episode_0007

Shihyuk went out to the living room with a feeling of emptiness and buried himself in the sofa. While sinking into the soft sofa, he turned his gaze toward the living room window.

Outside the window, the sun was peeking out from behind the mountain peaks, casting a slightly reddish glow. The chirping of an unknown bird could be heard from afar.

It was morning.

The electronic calendar hanging in the corner of the living room told him that two days had passed since he had received the magic stone.

“… … .”

For a while, he lay there like a corpse, unable to move. Shihyuk felt a pain in his stomach as if it was being squeezed by a compression wrench.

The stomach, which had shrunken like a deflated balloon, began to move again because of the water that had entered and what had been vomited out again.

For a body exhausted from work, long periods of fasting were enough to make hunger feel like violence.

Sihyuk forced himself to get up, his body still not fully rested, and left the house wearing only his parka.

The place where the cloth had brushed against his skin stung, and his legs trembled like a newborn calf. He forced his legs to bend and began to descend the mountain.

The descent from the mountain was too rough for Si-hyuk, who was extremely exhausted. By the time he was halfway down, he had already fallen down four or five times.

He often ran into hikers out for their morning walks, but when they saw Shihyuk’s behavior, they all frowned and slowly avoided him.

It was understandable. With his disheveled hair and unkempt beard, his exposed skin had been exposed to radiation for a long time, and the epidermis was peeling off. Thanks to this, the area where sweat and pus had dried was now covered in sticky pus.

His back was bent, his limbs were trembling, his eyes were dark from lack of sleep, his cheeks were hollow and hollow, like a corpse. When he passed by, a foul smell assaulted his nose.

Moreover, his knees and shins were covered in blood because he had fallen several times during the descent.

Even in the face of such painful wounds, his face remained expressionless like a plaster statue, giving people the impression that they were dealing with a bizarre lunatic rather than a wounded patient.

As Shihyuk limped past people, they all began to murmur.

—

Unlike the quiet morning in the mountains, the city was bustling. Children were going to school, people were going to work, the roads were jammed with traffic, and people on foot were checking their watches and walking briskly.

Only a flock of pigeons were peacefully strolling through the empty spaces on the sidewalk, pecking at something.

After getting off, Sihyuk headed straight to the local supermarket that caught his eye.

The inside of the supermarket was deserted, but the employees were busy checking the products after opening early. One of them noticed a customer and tried to greet Sihyuk, but froze in surprise. Of course, unfortunately, the first customer was not ordinary.

He walked across the shelves and grabbed what he needed, ignoring the stiff clerk.

A pack of ramen and a bottle of water.

It was a small purchase. Shihyuk absentmindedly handed over his card to the clerk, who tried to avoid eye contact with him while calculating the bill.

“Goodbye, take care… .”

A small greeting like the sound of a mosquito was heard from the back of his head, but Sihyuk did not bother to respond and limped towards the citizens’ park.

In the middle of the complex cityscape, the park was quiet and deserted, like a different world. Sihyuk sat down on a nearby bench, unwrapped the package of raw ramen, and began chewing.

The sound of hard, dried, refined carbohydrates being chewed loudly broke the peace of the park.

Was he half-eaten? He bit his lips for a moment, then spat out a bloody tooth.

Accumulated fatigue and stress weaken the gums. Even though he was an awakened person, Shihyuk’s physical condition was miserable, so he chewed on hard ramen raw and got sick.

“… … .”

In addition to the missing lower teeth, there were cuts on his tongue and the inside of his cheeks from chewing roughly, and bruises formed here and there, but Shihyuk didn’t care.

He ran his tongue over the spot where his tooth had been pulled out and then began chewing the remaining piece of ramen.

The tough meal didn’t last long. After finishing off with a bottle of water, Sihyuk quickly crumpled up the empty ramen bag and plastic bottle, stuffed them into his parka pocket, and got up.

Like a farmer who has eaten all his groceries, like a soldier whose mealtime is over, Sihyuk had to return to his work as a blacksmith after filling his stomach.

