Fate Does Not Change Itself
Park Su-hwan had lost count of how many days this story had been running. Then again, how often did a young man die by simply losing his footing?
He switched off the television with a soft click and clicked his tongue.
A dog quits its shit before you quit that. As if you'd ever stop.
He had expected it. There was nothing left to be surprised by.
He had warned the bastard clearly enough.
If he did not stop what he was doing right then and there, he would be crossing the Samdocheon.
The sin of casually wounding and slaughtering creatures that could not speak for themselves.
In the Hell of Equal Living, Kim Jin-woo would pay for every scrap of the evil he had piled up, over eons of agony. And of course the friend who had helped him and died right beside him would be there too.
"Calling yourselves friends. Tch."
It looked as if he had died trying to save Kim Jin-woo, but Su-hwan could not have cared less. The man had been an accomplice. This, too, was nothing but the price of cause and effect.
"Sun-mi!!"
Suddenly the landlady's frantic cry rang out from outside.
Someone hammered on the door so hard it seemed about to break.
"Sun-mi!!"
"Open this door right now…!!"
After what had happened, Su-hwan had known she would come here someday.
"I know you're in there!!"
"Sun-mi!"
"Let go of me!!"
There was no running from this. Swallowing a sigh, he opened the door.
"…"
Kim Jin-woo's mother stood there, her face streaked with tears. Beside her the landlady fidgeted in helpless agitation.
"Y-young man…"
"Why? Why did you do it! You could have told me!"
Her voice, raw with fury, lashed at Park Su-hwan. What must it feel like for a parent who has lost a precious child?
Su-hwan saw the vast grief and pain on her face and kept his mouth shut.
"You told everyone else when and how they would die! So why—why…"
"Sun-mi…"
The landlady shot Su-hwan a sidelong glance and tried to restrain her, but it was no use.
"You could have saved my Jin-woo!"
At last, reason gone, she lunged at him. Caught off guard by the force of it, Su-hwan went straight over backward.
"Ugh!"
"You should have saved him! Why!"
She seized him by the collar and shook him like a madwoman.
Su-hwan stayed still, smelling the thick reek of fish on her hands, and only stared at her with cold, settled eyes.
"If this is what a parent feels after losing a child…"
"Hic… hic…"
"…then how different do you think it is for a creature that cannot even speak?"
He thought of the kitten Kim Jin-woo had killed with a thrown stone.
"What…"
"It's all the same. They feel pain. They grieve. They miss. How deep must a mother cat's grudge have run for her to do what she did?"
Kim Jin-woo's face, ruined past recognition by the mother cat, explained everything.
"Hah… hngh… ha…"
The strength slowly left the hands gripping his collar. She collapsed where she stood and began to beat the floor, weeping without end.
"How… how can it be the same… Haa, heuaaagh… Jin-woo-ya…"
"…You're right, ma'am."
"Then why!"
"That still doesn't mean the weight of a life is any different."
"…!"
"At least not the principle that you must never take life lightly."
"Then what about me!!"
She beat her own chest and wailed.
"I gut fish and chop them up and sell them!! Do I get divine punishment too? Does Kwon from the butcher shop go to hell for selling meat? Why did only my son have to die!"
Su-hwan shook his head firmly.
"The act of killing may look the same, but the weight of the karma is heaven and earth apart."
"What…?"
"Killing purely for pleasure, and taking on the sin of killing as a means of survival. How could those ever be the same?"
He swallowed a bitter smile inside.
He had never imagined that all the studying he had done to play the part of a proper fake shaman would be used like this.
"…"
"Ma'am. Did you not feel even a little pity for all the animals that died in agony for no reason in that boy's hands?"
Kim Jin-woo's atrocities had come out in raw detail through the statements of the friends who had been at the scene. The boy had killed animal after animal without rest—and for no reason except that it was fun.
Su-hwan felt not the slightest regret for choosing not to actively save him.
"You could have… said it a little better… just a little better…"
On top of everything, the fact that her son had been the one who killed Han-ul's puppy had come out, and she had already fought a screaming match with that family and half the neighborhood.
Her voice was weaker now than at the start.
"I am not someone bound to Kim Jin-woo by a thread of karma."
In other words: he was nothing more than a shaman who had brushed past them. A clear line drawn—he had no duty to save the boy.
"Even so. If I had packed a lunchbox and followed him around saying, Don't do that, don't go out that day—"
Su-hwan asked it back in a cold tone.
"Would the result have changed? Would your son have truly repented, truly atoned, and never again taken a life?"
"…"
"I'll answer for you. Absolutely not. Human nature does not change that easily. What happened to you is tragic—but that is all it is."
"…Hic… heuugh."
"And you have no reason to feel guilty either. No one did anything wrong. Not you. Not me."
Su-hwan looked at the landlady standing blankly to the side.
"Not you either, ma'am. If anyone is at fault in this, there is only one person."
This whole affair belonged solely to Kim Jin-woo, who had hurt mute creatures for nothing but his own amusement.
"I gave him a clear warning. And…"
Su-hwan continued quietly.
"There is something I always say when I deliver a gongsu."
"…"
"Fate only changes when you move it yourself."
Yes. Kim Jin-woo had not moved.
Everyone left. Alone in the wrecked shrine, Park Su-hwan drew out the ledger he kept hidden deep under the divination table.
An old book bound with a red cord. The Register of Life and Death from the underworld.
He stroked it carefully with his hand and muttered.
From now on… there will be a lot of this, won't there.
But he did not regret what he had done. Going forward, he would not save the wicked.
"Huu…"
When he lifted his head, the statue of Okhwang Sangje came into view. In the candlelight the figure seemed somehow to be looking straight down at him.
