Chapter 26: The Black-Haired Storyteller Of Chilgok County (5)
Dragging my ailing body, I dragged myself back to my near-collapsing shanty.
I carelessly stripped off my clothes, which were heavy and soaked from the rain. The old clothes had become ragged, drenched, torn, and dirty.
Next time I saw Mr. Wang, I must ask for some old clothes.
It was fortunate that I had kept my Joseon traditional clothes separate. They were expensive, and I only had one set. I had been leaving them at Mr. Wangs fabric store, never expecting they would come in handy like this.
After hastily cleaning myself, I lay down on the makeshift straw mat bed.
My body screamed in pain, but my mind was clearer than ever. Perhaps this was what they meant when they said people became the strongest when they faced hope.
Ending Conditions
I shouted out for hope.
[Ending Condition: Capture the true heroine.]
The green pop-up window in front of me clearly displayed the ending condition in Korean. How long has it been since Ive seen Korean writing? They said you cried over your homelands food when living abroad. Just seeing Korean writing moved me deeply.
Status Window, Status, System
There was no response. As expected, it only responded to the phrase ending condition.
So, youre only going to tell me how to leave this world? Im so, so grateful. Really.
I looked at the leaking ceiling. Did my sarcastic words escape through those gaps? I hoped they would reach the heavens.
Capture the true heroine, huh? The ending condition is too much.
I couldnt help but laugh at the absurdity.
The true heroine. heroine. The real heroine.
In harem manga or novels, they used the term true wife in fights over who the real wife was. But in visual novels, true heroine had a slightly different meaning.
Is there a hidden heroine?
Hidden heroine. This was the most common usage of true heroine in visual novels.
The developers first sold the game using the title heroine as the face of the work.
Even after clearing the title heroines route, gamers often started a second playthrough, wanting to explore other heroines.
In the second or third playthrough, they discovered an unexpected heroine with hidden backstories or twists.
Sometimes, these characters had deeper and more fulfilling stories than the title heroine.
Such characters were called the true heroines.
Werent there only two heroines?
There certainly were attractive female characters in the story, though not heroines. Could one of them be the true heroine?
But the term true heroine isnt used just in that way.
In games with only two heroines, one was often considered the true heroine.
If one characters dislikeability was too high, the other was seen as the true heroine.
If asked who I find less likable, honestly, I dislike both.
A princess who screamed Fueee at the protagonist or a woman who destroyed her husbands family because she didnt want to marry.
Their beauty was so unfairly overwhelming that it covered everything else. Both were disqualified as visual novel heroines.
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There was another case where the term true heroine was used.
In a game with only two heroines, if one character received a significantly more important story, the heroine with the more substantial story was called the true heroine.
How would I know who has the more important story?
I had only cleared the princesss story. I hadnt cleared Moyong Sang-ahs story. Damn this world.
I didnt like the princesss story, but I couldnt conclude that Moyong Sang-ah was the true heroine without clearing her story to compare.
Moyong Sang-ah being the true heroine is also a problem.
Lets say I faked my death perfectly, then suddenly reappeared.
Hehehe. Actually, I was alive. Wont you see the true heroine ending with me?
I wondered how I would react.
Would I tremble with feelings of betrayal, questioning why she had deceived me? Or worse, would she refuse to return her wealth and opt to bury me alive? The reaction to my reappearance, after having bid a proper farewell, was unpredictable.
Moreover, I was still regarded as a traitor in Joseon.
If I returned to the Moyong Family, Moyong Bi might capture me and send me to Joseon with Moyong Sang-ah. I would face execution, and Moyong Sang-ah would be sold as a slave under the false accusation of hiding my death.
Even with Moyong Sang-ah being the true heroine, I couldnt simply return to the Moyong Family now.
The princess might be the true heroine, it could be Moyong Sang-ah, or perhaps a third character. What am I supposed to do? Ugh.
As I pondered, my bruised body cried out in pain once more. Fortunately, I had suffered no broken bones. At least the art of spitting up blood () proved useful in this situation.
Even if I identified the true heroine, there was still a problem.
Who would be charmed by a black-haired barbarian who had nothing?
She even sent a wedding invitation to the protagonist.
What kind of mockery was that?
However, since I was now in this world, that fact had become a beacon of hope.
I didnt know who the true heroine was, but even on a second playthrough, the game UI hadnt changed. This meant that these scores were still crucial for reaching the ending.
Searching for the true heroine was too uncertain. How could I, wandering the vast Central Plains, know who the true heroine was? But money and fame were different.
Even if I didnt find the true heroine, accumulating enough money and fame would eventually draw her to me.
A book? Are you planning to write a storybook?
Yes, Id like to try writing a storybook.
Traveling the country as a storyteller would only make me known as a famous storyteller in a county or province.
Would that be enough to achieve the fame score needed to attract the true heroine?
It was uncertain. What was certain was that no wuxia novel ever mentioned a storyteller who, famous for storytelling, surpassed the greatest swordsman, the devil of martial arts, the emperor of swords, or the leader of the martial arts alliance.
A storybook written by a Joseon storyteller Thats certainly intriguing.
After much deliberation, the conclusion returned to writing a novel.
Of course, the fact that I couldnt immediately make money from a book didnt change.
But fame might be different.
The novels in this world were rigid and uninteresting. Most were written for moral teachings or biographies of great figures.
Once a book became famous, it would spread on its own. It was a way for my fame to resonate without moving an inch.
I would build fame and wealth through a novel.
And then the true heroine would come to me.
Right now, this was the only attempt I could make to win over the true heroine.
Yes, if it turns out well, Ill show it to you.
Alright. Go out of the fabric store, turn right, and keep going; youll find Yangs paper shop. Mention my name, and theyll give you a discount.
Thank you.
I thanked Mr. Wang and left the fabric store.
Even after scraping together every penny, this is all I could manage.
Mr. Wangs recommendation, my haggling, and the money I dug up from a corner of my shanty.
All I managed to acquire was this indistinct ink, indistinguishable from proper ink or just soot water. Instead of recycled paper, I had weed paper () made by mixing weeds with recycled paper.
The brush was nearly threadbare, and I couldnt even find a proper inkstone; I had to make do with grinding ink on a rough stone.
I can barely make one book with this.
Yellowish, low-quality paper. Ink full of impurities and dull in color.
One book made from these materials.
And with it, I aimed to spread my fame across the country.
A wry smile escaped me.
I knew it was a foolish endeavor, even by my own admission.
It was like a person lost in pitch darkness, blindly following the first glimmer of light they saw.
Even though I had been transmigrated, this was still a very real world.
To think that writing just one book would raise my fame. If someone in the heavens were watching, they would surely laugh.
But right now, I wanted to cling to this tiny hope.
Living without hope was not living; it was decaying.
I didnt want to decay in this world.
This irrational and illogical act seemed to give me hope.
Just like how writing web novels brought comfort to my weary self from my office job.
A writing attempt to avoid decay.
A narrative penned by me, thrown into this world, seeking hope.
Then, what should I write to find hope in this world?
Lets write a wuxia novel.
A wuxia world without heroes.
The North Star of Mount Tai in the martial world.
The revered Wudang of the South.
A protagonist from the Wudang Sect.
The theme would be:
What is the essence of heroism?