Chapter 1001: Live a Good Life (13)

There’s a saying: grit your teeth and rot your heart.

It means you make a hard, unbreakable vow—like sleeping on brushwood and tasting gall.

And then, what does sleeping on brushwood and tasting gall mean?

It means you make a hard, unbreakable vow—like gritting your teeth and rotting your heart.

Yeah, that “explanation” sounds sloppy as hell, but the point is: those two phrases get used as the same thing to begin with.

*****

“Hey, boss. Which one do you like better—grit your teeth and rot your heart, or sleep on brushwood and taste gall?”

Yeom Hwiyoung popped out of nowhere and asked.

Hyung Taejak nearly jumped out of his skin. An absolute master appearing without the faintest trace made him feel like his lifespan had just been shaved down by ten years.

“...Pardon?”

“Grit your teeth and rot your heart. Sleep on brushwood and taste gall. Which one do you like?”

It was an absurd question—like asking whether he liked Mom more or Dad more—right after abruptly showing up.

But when the other person was Mystical Realm, you answered even if you thought it was ridiculous. That was the law of the martial world.

“Th-then... I guess sleep on brushwood and taste gall...? It just feels a little more... grim and determined, doesn’t it?”

Sleep on brushwood and taste gall.

Lie down on rough wood, and lick bitter gall.

Long ago, some vicious bastard had an enemy he couldn’t let go of, and he figured if his body ever got comfortable, his thirst for revenge would fade—so he went out of his way to live in discomfort.

His bed was so miserable that even after sleeping, it didn’t feel like he’d slept. And during meals, he’d lick gall, so no matter what he ate, it didn’t feel like he’d eaten.

He used that constant discomfort as fuel—I’m living like this because of that bastard—and burned with revenge until he finally paid it back.

In other words, sleep on brushwood and taste gall meant hardening your heart into something vicious and making an ironclad vow to accomplish something.

“Good. So you like sleep on brushwood and taste gall, huh? Then starting today, you’re going to practice it until you become a good person. Lucky for you, this is a clinic, so we’ve got gall coming out our ears. I’ll even get you a nice, hefty bear gallbladder.”

“...What? I... I don’t understand what you mean...”

“Didn’t you hear me? Do I have to say it twice?”

“No, that’s not—”

He hadn’t failed to hear. He’d heard perfectly, which was why he asked again.

Practice an old proverb... out of nowhere?

“Come to think of it, becoming a good person isn’t exactly easy. If you’re going to do something hard, you need the right resolve—and you need to put it into practice. Let’s set the first goal as Lesson One: until your money relationships become clean and straightforward.”

So that’s what this meant.

Until you pay me back, you’re sleeping on a log.

And you’re eating gall as a side dish.

Hyung Taejak’s eyes rolled wildly.

“...Uh, on second thought, sleep on brushwood and taste gall feels a little extreme. I think I might like grit your teeth and rot your heart better...”

Grit your teeth and rot your heart.

Grind your teeth and let your heart fester.

Same kind of story—another vicious bastard, hating his enemy so much he ground his teeth every day and let hatred rot his heart, and that’s how the phrase got passed down.

If you left it at that, it sounded weaker.

Just grinding your teeth and swearing in your heart—wasn’t that a much smaller dose of venom than actually making your body miserable and turning that misery into the engine of hatred?

But then—

This other vicious bastard got a chance to pay his enemy back with his own death, and the instant the opportunity appeared, he didn’t hesitate for even a heartbeat. He stabbed his own throat with a blade and killed himself.

Proof that the hatred he’d built by grinding his teeth and festering inside had grown powerful enough to throw away even his own life without hesitation.

So really, sleep on brushwood and taste gall and grit your teeth and rot your heart were neck-and-neck—tiger versus dragon, an impossible problem, two heavens of self-strength—no way to rank them.

Still, if you actually had to “practice” one of them in real life...

Yeah. The latter was obviously way easier.

“Oh. You’re going to grit your teeth and rot your heart until you become a good person?”

“Yes, sir! Look— even right now, I’m grinding my teeth—GRRNNK—this is how badly I want to become a good person.”

“Oh? Grit your teeth and rot your heart, huh. That’s a serious commitment. Then open your mouth wide for a second. It’ll be over quick.”

“...Why am I opening my mouth all of a sudden...?”

“‘Grit your teeth.’ It says break the teeth. I’ll snap them off clean with my aura. But... ‘rot your heart.’ I’ll need to make your heart go bad. If I ask Sasa Bo-yeol to boil up some herbs that are terrible for your heart, would that do it...?”

