CLS-Chapter 474

Chapter 474:

“Hey.”

At Jang-il’s call, Wei Yan-ho turned his head.

“Did you come all the way here because there’s something to mooch off of?”

“Hehehe, don’t think that beggars only move when there’s something to mooch. Beggars also move when there’s something to hear.”

“……You’re quite diligent too.”

Wei Yan-ho clicked his tongue.

“And then when your belly empties, you go out begging again?”

“You know too much about beggars. You should be careful.”

“Yeah right, yeah right.”

Wei Yan-ho waved his hand dismissively.

“Go on. I have things to think about, so I have no intention of playing with a beggar.”

“Can you still say that after seeing this?”

Jang-il opened the bundle hanging from his waist and pulled something out.

“Ugh!”

Wei Yan-ho ground his teeth.

Inside Jang-il’s bundle was well-cooked roasted duck and a large gourd bottle.

He wasn’t particularly interested in the liquor in the gourd bottle, but he couldn’t help but look at the roasted duck steaming with aromatic smoke.

“There are foods that taste better when eaten on rooftops.”

“A beggar knowing about epicurean tastes.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s because I’m a beggar that I know about epicurean tastes. There are times when you have to eat a single meal that means nothing to others like it’s heavenly food. So you become more sensitive to taste.”

“……That strangely makes sense.”

Wei Yan-ho chuckled and stretched out his hand.

“Give me one leg.”

“Here.”

When Jang-il unhesitatingly tore off a duck leg and offered it, Wei Yan-ho looked at Jang-il with slightly surprised eyes.

“Did you eat something wrong? I thought you’d throw a tantrum and refuse to give it.”

“I brought it to give to you, so I can’t not give it.”

“You brought it to give to me?”

Wei Yan-ho took the duck leg and looked suspiciously back and forth between Jang-il and the duck leg.

“……It’s not poisoned.”

“Suspicious.”

Jang-il’s face contorted.

This is why there’s no need to be nice to this guy.

“Anyway, I’ll eat well.”

Wei Yan-ho took a big bite of the duck leg. Jang-il also grabbed the other duck leg and started tearing at it.

“Where did you get money to buy something like this?”

“Money is something that exists one moment and doesn’t the next, and doesn’t exist one moment and does the next. So you have to spend it as soon as you get it.”

“……Now I understand why you’re a beggar.”

“Hehehe. How could a materialistic guy like you understand the heart of a beggar who lives like an immortal in this world?”

“I have a lot to say, but I can’t run my mouth when I’m mooching.”

Wei Yan-ho obediently began tearing at the duck leg.

When Jang-il poured liquor into the cup he had prepared, Wei Yan-ho accepted the cup without a word. He didn’t particularly enjoy drinking, but it wasn’t to the extent that he’d refuse what had been prepared.

“Keuuu……”

Wei Yan-ho, who had downed a cup of liquor, contorted his face.

“How is it? Isn’t it atmospheric?”

“Atmospheric?”

“Drinking a cup of liquor while sitting on the edge of a roof on this bright moonlit night. Keu, a poem naturally comes to mind.”

“……It’s just cold though?”

“……”

Jang-il smiled gently.

This was Jang-il’s mistake. Talking about refined taste to that guy. Even if everyone in the world enjoyed refined taste, that guy alone would be someone far from refinement.

He should be praised just for not bringing a blanket up to this roof.

“Anyway. What’s your business?”

“Business?”

“You wouldn’t have brought something like this, spending money, just because you had nothing to do. You have something to say, don’t you?”

Jang-il smiled bitterly.

“I don’t.”

“Just tell me.”

“I really don’t.”

“……Really?”

Wei Yan-ho looked at Jang-il with eyes that said ‘Did this beggar eat something rotten somewhere?’

“Really, I don’t.”

“Hmm.”

Wei Yan-ho looked at Jang-il with a blank expression.

“Do I have that little credibility?”

“Do I really need to put that into words?”

“Ugh.”

Jang-il sighed and opened his mouth.

“It’s a bit embarrassing to say this, but I thought you must be having a hard time too.”

“Having a hard time?”

“It must be hard. It must feel like everyone in the world expects something from you. I can’t even imagine what that feeling would be like.”

Wei Yan-ho didn’t answer and looked up at the sky. A bright moon was looking down at him.

“I never thought a lazy bum like me would end up doing this kind of work.”

“It’s the duty of those who have power.”

“Duty……”

Wei Yan-ho flopped down flat.

“I don’t particularly relate to it, but I did have that thought.”

“What thought?”

“……Whether the people who entrust this kind of work to me are really okay with it.”

Jang-il chuckled.

‘It is ridiculous.’

Wei Yan-ho was the laziest person under heaven.

If you asked people who knew him what kind of person Wei Yan-ho was, there wouldn’t be more than five people who would say good things about him.

It wasn’t simply because he was lazy. He had a bad personality, no sense of responsibility, and as if his father had taken all the cooperation, he hadn’t brought even a mouse dropping’s worth with him – that was Wei Yan-ho.

But the funny thing was that most people who knew Wei Yan-ho trusted him.

It was a bizarre thing, but it was true.

If you objectively evaluated Wei Yan-ho as a person, he was absolutely someone you shouldn’t trust and shouldn’t entrust work to, but most people who knew Wei Yan-ho trusted him.

They always complained with their mouths, but if they actually had to follow someone’s word, they would all follow Wei Yan-ho’s words without doubt.

