Old Monster
For the past few days, my life had gone on as usual. But I couldn't seem to focus on anything. Even when I looked up information on new game releases, nothing quite caught my fancy, and food somehow lost its taste the moment it touched my tongue.
Then again, staying calm after everything that happened would make me a lunatic, wouldn't it?
In the world of righteous cultivators, I'd been a man who belonged nowhere.
The orthodox sects cast me out, saying I knew far too many sinister, underhanded arts. The demonic sects sneered at me for pointlessly clinging to righteousness. The young ones drew a line around me, calling me an old monster whose depths they couldn't fathom, and the true old monsters kept their distance, wary of a yellowish serpent with too much cunning in its scales.
That was exactly how I felt now.
I hadn't become one of the shaman world's people like them, but I was no longer some clueless civilian either.
This awkward feeling of being a civilian — sort of, kind of, half-in and half-out of ordinary life.
What the hell even is this, goddamn it?
So I propped my chin in my hands and thought. It had been a long, long time.
This was the expression I used to wear whenever I stared up at the sky, wondering what sons of bitches the immortal realm would throw at me next — and here I was making it again. Nobody could tell that with the corners of my mouth curled up like that, I was actually worrying harder than ever.
My peaceful daily life must not be disturbed.
Should I have actually used the Soul-Bewitching Art?
If I had, I might have had to turn the whole district inside out — but then again, maybe I could have covered my tracks properly. Still, if there was one thing I'd learned in that world, it was that every deed's tail eventually gets stepped on, and if you wanted to avoid that, you'd have to run yourself ragged cleaning up the mess.
Damn if I know. Goddamn it all.
Why should I have to worry over their bullshit? It was practically their fault I was in this mess to begin with.
Right around the time I was thinking that, the doorbell rang. …Goddamn it.
Maybe the fact that I'd learned to react to it with such resigned calm was just another fixed step in fate's script. They call it divine destiny, apparently.
Somewhere along the way, I'd become Pavlov's dog.
So it's here. The thing that was coming.
I looked at the intercom screen.
A woman in a business suit stood there.
"Who is it?"
I'd expected the same old answer about being from the government, but what came back was unexpected.
"This is Yuki, Team Leader of Field Team 4, Korea Shaman Association Gangseo Branch. I've come to discuss the incident from the other day. I mean no hostility, so I would appreciate the chance to talk."
"No thanks. That's what this is about, right? The beatdown."
"……"
"Leave. And take the drinks at the gate with you."
"It will only take a moment."
"I said no."
Ding-dong. The woman — Yuki, that is — pressed the bell again.
"It will only take a moment. Truly, just a moment."
Something about that sounded like she was gritting her teeth.
"I told you no. Fine, then — go grab those drinks outside or something. I ordered them a while back."
"…The ones in front of the gate, you mean?"
"Yes. Those."
I suppose I'd been slipping into casual speech with her. Which, to be clear, was entirely on purpose.
When I opened the door, Yuki obediently carried the pack of drinks inside.
If she hadn't followed orders, I'd have knocked her out cold with a strike to the back of the neck, no questions asked. And then what? She'd probably just go looking for the messenger again. Was there an office romance or not, hmm….
Enough with the pointless thoughts. I sat down on the sofa and gestured at Yuki.
"Put those in the fridge, and then say whatever it is you came to say."
"…Where is the fridge?"
"Over there. Ah — put them in individually. Don't just shove the whole pack in."
Yuki froze for a moment, then silently headed to the fridge and set the cans inside one by one. When she finished, she came back toward me. I was on the sofa, and there was no chair to speak of on the other side.
Her gaze searched the living room for a place to sit for a few seconds. In the end, she stood ramrod straight next to the TV and looked at me.
"I have heard everything from the reports."
"Well, that's why you're here, isn't it? I'd assume so."
"…Who exactly are you?"
"The owner of this house, like I said."
"I know that. I'm asking whether you're someone from this industry, an outsider, or someone we've failed to identify."
"What's our side, exactly?"
Yuki exhaled a deliberate sigh.
"The government's side. To be precise, the Korea Shaman Association."
"Never heard of it."
"Did you come from abroad?"
"From another country, maybe. Or maybe not another country at all."
An otherworld, if it's an otherworld. A foreign dimension, if it's a foreign dimension.
"Actually, no. Maybe not a foreign country."
Think about it — it wasn't China either.
