Fabre in Sacheondangga Episode 155
Inhale 3
Following the guidance of Lee Tae, the leader of the pirates, we head to Suchae, the pirates’ base, to repair the ship.
While I was watching the direction the ship was heading from the bow, my sister Seol ran out of the cabin and asked me.
“Ryong-ah, now that its hind legs have grown out, can’t we tell if it’s a frog or a toad?”
Seol Nui had probably been watching Hwayang grow hind legs with Hwaeun, and now that he had grown hind legs, she seemed to be expecting to know what kind of offspring he was.
But it’s a bit early to expect that.
He answered, shaking his head.
“You can’t know yet.”
“Why!? Even though the hind legs are out, you still can’t tell if it’s wine or an island?”
‘Why!? Oh, no.’
I was startled by Seol’s sister’s question of why.
Because I wondered if the disease had spread to Cho.
But come to think of it, Sister Seol is past that age.
I pulled myself together and answered.
“Yes, when the front legs grow and the tail gets shorter, then you can see what the skin feels like. Just because it’s a Shaman cat doesn’t mean its skin is necessarily bumpy, so you have to raise it first.”
“I’m dying of curiosity···.”
Seol’s sister, who had high hopes that she would be able to figure out Hwayang’s identity by looking at his cute hind legs, looked disappointed when I explained it to her.
At that moment, the Taoist priest’s voice was heard from behind.
“Your Majesty, judging by the overgrown reeds, it looks like our boat can’t go any further. The water seems quite shallow.
“Should I tell the enemy to find another way?”
As the Taoist priest explained, we looked beyond the bow of the boat and what we saw before us was a feast of reeds as tall as a person.
A field of reeds stretched far ahead of the boats of the pirates leading us ahead.
I quickly shouted at Itae, who was pulling a small boat in front of us.
“Itae, our ship is too big to go this way!?”
“It’s okay, just wait a moment! Little Dragon!”
When I looked at Itae’s belly below my head and shouted, Itae told me to wait a moment.
Itae took out something like a short bamboo flute from his bosom and blew it long to signal to someone.
-Aaaah.
A signal like the cry of a duck spread far and wide through the reeds.
As the cry spread far and wide, strange things soon began to happen.
The center of the reed field split to the left and right, revealing a deep waterway.
“Reeds!?”
“Huh? The reeds are moving!”
Even the Taoist monk and his sister Seol, who was looking at the reed field next to me, looked surprised.
Let’s focus our gaze more on the reeds to see what kind of harmony they were creating, and we could see them swaying up and down in the waves being pushed by the boat.
Reeds are plants that usually grow with their roots firmly planted in the mud or near the water.
‘Ah… It looks like they planted reeds on top of floating aquatic plants, like in Yanle Lake in Myanmar?’
And the moment I saw it, I could roughly understand what kind of harmony the numbers were.
It felt like they had woven aquatic plants and floated them on the water, like in Yanle Lake in Myanmar where I went on a water snake tour, and planted reeds on top of them.
The pirates probably planted reeds on the floating weeds to camouflage the water level, only making way for the ships to pass.
“It looks like they wove together aquatic plants, floated them on the water, and planted reeds on top of them?”
“Yes, indeed you are Confucius.”
Itaewon, who had a proud expression on his face at the surprised Taoist priest and Seol’s sister’s words, then flinched at my question.
“Is this how you avoid the soldiers?”
“Hehehe. Yeah, I guess so.”
As we moved further inward along the waterway that had been revealed, a small pier appeared between the reeds, and beyond the pier, a small village began to come into view.
Smoke rising from chimneys here and there.
Is this a typical rural village scene, with smoke rising from cooking rice as it nears dinnertime?
I thought Suchae was a den of thieves because it was called Sujeok, but contrary to my expectations, Suchae was a place that felt a bit like a rural fishing village.
There are nets hanging here and there.
The unexpected voice that came to mind was that Seol’s sister also had the same thought.
“I thought Suchae was a den of vicious thieves, but it’s just a village.”
“Is that so?”
