The Girl Who Refused to Go Home
From the moment Mother conceived me, she and Father built a palace in the Heavens dedicated to me alone — Sangra Palace.
The Netherworld, after all, was hardly a pleasant place to live.
After I was born, both my parents took up residence in Sangra Palace, commuting from there to their respective duties — Mother to Jami Palace in the Celestial Realm, Father to Yeomraguk below.
In this way, Sangra Palace effectively became our family home.
But since it was fundamentally my palace, everything in Sangra Palace had been arranged to suit me, and my traces lingered in every corner of it. If I suddenly vanished from there, the empty space I left behind would feel enormous to Mother and Father. Living apart might ease the ache a little, but they were not the sort of parents to go off and live separately while leaving me behind.
Should I just move out and live somewhere else?
It was an impulsive thought, but the idea of living somewhere new struck me as irresistibly appealing.
I had lived my whole life within Sangra Palace, after all.
Should I really try living out there? Where? And how?
While I patted the endlessly sobbing Ansi and mulled it over, the ferry that had carried that silver-haired child earlier came to rest against the sandbar.
Hm?
Behind the little girl stepping off the boat, I glimpsed a faintly glowing cord.
Isn't that a Lifespan Cord?
A Lifespan Cord was the thread that bound a soul to its body.
If that cord snapped, the body became a corpse and the soul a departed spirit.
Why would a dead soul still have a Lifespan Cord attached?
The whitely glowing cord shimmered and stretched across Samdocheon, reaching back toward the living world beyond.
The reaper leading the child seemed to notice the cord only belatedly. He clicked his tongue.
"No wonder her allotted years weren't up yet."
The girl looked up at him, puzzled. The reaper pointed at the cord trailing toward the living world.
"Hey, grab that thing and go home. You're not actually dead."
Watching from a distance, I finally understood what phenomenon this was.
They said that when a demon or evil spirit flung its flesh and killed a human, the victim's Lifespan Cord remained intact like that.
The person had been struck down, so they did die — but since their natural lifespan hadn't run out, if someone simply lent them a hand, they could come right back to life.
Help like the accumulated virtue of ancestors, or the desperate prayers of the living, or the power of a god greater than whatever demon struck them down — something like that.
Dying before one's allotted lifespan meant the Netherworld didn't stand in the way of such a revival.
Quite the opposite — Father had told me they actively sent people back.
In a way, it's not so different from me coming back to life through my parents' power.
Either way, it was no ordinary occurrence.
"If you hold onto your Lifespan Cord, you'll return to the living world on your own. Now hurry up and go."
At the reaper's urging, the girl stared at the cord bound to her, then shook her head vigorously.
"I don't want to go. I-I don't want to go back."
"What?"
"E-even if I go back, I'll just die again right away……"
Despair stole over that young face, far too old for it.
What could her story be, that a child so young would say returning was pointless because she'd only die again?
Is she sick like me? Or does she mean she'll get struck down again the moment she returns?
As I watched with a tangle of feelings, the reaper's face twisted into a scowl.
"That's none of my business, so just hurry up and go."
"I-I refuse……"
"You've got some nerve, kid. Listen, if you set foot in Yeomraguk like this, that cord'll get you tossed right back out at the gate."
"Even if I go back, I'll just d-die fast and come right here again……. So I just w-won't go back……"
"Then go quickly, die one more time, and come back."
"D-dying hurts. I hate hurting……"
"Ugh, of all the annoying brats I could've gotten stuck with."
"I-I'm sorry……"
"Should I just kill you again right now, then? A few good hits and that cord might snap on its own, hm?"
When the reaper thrust his fist into the air, the girl flinched and cowered by reflex.
Is that lunatic serious?
I shot to my feet.
Ansi, who had been wailing and seen nothing, lifted her head in bewilderment.
"Your Highness?"
"Step aside for a moment."
Shouldering past Ansi, I marched toward the reaper.
"Hey, you there."
"Hm?"
The reaper turned to look at me, and his face went slack with shock.
"Now what in the blazes is this?"
"I'm the daughter of your far-far-above superior."
"What nonsense is that?"
"You. What were you about to do to her just now?"
"Ha! Listen, little girl, dead souls don't go sticking their noses into a reaper's work. Where's the reaper assigned to you?"
"Being a reaper is a position for guiding the dead — not a position for threatening them, isn't it? Answer properly. What exactly were you about to do just now?"
"You insolent little—!"
The reaper lunged, reaching to grab me by the collar.
Behind me, Ansi's presence turned absolutely terrifying. But he never got the chance for her to step in.
"Who DARES—"
From the crimson sky, black clouds came pouring down behind me like a waterfall.
Those pitch-black clouds at once took the shape of a colossal man.
"—lay a hand on my daughter?"
A hand, thick-knuckled and enormous, seized the reaper's wrist mere instants before it could touch me.
Father had arrived.
Facing King Yama himself, the reaper's face went white in an instant — whiter than any of the dead souls around us.
"Y-Y-Your Majesty……?"
He recognized Father at a glance.
I could forgive him for failing to recognize me — I'd been recuperating in the palace and hardly went anywhere — but there was no mistaking the superior of all superiors.
Father twisted the reaper's arm with a pleasant smile.
"I distinctly remember ordering every official who ferries across Samdocheon to memorize my daughter's face and attire."