"Then can you state clearly which side you belong to? This matter could turn sensitive. For instance, if your identity remains unclear, you could be classified as a dangerous individual—"
"Does someone who talks this politely look like a dangerous individual to you?"
She pressed her lips into a thin line.
"…No, you don't. That's precisely why I came to resolve this verbally."
"Then you know now, don't you? Think about it — didn't I spare your people's lives and send them back?"
"Ha. Thank you. If you indeed had the power to do such a thing."
"That's right. You should be grateful."
"…How long are you going to keep this up?"
"Keep what up?"
I took a sip of my drink and shot the question back. Truth be told, I lived on these energy drinks. Since I didn't really need sleep anyway, the caffeine served no real purpose — it just tasted good. At least I wouldn't be dropping dead of a caffeine overdose anytime soon.
…Right? Probably not.
"Fine. I tried to be sparing with the details since listing everything one by one seemed tedious, but it seems I have no choice. You gauged the cursed energy stored in our cursed tools. You scanned the area casually and pinpointed the beast's location. And above all — you neutralized our agents."
"So what?"
"…Each one on its own is suspicious, and the last one especially so."
"The world is hu~gely wide, you know. Truly, hu~gely. Defeat is nothing to be ashamed of — it's just the natural order of things. Those bastards who claim they've never lost a fight? One hundred percent bullshit, every last one of them."
She sighed again, this time very pointedly.
The sight was oddly funny, but I didn't laugh.
Yes, I know. I'm talking in circles.
But here's the thing — a person who looks like a sucker gets used. That's just how people are. I had no idea how far these bastards' reach extended, but one thing was certain: look like a soft mark, and you get devoured.
I'd been tormented to my dying breath by the orthodox sects and the demonic sects, by those absolutely batshit lunatics — their coaxing, their threats, their endless goddamn nonsense — so I knew this game better than anyone.
You're wondering why they warned me off and disdained me back then, instead of just leaving me be? Well, they did both. They schemed to win me over because they were wary of me. If they brought me to their side, they could handle me with less of a headache.
The infuriating ones were those bastards — so why did I end up in that wretched position? Thinking about it now just makes my blood boil.
"If your identity remains unclear, you can be classified as a dangerous individual."
"And what happens if I'm classified?"
"…You may become a surveillance target."
"And after surveillance?"
"Depending on the circumstances, a compulsory investigation may be conducted."
A compulsory investigation.
A compulsory investigation, huh… that sounds a little scary, actually.
"Geez, if you were going to say that, you should have led with it. I need to know whether you're threatening me right now or politely requesting my identity before I can answer, don't I?"
"……"
"Anything else to say?"
"…Ha."
"If not, get out. I have things to do now."
Yuki said nothing. She wasn't deaf, last I checked.
I rose from the sofa, energy drink can still in hand.
In that other world, teeming with every species of human garbage imaginable, scenes like this were utterly commonplace.
The most frequent variety went like this: you killed a few demonic sect bastards, and they immediately dispatched some obscenely powerful executive to interrogate you out of nowhere. Why was one of their Qiankun Pouches hanging from my belt, you ask?
Well, funny story. It just happened to be there — attached to a corpse that had trespassed into my eastern courtyard.
"…I will come again."
That obscenely powerful executive had said something remarkably similar.
Exactly: "I shall call upon you again. Should a similar misfortune occur." Word for word, that.
Of course, similar and identical are two different things. Back then I'd seen him off with perfect satisfaction, but now… hard to say.
Damn it all.
I was living quite a distance from my house. About a week now?
An hour by subway.
The timeline probably started the day after the association woman's visit.
The whole time, something kept nagging at me — had I turned off the storage room light when I left? …Going back now felt like a bit much, though. I'd thrown my weight around as if I owned the place, but I wasn't the landlord. I was the tenant.
Anyway, this neighborhood was a busy commercial district, so there was plenty to look at.
Lots of pop-up stores, lots of people.
I was sipping coffee at a café near the department store, scrolling through my phone, when I sensed someone glancing my way. One look told me they weren't women checking me out for my number — not that I'd have minded. Call me what you will, but I've had my share of that sort of attention.
Truthfully, I couldn't pinpoint any single watcher. There were about four sets of eyes on me.
Fine, a department store isn't the kind of place where suits stand out — but I didn't know they'd all dress up in crisp suits just to tail someone. Crazy bastards!
