The wind on the hill cut through Kai's jacket but he didn't move. He stood there looking down at Muraki. From this height the houses looked like small grey boxes pressed together as if they were trying to keep each other warm. He could see thin streams of smoke rising from chimneys. The muddy paths he'd walked his entire life. But his mind wasn't here. The anger burning in his chest had opened a door to a memory he'd tried so hard to bury. And now he was walking through it again.
It happened five years ago. That winter was the coldest anyone could remember. The sky was a sheet of dull white. Ice covered the windows of their house so thick you couldn't see through it. His father Sungho Jinho had been coughing for weeks. At first it was just a dry irritating sound. Like paper being crumpled. Then it turned wet. Heavy. Like something inside him was drowning.
Kai remembered sitting in the kitchen at night. Just sitting there. Listening. His father was in the next room and the coughing never stopped. It was the sound of a man desperately trying to hold onto something that was slipping through his fingers. His breath. His life. His mother Yoonhee would sit by the bed with a bowl of warm water and a cloth. She'd wipe the sweat from his face even though the room was freezing. Even though her own hands were shaking from the cold.
Then one Tuesday night the sound changed. It wasn't coughing anymore. It was gasping. Sharp. Panicked. Kai jumped up and ran into the room. His father was lying on the thin mattress. His face had turned a strange unnatural shade of blue in the weak candlelight. His eyes were wide. Not just wide. Filled with a terror Kai had never seen in another human being. It was the look of a man drowning. But there was no water. Just air he couldn't reach.
Kai we have to take him to the hospital. Right now. He can't breathe.
The town clinic is closed. The doctor left for the city this week.
Then we go to the District Hospital. We have to go now.
Kai looked at his father's face. The District Hospital was an hour away by car. They didn't have a car. None of their neighbors had one that worked in the snow. Kai ran out into the freezing night. The cold burned his lungs. He pounded on the door of Mr. Park. An older man who owned a rusted old truck he used to haul firewood.
Please Mr. Park. My father is dying. We need to get him to the hospital.
Mr. Park opened the door and looked past Kai at the falling snow. Then he looked at his truck parked under a tarp. He looked back at Kai with pity. But also with fear.
The roads are dangerous Kai. Ice everywhere. And gasoline costs more than I made all week. I can't risk the truck. Not for nothing.
Kai's heart was pounding. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the only thing he owned that had any value. His watch. It was a gift from his grandfather. Silver. Beautiful. Still kept perfect time. He pressed it into Mr. Park's rough calloused hand.
Take this. Please. Just get us there.
Mr. Park stared at the watch for a long moment. Then he sighed and nodded. Kai and his mother wrapped Jinho in every blanket they could find. They carried him out to the truck. Every time they moved him he groaned. A low terrible sound. And the air going into his throat whistled. Like wind through a crack in a wall.
The journey was slow. Painfully slow. The truck slid on the ice. The heater inside was broken and freezing wind poured through the gaps in the doors. Kai sat in the back with his father's head cradled in his lap. He could feel the heat of the fever radiating through the blankets. He kept talking. Kept trying to keep his father awake.
We're almost there. Just hold on a little longer. The doctors will help you. They'll give you medicine. You'll be back in the garden by spring. I promise.
His father didn't speak. He just gripped Kai's hand. Tight. So tight it hurt. It felt like a goodbye.
They reached the District Hospital just after midnight. It was a massive building made of white stone. Clean. Gleaming. It looked like a palace. Nothing like the crumbling structures in Muraki. There were bright lights everywhere. Tall windows that weren't broken. A fence of black iron surrounded the entire grounds. A guard stood at the gate. He looked at their old truck with open disgust. Like it was something dirty that shouldn't be there.
You can't park here. This entrance is for ambulances and official visitors only.
Kai jumped out of the truck. His whole body was shaking. From the cold. From the fear.
My father is dying. He can't breathe. Please. We need to get him inside.
The guard glanced at Jinho lying in the back. He saw the worn blankets. The threadbare clothes. The mud on their boots. He pointed toward a small side door barely visible in the shadows.
Use the service entrance. The emergency room is that way.
Kai and Mr. Park carried Jinho through the side door. Inside the air was warm. It smelled of cleaning chemicals and polished floors. But somehow it felt colder than the snow outside. The walls were painted a harsh bright white. Everything looked sterile. Unwelcoming. They reached a desk where a woman in a crisp blue uniform sat behind a glass partition. She was typing something on a computer. She didn't look up when they approached.
Please. My father needs help. He's very sick. He can't breathe.
The woman kept typing. For a long agonizing minute she just kept typing. Then finally she looked up. Her eyes were tired. Flat. Bored. She looked at Jinho's blue face and still didn't move any faster. She slid a stack of papers through a slot in the glass.
