Chapter 250 — Persuasion Fails: Close Quarters
The moment the junior general's order fell, the junior officer squeezed his eyes shut.
He had been mocking Yeongu and needling him only moments before, but his complexion changed at the order to open the cell door.
The man was bound.
Both hands were tied behind his back.
Yet that bound man had knocked down more than a dozen men in an instant.
He had seen the jailers dragged out with his own eyes.
The ones with crushed noses, broken teeth, and the ones clutching their ribs while barely able to breathe were still groaning on one side of the yard.
The junior officer spoke carefully.
"It is dangerous. Opening the door is dangerous. He is tied up, yes, but he beats everyone down."
The junior general frowned.
"Do you want to die?"
"No, sir."
"Take a few men in with you."
The junior officer's face twisted.
"Aaaah..."
The junior general clicked his tongue sharply.
An order was an order.
The junior officer could not refuse.
He went out into the yard and picked men who were good at fighting.
Large men with thick forearms, men used to pressing others down, men who bragged at drinking tables that they were good at wrestling.
The yard was soon filled with rough breathing and the sound of metal.
He gave them no prior explanation.
If he explained too much, they might refuse to go in.
In the army, men often became fools because they lacked information.
He merely told them they were going in to educate one bound prisoner.
The junior general pointed at the cell door with his chin.
"Go in and educate him a little."
The large men answered loudly.
"Loyalty!"
Even hearing that, the junior officer felt no reassurance at all.
The junior general shouted toward the cell.
"I will speak to him again after the words 'I was wrong' come out of that bastard's mouth."
Yeongu immediately shouted from inside the cell.
"I was wrong!"
The yard fell silent for a moment.
The junior officer quickly showed his open palm.
"He says he was wrong."
The junior general shouted.
"Too late. He should have said it earlier. Let him take a beating first."
The junior officer truly hated the thought of going inside more than dying.
When he recalled what had just happened before his eyes, that doorway did not look like a prison cell.
It looked like the cage of a beast.
The fact that the beast was tied made it worse.
A chained beast had nowhere to retreat, so it was fiercer.
The junior officer spoke carefully.
"Junior General, sir. May I stay outside?"
The junior general glared.
"No. You educate him yourself."
"Aaaah..."
"Open the door!"
The junior general's roar fell.
The junior officer pulled out the key with a miserable face.
His hand trembled a little.
The sound of the bolt sliding up seemed unusually loud.
As the crack of the door opened, the damp smell of the cell and the smell of blood flowed out together.
Yeongu was sitting with his back against the wall.
His two hands were still behind his back, as if bound.
His expression was far too calm.
That calmness made the junior officer even more uneasy.
The junior officer pushed the large men in first.
He tried to enter last.
But the junior general's eyes were fixed on the back of his head.
The junior officer clenched his teeth and stepped across the threshold.
Yeongu raised his head slightly.
"Is the education starting?"
The junior officer swallowed.
"If you stay still and take it, you will be less hurt."
Yeongu smiled.
"That is what you should say to yourselves, right?"
Three men had entered the cell.
The junior officer waited at the very back, his hips pulled away as if he wanted to flee.
What was he waiting for?
Was he waiting for the ruin that would come to him after everyone else fell?
"Grab him!" the junior general shouted.
A huge man approached and seized Yeongu by the collar to haul him up.
Or rather, he tried to haul him up.
A fist rose into the man's jaw.
The man took Yeongu's punch to the chin and lost consciousness.
He pitched forward.
Yeongu shifted lightly aside.
The second man raised his foot.
He had decided to stop looking for details and simply stamp him down.
Yeongu spun half a turn from where he sat.
His rear leg swept sideways into the man's supporting leg.
"Agh!"
Was the leg broken?
The huge body lifted into the air.
For an instant, his body became level with the ground.
Then he fell, arms flailing.
No, before he fell, Yeongu's fist drove deep into his side.
It seemed to make a soft thudding sound, followed by the grinding crack of something breaking.
"Huhup."
The man hit the ground and curled his waist like a shrimp.
Yeongu stepped on the face of the fallen man and sprang up, driving his knee into the lowered head of another.
Blood burst from the man's nose, and his head snapped backward.
If he simply fell like that, he might die.
The junior officer wrapped his arms around the man's head to keep it from striking the ground, but the man who had been hit was already senseless.
Yeongu grabbed the junior officer by the shoulder.
"Aaaagh!"
At the junior officer's scream, Yeongu stopped.
He did not strike him.
He did not stab him.
He did not break him.
He only patted his shoulder.
The junior officer wet himself.
Something hot, warm, and as sad as tears soaked downward.
It had all happened in an instant.
In the space of a single breath.
In the blink of an eye.