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“Do you want to visit your mom?” Jin-Woo asks one day, ten years into their globetrotting trip. They’re in the middle of the Amazon this time, waist deep in muddy river water. Zhigang doesn’t see how his mother factors into this; he swats a truly monstrous mosquito and answers.
“We could,” he says. “But we’ll have to get out of here first.”
They still have three more Aztec tombs on their quasi-archeology, part grave robbing trip, so they continue wading through the mud.
Their globe trotting starts by pure accident, really.
Zhigang wakes up in a hospital bed for the first time in years and wonders why he’s waking up at all. He remembers the Giant’s Avatar crushing him with his club; it’s not a pleasant feeling, getting torn apart at the seams. He unbuttons his shirt and looks, runs a hand down his chest- no scars whatsoever.
Someone clears their throat next to him, and he already knows who it is even without turning around. There are only two people who don’t trigger his Hunter senses, and he hopes it’s one and not the other.
He turns around.
He’s fresh out of luck it seems (if the fiasco with the giants isn’t already a clue enough to that), because both of them are sitting next to him. There’s an apology on his lips before he even says hello, but all that comes out of his mouth is a croak.
“Take it easy, Zhigang,” Yang says with a relieved grin. He pours Zhigang a cup of water. “Sips only, for now. They had to intubate. You weren’t breathing when they found you.”
That bad, huh? He winces. He gathers up what’s left of his pride and turns to look at the other occupant in the room who looks expressionless. Flat, like when Zhigang first found him.
“I’m sorry,” he mouths instead and holds his hand together in a universal prayer pose and gives him a sheepish smile. It was one of his less than stellar ideas, to go to Beijing for the Giants Dungeon. Jin-Woo had told him not to go- that there’s a Monarch behind this- and that he’s no match for it. He didn’t listen of course- he’s China’s highest ranking hunter. He has to be there- has to show up for a dungeon that size.
It was one of their worst arguments to date. He leapt into battle by himself and didn’t bother bringing his phone with him. Jin-Woo’s absence is a glaring hole at his side, but he earned his title as national-level, so he goes in with his head held high and swords glowing mana-bright. He’s no pushover. Or at least, he thought so woke up to the hospital's four walls.
Some of the tension drains out of Jin-Woo’s eyes, and he shifts to hold Zhigang’s hands in his own warm grip.
“I’m glad you’re alright,” Jin-Woo says, his head bowed. They’re four simple words, but the sheer relief in the tone makes Zhigang wince.
There’s a stab of hurt that’s not related to his surgical wounds when he realizes that his god isn’t angry but worried for him.
Yang looks at their hands, curved over each other-Zhigang’s shirt still opened- and raises an eyebrow. He makes a peculiar huffing sound and turns away.
“I’m sorry,” Zhigang croaks again.
“I know,” Jin-Woo replies. “He was worried too, you know,” Jin-Woo says, tilting his head towards Yang… who was starting to look very amused for no discernable reason.
Zhigang shakes his head. This really wasn’t one of his better decisions, he thinks ruefully.
“Well, you looked pretty dead when we fished you out from under the Giant’s corpse,” Yang says bluntly. He continues when he sees the question Zhigang wants to ask. “Yes, yes- you got him. Good job,” his Vice says sarcastically.
Jin-Woo stays silent; he’ll tell Zhigang about Regia later, when he settles down a bit. He felt Zhigang’s pulse stop, felt the shadow get destroyed and couldn’t reform. He teleported there as fast as he could, but even his immortal soldiers took more than a few seconds to regather themselves. By the time he got there… Zhigang’s heart had already stopped.
He stood there in a pool of blood, staring at the motionless chest. The pair of ambers he gave his friend once upon a time were still pristine as the first day he pried them off of Querehsha’s dead corpse. There is one more hidden ability to them. The reason why he gave them to Zhigang in the first place.
[Activate Auto-Revive?] the system screen flashes before his eyes.