Fill these out. I'll need his identity card and proof of insurance.
Kai's hands were shaking so badly he almost dropped the papers.
I have his card. But we don't have insurance. We're workers from Muraki. The factory doesn't provide it.
The woman stopped typing. She looked at Kai the way you might look at a child who didn't understand a very simple rule.
This is a Category Two hospital. To be admitted to the emergency ward you must have Level A insurance. Or you can pay a deposit up front.
How much is the deposit.
Five thousand gold pieces.
The world stopped. Kai felt like the floor had dropped out from under him. Five thousand gold pieces. That was more money than his entire family earned in a year. Maybe two years.
I don't have that. I have maybe fifty pieces. But please. Look at him. He's dying. He's a person. He's lived and worked in this country his whole life.
I understand. But the rules are the rules. I don't make them. Without the deposit or the insurance I can't open a file. And without a file no doctor will see him.
Yoonhee stepped forward. Tears were streaming down her face. She grabbed the edge of the glass window with both hands.
Please. Have mercy. We'll pay you back. I swear. I'll work every single day. I'll clean this hospital for free. Just please help my husband.
The woman looked away. She stared at the wall behind her.
There are other people waiting. You're blocking the line. Please step aside.
Kai looked around the waiting room. There was a man in an expensive wool coat holding a small child. A woman wearing a silk scarf. They looked at Kai and his family like they were something dirty. Something dangerous. They didn't want to see what poverty looked like. Not here. Not in their clean safe hospital.
Kai saw a doctor standing near a door. White coat. Stethoscope hanging around his neck. Clipboard in hand. Kai walked over to him.
Doctor. Please. My father is in the truck outside. He can't breathe. The woman at the desk says we need money first. But there's no time. He's dying.
The doctor looked at Kai. And for just a second. Just one brief moment. Kai saw something flicker in the man's eyes. Sadness. Maybe guilt. But then it was gone. Replaced by a cold professional mask.
I'm sorry. The administration here is very strict. If I treat patients without proper payment the hospital loses funding. I could lose my job. There's a public clinic in the city of Kojin. You should try there.
Kojin is three hours away. He won't survive three hours.
I'm sorry. I have other patients. Patients who have already been processed.
The doctor turned and walked through the door. It closed behind him with a soft click. Such a small sound. But to Kai it felt like a gunshot. The sound of a door closing on his father's life.
They carried Jinho back to the truck. Mr. Park didn't say a word. He just started the engine and began the long drive back to Muraki. The snow was falling harder now. It covered the windshield faster than the wipers could clear it. The world outside disappeared into white.
In the back of the truck Jinho's breathing became slower. Each breath was a fight. It sounded like dry leaves being dragged across stone.
And then halfway back to town the sound stopped.
Kai waited. He held his own breath and listened. Waiting for the next one. One second passed. Then five. Then ten. He pressed his ear against his father's chest. There was nothing. No whistle. No rattle. No heartbeat. Just the howl of the wind and the rumble of the engine.
Father.
Nothing. Jinho's hand went limp. It slipped from Kai's grip and fell to the cold metal floor of the truck bed.
Yoonhee screamed. It was a sound Kai would carry with him for the rest of his life. A sound of pure anguish. A sound that didn't seem like it could come from a human throat. She threw herself over her husband's body. She called his name again and again. She begged him to wake up. She made promises that could never be kept.
Kai didn't scream. He didn't cry. A strange cold numbness spread through him. He looked at his father's face. The blue was fading now. Replaced by a pale waxy grey. The terror in his eyes was gone. He just looked tired. Like a man who had finally stopped running a race he was never meant to win.
They brought the body home. The neighbors came out of their houses and stood in the snow. Silent. Watching. They didn't need to ask what happened. They all knew the story. They'd all lived some version of it. In Muraki death wasn't a mystery. It was just another bill you couldn't afford to pay.
The next day a man from the factory came to the house. He was small. Had a thin mustache. Carried a clipboard. He didn't say he was sorry. Didn't ask how they were holding up.
I'm here from the factory office. We heard about Jinho. Since he's no longer employed you'll need to return his work boots and safety vest by the end of the day. The factory is willing to provide fifty gold pieces toward burial costs. All you need to do is sign this form stating that the factory bears no responsibility for his illness.
Kai stared at the paper. It was just a piece of paper. But it was also a knife. A way for the company to protect itself. To wash its hands.
Get out.
Excuse me.
Get out of my house. Keep your fifty pieces. Keep the boots. Get out before I do something I can't take back.
The man saw something in Kai's eyes that made him step back. He dropped the paper on the table and left quickly.
