Bunny Girl Heading for the Summit (4)
Once upon a time, a mother and her two young children lived happily together.
The mother would cross the mountain to work in the village beyond.
That day, as she left for work, she said to her children,
“Kids, what did Mommy tell you?”
“Lock the door tight and never open it for just anyone.”
“That’s right. Mommy will be back soon.”
That day.
As the sun set.
The mother was crossing the mountain with the rice cakes she had received as wages.
But what should appear blocking the path ahead but a tiger?
The tiger roared and said,
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you!”
“Eek! H-here, take it. Please, just spare my life…”
Trembling, the mother tossed him one rice cake.
The tiger ate it with relish and went on his way.
But as she walked on,
the tiger appeared again and blocked her path.
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you!”
And again after that.
And again after that.
The tiger kept appearing, blocking the mother’s way.
Before long, not a single rice cake remained in her arms.
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you!”
“W-what do I do? I don’t have any rice cakes left…”
“Then I’ll have to eat your arm!”
In place of a rice cake, the mother gave the tiger one of her arms.
When she met the tiger again, she gave the other arm.
After giving up both legs one by one, the mother met the tiger once more.
“Now I’ll have to eat you.”
The tiger swallowed the mother whole.
Then he stole her clothes and set off toward the two children.
Beneath a chilly new moon,
Han Yeseo climbed the mountain path.
Her steps were painfully slow.
She clung to the hiking trail railing as if it were a lifeline, checking several times before she dared set her foot down for even a single step.
It was beyond her control.
On this new-moon night, she could barely see an inch ahead on the mountain, so she had no choice but to press on while tears kept threatening to spill.
And every time she took one step,
another step followed right behind her—and said this:
—Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.
“Ah, earlier… you already took one. I just gave it to you, so why…”
—Is that sooo? That must have been a different tiger.
It was, of course, a blatant lie.
Where else in the world would you find another tiger that demanded rice cakes from humans?
Why was the voice exactly the same as before, and why could she still hear that snickering kirrk—kirr-rrrk?
It had been following her from the very start.
It hadn’t even bothered to hide the fact that it was trailing her.
It had even driven off other beasts.
Yeseo simply could not understand why it was telling such a lie.
But anomalies were never things one could fully understand.
They were creatures that fed on that very anguish and fear, and delighted in it.
—Come on now. Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.
“I’ll give it. I’ll give it, so please don’t eat me.”
—Delicious. Awoong.
The Sun and the Moon was a traditional Korean folktale known far and wide.
Even if you didn’t know the exact title, everyone had heard the line “Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you” at least once.
Han Yeseo roughly knew the story as well.
That tiger would never let her go.
Just as the tiger in the tale had eaten the mother,
it would never be satisfied until it had put her in its mouth and swallowed her whole.
No—the real problem came after that.
In the story, the tiger disguised itself as the mother and went after the children.
There was no reason this monster wouldn’t do the same.
Would her parents be able to handle a tiger wearing Han Yeseo’s face?
Parents who could barely even get angry at their useless daughter?
That single worry was the only thing holding Han Yeseo’s legs in place.
Her body wanted to collapse from terror—yet, paradoxically, a different terror kept her upright.
—Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.
And so Han Yeseo kept walking.
She had no idea whether she was heading toward the summit or toward death.
The only unchanging fact was that she continued to walk.
Unfortunately, Yeseo’s path lay closer to the far shore than the near one.
Closer to death than life, closer to despair than hope.
It had nothing to do with how hard she tried.
—Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.
This urban legend was a story whose ending was already fixed.
Follow the path the legend laid out and you would inevitably meet death at the end.
There was a reason the world needed hunters.
If you wanted to make a different choice inside an anomaly’s domain, you needed power.
In a world where even Awakened died like flies,
the lives of powerless, innocent ordinary people like Yeseo were weightless.
And now that weightless life seemed to have lost even its paperweight.
—Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.
Only… one left now.
Until now Yeseo had been throwing chocolate bars instead of rice cakes.
