Tangmunjeon - Chapter 316



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Episode 316 Wooden tablet

“Don’t you smell blood somewhere?”

When Dang Mu-jin spoke, Hong Geol-gae answered.

“Well, I’m not sure.”

Dang Mu-jin looked around. Seol-hwa tilted her head as if she couldn’t smell anything, and Nam-gung-myeong and Hyeon-gong were talking amongst themselves and couldn’t hear Dang Mu-jin’s story.

‘Did I smell something wrong?’

It wasn’t a strong enough smell to be certain. I just felt like there was a faint scent of blood.

Hong Geol-gae added a word.

“It could be that I have a bad sense of smell. I might even be catching a cow somewhere.”

“If that were the case, people would have gone to see it.”

Slaughtering a cow is a big deal. If you slaughter a cow in a small village like this, the whole village usually gathers to watch.

However, people passing by now were not looking for things to see, but were just glancing at Dang Mu-jin and his party.

Dang Mu-jin also looked at the people. The people of Suk-song did not have a very good impression.

There were few women and many men, and among the men there were many who were in the prime of their working years rather than children or the elderly.

Also, people were not surprised to see Dang Mu-jin and his party each carrying a weapon, as they were accustomed to weapons. They just frowned slightly and tried to keep their distance.

Dang Mu-jin approached the man closest to him. He had a nose as big as a child’s fist.

“I have a question for you.”

“···What?”

A very unpleasant look. But Dang Mu-jin didn’t care.

“Didn’t two congressmen come to see you a while ago? They were quite old.”

“I don’t know.”

If the other person had even shown a hint of thought, he would have replied, “Is that so?” and stepped back, but there was no sincerity in the man’s voice.

Dang Mu-jin did not let go of the person he was talking to, even though he did not like the sight, and asked him again.

“You clearly said that the two members of the council were going to Sooksong. How could you not know that outsiders were coming and going in such a small village?”

“I don’t know. Do you think there’s only one village in Suksong? It seems like they went to another village.”

I hadn’t thought of that. As Dang Mu-jin stepped aside awkwardly, the man with the big nose slowly distanced himself from Dang Mu-jin.

Dang Mu-jin returned to his group and spoke.

“Well, I might have to wander around the nearby villages a bit to meet the two elder members.”

Then Hyun-gong answered.

“That’s unexpected. I thought I would meet you two in this town.”

“why?”

“The doctor I met on the way to Namgung Se-ga said that. It’s a town where people have rough personalities and many are sick or injured. The impressions and eyes of the people in this town looked quite rough, so I thought the two elders would be in this town.”

Dang Mu-jin also agreed with Hyun-gong’s idea.

However, since it seemed a bit strange that the person in question kept asking questions when he said he didn’t know, Dang Mu-jin didn’t stop the man with the big nose again.

Still, just in case, Dang Mu-jin approached a couple more people and asked if they had seen Representative Yang and Representative Yeom. But the only answer he got was that they had no idea.

Some time passed without any results, and soon the sun began to set.

With no choice, Dang Mu-jin and his party decided to find a place to stay in this village.

I had no intention of coming all the way to town and sleeping rough.

But there was no need to grab those rude people and ask them to stay for the night. There were always empty houses in a town like this.

Dang Mu-jin led his party around the village and quickly found a suitable empty house.

“Let’s stay here today.”

The moment they heard Dang Mu-jin’s story, Hong Geol-gae and Nam Gung-myeong competed with each other in their lightness and ran into the house, then lay down in the best spot. Seol-hwa also secretly followed behind them.

“···.”

Dang Mu-jin and Hyeon-gong looked at the group with an uneasy expression, then let out a light sigh.

Someone has to do the dirty work for the immature guys.

The two looked around the house to find firewood. Of course, they didn’t expect much. If there was something worth selling in an empty house, the neighbors would quickly take it.

Meanwhile, Dang Mu-jin and Hyeon-gong discovered something subtle in the kitchen.

