Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
⟨Chapter 34⟩
“Of course.”
Baek Ran replied.
“Especially if one is deeply related to Heaven like me, they receive even stricter judgments. The Heavens sometimes show kindness by bestowing sweet water on this world, but when enraged, it punishes without any mercy.”
“What was it punished for?”
“It’s suspected of harming a human’s child. In fact, like all yokai I brought under my command, Furious Thunder wasn’t a yokai, who led an upright and moral life. However, that’s not the case now. The judgment of Supreme One[1] is wrong.”
Everyone was startled. Especially the elder yokai were shocked.
“Saying such things without a hesitation!”
“Cheonho-nim, You have to be a bit more careful.”
“What if someone hears it?”
Everyone looked around in fear. Some yokai glanced at Yu Dan.
“We should erase that human’s memory before he leaves.”
“It won’t be effective anyway.”
Baek Ran replied. Yu Dan asked.
“Who is that Supreme One?”
“Judge. If I were to explain it, it’s a kind of Law. Humans perceive it as a god.”
“It’s complicated.”
“To give an example… Do You know about Nazaca’s geoglyph? Because the drawings are so enormous, You can only see stone piles and lines on the ground. You have to rise into air for the shapes of monkeys, spiders and birds to be clearly revealed. It’s similar. The Laws of Heaven are so enormous, the humans can only see an extremely small part. Because humans live short lives, it’s even harder to understand.”
“While I got it that you’re trying to explain it very diligently and as simply as possible, I really don’t understand.”
“Very natural. Because I was explaining that it’s difficult to understand.”
“Right, right.”
The frog cut in.
“Anyhow, for that reason we’re making an appeal to Heaven right now. We’re going to ask to revoke the Heavenly Punishment on the yokai under Cheonho-nim’s command. The situation is pretty difficult right now. The powers of beings, who descended from Heaven like Cheonho, come from following Heavenly Principles.”
“Here ‘following’ means not getting caught breaking it.”
“Not throwing out a person, who received Heavenly Punishment? That’s a discordance. There will be backlash.”
“Here ‘backlash’ means being slapped a few times on the wrist.”
“Cheonho-nim! Such attitude…!”
Heuk-yo unconsciously shouted and then became embarrassed.
“You can’t do such things. If You lose Your power…”
She swallowed the end of that sentence.
Baek Ran lightly shook his head.
“There will be backlash all the same, even if I don’t throw it out. One of my subordinates committed a crime? If I acknowledge it, do You think that my power that everyone is so worried about will be intact? I have absolutely no intention of acknowledging it obediently.”
After hammering that down, he looked at Yu Dan again.
“Anyhow, does this much roughly answer all You were curious about?”
It seemed to mean he would speak only up to here. That was enough though. He got a rough sense of it.
“You have no intention of chasing that wolf away, so you’re planning on finding that lost child and prove its innocence, huh?”
“Correct.”
“That’s the right thing to do.”
The frog spoke with a worried face.
“But I can’t help to have a thought. What if it’s someone’s conspiracy?”
“Again with those conspiracies, eh? What kind of Divine Beast comes up with conspiracy theories whenever he gets a chance? Please stop watching alien dramas.”
Baek Ran rebuked, but the frog was unfazed.
“However, everyone would predict that Cheonho-nim would step out like this, and now You’re clearly moving according to those predictions. I feel uneasy about it by itself.”
“That’s because the frog’s heart is too small[2]. I suggest changing a body to another. Because it’s about time for it.”
“…”
“Anyhow, the result is no different. I have to make sure to find that child somehow. Isn’t it a good thing to find a lost child anyway?”
No one could reply to Baek Ran’s words.
“So that’s how it turned out.”
Chaeu stepped out and organized things.
That’s how it was, huh…?
Yu Dan looked around the room. At some point even other yokai followed and swarmed inside.
“But if something like that happened, shouldn’t you have called me?”
At Yu Dan’s words, Baek Ran frowned.
“Why do You think so?”
“You said that I can see well hidden things with those eyes. Not only that, I attract things. Since I was young, yokai and ghosts often hovered around me, and now I even attract the supernatural and possessed by the supernatural people. I’m a living magnet. So I may be able to find something. Isn’t that right?”
He looked at everyone around him. The twins easily nodded, agreeing.
“If it were me, instead of dreaming and worrying others so much, I would call myself at once and order to come to the store. What is so difficult about it? You can just make a call. If calling is too much, you could just text me. If you straightforward asked ‘Do you want to come and take a look this?, I would come straight away to take a look, so if I saw something I would see something, if not, then I wouldn’t and…”
“Okay. That’s really straightforward. Then take a look at this.”
Do-ssi handed him a photo. Perhaps he stashed it before, his movements were extremely quick for a middle-aged dokkaebi. Baek Ran tried to snatch the photo back, but under everyone’s earnest gazes, he just dropped his hand.
