Chapter 5: The Ferry

We were halfway across the courtyard when I saw her.

Yeon-hee. Coming out of the kitchen hall in a red short jacket and a tight cream skirt that stopped way above where any physician’s skirt should stop. Hair down. Lips painted.

My brain stopped working for a second.

What the fuck, Yeon-hee?

She saw me and went pink. "Mu-jin. You — I —"

"You look—" I looked her up and down. Slowly. "Damn."

"My mother sent a boy. She’s sick again. Across the river." She glanced at the sky, then back at me, and dropped her voice. "I’ll be back before the night bell. I swear."

"We’re crossing too. Academy."

Tae-man looked at her. Looked at me. Looked at the bite mark on my neck that was very clearly not from a blonde.

"Bro," he whispered. "Another one?"

"Shut up."

Clack.

We all turned.

Hong Seo-rin was sitting on the bench by the gate with her ledger on her knees. She didn’t look up. She just flicked one bead across her abacus.

"Physician. Baek Mu-jin." Clack. "Leaving together. At dusk."

"I’m going to my mother’s!" Yeon-hee squeaked.

"Of course you are." Clack.

She finally looked up. At me. Then back down at her numbers like we weren’t even worth the ink.

[Desire +5.]

What the hell does five mean? Is that good? Is she adding me up or subtracting me?

We got out of there.

"She saw us," Yeon-hee said on the way to the dock. "In the office. And now this. She knows. She definitely knows."

"Hey, she hasn’t told anyone yet."

"Yet." She chewed her lip. "Seo-rin unni doesn’t do anything for free. If she’s keeping quiet, she wants something."

I didn’t know what Hong Seo-rin wanted.

I had a feeling I was gonna find out.

The ferry dock was a mess. Some temple festival on the other bank — lanterns, incense, half the city trying to cross at once. When the flat ferry finally bumped against the pier, people shoved on like their lives depended on it.

We got crammed into the back corner by the rail. Tae-man got separated, wedged between a fishmonger and a guy carrying a live goose. The goose hated him immediately.

And me?

I was right behind Yeon-hee. Again.

There wasn’t even room to turn around. The whole boat rocked, and every time it rocked, the crowd pushed, and every time the crowd pushed—

Yeah.

That tight cream skirt was thin. Way too thin. And I was very, very awake.

She went still. Then she looked back over her shoulder at me. Not shocked. Not shy. Just... amused. The doctor look again.

"Again?" she whispered. "Do you ever rest?"

"It’s your fault. You can’t wear a skirt like that and expect me to behave."

"Oh?" She leaned back into me. Just a little. "What would you rather do with it?"

"Honestly? Slide it up. Slowly."

"In front of the goose?"

"The goose doesn’t care."

She laughed — that bright loud laugh — and half the ferry turned to look at us. She slapped her hand over her mouth. Her shoulders shook.

Then, when everyone looked away again, she pushed her ass back into me. Slow. Grinding. Right in the middle of the river with forty people around us.

God.

[Desire +10.]

The system again. A day ago she’d have died before doing this in public.

"Chill," I breathed in her ear, even though I didn’t want her to chill at all. "Way too many people."

"You’re the one poking me."

"I can’t control that."

"I know." She smiled at the water. "I took your pulse, remember? You can’t control anything."

The ferry bumped the far dock. People started shoving off.

She turned around fast and fixed my collar, like a wife. Her fingers brushed my neck right over the bite she gave me.

"Night bell," she said quietly. "Don’t be late. If you’re late, I’m starting without you."

Then she was gone into the festival crowd.

I stood there blinking.

Starting without me?

What does that even mean?

Tae-man finally fought his way over. He had a feather in his hair and a red mark on his ear.

"That goose bit me, bro."

"I saw."

"You were too busy being humped by a physician to save me."

"She wasn’t humping. She was... adjusting."

"Adjusting," he said flatly. "Sure."

The academy was mostly dark. Outer disciples don’t get lanterns after sundown — too expensive. But there was one window still lit, high up in the scroll library.

"He’s copying it," Tae-man growled. "Right now. Our formation. Making a clean copy with only his name on it."

We took the library stairs two at a time.

Nam Gi-chul was hunched over a desk under one candle, brush in hand. Round glasses. Skinny neck. He looked like a stick insect that learned to read. Spread out in front of him was the scroll for the Three Willows Formation — the three-man sword pattern our group had to present tomorrow morning.

At the bottom, in very neat handwriting, it said: Developed by Nam Gi-chul.

That’s it. Nobody else.

"Gi-chul," I said.

He jumped so hard his brush flew across the room.

"B-Baek Mu-jin! Gong Tae-man! What are you doing here? It’s night!"

"What are YOU doing here?" Tae-man jabbed a finger at the scroll. "Our names, you four-eyed—"

"Your names?" Gi-chul pushed his glasses up his nose. He was shaking, but he still did it. "What did you do? Hm? Tell me one thing you did. One move. One line of the scroll."

