Lives That Save Each Other (2)
Park Su-hwan had been certain of it. If Choi Yu-ri listened to him and managed to keep her life, she would come looking for him.
He had told her that Mungchi, her perfectly healthy puppy, would suddenly fall ill.
But he never expected her to show up at this hour. And in pouring rain, no less.
"I'm so, so sorry. Hic— sob…"
"…"
In Choi Yu-ri's trembling hand was a business card, crumpled into a wrinkled mess.
It was the one he had given her before she boarded the bus. His name—Park Su-hwan—and the location of the shrine were printed on it.
"Mungchi… my Mungchi is a friend I brought home from the shelter. Right before he was going to be put down. I thought it was fate, so I took him right away."
Su-hwan looked at her feet. One sandal, one slipper. Exactly as he had seen written in the ledger.
Which made the present moment even harder to understand. She had clearly ignored the warning—so how had she managed to twist a fate already set in stone?
He felt certain the reason her entry in the ledger had appeared so late was connected to this.
"It's raining hard. Shall we talk inside?"
The rainy season was supposed to start today. If she kept standing out there getting soaked, she would definitely catch a cold by tomorrow.
"He's like family to me…"
Su-hwan half-guided, half-supported the rambling, weeping woman into the shrine.
"Hic— sob…"
Choi Yu-ri collapsed onto the floor more than she sat. Su-hwan immediately fetched a dry towel and a cup of warm water and pressed them into her hands.
On the way to grab the towel he had ducked into the bathroom for a second, smoothing down his bed-head with a splash of water as best he could.
"…Thank you."
"Not at all."
Su-hwan shoved aside the blanket he had spread out earlier, set a low table between them, and sat facing her. He spoke calmly.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes… No. I'm not all right. Not even a little."
Choi Yu-ri shook her head, having only just managed to stop crying. She looked so haggard she might pass out at any second.
"Ah…"
Still sniffling, she suddenly fixed her gaze somewhere, as if entranced. At the end of that stare lay Baekya, curled into a tight white ball and sound asleep.
The puppy had startled awake at the sudden commotion, only to sink right back into deep sleep.
He was still young, after all. He seemed to need a lot of rest.
"You keep a dog?"
"Yes. We crossed paths recently, so I took him in. From what I heard, he'd been wandering the streets."
Su-hwan glanced once, indifferently, at the sleeping Baekya, then looked back at her. Time to get to the point. Exactly what had happened.
"I didn't think you'd listen to my warning."
"…"
He murmured the words quietly, staring straight into Choi Yu-ri's eyes.
"I'm sorry…"
"I'm not scolding you. I'm saying it's a good thing. And…"
Su-hwan paused. Judging by everything she had said and done so far, he already knew Mungchi had not met a happy end.
"Is this because I didn't pay the bokchae? Did that cause all this?"
Choi Yu-ri cut in, her voice shaking with deep guilt.
"No. That's not it. Fate isn't that light. Before I left, I told you one more thing. Do you remember?"
Choi Yu-ri seemed to search her memory for a moment, then shook her head.
"I said fate only changes when you move it yourself. Only a will that strong can twist what has already been written."
"Ah… So that's why my Mungchi…"
Tears welled in Choi Yu-ri's eyes again. Every word Su-hwan spoke seemed to drive a sharp spike into her chest.
"Honestly, I never believed you until the end. I thought it was all nonsense."
She hung her head, forcing the words out. Tears kept soaking into her voice.
"But Mungchi swallowed a laundry detergent pod. I'd dropped it while doing laundry and never noticed."
So that was it. Now he understood why her dog had suddenly fallen so ill. Swallowing detergent would be more than enough to send a small animal into rapid decline.
"It was only when I was rushing him to the hospital that I remembered what you'd said. The warning not to go outside."
But she couldn't stay. Her family—Mungchi—was gasping for breath and dying in her arms.
She brushed off the warning a second time. She figured if she just watched out for cars, nothing would happen.
"Mungchi never bit me. Not once. He was that gentle, that good. He listened so well, too."
"…"
"But just once—just that one time—he bit me."
The moment a car skidding on the wet road came hurtling toward her, Mungchi, limp and spent, sank his teeth into her arm with every last scrap of strength he had.
Startled by the sudden pain, Choi Yu-ri froze in place. The car shot past, missing her by a hair's breadth.
"Can you believe it? A dog who never bit anyone. He bit me to save me. Who am I that he would…"
His strength gone, Mungchi closed his eyes right there. She raced him to the hospital, but they told her it was already too late.
The last sensation of his body going limp in her arms was still vivid. On her arm, the teeth marks he had left stood out like a red bruise.
"Ah…"
Listening, Su-hwan realized one thing. The enormous will capable of twisting fixed cause and effect was not something only humans possessed.
The reason her information had appeared so late in a ledger that should have been blank—
—was the intervention of one small, humble life that even vast destiny itself had never foreseen.
"It's my fault Mungchi died. He was so pitiful, how am I supposed to…"
Choi Yu-ri beat her own chest and wailed. The sobs tore out of her so hard she could not finish the sentence.
Su-hwan quietly handed her a tissue. Then he simply watched, giving her the space to pour out every last drop of feeling.
When you needed to cry, you had to cry as hard as you wanted. The old saying that grief forced down turned into poison and sickness was no empty talk.
He hoped she would leave at least a little of that tangled knot of grief behind here.
Helping people untangle their grudges, soothe their sense of injustice, and feel understood—wasn't that exactly a shaman's work?
"I have one question. Did you ever hate Mungchi, even once? Or dislike him?"
"…What? No. Never. I always doted on him. He was my everything. I fell for him the second I saw him."
Choi Yu-ri shook her head hard, denying it completely.
Choi Yu-ri, who had saved a nameless puppy from euthanasia. And years later, that same puppy had thrown away his own life to save hers.
In each other's lives, they had become each other's saviors.
Listening to her desperate answer, Su-hwan murmured softly.
"If all you ever gave him was love, that is enough. That is the hardest thing of all."
Su-hwan thought to himself.
Maybe—just maybe… this was never Choi Yu-ri's true fate to begin with.
"The laws of the Underworld are strict so that no one may be wronged."
A dream, then.
In darkness where nothing could be seen, only a voice reached him. It was similar to the dream a few days ago, when a strange man had been scolding a puppy.
But this voice was far heavier, far more profound. It felt like someone far higher and older than that man was speaking.
"That is why we cannot judge the weight of sin by good and evil alone. The reason the Underworld holds so many trials is for that very reason."
"Why? If someone commits a crime, shouldn't they be punished?"
Another voice answered this time. It sounded like a bright, lively child's.
"Then let me ask you one thing. Is a man who steals rice cakes because he is starving truly a villain?"
"Yes. Isn't that obvious? You just said the laws of the Underworld must be strict. He committed a crime, so of course he should be punished."
"Then what if, with those rice cakes, he kept his starving old mother alive? What should be done then?"
"Even so, he still committed a crime, so…"
"No."
This voice…!!
It was the man who had been playing with the puppy called Baekya. An unforgettable voice—Su-hwan recognized it at once.
And then—
—Crash! Clatter-clatter-clatter!!!
A deafening racket erupted from somewhere. At the same time static cut through the man's words, and Su-hwan was violently dragged out of the dream.
His eyes snapped open—and he beheld Baekya standing amid the ruins of a towering stack of peaches. Looking at the wrecked altar, Su-hwan lost the power of speech.
"You…"
Whine, whimper.
"What do you think you're doing right now?"