At that moment, Itae’s voice was heard from below.
“This is our Suchae.”
“It’s more of a village than a watercolor painting, isn’t it?”
“Well, people who suffered injustice from all over the world gathered together and formed this village.”
Itae said that the people gathered here were people who had suffered injustice, but I couldn’t believe it because I heard that all criminals are like that.
Among the YouTubers with previous lives, there were also broadcasts by ex-convicts. They said that even criminals in prison all claim that they have been wronged.
When violent criminals enter the same prison, they call them bad guys.
But as the ship approached the dock and the sight of the people that came into view made me think about Itae’s words again.
There were quite a few people in the watercolor painting, and the faces of the people were as unexpected as when I first saw the watercolor painting.
Most of the people who were looking at our ship with slightly fearful eyes near the dock were women and children.
“Dragon, didn’t you clearly say with your own mouth that there were only a few?”
“It definitely was.”
Seol’s sister looks surprised at the hidden appearance behind the guys.
People greeted us with very tense expressions, as if the people who had sent ahead had already told us everything.
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I guess they are afraid because the elders were captured and punished.
As soon as the ship arrived, a man of substantial build stood in front of the crowd of people and climbed onto the ship as soon as the planks were lowered, saying:
“A Jin-geuk-seon (眞克船) on the Yangtze River… It’s been quite some time since I’ve seen a Jin-geuk-seon. I’m So Sam-rang, a shipbuilder who worked in Bokju. Did you say that the ship was leaking water?”
A man in his forties with muscular arms and a bushy beard.
The way he spoke while caressing her belly gave her a sense of trust.
Even at first glance, I saw that his hands were full of calluses, which made me feel more confident.
“I am the son-in-law of the Tang family and the dragon of the Beast Palace. Nice to meet you. Taoist master, please tell him where the water is leaking.”
We greeted each other and connected him directly with the Taoist priest.
After all, I thought that the Taoist monk would be better at talking about ships than I was.
“Yes, Little Dragon. I understand. That’s right. It’s been like that since I was hit by a tree that was floating in the water a while ago. There’s a leak at the bow. Do you see it?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
The two who had gone down to the hold at the bow came back up on deck a little while later and started talking to me about repairs.
“To catch a leak, you need hemp, lime, and tung oil. I can have the local men dig up the hemp from the mountain, but the lime and tung oil aren’t here. Do you happen to have any?”
“Of course. Is that okay?”
“Yes, that is enough.”
“How long do you think it will take?”
“Hmm… First, we have to drag the boat out and dry it as soon as the sun rises tomorrow. Oh, wait a minute. Itaewon! Tell the scoundrels to pull out some of those seaweed! I mean, plenty!”
“i get it!”
The captain shouts to Itae outside the ship and orders him to pull out the grass needed for repairs, and continues the conversation.
“Where did I leave off? Oh, you said that you’re going to drag the boat out and dry it. Once the boat is dry······.”
The captain said it would take ten days to repair the ship.
After pulling out the boat and drying it, you have to re-feed the tree with paulownia oil, and seal the gaps with a mixture of fiber from the ramie plant and lime. It takes about that long to do this and then dry it again.
The Taoist priest, who had finished talking to the captain, looked at me and asked.
“Then, can I do as the captain says?”
“Okay, then I’ll leave the repairs to the shipyard. And can I talk to the shipyard for a moment?”
“Is Confucius talking to me?”
“I don’t know if you heard the story, but······.”
A man tilts his head when I suggest we talk.
When I told him about the origins of self-destruction, he said with a look of absurdity.
“Itae, it seems like that guy is selling me out to survive. Dangga… I kept my promise to that guy… But are you okay with it? This guy beat someone to death?”
“You beat a person to death?”
If I hadn’t seen the village’s faces at his words about beating people to death, I would have just fixed my boat and left, but the words Lee Tae had said, ‘A man who suffered injustice all over the world’ came to mind.
I asked him back.
“Hey, can you tell me more about the story?”
Then he nodded to my question and sat down on the deck and said.