They buried Jinho in the small cemetery at the edge of town. The ground was frozen solid. It took a group of men hours to dig the grave. There were no flowers. No music. Just the wind and the priest's thin reedy voice that barely carried in the cold air.
After the funeral Kai went back to work. He had no choice. There were debts. His sister's school fees. Food for his mother. So he went back to the same warehouse. Lifted the same boxes. Listened to the same voices on the radio.
And he watched the politicians on television. Smiling. Well fed. Talking about the greatness of the Kingdom. About new laws that would strengthen the economy. And he realized something. They weren't living in the same world he was. In their world hospitals were places where people went to heal. In his world hospitals were fortresses. Walls built to keep the poor outside. To let them die in the cold and the mud where no one important had to see.
The memory faded. Kai was standing on the hill again. Back in the present. His hands were clenched so tight his nails were cutting into his palms. He looked down at Muraki. And he didn't see home anymore. He saw a cage.
His father didn't die from sickness. He died from a price tag. He died because his life wasn't worth five thousand gold pieces to the people who ran this country. To the doctor he was a liability. To the woman behind the glass he was an inconvenience. To the factory he was a broken tool.
And Kai thought about the stadium in Kojin. The millions of gold pieces poured into glass and steel. How many lives could that money have saved. How many fathers could still be breathing if that wealth had been turned into medicine instead of monuments.
They think we're nothing, he said out loud to the empty wind. They think we're just dirt under their feet.
He looked at his hands. Rough. Scarred. Callused. Just like his father's hands had been. But his were younger. He still had time. Time his father never got.
The path ahead was becoming clear. It was a dangerous path. One that might lead to the Black Prison. Or to an early grave. But as he stared at the grey horizon he knew he had no other choice. The memory of that night in the truck would haunt him forever. The only way to find any kind of peace was to make sure no other son in Muraki would have to cradle his father's head in the back of a truck and listen to the silence that came after the last breath.
He turned and walked down the hill. But he didn't go home. He walked toward the small shop where he knew his friend Park Dohyun would be. Park was a quiet man. An accountant for a local company. He dealt with numbers all day. He saw where the money flowed. He knew the secrets hidden in ledgers and balance sheets.
Kai pushed open the door. Park was sitting at a small table near the window. A cup of bitter tea in front of him. He looked up when Kai walked in. And he stopped. Something about Kai's face made him put down the cup.
You look different Kai. You look like a man who just made a very dangerous decision.
Kai sat down across from him. He leaned forward.
I'm tired Park. Tired of being treated like dirt. Tired of watching people die just because they're poor.
We're all tired Kai. But what can any of us do. The world runs on money and power. And we don't have either.
Then we take it. Not with violence. Not yet. We take it from the inside.
Park glanced around nervously to make sure no one else was listening. He lowered his voice.
What are you talking about.
I want to start something. A political party. For all the people who've been forgotten. I want to go to Kojin. Sit in those seats where they make the laws. I want to change the system that puts a price on human life.
Park stared at him. For a long time he just stared. He didn't laugh. Didn't smile. He saw the seriousness burning in Kai's eyes. And he knew the story. Everyone in Muraki knew what had happened to Kai's father.
They'll destroy you Kai. They'll find some excuse to lock you up before you even give your first speech. They own the police. They own the courts.
They own the buildings and the money. But they don't own the people. There are more of us than there are of them. They just need someone to show them it's possible to stand up.
Park looked down at his tea. Cold now. He thought about the numbers he saw every day. Millions flowing to the capital for monuments and stadiums. While schools in places like Muraki had no heat. No books. He thought about his own fear. The fear that kept him silent.
It's suicide.
We're already dead Park. We're just waiting for the day our hearts stop beating. I'd rather die fighting for something than die gasping for air in the back of a truck like my father did.
Park looked up. And he saw it. The fire in Kai. It was small. Fragile. But in the suffocating darkness of Muraki it was the only light anyone had seen in years.
What do we do first.
Kai reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper and a pencil. He laid them on the scarred wooden table between them.
We write it down. Everything we believe. A plan for hospitals. For schools. For a country where people don't have to choose between medicine and food. We show people there's another way to live.
He slid the paper toward Park.
Write the title. Call it the Liberation Party.
Park picked up the pencil. His hand trembled slightly. But he pressed the tip to the paper. And he began to write.
The price of sickness had already been paid. Kai's father had paid it with his life. But the debt wasn't settled. Not even close. As the two men sat in that tiny shop in the heart of a forgotten town they were writing the first words of a new chapter. The ash that had been cold and silent for so long was beginning to glow. It was becoming fire. And the Kingdom of Hakoran had no idea that somewhere in the smallest poorest corner of the country a flame had been lit that would one day consume everything.