Eventually, one of the men who'd been studying me intently walked over.
"Crowded, isn't it?"
I glanced up at him. Bleached-yellow hair, a face stretched into an easy grin. One look said slick.
"Sure is."
"It's a weekday, so it's not usually this busy."
"Could be."
"You said it was crowded just now, though."
"Crowded or not crowded — depends how you count."
"Hmm."
The man sat down across from me with a smile, and simultaneously made a small gesture beneath the table. A thin sound-muffling ward. Crude, but it looked like it kept the conversation from leaking to the next seat over. The craftsmanship was actually rather impressive.
I turned my volume up. The sound from my Bluetooth earphones grew louder.
"So, uh — why did you leave your house? From what we've seen, you'd been living around there for about a week."
"You're well informed. The air's just been stuffy lately."
"Stuffy how?"
"Someone seemed to be watching me. Went to a psychiatrist and they said early-stage schizophrenia, can you believe it…."
I never actually went, of course — and no clinic diagnoses schizophrenia on a first visit anyway.
"Ah, that must be suffocating. Bugs, probably. Wiretaps, that sort of thing. Inside my ear there's a wiretap."
"Could be. Could not be."
"You don't seem to have a job either? Must be rough, stuck inside all day."
"Job hunting's hard too, honestly. My mental health."
"What's wrong with it?"
"My daily life's been disrupted these past few weeks. Wait, no. Quite a lot?"
"Ahem."
Yellow-hair took a sip of the coffee he'd brought, then motioned behind him. Three suits came marching over toward me all at once. Each looked unremarkable enough, but the woman among them — the most polished of the bunch — stood out.
Yuki.
Team Leader of Field Team 4, was it?
Ah, these creepy bastards. So they can at least trace me to this location. The genre did grow up in twenty-first-century modernity, after all — the righteous sects had techniques like this in spades. Divination arts, soul-tracking, the works….
"Let's get to the point, just the point. That, uh… Jin Hyun-ssi? Pretty name."
A single-character given name. Jin Hyun. I'd thought it unusual since I was a child, but I never dreamed it would suit the righteous sects too. There's such a thing as heaven's mandate. Was that name given to me by heaven's will — chosen to fit the righteous path?
Then this interrogation I'm sitting through… don't tell me that's heaven's will too?
Yellow-hair leafed through his documents, then looked at me.
"Our read is that you left home because something about that place was weighing on you. So let's keep this simple. You — are you a beast? A ghost? A spirit creature?"
"You read the files pretty well — isn't that the kind of thing that only shows up in humans?"
"Then are you a shaman?"
"Not a shaman."
"Then what?"
"A person. I told you."
"……"
Yellow-hair turned more pages.
"Just come in for an investigation. Just the investigation."
"Pretty sure that's already happening."
"What I mean is… somewhere with fewer people, where you'd also undergo testing and could prove your innocence, and—"
Bzzt.
Bzzzzt.
A vibration rang out from somewhere on the table. Following the sound, it was Yuki's pocket. Nothing indecent about the pocket — a trouser pocket.
How long was she going to ignore it? Even as we all stared holes into her, not a single reaction.
"That table's going to collapse at this rate. From the vibration."
Only after I gestured did she hum low in her throat and hurriedly fish the phone from her pocket.
"……"
Yellow-hair looked away again and pressed on with the interrogation.
"How did you know about the cursed energy? You seemed to know a thing or two about cursed tools as well."
"One look told me everything. Speaking of which — even thinking back now, that thing was shoddily made."
"You seem quite knowledgeable."
"Wouldn't have butted in if I weren't."
"How did you come to know these things?"
"Studied. Turns out it was useful."
"Where?"
"Somewhere I won't be going back to."
"From whom?"
"Hard to say how many of them are still breathing."
"……"
Yellow-hair clicked his tongue. Apparently finding the conversation going nowhere, he tapped the documents lazily with his finger.
That was when it happened. In the middle of that dead air, with no further exchange between any of us, Yuki slipped her phone back into her pocket.
"Hold on. Wait."
Then she cast a hurried look around.
"…Chaos-grade beast. Alert issued."
Every gaze at the table snapped to her at once.
"A power from… Japan appears to be exerting its influence all the way here. Location — this building. This is an emergency."
Well, isn't everything just going swimmingly.
One by one, the faces of these people who'd been sizing each other up began to harden.