By Zephyria 
103
“What.”
A low, deep voice fell from above. Ho-eun craned his neck, looking up at him upside down, and said in a small voice,
“I had nowhere to hold onto…”
“……”
“I’ll hold on lightly. So it doesn’t get in the way.”
Ho-eun barely placed his hand on Tae-muk’s wrist. Even so, the bone structure of his wrist was thick and solid, making it feel very stable. For some reason, it felt so good in his hand that he unconsciously began to fidget with it.
Suddenly, Tae-muk’s breath grazed the back of his neck. Startled, Ho-eun quickly withdrew his hand. Tae-muk seemed to be angry. He wondered if today wasn’t the right day to carry out the ‘sticking close operation,’ and if he should have just walked.
“If you fall, I won’t catch you.”
Tae-muk warned.
“Oh, ah, yes.”
Ho-eun quickly grabbed Tae-muk’s wrist again. He froze and looked ahead.
Tae-muk no longer paid attention to Ho-eun. Instead, he exchanged words with the soldier behind him, asking about the situation outside the fortress walls, how far the message sent to the garrison had reached, and the exact number of refugees.
Meanwhile, Ho-eun stared blankly ahead. Then, he spotted a sign stuck vertically in the ground not far away.
[Great Muk-o Hospital]
It was the kind of sign commonly hung on gates. Ho-eun stared at it blankly, then inadvertently turned his head towards the hospital. But.
“……”
Somehow, the hospital… was much more ruined than the last time he’d seen it. When he and Seong-im left, it seemed like about half of it was still standing, but now only the back wall remained. It was as if a giant, or a monster, had rampaged through the building, smashing it to pieces.
Had more cannons been fired in the meantime?
Ho-eun tilted his head and examined the hospital more closely.
That wasn’t the only strange thing. The center of the hospital, the middle of the courtyard, was completely empty. Devouring Ghoul corpses and building debris were piled up along the edges. It looked as if someone had cleared away the debris.
“……”
Ho-eun thought, ‘Well, Gil-sang and the Crimson Rain Brigade soldiers and people were buried underneath, so they must have had to clear it away,’ and dismissed it casually.
Also, there were piles of Devouring Ghoul corpses along the fence, and there were a lot of them. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say they were as high as a mountain. Moreover, they were all torn to shreds. Not just limbs, but their waists and bellies were snapped or split open, and blood was still oozing from the wounds.
Thanks to that, even though it had rained so much, the blood hadn’t washed away, but had pooled and gathered, forming a lake on the courtyard. The sight of the crimson water rippling whenever the wind blew was bizarre.
Among them, there was one corpse that stood out: the corpse of a Devouring Ghoul with stag-horn-shaped antennae.
It was that one. The smart one that had stood at the front and turned the cannon’s head towards the hospital.
Unlike the other Devouring Ghoul corpses, that one was inside the hospital building. Its body was on the floor, and its torn Helmet Bone was embedded in the wall. Judging by the way the Helmet Bone was torn off like a crab shell, it wasn’t hard to guess who had killed it.
Ho-eun imagined Tae-muk fighting the Devouring Ghouls in this hospital on a rainy night.
Tae-muk probably hadn’t killed all those Devouring Ghouls, but he must have killed a significant number of them.
It was raining, the Devouring Ghouls were swarming, and the Crimson Rain Brigade soldiers were buried. He must have been exhausted, both physically and mentally, and Ho-eun felt depressed along with him. He couldn’t even begin to imagine the pressure he must have been under.
Ho-eun sighed silently and squeezed Tae-muk’s hand tightly.
The Crimson Rain Brigade crossed the town and reached the eastern fortress wall. As Ho-eun watched the fortress gate getting closer, he involuntarily turned around.
The ruined and collapsed buildings were very desolate. When he had entered, he had just thought it was quiet, but he didn’t feel it was desolate. Maybe it was because he knew that no one lived there anymore, but the buildings somehow looked lonely.
“Is this place just going to be abandoned like this?”
Ho-eun asked. It wasn’t a question he expected an answer to. It was such a trivial and useless question that Tae-muk would probably ignore it. But a low voice landed above his head.
“For a while.”
Ho-eun looked up at Tae-muk.
“For a while?”
“Someone will come soon.”
“Who?”
“Those without a home.”
“……”
“Because there are many in this world who have been robbed of their homes.”
“Robbed…”
Ho-eun murmured the word involuntarily. Tae-muk’s expression, the way he said they had been robbed rather than lost their homes, felt unfamiliar, yet perfectly fitting. Robbed homes, robbed lands, robbed lives. Just murmuring the words made his heart heavy.
“There will be a lot of Devouring Ghouls here again then… Will it be okay?”
“It won’t be okay.”
Tae-muk said firmly. Ho-eun’s eyebrows immediately drooped. He was worried about the people who would settle here in the future. He wondered how many people would shed blood and lose their lives. Tae-muk added,
“So we have to move diligently.”
“We do?”
“Yes.”
“……”
Ho-eun blinked slowly. To move diligently meant to kill Devouring Ghouls diligently.
If they killed, killed, and killed Devouring Ghouls like that, eventually their numbers would decrease, and then those who settled here in the future wouldn’t be in danger. They could unpack their belongings, repair their homes, and plow their fields more comfortably and safely.
At that moment, Ho-eun finally realized what the Crimson Rain Brigade did.
He had thought that their mission was simply to kill Devouring Ghouls, but that was also another way of protecting people.
“……”
Ho-eun took a deep breath. His chest swelled. It wasn’t just because of the breath. It was because a certain goal had filled his heart.
When he left home and came all the way here, all he had in mind was the desire to find his usefulness, but now it seemed like the time had come to embrace something bigger than that.
As Ho-eun continued to take deep breaths, the fortress gate drew closer. Unlike when they had entered, both sides of the gate were wide open. The Crimson Rain Brigade soldiers who had arrived earlier to guard the gate greeted Tae-muk. Tae-muk nodded briefly, and they spurred their horses to merge into the group.
Tae-muk was the first to step through the fortress gate. But at that moment, a strong wind rushed in with a whooshing sound. Perhaps because the gate was the only opening in the fortress walls, the density of the wind was very high.
The incoming and outgoing winds collided and swirled. It was an unknowable wind, whether it was pushing them to go quickly or holding them back from leaving.
“Ugh…”
Ho-eun groaned, shrinking his neck. His thin earlobes fluttered. He couldn’t breathe properly in the rushing wind, and he couldn’t open his eyes either. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to breathe, gasping as if he were drowning.
Suddenly, it became easier to breathe. Had he already passed through the fortress gate? He cautiously opened his eyes. But.
“Uh…”
His vision was black. Tae-muk’s large hand was blocking his eyes and nose. The wind blocked by the back of his hand swerved away from Ho-eun’s face. Thanks to that, it became easier to breathe and open his eyes.
Ho-eun cautiously raised his head and looked up at Tae-muk. Perhaps sensing his gaze, Tae-muk glanced down at Ho-eun, then raised his head again and said,
“Honestly, you’re such a pain, like a noble.”
“……”
In the past, those words would have made him feel embarrassed, ashamed, and even self-loathing. But now, he didn’t feel even a sliver of those negative emotions. Ho-eun smiled slightly. The swirling wind that had felt like a typhoon a moment ago now felt as soft as a gentle breeze.