The chocolate bars the cultist ajumma had stolen, to be exact.
If it hadn’t been for that ajumma, would she have survived?
It felt like a meaningless what-if.
If not for the ajumma she never would have left the Seonangdang in the first place.
The thought that she had already been as good as murdered kept circling through her mind.
She wanted to blame something—anything.
She wanted to wail and scream and demand why this was happening to her.
The world tormented her this much, so why was there no helping hand anywhere?
In the end Yeseo stopped walking.
She looked up, but she couldn’t even tell how much farther the summit was.
Death seemed to have finally caught up with her.
The tiger said,
—Give me a rice cake and…
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.”
—?
No. She had been about to speak.
But another voice had beaten her to it.
A voice so beautiful that, without thinking, she found herself thinking it was pretty.
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.”
—?
The tiger that had been walking ahead of me whipped its head around.
An expression that clearly said, Why are you the one saying that?
It looked full of questions, but didn’t it have something more urgent to deal with first?
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.”
—???
“If you don’t give it, I’ll eat you?”
Looking thoroughly bewildered, the tiger handed me a rice cake.
Or rather, a crumpled chocolate bar still in its wrapper.
A truly wise decision.
Anomalies that deal with humans usually give three chances.
Whether it came from the time-honored Korean tradition of best-of-three or from some other religious or shamanic origin, I wasn’t sure,
but anomalies that conversed and asked questions generally offered three opportunities.
The same restriction had probably been placed on me after I hijacked the anomaly’s method.
So instead of killing the tiger, I tossed the chocolate bar to Miss Yeseo.
“Uh… thank you?”
“Just keep moving for now. I’ll follow from behind.”
As I’ve said again and again, urban legends are phenomena built on rules.
If the fundamental premise of those rules isn’t upheld, the legend cannot exist.
And rules apply equally to everyone.
Think of it as a kind of passageway.
Between human and anomaly there always exists a single virtual corridor.
To affect each other, both sides must cross that corridor.
But what if the corridor is a hole too small for even a human head to fit through?
The anomaly can slip through freely, while an ordinary person cannot.
Of course, if the human side is an Awakened with abilities like mist-form or liquid-form, the story changes.
The important point is that this corridor of rules is open to both sides.
It’s simply made difficult for humans to use.
The corridor itself must always remain open.
That’s why a stunt like this is possible.
—Give me a rice ca…
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.”
—……
This thing was an anomaly based on The Sun and the Moon.
Just as the tiger had chased the mother who carried rice cakes, it had been chasing Han Yeseo who carried chocolate bars.
If you reduce it to a condition, it would be something like “follow a target who possesses multiple food items.”
But now you have a chocolate bar too, don’t you?
And just like you did, I’m following you, aren’t I?
Right now I was doing exactly what the tiger had done.
The only unknown for me was “how long do I wait before shaking you down?”
But the tiger would measure that timing for me.
If you intend to kill someone, you have to be prepared to die yourself.
Those who rise by rules shall fall by rules.
How does a taste of your own medicine feel, you rotten anomaly bastard?
—Give me a ri…
“Give me a rice cake and I won’t eat you.”
—……Grrrrrrr.
Every time the tiger tried to shake Yeseo down, I hijacked it in a flash and reverse-robbed the chocolate bar it held.
Having lost the food war, the tiger finally bared its fangs at me.
Right. There was one prerequisite to this rule.
In the fairy tale, the mother had no means of resisting the tiger.
In short, the tiger could eat the mother, but the reverse was impossible.
If the tiger overpowered me by force, the rule I had created would collapse.
But…
“You think that’s going to work?”
—Kying, kiiiiiing! Kying…
“The chocolate bar was tasty, so I’ll let it slide this once. Hurry up and stick close in front.”
The tiger with a broken front leg limped along behind Yeseo.
And I stuck right behind the tiger.
Earlier I’d seen this thing drive off other anomalies.
It had probably been warning them not to touch its prey.
Dealing with every random monster is a pain, so let’s just keep going like this.
From now on, your name is Mogihyang.