📜 NEW CHAPTER 2 — THE FUNERAL BELL

Jin Ryu woke to the cold creak of old beams above him — the same cracked rafters that leaked rainwater every monsoon. He lay still, half-buried in the rough blanket, listening to the world breathe around him.

He flexed his fingers — thin, smooth, untouched by decades of scarring work and desperate grips on rusted steel. Young again. The hand of a boy who hadn’t yet signed away his family’s fields to loan sharks or watched trusted men gut his coffers for Baek’s scraps.

His eyes flicked to the signet ring beside him. He hadn’t worn it in years — sold it once, bought it back too late, buried it with a vow that never held.

Now it gleamed weakly in the half-light, dull brass marked by a dragon’s faded coil. His ancestor’s promise, the one thing they hadn’t stolen.

He slipped it on. It felt cold and too large for his thin knuckles — but it fit. It fit.

Three bells.

Outside, the wind carried the echo — deep and solemn. Funeral bells. The third toll meant the doors would close soon.

He sat up, the blanket slipping to the floor. His old tunic hung off his shoulders. He caught sight of his reflection in a cracked bronze mirror leaning in the corner. The boy staring back had clear eyes — no bloodshot corners from cheap wine, no sunken cheeks from nights without bread.

Just Jin. Eighteen. Or fifty, if you counted all the years wasted.

The door creaked. He turned. Tae stood there — older brother by blood, older still by life’s weight. In Jin’s first life, Tae had died in a gutter fight, drunk and stabbed from behind for a handful of copper.

Tae looked at him now with the same gruff frown — but there was no suspicion yet, no broken trust. Only weariness.

“Little brother,” Tae said. His voice cracked like dry bark. “They’re waiting. If you don’t come out soon, they’ll start dividing the scraps without you.”

Jin stood. He smoothed the tunic’s front, then met Tae’s eyes. He searched them — loyalty, regret, the faint hope that maybe this time the second son wouldn’t crumble like stale bread.

“They’ll wait,” Jin said simply.

Tae raised an eyebrow. The old Jin would have mumbled an apology, ducked his head, let the uncles and cousins pick him clean before the last shovelful of earth hit Father’s coffin.

But Tae said nothing. He stepped aside as Jin moved past him, bare feet cold on the stone floor.

The small courtyard was choked with mourners — half of them family in name only, the other half debtors, gossip-mongers, or carrion waiting for the last drop of meat.

A simple wooden coffin lay on the pyre. No marble, no silk banners, no house guard. House Ryu had spent its gold long ago.

Jin paused at the threshold. He felt the wind cut through him — crisp with winter’s bite. He felt alive. And behind his ribs, buried deep, he felt the echo of the blade Mun had buried in his throat once. Not this time.

He stepped out. The whispers rolled like snakes through dry grass.

"There he is — the new head."
"A boy still wet behind the ears."
"Baek will eat him in a season."

Jin ignored them. He walked straight to the coffin, placed one hand on the rough pine. The old man inside had done his best — and his worst. Jin didn’t mourn him this time. He mourned the years he’d wasted cursing his father instead of fighting for what mattered.

A voice cut through the murmur. Oil over water.

“Lord Jin. We must speak before the ashes scatter.”

It was Uncle Hwan — a cousin of Jin’s late mother, self-styled ‘guardian’ of House Ryu’s affairs when convenient. He stood by the old stone well, draped in a fox-fur coat far richer than any cloak Jin had owned in years.

His smile was polite poison. “Your father trusted me to see the estate’s transition goes smoothly.”

Jin turned, slow as frost creeping over glass. His voice stayed soft — the same tone he’d used once when begging Hwan for a loan to pay harvest tax. Hwan had refused, then bragged about it to Baek’s men.

“There is no transition,” Jin said. “My father’s will named me head. As the signet shows.”

He raised his hand — the old crest gleaming in the dull sun.

Hwan’s eyes flickered — just a flicker, but enough for Jin to taste it. The old man didn’t expect resistance. He expected the same pliant boy.

“The signet is a symbol,” Hwan said smoothly. “But the House must stand on ledgers and agreements, not rings and old tales. You’re young, Lord Jin. Let your uncle help carry the burden.”

A few older relatives bobbed their heads behind him — hungry dogs pretending to be sheep.

Jin smiled. The same speech, he thought. Word for word, the same false concern Hwan had spat thirty years ago — before carving up the salt pans and selling the orchard lease to Baek’s agents for coins that vanished in a whore’s pocket.

He stepped closer, close enough for only Hwan to hear. His voice dropped, soft enough to force the old fox to lean in.

“You’ll carry nothing,” Jin murmured. “If you touch my ledgers, I’ll remind the village where you buried your first wife’s dowry.”

Hwan froze. The color drained from his powdered cheeks. His mouth opened — no words came.

Jin’s smile widened — just enough for Hwan to see teeth.

“Pay your respects to my father, Uncle. Then leave.”

He stepped past him without waiting for an answer. Tae watched him approach the coffin again — eyes wide, suspicion blooming into something fiercer.

Jin bent, placed the signet gently on the coffin lid for a heartbeat, then palmed it again.

He whispered under his breath — too low for the crows to hear:

"I bury you once, Father. But this house? Never again."

When the pyre took the coffin, the mourners watched the smoke rise with a hunger that turned Jin’s stomach. Vultures and jackals — all of them.

Behind him, Tae stepped close. “Little brother… what did you say to Hwan? He looked like he’d seen the ghost of your grandfather.”

Jin shrugged. “A reminder he owed us more than he’ll admit.”

Tae studied him — really studied him, as if trying to find the crack that let this cold steel slip through his soft brother’s skin.

“Lord Jin,” said another voice — low, deferential but slick as oil.

A man in a grey cloak approached — the tax steward for Baek’s outlying estates. He carried a scroll tied with a black ribbon.

“I come bearing Lord Baek’s condolences,” he said with a stiff bow. “And his request that you honor the late Lord Ryu’s obligations by month’s end.”

He offered the scroll. Jin didn’t take it.

“Obligations?” Jin asked, voice calm as frost.

“Debts,” the steward said, baring yellow teeth in what passed for a smile. “The salt pans, the orchard. Interest due, Lord Jin. Lord Baek expects your tribute.”

Jin’s gaze swept the gathered family — none met his eyes. They’d see him buckle, as he always had. The desperate boy who sold the orchard twice and begged Baek for an extension while rats nested in the granary.

But this time, Jin only nodded — once. He took the scroll, cracked the wax, glanced at the ink that had bled through cheap parchment. A trap. He knew every line already.

He looked the steward dead in the eye.

“I’ll see it’s paid,” Jin said. His smile cut cold. “But next time you bring tribute demands to my father’s pyre, bring them to the grave instead.”

He tore the scroll in half. The crowd gasped — the steward recoiled, his eyes bulging like a toad’s.

Jin dropped the shreds in the pyre. Fire took them greedily — like the house would take every debt, every scrap of shame, and turn it to ash.

Tae laughed — a single bark that startled even himself. He slapped Jin’s shoulder.

“My brother’s grown fangs.”

Jin didn’t smile back. His eyes stayed locked on the flames. No fangs yet, he thought.

Teeth come later. Claws come later. For now — fire.

To be continued.