The Easiest and Hardest of Arts
Unknown.
"Possession is the simplest of all shamanic arts. All you have to do is surrender your body to the god. And yet it is also the most difficult, because success hinges entirely on one thing—whether the god consents or not. In truth, it is exceedingly rare for a shaman to achieve true possession."
Which means this is the easiest art there is—for me.
Baek Tamsol continued her explanation in her calm, even voice.
"Possession is also the most powerful technique a shaman possesses. The god borrows a human body and exercises its divine power in full—so naturally it surpasses anything a mortal could manage alone."
"But because it means summoning a god into a human body, it must be enormously dangerous, right?"
"It is. When the god merely alights upon the shaman without moving the body directly—the state we call jeopsin, the touching of the god—it is comparatively safe. But in the state of full possession, the gangsin itself, there are shamans who cannot bear the god's weight and die."
Baek Tamsol let out a short sigh before adding, "That is why most shamans wish to go no further than jeopsin. But the gods do not look kindly on that arrangement."
I imagine not. If a god had gone to the trouble of descending into a mortal body in the middle of everything, wouldn't it want to move that body itself and dispatch its business quickly, rather than sit cramped inside, doling out advice? Of course they'd hate it.
"Now, then—let me walk you through the actual method of possession. First…"
By the end of that lesson, she had absorbed the whole theory of gangsin.
Possession. She was already inhabiting Seruhwa's body. What would happen if she performed Cheonmyeong's possession on top of that?
She was, in effect, already possessed. Would anything change at all?
I meant to study more, watch Baek Tamsol demonstrate a real possession, and only then attempt it myself…
But the Geuseundae's words kept surfacing in her mind—eat the Eodukseoni, it had muttered, over and over. And the Uijeong's twins, dragged along in a line when it had tried to seize her.
Anxiety coiled tight in her chest. If those children came to harm because of her…
There's no time. Right now, I have to try everything.
She knelt where she stood, closed her eyes, and pressed her palms together.
Just as Baek Tamsol had taught in her lessons on the shamanic arts—she imagined placing her wish, her entreaty to the divine, into the tips of her joined hands.
She pictured the praying heart traveling up through her gathered hands, rising like smoke until it touched the heavens—reaching the one who existed above that sky. The princess of the Celestial Realm and the Netherworld both. A great god in her own right.
Cheonmyeong. Sangra Heeyo.
A shaman, they said, was meant to keep dancing until an answer came—the dance offered up to the god, the dance that prepared the body to receive the divine.
She did not wait for an answer. She could not afford to.
Because she was Cheonmyeong.
Her true body, the one up in heaven, lay unconscious. It was in no state to answer anyone.
So instead of waiting for a reply, what I must do is—
She steadied her breathing the way Gi Ho-cheol had drilled into her. With senses honed sharper than before, she reached for what she sought.
When she used her divine power, it had always flowed as naturally as breathing, without the slightest effort—until, for the sake of her true body's stability, her parents had sealed the unconscious use of it away, and it had vanished from her sight.
She released a long, thin breath and slowly opened her eyes.
At the tips of her joined hands, a faint thread trembled into view.
Her lifespan cord.
Not the cord binding Seruhwa's body to its soul.
The cord that joined Sangra Heeyo's body to her soul.
The cord linking her body in the Celestial Realm to her spirit here in the world below.
When she had been one of the dead drifting down the Samdocheon, it had blazed clear and bright. But she was no longer one of the dead, and she was not wielding her divine power now, so the cord hung dim and wavering.
Still—the fact that I can see it with my senses alone is something.
Here in the shadows, the passage between the Palju bells would not open, but the lifespan cord did not break.
The lifespan cord was the line binding soul to body. As long as life endured, it held fast, tougher and more tenacious than anything else in the world.
Mine is a bit patchwork, admittedly.
She gently wrapped both hands around the pale thread stretching faintly upward into the unfathomable distance.
Cradling the cord that connected her to the divine, she made her wish once more.
Come down, Cheonmyeong.
This was not, in truth, a prayer at all. It was her soul issuing a command to her own body, to her own divine power—to the god named Cheonmyeong.
Hand over my divine power!
The moment she willed it with everything she had, the cord shuddered.
It's coming!
Divine power came pouring down the thread like a waterfall—familiar, overwhelming, and utterly beyond her control.
So this is what happens when I attempt possession in this state.
Gangsin, it turned out, felt little different from simply drawing on her own power.
Uncontrollable force surged in like a thunderhead breaking.
And with it, she could do… almost nothing. Open the Cheonmyeong Eyes she had sealed shut. Trigger the Heavenly Retribution. Or hurl it recklessly in every direction and make it explode.
In other words, she was no better off than when she used her own power normally.
Well—it makes sense. They said possession meant the god wielding divine power directly. I could never handle my power properly to begin with, so it'd be strange if suddenly possessing myself made it work.
A little disappointed, yes—but she had anticipated as much, so she did not panic.
Instead of accepting the cascading torrent, she turned it back. Her divine power flowed naturally up the cord, returning to her body in heaven.
A circulation had begun between body and soul. Using the lifespan cord as a vessel, her divine power coursed like blood between the her that was here and the her that was above.
This is almost exactly the state I was in right after possessing Seruhwa's body.
Those early days, when the Heavenly Retribution fell on its own and the Cheonmyeong Eyes answered her every whim.
In this state, the entire burden of using divine power fell on her body in the heavens.
That was why, with her mother and father's help, she had dammed this flow and sworn off using her power altogether.