“I know it’s a bit weird to just talk about this, but can I have a drink?”
Saying you need alcohol is something you can’t say when you’re sober.
Seol’s sister, who had been silently watching him, ordered the boatman to bring him some alcohol. As the man drank the bottle, the story of the injustice he had suffered poured out.
“That’s why···.”
***
-Tsurut.
Bin’s startled cry was heard as he was about to step out onto the deck.
Outside the cabin beyond the empty house, the morning fog had risen so thickly that it was impossible to see even an inch ahead of the water.
“The fog is thick. Bin-ah. Should we go out after the fog clears a bit?”
-Tsurut!
Binnie doesn’t like high humidity, and when the fog gets too thick, my clothes get stuffy, so I close the door and go back to the cabin, where I see Joseonjang and Leetae crumpled on the floor.
He covered them both with the blanket that was rolling around.
The reason the two of them are sleeping here is because the conversation with the captain that started while drinking yesterday went on longer than expected, and because they drank too much, they fell asleep here.
It was only natural that the great Lee Tae-do also fell asleep.
As I lit the cabin lamp, a splashing sound was heard from a corner of the cabin.
-Splash. Splash.
At Hwayang’s request for food, I placed the lamp near him.
And I stared blankly at the sleeping captain.
Because I remembered the story he told me yesterday while he was drunk.
‘It’s true that he was treated unfairly···.’
After talking to him yesterday, it was clear to anyone that Captain Joseon was a person who had been wronged.
It is said that he worked as a shipbuilder in Bokju with his older brother, taking over the family business. He beat to death a man who tried to rape his beautiful sister-in-law, but because he was the son of a high-ranking official, he was falsely accused of murder and became a fugitive.
And the story was that he had wandered around the Central Plains to escape the fire and then hid here.
That was already ten years ago.
After listening to the story, it seemed like his personality was fine, but the problem was that his wanted status had not been lifted yet.
Anyway, the montage of this era is called Yongmopagi, but it is not accurate, and since it is a montage from ten years ago, no one would recognize him, but it was difficult to make a decision right away.
Since it was a matter of bringing in a wanted person, I thought I should ask the craftsman.
‘I guess it would be right to go back to the party and ask the craftsman, right?’
It was while I was looking at the sleeping captain that I was making a decision in my mind.
A loud noise coming from outside.
“Chief! Chief!”
“Chief! Where are you? Wake up!”
The voices of other pirates could be heard outside, searching for Itaewon.
“What’s going on? Itaewon. Itaewon.”
“Don’t touch that, you guys. Hmm···”
-Tsururut!
“Eek!”
When Bin-i shouted in Itaewon’s ear because she didn’t like the sight of Itaewon, Itaewon awoke with a start even though it was still the middle of the night.
He was so surprised that he was brought up onto the deck.
“The men have arrived. Itaewon. Go out.”
“The luggage?”
Itae, who had rubbed his eyes and gone out to the deck, returned a little later with a surprised face and asked.
“So, Soryong. Of course you will keep your promise, right?”
“promise?”
“You promised not to feed us to spirits.”
Suddenly, they nodded at Itaewon’s question, which reaffirmed their promise not to feed them to spirits.
That’s because it was already a finished story.
“That’s obvious. Why all of a sudden?”
“Well, then. I guess one of your spirits was hungry last night···.”
“Huh? What is that?”
On the deck that followed the Itaewon, the fog was now slowly clearing, but perhaps because of the commotion, Hwa-eun had arrived before us and was examining something on the deck.
Hwa-eun lifts the giant and examines something, then shouts in disbelief.
“What is this!? Moknaei?”
I was curious about what the woodpecker was, so I moved the log, but there was a dried-up corpse lying there.
‘Moknae-i was a mummy!?’
The scent of coriander (cilantro) faintly tickles the tip of my nose, perhaps because of the fluttering giant.
Now I finally understand what Itae meant.
That’s probably what our kids thought.
‘Hey, this kid? Our kids don’t eat junk food like this.’
There’s no way our children would eat junk food like this.