Yu Dan stared down at the photo.
A girl standing with a baseball park in the background. A circular beret, bright yellow clothes, checkered one-piece outfit. She was holding a sign ball and smiling brightly revealing a snaggletooth.
“It’s a picture taken on the day of disappearance.”
Chaeu said.
Yu Dan stared at the picture, concentrating.
But even after looking for a while, he didn’t see anything. Not even a very dim glimpse.
“It isn’t easy to look for things, let alone a soul. Please don’t forcibly rush into things that can’t be done without a training.”
Baek Ran tried to snatch the photo, but Yu Dan grasped it tightly.
“I’ll look more.”
“Truly head first, eh?”
“Try waiting. Didn’t you say it was already a few times? You won’t have a usage for this picture anymore.”
“It’s true. You have to rest for a bit now.”
Heuk-yo spoke sternly. Baek Ran shook his head.
“It’s time for the yokai, who were sent on a patrol to return. I’ll meet with them first.”
Yu Dan stared at the picture again. Baek Ran, who crossed the study, was about to say something, but the twins cut in.
“Please leave it alone. Because he will just do that.”
“Right. I will just do this.”
Yu Dan also added a word.
“He said that, Cheonho-nim.”
Chaeseol pushed Baek Ran’s back. Heuk-yo, Do-ssi and elder yokai followed the fox and rushed out.
Yu Dan sat down in the bedroom which became quiet and concentrated again. He stared at the child’s innocent face, while thinking.
This child, what happened to this beret-wearing and brightly smiling child? If it was an action of the supernatural, what kind of supernatural caught her?
He looked down without even blinking, while concentrating.
How long did he stare? He saw a form of the child slowly move as if looking at an optical illusion. Perhaps it wasn’t an optical illusion. The boundaries blurred and the boundaries of colors started to gradually spill out.
Then, the picture suddenly moved. He reflexively grabbed it.
It was Baek Ran.
“When did you come back?”
“I guess You were concentrating on concentrating, eh?”
The fox yokai replied as if he was at a loss for words.
“I came back some time ago and wandered around for a while.”
“Really? I had no idea.”
Yu Dan’s gaze turned to the picture again.
“Just leave me alone. I’ll do it.” [3]
“Who is saying what now?”
Baek Ran stepped out. He was trying to concentrate again for a bit, but this time Do-ssi stealthily came in.
“Saw anything?”
“No. I thought I saw something, but didn’t see it… I’m not sure. It’s more difficult than I thought.”
“You’re wasting your eyes. Let’s take a look. Cheonho-nim didn’t let me even look. Give it to me.”
The instant he handed it over, it was swiftly snatched.
Uh?
When he looked again, it wasn’t Do-ssi but Baek Ran.
“What? You’re even using disguises now?”
“Have dinner.”
“Uh? Dinner?”
Looking now, the sunlight spilling through the circular window was red. The furniture inside of the bedroom was dyed in the evening glow.
“What time is it?”
“Please go down first and have dinner. And then please go home. Don’t You have to go to school?”
“That’s really…”
“Skipping all the same, eh? Please don’t come up here now.”
Baek Ran chased Yu Dan away and closed the door.
Yu Dan frowned.
Why didn’t it work?
Up till now such things clearly appeared in front of his eyes even if he didn’t want to see them. Enough that he wanted to say ‘Can I please not see so well?’. But this time even though he wanted to see, he didn’t see. Whether he caught something or not, it was just flickering.
If Heavenly Eye was such a good eye, shouldn’t he see it?
He fell into thoughts with a grave expression.
He ate dinner, and then he couldn’t do anything as he was chased home. Even other yokai in unison said ‘You have to go to school’.
The twins came out to see him off.
“Well, please don’t burden Yourself too much.”
“Right. Look if you see it, don’t if you don’t. That’s it.”
However, the two children’s eyes were saying something completely different. Please figure something out. They were desperately begging for it.
But more than that…
He just kept thinking about it. Even after he returned home and washed, even when he laid down to sleep, he kept thinking.
Where the hell was that child?
He abruptly stood up and turned on the computer.
When he checked, there really were a few of such incidents since a couple of months ago. The incidents where a child suddenly disappeared from an apartment parking lot. Articles poured out.
Yu Dan clicked on the news video.
“… Today marks the third day since the disappearance, but no trace had been found. The main and auxiliary police mobilized over 560 people in 7 groups and searched the nearby mountains. It was decided to once again thoroughly analyze the footage from the CCTV installed in the nearby area and distribute additional million missing posters.”
The scene changed, and the faces of crying parents were fully shown.
His chest tightened.
Who the hell caught her? If Heavenly Eye was really such a good eye, shouldn’t he see something around?
The next day, after school ended, he went to the scene of the incident. He roughly knew the location. Because the incident became quite a hot topic, it wasn’t only in the news, but even people on the internet boards posted what apartment it was and what parents were doing.
