New Year Doomsday Theory (3): The New Millennium Salvation Society
The New Millennium Salvation Society. Just the kind of name you'd stumble across in a quick internet search for cults. Their doctrine was obvious without even looking it up—bullshit about atoning in preparation for a new era, or how they were the only ones who could save sinners before the new age arrived. And hey, I know a thing or two about religion.
At its core, religion is a refuge humans invented to fill the gaps in their frail bodies and minds that can't easily accept the abnormal or irrational. In the distant past, people were too primitive and ignorant to swallow every truth about the world whole, and they hated taking direct responsibility for specific situations or phenomena. In short, back when the idea of "stepping up to the plate" was basically nonexistent, some genius came up with the ultimate buck-passing scheme: God. An omnipotent, unknowable transcendent being in some mysterious realm to dump all the blame on. When the world ran smoothly, it was God's love; when it was chaotic, God's wrath; and when things were quietly uneventful, humans wailed about God's absence—but they always came crawling back to Him. That's why thousands upon thousands of religions and gods sprang up across regions, races, and cultures. And among them, the biggest success story is Christianity.
It boasts the most followers worldwide, wields the most power, and reveres Yahweh, the name that comes up most whenever anyone talks about a "one true God." With such a massive religion dominating, it was inevitable that cults would latch on to piggyback its prestige. That's why so many of the cults we see around us are Christian offshoots. They don't believe in the one true God worth a damn, but they trot out the name like it's their trademark, cobbling together a mishmash to pretend they're just another denomination—poisoning the minds of the ignorant masses. While mainstream religions peddle "meaningless faith," these cults hawk "false faith," sucking the lifeblood from the innocent.
Hell, didn't ordinary Seoul citizens get brainwashed by this New Millennium Salvation Society or whatever and brutally stab a perfectly healthy person to death with an iron rod? Karl Marx, that mass-producer of commies, called religion "the opium of the people," and while that was his personal beef, I don't think it's entirely wrong. Humans who can't even enjoy full freedom chain themselves further to some unproven entity called God, forcing themselves into severely limited lives with choices hacked away left and right. No wonder "religion is the opium of the people" caught on as a commie catchphrase.
Come to think of it, I'm no better—shoving sinners willy-nilly toward some such existence. Not exactly in a position to talk.
I checked the pamphlet for the New Millennium Salvation Society's headquarters. It wasn't far from where I was. I was near Aksu Station, a short distance from the Shilla Hotel, and surprisingly, their church was right by Namsan Town—a densely populated area full of middle-class folks and up. A cult plopped down in a place like that explained why even seemingly normal people had gone half-mad, wandering around like zombies. The doomsday prophecy from that no-name seer "Maya" had synced up perfectly with the cult's timing, turning the streets of this city of ten million into a ghost town.
As I detoured around the crumbled roads heading toward Namsan Town, a strange prickling itch started at the back of my neck. How to describe it? Like getting a half-assed haircut at the salon—you know that spot they botched, and your hand keeps drifting back to it. You notice the uncomfortable truth, Oh, they screwed this up, but shrug it off with Eh, it'll grow out; I'll fix it next time. That nagging feeling lifelong loners get every 2-3 months at the barber.
Thinking maybe someone was cursing me out from behind, I whipped around. And there, right in front of my face—no, at the back of my head—was a familiar face.
"Fancy meeting you again? You headed this way too, Siwoo?"
"......"
What the hell? I froze mid-turn, hunting for the source of a bewilderment I hadn't felt in ages.
1. The one who'd snuck up on me without a sound was Park In-ha, who'd parted ways at the Shilla Hotel.
2. Before we split, I'd definitely erased my memories from her mind with my pattern spell.
3. Yet here she was, remembering me.
Everything was off, but to put it simply: all of it was fucked. There's no way my pattern spell didn't work, and I'm not oblivious enough to miss it. How?
Instead of wasting words on her, I went to retrace the pattern on my tongue—only for Park In-ha to clamp my mouth shut with a gentle hand.
"Don't you wonder why the world ends next year?"
"!"
Crack! I slapped her arm away in one motion and seized her slender throat with one hand. A little pressure, and I'd snap her neck like a cookie.
"You're that no-name prophet 'Maya'?"
"Is that any way to talk to a lady? We're classmates, so a little skinship's fine, but you should always watch your mouth."
"Answer."
"Right. I'm 'Maya'—the emerging prophet known only by her gender."
Why hadn't I noticed? Where did I slip up? What did I misjudge? Or had I been wrong from the start? Why the hell didn't the pattern spell work?
"You look like you're overthinking it. No need to complicate things. You know when 'Maya' made her prophecy, right?"
"This morning."
"I hadn't planned to prophesy today, but staying up all night with you at the hotel... I saw and felt a lot. So I spread it via smartphone. Technically, it's not a prophecy, but people treat it like one."
"Obviously. If you'd had some grand prophetic power, I'd have spotted it first. Peeking into someone's future without permission counts as a sin."
"Ah, so you stared at everyone else but only glanced at me? Must have eyes as fun as mine."
She wasn't wrong. Everyone else trailed fragments of sin big and small, but Park In-ha shone with an almost miraculous light. Her life seemed so blessed compared to mine. That brilliance was so dazzling I couldn't see a thing, so I'd averted my eyes from her more than anyone else. Who'd have thought it'd come back to bite me in the ass like this.
Even with my meaty hand gripping her nape, Park In-ha gazed at me calmly, showing no sign of distress.
"How do you think I managed to go around with this nice-girl face, pretending to befriend worthless trash while drawing razor-sharp lines?"
"Woman's intuition skill maxed out?"
"Witty, but don't use lines like that with women. The real answer? These eyes."
She pointed to her obsidian-black eyes.
"Thanks to them, I can read people, phenomena, even scraps of data that aren't even info yet, all at a glance. You know how I seemed airheaded on the outside but navigated life flawlessly? These eyes."
"If they're that amazing, why show up to a second reunion?"
"You're right. I planned to gather 'evidence' at the first one and blow it open. But after verifying and compiling all that data with these eyes... I got a weird prophecy. One where you—who never appeared in any of my prophecies—suddenly show up at the year-end reunion."
"You came back to that hellhole just for that?"
"You fixed it, didn't you?"
"I could've ignored it."
"If you were really that heartless, I might've ignored you too."
Only then did her unusually clingy attitude toward me make sense. She'd believed I'd solve the reunion mess—and I did—so she kept sticking close. A contradictory but plausible excuse that almost had me nodding along like an idiot.
"So what exactly is this 'prophecy' of yours?"
"Data collection via these eyes, info synthesis, probability and stats calculations, final conclusion. That's my prophecy. Never really thought about margin of error."
She explained so casually, and for two seconds, I pondered what to do with this baffling woman. To confirm her intentions, I asked what bugged me most.
"Why'd you suddenly prophesy the world ending next year—right after pulling an all-nighter with me?"
She answered so matter-of-factly, like it was no big deal.
"Because you're the only one who won't die."