Unknown
Even with a mighty goddess to serve, she had ended up beneath that charlatan. And there was the scar on her face, the bruises that flashed into view, and the way she was, all in all, a person whose story made me curious in a dozen different ways despite having only met her today.
I want to look closer.
If I had spotted her from Heaven while peering down at the mortal realm through a thousand-li telescope, I could have examined her properly. But I had become human and met her down here instead, and since I couldn't even use my Heavenly Sight anymore, curiosity now meant I had no choice but to approach her myself.
“I'll call you Tamsol.”
“……Yes.”
When I smiled and said her name, Baek Tamsol averted her gaze. She seemed to find meeting someone's eyes uncomfortable.
“……I'll answer the questions you asked earlier, one by one. First, the difference between a gut ritual and an offering is……”
The voice that followed was flat and uninflected, without a single rise or fall — but the story it carried was remarkably rich.
“……Therefore, a mudang is one who serves the gods and an intermediary who stands between the human and the divine. In truth, she is closer to a monk than to one of the ordinary gweryeoknansin of bizarre strength……”
She was clear as flowing water — in precisely the opposite sense from that fraud earlier. She even remembered every single question I had dumped on her all at once and was answering each one in turn.
How on earth did she learn this well under a sham like that?
“……Therefore, both of Your Highness the Crown Princess's questions are correct. Shamanism is both a method of disciplining the body to grow the 'vessel' that holds a god well, and a 'technique' for using well the divine power the vessel contains. And so the heart of shamanism is the mumu — the shaman's dance — which disciplines the body while also being the very technique of wielding divine power.”
“Mumu? Dance?”
“Yes. Every mudang is, at her core, a dancer.”
And then, suddenly, light kindled in Baek Tamsol's dry, lecturing eyes. Strength flooded into her voice.
“Through dance, we serve the gods. Through dance, we offer our bodies to them. Through dance, we shake the divine seat and destroy what is corrupt. A mudang is one who unfolds, for the sake of people, the dance that holds a god within it. The kind of behavior that frightens people with fortune-telling or demands payment for a gut ritual they claim is needed — that sort of thing is simply, ah—”
Baek Tamsol, who had been pouring words out as if entranced, hastily clapped a hand over her own mouth.
So it wasn't that she only watched because she didn't know the charlatan's tricks were wrong.
And she… loves the dance of shamanism.
Just now, when she spoke of the mumu, her eyes had sparkled like glass polished clean. An unquenchable fire was burning inside that glass — the same flame I had sometimes glimpsed in humans while watching the mortal world from above.
The fire called passion.
A human who carries flame is splendid and beautiful. Like a lantern whose light leaks out no matter how tightly you cage it and shroud it with a cover.
I watched the flustered Baek Tamsol for a moment, then asked.
“Could you show me a little of that mumu, perhaps?”
“……I cannot dance it.”
“Oh? Why not? Is it because you haven't finished learning?”
At my question, Baek Tamsol abruptly raised a hand and pulled her bangs down over her forehead, as if she wanted to hide her face. Then she flinched and lowered her hand — apparently an unconscious gesture.
“……Yes. I am still unskilled.”
The girl answered bluntly, her voice twice as dry as before.
No matter how I looked at it, it seemed to be because of the scar on her face.
Is she embarrassed by it herself? Or did that fraud teach her something twisted?
I couldn't tell whether it was one or the other — or perhaps both.
I want to see the dance she offers to the gods.
Would that dance resemble the flame she carries? I had to know.
As I listened to her explanation flow on without a hitch, the heart that had been tipping slowly tipped all the way over to one side.
Toward tying this bond.
“Baek Tamsol.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Will you be my teacher?”
“……I beg your pardon?”
“I'm free to choose the guests of Jaebang as I please. And I like you far better than I like your spirit-father.”
I leaned across the desk and looked up at her. The girl hastily grabbed at her bangs again.
I met her eyes through the strands of hair and smiled as adorably as I could manage — with the very expression that had made the fairy maidens all swoon.
“So please be my teacher. Pretty please?”
“……!”
Baek Tamsol jumped as if struck and fumbled frantically, still hauling at her bangs.
“Ah, th-that is, Your Highness, I… I am not a proper mudang yet, I am only a spirit-daughter……”
“And I could never become a real mudang myself. I have two left feet, so I won't be able to learn the mumu properly anyway.”
A sigh escaped me as I spoke.
The heart of shamanism is dance, of all things. Even if I had received the descent and become a mudang, I wouldn't have managed it.
But borrowing and using my own divine power should be possible even without the mumu, shouldn't it? Please, let it be possible. If I practice handling even that, won't I develop a knack for handling my divine power? Then I might not even need to follow the Straw God Plan……
It was a faint hope, but that too was part of what drove me to throw myself into these lessons.
Having sighed my fill, I pressed on.
