Chapter 81
Chapter 81
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 81
Chapter Title: Evil Ghost Baek Dong-su (10)
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"Dong-su's dead, isn't he? Wasn't his funeral the day before yesterday?"
"Yes, that's right. And that dead Dong-su has come back as a real evil spirit."
"What kind of nonsense is that?"
Manager Kim launched into a long explanation in response to Kotul's scolding.
"Before we left, we gathered at the Seoul office, got in the car, and headed down. Just as you said, we assigned three reliable guys to watch over your sister-in-law. We made it down without any issues."
"Then?"
"Right after we got off the highway onto the national road. A dump truck and a big cargo truck came at the car we were in."
"Came at the car?"
Kotul spotted the car Manager Kim had arrived in.
"It looks fine."
"Yes, it is. They drove right over our car, but it wasn't even dented, and no one was hurt. We thought we'd been lucky."
"What are you talking about? And then?"
"Here's the thing. Eight guys got out of the dump truck and the cargo truck, dragged us out while we were dazed from the crash, and forced us to our knees."
"What?"
"Then they said, 'By five o'clock tomorrow afternoon, go to the hospital where Magwi is admitted and make Kotul apologize to him.' And all eight of them were Dong-su."
Kotul was dumbfounded by Manager Kim's lengthy, absurd story.
"To me? Why? What did I do to make me apologize to Magwi? Dong-su the evil spirit is dead anyway."
'Was that thing I saw last night really Dong-su?'
Listening to Manager Kim, Kotul started to think that what he'd seen the night before might indeed have been Dong-su.
"Yes, evil spirit Dong-su is dead. That's why he's come back as a real vengeful ghost—no, an evil spirit."
"No, but why is he after me? What the hell did I do?"
"He said he'd appeared to you three times yesterday and spoken to you, but you didn't get the message. If you don't do as he says, your dreams will become reality."
"Dreams come true? Evil spirit Dong-su spoke to me three times?"
Only then did it click for Kotul.
He recalled the woman in the next car as he passed, the hulking head in the compact car, and the words the man stabbing the woman had directed at him.
'Was that what they were saying? Apologize?'
Manager Kim's words were utterly unrealistic, but after experiencing unbelievable things all day yesterday, Kotul couldn't dismiss them.
Still, he couldn't show that he believed such irrational nonsense.
"Shut up! Are you spouting bullshit? Hey, Song! Let's head back to Seoul."
He yelled, but the unease didn't fade.
The group arrived at Kotul's house in Seoul as the sun set.
Kotul kept only the three men guarding the house and sent the rest back.
His young, beautiful wife was safe inside.
She had a slender figure and attractive tanned skin.
He'd always complained that she didn't have pale skin, but Kotul saw it differently.
Sensing the unusual tension, his wife asked,
"What happened? Your call this morning, your clothes... And why are your employees outside?"
Kotul ignored his wife's questions about what was going on, checked every corner of the house, and only then sat on the sofa to collect himself.
'I don't know what's going on either, you nagging wife. Can't tell you anything. Guess I'll shower first.'
His head was spinning; he wanted to shower and hit the sack early.
He'd spent the night wide awake in the bushes, so he was exhausted.
When Kotul came out of the shower, his young wife followed him around, asking,
"What's going on with you?"
His unusual behavior must have seemed strange.
He couldn't tell his wife what he'd seen.
He lay in bed, pulling the covers up to his head, and tried to sleep.
It was early summer, but the early morning chill lingered.
Feeling an unnatural cold, Kotul woke up.
The blanket was gone.
He looked beside him—his wife wasn't covered either.
'Where's the blanket? Did I kick it off? No way...'
Kotul and his wife didn't have restless sleeping habits.
He turned on the bedside lamp to look for the blanket, and his gaze fell on his young wife.
She was a beautiful woman in her mid-twenties, twenty-five years younger than him.
Unlike usual, she was sleeping naked.
Her turned body looked incredibly alluring.
Dazzlingly white skin, slim waist, long straight legs—a perfect figure.
As Kotul reached out to stroke her waist, he froze.
'White skin? My wife's got tanned skin... Who is this?'
It definitely wasn't his wife.
Kotul extended his hand to the back-turned woman's head and carefully turned her face toward him.
He tried his utmost not to wake her.
Crack.
Even so, as he gently turned her, a grinding bone sound came from her neck, and her head spun 180 degrees.
"Argh!"
Kotul recoiled in shock.
As he pulled back, the woman's head stuck firmly to his hand and yanked free from her neck with a pop.
"Argh! The, the head?!"
"What's wrong with my head?"
The head stuck to both of Kotul's hands spoke.
Where eyes should have been, there were only holes, and her lips seemed bitten off, exposing bloody gums.
Even severed from the body, it spoke.
"Ugh, argh!"
Kotul desperately tried to pry the head off his hands, but it wouldn't budge.