"GWAAAH! I-I-I'm a new recruit, Your Majesty……!"
"It's part of the basic training curriculum for new hires. Apparently you dozed off during orientation."
Wait, hold on — memorizing my face is part of basic training for Netherworld officials?
So THAT'S why even reapers and clerks I'd never seen before would recognize me the moment I fell into Samdocheon……
"Discipline in Yeomraguk has grown rather lax of late, it seems. To think a fellow like this was commissioned as a reaper and let loose to roam about."
Smiling all the while, Father fixed the reaper with a gaze cold enough to freeze hell over. Then he flicked his fingertips lazily into the air.
"Gangrim."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
A man in a black overcoat and indigo uniform, a black official's hat on his head, appeared as though parting the mist.
It was Gangrim Doryeong — Father's right hand and the reapers' chief.
"Deal with him."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Gangrim Doryeong advanced on the trembling reaper, grinning ear to ear.
"Hey."
"Yes! Chasa Official, Northeast Branch, Unseong District, Deputy Reaper No. 28, Park—!"
"Spare me the rank and name. Go gather up every last one of your superiors and my subordinates, all of them, right now."
The reaper's face went ashen where he stood, as if he might faint on the spot.
Well, his career is toast.
I didn't feel the least bit sorry for him. Not after seeing him raise a hand to strike a child.
"My princess."
Father scooped me up in his arms. With my view suddenly elevated, I found myself looking into eyes brimming with moisture.
Father cried every single time. Because of me.
My chest stung.
"Did you wait long, Dad?"
"Not at all. You got here quickly."
"Were you cold?"
"Ansi came to keep me company, so I was fine."
"Thank goodness…… Come now, let's hurry home."
"Just a moment, Dad."
I caught hold of Father as he moved to whisk me away, and pointed at the little girl still trembling like a leaf.
"I want to bring that child back with us."
"Hm?"
When Father's eyes fell on the Lifespan Cord trailing from the girl's body, they narrowed. I hurried to explain.
"She has a Lifespan Cord, but she says she doesn't want to go back to the living world. So just now, that reaper threatened to kill her again and tried to hit her."
Father's brows twitched.
"Gangrim."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"You know what to do?"
"Yes. Severe punishment for the reaper in question, and mandatory attitude retraining and disciplinary case instruction for the Unseong district — no, for every deputy reaper in the entire Northeast Branch."
"Mm."
Gangrim Doryeong, who had served Father for over a thousand years, answered everything smoothly on his own, and Father gave a small nod.
Collective responsibility, then. That reaper would probably be begging for death itself before long.
Gangrim Doryeong booted the frozen-pale reaper along and dragged him away into the mist.
Father lifted me into his arms and met my eyes.
"Huiyo, my child — you wish to take that girl to your palace?"
"Yes. I'm curious why she doesn't want to go back to the living world."
Father's gaze moved between the shivering girl and me for a moment. I caught a faint murmur. 'She has no one her own age around, does she…… my poor little princess.'
Excuse me, it's not like I'm doing this because I need friends.
I'm just curious, that's all.
Whether the reason she didn't want to be revived was pain like mine, or some other circumstance entirely — that was the whole of it.
Father gave Ansi a small tilt of the chin, signaling her to look after the girl, then leaned close and murmured to me with utter tenderness.
"The girl must ride her Lifespan Cord back before the first cock crows, or she cannot be revived. So play with her only until then."
"……Yes."
I wasn't planning on playing with her, but I simply nodded and wrapped my arms around Father's neck.
Once we had left the Netherworld behind, I opened my eyes to a familiar ceiling.
My bedroom in Sangra Palace, in the Celestial Realm.
"Ughh……"
My throat was raw and my limbs ached with pins and needles, and a groan escaped me unbidden. My head throbbed as though it might split open.
Cursed body of mine.
Being in Samdocheon had at least been pleasant in one way — as a soul, my senses had been dulled.
Still, this was on the milder side. There had been mornings when I woke up vomiting before I could even see straight.
"Huiyo!"
As I tried to sit up, Mother, who was at my bedside, quickly brought a bowl of decoction to my lips.
My usual painkiller.
It tasted horrifyingly bitter, but without it I couldn't function at all. I obediently drank every last drop.
Mother gazed down at me for a long moment.
"……Are you feeling any better?"
"Yes, I don't think I need any other medicine."
My tongue tingled and went faintly numb, and the pain settled. About the same level as when I'd been in the Netherworld.
Mother slipped a candy into my mouth, then drew me gently into her arms.
"Sleep more, my darling. I'll keep holding you."
"I'm fine!"
I slipped out of Mother's embrace and broke into a wide smile.
"I'm not hurting anymore, so you can go now. You're busy, aren't you?"
"Not that busy."
Lie.
The Jade Emperor was busy. From the heavens above to the world beneath the earth, she had to oversee everything — truly, enormously busy. Likely two or three times busier than Father, who only had the Netherworld to mind.
And yet Mother is always at my side whenever I wake.
She made up the backlog of work by staying up through the night afterward, handled the urgent matters right beside my sickbed, and stayed glued to my side every single time.
Which meant it was up to me to send her off on my own.
"Um — there's a child I brought back from the Netherworld this time. She has to be sent back to the living world before the first cock crows."
"You brought someone back from the Netherworld? You?"