Did it even need to ask? “Yes,” Jin-Woo murmurs. He leaves Igris in Zhigang’s shadow and makes for the gate that has yet to close. He has a Monarch to kill.
“At least we’re not the only ones who thought you died for good,” Yang says, tossing a copy of Beijing Times onto Zhigang’s bed.
He blinks at the title in large printed letters. “I-what?” he gapes. ‘National Hero Liu Zhigang Rises to Sainthood Post Mortem!” There’s a smaller subtitle underneath and a picture of the entire congress- their Prime Minister included- bowing to a large blown up picture of Zhigang’s hideous passport photo from ten years ago.
The nurse pokes her head in- evidently Zhigang’s shock has his heart monitor beeping erratically- before waving cheerfully and leaving them be. She makes a motion- draws her arms across her chest- and grins and Zhigang hastily buttons up his shirt.
“Congratulations on your newfound religion,” Jin-Woo smirks. Zhigang will deny pouting, but he does give Jin-Woo the evil eye.
“I’m going to burn Beijing to the ground,” he says.
“It’s tacky to come back from the dead at your own funeral,” Yang says with a straight face.
They don’t raze Beijing to the ground in the end. Instead, they leave the hospital after accidentally-on-purposely generating a mortuary mix up.
A dead man leaves the hospital walking on two feet. No one blinks or even questions the plausibility of it. Stranger things have happened, and the nurses wave him off happily- after getting his number. (He writes them a random string of numbers and doesn’t even care.)
“The State can’t be wrong,” Yang says and nods. “You’ll have bigger problems than a Giant on your hands if you make the State lose face like that.”
Zhigang growls; he doesn’t want to be dead dammit. He doesn’t want to be canonized either, least of all in a religion as tacky as the state’s.
“On the other hand, you won’t have to do any of your paperwork anymore. Consider yourself officially unemployed.” Yang pats him on the back.
Unemployed, Zhigang blinks. That’s one word that he never thought would be used to describe him. But a life free of responsibilities is an attractive one. No more Hunters’ Association, no more Bureaus, no more rosters and paperworks and rookie training. He gives it serious consideration; after all, it’s not his mistake to correct.
“You’re free to come haunt our guild any time, if you’d like,” Yang says. Jin-Woo chokes on a laugh when he hears that and asks if Zhigang would pick up a hot pot for him when he goes.
And that’s how he ends up accidentally getting disappeared from the records. Oh, they know he’s not dead, but their statement- once made- is absolute. They let their seven-starred Hunter off the leash, and he doesn’t even have a legal trail since he travels via shadow teleportation and not by public transport. He doesn’t even have to update his passport anymore.
“Are you sure you want to meet my mother?” Zhigang asks once they’ve gotten out of the jungle. They emerge with bags full of treasure, hidden in Jin-Woo’s spatial magic. They’re not doing this for the money- no- they’re doing this for the thrill of the challenge. There’s very little that challenges them nowadays and very few places they have not been.
Jin-Woo hums. “Is there any reason why I shouldn’t?” he counters.
“No,” Zhigang replies. “But my village is… remote.” Remote’s putting it lightly; normally it’s a three hour train ride from Beijing, then another two hour bus ride and a trek to get there. But with Kaisel there, none of it matters.
“That’s fine.” I won’t judge, Jin-Woo says with his eyes.
“Alright, I’ll give my mother a call then.” If it’s what his god wants, then they’ll have a grand feast in his honor.
Kaisel does well with directions, and the further away from the city they go, the clearer the skies become. The miasma of the city dissipates, and clear mountain air greets them.
They land in front of Zhigang’s village, careful not to kick up a dust storm with Kaisel’s wings. There’s a welcoming committee in front of the gate, and they gape at their arrival.
“Mother’s doing,” Zhigang says with a rueful shrug.
