140.Persuading the Magistrate
Yang Johwi answered as if irritated and slashed down the stacked furnishings beside the magistrate.
A crashing noise exploded through the hall, and the magistrate wet himself where he stood.
"So why would a faint-hearted man do such a thing?"
"Why… what do you mean…?"
The thin, small-framed magistrate stammered.
"If you were going to cower like this, why mobilize troops to attack Jinga Manor?"
"What reason does one need to strike a traitor!"
Soun seized on that answer.
"Branding a loyal man a traitor—was that not a temporary measure used by power to preserve itself?
Do you truly call that truth?"
"What does truth matter? If His Majesty names him traitor, then traitor he is."
Though Soun's voice was young, the magistrate's reply carried forced conviction.
"So even if he were no traitor, once His Majesty declared it so, you gathered troops and requested reinforcements."
"That is correct."
"If I were in your place, I would choose my words carefully before someone holding my life in his hand.
A man who stirs such matters for the sake of office or promotion would go further still to preserve his own life.
Would he not?"
There was an unspoken threat in Soun's tone.
The magistrate understood that a single wrong word could end him.
A youthful voice did not make the danger light.
Even the mounted warriors behind this boy deferred to him.
They moved with caution.
"What is it you want?"
Soun stepped forward and laid the crescent blade of his polearm across the magistrate's shoulder.
The thin edge rested along his shortened neck.
Warm blood began to seep downward.
The magistrate trembled again.
Tears gathered in his eyes.
The smell rose from his soaked trousers.
"Do not rush forward and act zealously.
Comply with the palace orders in form only.
You cannot refuse outright, I know that.
But to take the lead in persecuting loyal men—does that not shame you, a student of Confucius and Mencius?
What is worth more than your own life?
If you carry out orders only in appearance, you will live.
Otherwise, when men like me come, we will take the heads of magistrates one by one.
That much is well within our power."
The magistrate blinked rapidly.
"If I fail to carry out the palace's orders—"
Soun cut him off with a sharp bark.
"Carry them out suitably. That is enough."
The curved blade pressed deeper.
A thin line split the skin at his neck, and blood trickled down.
"Otherwise…"
Soun shifted his grip, letting a trace of internal force flow into the weapon.
Cold energy spilled from the blade, and the magistrate's body froze.
Just before his head might have fallen, he dropped to his knees.
"I will do it. I will comply. Spare me."
He wept openly, urine still staining his clothes.
Whether the tears were of humiliation, relief, or simple survival, no one could tell.
Soun withdrew the polearm.
"We will purge the remaining troops and withdraw.
Afterward, you will appear to obey the Emperor's orders.
You know well those orders do not truly come from him.
See that the people of Anyang suffer no harm.
Restore what was damaged without delay.
And personally offer condolences to those who died in vain."
"I will do as you say."
Only then did the magistrate recall the name that had circulated.
The boy general who shattered Gatteuprip's forces, who broke enemies at the vanguard without restraint, upright and righteous, followed by all…
So this is that boy. He had hidden in Jinga Manor…
"Think of the generals who died before battle even began.
Your path is yours to choose.
As a magistrate, you may devote yourself wholly to extinguishing so-called traitors,
or you may walk a double path in the name of truth.
Choose."
"I will follow your words."
The magistrate remained kneeling.
Relief at survival made him add one more line.
"I failed to recognize the young general who defeated the barbarians…"
Soun turned away without comment.
The magistrate had known the truth all along.
He had once ridden thirty li beyond the city walls to welcome General Jin Mugwang upon his triumphant return from the southern campaign.
To abase oneself to survive was human.
But even in abasement, a man ought to know shame.
The bearing of the young general who had remained to guard the general's ancestral home after the war moved the heart.
His words were clear, reasoned, unshaken.
After Soun left, the magistrate collapsed where he knelt and wept.
He was afraid.
He was grateful to be alive.
And he was ashamed.
After defeating the Jinyiwei, the Baekryongdae vanished like the wind and returned to Jinga-jang.
The Jinyiwei(Imperial Guards) soldiers, routed and stripped of their commander, scattered in all directions.
The magistrate, shaken awake by a conversation held at the edge of life and death, regained his composure and restored order within the city.