"Baek Dong-su said to tell you to apologize to Magwi by five o'clock today. If you miss the time, everything you've experienced so far will become reality."
Against his will, the arms holding the woman's head bent inward at the joints, pulling it closer.
From her lipless mouth, breath blew onto Kotul's face as she said,
"Don't forget. Five o'clock this afternoon."
With that, the woman's head dissolved into bloody water and fell from Kotul's hands.
Kotul jolted up from the bed and backed away in horror. The headless body turned to bloody water, soaking the bed in gore.
Kotul bolted from the room and searched for his wife.
In the dark living room, he heard sobbing.
It came from the bathroom.
He cautiously opened the bathroom door. In the windowless room, with no light on, his wife was crying quietly.
Thankfully, though her hair was disheveled, she was unharmed.
She said a strange woman had woken her while she slept, grabbed her by the hair, dragged her to the bathroom, and shoved her in. Terrified, she hadn't dared come out and had been sobbing in fear.
Kotul was furious, seeing red.
"That blind bitch living with Dong-su in Gwanghwamun—grab her right now! Ghost or evil spirit, I don't care. That bastard Dong-su! I'm not letting him get away with this. Bring her here now!"
In his agitation, Kotul called Manager Kim, who he'd woken, and ordered him to capture Seol-mi.
—Is Dong-su's wife in Gwanghwamun? Did Dong-su get married?
"That's what the ghouls said. Look into it. Bring her here now!"
'Let's see what you do when I have your blind bitch...'
* * *
As morning broke, Kotul Kim Hyung-il headed to his office in Yeoksam-dong.
The building, which housed a room salon in the basement, was his. Normally, he didn't go in on Saturdays or Sundays unless it was urgent.
He'd planned to make the upper floors a motel, but with crackdowns on prostitution lately, he rented them out as offices and used only the top floor, the 10th, for his own office.
Manager Kim and Woo-song were already there when he arrived, skipping breakfast.
It was past 10 a.m.
"Boss, you're here? Did you have breakfast?"
Manager Kim bowed deeply in greeting.
"Food's the last thing on my mind right now. Did you send the guys? Make sure their mouths are shut tight?"
He fired questions at Manager Kim mid-greeting.
"I told Jeong-ho to take them, but why are we grabbing the blind woman?"
Jeong-ho was Manager Kim's right-hand man.
Frustrated by the question, Woo-song cut in.
"Insurance, right? Hostage. Against that evil spirit Dong-su bastard?"
In his haste, Kotul snapped at Woo-song.
"Ah! Shut up. Keep their mouths shut! In the 21st century, talking ghosts makes us look like idiots. You've seen it yourselves, so you're fine."
Bowing repeatedly, Manager Kim said anxiously,
"Got it. But there's a problem."
"What?"
Kotul asked irritably, and Manager Kim replied quietly.
"Magwi Bang Il-seok is dead."
"What? When? Why tell me now?!"
Bang Il-seok's death, the boss of the Magwi faction, meant he'd failed to fulfill evil spirit Dong-su's demand to apologize to him.
"I just heard a bit ago. Seems like it was just after 9 a.m."
"Damn it all! Now I can't even apologize to Magwi. Why's that evil spirit Dong-su screwing with me? It wasn't me. I didn't set up Il-seok and Dong-su. Doesn't the ghost know that? Fine, grab that blind bitch for sure and see what happens."
Sitting on the sofa, puffing cigarette smoke nonstop, Kotul muttered.
Manager Kim approached, leaning in to ask,
"Wasn't it you who set it up, boss?"
"No! Idiot, did I do it without you knowing?"
As Kotul denied it vehemently, Manager Kim asked again.
"Then that Dong-su ghost doesn't even know who killed him and is coming after us?"
"Exactly! The ghost's got it all wrong."
Manager Kim's face grew even more anxious at Kotul's troubled response.
"He won't show up before five, right?"
"How should I know? Call the guys in Gwanghwamun. If they can't bring the blind bitch, find a shaman somewhere."
"A shaman? Boss, if it's a shaman, I know a good one."
"What? You know a shaman? Who? Is she powerful?"
"Yes! Very. You've seen him before, boss. The Taoist who did the office blessing. They say he's the best at chasing ghosts."
"A shaman who gets possessed chases ghosts? Doesn't he do rituals to appease them?"
"He does rituals too, but he says he's not a shaman, he's a Taoist. The young master from Gyeryong Mountain? Anyway, he banishes minor spirits in a flash. Want to see him?"
A man came to Kotul's mind from Manager Kim's words.
A young guy with a slow Chunchon dialect, looking very kind.
"How do you know him? Seen him bust ghosts?"
"My wife got him from her fortune-teller. I saw him exorcise a jibakryeong at my in-laws' rural home. He's amazing."
"Alright, send guys to bring him now. Shaman, ghostbuster—get anyone!"
Kotul was certain evil spirit Dong-su would come after five o'clock today, so he needed all the help he could get.