Chronicles of the Martial God’s Return - Chapter 4

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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“Hmm…….”
“Mm…….”
Dan Woo-hyeon gazed at the scattered items across the courtyard, swallowing a groan. Before him lay a doe and an assortment of wild mountain herbs, all spread out in disarray.
As he stared at them, Hwa So-mi released a matching sigh, as if mirroring him precisely.
“How do you suppose we should prepare these so people will speak of us as culinary masters?”
“I think the greens should be seasoned and the venison roasted, and that’s the best way to do it.”
Hwa So-mi answered with surprising confidence.
There was no one here capable of elaborate cooking anyway, so roasting or eating things plain was inevitable.
There was no point wasting time on unnecessary deliberation.
The wisest course was simply to eat it as soon as possible.
“But don’t you think the quantity is rather large?”
“Mm— so where should we put it?”
Dan Woo-hyeon himself did not eat much. Hwa So-mi, being at an age when appetites ran high, consumed considerably more.
The haggard, skeletal appearance she’d had when they first met had vanished entirely. Now her cheeks had grown round and full.
It was Dan Woo-hyeon’s doing—catching fish, wild boar, and deer at every meal and feeding them to her.
Yet the provisions before them were substantial. Even if So-mi’s belly were bottomless as a furnace, she could not devour an entire doe without leaving something behind.
Having lived as a beggar for so long, Dan Woo-hyeon found it difficult to waste food.
If he were to slice the meat thin and dry it in a place safe from scavengers, it would make for quite appetizing jerky.
“We have nowhere to store it.”
“We can’t leave it outside either.”
Hwa So-mi shrugged her small shoulders, and Dan Woo-hyeon nodded in agreement.
The house itself was built well enough and large, but now that they’d accumulated stores of food, there was simply no proper space to keep them.
They had not built a storage shed.
“There’s nothing for it then.”
Dan Woo-hyeon picked up a hammer and nails.
He intended to build a small storage shed in the corner of the manor.
“You’re building something again?”
“Mm……! What kind of proper manor lacks a storage shed?”
“That’s true. Hehe, then I’ll help too!”
Hwa So-mi began grunting and hefting the materials one by one.
Though there were only tools and wooden nails to work with, even these were quite heavy for a child, and she groaned with each lift.
Dan Woo-hyeon let out a quiet laugh at the sight.
Well then, shall we build a shed?

Tap-tap-tap—
Hwa So-mi, now seven years old, watched Dan Woo-hyeon with an expression of wonder. The way he held the hammer and began to construct something evoked the image of a goblin craftsman.
And that hammer—it was surely a goblin’s magic mallet.
Once in hand and swung, there was nothing it could not craft.
Hwa So-mi reflected on this.
She was convinced that Dan Woo-hyeon must have been a carpenter before becoming a beggar. He denied it himself, but on this point she was certain of her judgment.
Perhaps he was ashamed of it.
How else could he create so many things with such skill?
Now he gripped a massive beam and tossed it aside as though it weighed nothing.
It looked so heavy that not only Hwa So-mi, but even her parents—had they still been alive—could not have lifted it.
Yet he moved and fashioned such things with complete ease.
Truly remarkable.
Within an hour of beginning to swing the hammer, the shed was already taking its final form. How many people in the world could create something like this in such a short span of time?
‘How amazing, our mister is!’
She felt a warm satisfaction watching it all unfold.
Once again, she was reminded that her choice had been right. Even when her parents were alive, her father had made many things. But most of them were simple, and he failed far more often than he succeeded.
In that sense, Dan Woo-hyeon was nothing short of a virtuoso.
Hwa So-mi, who had been beaming with joy, suddenly went rigid.
Thinking of her parents brought the familiar sting back to her heart.
For a moment her spirits flagged, but soon her smile returned.
After all, Hwa So-mi was no longer alone.
She gazed at Dan Woo-hyeon before her and found herself breaking into a gentle smile.
While lost in such thoughts, the storage shed was suddenly complete. With windows cut for ventilation and a door fitted into place, a proper space had come into being.
“Wow—that looks amazing!”
“Ha, it turned out better than I expected.”
Dan Woo-hyeon felt satisfied too. Now they had a proper place to store and organize their supplies.
The Manor looked far more established.
He dressed the dead roe deer and arranged the wild vegetables inside, storing everything away. When he closed the door and stepped out, his chest felt inexplicably lighter.
“But…”
“Hmm?”
“What should we eat?”
Hwa So-mi tilted her head. They’d put all their food stores away in the cellar.
Getting them back out again would be simple enough, but today he’d been craving fresh fish rather than game meat or raw greens.
Dan Woo-hyeon, catching her meaning, smiled and spoke up.
“Why don’t we go fishing? It’s been a while.”
“Yes, let’s!”
Hwa So-mi’s face lit up with a bright smile.