There were three fireplaces in the kitchen: one large one and two small ones.

An ordinary house has only one fireplace. Even in a large family, there are only two.

There was only one reason why a small house could have three fireplaces.

“Is this the house where the congressman lived?”

To Dang Mu-jin, the two small stoves appeared to be for boiling medicine.

It may be because, in the eyes of the members of the National Assembly, everything seems to be related to them, but as far as the party staff knows, the authors of these small braziers are usually members of the National Assembly.

Hyun-gong also agreed.

“I think you’re a member of the National Assembly. When I came in here, I could smell the faint smell of dried herbs.”

“Then shouldn’t the elder members be here too?”

“That’s not true. You could have gone to another village in the first place.”

“Oh, right.”

Dang Mu-jin carefully inspected the kitchen, then went into the half-collapsed warehouse to look around. Of course, there was nothing left.

Of course, Dang Mu-jin had no intention of taking on this difficult task and carrying it out to the end, so he went straight into the room where his friends were lying down.

Three people appeared. Hong Geol-gae, Namgung Myeong, and Seol-hwa.

Dang Mu-jin thought for a moment, then kicked Hong Geol-gae hard in the side. Hong Geol-gae grabbed his side and rolled around, then got up unsteadily and grumbled.

“Why are you suddenly like that?”

“Go out and get some firewood.”

“···Why me?”

When Hong Geol-gae asked that, Namgung Myung secretly unbuttoned the front of his clothes to reveal his wound.

“Namgung Myung is still sick, and Seolhwa… is a bit like that.”

Hong Geol-gae grumbled as he got up from his seat.

But when I opened the door, a cool breeze, typical of the transition from late autumn to early winter, came in. The wind had become even colder as the sun set.

No one wants to wander around in the cold wind on a winter night like this.

In the end, Hong Geol-gae committed an act that no normal human being would commit.

“Move over for a moment.”

Dangmujin and Hyeon-gong cleared the way for Hong-geol-gae to go out. However, Hong-geol-gae did not ask to get out of the way.

Hong Geol-gae firmly planted his two feet on the floor, then looked at the floor outside the room and drew a circle with his arms. Dang Mu-jin realized what he was doing.

“Hey, Emma!”

“Hangryongyuhoe.”

Falling-

Hong Geol-gae unfolded Hangryong Sipaljang and destroyed the floor outside the room. Dang Mu-jin shouted in terror.

“What are you doing! No matter how empty the house is, who would use the wooden floor as firewood?”

“It’s dark under the lamp. Firewood is always by our side…”

Hong Geol-gae shamelessly picked up the broken floor.

There was a lot of well-dried firewood, but it was by no means normal behavior. It was strangely unpleasant that he was trying to cheat in such an early manner when he had been asked to do something for the first time in a while.

Dang Mu-jin thought.

‘I have to give you a serious dose of poison tonight without you having to snore.’

While Hong Geol-gae was gathering up the floor scraps, something subtle caught Dang Mu-jin’s eye. There was something under the floor.

Upon closer inspection, I saw that it was a book made by binding together small pieces of wood, called a mokgan.

Hong Geol-gae became even more arrogant.

“Look! It’s firewood! Didn’t I say it’s dark under the lamp earlier? I wasn’t aiming at the floor. I was aiming at the wooden block underneath it.”

Hong Geol-gae, who must have been Qin Shi Huang in his past life, spoke very proudly about burning books.

“It would be better to use the wooden floor as firewood. What if you use a wooden block as firewood?”

“If it were a paper book, it wouldn’t have been like that. But it’s a wooden tablet. It’s probably not going to be anything special.”

Excuses flow out like a stream from a mountain.

Dang Mu-jin thought that all of this might be Hyun-gong’s fault.

However, Hong Geol-gae had a point. The content written on wooden tablets is usually of little importance.

There are three main reasons for writing on wooden or bamboo slips: when studying, when writing trivial things, or when you don’t have money to buy paper.

Still, just in case, Dang Mu-jin dusted off the scroll and read its contents.