The parking lot was quiet.
Yu Dan found the spot where the child disappeared straight away.
Evening that day, the child’s dad came out of the car parked in this spot of the parking lot. He opened the car door, and first took out the child, and then bowed down and stretched out his arm to take out the baggage from the front seat, but… in those short 10 seconds the child disappeared.
Why was there no trace left? Footprints, other marks, some kind of remnants of energy. He hoped they were just very faint, but there was nothing?
He thoroughly surveyed the area, but he wasn’t able to discover anything.
When he gave up and turned to leave, a wind suddenly blew and fluttered the hem of his school uniform.
A faint sound brushed his ears. It seemed like some kind of singing.
Yu Dan looked back.
“Who?”
There was no one. Besides the hatchback of yellow car parked over there, there was nothing.
What…?
With an uncomfortable feeling as if he caught something but didn’t, he headed to the Banwoldang.
The atmosphere was subdued as before. Seeing that Yu Dan came, the twin’s face became a bit brighter.
“You came? Cheonho-nim is upstairs.”
“Did you find anything?”
“No.”
“The picture?”
“He would try to hide it, so I stole it beforehand.”
Do-ssi took out a picture of the child from his pockets and handed it to him. Yu Dan stared at the dokkaebi and then poked his face with one finger.
“Aay! What are you doing?”
“Nothing. You’re the true uncle.”
It didn’t seem like a fox in disguise.
He accepted the photo and climbed to the second floor.
Baek Ran was sitting in the study together with elder yokai. He took out a thing that looked like an old and very complicated compass and was discussing something over it, and then looked at Yu Dan with an expression of ‘You came back here again’.
“Just leave it alone, please.”
The frog said hastily.
“No one ordered him and he is doing it because he is a good person. Isn’t it his own choice?”
Baek Ran stared at the frog. His lips parted slightly as if to say ‘what are you talking about’, but he shut his mouth.
Yu Dan sat down in the corner of the study.
The time came to focus again. After the frog motioned with his eyes, the elder yokai stealthily left.
The study became quiet.
For how long had he stared? The child clearly appeared in his eyes without even a photo now. Even so, he focused his gaze on the photo. For the first time since he was born he was looking at someone so meticulously.
The child in a beret. A child, who smiles while revealing her teeth. Who caught this girl, who looks so cheerful and playful? Not in the world of the living, not in the world of the dead, then where is she right now?
What kind of supernatural trick was it?
He was staring, but his vision became somewhat fuzzy. His eyelids slowly fell down and he couldn’t move a finger. It was similar to a sleep paralysis.
He saw the fox yokai under his half-closed eyes.
It seemed that he came to the study some time ago and was walking around. He had no idea because he was concentrating on the picture.
Then Baek Ran looked at him.
As if thinking that Yu Dan was asleep, his expression changed subtlety. The fox walked up closer and observed his face in more detail. He tried to wave his hand a few times in front of his eyes, and then stood up again. After leaving for a moment, he returned from the bedroom.
What to do, he couldn’t twitch a finger.
Baek Ran unfolded a curtain. After a moment, he hung a bell on a string outside of it.
Were you perhaps thinking I wouldn’t make it?
In this groggy state, his mind turned into a vacuum. All the sights and sounds of the world were sucked in and annihilated, only a prefect silence seemed to be left.
In that stillness, the child in the picture passed him by.
He heard the sound of the news. The interview.
“It greatly pains the hearts of all residents in the neighborhood. The child has to return to parents-nim side as quickly as possible.”
He saw a middle-aged man in a sweat-suit, speaking with an awkward accent.
Uh…? He didn’t see those news last night.
Was he perhaps ‘seeing’ something right now? But it wasn’t what he wanted. Not this…
The picture passed him again. While her outline blurred again, the colors mixed and turned into a whirl. Everything started to spin.
At some point, he heard a high-pitched beeping noise.
A familiar sensation.
He hated it. He really hated such things. The hate, the rage, the disgust, the loathing… This feeling stimulated all kinds of negative emotions deep within his heart. All his senses became extremely sensitive to this sensation of supernatural.
He heard a hum in his ears.
What was it? Children chatting?
… No. It was singing. That singing he heard when he found the incident’s scene in the apartment complex.
When he concentrated on it wholeheartedly, mixed with the buzzing noise, he heard pieces of words.
「Once the bell sound rings… can’t wander around.
To play, the children… grab a stick…
And until the moon’s shadow sets… don’t come back.」
Something blurry flashed in front of his eyes, forming some kind of a shape over the picture.
*~*~*
[1] Supreme One — 상제 (sang-je 上帝) the Highest Absolute, which created and controls the universe.
[2] heart is too small — an idiom meaning to be very anxious.
[3] “Just leave me alone. I’ll do it.” — that’s Yu Dan’s sentence.
Translator’s note: Baek Ran hates being helped (and putting Yu Dan in danger).
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