The Vengeful Ghost
Watching the old man's face turn to ash, Seoryeong burst out laughing.
"Ahaha! If I'd had my way, I'd have secretly called for the servant boy and split this household's hidden treasure down the middle with him. Tsk. But the moment I laid eyes on your daughter-in-law, that halo blazing behind her back was simply too much to ignore."
Doom-doom!Tak! A final drumbeat rang out, and the music faded. The con was over.
"Ugh, damn it! Better to get on the good side of a woman destined to be the mother of someone great than to hoard a little money. That's why I've come all this way to offer you some special advice."
Seoryeong rapped her knuckles against the treasure chest with a tang!
"You think splitting this in half would even amount to anything? I'm not a greedy person, which is why I'm giving you the whole thing. Do you even realize how lucky you are?"
"Oh my, well then! Thank you kindly! Thank you kindly!"
A person truly without greed wouldn't dream of putting a single ring on ten fingers. Seoryeong hollered, grumbling all the while.
"Somebody bring me my flower shoes!!!"
Before anyone knew it, Strange Tales' first episode was drawing to a close.
Having wrung the old man dry of his fortune, Seoryeong appeared in glittering silks, seeing him off at the gate.
"Might I receive my lady's farewell? I wish to bask a little longer in the aura of your virtuous spirit."
The Seoryeong who had once spat out coarse talk like some good-for-nothing ruffian was now observing courtesies with impeccable grace.
Beaming with pride at the daughter-in-law who had finally won everyone's recognition, the old woman laughed and shouted at her to hurry up and go already.
The two of them walked together down a deserted road.
"My lord, I fear the flower shoes do not fit your feet properly. If it pleases you, why not stay a few days? A great market is soon to open, and I shall have a new pair made that fits you perfectly."
"Enough! What's there to want in this backwater? Besides, I won't be the one wearing those shoes, so never mind. They'll fit her feet just right. I can't see a single good thing about the woman, but what can you do?"
For all her chatter about new shoes, what Seoryeong actually wore was a plain pair of straw sandals.
"If it weren't for me, she'd be trudging around in shoes falling apart at the seams. Ugh, but she'll only nag me again, saying I wasted money at the market when I didn't need to…."
What Seoryeong wanted was not flower shoes of her own. It was Jeong-an's.
"I… I must thank you, my lord. Truly."
Back to the arrogant swagger of moments ago, yet the lady bowed low and offered her gratitude all the same.
She had been a strange, insufferable creature — but to her, she was nothing short of a savior.
"There is nothing to thank."
But when Seoryeong turned back, her eyes held an odd, chilling stillness as they fixed on the lady. She was utterly unreadable.
The lady's own steps froze in place as she met that gaze. Something in it pressed down on her, overwhelming and inescapable.
"There is no child coming to you. That part was a lie."
What followed was more than enough to shatter her. It amounted to a confession that everything had been a fraud.
And yet — why, then…? To the lady standing frozen in a daze, Seoryeong spoke.
"My promise to save your life, however, I kept."
The low voice sank into her ears like a blade.
"You've just crossed one threshold of death. Can you still not see that?"
In a voice cold enough to freeze her where she stood, Seoryeong pinned the woman in place.
"That path you take to the temple every single day — treacherous as it is — your husband kept ordering you to go alone, didn't he? Telling you that bringing the servants along would dilute the sincerity of your devotion to the Buddha?"
Not a trace of humor remained on Seoryeong's face as she went on.
"That man intends to take a concubine soon. A jealous one, and grasping to boot — to eyes like hers, a gentle woman such as you will look no better than a thorn. The servants will flatter her, she'll want to be treated as the true mistress of the house, and in one stroke she'll brew something vicious enough to cut your breath short."
Carving mercilessly into the lady's heart, Seoryeong no longer wore the face of the mischievous boy who'd been laughing in the market earlier. Her gaze, as if it pierced through all creation, was frighteningly sharp.
"Your husband has been desperate to cast you out of the house ever since he decided you were of no use to him. Where, in all of that, do you imagine your survival lies?"
At the fork between life and death, it was Seoryeong who had barely, narrowly held the lady back.
Before the woman who had collapsed to the ground, Seoryeong took her place like a deliverer.
"Listen carefully to every word I say from this moment. Convert everything in the household into things that are easy to carry and worth a fortune. Sell the silks and buy gold rings — that's what I mean."
Seoryeong rose, one hand braced on her knee. In the lady's eyes, that small, slight frame looked as vast as a savior.
"That house has run through its fortune. Soon nothing will be left of it at all."
With the burning year carried on her back, Seoryeong stood in the backlight and blazed like living flame, as though she possessed some uncanny power.
"You may have no luck with children, but your luck with people is beyond abundance. You'll live well. When you leave that house, take good care of the maids who were around you today. As if they were your own flesh and blood."
Seoryeong took the lady's palm in her hands and drew a blade along its lifeline. Crimson blood filled a small gourd.
The lady's every desire, exactly as she held it in that moment, flowed into the vessel.
Her fury toward her husband, her resentment toward her father-in-law, and yet her sense of duty that she must care for the servants like family, the relief of knowing she had never once been wrong, and her fragile hopes for the life ahead — the blood brimmed steadily, filling the gourd to its lip.
Beneath a warm sky where the sun was slowly beginning to sink, Jeong-an wrote her will with a calm, composed face.
The will was far too short.
Though the time they had shared had been anything but.
