Struggle Chapter 103

The captain realized they had entered Gwangdolmok. The only stroke of fortune was that he knew it at the entrance, before they were fully entangled. The laborers toiling at the oars below were striving to turn the bow, gripping the oars until their palms burst, even putting salt into their mouths. They should have launched a small boat and sent at least the Grand Prince, but it was already too late. The only gamble worth staking their lives on was to escape the center of Gwangdolmok as much as possible and send people not toward the current that sucked them in, but toward the current that spat them out.

“Turn her fully to starboard!”

The boatswain shouted at those gripping the oars beneath the water until his voice bled.

With immense effort, they gripped the oars that were on the verge of snapping and turned them in their direction. But the impact of the sucking current colliding with the solid, heavy ship was tremendous.

“Ugh!”

Suhwan and Nanyoung were likewise hurled backward and crashed violently against their backs.

The shock was so great that Nanyoung could not regain his senses for a moment. It was Sim Eung who pulled Nanyoung close.

“Your Highness, you must return.”

Sim Eung cried out desperately.

“You must not lose consciousness. If you lose consciousness….”

The words telling him not to lose consciousness sounded faint.

Sim Eung had just been told that he would push them as far outside the current as possible, and that they were to jump not from the bow, but from the stern.

Sim Eung, Suhwan, and Nanyoung leaned on one another and headed for the stern. There, the retainers were already making preparations.

“We will go down first! When His Highness throws himself over, we will catch him!”

They had just thrown every lantern and lamp, whether useful or not, into the sea.

“It’s moving!”

One of the sailors shouted. Almost simultaneously, Nanyoung, who had staggered, crashed his chest as well as his back against the stern railing. A groan burst out, not even rising to the level of a scream.

At that moment, someone lifted Nanyoung up in a flash.

“Your Highness! Steel your heart!”

“Su, Suhwan….”

“I… I have been truly wretched.”

Suhwan, murmuring in a choked voice, offered his final apology to Nanyoung.

“If we meet again alive, please forgive this wretched one.”

Suhwan had also heard, right before their departure, what Nanyoung had given up. The rumor that it was Nanyoung who had proposed that even royal kinsmen be stripped of private soldiers and barred from involvement in the court had already spread. Gossip-mongers praised Nanyoung’s humility and loyalty, but Suhwan alone knew that Nanyoung had forsaken the person he loved.

“I can’t go alone. I can’t, alone.”

Nanyoung grabbed Sim Suhwan by the collar and held on. Holding onto Suhwan, he looked at Sim Eung. His face, on the verge of tears, stood in greater contrast to this dry windstorm.

“You have someone you must meet again, alive.”

Suhwan did not know whether Taerok, having learned of Nanyoung’s betrayal, had forgiven his nephew. He did not know if that cold man had accepted Nanyoung again, but even so, he hoped there would be a chance to meet again and ask.

“You must go quickly, Your Highness!”

And Nanyoung’s mind snapped sharply awake at the scream of Sim Eung, which felt like it was striking his head.

“One last time….”

Sim Eung, grasping his meaning, approached. Nanyoung fiercely embraced Suhwan and Sim Eung. Then he whispered to the two of them.

“Tell my uncle and brother that I am sorry.”

“Your Highness…?”

Just as Sim Eung’s eyes flew wide open, Nanyoung pushed them both.

‘You are far from being able to overcome anyone with strength, so remember this, Nephew. A person becomes careless if they suddenly lose balance in their lower body. So if it comes down to it, embrace them so they cannot stab you, and then sweep their legs away.’

Nanyoung closes his eyes, Taerok’s voice passing vividly through his head.

And he slipped his foot inside the ankles of the two people he was embracing and pulled. The two, losing their balance, collapsed helplessly over the stern.

“Your Highness…!”

Sim Eung sobs as he falls downward. Suhwan, looking into Nanyoung’s eyes, embraced Sim Eung, wrapping around him so the impact would not harm his aged body.

“Your Highness! We can hold on no longer! If you miss the current now…!”

“You jump too, quickly!”

Nanyoung shouted, gripping the stern railing.

