Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
⟨Chapter 21⟩
⟨Spider Ghost’s Market⟩
In the old days, an elder couple prayed for 100 days and barely obtained a son. But the born child was a monster resembling a spider. The people called that child Spider Ghost[1]. As Spider Ghost was a mighty person, everyone decide to avoid and distance themselves from him. With time, Spider Ghost’s nature gradually became violent and if someone offended him even a little, he would capture and kill them like a fly. Especially when a new governor took office, he would end up dead by the evening of the day he came, so no one wanted to become a governor. But one day the son of a retired jeongseung[2] heard a rumor about it and…
『Anecdotes of Reed Forest』
He sat like this since a while, right?
The maru[3] heated up by sunlight was warm. He thought it may soon become hot, so he shifted a bit towards the shade, where light didn’t reach.
He heard the sound of the radio somewhere from the inside. It was mixed with a scratching noise.
[… April is a cruel month. Lilacs sprout from the dead land and memories blend with desires…]
He casually leaned in his ear and turned his head.
He had no idea why he looked in that direction, but someone was standing there. Because of the backlight, he couldn’t see the face.
“You can’t come in here…”
“You promised, remember? You decided to give it, remember?”
The growl-like voice came back.
He suddenly approached, stretching out his hand. The hairy hand didn’t have a little finger and ring finger.
Looking at this, he remembered something he didn’t before.
Cold winter. A stink of a stove. A synthetic smell coming out of old bubble gum. A Pinocchio doll made from faded wood… How did he completely forget it for such a long time?
「… Winter was rather merciful. It covered the earth with snow to make everyone forget…」
The hairy hand was just in front of his eyes. But he couldn’t move.
I can’t. I, like this…
With a ‘creak’ as if a fuse went out, his vision turned dark.
… Yu Dan suddenly raised his head.
The curtains of the opened window fluttered. In front of the blackboard he saw teacher-nim slowly read a textbook. Because of that monotonous voice almost all kids around were laying down.
Was he dreaming?
No.
Cold sweat was dripping from his nape. His head hurt. He tried to trace back his memory, but he couldn’t think anymore.
What was it? What did he completely forget?
Chilling anxiety pressed on his chest.
He couldn’t think about anything else. He planned to play a game to celebrate the class ending early, but he gave up and headed to the Banwoldang.
After the door opened, he heard low voices.
Some young man and woman were sitting inside. They appeared frozen from fear.
On the opposite side, a huge paper umbrella was opened. Outside of the umbrella, the hand of the fox yokai came out, holding a Buddha painting he often saw and a bottle with a long neck. After the twins took out a bottle of mineral water, the clear sound of water was heard from where Baek Ran was. Do-ssi handed the things to the man and woman.
“Here, this is sweet water. If a hungry ghost drinks it, their hunger will disappear. Pour it into a clean bowl and put it in the kitchen. That child ghost, who often steals the food from the kitchen, should disappear.”
“Thank You. Thank You.”
The young man and woman thanked again as they left.
Baek Ran folded the umbrella. Some kind of shimmering shapes inside of it disappeared like smoke.
“Next? What happened?”
Yu Dan sat down on the chair where the man and the woman were sitting a moment ago. He planned to explain, but he had no point to where to start.
“Can you feel anything from me?”
The fox yokai narrowed his eyes, making a particular expression as he stared at him. Then he was shocked.
“Did You wash up today? Your face is white.”
“Can’t you assume that my face turned white?”
“Looking closely, you look pretty unstable.”
Do-ssi cut in.
“Why is it? Did you see a ghost? Wait, don’t you always see them?”
“I’m serious…”
Yu Dan started his incoherent story.
In the past he promised someone to give something. He said he would come to receive it later, but Yu Dan completely forgot. But a moment ago he suddenly recalled that memory. That guy probably wasn’t human.
With each word, the yokai’s expressions gradually turned serious. When he got to the part when he described that guy’s hand, Baek Ran’s forehead wrinkled.
“Hairy, two fingers missing. Is that all?”
“I can’t remember anything more.”
“There are too few clues.”
After he called the twins and instructed them about something, the two child ginseng yokai hurriedly climbed the upper floor.
“What did You promise to give? Did you perhaps receive something in return?”
“I don’t remember.”
“I have a very bad feeling, eh? But I already foresaw that someday something like that would happen.”
“What do you mean?”
“Didn’t You come across all sorts of things since You were young? You must have been entangled into a lot of bad relationships. One day they would strike one after one, so because You would turn deadly pale from fear and run to me, I thought I should change my home before that…”
“Your foresight is indeed amazing, sir.”
The dokkaebi was in awe. Suddenly, after a long time, he had a feeling of something surging inside of him.
“Why are you dancing to his tune again?! Do you think I won’t be able to find you when you move?”
At that moment, the twins came down holding a huge book. As if it was quite heavy, after putting it with a ‘thud’, they massaged their wrists.
