Etranger

Biyeon was protesting with a straight face. This was a bad atmosphere to think carefully in. This was a person who had hit her until her life was hanging by a thread in a fit of anger. Although he had grabbed her in a moment of crisis, there was no need to hit her so hard that she lost consciousness and almost died, there was no counter evidence to the fact that he had almost killed her. Who knows, he might even be a s.a.d.i.s.t who enjoys mistreating people. Biyeon held such behavior in contempt. Even worse, he hit and messed up a woman’s hair, she was incomparably angry.

“Hey… Lt. Kim!”

“Yes sir!”

Hearing San’s voice calling her, Biyeon crisply turned her neck and faced him. An action fueled by instinct. San lowered his voice. So far there was something else.[TN: Lost in translation] It will be something scary or gruesome.

“Watch your words. So you’re quite the shameless one aren’t you. Regardless of whether or not you’re complaining or spewing bulls.h.i.+t out of your mouth, don’t you feel that you should first consider how your carelessness put another person’s life at risk? I don’t know if you remember, but you brought about a dangerous situation, it was perhaps one of the most stupid thing I’ve ever seen. An incredibly brainless act. Now let me ask you, you say that I beat you? When our parachutes became tangled in each other, do you remember trying to open the reserve parachute?”

“I remember sir”

Clearly, she had tried to open the reserve parachute in that dangerous situation as she had been taught during her training. Then suddenly she felt a blow and lost consciousness on the spot.

“What kind of dumba.s.s taught you to do that in that scenario?” San looked at Biyeon as though she were a fool.

“That’s…”

Biyeon hesitated. Is what she learned wrong? Or did she perhaps misinterpret what she was trained… after thinking for a bit, she wasn’t sure.

“Look here you little chick. Listen carefully. The reserve parachute is only used when the main parachute doesn’t open. When the reserve parachute is released while the main parachute is already unfurled, the reserve parachute will open up from beneath the main parachute. From there it’ll just get tangled. Once that happens, there’s no way to resolve the issue. At that point the only outcome is death.

What you ended up doing was exactly what I just described. If had gone ahead and died on your own I wouldn’t have said done, but I didn’t exactly want to follow you to my death. That’s why I hit you just enough so that you would pa.s.s out. Thanks to you being pa.s.sed out, I was able to handle the situation. Have I given a suitable explanation?”

“…”

“And what? Why did I slap you to wake you up? Because you were a woman I shook your shoulder, but who would have known that all discipline would have disappeared and that there wouldn’t be even the faintest of responses. Because of that should I have instead hit your chest? Should I have caressed your stomach? Should I have kicked your a.s.s? Or did you want me to kiss you? My face makes me look like a pushover. [TN: Author says 그나마 만만한 게 얼굴이더군 which means “at least easy thing is your face” or something like that] There isn’t much of a misunderstanding, although my mood might be bad, I don’t feel much shame. I’ve thought about this a lot too!  If you were a guy I would have started with breaking off your d.i.c.k.”

“…”

Biyeon forgot what she was going to say and hung her head. Her face dyed with in an extremely red color. This time she was really careless. Her mistakes had nearly led to death not once, but twice. Truly a fatal mistake that caused one’s life to hang from a thread. Even if it was to the point of death, there would still be no words that could be said. She had put the cart before the horse, resulting in her pride getting pride and subsequently causing her anger to flare up… I think I’d be p.i.s.sed too if I were him. It was very embarra.s.sing. She would probably not be able to face the man in front of her again.The moment pa.s.sed in an awkward silence.

“Sorry…”

“Eh… regardless it was a talk that resulted in discomfort.”

Before Biyeon muttered out some words, San scratched his head before fixing the field cap in place and putting it back on. Then he promptly got up. San picked up the field shovel and walked forward towards the tree whilst swinging his arms. Anyhow, his instincts told him that it was not safe here. Even if this isn’t The Republic of Korea, there’s still a need to mark a boundary and reinforce it in this strange land. Sometimes in a place like this, there animals like wild boars or other savage beasts.

San briefly touched a tree as thick as an adult’s forearm before pus.h.i.+ng it with the palm of his hands. Making a “dutuduk” sound, the roots were severed and the base of the tree was ripped out of the ground before falling to the ground. It definitely looked like a tree, but it felt as though he were plucking gra.s.s. He hoisted up the two cut up tree with two hands. For now, it feels light. The inside doesn’t seem to be hollow. San trimmed the piece of wood, lopping off the twigs with a ‘tuk-tuk’ sound before finally tr.i.m.m.i.n.g it down to look like a cudgel. From a cross section he had cut, a sap-like substance dripped onto the floor.

After examining the roughly hewn cudgel by spinning it in his hand, San gripped it with both hands and lifted it up to his shoulders and exerted his strength on the wood.

‘Pogak’

The center easily gave way. Although he had forcibly used his strength to cut through it, the cross section looked like as if someone had made a clean cut through a cuc.u.mber.

“Hmmm… I held a vague inkling since earlier when I had hit the tree branches, but the wood in this area is very weak. It’s too weak to use a lumber. I wonder, is this big tree like so as well?”

San promptly took a look at the large tree besides him, and after examining it up and down, he promptly pushed it with all of his strength.

‘Pudeuk’

The sound of roots being plucked, no rather the sound of roots being torn out of the ground the tree began to tilt in the direction it was pushed.

‘What? Huh- this… what is this? It seems it’d be more comfortable to just do things rather than think about it.’

San knocked down the tree he had pushed earlier. Like rotten stalks of straw, the tree fell forwards while knocking into smaller trees. San pulled out his knife and held it in his hand. He felt that with trees as tender as these, it would be a simple matter to chop them up with his knife.

‘Hmm… where can I use the knife.’

‘Seogeok – seogeok -’

“This is quite fun. Who in the world cuts up wood into logs with a knife like they’re cutting up tofu. It doesn’t seem like a fence made out of this would stand well.”

San muttered to himself while cutting away at the wood the way he saw fit. He gathered up some dry pieces of firewood and kindled a fire in two places, then using the plant stems of a plant similar to kudzu, he woved together a wooden fence-like barrier around the tent.

His mouth hung wide open, San stared in disbelief at the figure of Biyeon diligently moving around here and there preparing something in the area. The pale light emanating from the campfire revealed an unreal scene. In an instant she snapped big trees as though she were snapping chopsticks, her figure looked like she was tr.i.m.m.i.n.g kimchi radishes!

‘Definitely someone with an incredible amount of strength.’

In fact, having remembered the time she had spent unconscious after having been hit in the back of her head, she was just barely sc.r.a.ping along. For some reason her body s.h.i.+vered.  As expected, Biyeon was examining her gear as advised by San. She had no choice but to partic.i.p.ate in the parachute drop exercise, a symbol of the special forces, but because she played a supporting role towards the rear of the main forces, her gear was very basic. There was an incredibly simple tent or rain coat, a sleeping bag, two MREs, and in addition there were operation instructions and other items important for translators, including writing utensils, an electronic dictionary, and some stationary. There were also toiletries, female products, various household medicines, and other miscellaneous goods.

They pa.s.sed their night as such. The antic.i.p.ated search party from the main army never came.

The dawn of a new day came. They will probably be able to take off soon.

Dawn shattering light came from over the horizon, the dusky morning lit up in red. However the eyes of the two soldiers sunk more deeply than an abyss.