Zhigang’s mother seems to be a force of nature by the way he describes her, Jin-Woo thinks. He sees someone take a picture of them, and one of the braver kids runs up to Kaisel to feed her a cookie and a pat on the head. Can his shadows even eat? Jin-Woo looks at Igris- the knight shakes his head from his spot in the shadows. Is that supposed to a yes or a no?
(In reality, Igris shakes his head because now that Kaisel has had a taste of human food, she’ll clean out the Sung family kitchen and Jin-Woo won’t even notice.)
“Welcome to our humble little village,” the headman bows low to Jin-Woo, and he returns the bow politely. “Welcome back, Zhigang,” the man grins at him, all of three teeth left in this mouth gleaming ivory white. He pats Zhigang on the shoulder. “You’ve done good, Boy. A saint, eh?”
Zhigang allows the touch and laughs. “I’m dead,” he says and shrugs. “Not good enough if I died in a dungeon.”
“Ay, dead you are. We never saw you at all,” the headman continues without missing a beat. Jin-Woo looks at him oddly. Is that… normal? Apparently so, he shrugs.
“You’ve done all of us proud,” the headman says. “Especially your mother.”
And their ancestors, back and back and back- Zhigang knows. It’s how he’s greeted at the door every time he comes home. He has heard it so many times he can practically recite it from heart.
“Is everyone like this?” Jin-Woo asks, looking part amused, part lost.
“This isn’t even the worst of it,” Zhigang says dryly. “You haven’t met my mother yet.”
“Liu Zhigang! Come here, you! You died, and I had to read about your death from a newspaper ?” His mother screeches, a spatula in one hand. She’s a plump lady with greying hair, short and imposing in a way that more than makes up for her height.
“I was unconscious in a hospital, Ma,” Zhigang explains, exasperated. “I couldn’t exactly call you with a tube down my throat.”
“Don’t give me any of that! Ten years dead, and you can’t even take the time to visit!” She continues. “Look at how tall you’ve grown! Are they feeding you alright down there? Beijing air does you no good at all- all that smog.” She tsks.
His god looks bamboozled to come face to face with his mother for the first time. Zhigang thinks that this is an entirely normal reaction to his mother.
“We have a guest, Ma,” he points out. If there’s one surefire way to get her to pause her rampage, it’s this one.
Mrs. Liu’s sharp eyes turn to Jin-Woo who fights the sudden urge to fidget.
“So we do,” she says, moving to bow to Jin-Woo and to shake his hand. “Thank you for taking care of my dear boy; I’m sorry for all the trouble. He’s a right handful, that one. He has always been even as a kid.”
“It’s no trouble at all,” Jin-Woo says automatically, wondering when it would be polite to extricate his hands. Help me, Jin-Woo’s eyes seem to say. Zhigang chuckles; he’s the one who asked to meet her.
Zhigang interrupts his mother before she can pull out all his baby pictures- again. “He’s the one I told you about all those years ago, the one who saved me from Kamish in America.”
His mother’s eyes go wide, and she begins shaking Jin-Woo’s hand in earnest. “Oh thank you so much for saving him; I wouldn’t know what to do if he didn’t come home at all. He’s our only son from either side of the family, you know.”
Zhigang smiles; in some ways, he did miss this. This feeling of home, with all its annoyances and his mother’s dulcet tones. His sisters aren’t there; they have families of their own now, and they don’t visit as much as they used to (but still far more than he visits).
His mother steps back from his god to get a good look at him; she’s not even subtle about it, looking Jin-Woo up and down with approval.
She looks at Zhigang, and he wonders how much trouble he’s in, bringing Jin-Woo home like this (he knows he’s going to get slack from his sisters, for not introducing him earlier).
“This is your god?” She asks, her hands on her hips and a serious frown on her face. Jin-Woo is swift to deny, but he doesn’t know that denial is only another form of acceptance in a situation like this.
“Yes,” Zhigang says without hesitation.