“How about evolving that persistence in a bit more useful direction? For instance, this.”
Baek Ran unfolded the book. It was a book depicting all kinds of hair and names in Chinese attached to them.
“Was it any hair among those?”
Yu Dan stared at the variety of hairs.
“This? No, this?”
His head started to spin.
Everything looked exactly the same. When he pointed at one that he thought was right, on the next page was something even more similar. As he looked back and forth, even the impression he had in his head at the beginning began to blur.
“I don’t know.”
Baek Ran stood up without a word.
“Where is the cheval mirror?”
“I’ll help You.”
The dokkaebi followed. Seeing the two disappear in the instant, Yu Dan tilted his head.
“Why did they leave? With his personality I thought he would say some trampling words like ‘You can’t find it even when it’s in front of you?’ or ‘Isn’t your most serious problem right now your intelligence?’. Should I worry?”
“Ah, is that so? I’ll relay it to Him when They return. I’ll say that to be at ease, You have to hear words trampling on Your personality.”
“It sounds really strange if you shorten it like this! Don’t do that.”
“Yeah. Don’t do that. Let’s instead of waiting, go inform Him. Yu Dan needs to hear words trampling on his personality to be at ease.”
“Are you guys even listening to me?”
“Indeed. Listening and speaking. Anyhow, please come here.”
The child ginseng twins brought Yu Dan to the backyard.
“Cheval mirror is a mirror which reflects the inside of the mind. Please wait here while we bring the mirror hanging between two poles.”
“It’s safe here. We will be back in a moment.”
He sat alone on the sunny backyard maru.
The yard was silent, as if it was cut off from the outside world. Even the time seemed to have stopped. The old wooden floor was turning fairly warm in the spring sun. He thought it may soon become hot, so he shifted a bit towards the shade, where light didn’t reach.
At that moment, suddenly the music, which he didn’t even perceive before, stopped. He heard a person’s voice coming from the inside.
Someone turned on the radio, huh?
The broadcast’s host spoke:
「… British poet T.S Eliot wrote this in ‘Wasteland’. April is a cruel month. Lilacs sprout from the dead land and memories blend with desires…[4].」
Yu Dan was startled and raised his head.
He had no idea why he looked in that direction, but someone was standing there. Because of the backlight, he couldn’t see the face.
“You can’t come in here…”
Goosebumps rose on his arms. Those words he spat out thoughtlessly, those were the very words from his daydream.
“You promised, remember? You decided to give it, remember?”
The growl-like voice came back.
He suddenly approached, stretching out his hand. The hairy hand didn’t have a little finger and ring finger.
He suddenly remembered everything like a lie.
Cold winter. Small stationery shop, he entered for a moment with a friend on the way home after school. After the door opened, the stink of a stove made him gulp nervously. A synthetic smell coming out of old bubble gum. A Pinocchio doll made of faded wood—
— There is a mainspring in the back.
After coiling up the mainspring, if he let it go, it would jump to stretch out and make a noise. It wasn’t anything special, but it was strangely fun, so he played with the mainspring by coiling it a few times, but…
He heard a loud noise from the inside.
He looked through the door gap into a backroom.
His friend collapsed. The stationery store manager was stretching out his hand. A hairy hand without two fingers.
Yu Dan saw it.
The store manager was hiding another face. That of a hairy beast. From a face of a kind-hearted, middle-aged man only a thin mask remained and was dangling on top of it.
Scary. So scary his breath stopped.
Hearing the whistle of lost breath, the thing swiftly turned its head. The bloodshot glaring eyes met with Yu Dan’s.
The thing’s bright red mouth opened wide, up to its ears. The yellow scale teeth dripped with saliva.
— Brat. You see things you shouldn’t, huh?
A rotten smell came out of its maw. Someone’s blood and meat was blending in the thing’s stomach and rotting.
He hated it. It was scary.
His legs lost strength from fear, but at the same time, he raised his head because of another feeling. The wicked things that hid in the world to commit such crimes. He hated them.
— You can’t! Don’t do it!
When he grabbed the stick that laid on the side and shouted with a trembling voice, the thing laughed as it thought he was ridiculous.
— Look at that. I smell something very fun from you, huh?
Now it wasn’t using a human language anymore. It was a sound of a beast. The thing put down his friend and spread its maw open towards him as it showed something it took out. Something very scary.
— Then will you also do it? Answer me! Quickly!
He was too frightened, Yu Dan nodded without even thinking.
— Promise. It can’t be now, but I’ll come to take it later. One day I will suddenly find you. You can’t back out of the promise then. You know what happens to the children who lie, right?
The beast’s roar changed into laughter.
The Pinocchio doll, which fell on the floor, started to move by itself. Its mainspring wasn’t coiled, but it jumped by itself and slammed its head against the floor. Its long nose shattered, its face shattered and its head shattered, and its remaining torso was left convulsing.
“Hey, you have to keep a promise, right?”
At that moment, that beast came to him again and spoke.