“···It’s a book.”

“Even if it’s a medical book, it probably isn’t anything special. If a doctor is so poor that he can’t even afford to buy paper, his medical skills are definitely not that great.”

Perhaps forgetting his duty as a beggar, Hong Geol-gae disparaged the poor lawmakers without a moment’s hesitation.

“Still, just wait.”

As for medical books, seven out of ten usually contain similar content.

But if we say it the other way around, it also means that about three out of ten contain unique content. Such as a family secret recipe or a record of success in trying a unique treatment. Dang Mu-jin needed that kind of knowledge.

Of course, there is no guarantee that everything written on the wooden tablet is true, so it would be good to remember it well and use it carefully when the opportunity arises. It would be even better to experiment on a sturdy guy like Honggeolgae.

Dang Mu-jin carefully read the contents of the scroll. There were some fairly plausible contents, but there were also some ridiculous and absurd stories.

As Dang Mu-jin was about to put down the wooden tablet, wondering whether he should use it as firewood or not, something strange caught his eye. There was writing on the back of the bamboo tablet, not just the front.

“What is that?”

“You’ll know when you read it. Just wait.”

Dang Mu-jin read the writing on the back of the bamboo slip.

[···You never know what will happen in a person’s life, Miss Yeo-hye said she would teach me medicine. She even gave me a wooden tablet, so I promised myself that I would learn medicine by cutting down on my sleep.]

[While Dr. Shim was away, Miss Yeo-hye took care of the patient. She raised her voice so that I could hear her from outside and examined the symptoms. I was glad that the conclusions were similar every other time.]

[It was a day when no patients came, except for one woman with a bad cough. As I watched Miss Yeo-hye from afar, the day passed by in a flash.]

Unlike the large, neat letters on the front of the wooden tablet, the letters on the back were small but powerful. It was probably written by someone else.

The content was completely different. It was more like a diary than a medical article.

However, Dang Mu-jin read the contents with considerable interest.

This is because the person who wrote the writing on the wooden tablet was clearly secretly in love with a woman named Yeo-hye.

The wooden tablet contained the pleasure of stealing someone else’s diary and the pleasure of observing someone else’s love life.

Dang Mu-jin read it with love advice in his heart.

‘I should have been a little more proactive here. If a man misses his timing, things won’t work out.’

‘You’re messing around here again? It’s so frustrating…’

Dang Mu-jin put down the wooden tablet he had read all the diary entries on. For some reason, he felt fulfilled.

Looking around, Namgung Myung, Hyeon Gong, and even Seol Hwa were reading the diary on the back of the wooden tablet. The diary of an unknown man and his sweet love were being revealed to the world. However, Hong Geol Gae was nowhere to be seen, perhaps because he had gone out to get firewood.

The moment he was about to get up from his seat, Dang Mu-jin felt a subtle sensation.

Dang Mu-jin looked through the bamboo slips again.

Strange content. Stories of strangers. Stories about strangers.

Even the dormitory was an unfamiliar place that I had visited for the first time.

But somehow the wooden tablet felt familiar.

‘what?’

Dang Mu-jin asked his friends.

“Namgung Myung, Hyeon-gong.”

“why?”

“This bamboo slip, doesn’t it look familiar?”

“It’s good to know, you’re just like someone who is so clueless.”

“···.”

Both Namgung Myung and Hyeon Gong seemed to not feel the sense of awkwardness and familiarity that Dang Mu Jin felt.

After racking his brain for a long time, Dang Mu-jin finally realized what that familiarity was.

The handwriting looked strangely familiar.

‘Where have I seen this handwriting?’

However, even after thinking about it for a long time, Dang Mu-jin could not remember where he had seen that handwriting. This was because he had read so many books up until then.

That night, when everyone was asleep.

Dang Mu-jin got up from his seat, remembering where he had seen the handwriting on the wooden tablet.

It was the exact same handwriting as the magician’s handwriting in the subscription book.