A Cult of Fanatics
"Bullshit."
Wolryeong spat the word the moment she heard that the evil spirit who had cursed her was a Suicide Ghost—and that it was one of her own blood.
"Wha... what? How can you use such vulgar language, sister?"
The elderly gentleman, struck full in the face by the curse, answered with a smile still fixed on his lips.
"Drop the kindly-old-man act, gramps. You're just spouting nonsense so I'll become an exorcist."
"Nonsense? Everything I saw in you, Miss Wolryeong, is the truth....."
He fussed with his necktie, straining to keep the smile in place. Whether it was genuine warmth or a carefully painted lie, Wolryeong could not tell; she only kept her arms crossed and her tone sharp.
"Mom didn't kill herself. My sister's still alive. Dad tried, yeah, but..... he's still breathing. Still."
She dropped onto one of the long church pews as she spoke. Dust rose from the ancient wood and settled lightly on the legs of her sweatpants.
The old man looked at her with quiet pity, then went down on one knee and brushed the dust from her pants.
"So who the hell turned into a Suicide Ghost, then? Don't fuck with me....."
Tears slid down Wolryeong's cheeks. One drop, then another, until they gathered in a small pool on the floor.
"Don't... fuck with me. My family never... never did anything like....."
"You've been through a great deal, sister. Cry as much as you need. When you've calmed a little, we will speak again."
He drew a handkerchief from the breast pocket of his suit and gently wiped her tears, still kneeling, never once rising.
"Hey, Yoon Wolryeong—so? Have you made up your mind for good—"
Ino burst through the church doors, voice bright and careless.
".....Oh."
The old man lifted a finger to his lips without a word. Quiet.
Startled, Ino approached so carefully that even her footsteps and breathing vanished. She laid a hand on Wolryeong's shoulder.
"Hey, Yoon Wolryeong... why are you crying? What happened....."
Wolryeong raised her head at the touch. Bloodshot eyes found the two of them.
".....It hurts. Hurts like fucking hell. It's starting again."
The pain had returned—the curse that tore her body apart, that set every nerve on fire. The curse her own blood had supposedly laid upon her.
"Ugh—aaargh...!!!"
She screamed and collapsed to the dusty floor, thrashing. Dust coated her from head to toe.
Neither of them had ever seen the curse actually take hold. Both froze in shock.
"W-what do we do, Legion?"
Ino looked from Wolryeong—clutching her own arms, writhing—to the old man.
"There should be painkillers in the basement. I'll fetch them. Watch over her a moment."
The gentleman called Legion sprinted toward the stairs behind the pulpit.
"What did this to you, Yoon Wolryeong....."
Wolryeong's fingers dug into Ino's forearm as if begging for salvation, tears streaming, body convulsing. Blood welled from the broken skin, yet Ino only held her tighter.
"Just a little longer. Hang on."
Ino's own eyes began to redden. Her golden irises, wet with unshed tears, stayed fixed on Wolryeong for a long time.
"All I could find were ordinary over-the-counter painkillers. Forgive me."
The narcotic-grade painkillers the prison had forced into her whenever the curse flared were far stronger than these. Wolryeong swallowed a handful anyway and clung to the last scraps of her reason, arms wrapped tight around her still-burning body.
"Better than... nothing... ugh."
She lay on the dusty pew while Ino draped a worn blanket over her.
"We'll be outside. Rest easy. Yell if you need us."
Legion and Ino left with worried glances, stepping out into the night.
".....So what exactly is her curse?"
Ino brushed dead leaves off a bench and sat. Legion gazed up at the crescent moon.
"The Curse of the Suicide Ghost. And a blood-bound one at that."
His face was heavy as he drew a cigarette from his suit pocket and lit it.
"Still haven't quit, huh? For a self-proclaimed pastor."
Ino lit one of her own, needling him lightly. Two thin streams of smoke rose and briefly veiled the moon.
"A family member becoming a Suicide Ghost... no wonder she's in agony."
"Indeed. And a Suicide Ghost's curse is one we cannot lift."
A Suicide Ghost—born only from the dead who chose their own end while carrying a hatred so deep it dwarfed ordinary evil spirits. Because that resentment was so absolute, almost no third party could ever break the curse.