His whole body shivered.
Before he couldn’t understand the meaning of the scene, even though it was just in front of his eyes, but now he realized. The scene he saw through the door’s crevice. What the thing tried to steal from his friend was—.
Heart.
Something sharp pierced his chest.
「… Winter was rather merciful. It covered the earth with snow to make everyone forget…」
His legs gave up.
That was a precognitive dream, huh?
From his chest, the nerves of his whole body flared up and the horrible blazing hot pain spread all over his senses.
And…
His vision darkened.
Numerous voices blended in his ears. Screams. Sound of something breaking. Laughter. They all mixed together. Because the boundary of here and there was dim in this world, the voices took shape and fell on his cheek.
Cold water droplets.
… Rain?
He forced himself to open his blurry eyes.
On the ground in front of his eyes, one or two round points formed. Since when was he lying like this?
“Stand up.”
Someone made him stand up.
Black chimajeogori[5] with a black ribbon. A beauty so cold it would cut you. When he stared at her blankly, she pulled on his arm.
“What is it? Go quickly. It’s raining.”
He shifted his gaze.
The sky was truly turning very cloudy. The wind carried the scent of rain. The things that seemed to be white cotton clothes hanging on each pole lining up to the hill fluttered.
“Where… are we?”
“Go quickly.”
The woman pulled him again. Looking closely, he knew that face.
“… Heuk-yo?”
She halted. Lowering her voice and whispered.
“Be quiet. Because everyone is looking.”
“Everyone?”
Looking around, they really were. The towns of thatched houses, the gloomy trees, the dead hiding the identity of this world were all looking at them. The gaze of nonliving things persistently followed them.
“What the hell is…”
“It’s a place diverging from the world of forms. Your time currently stopped.”
“What do you mean? This?”
“Don’t look back.”
He already looked.
Someone collapsed in a pool of blood. A male student wearing a school uniform.
“Is it me perhaps?”
“Right.”
Heuk-yo dragged Yu Dan while speaking.
“You’re dead right now.”
“You can’t say…”
“When we ran in, it already happened. That bastard’s finger pierced your chest. If we were just a few seconds late, he would have taken out your heart, but we barely managed to stop the time of the two of you in the critical moment. Thanks to Cheonho-nim.”
Yu Dan stared blankly at the profile of the serpent yokai, who spoke so calmly.
It was a story he couldn’t believe at all.
“My heart?”
He touched his chest, which felt strange.
It was real. His heart didn’t beat. He didn’t feel anything as if it was empty inside.
“But how am I moving?”
“Don’t think too deeply about it. It isn’t something you could do in the original world. But it isn’t reality.”
Heuk-yo hastened her steps as she spoke.
“Remember just one thing. If you turn back again now, you will die. If you’re injured, the twin punks can cure you, right? However, if we don’t do something about that bastard before the time of the two of you starts to move again, your heart will be plucked out, and it will flee.”
They climbed down the hill and reached the river.
Under the branches of the willow, hanging down like lady’s hair, stood a boy wearing blue silk clothes and a girl wearing a headdress. The two looked at them at the same time.
“You’re here!”
They ran up to them with excited faces and looked up at Yu Dan.
“You have no idea how surprised everyone was! It all happened in an instant!”
“How the hell did that thing pierce the barrier and enter? I can’t believe it!”
“Don’t worry about Your body. Uncle is guarding it so no one steals it or harms it.”
“Just think about how to come back. Ok? We will come back together safely!”
Grabbing Yu Dan from both sides, the twins poured out words, trying to cheer him up, but Heuk-yo separated them.
“There is not much time. That thing is chasing us.”
She placed a hand on her forehead and observed the river.
On the other side, a boat was leisurely drifting. It was a colorful entertainment boat. In the center was a pavilion with drawn curtains, and on the bow, the musicians, dancers and performers created a lively scene.
The masked boatmen steered the ship towards the river bank. Yu Dan, Heuk-yo and twins boarded the boat.
After passing through the curtains and entering the pavilion, he saw Baek Ran sitting at a table.
*~*~*
[1] Spider Ghost — 신거무 (sin-geunmu). Usually I would translate ‘sin 신’ as divine or god, but in this case ghost is a more suiting translation.
[2] jeongseung — a position equivalent to a prime minister in Joseon.
[3] maru — an open floor.
[4] April is a cruel month. Lilacs sprout from the dead land and memories blend with desires — It’s a bit different from the popular Korean translation of Wasteland I saw. I’m not sure if the poem was changed a bit to suit something that wouldn’t be automatically recognized as a poem or is it just different translation. In the first place, that poem in Korean feels very different as consequence of impossibility (or almost impossibility) of translating such a poem to Korean… Therefore, rather than copying original Wasteland, I opted to translate the Korean text.
[5] chimajeogori — name for women’s hanbok.
Translator’s note:
Yu Dan sick because of supernatural count: 2?
This story is four chapters long.
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