Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
⟨Chapter 14⟩
⟨Ghost Painting⟩
In the old days, a scholar happened to obtain a painting of a beautiful woman in green and red clothing, and hung it in his room, cherishing it a lot. But not much time passed when he lost weight and died. It was greatly feared by everyone that it was not a painting of a person but of a ghost, and it was stealing the energy of the living.
When the people’s unease grew, the village governor ordered one person to bring that painting to his govern office. He told her that if there was any injustice, to come out and make an appeal, but the woman didn’t appear, and soon even the governor died all of a sudden.
Deeply fearful, the people burned the painting, but after a few days, the painting returned to its original place, unscathed. A certain traveling doctor, who knew nothing of it, took liking in the painting and brought it with him, but immediately after that, a rumor spread that he also died suddenly.
Since then, no one saw that painting. Who the woman in green and red was, and what was the full story wasn’t revealed to the end.
『 Record of ghostly stories 』
Isn’t it a bit hot…?
Yu Dan pulled the scarf and loosened it a bit. A spring breeze come in through the loose opening. He put his hand in his pocket again and started walking.
The school ended early because it was before the exam, but because he didn’t want to go home straight away, he walked where his feet wanted. The blank space between thick leaves, the clouds and the sky. Such things brushed past his eyes. The wind blew.
Then he stopped at a certain point.
He turned to look back at the place he just passed.
On the other side of the dusty window was a small shop. Old books tied up with plastic straps were pilling up. How freaking old were they? After he looked at the pages that turned yellow for a while, he turned his head around.
…. Where was he?
Unknown antique painting gallery street. He was walking without thinking, but it seemed that he ended up walking a long distance. What should he do? Yu Dan stood for a moment, thinking, and then looked back.
That being said, he didn’t feel like going back the way he came again.
If he went while looking around, wouldn’t he come across a place he knew? Anyhow, he had enough time, so what did it matter?
He started to wander again.
The gallery street, where the magnolias just started to bloom, was quiet. There were almost no customers. Perhaps the places, which sold such old items, were always like that, there were only the non-human things hiding in the corners as if it was a ‘find a hidden picture’ game.
The drowsy things, who were comfortably napping, subtly stirred after Yu Dan appeared.
Among piles of the tea sets scattered on the road, a few urgently closed their lids. The black shadows behind the antique furniture hid their traces. The eyes of immortals engraved on the pottery followed after him.
What? What did he do?
Yu Dan skimmed through those things with an unhappy face.
At that moment a violent wind blew.
With the loud sound of the engine, a racing black car came to a sudden halt. The door abruptly opened and a man in a suit ran out. Breathing deeply, he grabbed a paper bag from the back seat. It was clearly visible that his hands were trembling even from this distance.
What? Was he holding something that frightening?
Having such a strange thought, he followed after him.
The man hastily ran to enter the framing shop with the sign ‘Classic Paintings Trading Post’, and the moment he opened the glass door, he threw the paper bag. The elderly shopkeeper, who was watching the news, stood up in surprise.
“Ma-Ma-Manager-nim…!”
The man’s face was pale, and he couldn’t speak. The elderly shopkeeper, who instantly figured out the situation, clicked his tongue.
“You saw it too, right? That thing? That person. What did I tell you? But no matter what I said, you didn’t even pretend to listen!”
“I thought that manager-nim was just joking! I couldn’t expect it was a g-g-ghost for real!”
Ghost?
There was no way that a thing bought in such a place would be completely clean, right? The malicious ghosts would cause trouble when they hung around. When you realize that the wall portrait, which stares at you every time you pass it in the bathroom for over ten years, looks like a landscape painting in other people’s eyes, you would be able to tell that you saw a ghost, right?
With such thought, Yu Dan stared at the hanging scroll, but he couldn’t see it very clearly, besides a vague blur. Even when he looked with his right eye covered, it was the same.
What is it?
