The Ledger Rewrites Itself
“Please… couldn’t you at least tell me?”
Left alone, Han Seung-ju dropped to his knees and pleaded earnestly with Park Su-hwan.
“…”
Park Su-hwan gazed at him in silence.
Yes. In the end, Oh Seok-ju had stormed out, spouting that he couldn’t believe a word of it.
That, too, had been the man’s own choice, and Park Su-hwan fully intended to respect it.
“Even if I told you, do you think he’d listen? He doesn’t listen to me—you think he’d listen to you?”
“Still, I’ll try my best.”
At those words, Park Su-hwan snorted.
“You two didn’t even look that close. Talk about pure devotion, huh?”
“…Please. Teacher.”
Seeing Han Seung-ju’s expression, Park Su-hwan swallowed a sigh.
This is exactly why I can’t stand upright, good-hearted people.
Park Su-hwan sincerely did not want to tell him Oh Seok-ju’s fate. He was no sucker, after all.
No—the very fact that he made his living as a fraudulent shaman was proof enough that he was no sucker.
Breaking the heavy silence, Park Su-hwan held out his hand. At the sudden gesture, Han Seung-ju asked blankly,
“Yes…?”
“Bokchae.”
After Han Seung-ju’s repeated pleas, he had finally decided to speak. But he had no intention of simply giving it away.
Getting cursed out to his face and then handing over the information for free? His pride wouldn’t allow it.
“Ah, yes. Just a moment.”
Han Seung-ju hurriedly pulled out his wallet and opened it. In that instant, Park Su-hwan’s eyes flicked over the contents.
“That’s enough. Just give me ten thousand won. What’s with fifty thousand?”
“But still…”
The man was working construction sites while preparing for the civil service exam. Su-hwan couldn’t take a large sum from him here.
Of course, claiming he felt no greed would have been a lie. Park Su-hwan knew perfectly well how many things fifty thousand won could buy.
But his conscience wouldn’t allow it.
Ugh… General. Send me a rich client already.
“I hate repeating myself.”
“I’m sorry. H-here.”
Park Su-hwan slipped the ten-thousand-won bill under the cushion he was sitting on.
“Fate changes when it moves on its own. No matter how much you yell at someone from the side to be careful, if they don’t budge, nothing changes.”
“…You’re right. That’s true.”
No one knew that better than Han Seung-ju. If he had ignored Park Su-hwan’s warning, the one who would have been left a cripple wouldn’t have been the team leader—it would have been him.
“The day after tomorrow. Ten seventeen in the morning.”
“Then Uncle will…”
“He’ll get hit by a steel structure falling from above and die instantly.”
“…!”
“Why the surprise? You almost burned to death yourself.”
Through the world of the ledger, Park Su-hwan had gauged the location where Oh Seok-ju would meet with the accident.
Where was it again…
It was an enormous construction site, and the building hadn’t even started going up yet. Pinpointing exactly where Oh Seok-ju would have the accident was difficult.
“But I don’t know construction sites well, so it’s hard to say.”
“Just tell me everything you know, and I’ll try to figure it out somehow.”
“Ready-mix concrete trucks. There were a whole lot of them.”
“Ready-mix…?”
Han Seung-ju muttered something, eyes darting around.
But given the nature of the place, the clue that there were lots of ready-mix trucks alone wasn’t enough to pinpoint the accident location exactly.
“Is there anything else?”
“Well… Ah. There were two shipping containers stuck together nearby. And a big banner hanging next to them that said something like ‘Safety First.’”
Han Seung-ju let out a short gasp of realization. With that much, identifying the accident site wouldn’t be hard.
He could stop Oh Seok-ju’s accident. Now that he knew where it would happen.
Park Su-hwan watched him quietly.
That was when it happened. The words he had once shouted at Ganglim Doryeong flashed through his mind.
So has the living world gotten even a little better? Not at all. The world only grows more turbid, and people only grow more selfish.
Yeah. People like him are exactly what the world needs to get better.
He tried hard to think well of the pitiful-looking Han Seung-ju.
“Tell the others to be careful too. Innocent people could get caught up in it.”
In the future Park Su-hwan had seen, the only one who met with disaster was clearly Oh Seok-ju.
But now that the fixed future would change, no one could know how the chains of cause and effect would flow.
A steel structure sitting still wouldn’t just fall for no reason. He was certain it had to be deeply connected to shoddy construction.
What else could make a structure that should be perfectly secured drop out of the sky?
But speaking it aloud wouldn’t change anything, he thought.
Han Seung-ju was the lowest-ranking laborer. Even if someone like him raised a fuss about shoddy construction on a massive building site, it would clearly be useless.
“Be careful. Gear up properly.”
That was all Park Su-hwan could say.
Just… be careful.
“Good. One more time.”
Park Su-hwan flicked a piece of meat. It was a scrap of the jerky the landlady had given him as a gift.
Kang!
Baekya leapt high and snatched it out of the air. For such a small creature, the little guy had surprisingly good athletic instincts.
“Like a seal. Good. Well done.”
It was a hobby Park Su-hwan had recently picked up—training Baekya. He was only roughly imitating things he’d seen on his phone, but it turned out to be more fun than expected.
Kang, kang!!