Jang-il was also feeling this bizarre reality.

Jang-il was the same way.

He had realized this fact not long ago.

The reports he sent up were mostly about Wei Yan-ho. And those reports were filled with Jang-il’s personal feelings.

To put it nicely, they were cool evaluations, and to put it badly, they were filled only with harsh words. The letter that the King Beggar sent him after reviewing the report read like this:

According to your report, that Wei Yan-ho bastard is a complete son of a bitch, so why are you saying you have to trust and follow that complete son of a bitch? Are you crazy?

‘I am crazy.’

Jang-il couldn’t help but chuckle.

This wasn’t something that could be explained in words or writing. You could tell just by looking at the people gathered around Wei Yan-ho.

People who would be fine elsewhere…… no, they were all people who could make something of themselves. They were people who could receive proper treatment wherever they went.

They were people who could live comfortably if only they didn’t stick around Wei Yan-ho, but they were all enduring harsh treatment and tyranny while loitering around Wei Yan-ho.

‘It’s too good a word to call it charisma.’

Certainly Wei Yan-ho had the power to draw people to him. Moreover, in urgent situations, you develop the vague expectation that ‘that guy will do something.’

It was around that time that Jang-il discovered something strange.

He had found it absurd that people all expected something from Wei Yan-ho, but after accepting that fact, his eyes went not to the people but to Wei Yan-ho.

What would this guy be feeling?

Could a guy who originally had no sense of responsibility shoulder the expectations of so many people?

When he thought about that point and observed Wei Yan-ho, he saw things that hadn’t been visible before.

When he first saw Wei Yan-ho, Wei Yan-ho was really a hopeless case. He couldn’t understand how such a guy had emerged. The long life in the cave might have twisted him, but there was something inherently different about him. He doubted whether this guy could even eat properly and live normally.

But what about Wei Yan-ho now?

‘He’s just an ordinary lazy bum.’

The current Wei Yan-ho didn’t give off the feeling of that insane lazy bum from back then. If you looked at it positively, you could say he had become a bit softer through experiencing the world.

But in Jang-il’s eyes, that didn’t necessarily look good.

The feeling of being worn down.

It was the feeling of a lazy bum who would have lived well without caring about other people if he hadn’t experienced the harsh realities of life, but had been worn down and rounded through experiencing countless events.

For others, that might be a good thing, but was it really a good thing for Wei Yan-ho?

Wei Yan-ho was still at a young age to experience the storms of the world. It was something wrong for so many adults to place expectations on this young guy.

He didn’t know where it started going wrong.

“Tsk.”

Even so, there was nothing Jang-il could do.

Wei Yan-ho was already playing an extremely central role in the martial world, and if he let go of the work he was currently handling, great chaos would come to the martial world.

Probably Wei Yan-ho knew that fact too. He wasn’t a stupid guy, after all.

What he could do was just comfort Wei Yan-ho like this. Sitting beside this young guy who couldn’t confide his feelings to anyone, sipping drinks with him. He didn’t know if it would be comforting.

“Beggar.”

“Hmm?”

“You know.”

Wei Yan-ho quietly opened his mouth.

“Is hyung still alive?”

“……”

Jang-il pressed his lips tightly together.

Thinking about how much agonizing there must have been before that single sentence came out, his lips felt parched.

“He’s not the type to die just because someone tries to kill him.”

“Yeah.”

“And if they were going to kill him, they would have killed him on the spot. Why would they bother taking him away?”

“That’s probably right?”

“Right. So don’t think useless thoughts.”

“I don’t really think about it or anything. It’s just that sometimes I have those thoughts.”

“Thoughts?”

“Yeah. Hyung was captured by the Demonic Cult, but what am I doing here right now? I’m trying my best to make an effort…… but sometimes it all feels like meaningless work.”

Wei Yan-ho scratched his head roughly.

“Even though I think that preparing like this is the fastest way to save hyung, sometimes I have that thought. Whether I just don’t have the courage to charge into the Demonic Cult alone.”

“Hey.”

“I just wonder if I’m scared of dying, so even though hyung was captured, I’m just making other excuses and wasting time.”

“Don’t talk nonsense, hey!”

Jang-il shouted angrily.

“Wei San-ho is your brother, but he’s my friend, and he’s your father’s son. So are you saying we’re all doing this because we’re scared of dying?”

“Hmm, that’s probably not it.”

“I understand having an impatient heart. But this isn’t something you should be impatient about.”

“Hmm…… Yeah, that’s probably right.”

Wei Yan-ho’s head was still fixed on the moon floating in the sky above. Seeing that gaze, Jang-il’s eyes became complicated.

‘What is this guy thinking right now?’

No matter how much he tried to empathize, it was difficult for him to understand Wei Yan-ho’s heart. He could only guess that it was a complicated feeling.

How could he know?

It was a fact everyone knew that Wei Yan-ho had followed his hyung more than his father. But that hyung wasn’t his real brother, and he learned that he was the child of the Demon Lord.

What would be the feelings of someone preparing for battle against the Demonic Cult to save that child of the Demon Lord?

They say heroes need hardships. But looking at Wei Yan-ho, he had different thoughts.

Wasn’t it that only those who overcome such hardships become heroes?

Ordinary people wouldn’t be able to overcome such hardships.

“Have a drink.”

“Yeah.”

Wei Yan-ho accepted the cup Jang-il offered without a word.

Above the liquor swaying in the cup, the bright moon had settled.