Dohyuk let out a long breath as he put down a big bag on the ground. It was not within the expected expenses to purchase ‘these’, but he did not and will not regret buying them. He did pay a hefty amount of coins, but he believed it was worth the money and would be the most efficient use of the money.
It even brought him to smile just by thinking of it.
“I haven’t…”
‘Taken a shower and had a good sleep in bed,’ thought Dohyuk as he was beginning to prepare warm water when someone knocked on the door.
“It’s open. Come in.”
Dohyuk was surprised as the knock seemed to be rushed. Just listening to the knock was enough to feel as if the person was in a hurry. That alone was no problem, but…
“…W-what is it?”
It was different if the person was Lee Yuri. Dohyuk even stuttered as he asked because of the surprise.
“Did something jump out of the sea? Or…”
“It’s not about the outside.”
“Oh.”
Dohyuk sighed in relief, but Yuri had to do best she could to bring up what she was going to say.
“A person is dead.”
“…”
Dohyuk became silent and did not respond for a while. He then nodded, signaling her to continue.
“You’ll know him once you see his face. He’s not good enough to join my class, but he was well-trained.”
“Who… what happened to him?”
Lee Yuri shook her head.
“The person I’m talking about is not the one who died.”
The story was this: when he was a slave, he met a woman. They were not in a relationship then. The woman had no power or strength, but she helped everyone around her as best as she could and shared her food to the children or seniors. Soon, she was like the leader among her small group of slaves. They withstood everything together and was later was saved by Dohyuk and began their life in the city.
And then-
“She found another man.”
“…”
“But I guess he had been longing for her for a long time. She refused politely, but now… I guess he became mad.”
Fortunately, the fight was stopped by Yoo Giwon who had been around at the time. He listened to their stories and sentenced a month-long job for the man and warned him to stay away from the woman. It wasn’t Giwon’s fault that this happened. Everyone thought the judgment was just.
“…Yeah. I think I remember hearing it from Giwon.”
There was no way anyone would’ve known that the man who had been training and working hard until then was a criminal with a sexual assault record and was on mental medications.
“The woman’s lover was at the farm, working.”
The man smashed the lover’s head with a farm tool, again and again until the lover was no longer breathing. And even after that, he continued smashing the head.
“What of the woman? Is she…”
“She’s safe.”
Citizens weren’t cowards. After a few seconds of what happened, people quickly came up to him and apprehended him.
“…”
“…”
Yuri couldn’t say anything to Dohyuk who had fallen silent.
‘You know what? That bastard, that f*cking assh*le, kept on calling her name even then. I wanted to kill him right on the spot when I saw him tied down. I wanted to rip his limbs out so that he could feel the pain as much as possible.’
That was what Yuri wanted to say. If Giwon wasn’t there before her, she probably would’ve really killed the murder like she thought.
She couldn’t believe what had happened. The man shouldn’t have done this. If he thought about the hero, the master of the city, who had sacrificed so much for everyone else, he should not have done such a terrible thing.
But it still happened. It was the first death of a citizen, but it was not from an outer threat and was rather a petty inner conflict. Yuri didn’t even want to think about how this would hurt Dohyuk.
“…Okay.”
As Dohyuk broke out of his long silence, Yuri flinched.
“So, when did it happen exactly?”
“20 minutes… ago.”
“And what happened? What of the body? What about the murderer? Tell me everything that happened during those 20 minutes until you came to me.”
As he listened to the details, Yuri wasn’t sure what Dohyuk was thinking.
“…So, that bastard is still outside the city wall. He’s being imprisoned in one of the tents temporarily.”
“Who made that decision?”
“Me and Giwon. That man… he’s no longer a citizen from the point he killed someone.”
“…!”
It was apparent of what she meant. Corruption.
“Oh and…”
She brought out a bag. There was a metal clanking sound coming from within.
“This. The woman brought it over. She dropped this in front of her all of a sudden. It was the exact moment when the murder happened and the murderer became corrupt.”
Dohyuk received the bag and opened it up to check inside. He expected what was inside even before he opened it up, and he was right.
There was a total of 30 gray coins.