Chapter 106: What Is It to Be Born Guilty!

Dago was in agony as he told Su about it, speaking in fragments, as though sketching faint, primitive lines in the dark.

A dim, low tent. Filthy straw on the ground. Three men grinning cruelly as they committed their violence. A girl scarcely covered by her clothes.

And the girl’s eyes when she saw Dago—an expression of misery beyond life or death.

The three men were displeased by Dago’s silent intrusion. Cursing under their breath, they were tugging up their trousers when, once their eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness, they finally realized it was Dago.

So the three men, all with three-syllable names, forced out ingratiating smiles and asked whether Dago wanted to join them.

Dago came back to himself from his shock, and in the next instant his heart was flooded with rage.

He drew the short knife at his waist and drove it into the nearest man, killing him.

The other two reacted at last and stumbled back in alarm. Fueled by fury, Dago swung once and cut one man’s throat open.

The last man turned and fled. Dago chased him down, and at last in the pasture he hacked his belly to pieces with the blade.

When he returned to the low tent, the girl lying on the straw had already stopped breathing. She had swallowed the silver hairpin Dago had given her.

Dago held her still-warm body and wept until he could weep no more.

Only when an early-rising herdsman discovered the bodies in the pasture were the others summoned.

As a two-syllable name, Dago had killed three men of the lowest name rank, and he suffered no punishment.

His father paid the owner of the neighboring pasture one hundred and twenty meat sheep, and the matter was settled.

No one in Dago’s family asked him why he had killed. They shunned that answer as though it were plague.

His father sent him into the camp of candidates for the chieftain’s attendants, hoping he would cease causing trouble and instead devote himself to his duties, bringing honor to the family.

And Dago drifted through his days in a daze, until at a family gathering someone let slip the truth over drink.

Only then did Dago learn that those three men had done it at his father’s instruction.

Except his father had only instructed one of them to kill the girl.

Perhaps that man had taken it upon himself to enlist two friends, intending to have his way with her before killing her.

Dago could scarcely believe it. He demanded to know why his father would do such a thing.

The old man, already gray-haired, threw the question back at Dago: then what was he supposed to have done?

Red-faced, he asked whether Dago meant to turn their family into a joke across the whole grassland.

Dago cried out in fury that for such a damned reason, they had found someone to kill an innocent girl?

The old man only sneered. It was merely one person with a four-syllable name. For the honor of the family, what was wrong with killing her?

Dago left the gathering tent speechless.

His father’s words echoed in his mind.

Merely one person with a four-syllable name...

Dago wandered the pasture like a lost soul. Then, in the middle of the night, an idea took root in his mind and quickly grew beyond all restraint.

If the source of this tragedy was that accursed system of name ranks,

then why not... overthrow it?

The thought sent a pulse of life surging back into Dago’s dried-up heart.

He began to watch those around him, probing them indirectly for their views on the name-rank system, hoping to find comrades he could trust.

It was as though he had at last discovered his purpose, and fortune began to favor him.

Half a year later, through a friend’s introduction, he joined a secret society.

Its aim was to overthrow the decayed system of name ranks.

Dago spoke with them and was overjoyed to find he was not alone.

Full of ambition, they decided to seize the chance of the warrior trials to launch a coup.

The crucial part of the plan was to draw away Gan, the tribe’s most valiant fighter. So long as he remained, success would be nearly impossible.

Someone provided intelligence: Su, the grandson of the tribal chief, had long dreamed of going to Hunt the Wind. They could help Su make it happen, and in the process kill the boy who would one day become chief.

In that way, Gan, unable to abandon his own blood, would leave the tribe, and they would gain a precious opening to strike.

As for why they did not make their move while Gan was out gathering supplies, it was because the society’s strongest fighters had also gone out with him, and they had to wait for their return.

...

When Su finished telling Dago’s story, he seemed to have exhausted every last ounce of strength. His expression was one of unbearable pain.

The twelve-year-old boy could no longer use the old excuses with which he had once soothed himself, and ignore the horrors born of hierarchy and exploitation.

After listening, Gan’s one eye suddenly flashed with a fierce light. “Who were those traitors?”

Su looked coldly at his uncle. “Do you really think the word traitor is enough to describe them?”

“Boy, don’t you dare hear one story from someone and forget the place you were born into! There is a reason the tribe has such a system!” Gan said anxiously.

“Tell me quickly who those traitors are, and what they plan to do!” Gan demanded sharply. “Your grandfather may be in danger right now. Do you want your beloved grandfather to come to harm?”

At that, Su’s icy gaze darkened. “Even if I told you, it would be meaningless. Dago told me everything because it was already too late.”

“In the supply party, everyone with a two-syllable name except Yabo was one of the so-called traitors.”

“They should already have launched a surprise attack on the chief’s golden tent, beheaded Grandfather, and stolen the great wind banner. Before long, many rebels will rise across this grassland.”

A smile formed at the corner of Su’s mouth, part self-mockery, part relief. “Uncle, I imagine the two of us will soon lose our heads as well.”

Seeing Su like this, Gan ground his teeth in rage, seized him by the collar, and slapped him hard several times.

“You little wretch, and you can still smile? Are you so pleased to see our family ground to dust?”

The blows split the skin at the corner of Su’s eye, and blood spilled from the edge of his mouth as well.

He stared at Gan with mad eyes. “Then what else should I do? What am I supposed to do? Find some way to keep going this rule that has made countless Wind-Hunting people suffer unbearably?”

Tears welled at the corners of Su’s eyes and mingled with the blood. “Do you know? After I heard Dago, I wanted to let him go. But after I dug into Rock Hand, he would not accept it.”

“Do you know what he said?” Su’s lips trembled. “He said it was our family that had driven him to this point, and now we wanted to save him so he would be grateful to us. What a fine scheme.”

Bloodlike tears seemed to fall from Su’s eyes. “He cursed me, and our family, to sink forever into hell—and then he killed himself right before me!”

“I do not even have the right to save someone else! Because I am one of the people who harmed them! I am upheld by the very group that oppresses them, and I had even meant to pretend not to see it!”

“Uncle, why do you still not understand? We are guilty! We should be dead right now!”

Gan looked down in disgust at Su, who seemed possessed, and casually threw him aside, ordering the others to rush back to support the tribe.

Su, meanwhile, sank back into that pitiful, worthless state, hugging his knees and muttering that he had been born sinful.