“Then we’ll have a feast tonight in your honor. My apologies for our humble household; we have nothing grand enough to greet you with.” Jin-Woo politely asks to help out only to be tsked away. Mrs. Liu shakes her head. “Such a humble god,” she pats Jin-Woo when he continues to deny his godhood- Zhigang thinks it’s entirely useless. Anything he says at this point will only be used against him. She lets him go a short while after and starts bustling around the kitchen for dinner preparations.
Jin-Woo turns to him, looking more lost than he has in a very long time. “You were the one who wanted to meet my mom,” Zhigang says. And they are a humble household; they didn’t inherit this wealth, this house. Once upon a time, they were ashamed of the very clothes on their back. They couldn’t even get enough food to feed their own, and their mother worked until her hands were raw and red just to avoid having to sell off his sisters.
“You didn’t tell me she’s like this,” Jin-Woo mutters and bends down to pat the dog. That’s somehow less humiliating than meeting Zhigang’s other relatives. At least the dog seems normal enough, though he barks at Jin-Woo’s shadow.
Zhigang chuckles and gives the pooch a scratch on the head. “Don’t you see the family resemblance?”
Jin-Woo only stares at him balefully.
(Later, when he ducks into the kitchen to steal a bite, his mother pokes him with a spatula. “Get your grubby hands away from the roast,” she says with a frown. Thirteen or thirty, some things never change.
Her boy brings home a god and such a handsome one at that, she thinks proudly.
She was hoping to one day see her boy with a family of his own, but this isn’t so bad either. After all, she has already had all the grandchildren she can stand.)
“I can’t eat all of this,” Jin-Woo says, eyes wide and looking at the table practically bursting with food. The dishes are dangling on the edges of the table, and there’s hardly enough room to put chopsticks, let alone a placemat.
“Sit, sit,” Mrs. Liu herds Jin-Woo towards a chair and even pulls it out for him.
“Don’t mind me then,” Zhigang grins, chopsticks at ready and already aiming for his favorites. The stewed meat looks ready to fall apart at the slightest touch. If there’s one thing he misses about his home, it’s his mother’s cooking. There’s nothing that tastes quite like it.
“Wash your hands first,” his mom snaps reflexively.
He shrinks down a bit in his seat, and that surprises a laugh out of his god.
Jin-Woo waves his stare away but doesn’t stop chuckling. He looks like a kid, hunched over and told to mind his manners.
“Thank you,” Jin-Woo says earnestly to Mrs. Liu. “You went through so much trouble for me,” he says quietly.
She coos over him and starts piling food onto his plate in earnest. It’s no trouble at all, of course. Anything for the god who brought her son back to her.
His sisters, once they’re done yelling at him- look about ready to switch religions with him. “Are you sure you’re a saint for the right religion?” his brattiest sister asks doubtfully, bouncing one of his nephews on her hip. It’s not often he sees his god blush, but he’s curious to see the familiar pink appear over his cheeks.
(Her brother has never brought anyone home to meet their mother, not even once. She sneaks another look at the tall Korean man visiting their household and thinks at least Zhigang has good taste. Even if he made them wait thirty years.)
“The Soothsayer wants to speak to you,” Mama Liu says over breakfast. They have three different kinds of congee on the table, fresh eggs from the hens, and a plate of fried vegetables. That’s not counting five different types of pickles in varying colors.
“Just me?” Zhigang asks, sharing a knowing look with his mother.
“Your god too,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Pick some vegetables from the garden and bring them with you; the summer melons should be about ready. We should have some fruits and incense in the back that you can bring to her.”
Jin-Woo makes an inquiring noise but doesn’t ask. He’s quiet here, Zhigang thinks. It’s not a language thing, he knows; he speaks Mandarin as fluently as a native by now. He’s almost as quiet as he is in front of other Hunters.
In reality, he’s quiet because these people here are loud enough to fill a stadium with echoes. It’s easy for someone like him to stay quiet and fade into the background.
(Silly him. He’s their guest of honor; he’ll never be in the background.)
“The Soothsayer is... “ Zhigang considers how to explain their quasi- culture cross religion to his foreigner god. “Well, you’ll see when you get there.”