Anyhow, he swiftly entered the framing shop, because he became anxious. The shopkeeper and customers had their attention on the hanging scroll and didn’t look his way.
“Anyway, I don’t need a refund or anything!”
The man took out something out of the suit pocket. It was a black plastic bag. After untying a knot, white salt scattered in all directions. He took off his shoes, put them backwards, and then quickly staggered to get into the car again.
A few minutes didn’t even pass. The moment he got into the back car, it disappeared like a shooting arrow. Yu Dan was in doubt.
“What? Is he sick in the head? Why sprinkle salt and wear shoes backwards?”
The framing shop elder glanced at him.
“As for that, there is a saying that you should scatter salt to chase away ghosts, and to put shoes backwards, so the ghost can’t follow you. I guess he went to a shaman. If he was so frightened…”
He clicked his tongue and picked up the paper bag.
“It’s truly strange. No matter how I think about it. I never bought such a painting before. The moment customers find it, they buy it as if they’re possessed, no matter how I try to stop them, and then bring it back shuddering.”
From the bag, a hanging scroll wrapped in a red paper came out.
Like before, he couldn’t clearly see its identity. Only something very vague and fuzzy. When he concentrated all his senses, some kind of silhouette skimmed past.
… A woman? A woman from the old days?
“That’s a pity. No matter how many times I put it away, it will just come out again.”
The elder picked up the hanging scroll to put it away in the depths of the drawer. In that instant, as if that thing was alive, it slipped past numerous other hanging scrolls and came out. It very much seemed to be fleeing.
“Wait!”
Yu Dan grabbed the end of the hanging scroll, which was about to disappear, at the critical moment and pulled. Where was it fleeing? The red paper came off, and the hanging scroll suddenly unfolded.
Because it unrolled to the end, the painting was revealed.
As expected, it was supernatural. Now he could feel it clearly.
In the painting was a person from the old days, a lady, who seemed to be probably from the age of the Joseon dynasty. Even if he was wrong, it would be a hundred years old, but it was extremely sharp and clear. Sitting on the floor, between her long freely flowing black hair, a pale face flashed. Colorful silk clothes with golden leaf[1] pattern. On the side laid a mirror box and a comb.
Yu Dan stared at the painting blankly.
He didn’t’ notice before, because his gaze was caught by that gloomy woman, but even overall, it was a very strange painting. Besides, on the wide floor, there were three animals sitting side by side. A rooster, pig and a peacock. Each hair was painted extremely realistically, but for some reason none of them had eyes.
Strange. Why didn’t they have eyes?
He fell into thoughts, but then someone shook his shoulder. As he raised his head, it was the framing shop’s elderly owner. The person who shook him was even more surprised.
“Aack, cold! Your body is cold as ice! Don’t thoughtlessly touch such things. Hey, put it down!”
Only then did he realize. The fingers which held the hanging scroll burned from the cold that climbed them. The goosebumps went up his arms. It was so extremely cold, he feared that even his heart was about to freeze.
This thing was harmful.
However, if he left it alone now, it was clear it would flee again. And he probably wouldn’t be able to find it the second time.
That was seriously bothering him.
Yu Dan made a decision.
“Grandpa, can I take that painting with me?”
“Eh?! Did everything I said up till now went through one ear and went out the other? First, put it down!”
“No! I hate it in the first place, but I hate leaving it alone like this even more!”
He came out before he could change someone else’s or his own mind. Perhaps the elderly owner didn’t want to follow him outside, but…
He didn’t follow.
At the beginning he was resolute, but now he wasn’t sure if he indeed made the right decision. The sensation that he was holding something harmful grew stronger. The shivering cold changed to cold air which gave him chills, and now even his head was spinning.
It was because of that painting, he found something very dangerous, right?
So let’s endure it for a little longer. Anyhow, if he says he found something like this, he might be able to act all high and mighty in front of the yokai. Let’s make sure to endure the want to throw it away and only throw it the moment he enters the Banwoldang’s doorstep. Yeah. He should do it.
