Chapter 38
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 38
Chapter Title: Extra File. Woman in the Snow
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The man climbed the snow-covered mountain. Having set out on the hike without proper preparation, the outer coat he had casually thrown on was woefully inadequate against the raging blizzard. His shoes, too, sank helplessly up to his knees, soaking through completely. It had been hours since he lost all feeling in his feet. Now even his hands and cheeks were starting to go numb. Dancing snowflakes filled his entire field of vision, blurring his sight like a lens knocked out of focus. Stars and rainbows flashed by, and the darkness looming ahead seemed poised to engulf him like an entire mountain range.
The man raised a hand that barely obeyed him and slapped his cheek. He felt no pain, but his vision cleared a little. He knew full well he couldn't escape this mountain alive. It was his hometown, after all—he knew better than anyone how treacherous its peaks were. Yet the man refused to give up. He lifted his frozen-stiff feet and took one laborious step after another. He wasn't walking to escape the mountain.
Right now, the man was searching for the Snow Woman. She was a legend passed down about this mountain—a ghost from a story an elderly neighbor once told to scare him on a sleepless winter night when he kept trying to sneak outside as a child.
When snow piled up, the Snow Woman—in her long hair and white mourning garb—wandered the mountain all night long. Any human who entered the mountain then would be silently devoured by her.
At the foot of this mountain lay a small village. Fewer than thirty households remained, and almost no young people lived there. The harsh peaks cradling it under their arms shifted with the seasons, offering a serene beauty, but the village was little more than an isolated relic fading away. The man had been born there. So had his younger sister. With hardly any other kids to play with and the school a full hour's walk away, it had still felt like a happy place. Well, at least until the innocent days when they knew nothing of the world.
When the man was around ten, their parents died. It happened in an accident on the mountain. No one knew exactly what kind, just that their bodies were found sometime later. He and his sister wept for days on end. The kind-hearted villagers looked after them plenty, but that didn't change the fact that they were orphans without anyone to truly rely on.
On top of that, his sister was frail. She spent four months out of every year bedridden. As he cared for her—unable to attend school properly himself—the man grew up harboring a bitter resolve. When I grow up, I'll leave this godforsaken village and be free, he vowed. Once he was old enough to stand on his own. Once his sister was strong enough.
But the world wasn't as forgiving as his dreams. He graduated school and became an adult, yet he couldn't leave his hometown. His sister was still a student, too weak to survive without him. Still, he clung to hope and planned for the future. He went into the city to find work and earn money. It wasn't much, but he saved what he could. Once his sister got into university and moved into a dorm, he'd head to Seoul for a fresh start.
Winter approached, and the mountains embracing the village donned their white cloaks. As always, his perpetually ailing sister began to fade. The man felt anxious but prayed everything would work out. After all this misfortune, hoping for one stroke of luck isn't too greedy, he told himself.
Those prayers betrayed him. On the day of her college entrance exam, his sister's fever spiked. Maybe he should have let her rest, but instead he lashed out in pointless rage. If you miss the exam today, you'll have to wait another year? I can't take that. I won't endure it anymore.
His sister collapsed on the way to the test site, unable to stand. Despite his insistence, she couldn't even sit for it. By the time she returned home from the hospital, the snow had melted, and pale green buds were sprouting. Seeing her ashen face, the man finally lost control and struck her.
That night, she cried herself to sleep. If he'd only turned on the light for a moment to check on her, he might not have made the choice he regretted forever. But luck never favored him. That night, the man took all their savings and vanished from the house. The next morning, his sister woke with swollen eyes, rubbed them, and cooked rice for two—convinced her angry brother would return soon. But days turned to seasons, and he never came back.
The man reached the Seoul of his dreams, but the city offered no welcome. Finding a place to live was the first hurdle. He'd never thought himself a fool before, but the world was far more cunning. Marked as easy prey by every sort of lowlife, he blew through his meager savings in no time.
With nowhere to go, he wandered the streets until he fell in with others in the same boat—and stepped into crime. By the time he realized what kind of world he'd entered, it was too late. It didn't take long for the law to catch up. That was how the man ended up behind bars for the first time in his life.
Years later, released back into the world, he wandered aimlessly until he collapsed in tears. No one remembered him. No one needed him. All he could think was how much he missed his hometown—and his sister. If only he hadn't left that day, maybe they'd be living peacefully in the village now. He longed for his only remaining family so badly he couldn't bear it.
Returning home empty-handed, he found no sister to greet him.
Word of his imprisonment had reached the village, and she'd spent every day in tears, they said. Dragging her frail body, she'd climb the mountain whenever she could, praying at the sacred tree for his health. Even after winter came and snow piled high—even with her usual fevers. The villagers tried to stop her, but she ascended the snow-blanketed mountain anyway. And she never came back.
When the man finally returned, all that met him were the villagers' accusatory stares. Wretch. Sister-killer. The monster who devoured his own kind-hearted sibling. He couldn't endure it. Not their blame, but his own self-loathing. With a howl, he plunged into the mountain's snowy embrace.
And now, the man wandered in search of the Snow Woman. His sister must have been devoured by her, never to return. As a natural hunter, the Snow Woman left her victims' souls wandering the mountain eternally, unaware they'd even died. And there was a gathering place for those restless spirits, the legend went. The man had to find it. He had to see his sister. Beg her forgiveness. Otherwise, he couldn't go on living...
How many times had he fallen? His legs gave out, and he collapsed, but he summoned the last of his strength to rise. Then, right before him—where moments ago there had been nothing—a figure appeared. It was a person. A woman in white with long hair. Her face was hidden behind those strands. But the man knew. This was the Snow Woman.
Even in this state, fear gripped him. The Snow Woman approached without a sound, gliding over the snow as if floating. He wanted to flee, but he mustered his courage and spoke.
"Let me see my sister."
The Snow Woman's head tilted curiously. Did she even understand human speech? His mouth ached from the cold and terror, but he repeated himself.
"The legend says you gather the souls of those you've killed. I won't resent you. I won't ask you to revive her. Just let me see her. Please..."
The Snow Woman shook her head back and forth like a pendulum several more times, then finally turned and began walking somewhere. Taking it as a sign to follow, the man dragged his unresponsive body after her.
He followed the Snow Woman for what felt like an eternity. He kept stumbling and falling. Several times, his blurred vision nearly sent him tumbling off a cliff. Gradually, reality blurred into dream. Maybe this is all a dream. Maybe I never left home. I'll wake up in that cramped little house, and my sister will smile and greet me...
"Why'd you take so long?"
The sudden voice snapped his drooping eyes wide open. It was so long since he'd heard it—too long to recognize at once, despite how desperately he'd missed it.
The Snow Woman slowly turned. The hair veiling her face had somehow been neatly combed back. Seeing the revealed face, the man froze in place. There was no mistaking it. His sister stood there.
"Do you know how long I waited? If you'd come just a little sooner, we could've met again."
The words brimmed with resentment, but her tone was close to a teasing jest laced with love and hate. She was smiling—just like in the dream he'd once had.
The man crawled to her and reached out, caressing her cheek. It was cold.
"I'm sorry. This is all because of my selfishness. I'm sorry... I never should have hit you that day. I shouldn't have..."
In that hesitant moment, she threw her arms around him. Hot tears welled from a body he thought long bereft of warmth. They froze before they could flow.
"It's okay, brother. Now we can be together forever."
The Snow Woman—who had embraced him—watched him intently with curious eyes. Then she opened her mouth. A mouth so tiny he hadn't even noticed it gaped impossibly wide, large enough to swallow him whole in one bite. That was the end.