“I just want to know about shamanism itself, and study it. If I learn from a teacher, I'm sure I'll learn it well. Won't you?”
“I hardly think that is something someone like me is worthy of accepting.”
“You're not saying you don't want to, though, are you?”
“…Pardon?”
“Becoming my teacher — you don't dislike the idea, do you? If you become a guest of Jaebang, you get room and board, and the monthly stipend is generous!”
“……Room and board, you say?”
Baek Tamsol reacted to that.
As she clutched her bangs, her sleeve had slipped down, baring the girl's wrist — mottled with bruises dark as if she'd been beaten.
My resolve to seat her in Jaebang as a guest, no matter what, hardened.
I declared, entirely on my own authority:
“Then I'll take it that you're becoming my guest.”
“No, you mustn't! My spirit-father will be furious.”
“That fraud? What does his opinion matter? I, the Crown Princess, am telling you I'm choosing you as my guest.”
“……!”
Baek Tamsol flinched. She looked at me with an expression that asked whether that were truly possible, then slunk her gaze away.
I reached out, caught the girl's sleeve as she kept dragging at her bangs, and drew it back down. Meeting those fleeing eyes head-on, I asked:
“All that's needed is your consent. You needn't mind anything else, or worry about anything else. What will you do?”
The eyes that met mine wavered like candle flames. The girl murmured, very small:
“……You didn't grimace.”
“Hm? Sorry — what?”
“This. Doesn't it look… unsightly to you?”
Baek Tamsol gestured at the mess of marks tangled across her forehead as she asked.
Huh? Why would that matter?
I answered, bewildered.
“What? It's not pleasant to look at, no. But that has nothing whatsoever to do with my wanting to make you my guest, does it?”
Baek Tamsol's face went strangely blank, and she pressed again.
“Nothing… whatsoever?”
“None at all. It's what you said in answer to my questions, and what you told me about the mumu, that won me over.”
“…….”
Or, to be precise — it was the flame in this girl's eyes as she spoke of it that had been so magnificent. And if I was going to learn properly, I wanted to learn from someone who carried a fire like that.
With that thought, I looked up into Baek Tamsol's eyes. Come to think of it, she really did have lovely eyes.
Baek Tamsol said nothing for a while. She stared at me from a distance, and then abruptly sprang to her feet.
Standing rigid, chest heaving as though she were marching off to war, she declared with grim resolve:
“I shall… become your guest.”
And then, before I could say a word, she dropped into a deep, formal bow.
Replacing the guest proved no difficult task.
After all, the story of how that charlatan named Jo Man-hee had become my guest in the first place turned out to be absurd once you looked into it.
For one thing… it was true that the shamans had all avoided my guest position.
Should they teach me poorly and I suddenly fall ill — or worse, become possessed — the blame would land squarely on their heads, so the shamans had been too frightened to come anywhere near. Even with Seoljuok's assurances, it seemed they couldn't feel entirely at ease.
Princess Onseol, being royalty and belonging to the insular Hyoguksa besides, didn't have a particularly wide network among the shamans.
Unable to find a suitable candidate, she had handed her right to nominate my guest over to the Seongsucheong, the kingdom's official shamanic bureau — and while they too were casting about in vain for a suitable mudang, Jo Man-hee had volunteered with fervent enthusiasm.
So it's true that everyone else shied away and he stepped up. No wonder choosing a guest took so long.
I reported every word Jo Man-hee had said to me straight to the King — that a gut ritual must be performed for one reason or another, that something was strange about me, and so on.
Hauled off to the Uigeumbu at once, the man had every fraud he'd ever committed dragged out into the light.
From the look of things, he would certainly be punished within the bounds of human justice, so I decided there was no need for me to meddle with him further.
Besides, once he reaches the underworld, Baridegi will personally escort him to a hell reserved just for charlatans. So.
When Princess Onseol heard what had happened, she sent a gift along with a letter apologizing for her failure to recommend a proper candidate.
Since I had made the request without any idea how hard it would be to find someone to teach me shamanism, I wrote back to say all was well.
Baek Tamsol passed a round of identity verification, and before long she became the first resident guest of Jaebang.
She's young, but thankfully she's eighteen and has already had her coming-of-age ceremony.
I decided not to attempt any other lessons for the time being, and to abandon even the breathing practice I did every morning, devoting myself entirely to Baek Tamsol's shamanic instruction.
Because I wanted to wield my divine power as soon as possible.
Divine power borrowed and used through a human body would amount to barely a speck of dust… but if I practiced handling even that, surely I'd develop a feel for handling my own power? And then, without needing to follow the Straw God Plan——
It was a fragile hope, but that too was one of the things that drew me so deep into these lessons.
And so, absorbed in my studies, I found before I knew it that the day had come to depart for the ancestral rites with the Crown Prince.