While his mind wandered, he opened the front door.
… Uh? The front door?
Dumbfounded, he looked around.
No matter how he looked, he was in front of his house. But why did he come back to his house? He surely took the painting and was heading to the Banwoldang. No, he was thinking that he was going to the Banwoldang. Unknowingly, he changed the direction and headed home, and didn’t realize that fact until he just opened the front door.
It was as if he was possessed.
He looked down.
The painting was in his hand as it was. He was overcome with an urge he couldn’t’ endure and unfolded the hanging scroll.
He couldn’t believe it.
The painting changed.
The clarity and the scope increased. When he peeked at it in the framing shop, he only clearly saw the main floor[2]. Now, as if something happened, he also saw the other rooms beyond the floor.
“How is this possible?”
Frowning his forehead, he looked at it even more intently.
Those were ordinary rooms with paper sliding doors, but the room at the very end drew his gaze.
Only this one was different. That was a white and smooth door to the apartment room, which didn’t harmonize at all with the giwajip[3] of the Joseon period.
Yu Dan’s eyes almost popped out.
That door was seriously familiar. Wasn’t that the door to the second bedroom he passes a few times a day? Even the mark left when he brought out a chair out was clear. But why was his own house’s room door depicted in this painting?
His heart turned cold.
He was in big trouble. Something was very wrong. It was as the fox yokai said, he was wandering a world that was like a very dangerous maze, and he couldn’t know when he would face something he shouldn’t have.
Behind him, something creaked.
The ‘thing’ in the painting opened the door and came out.
But looking at that, was it really a ghost? If it was a ghost, he saw all kinds of horrible kinds others couldn’t even imagine.
Yu Dan slowly looked back.
His expression changed.
This thing was different. It was different from all the ghost he saw until now, it emanated an overwhelming presence that took away his breath. The wicked energy squashed his whole body. He couldn’t make the slightest move, as if he was pinned by needles.
The corrupted thing which died a long time ago, unable to rot away or turn into dust, forever wandering the boundary of the death and life. Between the hanging down long hair, instead of eyes were deep-deep pits of hell. Even though he saw it once, it was such a horrible sight he wouldn’t be able to forget it for the rest of his life.
It would be doing it all along. It would give people such overwhelming fear, and then kill them off one after one. While hiding like this.
Because of anger, he for a moment forgot about the fear.
“What do you want?!”
In the instant, the needles were released.
Yu Dan hastily rolled up the hanging scroll. The ghost, which curled as if it was about to pounce at any moment, suddenly disappeared.
He barely caught his breath.
He stared down at the hanging scroll with a tired face. His only urge was to immediately open the window and drop it on the ground twenty floors below.
He carefully suppressed that urge.
No matter how he looked, it was an extremely nasty thing, so he couldn’t do that even more. If he wanted to throw it away, he had to go to that place and throw it away there.
He gripped the hanging scroll, which was like a cold snake, so tightly the veins on his hands popped up, opened the door and ran out.
* * *
“I don’t understand…”
Yu Dan held a blanket and abruptly stood up.
“Why am I cold even though I threw away the painting?”
This place with a faint scent of medical herbs was a small alcove in the back corner of the Banwoldong. It was a so-called ‘medical room’, with pouches full of drugs hanging around, a straw cutter and strange yokai’s anatomy charts were scattered around.
The twin yokai, who were moving busily while whispering, stopped their movements at the same time. They argued for a moment, “You say it” and “Noona say it”, and then finally Chaeseol stepped forward with a troubled face.
“I’m very sorry, but it’s not cold.”
“Then?”
“You can’t say it. Because it’s a serious disease that even a wild child ginseng can’t cure.”
“Noona! You should just say something better instead! This is spiritual punishment. It’s a disaster brought because one touched something wrong. Usually they’re items with ghost stuck to them or something possessing a mysterious power.”
“So you say I’m in the middle of disaster right now?”
