Episode 1278 I’m not wrong. (3)
Sigh.
The waves were quite rough and hit the boat, creating white foam. Cheongmyeong watched the scene in silence with sunken eyes.
‘It’s frustrating.’
If you are running on your own, you can spur your legs, and if you are riding a horse, you can urge your horse, but if you are traveling in a boat driven by the wind, there is a limit to how much speed you can increase with human power.
Therefore, from now until the moment you arrive in Gangnam, you should just pass the time like this.
‘Anyway, this kind of thing doesn’t suit my spiritual aptitude.’
In a way, this is truly natural. However, feeling frustrated in the face of such naturalness, it may be that Cheongmyeong should not have become a Taoist in the first place.
“You look like you’re thinking a lot?”
Cheongmyeong turned his head at the voice he heard. Green Forest King Lim So-byeong approached with a grin.
“Or you have no thoughts.”
“⋯⋯.”
“Which one are you?”
“Looks like this way?”
When Cheongmyeong pointed his fist with his chin, the Green Forest King slowly retreated.
Cheongmyeong laughed and went back to the sea… No, more precisely, I looked at Gangnam land beyond the sea.
“How long will it take?”
“well. “At the current rate, we won’t arrive until midnight.”
“It’s taking longer than I thought.”
“Well, if I just swim like the instructor is good at, it will be quick…”
Lim So-byeong glanced toward the deck. Haenam’s disciples were sitting here and there resting together, like exhausted horses. “If that happens,
those gentlemen will be completely stretched out.”
“hmm.”
Cheongmyeong sighed softly. Lim So-byeong looked at him with a strange smile.
“Are you sure you’ll be okay?”
Cheongmyeong remained silent. But Lim So-byeong continued calmly, as if he had not asked the question with the intention of hearing the answer in the first place. “Of course, I am a
person who just does what I am told, but isn’t he the one who must take responsibility?”
“If anyone hears it, they’ll think it doesn’t matter what happens to them.”
“It is a natural death for a treacherous person to fall in love with the wrong person. This is how the treasonous group naturally falls.”
“⋯⋯Is that what the Green Forest King would say?”
“What about the Green Forest King and Nabal? That’s exactly what I thought my role in the Cheonwoo Alliance would be.”
Cheongmyeong let out a small laugh. Anyway, he is a truly unique person.
However, from Lim So-byeong’s perspective, Cheongmyeong seemed to be an unusual person.
“Of course, I know that there is a reason for everything the dojo does…”
Lim So-byeong glanced at Haenam’s disciples with slightly cold eyes.
“I don’t know. Do you think it will be of any help if I drag such a load of luggage around?”
“⋯⋯.”
“If we can bring Haenam, one of the old factions, into the Cheonwoo Alliance, it will be a great symbol externally… but… well, a cause is a cause because it will give us strength later.”
Lim So-byeong continued with a strange expression,
“I don’t think that people who prioritize immediate practical interests over distant causes are necessarily wrong, do you?”
“What do you want to say?”
“Nothing in particular.”
Lim So-byeong shrugged his shoulders.
“I just wanted to ask. I was wondering if it would really be helpful to save those clumsy things that fell from exhaustion as if they had fought all the battles of the world alone, even though they had no experience in swinging a sword properly.”
At those words, Cheongmyeong also caught a glimpse of Haenam’s disciples. They looked exhausted.
Well, it’s not that I don’t understand. People who had lived their whole lives without having to see blood saw the sight of a person’s head being cut off and limbs flying in the air before their eyes. It would be even weirder if you didn’t get shocked when you faced it. Especially in today’s world.
But… Cheongmyeong also knows. Lim So-byeong’s point is not so wrong.
Having an excuse doesn’t change the situation. Cheongmyeong said, We need to take the kids who don’t know what fighting is and break through Gangnam. That’s Gangnam, where the Sapae-ryeon is holding on.
“If you’re going to oppose it, oppose it in advance.”
“Have you ever listened to me when I said no?”
Lim So-byeong scratched the side of my chin with the end of a fan.
“A strategist is basically a person who hates things that are inefficient. If you know that nothing will change if you oppose it, but going against it is just a waste of time. It’s pointless and only hurts your mouth.”
Then Cheongmyeong looked at Lim So-byeong without saying anything.
“Why are you doing that?”
“No…”
Cheongmyeong shook his head.
“I think I’ve heard that before.”
“Could it have been just one or two?”
“That’s right.”
– Why should I tell you? They’re going to execute me anyway and do whatever they want! I’d rather pay homage to small ears!
Cheongmyeong laughed without even realizing it. The image of Cheongjin yelling while raising the blood vessels in his neck flashed through my mind. It has passed.
It seems that Cheongmyeong hasn’t changed much since then. Even though he thought he had changed a lot,
“But if I tell you, something might change.”
“well.”
Lim So-byeong looked at Cheongmyeong with a strange look in his eyes and said,
“If it’s just stubbornness, it might be so.”
“⋯⋯.”
“But I think this isn’t just stubbornness.”
Qingming smiled and shook his head,
“I think you overestimate me.”
“Of course, that might be the case. Well, honestly, I know the probability of that happening is much higher.”
⋯⋯But what about this bastard? When Cheongmyeong quietly glared at Lim So-byeong, Lim immediately looked at the distant sea and trembled.
Then he quietly said again,
“Even so, I won’t be able to stop him.”