"Poor kid..... Is there really nothing we can do for her?"
"First we put her to work as an exorcist and gather every scrap of information we can about the Suicide Ghost that cursed her."
Their cigarettes burned down to black ash that the wind scattered. Then the church door creaked open and Wolryeong stepped out.
"Um..... hey."
Ino jumped, spun around, flicked her cigarette away, and rushed to her.
"You okay? Does it still hurt? Can you walk?"
She fretted over Wolryeong's body with anxious hands. The contact felt awkward, yet being fretted over wasn't entirely unpleasant.
"Ah, still hurts, but... better than before. I can handle it."
She could handle it—partly because the pain had lessened, partly because she had simply grown used to it.
"What did you wish to say, Miss Wolryeong? Speak freely."
Legion approached, trailing the sharp, old-fashioned reek of the cheap cigarettes only elderly men seemed to smoke. Both women wrinkled their noses at once.
"I, uh....."
Wolryeong covered her nose with one hand, hesitating, clearly unsure whether she should even ask.
"What is it that troubles you so? A question, perhaps? Or a request?"
"Or maybe you want to become an exorcist... something like that?"
Ino's transparent guess made Wolryeong laugh despite herself, and the tension eased a fraction.
".....I'm hungry."
After all that buildup, the answer hung in the air. Only the rustle of leaves filled the silence.
Ino broke it first, smiling with a touch of disappointment.
"Seriously? Way to kill the mood."
Wolryeong's face went scarlet; she stammered out a defense.
"N-no, I mean... I've only eaten prison food forever... and now I'm outside, so I just... wanted something, anything....."
Both of them burst out laughing. When the laughter finally died, Legion opened the church door again.
"There's a kitchen downstairs. Let us eat while we talk."
"Hey, is 'Ino' your real name?"
Wolryeong asked around a mouthful of oversized handmade burger, words half-muffled.
"Finish chewing first, idiot. Why do you even ask?"
Ino lifted her spoon over a neatly arranged Korean meal, the opposite of Wolryeong's greasy burger.
Wolryeong swallowed and pressed on.
"It just sounds weird. Is your last name Lee and first name No? And is Legion Grandpa's real name actually Legion?"
She glanced toward the kitchen corner where Legion was sweating through the cleanup.
"Your name's pretty weird too, you know."
"What's wrong with Yoon Wolryeong? My mom gave it to me."
She took a defiant sip of the cola Ino had bought from the convenience store earlier. Ino picked at her side dishes, thinking, She really is making it obvious how long it's been since she had fast food.
"You still haven't answered. Are those your real names or not?"
Ino set her spoon down; the entire meal had already vanished.
"It's a long story."
"Tell me anyway."
Wolryeong didn't stop her from snatching the cola either, only waited.
".....Ino. From the Japanese word for wild boar—Inoshishi."
Ino sighed and gave in.
"Wait, your name means wild boar? And why Japanese?"
Instead of answering, Ino pointed at the half-eaten burger.
"Huh? Oh... yeah, go ahead."
"Thanks."
Wolryeong watched, astonished, as the tiny, thin girl finished the rest of the burger in moments.
"I'm Japanese. And Ino isn't my real name."
Wolryeong fell silent, thinking, then asked again.
"Wait—so Legion Grandpa too?"
Ino only nodded. Wolryeong's face twisted with confusion as she tried to force the pieces together.
"But why call yourselves that at all? Do exorcists use codenames or something?"
Legion finished cleaning and walked over still wearing his apron.
".....We no longer remember our true names."
Ino, having drained the last of the cola, added quietly,
"Our names..... are the names of the demons that cursed us."
Wolryeong's ordinary sense of the world could not accept it. Or rather, she refused to. It sounded like a bad joke no one would ever take seriously.
"So you're saying you took the names of the demons that cursed you as aliases. And you don't remember your real ones."
"That is so."
"Exactly."
Their answers came together just as the empty cola bottle clattered to the floor.
".....What a fucking cult of fanatics."
Ino smiled at the words.
"Let me introduce myself properly this time. I'm Ino—cursed by the Great Demon of Gluttony."