Even after hearing the explanation, he couldn’t understand all the same.
He handed that wicked painting to the owner of this place, the fox yokai. He straight away tightly wrapped the hanging scroll in the red cloth and hung it dangling on the wall and then circled around it with a very powerful looking golden rope. Even so, nothing changed at all.
“Don’t think too excessively. You did well. You really did.”
Do-ssi unexpectedly appeared, sat close to him and comforted him.
“I did well? Really?”
“Yeah. Very well. I was still angry about you breaking a genuine Dogū from the Silla period, but didn’t you obtain and bring a genuine painting from the Joseon period? Though there is a ghost stuck to it, it’s really old, but in such a good condition. I have to say I’m proud of you.”
Yu Dan stared at him blankly.
What was this middle-aged dokkaebi just said? He couldn’t understand. Perhaps because his head was spinning, he heard nothing but nonsense.
“What nonsense are You spouting!?”
Heuk-yo shouted. As expected, he heard that nonsense right, huh?
“No way that older brother is like this! That human punk, who was completely fine just a few days ago, crawled in with half of his lifeline held by a ghost, but You’re talking about a painting? You should be cleaning a corpse right now!”
While criticizing Do-ssi, Heuk-yo picked something up and handed it out towards him.
“I brought you restorative tonic. Drink it quickly.”
It was a tray covered with a red cloth, but inside the porcelain bowl was a herbal medicine in the color of blood. Beside it, a pair of bamboo sticks were neatly placed.
“Why is it somehow familiar? Also, the feeling is somewhat bad.”
“Neat, right? I made it according to my taste.”
“What neat?! No matter how I look, it’s poison! Are you trying to euthanize me?”
“Of course not. I even said it’s a restorative tonic.”
“Who would think it’s okay to drink a restorative tonic if they’re brought something that looks so much like a deadly poison!”
“Are you rejecting a tonic I put my heart and soul into?! Then there is no other way but force you to drink it!”
The serpent yokai’s eyes flashed as she picked up the bamboo sticks. The twins hastily stepped forward to stop her, but because they spilled the washbasin, a commotion ensured.
Baek Ran, who was tying a knot on the golden rope, looked around.
“Everyone.”
“Yes. Please order.”
“Please leave.”
“Yes.”
Only then it became quiet.
However, wouldn’t it be better if it was noisy? His head started to hurt again so much it felt as if it was splinting. He turned his head to look at the fox yokai.
Hanging talismans on the golden rope took a considerably long time. It was because Baek Ran was only using his left hand. When he accepted the hanging scroll, when he fastened the knot, when he hung it on the wall, he kept it like this. He asked if he perhaps hurt his right hand, but he said no and hid his hand behind his back.
It was strange. No matter how he thought about it, it was strange.
But because his head hurt, thinking anymore was too much.
Yu Dan wrapped himself in the blanket.
“What is it? I took one wrong walk…”
“I don’t know if it can be a consolation, but nothing ever is a coincidence.”
Baek Ran barely tied the last knot on the golden rope and turned around.
“From the story, it appears that the walking wherever your legs take you was just an illusion. It seems that Your eye guided you to that place. It said ‘there is something strange there, so please take a look’.”
“What? I had no idea at all! Are you saying that I wasn’t walking out of my own will?”
“Your eye is definitely a part of Yourself.”
“For the first time, I feel like punching a part of myself.”
“Please don’t do that. Because what it saw was correct. The problem was what came next, right? As Your current state isn’t good, it would be too cruel to point out each single one, so—“
“What is that? Is that all of your consideration?”
“— So I can’t miss an opportunity to be cruel, correct?”
The fox yokai smirked.
Here it goes.
Yu Dan sighed.
Do whatever you like.
“Yes. It’s good that You discovered it first, but the instant You stretched your hand out and grabbed it, that thing also stretched its hand out and grabbed your lifeline. So, as You heard a moment ago, it currently seized half of Your lifeline. It can drag You to the afterlife in a blink of an eye.”