But now, because she had attempted possession, it was flowing again.
Then… what happens if, right here, I use a shaman's art?
Her sharpened senses caught it—the lifespan cord within her.
The cord of Seruhwa, binding this body to her spirit. It had no reason to extend outward, so it lay sleeping quietly inside the body.
I have to draw it out.
Shamans, without ever knowing it, pulled their own lifespan cords out of their bodies and connected them to gods or spirits.
That was possession.
When she laid the knowledge of mortal shamans over what she knew of the Netherworld and the Celestial Realm, musok—the shamanic art itself—turned out to be, at its heart, the craft of handling one's own lifespan cord.
A cord that an ordinary person would never touch until the day they died, that only slipped free of the body in moments of unconsciousness—and shamans drew it out with their own hands.
I doubt humans understand the principle behind what they're doing… but in the end, shamans move the cord indirectly, through dance and ritual.
A shaman's constitution? A vessel fit to hold a god?
That was simply a body whose cord slipped out easily. It meant a person who lost consciousness readily, whose soul clung poorly to the flesh, who fainted at the drop of a hat.
Because their original soul leaves the body so easily, another god or spirit can take up residence. And because the cord is always rattling loose, if they don't fill the space with something to weigh it down, they fall prey to spirit sickness.
A being that can empty itself, and therefore become a vessel for something else. That was what a human shaman was.
Seen that way, it was only natural that Seruhwa possessed outstanding shamanic gifts.
Seruhwa's original soul was gone. She was, in effect, a vessel emptied completely.
And so the "emptying of the vessel" that normally required a shaman to half-lose her mind through the mumu dance or a gut ritual—she could accomplish it with her wits fully about her, by her own will alone.
…Could. Couldn't I?
Frankly, all of this was a hypothesis she had built herself while studying the shamanic arts.
This would be her first time in the field.
Doesn't matter. Let's try. Drawing out the lifespan cord first.
For all she knew, the Geuseundae was doing horrors to the children at this very moment. There was no room to hesitate, no room to let fear slow her hand.
…I have crossed into the land of the dead more times than I can count. I am a great god of two hundred and ten years. I am Cheonmyeong, the only daughter of the Jade Emperor and King Yama.
So grabbing a lifespan cord and pulling it free was not frightening at all. Not frightening. It wouldn't hurt one bit.
Lips pressed into a hard line, she moved her hand.
"Eat it. Eat it, and I'll grow stronger… the moment I succeed. Stronger. Stronger."
The muttered, litany-like voice and the sound of dragging feet drew closer.
The monster was coming.
Cheon Gyeol-woo stilled his breath to nothing.
What in the world is happening?
When he had come to his senses, the boy had found himself sealed in a cramped, lightless space.
Only after smashing his way out had he understood what it was—a steel dwiju, a lock-chest, plastered layer upon layer with talismans.
Cheon Gyeol-woo cast a brief glance at the shards of the chest he had cleaved apart.
A lock-chest wrought of iron, warded with a dozen talismans. It was without question a device built to confine something dangerous.
And he had cut it open without knowing what it held.
Once again he felt, keenly, what a fearsome weapon the Eodukseoni could become in the right hands.
"The Dark Spirit Blade you have forged, my prince, is a crystallization of mighty and pristine energy."
"You know of sword qi, the aura a master swordsman wreathes about his blade? Qi honed sharper, refined purer, and bound fast to the steel is called sword gang."
"Your Dark Spirit Blade stands beyond sword qi altogether—its power rivals the gang itself. That a boy of twelve should wield a weapon of this caliber is nothing short of a miracle, a fated boon."
Gi Ho-cheol's lavish praise echoed in his memory.
But the Crown Prince did not let down his guard.
He had wielded this very blade through every bout with Gi Ho-cheol, and not once had he landed a true strike.
"You are still weak, my prince. Your experience is wanting, and so is your technique. That is precisely why you must never, ever grow careless."
"However mighty the weapon in your hand, it is worthless if it never reaches your enemy."
I don't yet understand my situation, so I must not act rashly.
That someone had sealed him inside a steel lock-chest meant his enemy knew he carried a strange power.
First—identify the enemy.
Gripping the Dark Spirit Blade anew, Cheon Gyeol-woo pressed himself tighter against the great roof beam.
He had broken out of the chest into a small chamber. Beyond the window, grotesque shadows churned without end, and the door was locked fast.
The instant he had moved to smash his way out, his unnaturally keen ears had caught the monster's voice.
The Crown Prince had leapt at once to the beam, drawn the darkness up over his whole body, and waited in silence for the monster to approach.
…Is my wife safe?
The thought, surfacing as he waited, scorched his heart to ash.
He had to find her, and quickly. He was going out of his mind wondering what torments a small, fragile girl might be enduring in a place as grotesque and dreadful as this.
…The more urgent the matter, the calmer I must be.
Jaw clenched, Cheon Gyeol-woo tightened his hold on the Dark Spirit Blade.
The dragging footsteps drew very near. The monster stopped just before the locked door, mumbling to itself, and closed a clawed hand around the latch.
"Eodukseoni… eat the Eodukseoni, and my shadow grows stronger. It will. The Eodukseoni before, the big one—too big, too scary, ran away. But human whelp Eodukseoni… small. Not scary. Not scary. Can eat…."
The Crown Prince held his breath and glared down through the gloom.
That thing… knows what I am?
He did not know what it was—yet it knew precisely what he was.
The hair rose all over Cheon Gyeol-woo's body.
Click. The lock gave way, and the door swung open.