In that case, it would have been better to just live as a monk. It seemed the Sea Dragon King had eventually come to the same conclusion as Haeshin. The Sea Dragon King — guardian of all merfolk on the peninsula and sovereign of the Eastern Sea — could no longer bear to watch his descendants’ disastrous love lives, and at last saw fit to make one request.
— Let my descendants who dwell on this island live alone for the rest of their lives. This is both a warning and a plea.
In truth, it was neither a warning nor a plea. If anything, it was closer to a curse. It only came across the way it did because it was phrased with dignity and decorum — put plainly, it amounted to: “I can’t stand watching any more divorce proceedings! Every last one of you brats falling in love on my land will face divine punishment!”
In other words, any merfolk who defied the Sea Dragon King’s plea and began a romance on Samsam Island would earn the wrath of the heavens. That wretched old man.
“Tch.”
So did the merfolk become happy thanks to that plea? Of course not.
What else would you expect from descendants of a man who fell so blindly in love he carved an entire island out of it? The merfolk couldn’t bring themselves to give up on love, not even in the face of their homeland’s sea guardian’s unrelenting plea. Rather than shutting themselves away on the island, they chose to abandon their home and go live on the mainland instead.
“Get it together, Lee Haeshin.”
Every last one of them — except for a single person. Lee Haeshin.
The reason a typhoon had blown in out of nowhere today was all part of that same legend.
Whenever Lee Haeshin felt his heart flutter or race at the sight of someone, the sky over Samsam Island would sense it with uncanny precision and immediately pour down rain. The stronger the feeling grew, the worse the weather became.
First a shower, then rain and wind, then thunder and lightning, then a typhoon, then a storm…… In a way, Haeshin might have been responsible for at least half of Samsam Island’s poor communications situation.
Because of that, Haeshin couldn’t even let himself have a crush in peace. If he were to truly fall in love, this beautiful, gentle island and his cozy home would be swallowed by water.
By the time he’d finished helping the village elders wrap up the kimchi-making, the sun had already set without him noticing. Haeshin sat on the rocks by the shore with a gloomy expression, shivering. The shower had let up a little from before, but showed no sign of stopping.
The wind carrying rain lashed fiercely, and every time the waves surged through the night sea, Hwichan’s pretty face and jet-black hair shamelessly flickered before his eyes. The image of that guy’s wet, bare body — one he’d never even actually seen — fanned the flames of Haeshin’s storm with furious intensity.
He half-felt like going mad and throwing back a bottle of soju. But if he bought soju from the one and only corner shop on the island, the village elders would be eyeing him tomorrow morning, asking if something was the matter. Gossip among fewer than thirty villagers travels faster than the wind.
Rumble!
“……Forget it. He’ll be heading back to the mainland soon anyway.”
This insufferable, hopeless tendency to fall fast.
A sigh escaped Haeshin’s lips on its own. In the end, with his mind too unsettled to rest, he set his padded jacket down on the rock and began to stretch.
The island elders had told him time and again never to swim at night, but on nights like this, he absolutely had to get into the water to clear his head. A good splash of salty seawater was enough to snap even a scattered mind back into place.
He hid his shoes in a crevice between the rocks so they wouldn’t get wet, then slowly walked toward the sea. Before long, both feet met the boundary between ocean and land. Soft foam rolled in and tickled between Haeshin’s toes.
“It’s cold.”
The water was colder than usual. The rain made it colder still. By the time the damp shower Haeshin had brought on had soaked through all of his outer layers — he ran headlong into the sea without even holding his breath and plunged in.
It was a reckless, unrestrained leap. Then came the sound of a splash, and Haeshin’s slight body was soaked through in the colors of home.
Unfortunately, the rain had muddied the water today so it wasn’t clear. Seawater the same wheat color as his own hair pressed into every corner of Haeshin’s body. On a whim, he wriggled his toes a little — just in case — but no tail appeared. Unfortunately.
It’s murky. Can’t see a thing.
There were more than enough reasons why swimming in the sea on a rainy day was dangerous. It was colder than usual, rougher, and unpredictable.
Diving underwater was especially dangerous. Even the haenyeo who had spent their entire lives diving would shake their heads at the thought.
Mermaid or not, Haeshin had no power to see what couldn’t be seen. Letting go of his disappointment at not being able to take in the stillness beneath the waves, he slowly let his eyes fall shut.
At first the chill felt like it would shatter his bones, but after one long exhale, a warm comfort soon wrapped around his entire body like a cotton quilt. The current was rougher than usual, but when he was submerged, drifting quietly and giving himself over to the flow of the water, it felt as though every worry and trouble faded away along with it.