Or should I just land one Heart-Crusher Palm? If I mess up the control, his heart might burst. But if he can’t become a good person, maybe that isn’t such a bad outcome...

As Yeom Hwiyoung casually continued muttering, Hyung Taejak’s face turned corpse-blue.

“Sleep on brushwood and taste gall! I’ll do sleep on brushwood and taste gall!”

“What? You said you’d grit your teeth and rot your heart.”

“No! Sleep on brushwood and taste gall has been my lifelong dream! I’ve always wanted to do it! I truly do!”

Yeom Hwiyoung nodded with a satisfied smile.

“Good. Then for your first step toward becoming a good person, you’ll keep sleeping on brushwood and tasting gall until your money relationships become clean and straightforward.”

And thus began Hyung Taejak’s era of suffering—his sincere, real-life sleep on brushwood and taste gall lifestyle...

*****

To be fair, Hyung Taejak only acted submissive in front of Yeom Hwiyoung. He was, in fact, a Transformation Realm master.

And once you were around that level, sleeping on a cold floor didn’t make your mouth go crooked, and sleeping on hard stone floors or stone beds didn’t leave you all cramped and aching either.

And licking gall, well... it wasn’t actually that harmful in the first place.

In traditional Central Plains medicine, gall was used as medicine—wasn’t it supposed to boost vitality and wash away fatigue, a tonic of sorts?

Doctors from Qing’s homeland might disagree, but as far as the common sense here went, gall was “good for you.”

But just because you could do something didn’t mean it was a good thing to do.

His quality of life went into a vertical freefall—plunging straight down into a bottomless pit.

Because wasn’t this basically throwing two of life’s three most important essentials into the mud?

Eating well, sleeping well, and taking a good dump.

Two out of three were being smashed to pieces.

Sleeping on a hard stone floor was already torture.

Sleeping on a knobby log was even worse.

The contact surface was basically a thin line, so all his weight concentrated and stabbed into him. And the uneven bumps—skin turning sensitive the moment he closed his eyes—jabbed and tormented him relentlessly.

There was no such thing as waking refreshed.

Instead of lazily savoring the leftover drowsiness in bed after waking, he’d grit his teeth and bolt upright in rage.

And then there was the gall.

Gall was called “gall” because it was bitter enough to deserve the name.

But was it only bitter?

No. Bitter was just the strongest taste.

It was also sour. It reeked. And if you soaked it deep in salt, it became viciously salty on top of everything else.

Bitter, salty, sour, nauseating.

A meal where you lick salted gall and eat it like a side dish—something that would make a weak stomach vomit on the spot.

So Hyung Taejak started sleeping less and eating less, and his cheek fat vanished fast—his face hollowing in.

His eyes went dull and sunken, blood vessels standing out in the whites, dark stains blooming under his eyes.

Sure, living like this would make it impossible to forget your enemy...

But wouldn’t it make you think I don’t even want to live first?

*****

As time passed, only one hope existed in Hyung Taejak’s head.

Hurry—hurry—hurry and let the signboard payment get here!

They’d agreed he would keep sleeping on brushwood and tasting gall until the money relationship became clean, so the moment Headquarters sent the payment for the Evil Path Thug Grand Coalition signboard he’d shipped off...

These horrific days would finally end.

So day after day, every meal and every night, Hyung Taejak waited with desperate intensity.

And then, at last—

The subordinate who’d been sent to deliver the signboard came back.

“How did it go?! How did it go—my money, my money?!”

No idea why he was calling it his money.

“Well... about that...”

That subordinate’s face was dark—because of the crime of being the youngest in the Golden Hawk Unit, he’d had to take a boat all the way to the Evil Path Alliance and then walk back on foot.

“Why? What—what happened? Don’t tell me, you bastard, don’t tell me it was New Greenwood again—”

“No, it’s not that. It’s not something like that.”

“Then what is it?! Where’s my money?!”

“Headquarters said... they absolutely can’t process the signboard as an expense, so you’re supposed to cover it yourself... out of pocket...”

“What? Why?!”

Hyung Taejak screamed.

He’d trusted Headquarters and sent it—only for them to swallow the signboard whole and call it done?

If he’d known it would be like this, he would’ve sold it in Beijing or Jiangnan instead.

He’d only sent it out of loyalty because that splendid writing possessed a spirit that truly matched the Evil Path Thug Grand Coalition.

And they repaid that loyalty like this...

“Uh, Commander. And there’s more...”

“What now?”

“They said the Golden Hawk Unit is getting its monthly stipend and full operational budget cut... for the entire next six months...”

