Magician City Ch 13

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Chapter 13. Independence (2)

Yu-ye’s peaceful life had its ups and downs too.

It was the seasons.

The summer was fine. Other than the heat, there wasn’t too much to care for.

The news blabbered that it was the hottest summer in a hundred years, but when Yu-ye opened all the windows and laid down on the floor playing dead until the sun set, it was bearable. He was at the highest point in a mountainous village. The winds were favorable, and the location of the house was one almost unaffected by the heat.

If he really couldn’t stand the heat, he could always ride the bus down to the library, or have a cold shower.

However, the monsoon seasons were the worst.

Because of the old, worn house, the rain water would drip from the ceiling, always making a puddle in his sleep even when he had placed buckets underneath where it leaked. The water would splash over his front door, and he would have to wipe it down all day, causing serious back pains. It would take hours to wipe the floors clean.

But the monsoons were nothing compared to the icy winter. Yu-ye’s house was breezy and cool in the summer, but freezing with the penetrating cold like living in an ice cave. It was almost as if the snappy, piercing winds were trying to make a death threat to Yu-ye.

The winds would freeze the sink, and with no water, Yu-ye couldn’t wash, or cook rice to eat.

However, this much was bearable. It was cold and horrible, but judging from Yu-ye’s years in the Moon Village, he could adapt better each year.

The breathing technique that Handcart Grandpa had left him helped to warm up his body greatly in the midst of the cold.  When he felt that he couldn’t move an inch, slowly freezing up and catching a cold, he would practice the technique. It warmed him right up after a few moments of focus.

The biggest problem was the snow. It came down as if it was going to eat up the whole world. The first winter after his grandmother’s death was especially cold, and lonely.

The heavy snow Yu-ye witnessed that year was the greatest amount he had ever seen in his life.

The news went wild. It repeated that the snow was not something in ten or a hundred years. It was the heaviest amount that the country had seen. Ever.

However, Yu-ye wasn’t worried about the snow.

Even when he saw other insulated, plastic-covered farms break and ruined because of the weight of the snow, he thought ‘it did snow a lot this year,’ but nothing more. He never expected himself to be in the place of the dead, frozen plants inside the broken insulated farms.

This was also the reason why he thought nothing about why people cared so much to sweep the snow on top of their roofs.

When the villagers swept their rooves, he stayed indoors, asleep.

On the days it snowed, Yu-ye felt cozier. He could sleep even better.

In his sleep, he suddenly heard a nervous voice.

-Hu..hurry..!!!Wak….up! Its..break…g!!!!!

The shrieking voice was loud and clear. It was so loud that it rang in his ears.

It was the woman. The woman’s voice he heard regularly every week.

Unlike the usual broken unrecognizable murmuring, this time it was making a good clear sentence. Some words were blocked out by the other whispering noises, but it was evident what she was trying to say.

Her voice was nervous and anxious to the core. Catching its urgency, Yu-ye became wide awake. He sat up as he yelled,

“Who is it? What’s breaking?”

-The snow!!

Creak.

Yu-ye finally realized what the serious problem was. The creaking boards of the old, run down house pierced his ears and made him bolt outdoors.

The snow in front of his house was thick. It came up to his knees.

Struggling to move forward, he barely walked enough to have the roof in his sight. It was bent with the heavy snow that amounted ever since it started to snow a couple days ago. Yu-ye thought of the broken insulated farm.

He swallowed in anxiety.

He stared blankly for a while until he slapped himself awake, reminding him of the seriousness at hand.

He ran to the storage shed he had to find a dusty, unstable ladder.

Was the small ladder enough to hold him up? It would give him just enough reach to touch the roof. But was it going to break before he reached the top?

Whatever. It was all or nothing.

If the house broke, he had nowhere to go.

He couldn’t bring himself to live in another person’s care, burdening them. Even if he did, he would try to rely on nothing but the money his grandmother had left him.

Yu-ye lightly placed the ladder at the edge of the roof. He hesitated for a moment, but then ran inside to grab his fur gloves. It was a nice mitten. If he touched the snow for a while, he would ruin the gloves, but that didn’t matter. He had nothing else.

Yu-ye instinctively climbed up the ladder and started to scrape the outer edges of the roof first.

He hadn’t progressed too far before he started to pant, short of breath. The gods must have been on his side today since the ladder held Yu-ye’s weight well.

Yu-ye cleared the snow up to where his arms could reach, then stood on top of the roof, cleaning the rest.

However, it was still snowing heavily. Yu-ye was not allowed a moment of rest. Once he stopped shoveling, the fate of the house would be far from okay.

More than the harsh physical labor, it was the psychological pressure that started to torture him.

What if he died because the roof couldn’t hold up the weight?

What if he died with one wrong step?

What if he died because the ladder broke?

Whatever scenario he came up with included his way to hell. It made his arms and legs 10 times as hard to move.

Yu-ye bit his lip, and moved his arms.

He felt his every inch slowly becoming fatigued and in pain in the cold, icy snow, but he continued, fixed on getting every bit of snow off the roof.

The amount of physical and mental stress he faced was far greater than anything he had experienced before. It was testing his limits, and luckily opened a new frontier.

The situation lead him to look deep inside himself. Deeper than ever before. The stimulant was none other than the breathing technique. He started to breathe as he was taught. It was easy. He had been practicing it throughout the years to the point that it became a habit.

The more he breathed, more blue threads started to gather. It was 20 times more than the usual amount he could conjure. It created a sea, and Yu-ye absorbed them endlessly.

30 minutes had passed before he reminded himself of his original purpose. To his surprise, he wasn’t cold anymore even if he had been maneuvering in the snow for hours.

His body felt cozy and warm. Then, before he knew it, the snow on his roof was all cleared.

Yu-ye sighed as he plopped down to take a moment. He hugged the shovel as he took in the sight. The Moon Village, located on a higher ground than those around it, provided a wide range of the view.

The bus in the middle of the road was covered and surrounded in snow. Except for some street lights and a couple cars, the whole world was painted white.

Even the skies were white as the heavy snow covered even the greyest of the clouds.

Yu-ye stared at the fascinating sight. It was rare to see the full effect of nature take over the cities. Yu-ye had never seen the world so beautiful.

He marveled at the view, then instinctively looked down at the small crumbling sound below his feet. It was a sound of an icicle breaking off from the edge of the roof. The sound was nothing but a small thud, but to Yu-ye it felt thunderous.

When he looked up again, he was awestruck.

This time, the sight was truly beautiful and otherworldly.

The whole world covered in blue thread.

The sea of emerald green had come to greet him.