Tae-man opened his mouth.

Closed it.

Looked at me.

I opened my mouth.

And... nothing.

Because honestly? He wasn’t wrong. The old Mu-jin probably helped. The new Mu-jin had been busy.

"We agreed," I tried. "You’d write it, we’d perform it. Three-man formation. You can’t do a three-man formation with one man."

"I’ll find two others." He sniffed. "Better ones."

Tae-man lunged. I grabbed the back of his collar.

"Motherf— let me go, I’ll fold him in half—"

"Calm down."

I let go of Tae-man and walked over to the desk. Slowly. I leaned down until my face was right in front of Gi-chul’s little round glasses.

I had nothing. Zero. But my last life was mostly sitting in dark rooms with guys exactly like Gi-chul. I knew one thing about them for sure.

They always have a secret.

"Gi-chul," I said quietly. "If you do this... we’re gonna tell everyone."

"T-tell everyone what?"

"You know what." I let it hang there. "That thing. In your room."

He went white.

Then red.

Then a color I’d only ever seen on Elder Gu.

"You can’t!" he squeaked. "You can’t tell anyone about the paintings of Instructor Cha! They’re art! They’re anatomical studies!"

Silence.

Tae-man and I looked at each other.

"...The what?" Tae-man said.

Gi-chul realized what he’d just said. His mouth snapped shut. He grabbed his scroll, grabbed his candle, grabbed his bag, and ran out of the library so fast he left a little breeze behind him.

"HEY! GET BACK HERE!" Tae-man yelled after him.

The candle went with him. We were standing in the dark.

Then Tae-man started laughing. Then I started laughing. We laughed so hard I had to hold onto the desk.

"Paintings," Tae-man wheezed. "Of Instructor Cha. Anatomical studies."

"Like he’s the only one," I said. "Every guy in this academy has thought about Instructor Cha at least once."

It was true. Instructor Cha Mi-ran taught sword theory in a uniform that was technically regulation. Technically. Thick hips, tight sash, a voice that made you forget what a sword was. Half the outer disciples failed her class on purpose just to take it again.

"So is he keeping us on the scroll or not?" Tae-man asked, still wiping his eyes.

"Who knows. He’ll come around. A guy with a secret like that doesn’t want enemies."

Then I grinned. "Anyway. I’ve got way better news."

We walked back through the dark training yard, and I told him. The stairs. The physician. The blonde with the sword. The tub. The talisman call.

By the time I got to the part where her husband called me a young fool while I was in his bed, Tae-man had to stop walking and put his hands on his knees.

"Bro," he said. "Bro. BRO."

"I know."

"You’re the luckiest bastard in the Central Plains."

"I know."

"Set me up with one of them. Please. I’m your best friend."

"Bros before—" I stopped. Thought about Ayla’s tub. "Nah. Get your own milfs, bro."

He threw a shoe at me.

I made it back to the inn just as the last light went out of the sky. My whole body felt like wet rice. Two women, two fights, one goose, one ferry, and one very confused nerd.

Today had drained me. Mentally. Physically. And very, very sexually.

I flopped on my bed. The cracked jar dripped in the corner. Ayla’s pink robe was still crumpled on the floor.

Soon. The night bell. The hot spring. Yeon-hee in that steam, with nobody around.

You can do whatever you want with me.

Just thinking about it, my dick woke up like it had its own heartbeat.

Then somebody knocked.

Three sharp knocks. Like a teacher.

Yeon-hee? Already? She couldn’t wait, huh?

I grinned, got up, slid the door open—

It wasn’t Yeon-hee.

[Target Detected.]

Thick. Holy hell, thick. Long brown hair pinned in a strict bun. Thin wire spectacles — real ones, imported, the kind only rich families can afford — sitting on a sharp nose. A navy scholar’s robe buttoned all the way to the throat like armor, and still, somehow, it was losing the fight against her chest. The sash was cinched tight around a waist that flared out into hips that could stop a cart.

She looked like every strict tutor I’d ever been scared of.

She also looked like every dirty dream I’d ever had about strict tutors.

She crossed her arms. Which only made it worse.

Then her eyes dropped. Straight to my trousers. Where my dick was still very much awake from thinking about the hot spring.

She stared at it for a full second. Didn’t even blink.

Then her eyes snapped back up to my face, colder than before.

"Baek Mu-jin," she said. "I am Gwak Ji-yeon."

I blinked. "Okay?"

"Nam Gi-chul’s mother."

Wait. What?

Gi-chul — the skinny stick insect with the glasses — came out of THIS?

"My son just ran home in tears," she said, every word sharp as a knife. "He says you and that Gong boy cornered him in the library. Threatened him. Mocked him." She stepped closer. "He has been bullied his whole life. I will not let it happen here too."

Oh, fuck.

And from the other side of my wall, I heard Ayla’s bed creak. She was awake.

And somewhere outside, any minute now, the night bell was gonna ring.