-chon made a full spectacle of himself, Han Man-seok didn't add a single word, and Han San was busy with another thought.

How had this gone in my last life?

My sharpened memory after returning turned like an opened index.

[Wolves! A whole pack showed up!]

[I'll go.]

Right, I remember.

That time too, Go Tae-chon came by making a scene, and Father went out with him.

And I... just watched Father's back as he left.

Part of it was wanting Go Tae-chon's approval. But I also still hadn't cooled off from the argument with Father that morning.

And going outside on a chilly April night had just felt annoying....

What an unfilial bastard.

So what happened after that?

A few hours later, I sensed Father returning... I woke for a moment. I heard Mother and Father talking....

[Honey, what happened out there? Was it really wolves?]

[No.]

That was it. Mother asked a few more questions, but Father only said, "Sleep. It's late," and then... I went back to sleep too... damn it.

"Speaking of which, those wolves, huh? Wolves on this land originally came from the north. You know Noseo-a? They call it Russi-a too. Wolves from those Sibe-ria plains up by the Arctic.

To begin with, did people on this peninsula make even one thing themselves? No, right? Even the wolves here are like that. Foreign goods, foreign goods! Imported wolves. Sibe-ria! Imagine how strong they'd be!"

Was there any bigger unfilial son than this? He managed to return to the past, his memory even improved, and still he didn't know what exactly happened this night. What the hell....

"And that Sibe-ria thing reminds me, over on the Mainland they've got Sibe-dogs. They're called that because they got blood from Sibe-ria wolves, you know?

Round puffy cheeks, super cute but brave too, and as expected, things from the Mainland, huh? The color's just different from peninsula stuff from the start...."

"Ah, enough!"

Han San, furious at his former self, snapped for no real reason.

"Let's walk quietly! You'll wake the whole village!"

Go Tae-chon glared at Han San like, What's with this brat? But when Han San glared right back with a What? look, Go Tae-chon squeaked and shrank.

"No, well... uh... we're here anyway...."

Go Tae-chon pointed his pocket flashlight ahead.

Beyond the yellowed beam sat the chicken coop behind Go Tae-chon's house on the outskirts of the Lower Hamlet.

It was gruesome.

Inside looked like a bomb had gone off, and white feathers were scattered across the ground. Bloodstains that had dried some time ago had hardened black.

"Look at this! My expensive Leghorns! The coop I commissioned from Mr. Baek! Those Sibe-ria wolf bastards wrecked everything!"

Go Tae-chon's neck veins bulged as he shouted.

Han San clicked his tongue. In this period, Leghorns bred for heavy egg-laying were pricier than native chickens. With the coop wrecked too, it made sense this money-mad small fry had lost his mind.

But Han Man-seok, just as before, ignored everything Go Tae-chon was babbling and moved forward. Han San supported his father.

Standing before the coop, Han Man-seok studied the area the flashlight didn't quite reach, the border between light and dark.

Then he gestured, asking Han San to move him a little closer.

Han San followed. Once they reached the spot he wanted, Han Man-seok bent down. He quietly examined the tracks scattered inside the coop, brushed the dirt once with his fingertips, and brought it to his nose.

Sniff.

He took a short breath and shook his head.

"No."

"This Leghorn breed too is fine civilization imported from outside the peninsula..." Go Tae-chon, mid-rant, stopped. "What? Hunter Han, what did you just sa..."

"It's a different beast."

The retired hunter's eyes moved around, then slid toward one point in the dark.

They fixed there.

Han San felt strength gather in his father's right arm, the one holding the cloth-wrapped stick.

"It's here. Right now."

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