Whoo—
Even the way she blew on the paper once, to dry the ink, seemed so transcendent that one would never guess she stood before death itself.
As if she had known this moment was coming all along.
Jeong-an folded the paper slowly, careful not to make even the faintest rustle, and set it atop the small legged tray.
Tteok—
Then she stepped out of the old shack. An unnatural wind shook the leaves on the trees as though driven mad.
Jeong-an closed her eyes for a moment and breathed. Then, slowly, she made her way behind the shack.
There sat a single bowl of water, set out by Jeong-an's own hand.
The sky was so clear — and yet, inside the white bowl, small ripples rose and trembled, as though something were dripping down onto it from above.
The trees crowding around the shack loomed dark and heavy. Jeong-an parted her lips slowly, murmuring.
"Cheonsang cheongmyeong — the heavens turn clear and bright, sahae muhyeong — the four seas lose all form…."
Ssaaaaa…. The leaves that had been battering against one another like things possessed gradually fell still.
"I cast your death-bringing malice upon the wind, and scatter it to nothing."
The camera found Jeong-an standing alone in the open air. Such a small, humble nun.
Her frail body was straining to hold back something invisible.
"Baegun cheongwang — white clouds, heaven's own light, jeokya musang — the still night knows no form. I return your evil to the void, leaving not even a shadow behind."
From far away came the clear chime of a wind bell.
"Cheonhwa bunji — heaven's fire burns it, jisu tangji — earth's water washes it away, yeongpung yeolji — the spirit wind tears it apart, heogong gwiji — the void receives it home…"kkeureok.
Chanting the spell that would burn with heaven's fire, cleanse with earth's water, split apart with the wind of eternity, and return all to the void — Jeong-an coughed, and blood poured out of her.
Dark red blood streamed down from between her teeth.
And still her voice — quiet, tender — did not break off.
"Salgi muhyeong — the killing air takes no form… kkeureok! …Sanyeom musil — the wicked mind has no substance!"
Each syllable pressed out with all her strength. Then, without warning, Jeong-an — who had stood so straight and upright — crumpled to her knees.
Her gray habit, old but always kept clean, was stained through with dirt. In Jeong-an's panting eyes, clear tears gathered.
The sky was bleeding into a tender shade of vermilion.
Ddallang— ddallang— ddallang….
Unlike in the opening, the sound of the bell was no longer menacing. It rang out as though announcing a peace of some kind, mingled with the chime of the wind bell.
Ddallang! Ddallang-ddallang-ddallang-ddallang!
The instant the mad clatter of bells rang out, the camera slid sideways. In a space without a single thread of light, radiating a dread stillness, Yeomga sat.
Slapping the desk with both hands in gleeful abandon, Yeomga hurled her curse.
"Jimae mangnyang — demons and goblins of every ilk! Baegwi sujong — a hundred ghosts follow at your heel, chilsal gabjung — seven deaths sealed in the box, hyeolin bunhyang — burn incense over the blood seal!"
Her eyes were fixed on the empty air.
As if she were watching something there.
Even as she flung her curse, Yeomga hammered down at the desk in a wild rhythm, as if to smash it to pieces.
Ddallang-ddallang-ddallang-ddallang!!!
With the bells ringing out of their minds, the screen cut to Seoryeong sprinting up a mountain path.
Wearing the face of a child frantic to deliver the flower shoes to Jeong-an in time, Seoryeong knew nothing at all.
"Palgwae hosin — the eight trigrams guard the body, sabang jin — the four directions hold fast… kkeureok! Keoeok…!"
Jeong-an, rolling across the ground, wanted to protect every last thing in this world.
"Sindeung bulgo — the gods turn their lamps away, honbul nangwi — the soul cannot find its way home!"
Yeomga, hammering at the desk, wanted to shatter every last thing in it.
Ddallang-ddallang-ddallang!
In the world of Seoryeong, running alone up the blue mountain path, there was only Jeong-an, and nothing else.
"Cheonbeol bulgeup — heaven's punishment never reaches! Hihihi! Jihobuljeon — earth's protection never holds!"
Beyond the reach of heaven's judgment, beyond the grasp of earth's shelter, with the gods turning their backs — Yeomga's curse, having forever lost its road home, sliced sharply across the world.
"Man, sa, bul… chim — ten thousand evils shall not touch her… heueu… uk…. Jeol, geom, bul… sang — the falling blade shall only pass her by."
With that final prayer — that no wicked air might ever draw near her, that the blade might only graze and go —
"Kkeureok…. Heueu… eu…."
Jeong-an's life ran out.
While Seoryeong clutched the strap of her bundle tightly in both hands and ran without rest. While Seoryeong, on her way to her, was left alone. Leaving behind a girl for whom Jeong-an had been the whole wide world.
Before she knew it, the vermilion sky had darkened.
The blazing sun sank away into the distance, parting from Jeong-an.
—….
With one last clear toll of the temple plank, the nun drew her final breath — unable, even now, to close her eyes.
"Hihihihihik! Hihihihihik!"
Yeomga hammered at the desk like one possessed. Then she collapsed across it, overjoyed beyond measure, and began clawing at the wood with her fingernails.
Kkiik— kkiik—.
The same sound that had opened Strange Tales — a shrieking scrape that clawed at the world, sharp as knives.
"Hihik…."
As Yeomga slowly lifted her head from the desk, her gaze seized the screen and pierced straight through to the audience.
She was no longer a person. She was something else entirely.
She was a vengeful ghost.
Episode one of Strange Tales had ended.