Don't Take Fate Lightly
“Doryeong!”
“I know.”
Ganglim Doryeong sat with one leg crossed over the other, sipping his coffee as he answered with complete nonchalance.
They were in a handsome house with a spacious garden. The Samchasa lounged around a table, taking a leisurely break.
It was an incongruous sight, yet the middle-aged man weeding the garden never noticed them at all.
“Honestly, covering this up once or twice is one thing. I can’t do it anymore. I’m scared half to death.”
“N-Noona…”
Hae-dong, the Iljik Chasa, spoke up in a thoroughly timid voice. Thanks to Ganglim Doryeong’s usual easygoing attitude, they had always gotten along without much formality, laughing and joking together.
This time, however, they had clearly crossed the line. Ganglim was still their superior, after all.
“You stay out of this.”
“Just calm down a little, okay? Please.”
Hae-dong sneaked a glance at Ganglim Doryeong. The man’s face remained as unreadable as ever. Behind that indifferent expression, it was impossible to tell what he was thinking.
Even after years at his side, Hae-dong still could not fathom his boss.
“If King Yama finds out, there’s no telling what will happen to us. Even if it just reaches the ears of the other Great Kings, we’re finished.”
“What’s got you so scared?”
At last Ganglim Doryeong turned his gaze toward So-hee, the Woljikchasa.
“Of course I’m scared! I…”
Her voice cracked as she spoke, her face on the verge of tears.
“I want to reincarnate.”
“That’s the reason? Don’t worry about it.”
“How can I not? You know what happens to people who take bribes from the Four Mans.”
“I’ll take the fall for everything.”
At those words, both So-hee and Hae-dong clamped their mouths shut.
“Why are you looking at me like that? I’m not getting reincarnated anyway. And this whole mess started because of my carelessness, so it’s only right that I take responsibility.”
That was why the ledger had now been entrusted to So-hee, the Woljikchasa. It still was not in Ganglim’s hands, but she was at least more reliable than the scatterbrained Hae-dong.
“…Whatever. If we die, we die together. Hmph.”
So-hee bit down hard on her lip and tucked the ledger back into her robes. Then she flopped into a chair.
“The Great Kings aren’t going to find out. I already told you—Baekokgyeong has gone silent, so everyone’s too busy keeping their heads above water.”
“What on earth is going on up there? You still don’t know?”
“I don’t. Everyone’s keeping their mouths shut tighter than a vault.”
Even when offered a fat stack of myeongjeon—Underworld currency—no one would talk.
“That bad?”
Hae-dong cut in, startled. Someone of Ganglim Doryeong’s standing should have had no trouble digging up the truth. He had lived long enough that his connections in Myeong-gye ran deep.
“Cheon-jon must have issued a gag order.”
Those who served in Baekokgyeong worked for Cheon-jon alone. They could neither defy his will nor oppose it.
“Haa… I have no idea how any of this is supposed to fit together. You said you felt the energy from that guy. How is it now?”
So-hee shook her head and looked to Ganglim Doryeong.
“Still nothing. It was too faint from the start.”
The energy of the ledger clinging to the thief had been so weak that even Ganglim had only noticed it after the fact. He had needed to get close to the bastard before he finally sensed it.
But the more the thief handled the ledger, the stronger that energy would grow. It was only a matter of time before the trail led straight to him.
And there was one more thing the thief had overlooked.
“You shouldn’t take fate lightly.”
Just look at the person whose entry they had rewritten this time. Go against the natural order, and a far greater price always came due.
The same rule applied to the ledger thief. He still seemed to have no idea what he was actually doing.
“Stupid bastard.”
So-hee caught his meaning at once. She nodded in agreement.
“He’s probably been thrilled this whole time, thinking he’s some kind of savior.”
From now on, cases like this would only grow more frequent—people who struggled to save someone only to collide with an even greater fate and die for it. And die horribly.
The ledger’s energy belonged strictly to Myeong-gye. For a living person to harbor that energy meant becoming part of the Underworld itself.
In other words, he was no different from the dead. Did the bastard even know that? Probably not. That was why he was still fighting so hard to keep the ledger.
“The record changed again this time, but I still didn’t feel the energy. No matter how I look at it, this has to mean…”
“That there’s a way to hide the energy.”
Hae-dong finished her sentence for her. Anyone listening might have thought the idea had been his first.
“I was about to say that!”
“I was thinking the same thing. He seemed ordinary enough, but of course the ledger thief would have something up his sleeve. He must have had a solid backer waiting in the wings.”
