78
A Strange Calm Inside the Barracks
In the cold of winter, a peculiar calm lay over the barracks.The soldiers had taken off their armor and leaned it against the wall.Wet boots were set near the fire to dry, while men sat in silence.Someone nodded off with a bowl still in his hands.Someone else stopped mid-polish, blade in hand, staring blankly into the flame.
There was no laughter, no shouting—but neither was there gloom.A moment in which one did not need to prove oneself alive.Only the relief of not having to fight today sank deep into the barracks.
Outside, snow still fell, but its sound was muffled by thick walls.Inside, only human breath and the warmth of fire continued, slow and steady.
The blizzard had stopped.The moment the door opened, a familiar smell brushed the nose—iron, horse dung, wet leather, and the breath of men.The smell of a place that was alive.
"Oh—Park Seong-jin!"Hwang Hyun-pil sprang up in welcome. His face was rough, but his eyes were bright."You made it back alive."
Park Seong-jin saluted at once."Loyalty!"
"Oh, don't do that."Hwang Hyun-pil waved him off."Just hearing that makes my head ache. If you're alive, that's enough."
Then the others rushed in, clapping Park Seong-jin's shoulder.
"So you really came back.""We were wondering.""You took too long."
Late as always, Dohyeon limped out."Hey, you said you were better.""Not yet," Dohyeon said with a grin."But I can live. Thought I was going to die, honestly. How was it out there?"
Park Seong-jin took a breath and answered."They say they'll cooperate. But they want Liaoyang and Ssangseong returned."
When the words ended, a brief stillness passed through the room.
Hwang Hyun-pil broke the silence lightly."Cold?"
"Yes. Very.""It's a dry cold over there… and here it's a wet cold.Strangely, this one is bearable."
Hwang Hyun-pil smiled."It's been colder here since the day before yesterday. Means winter's almost done."
Park Seong-jin blinked."In weather this harsh?"
"Fu (復)," Hwang Hyun-pil said.He traced a single character in the air.
復.Return. Restore.
"It means that inside the deepest cold, warmth is hidden.There is no perfect darkness in this world."
For a moment, it went quiet.From deeper inside the barracks came the low sound of firewood burning.
Perhaps the words landed in the chest—everyone seemed to breathe more slowly, as if the room itself had exhaled.At a time like this, it sounded like the speech of a sage.
It was the kind of sentence one wanted most to hear.
The thought that warmth waits to be reborn inside hard times offered a kind of comfort.Just as this cold would not last forever, so too would their hardship soon fade.No one knew why—no one could name the chain of cause and effect—but if that was the world's law, then even this endless despair would pass.
"Fu…"When Park Seong-jin murmured it, Hwang Hyun-pil laughed and slapped his shoulder."If you understand, that's enough. Your suffering's over for now. Come in.The jungnangjang said you're to do nothing but sleep for a few days."
Inside the barracks, a horse lifted its head.Oh Jin-cheol held its reins.
"I'll unload your gear.""I'll do it," Park Seong-jin stepped forward, but Oh Jin-cheol stopped him with a smile."Just today, let me do it instead. Tomorrow we'll be busy again.""Then… I'll leave it to you."
They led the horse to the stable.They brushed off the frozen snow, loosened the saddle, and slowly stroked the horse's neck.The animal's warmth traveled into the palm.
In that moment, Park Seong-jin raised his head and looked toward the sky beyond the camp.A pale, dawnlike gray was spreading wider, little by little.It was still cold.It was still winter.A sky that did not look as though spring would ever come.
And yet he felt it, faintly.In the coldest place, the world was already preparing spring.
Hwang Hyun-pil stood in the doorway, watching Park Seong-jin for a long time.He could tell from a distance, just by the way he walked.It was the stride of someone who had returned alive.
Neither hurried nor slow—a relaxed, natural march without pause.His shoulders sat low, his gaze stayed down, yet nothing in him was scattered.He no longer glanced around like before, building a fence of vigilance with his eyes.
That, oddly, stayed with Hwang Hyun-pil.
That bastard… he's been very far.
The difference between a man who had crossed a road and a man who had crossed a battlefield was clear.Not whether he carried wounds, but the shape of his breath.
Park Seong-jin's breath was deep, long, unbroken.
Hwang Hyun-pil forced a laugh and shouted something cheerful—to lighten the mood.For a man who had returned alive, what he needed first was the noise of ordinary life.
But the moment Park Seong-jin saluted, Hwang Hyun-pil understood by instinct.
Ah. He isn't a soldier anymore.
The word "loyalty" remained, but there was no clinging in it.Not the hunger to be 인정받다, not the desperation to keep a place.It was a motion like tidying up an old habit still lodged in the body.
That frightened Hwang Hyun-pil more.
When their eyes met, there was no anger, no excitement.Instead, there was a quiet difficult to name.A face that neither hid nor boasted of what it had killed.A gaze that did not need to pull what it had lived through into speech.
Eyes like that… you don't see them often.
War sharpens people.But eyes that settle that deeply even after surviving are rare.Most come back bent somewhere, or hardened too much.
Park Seong-jin was different.
He was like a lump of iron that had passed through heat once—and returned to its place.
That was why Hwang Hyun-pil had tossed out something like, "Cold?"There was no need to open a grand story.What a returned man needed was not judgment, but room to breathe.
That was why he brought up Fu (復), too.For a face like that, the language of seasons suited better than the logic of war.
Watching Park Seong-jin loosen the reins and stroke the horse's neck,Hwang Hyun-pil murmured inwardly.
Yeah… he's still on the side of people.
Men who come back fully turned into warriors usually look to the sword before the horse.But Park Seong-jin checked the horse's breath first.He had not forgotten the order of laying a hand on what lives.
Only then did Hwang Hyun-pil feel relief.
When war changes a man, it usually breaks him.This one had become stronger—but he had not broken.
He said nothing out loud.He only turned his back toward the inner barracks and thought,
The jungnangjang's eyes weren't wrong.What returned wasn't a single soldier…but someone who'll climb higher.