“… … .”

However, it would be a little different than before. Behind him as he headed towards his residence, pigeons flocked to eat the remaining crumbs and filled the space instead.

…

Sihyuk headed towards the blacksmith shop with unsteady steps.

Even as he played with his feet, he was constantly chewing over the facts he had realized.

Looking back on the days that have passed, his teacher, Baekhyun, always took care of him.

More than Shihyuk admired and respected his teacher, Hyeonman cherished and loved his disciple. Perhaps he reflected on the children and grandchildren he had lost through Shihyuk.

Since ancient times, older people have been detached from offerings, but they often spend lavishly on their own people and families. His teacher was just like that.

He would feed his disciples delicious food and dress them in nice clothes, telling them to take care of themselves without sparing themselves.

There were so many things that Hyun-man bought for his disciples that Si-hyuk bought more for himself than for himself.

Because he was such a sage, he felt uncomfortable with the sight of his disciples working in the guild’s workshop while being treated with contempt, and he also resented the guild’s teasing and stares that made his beloved disciples cower.

So Hyun-man must have made up his mind.

He decides to turn over the place of his memories and create a new forge for his disciple.

Although it cost a lot of money, Hyunman created a blacksmith’s dream that was connected to the living space, where he could work and rest at any time.

Not for oneself, but for one’s disciples.

If he was a disciple he knew, he might have felt burdened inside.

That’s why Hyun-man hid his intentions. Instead, he would suggest to her in passing, or openly, or sometimes quietly, that she visit him.

However, Shihyuk never noticed his teacher’s consideration at all.

He was immature, obsessed with his own goals and delusions. He was so focused on his efforts that he didn’t look around.

Finally, until the last day when his master closed his eyes.

Thanks to that, Sihyuk couldn’t know.

There is also a hammer that the master himself made for him in the underground blacksmith shop that was built under the guise of a resort that the master made.

After making it, I realized that it was embarrassing to just hand it over, so I intended to have people go and look for it in person.

The fact that the old man with an odd personality hid it on purpose as a prank to tease his disciple.

Now we will never know, for the dead cannot open their mouths.

However, even the clumsy Shihyuk could clearly understand the intention of all the Master’s actions. For what? Such a question was unnecessary.

There was no reason to begin with for the one-way affection and consideration that teachers and parents gave to their students and grandchildren.

That’s why, that’s why, Shihyuk had to shiver in pain. He couldn’t stand it because he hated himself.

As he watched his master Baekhyun burn his soul until the very end, as he watched him burn his soul to further ignite the flames of the furnace, and as he watched him not stop refining until his heart stopped beating, what were his thoughts?

Seeing such a teacher, Shihyuk felt sad, admired, respected, and proud, but in a corner of his heart, he was also jealous.

–I want to be like that too. I want to die like a craftsman.

I can do that too!

Shihyuk had to admit the ugly feelings he had for his teacher, Baek Hyunman. He wanted to follow Hyunman’s footsteps and complete his path with that.

By imitating the challenges of the great blacksmith, he tried to fill his own shortcomings as a craftsman.

Without even properly understanding the teacher’s true intentions.

Shihyuk was extremely embarrassed.

‘Compared to how much the Master has loved me…’

He himself, who now realizes how much his teacher devoted himself to Shihyeok and cherished him,

‘A little less, I cherished the teacher.’

And the fact is that he sent it away without being able to properly repay that love.

Si-hyuk, who had arrived at the blacksmith shop before he knew it, had tears streaming down his cheeks. Because of his shameless and incompetent self, and for his considerate teacher, he cried endlessly like a broken faucet.

Nevertheless, even so, Sihyuk was a blacksmith.

No matter how much it hurt or how much I regretted it, nothing changed.

He was freed from the agony of being ready for death, but in the end, this was all he knew, and perhaps now there really was nothing else.

Just more miserable than usual, and holding the hammer as always.

Shihyuk breathed mana back into the cold melting pot.

The mana furnace was overflowing with flames.