That explains nothing, but it does peak Jin-Woo’s curiosity. She seems respected, whoever she is.
Mama Liu wonders back to what the Soothsayer said about the god sitting at the table sharing breakfast with them.
In truth, she doesn’t mind having her only boy kept by a god if it’s a god like this. It’s a once in a generation honor, to have a member of their family chosen by a god and invited to serve. Only, she looks at the Korean man and doesn’t see death; she sees sadness and loneliness, an aloofness that’s out of place. She sees hope in his eyes when he looks at her boy, and she smiles.
The Soothsayer’s home is a little ways up, past a small hill and a forest. Jin-Woo has his hands full with a giant basket of vegetables (since when do melons grow this big? He wonders.) Zhigang looks comical with the amount of fruits and incense he’s piling in his hands.
“I’ve known her since I was a kid; she has been here as long as anyone from the village can remember,” Zhigang says. “She runs the local temple and organizes the festivals. One of my sisters helps her look after her household since she’s getting in on her years.”
“There’s a god here?” Jin-Woo asks curiously.
“Besides you?” Zhigang jokes. Jin-Woo would elbow him if he could. He’s not a god. Honest. “It’s a mountain god, I think,” Zhigang says with a frown. “I never paid much attention to the festivals when I was growing up, so I don’t remember.”
“You only cared for the food there, you mean” an aged voice says, amused. There, on the steps of a rather colorful temple, is an elderly lady with her back bent and a walking stick in one hand. Jin-Woo takes one look at her and knows: she’s like Norma Selner. She has the same air of omniscience around her, and for a second Jin-Woo sees double. Who is this lady? He wonders.
“Good morning,” Zhigang says respectfully and bows. “Apologies for the bother so early in the day.”
“Nonsense,” the lady laughs and waves her walking stick at them. “Look at you! All grown up from the brat running between his mother’s skirts and stealing candy from the stalls. I always knew you would grow up to do great things, and now you come back a saint!”
Zhigang clears his throat. Really, he would reconsider this whole homecoming thing if he knew how much his past would get brought up. It’s embarrassing, he grimbles. Jin-Woo bites back a small smile.
The Soothsayer’s inscrutable black eyes turn to Jin-Woo. She stares pointedly at his shadow, where his Shadow Legion sleeps. There isn’t a single drop of mana in her wizened bones, but she somehow sensed their presence. “You know it’s rude to bring Death to someone’s doorstep, Zhigang.”
Jin-Woo takes a step back hesitantly. It’s the first time since a long time that he has been unwelcome and turned away at the door. He’s only a little surprised, since everyone has been so warm.
Zhigang puts a hand around his god’s elbow, keeping him exactly where he is.
“I believe you are mistaken, Madam,” Zhigang objects politely. “This is my friend, Sung Jin-Woo.”
“I can leave,” Jin-Woo says, speaking quietly in mandarin, “If I make you uncomfortable, that is.” It’s not the first time he has upset someone or scared them shitless. It’s not an unusual occurrence. He should have expected it, really. The broad hand on his arm tightens its grip.
“My mother told me that you wanted to see me?” he asks steadily. He stands tall next to Jin-Woo, making it clear that she either talks to them both or neither of them. “ We brought some gifts from the garden at home.”
The Soothsayer looks at them both in turn, amused. “You’re just as hard-headed as you used to be, Zhigang.” She steps back and makes her way inside the house, waving her walking stick at them a second time. “Come in, you. Your god too.”
Jin-Woo side-eyes Zhigang. They seem to have passed some unsaid test- one they didn’t even know they took- and the tension in the air dissipated. “What have you been saying about me?”
“Nothing,” Zhigang replies easily. He’s happy to keep his religion to himself, thank you very much. “No one tells her anything, but there’s nothing she doesn’t know.”
And they just… take that as normal? Jin-Woo wonders.