“Do not mind your status in the face of death! I will manage somehow myself, so you must hurry…!”

When the remaining sailors and interpreter hesitated, Nanyoung stood on the stern. Only then did they hurl themselves vigorously out of the water. Nanyoung, having seen all of them, was just about to throw himself over when a crunching sound rang out. Just before the laborers and the boatswain leading them could escape, he felt even the wood bracing the oars shatter.

Nanyoung staggered. And Nanyoung, who was about to hurl himself out of the water, instead reeled backward and collapsed back into the ship.

“…!”

At the end of a soundless scream, Nanyoung, having barely caught the railing, pulled himself up and murmured.

“Uncle.”

I am sorry. Because I have done nothing but things I am sorry for, because I may not even be able to convey the words “I am sorry”… I was going to give myself to you.

Behind Nanyoung, the wail of an imugi was heard.

∞ ∞ ∞

Gwangdolmok was a place where the flow of water changed frequently. Nanyoung was late, but he was also just in time. The moment when the sucking current shifted to an expelling current had coincided. Ordinarily, it was something that would not happen. Because the shift in that flow had come early. It could only be explained as a miracle.

Except that the flow was fiercer, so he was tossed about somewhat longer than the others. Fortunately, he lost consciousness early and floated up limply like a buoy, and his body, carried on the broken wreckage, was washed up to the shore. That was the reason Nanyoung was found in a different place from the others, farther away than the others.

It was something that could only be explained as a miracle.

However, what came after was up to Nanyoung. People clung to him and devoted all their fervor and sincerity to warming his chilled body by wrapping him in cotton cloths heated in hot water. As soon as the herbal decoction was spooned into him, he vomited it back out. Each time that happened, more seawater that had not yet been expelled came out with it. It was as if Nanyoung had been born from the sea, and the seawater had become a person and emerged.

“What, what must be done. What must be done, I ask you!”

Taerok, having not slept a single wink for days since hearing news of the accident, was in a state where his eyes were red and bloodshot. Sim Suhwan had awakened early, and Sim Eung had not yet awakened, but his body was not cold, nor did he vomit up the decoction.

Nanyoung alone was the problem.

“His body must be kept warm!”

“After that.”

Wearing only trousers, Taerok embraced Nanyoung and asked through gritted teeth. Taerok, whose body temperature was higher than others, was holding the unclothed Nanyoung and warming his cold body.

“After that, a fever will rise.”

The royal physician personally sent by the king broke out in a cold sweat as he took Nanyoung’s pulse.

“Only when the fever rises and you safely weather it can it be said that the worst crisis has passed.”

“None of this ‘can be said’ or ‘will’—you must give a definite answer.”

Taerok ground his teeth and threatened desperately.

The royal physician, too, wanted to save Nanyoung. Even before he had entered the palace, it had been said that Grand Prince Heonui was originally frail, and that surviving this long was remarkable—but now, more than remarkable, a miracle was needed.

A miracle had already been used up once, with him returning alive from that sea. Would a miracle that had occurred once happen again? Though skeptical on one hand, the royal physician answered, yes, yes, in a fluster.

Embracing Nanyoung, whose body temperature would not rise at all, Taerok closed the door and pressed them to bring more quilted blankets.

The magistrate’s residence in Pyeonggak, suddenly hosting two Grand Princes, became the most important place after the palace. Security grew strict, and the wild ginseng diggers within Pyeonggak all scoured the winter-approaching mountains en masse to find wild ginseng and the necessary medicinal herbs.

“Even if you need the liver or heart of a tiger, I will obtain it and bring it.”

Taerok murmured, pressing his own cheek gently to the forehead of Nanyoung, who was drenched in cold sweat.

“If you need a wish-fulfilling jewel, that too; if you need a dragon’s claw, I will bring that as well.”

He who had told him not to speak carelessly of dragons was now invoking dragons. Taerok’s eyelids, gently closed, trembled.

“Just let him live.”

Taerok’s hands were tightly grasping Nanyoung’s chest and arms. So that even in his dreams, Nanyoung could feel not a sensation of falling somewhere, but of being held fast. So that he could feel him. Because I am here, because I want you to know I am here….