When he stepped deeper into the fortress, Park Seong-jin held his breath.The smell of burning and the smell of rot mixed together and stabbed at his nose.The road had already been devoured by flames, and roof tiles were melting and running down.Black smoke rose everywhere.
Within the fire, human shapes were visible.They were followers of the White Lotus Sect.They held swords, but their faces wore expressions not of combat, but of prayer."Maitreya is coming…!"Someone shouted so.It was not a cry of grief, but a voice closer to strange rapture.
Seong-jin's throat went dry.His body understood first that those words were not the words of a god, but words used to endure tonight.They charged toward Seong-jin.They were people running forward in order to die.
"Block them!"Oh Jin-cheol swung his spear and cut off the front.The spear tips collided, and sparks flew.At that moment, a soldier beside Seong-jin was pierced through the chest.A jet of blood burst up like a fountain.
Seong-jin's body moved before thought.He thrust his saber forward.At the very moment one ally fell, the tip of his blade split an enemy soldier's flesh.And for the first time, the enemy's body was felt in his hands as weight.Heavy, hot, and slippery.The man collapsed onto Seong-jin.His breath was crushed out of him.
He tried to push the body away, but the man's hand clenched tightly onto Seong-jin's collar.It was the hand of death.Panicking, Seong-jin tore at the hand like a madman and staggered backward.In that instant, Oh Sun-geun smashed the man's head.The head snapped aside and dropped to the ground.
The wall at his back was hot.No—it felt as if his own body were burning.Flames scorched his nostrils, and choking smoke brought tears to his eyes."Advance! Advance!"Hwang Hyun-pil's shout rang out.Hearing it, his body moved again.Not thought, but reflex.That was the only way to live.
He raised his shield to block enemy blades and shoved forward with his spear.Within the flames, bodies tangled and fell.
At the center of the city, before a burning shrine, White Lotus followers were gathered and prostrated.They were not fighting.They clasped their hands and offered chants like song.Behind their backs, flames surged upward.
Then Seong-jin saw it.Within the firelight, a woman lay prostrate, clutching a child.An arrow was lodged in her back.Yet her arms had not released the child.
The sword slipped from Seong-jin's hand.His breathing grew ragged.The trembling in his fingertips would not stop.Through the black smoke, Hwang Hyun-pil's voice rang out again."Pass through the burning zone and assemble inside the gate! Anyone still alive, move!"
Seong-jin walked.Even as his knees buckled and he staggered, he walked.Yet the image of that woman would not leave his mind.Amid that mad moment in the middle of the burning streets, where prayer, screaming, and laughter were all mixed together, a thought suddenly came to him.Just as they cling to Maitreya, we too cling to another name and endure.That may be all there is.
He knew it.This was not a war of faith.It was a war where human madness and the instinct to survive collided.Flames covered the sky, and the bell tower of the fortress collapsed.Beneath it rang the cry of metal.That was the final dawn of Liaoyang Fortress.
The battle was over.The flames were still alive, but the cries of suffering people had vanished.Each time the wind blew, ash from burned wood scattered, and between it only the low sound of cooling metal echoed.
Park Seong-jin stood beneath the collapsed wall.It had once been a fortress, a place where people lived.Now there were only heaps of stone and ash.The gate had collapsed inward, leaning, and from the gap black smoke slowly rose.It was a thick smell that lingered longer than blood.
Combat engineers hurried to repair the gate.They rushed to fill the collapsed wall.What the enemy had defended, now had to be defended by them.Only then could they live.
There were few survivors left in the streets of the fortress.Shattered helmets, severed arms, broken spears, faces scorched by fire.It was impossible to tell who was enemy and who was ally.Everyone was the same color.Blackened by fire—the color of human beings.
Seong-jin walked among them.Something crunched beneath his feet.It was probably an arrowhead, or someone's tooth.It was light.In this place, everything was that light.Beings lighter than dust struggling in vain.
From afar came the sound of weeping.It was a woman who had survived.She knelt before the ruins of a burned house.No one paid attention.What she held was a single pitch-black jar.From inside it, faint smoke was rising.
Seong-jin could not approach.He did not know what was inside that jar.Even in this field of destruction, was there still something so precious that it had to be cherished and protected?
"We won."Someone's voice was heard.Even those words were hollow.They struck the empty air, shattered, and were swallowed as the flames flickered.
The enemy retreated.More than half scattered outside the fortress, fleeing like wind.Seong-jin looked up at the sky.Smoke covered it.Not red, but ash-gray.He thought.What is victory?In these flames, who can smile?
His fingertips were still trembling.He had forgotten even that he was gripping a sword.His hand was stiff.Carefully, he set the blade down.The blood on his fingertips dried in the wind, hardening into black.
Oh Jin-cheol approached.Ash had settled on his shoulders as well."Seong-jin."It was a short call."Let's go back now."It sounded like a spell calling him back to a world of sanity.
Seong-jin did not answer.Beyond the wall, firelight still flickered.That light was the burning of someone's faith, and the fading of someone's life.Between the two, he stood.As one who survived, but not as a victor.
The flames gradually cooled.But the smell did not fade.That night, snow fell over Liaoyang Fortress.Snow falling onto fire settled like ash, covering blood, guilt, and names alike.