“Was there something you wanted to see us for, Madam?” Zhigang asks again, once the Soothsayer is done berating them for bringing too much food- again. He dwarfs their little tea table, looking practically giant when seated on the wooden carved stools.
She lights three sticks of incense and bows three times, and Jin-Woo traces the wisps of smoke as they lazily drift through the air. She sticks them in an incense holder, one piled pull with ashes.
She considers them both solemnly. “Zhigang-ah, you should be careful about your death; people can only live once… and they can only die once. Even if your death is an error, it is your death nonetheless. You were indeed meant to die that day, Liu Zhigang- make no mistake- and now you’ve missed your proper time. The State has their own mediums, have their gods. That’s why they haven’t retracted their statement. Not because they’d lose face- but because it was really meant to be your death.”
Zhigang nods, serious, but doesn’t interrupt.
“But perhaps it’s meant to be, for your god to intervene on your behalf,” she says with a sigh. Her eyes unfocus, staring into the empty space in front of her. “Do remember us when we are gone, Zhigang.”
There’s someone there, Jin-Woo stiffens in his seat when he feels a presence brush against his shoulder. He turns- but there’s nothing. Just smoke. There isn’t even a whisper of mana, but he knows that someone is there… looking at the assortment of food on the table. He approves, Jin-Woo thinks.
The Soothsayer smiles and merely rearranges the fruits in a bowl. “You are more of a god than you believe, Sung Jin-Woo, if you can see him.”
Jin-Woo shakes his head. “I don’t see anything, but there’s something there-” he says, frustrated.
“Not quite there yet then,” the Soothsayer laughs. “But you are still young; there is more for you to learn. You will get there one day with some patience.”
“You still have some years in you yet, Madam,” Zhigang says. She was ancient when he first saw her, and she’s still ancient- but somehow healthy as a horse.
“Oh you,” she laughs and waves a hand. Then, she says, “I just hope that you won’t regret this,” she murmurs, serious once more.
Zhigang looks at Jin-Woo, remembers how lonely his god was when he found him (in a supermarket of all palces, he thinks with a snort), and says- “I won’t.”
The Soothsayer smiles peacefully. “And so it is,” she says.
“Do take care of our boy, God of Death,” she says humbly with a bow.
They stay for as long as they can afford to, past the summer crops harvesting season.
“I never thought I’d end up with a religion of all things,” Jin-Woo muses as he watches Igris reach up to harvest a fig tree. He keeps an eye on his army of ants to make sure they don’t eat all the beans. Beru makes quick work of the cabbage field and starts on the potatoes.
“I never thought I would end up as a saint either,” Zhigang replies.
“Says the one actively promoting my religion,” Jin-Woo pokes.
“Yang tells me I have a picture hanging up in front of Tiananmen Square now,” was the dry reply. Yang sent that particular photo to him one day when he flew to Beijing for a meeting. With three smiley faces and a sarcastic praying emoji.
“We can swing by on the way back for you to autograph it,” Jin-Woo smirks. Zhigang scowls.
When they leave, it’s with a full village of new converts, and there’s now another little Jin-Woo in this world; one of Zhigang’s sisters named their newborn child after him- in hopes that the child would grow up to be half as handsome. (“Even a quarter will do,” she says, grinning.)
There’s more food than he knows what to do with, tucked away in his interdimensional pocket. They help nearby villages clear out their dungeons before they leave; it’s really the least they could do after staying for so long. They’re nothing serious- merely a couple of C ranks and B-ranks, but even low ranking dungeons can wreck havoc on a village if not properly contained, and the villages are grateful beyond measure.
They only leave when someone publishes pictures of “Liu Zhigang’s undead ghost” on Weibo, and Jin-Woo gets a long distance call from a very concerned Woo Jin-Chul who asks him what he is doing in China.
“Japan next?” Jin-Woo asks.
Zhigang wonders if Goto Ryuji will get a stroke on the spot when he sees them and decides that’s an entirely alright reason to go to Japan. “Sure,” he agrees, and they take off.