“What the hell is it? Why is it so vicious?”
The moment he turned his head towards the painting, his heart suddenly sunk. Unknowingly, he turned his gaze away.
“I should press it a bit more, eh?”
Baek Ran picked up a dagger laying on the top of the desk. The moment he cut the red string tightly tying it, the hanging scroll unfolded all at once. At the same time, two talismans flew and stuck to the face of the woman in the painting. It was a strange latter for a ghost ‘鬼’, but the insides of the 田 were empty like 口.
“What does it mean?”
“Blind ghost, ‘Hwe’. It’s a talisman to cover the ghost’s eyes.”
He definitely could look at the painting much more comfortably than a moment ago. However, separate from that thing, as the talisman covered the woman’s face, it became even more terrifying. Even though he said that he would press it, the chill he felt was stronger and colder.
Baek Ran picked up a stick from the corner and lightly touched the painting. With the sound of something exploding, a thick, blood-red smoke raised.
“As expected. This painting had truly taken many lives, eh? As it was wrapped in the red paper, I guess someone already sealed it once. So the people who recently bought this painting were able to save their lives. But even so, it’s very surprising.”
“Then what the hell is that painting?”
“It’s kwihwa(鬼畫 ghost painting). It means a painting depicting a ghost.”
Baek Ran unfolded 『Annals of Past and Present Bizarre Occurrences 』 and handed it to him.
He skimmed through it carefully.
It was a story about the painting depicting a ghost wearing a green jeogori and red chima[5]. Although the one in the illustration was just an ordinary woman in the green and red hanbok, it gave him the creeps because he couldn’t take his eyes off of her. The scholar, the govern official, and the doctor person, who put their hands on it, all died. And then…
“What? Is this the end?”
Yu Dan turned the page. That was suspicious.
“That’s really the end. Were those people actually the criminals, who murdered that woman or something, so it ended like this?”
“No. That’s the end of it.”
“So she is just a serial murderer? Just killing indiscriminately?”
“We can’t know even that. That’s the scariest thing about ghost paintings. Since the old days, what humans feared the most were ominous phenomena that couldn’t be explained. A lightning that suddenly strikes down from the sky. A black shadow that suddenly appears and covers the sun. The rainstorm that couldn’t be predicted. Because they imagined all kinds of reasons for those causes they couldn’t understand, they put them together and fell into fear. But when they realized the causes one after one, they overcame their fear. They dominated it with their mind. Isn’t it the content of many folktales? The tales about if one guesses the name of the being with mysterious power, they will win the bet.”
“Um… I seem to have vaguely heard about it before.”
“What goal someone has when painting the ghost painting, who is the ghost, and how she died. We don’t know anything. Such mysteriousness is the very source of the power the ghost painting has. Because of this mystery, the people who see this painting feel uneasy. It obtains the power because of their fear. You probably saw it, correct? The painting grew wider because it obtained power.”
“Right. Because of it, the door to my house appeared in the painting, right?”
“The boundary between the painting and reality is becoming blurry. So the ghost is able to overcome that boundary, cross to the reality and cause harm.”
Yu Dan took his eyes off of the book and looked at the fox.
“Then to resolve that so-called ghost painting…”
“We have to uncover its secret. Who she is, how she died, why is she harming people. We have to reveal those secrets for it to lose its power.”
*~*~*
[1] golden leaf — 금박 (geumbak) a traditional Korean technique of applying golden leaf on fabrics.
[2] main floor — when we’re talking about the floor in this chapter, it refers to ‘마루 (maru)’ an open floor between rooms. The main floor would be ‘대청마루 (daecheong maru)’, and it would be a floor between main rooms.
[4] giwajip — 기와집, a traditional Korean tile-roofed house
[5] jeogori and chima — part of hanbok. Jeogori is upper garment, chima is lower, skirt, garment.
Translator’s note: Yu Dan is sick because of the supernatural count: 1
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