***

“…”
Dan Woo-hyeon was thinking.
Whether there existed in this world beings blessed by heaven itself.
He, too, must have appeared that way to others once. Born with a genius for Martial Arts, quick understanding, and a mind sharp enough to adapt and apply what he learned.
He possessed every talent that would make any warrior green with envy—the very best gifts—and yet somehow he felt defeated. Thoroughly defeated.
By none other than Hwa So-mi.
He’d made her a Fishing Rod first.
Then he caught earthworms for bait. Digging in soil and collecting worms was trivial for him.
Soon his small container held about ten squirming earthworms.
But that wasn’t the problem.
The moment Hwa So-mi started digging, earthworms swarmed everywhere. The modest container seemed to fill with nearly a hundred in no time.
At first he thought it mere luck, but on reflection, he realized that whenever they went fishing before, So-mi had always begun with an abundance of worms.
That much could be coincidence.
Perhaps the spot where she dug simply happened to be rich with earthworms. But once they actually began fishing, his suspicions hardened into certainty.
“Ah! I caught another one!”
The fishing rod Hwa So-mi now held was made from crude branches. A large catch should naturally snap it or break the line, yet this girl had never once seen her rod break, no matter how hefty the fish.
Meanwhile, in half an hour, Dan Woo-hyeon had managed only three fish.
Even those were barely worth keeping—two he’d released for being too small, and the third was hardly larger than his palm.
But Hwa So-mi had already landed more than fifteen.
Not a single broken line, not one lost hook, and nearly all fifteen were prize catches.
The fish seemed to throw themselves at her deliberately.
Unlike Hwa So-mi, Dan Woo-hyeon had already snapped three fishing rods, and whenever he thought he had something on the line, the fish escaped mid-strike, or the moment he hauled it up the bait stripped away and vanished.
Dan Woo-hyeon, who’d always had some confidence in his fishing, now grasped viscerally what Good Fortune truly meant.
No—it went far beyond simple Good Fortune.
When they’d climbed the mountain, it was Dan Woo-hyeon who’d hunted the roe deer, but all the wild vegetables had been So-mi’s contribution.
In truth, he couldn’t even recall ever showing her what edible plants looked like.
Yet she’d just picked plants at random, and somehow gathered several times more than what he’d managed to collect.
The herbs now stored in the cellar were essentially all hers.
‘This girl is blessed. Her luck is extraordinary.’
For instance, suppose one gathered twenty pebbles from the ground and hurled them high into the sky. Or better—actually tried it. They wouldn’t cause serious injury, but a solid hit would hurt considerably.
Dan Woo-hyeon scooped up twenty small stones and tossed them skyward.
They climbed high, then came raining down like hail.
Clatter-clatter-clatter.
The pebbles scattered across Dan Woo-hyeon’s head.
They struck his shoulders and scalp, his entire body evenly.
But what of Hwa So-mi, standing nearby?
“What? Why are you doing that?”
Not a single stone touched her. He’d scattered them in all directions—logically, at least one should have grazed or struck her. Yet the moment the pebbles fell, a gust of wind arose and swept them away from above her head.
‘Remarkable…’
She was undoubtedly a being blessed by heaven.
“You were born with fortune,” he murmured.
“Pardon?”
“Nothing. We’ve caught enough. Let’s head back.”
“Yes!”
Hwa So-mi sprang to her feet. Dan Woo-hyeon watched her struggle with the bucket of caught fish, then smiled and took it from her hands.
Hwa So-mi bowed her head slightly in greeting.
It was her way of saying thank you. Dan Woo-hyeon had never received such courtesy from anyone before, and while the gesture still felt strange to him, he was beginning to grow accustomed to it.
“Look! Look at this! A butterfly, a butterfly!”
She laughed brightly at the flutter of wings dancing around them and gave chase. He worried she might stumble and fall, but he said nothing and simply watched her play.
The child chasing the butterfly soon came to a halt.
She seemed to have noticed something, crouching down and reaching out her hand.
The butterfly no longer held her interest, it seemed.
“What is this?”
So-mi pointed without hesitation at something hidden among the brush. Dan Woo-hyeon, observing it from beside her, felt the corners of his mouth twitch with an awkward smile.
“Mountain Ginseng.”
“Wow… wow!”
She truly was a remarkable child.

***

A rumor began to spread.
There was a Manor that had suddenly sprung up near Dongjeong Lake.
When word circulated that such a sprawling estate had been built in mere days, many dismissed it as mere fantasy and laughed.
They knew well how hard and unyielding the soil of that region was.
The ground was not only packed and difficult to work, but large stones lay scattered everywhere. To construct a Manor, every single one would have to be removed.
And with dense trees and overgrown brush surrounding the area, one would need to fell trees one by one just to make any progress at all.
A Manor built in such a place?
People simply laughed it off.
But there was one place that could not.
The Provincial Office managing the area around Dongjeong Lake.
Provincial Magistrate Hong Won-chang regarded the constables with a puzzled expression.
“Is that true?”
“We’re not entirely certain, but… the rumor does seem to be circulating.”
Hong Won-chang swallowed a low groan. It was possible for someone to claim ownership of unclaimed land. However, all the land near Dongjeong Lake belonged to the state, and nothing could be built there without the Provincial Office’s permission.
If this rumor were true, it would not be a matter to brush aside lightly.
Of course, it was likely just preposterous fiction.
“Ridiculous. A Manor built in mere days? It’s not as though a ghost constructed it.”
“I share your skepticism, but… I thought the report ought to be brought to your attention regardless.”
The two men snorted and laughed as though the notion were absurd.
No matter how he thought about it, none of it made sense. It seemed like some embellished tale concocted by gossips and tale-tellers.
Still, it was a welcome opportunity to escape from his duties for once.
Hong Won-chang rose from his seat, smiling.
“I’m curious enough to go have a look myself.”
“Will that be alright?”
“Ha, if there’s a ghost, I’ll catch it and bring it back. Who am I, after all? Why, I’m Provincial Magistrate Hong Won-chang. Haha!”
Watching Hong Won-chang laugh heartily, the man lowered his head. Holding the position of Provincial Magistrate was no simple matter.
Thus, Hong Won-chang’s display of confidence was entirely justified.
“Then I shall escort you at once.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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