This time he threw a dog chew. Baekya growled, clamped down on it, and began gnawing.
“That’s right. That’s how you bite. Got it? This guy right here.”
Park Su-hwan pulled a sheet of paper from his notebook and held it right in front of Baekya’s nose. Not understanding the action, Baekya tilted his head.
“This is the bastard who hit your big brother.”
On the paper was a drawing of someone wearing a traditional hat. Narrowed eyes, long fingernails, and a pointed mouth—a grotesque figure.
“And this one…”
He unfolded another sheet. This time it was a woman gripping a massive curved blade and spewing curses.
“She shoved me hard and tried to kill me.”
Park Su-hwan was showing Baekya the appearances of the Samchasa who had attacked him.
If the reapers themselves ever saw the drawings, they might shout that they looked nothing like that. But to Park Su-hwan’s eyes they were close enough, and he had drawn them with such care that he didn’t care.
The terrible nightmares that came when he leaked heavenly secrets without receiving bokchae—Baekya had the power to drive those nightmares away.
If that was the case, then maybe Baekya could handle the Samchasa somehow as well.
Above all, Baekya was no ordinary little white mutt.
He was a Jindo, famous for their fierce temper and cleverness. Right now he was just small and adorable, but once he grew, things would clearly be different.
So…
“The second you see them, bite. Got it? And if it comes to it, just go straight for the middle and— ahem. Anyway!”
No matter how many bizarre powers Ganglim Doryeong wielded, if he was a man, he would have that place.
Honestly, Park Su-hwan didn’t fail to understand their position. The same went for Bari Gongju.
In their eyes, he was nothing more than a great criminal who ignored the laws of the underworld and threw heavenly secrets into chaos.
Because he knew his own wrongdoing well, Park Su-hwan was all the more determined to treat them as enemies.
The reason was simple. He didn’t want to die.
It was the most primitive desire any human possessed—the craving for life.
So this wasn’t something he could be blamed for. After all, people even said that rolling in a field of dog shit was still better than the afterlife.
Kang-kang!
“You just nodded, right? That definitely meant you understood.”
Kang-kang!!
Baekya paddled his short legs and bounced in place. His gaze was locked on the snack in Su-hwan’s hand.
It seemed he was demanding a treat. Park Su-hwan heaved a deep sigh.
“If they drag me away, who’s going to raise you?”
Knock-knock.
“Su-hwan! I’m here!”
Well… there’s one person, at least.
If it was the landlady, she would look after Baekya with the utmost care.
“Yes. Just a moment.”
Park Su-hwan hid the notebook with the drawings of the reapers and opened the door. The landlady appeared, snacks in hand.
Kang-kang!!
“Hello, Baekya. Have you been good?”
“What were you up to?”
“Just playing with him for a bit. But why did you bring so much again?”
Today was the day for the drama they watched together every week—The Stepmother’s Temptation.
“Never mind. It’s not like this is the first or second time. Isn’t it about to start? Let’s watch.”
She glanced at the wall clock and hurried inside. Park Su-hwan stepped aside with practiced ease and began unfolding the fortune-telling table.
It was the same table where he normally read clients’ fates. But depending on the occasion—like now—it also became a dining table for food.
“Hold on. How about some ramen?”
“Oh my. That sounds wonderful!”
The landlady clapped her hands and laughed loudly.
Oh Seok-ju had lived. That was an undeniable fact. However Han Seung-ju had managed to persuade him, the man’s fate had been newly written in the ledger.
In a way, Han Seung-ju seemed like quite an impressive person himself. He had convinced that stubborn-looking man, after all.
At any rate, Park Su-hwan had completely let his guard down. He was dozing off after lunch, heavy with post-meal drowsiness—until he received Han Seung-ju’s call.
Riiing— riiing—
“Hello?”
“Th-there’s been a huge accident!”
“…?”
Han Seung-ju’s voice came through urgent and thick with tears. Something had clearly gone wrong.
“What happened?”
“S-Seok-ju… Uncle Seok-ju fell!”
“…!”
The news was that Oh Seok-ju had fallen while working at the construction site. From a height of eight stories, no less.
He had been rushed to the hospital immediately, but…
The ending was obvious.
They had clearly changed his fate—so what was this? It had been barely two days since they had prevented the falling-structure accident and rewritten his destiny.
Park Su-hwan asked again whether it was true. Not because he thought Han Seung-ju would lie. The question simply burst out in his own shock.
Through tears, the answer came back: it was true.
It was something that could certainly happen. No one lived forever, after all.
But the fact that so little time had passed since they twisted Oh Seok-ju’s fate made the blow land harder.
The ledger.
I need to look at the ledger. Quickly.
Park Su-hwan hurriedly pulled out the ledger he had hidden under the fortune-telling table and opened it. Then he examined Oh Seok-ju’s newly written entry.
“Hah… hhk…”
Discovering the unbelievable truth, Park Su-hwan sucked in a sharp breath.
Until yesterday, Oh Seok-ju’s time of death and cause of death had both been blank. The character for “empty” (空), damp and freshly rewritten by the change in fate.
But not anymore. It had dried hard, twisted into gray script that had been pressed down with force into a full sentence.
“That’s impossible…”