“Yeah. That’s why he had the nerve to mess with Doryeong right to his face and then run. What a piece of work.”
“No kidding.”
Ganglim Doryeong let out a short laugh. He had let his guard down watching the guy kneel and blubber. For a thief who had stolen the ledger, the man had looked far too ordinary.
Plenty of questions still remained unanswered.
How could he read the ledger, scramble the heavenly secrets, and see the reapers themselves? None of it made sense for a normal human.
Because he was a shaman who served Cheon-jon? Nonsense. Ganglim already knew every shaman in Korea worthy of being called a great mudang.
And then there was the question the bastard had thrown at him.
Is this really the proper, fair, and strict law of the afterlife?
For some reason, those words had called to mind “that existence” who had vanished from Myeong-gye without a trace.
Really… such a good person, too.
Just then—
“Khhk… ghk.”
The man who had been pulling weeds clutched his chest and began to gasp as if he were about to die on the spot.
Seeing this, Ganglim Doryeong rose from his seat. Break time was over.
“So what do we do now?”
“He’s not the type to hand over the ledger quietly.”
“Right. He’ll never let himself be dragged to the Underworld, either.”
“We’ll just have to outsmart him. In our own way.”
Ganglim muttered the words low and walked slowly toward the man. The man clawed at his own chest as if he could not breathe.
Bloodshot eyes locked onto Ganglim. In a voice that seemed ready to snap, the man croaked,
“M-Mom…?”
At once, a middle-aged woman’s voice flowed from Ganglim’s lips. In the same instant, his appearance shifted into someone else’s entirely.
“Park Jeong-gwon. You’ve worked so hard all this time.”
“Is it really you, Mom?”
“Of course it is, Park Jeong-gwon.”
Park Jeong-gwon.
The moment his full name was spoken, strength left the man’s body and he crumpled to the ground.
“You’ll do fine on the exam.”
“Really?”
Park Su-hwan fixed the young woman with a sharp look as he spoke.
“Yeah. But…”
“But?”
“It all depends on how hard you work. Right now you’re pouring everything into getting back into university. Later on, though, you’ll start slacking.”
“No way! Do you have any idea how hard I’ve been studying?!”
I said later, you idiot!
“…Tsk.”
The young man watched Su-hwan’s reaction and chimed in—using an excessively cutesy tone.
“Please look after our Ha-young, Teacher~.”
Ugh. Su-hwan nearly threw up. He had never heard a man speak like that before.
The woman covered her mouth and laughed, giving the young man’s shoulder a light smack.
“Oppa, seriously… stop it.”
“If the effort changes, how can you expect the same result?”
Only then did her expression show that the words had sunk in.
“You’re right. That makes sense.”
“See it through to the end. The rice is already cooked, after all.”
“Wow, so I’m really going to pass? Thank you so much!”
The woman clasped the young man’s hand. Looking at him with affectionate eyes, she continued,
“And we’re doing long-distance right now. But we’re actually getting along pretty well. Could you take a look at our love fortune too?”
“Is that so?”
“Work is work, but I’m dying to know about the love side. Whether we’ll keep getting along like this or end up fighting.”
Hmm?
Su-hwan’s mouth suddenly began to itch like mad. It had been quite a while since he had felt this particular sensation.
What the hell is this mouth about to say now?
The brief flash of nostalgia vanished under a wave of dread. Until the words left his lips, Su-hwan never knew what he was going to say.
Uuuuugh…
Unable to endure the itch any longer, Su-hwan finally opened his mouth.
“Hey. You. Get out.”
“Excuse me?”
Su-hwan glared at the young man as if he meant to devour him on the spot. The sheer ferocity of it made the man flinch.
“I said get out.”
“T-Teacher, what’s going on all of a sudden…?”
The woman asked carefully, only to be met with an even louder bark.
“Get the hell out of here right now!”
“Why so suddenly…?”
“Oppa, just step outside for a minute.”
“Ha-young.”
“We don’t have a choice. Just this once, okay?!”
The woman glanced at Su-hwan, who still sat with his arms crossed, glaring daggers at her boyfriend. The shaman had suddenly turned openly hostile toward the man she loved.
After a moment of hesitation, the young man was essentially driven out of the shrine. Su-hwan watched until he disappeared completely. Only then did he speak.
“Ladybug.”
“What?”
The woman could not make sense of it. The shaman had just blurted out something completely random.
“The ladybug doll he gave you recently.”
Su-hwan whispered, his eyes still fixed on the man outside.
“With that, that bastard is… spying on you.”