“why?”
When asked why, Lim So-byeong, who was silent for a moment, suddenly began to say something else:
“Ever since I was young, when I listened to old stories or studied history, there were parts that I really didn’t understand.”
“What?”
“The smartest people worked hard under stupid people and eventually lost.”
“⋯⋯.”
“In essence, a strategist is a position held by the smartest people of their time. So wouldn’t the conclusions they reach be the closest to the correct answer?”
“yes.”
“But those higher-ups always listen to those words and don’t give in to them, only to fall flat and regret it later, saying obvious lines like, ‘Ah, I should have listened to you back then.’”
“Are you criticizing me now?”
“Tsk. Please listen to the end.”
Cheongmyeong gave a disapproving look on his face, but Lim So-byeong didn’t care and continued,
“Do you know what the biggest question I felt when I saw that situation was?”
“⋯⋯Why don’t the superiors listen to me?”
“That’s not true. The superiors are just idiots who don’t listen to what they are told. That’s how they become the bosses. What’s the point in criticizing those who were born stupid in the first place? They’re just born stupid… “Oh no! I’m not swearing at you! Put your fist down!”
“…Be careful, you.”
When Cheongmyeong said that he didn’t like it at all, Lim So-byeong grinned.
“Anyway, that’s not what I was frustrated about. What I couldn’t understand was why the smartest people worked hard for people like that, doing things that didn’t make sense. They just did it. All you have to do is create a force.”
Cheongmyeong chuckled and asked back,
“So?”
“That’s why I thought. I shouldn’t do something like that. I should create my own force that only listens to me and destroy all the forces led by those idiots!”
“That’s why you became the Green Forest King?”
“Well… I only took on half of it.”
He actually took it upon himself, but if he really didn’t want to become the Green Forest King, there would have been many ways to do it. But he didn’t. Because he wanted to do it himself. “So? Then you just had to do what you thought.
”
“Yes. Of course I did as I thought. But I soon realized how much of a child’s delusion it was without reality.”
Lim So-byeong clicked his tongue hard as if he was annoyed.
“What if I say the right thing? They don’t even listen to me. Even if I tell them the right way, they ignore it as just desk-biting nonsense.”
“⋯⋯.”
“Persuasion? Oh, you can do it. Of course I tried it. But people don’t think that they might be wrong in the first place. Even if I tell them nine things are right, if one is slightly off, they bite it and say that everything I said was wrong, but it seems like they have a temperament. Really…!”
“You can’t win, right?”
“⋯⋯So I endured it.”
Cheongmyeong patted the limp Lim So-byeong on the shoulder.
“Thank you for your hard work.”
“Don’t even talk.”
Looking at Lim So-byeong’s tired face, Cheongmyeong laughed.
In fact, looking at it calmly, Lim So-byeong’s strength was not lacking. However, the problem was that it was not at a level worthy of the name Green Forest King. Moreover, he was an invalid who could not even use half of his skills until recently. .
In a place called Nokrim, where the principle of the law of the fittest is more faithful than anywhere else, how much would Lim So-byeong’s words have been used? It was
obvious even without looking at the hardships he must have gone through. At first, everyone, except for Nok-chae, who was loyal to his ancestors, properly regarded Lim So-byeong as the king of Nokrim. “But as you get older and your power level increases, your voice probably gets louder, does
n’t it?”
“If my goal was to eat and drink a moderate amount of green forest, that could have been possible. But what difference does that make? I end up becoming a foolish king of green forest, worse than my predecessor.”
“Hagiya.”
Lim So-byeong looked at Cheongmyeong.
“That’s when I saw him. He said nonsense, drew stupid conclusions, repeated ridiculous gambles, and was just a simpleton who was easy to kill… Oh no. I just said he was like that before.” ! In the past! Crolke! Cough! Oh my, I got sick…”
“⋯⋯.”
“And yet!”
Lim So-byeong grinned,
“There is a person who makes foolish decisions and is willing to risk his life, but the people around him are willing to follow that path.”
“⋯⋯.”
“That’s when I found out. Ah, I realized that such a person exists in the first place.”
Cheongmyeong smiled bitterly this time and shook his head,
“That’s an overestimation too.”
“Of course it is.”
⋯⋯But this bastard?
“But.”
“huh?”
“I guess I’m not the only one with that overestimation?”
Lim So-byeong made a small gesture towards the disciples of Haenam. Cheongmyeong also looked towards them.
“People who lived quietly and well in Haenam left Haenam, where they had lived all their lives, and walked to the grave, saying that a nobleman who did not know where they had come from showed them a way. “I’m going in. Even if I die, I will die there.”
“⋯⋯.”
“Do you think this is logically possible?”
“Because that is the most right way.”
“That’s what’s important.”
Lim So-byeong chuckled and said,
“If people only chose the right path and lived, there would be no such thing as war in the world. If people knew the right path and could act, the world would be full of good intentions. But what is the world like?”
“⋯⋯.”
“A dojo is not a person who suggests a right path that others do not know.”
Lim So-byeong grinned,
“He is the person who makes people walk on their own feet on a path that everyone knows but cannot dare to walk.”
Lim So-byeong’s gaze went beyond Cheongmyeong and headed toward Gangnam,
“even if the end of the road is a dead end.”
Cheongmyeong’s face, which had remained silent, hardened slightly.
