Chapter 46: The Injured Bird
As he spoke, Second Uncle clicked his tongue. "Back then, the village set aside a place to raise ducks and geese. Sometimes, people even had to feed them. But one night, when we rounded them up to return to the pen, we realized a few of them were missing."
"At first, everyone assumed they’d been taken by some wild animal. We even had the village dogs search for them, but when the dogs came back looking all dejected and spiritless, we didn’t dare push them to search any further."
"The next day, a few more were missing. That’s when Boemhyeon got suspicious. He personally took the dogs out to search, and that’s how our village’s black dog led him to this reed bay. It’s turns out, the missing ducks and geese had run here on their own. We never found the ones that disappeared the first night, but by the second night, more had followed them here."
"Im Beomhyeon wanted to catch them and bring them back, but the reed bay was vast, full of water, and impossible to chase them down. He didn’t have a bow with him at the time, so he couldn’t shoot them either. He reported back to the village, and I made the decision—if they all wanted to go to the reed bay, we’d just let them be."
"After all, even if they ran there, we could still shoot them down with slingshots or bows when we needed food. That way, the villagers wouldn’t have to waste time and effort feeding them."
Second Uncle spoke calmly, but Bok Taejin felt an overwhelming sense of boldness and decisiveness in his words.
"In the end, all the geese and ducks ran away. But then some ducks started coming back, injured from fighting with the geese over territory. Eventually, they settled down in the reed bay and even multiplied greatly."
Bok Taejin couldn’t help but admire the decision and praised Second Uncle’s wisdom.
Second Uncle laughed and clapped him on the shoulder.
Perhaps he was truly pleased, but he clapped with such force that Bok Taejin’s face twisted slightly from the impact.
No wonder Im Beomhyeon usually didn’t dare to provoke Second Uncle!