“What?! Why! Why!!”

“I... I don’t know. They said the medical academy will feed you, so you won’t starve to death—just eat whatever food they give you there and stay put quietly...”

Honestly, from the Evil Path Alliance’s perspective—from Bu Anpyeong’s perspective—this was already merciful.

They’d lost eighty strings of gold. And now these idiots were whining because they couldn’t hang a single signboard.

And on top of that, they’d gotten scammed again somewhere—or maybe they thought Headquarters were complete morons they could scam—because they sent a signboard so bizarre and horrifying it was too awful to even laugh at...

And then they had the nerve to demand five strings?

If the Golden Hawk Unit got demoted one rank into the White Hawk Unit, they’d have no right to complain.

But for the sake of the unit commander’s dignity—and the morale of a deployed combat force—Headquarters handed down the most generous sentence possible.

A pay cut.

But from Hyung Taejak’s point of view?

They swallowed the priceless signboard—his treasure—and then slapped him with a pay cut on top of it?

What kind of law was this?

How could this... how could it be like this?

Was this some dirty trick from the bastards in the Command Hall?

Maybe. He couldn’t know.

But an incomprehensible, irrational absurdity crashed down on Hyung Taejak like a wave...

And one thing was certain:

This sleep on brushwood and taste gall wouldn’t be ending.

*****

“Hey. You little bastard. You’re not actually planning to become a good person, are you? You sure run your mouth about wanting to become good, but your actions don’t match. A good person means words and actions match—and a man’s word is worth a thousand gold.”

“It’s because Headquarters won’t pay—”

“That’s your problem. Does the lender have to consider the borrower’s circumstances? If they won’t pay, then you cover it out of pocket.”

“And they said they’re cutting the stipend and operational budget for half a year—”

“Seriously. If you can’t become a good person, the world would be better off if you just died.”

It wasn’t an empty threat.

Killing intent—like a spear through the heart—swept over Hyung Taejak.

He shouted in panic.

“I will pay it back! I swear I will! Just give me a little more time!”

“Time? For how long? You said nothing’s coming in for six months.”

Hyung Taejak dropped to his knees and yelled.

“Please, Elder, give me a chance!”

“Hm. You’re making my heart go soft.”

Yeom Hwiyoung stroked his chin, then suddenly clapped his hands—smack, smack.

“Fine. Then let’s do this. If you don’t have money, you pay with your body. Work at the medical academy and repay your debt with that money. You and your men together—five strings is nothing.”

“Yes! I’ll do whatever you say!”

“But I can’t exactly kick out the people already working just to give you jobs. So I’ll have to assign you the hard work everyone avoids. Is that still fine?”

“Yes! Give us anything! Anything at all!”

Yeom Hwiyoung’s face turned serious.

“There are critically ill patients here that are extremely difficult to handle. Patients who can barely move on their own need someone stuck to them—feeding them, of course, but also squeezing out pus, wiping their bodies down... and you’ll even have to take their piss and shit. Is that still fine?”

“E-Elder... I mean, I’m someone people call a master, so that’s a bit—”

“Then forget it. So you don’t want to become a good person.”

Don’t like it?

Then die.

That was the answer.

And as horrifying as caring for critical patients sounded... it was still better than dying.

They said it was better to roll in a field of dog shit than to leave this world.

As long as you lived, someday you might reclaim glory—someday you might get a chance to repay every pain with interest.

“N-No! I want to! I really do!”

Then Yeom Hwiyoung’s expression softened.

All at once, he became gentle—patting Hyung Taejak’s shoulder, helping him to his feet with a soft grip, and speaking kindly.

“Now you truly, sincerely have the heart to become a good person. Which means you no longer have any reason to keep sleeping on logs and licking gall to strengthen your resolve. Live comfortably, like this is your home. No—this is a cradle where you’ll be reborn into a good person. Think of it as your home.”

It was the first time the Mystical Realm master who’d been acting like a complete bastard showed a warm, compassionate side.

And inside Hyung Taejak, something surged up—some unknown emotion that almost felt like being moved.

He didn’t even know what was supposed to be moving about it.

Of course, once time passed, it would seem ridiculous.

The moment he started that filthy, brutal work of nursing critical patients, that “emotion” would shatter instantly.

Because Yeom Hwiyoung had only suspended the sleep on brushwood and taste gall punishment to make him work.

When you’re caring for critical patients, if your body and mind aren’t at ease, irritation rises on its own. That was human nature.

And so Hyung Taejak’s nursing life began.

More and more patients started looking for him...