too many human failings excused by the phrase "making a living."
The reason he had never fully taught the secret methods was simple.
It was not rare in this world for a student to open a shop right in front of the teacher and cut off his livelihood.
So every craft had a line.
A final line that must not be crossed.
We have seen too many human failings excused by the phrase "making a living."
The greed to eat more, take more, claim more—
all neatly wrapped and justified under the plain words, I must survive.
Yet no matter how he looked at him, Park Seong-jin was not that kind of man.
He was a Goryeo man, and once the war ended, he would return home.
And however one looked at it, this shabby mountain-top station was not the place his life would end in a noodle shop.
The owner knew no fortune-telling, knew even less of physiognomy.
But that young, clear face was not one tangled with petty greed.
He himself often said he was not handsome.
But when one looked quietly at his face, only one character came to mind.
Jeong (正).
Upright.
A face that did not tilt.
No ornament, no haste.
And so, in the end, he taught what he had never taught before.
He agonized for a long time.
If he revealed this, the young man might stop coming.
Still, he finally spoke, almost as if throwing the words away.
Two secrets about the noodles.
One about the broth.
They were tiny differences.
The angle of the wrist when rolling.
The length of time the dough should rest.
The single breath in which the broth must be taken off the fire.
When he finished, Park smiled faintly.
"You already knew."
He said it lightly.
"The hidden addition.
The way you alter time.
I knew."
Startled, the owner asked how.
Park shook his head.
"Even knowing, I thought it right not to ask.
Things like that collapse the moment they are exposed."
The owner swallowed.
Park continued calmly.
"And I respected that spirit.
I thought secret techniques themselves did not matter much.
When I return to Goryeo, the ingredients will differ.
The water will differ.
The same noodles can never be made.
So rather than gain a skill that cannot truly be copied,
I thought it more important to learn the attitude that must not be lost."
The owner's eyes reddened.
"I'm sorry…"
The words slipped out strangely.
"I was afraid…
that if I taught you everything, you would open the same shop right in front of me and cut off my rice bowl."
Park smiled very softly.
"If you withheld it for that reason,
that isn't cowardice.
It's responsibility."
Then the owner burst into tears.
"There was another reason…
I was more afraid that if I taught you everything,
you would stop coming."
Park answered,
"For a while, I am not leaving.
And while I am here, I will keep coming for noodles."
The owner, voice shaking, added,
"And… the soldiers are strange.
Everyone who sees the writing grows cautious."
Park laughed again.
"One of them even straightened his posture before the calligraphy."
At that, Park burst into loud laughter.
That day, he told everything—
his identity, his role, his dream, his duty.
"I am Park Seong-jin, Jungnangjang and commander of the expeditionary forces against Wa.
I overturned them, negotiated with the bakufu,
and now wait for measures to eradicate the pirates and disarm their forces."
When he explained why he was here, why he could not yet return home,
the noodle master trembled like a poplar leaf and fell to his knees.
"Do you know?" he asked.
"Of course I do.
A master of the Hwagyeong realm.
A blood-soaked killer.
Ignorant, ruthless, inhuman—
a demon."
Park smirked.
"Yes.
That is me."
Then he bowed in gratitude.
"While I am here, I will keep coming.
When the season changes… I will return."
At those words, the owner wept openly.
It was not that he had passed on a secret.
It was that he was sending away a man.
Park made one last request.
Please do not tell the villagers who I am.
"Here, I wish to be only a passerby."
To drink tea in the station,
to wash his back in the bathhouse,
to boil and eat noodles in the shop—
he wished those things to remain as they were.
"If it becomes uncomfortable, I may not be able to come at all."
The owner nodded.
He promised he would not tell.
Yet his mouth itched.
Each time Park came and ordered a bowl,
each time he sat quietly in his place,
the urge rose to his throat—
Do you know who this man is?
There were days he wanted to shout it out loud.
But he endured.
Because now he knew—
some things are preserved precisely by not speaking them.
Then one day, Park said,
"It seems I must leave."
The words were calm,
but they changed the air in the shop.
The shogun had sent an envoy.
He had admitted fault.
Promised to eradicate the pirates.
Several lords who had incited them had been expelled.
Goryeo's authority over Kyushu was acknowledged.
Iki Island and Tsushima were recognized as Goryeo territory.
The explanation continued,
but at some point, the owner stopped hearing it.
Only one fact remained clear—
he was leaving.
"…Thank you for everything."
The owner bowed deeply.
The shorter the words, the heavier the heart.
Park hesitated, then took something from his bundle.
A tea millstone*
and a cast-iron kettle.
The tea millstone was used to grind solid brick tea into powder.
Much smaller than a grain mill.
Also called cha-ma, used in the era of powdered tea whisking (jeomdabeop).
The iron kettle was for boiling water—
for preparing tea.
"A gift from the heart."
They were not expensive items.
But they carried with them time—
the time to grind tea, to boil water, to wait.
The owner received them without words.
The weight of the millstone lingered in his hands.
The cold warmth of the iron kettle
slowly brought the reality of parting.
That night, he stood long before the calligraphy on the wall.
Ichigo ichie.
One meeting in a lifetime.
Only now did he understand it with his body.
In the span of one life,
we meet but once.
If one sees this life as a single term,
then within it, we meet but once.
Even a small encounter in this life,
they say, is the brushing of millions of past ties.
The meaning ran deep.