He’d only seen that sea-of-night boy for barely one or two minutes. So ten minutes should be more than enough to forget him. It had taken about two years to forget Yoo Sihyeon, a two-month-long crush — so ten minutes ought to be plenty to forget a one-minute crush.
Haeshin reassured himself with that thought, let the tension drain from his body, and sank down toward the seafloor.
Half-grown young seaweed tickled between his fingers, as if trying to comfort his troubled heart. He smiled, pleased, and opened his eyes underwater to check where the seaweed wrapped around his hand was. And then — something small and glimmering caught his eye.
What is it? Trash? A shell?
Suddenly, he thought of the fishing stranger he’d seen on the boat coming to the island in the early hours of the morning.
Honestly, rude fishermen like that — I should start taking their names and banning them from coming back next time.
He stretched his hand out as far as it would go to pick up the glimmering thing, but couldn’t quite grasp it. Just then, a rough current stirred up the muddy bottom nearby and sent a cloud of murky water rising up.
The glimmering thing caught his eye two more times after that, but churning muddy water kept rising up each time, and he couldn’t get his hands on it.
Had it been about ten minutes since he’d been submerged? He was gradually pulling his restless thoughts back into order — he let out a slow stream of bubbles with a sigh, and lazily kicked his feet to head back up to the surface.
Just then, something glimmered before Haeshin’s eyes once more. At the same time, an unfamiliar hand roughly seized his wrist.
“Hm?”
It wasn’t seaweed. Definitely a person. And a firm, large man’s hand at that. The glimmering thing had been the reflected light off a wristwatch. The shock of it sent a rush of bubbles bursting from Haeshin’s mouth.
With bubbles and murky water all mixed together, he couldn’t quite make out who had grabbed his wrist. But he could tell that whoever it was, they were kicking their legs furiously while gripping him, trying to push through the current.
There was one problem, however.
This guy…… couldn’t swim. Not even a little.
What on earth kind of swimming style is this. Sea cucumber style?
For reference, sea cucumbers don’t swim like fish — they crawl slowly along the seafloor or over rocks. In other words, they can’t swim at all. Haeshin was momentarily dumbfounded by his counterpart’s swimming ability, which amounted to nothing more than being tossed around by the current like a sea cucumber.
The one gripping his wrist was moving their legs busily enough, but somehow couldn’t make any forward progress and just stayed in place the whole time. The skill level was questionable enough to make you wonder how they’d even managed to swim this far out. On top of that, as time passed and their strength seemed to give out, the already clumsy movement of their arms and legs grew increasingly limp until they were flopping around like kelp swaying in a current.
Haeshin let out a silent, humorless laugh to himself. If he left them like this until they reached land, they’d run out of strength and pass out halfway there. He’d stake money on it.
Unable to stand by any longer, Haeshin shook off the hand gripping his wrist. The other person flailed around for a good while after losing hold of his wrist, but when Haeshin grabbed their thrashing legs and gently guided them up toward the surface, they soon stopped struggling and went quietly toward the surface.
“Puhaa!”
“Ugh, cough!”
Breaking the surface, Haeshin grabbed hold of the flailing person’s outer shirt and roughly hauled them upward. He had no choice but to use force — the other person’s frame was considerably larger than his own.
After a long moment, a face swollen and gone pale from being waterlogged appeared.
The owner of the swimming style that had bewildered Haeshin was none other than that mainlander. Shin Hwichan. His sea-of-night hair was completely soaked with seawater, a total mess like a drowned rat.
So that’s why he couldn’t swim? He’s an outsider — he must have been swept in by the current by accident.
Quickly making sense of the situation, Haeshin wrapped his arm around Hwichan and swam skillfully toward land. Hwichan, suddenly caught by the scruff of his neck like a kitten being carried by its mother, spluttered and struggled for a good while. Then at some point he went still and let himself be led along by Haeshin’s hand.
Fortunately, the two of them hadn’t been far from shore. So it didn’t take long to make it back.
Haeshin hauled Hwichan up onto dry land, then hurried across the sandy beach in quick little steps to retrieve his padded jacket he’d left on the rock, and draped it over him. Wet sand clung all over his pale toes.
“Hm?”
He’d seemed conscious when Haeshin had pulled him out — but at some point he’d gone slack, lips parted weakly like someone fallen asleep, completely unconscious. He’d apparently passed out just that quickly.