"I'll go to hell too, I suppose."
He muttered it with certainty.
For the sin of Cheonki Nuseol—leaking heavenly secrets.
And for the sin of harsh speech. Even if what he said was true, he had wounded someone with cold words. That, too, was a clear crime.
Knock, knock.
Just then someone tapped at the shrine door. Startled, Su-hwan hurriedly hid the ledger again and asked carefully,
"Who is it?"
Has the mother come back?
"It's me, Teacher. The man you chewed out for nearly having his achievements stolen."
"Huh?"
Cha Hyun-seok. He had come. Which meant…
"Come in."
…that he had safely gotten rid of Executive Director Im.
"I'm sorry, but could you open the door for me? I've got too much stuff…"
At the unexpected request Su-hwan tilted his head and opened the door.
"Uh…?"
Cha Hyun-seok stood there sweating rivers, arms piled high with every kind of box.
"I tried to carry too much at once…"
"Come in first."
You could not leave a guest standing outside like that. Su-hwan quickly guided him into the shrine.
Cha Hyun-seok looked around and said,
"The shrine's a bit of a mess. Are you cleaning? Or moving?"
Neither. It was simply the wreckage left from the rough struggle with Kim Jin-woo's mother.
"A shrine must always be kept clean, so I was sorting out things I don't need."
Su-hwan showed nothing and sat down as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"I didn't expect you to drop by so suddenly… Anyway, the fact that you're here means things wrapped up well?"
"Sorry for barging in. I just wanted to get the news to you as soon as I could, so I ran over."
He smiled a little awkwardly.
"It's fine. Nothing much was going on anyway."
If anything, Cha Hyun-seok's sudden visit was already lifting the mood that had sunk so low.
Su-hwan eyed the things the man had brought.
"It's all fruit?"
"Yes. I was afraid you might refuse if I brought money, so I brought fruit instead."
Watermelon, oriental melon, peaches, grapes—every box stamped with gold foil that said Premium.
Su-hwan's face said he had never heard of such a thing in his life.
What kind of nonsense is this? I'd have said thank you and taken the cash…!
Or luxury goods would have been fine too. The designer bag Professor Kim Jun-young had given him was something he cherished and used with the utmost care.
"I looked it up, and they say fruit offered to the spirits always has to be fresh. Fruit prices these days are pure gold, aren't they? I wanted to take at least a little of the burden off you."
"Ah…"
So that was the reason. He could not even bring himself to argue.
"Hahahaha… Right. That's true."
Su-hwan forced the corners of his mouth up and nodded.
"As it happens, our General is a little greedy. Next time…"
What he really wanted was to ask for cash, but he held it in.
"You don't have to bring anything. You already paid the bokchae."
A measly fifty thousand won, at that.
"No. Compared to the grace I've received, this is nothing."
Well, that's true enough.
Su-hwan found himself nodding without meaning to.
"Thank you, truly."
Cha Hyun-seok was under the sincere delusion that his surprise gift had moved the man deeply.
"Anyway—how did the matter turn out?"
He set the underwhelming fruit aside for now. What he really wanted to know was how the man's situation had ended.
"Executive Director Im was removed from duty at once, and a disciplinary committee was convened. He couldn't say a single word about the under-the-table contract with Sungchan Hi-Tech."
The evidence of corruption had been so clear that of course he could not.
"And that wasn't the only time he'd taken kickbacks either."
No wonder the equipment kept breaking down. I never dreamed Executive Director Im was behind it.
"Want to know the real crowning moment?"
Cha Hyun-seok let out a hollow laugh of pure disbelief.
"Even then, when it came to stealing my results, he brazenly argued back."
"What?"
"He said he was the superior who ordered and oversaw the work, so of course it was his. Haa…"
Exactly as Su-hwan had said. If he had stopped at merely protecting his achievements, Cha Hyun-seok would have been the one who got crushed.
Realizing that, a chill ran down Cha Hyun-seok's spine. How many moves ahead had this man seen? He could not even guess.
"So Executive Director Im only got fired?"
"Not even close. The president filed a massive damages suit—against Sungchan Hi-Tech as well. That bastard is going to end up flat broke on the street."
"Ohh. Glad it ended well."
"Yes. Honestly I thought I'd get fired too. I threw down in front of the president and the executives like a street brawler. But luckily they recognized the results and I even got promoted."
It made sense. He had exposed an executive's corruption, and the new program had dramatically cut the parts defect rate, saving the company tens of billions of won.
"I got a solid bonus on top of that."
"…"
For a second Su-hwan almost asked whether there was any intention of sharing a few crumbs. No—more than that, how much had he gotten?
Five hundred? Or a thousand?
It was clearly not a small amount.
Ugh… I'm dying of curiosity.
Swallowing the sourness in his gut, Su-hwan managed to speak in a trembling voice.
"Congrat… congratulations."
I mean it.
"Hello?"
"Oppa!!"
Jung Jin-ah's urgent voice came through the phone. But it did not sound as if something bad had happened. If anything, she was buzzing with excitement.
"What? You know I'm working right now."
Jung Jin-hyuk answered flatly.
"I know. But if I don't call you right this second my mouth is going to itch so bad I die."
"What happened that's got you this hyped?"
"It was exactly like the Teacher said."
"Teacher…?"
"Yeah. Shaman Park, the one who saved you! Just like he said—Kim Yu-jin, that bitch, got fired!!"
"What…?"
"Wahaha. He's incredible!! I didn't understand when he told me to stay still because she'd fall on her own—but so that's what he meant!!"
Jung Jin-hyuk sat up straighter, lifting his back from the chair.
"Tell me properly. What happened?"