Aftermath of the Formless Shadow (1)

Whoosh. Whoosh. I swung the goblin club several times. The sudden weight of my enlarged breasts made the motion awkward as hell, but that wasn’t the important part.

It didn’t make the thwack sound.

Why wasn’t it triggering? Was the ability not tied to the goblin club itself, but to the ‘goblin’ entity that once wielded it? Which meant the shadow I’d destroyed was a yokai capable of stealing not just forms, but the very powers that came with them.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized how terrifyingly close I’d come to dying. If I hadn’t clawed my way back from death and awakened as that blond delinquent, this place would have become my grave. And that unconscious blond Taoist master beside me would have joined me in it, nice and cozy.

“Uuuuugh…”

Ah. Right on cue, Hojun was waking up.

He blinked blearily, scanning the area before his gaze finally settled on me.

“Did you get it?”

“Yeah. I got it.”

“...Figures.”

Hojun pushed himself off the ground, brushed the dust from his clothes with a few sharp snaps, then stared at me. After a moment, he nodded like he’d pieced something together.

“Your tails increased. From six to seven.”

“Yeah, well…”

“And your chest got bigger.”

“No it didn’t.”

I played innocent. Sure, they had grown, just like he said, but not that dramatically.

“Bullshit. They got fucking dynamic.”

“...”

Okay, fine. Maybe they had grown more than I realized.

“At this size, they’ve gotta be at least an I-cup…”

“Will you shut up?”

I really didn’t need that information. His stare was getting uncomfortable enough that I considered switching back to my two-tailed kid form, but I stayed put. In this seven-tailed state I didn’t give off any yokai energy, and I needed to keep it that way.

Yeah. Right now, in this seven-tailed body, I had zero yokai energy. Just what kind of ridiculous physiology was this? One extra tail and suddenly I had spiritual power and a chest that could knock someone out. I still had no idea what kind of yokai I actually was.

Hojun kept throwing out dirty comments about how much lewder my body had become, but anyone could see he was just talking to hide whatever negative feelings were churning inside him. It was almost pitiful.

Eventually he lowered his head and spoke in a quiet voice.

“Thank you.”

“It’s nothing, really…”

It felt heavy. I never expected someone who treated everything like a joke to thank me with such dead-serious sincerity.

“How’s your body? Need any treatment?”

“I’m fine. Just passed out like an idiot. So… what the hell is that thing?”

“Oh, this?”

I had no reason to hide anything from him.

“It looks like a goblin club.”

I told him everything. What the yokai’s true identity was. How I’d managed to destroy it. What powers the goblin-shaped yokai had used.

Hojun listened carefully, then spoke.

“Goblins… they were real creatures?”

“Didn’t you already have a rough idea?”

“Sure, but it clearly wasn’t a yokai.”

“Just so you know, this club is mine now. I caught it, so I keep it.”

“...Yeah. You ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠caught it. I couldn’t do a damn thing.”

Whoa. Why was he being so negative?

He wore a hollow expression as he continued.

“In the end I was nothing but dead weight. Couldn’t do anything at all.”

“The opponent was just that bad.”

“No. It’s because my training was lacking. The reincarnation of Jeon Woochi… that title was way too much for someone like me.”

He fell silent for a moment, thinking hard, then clenched his fist.

“I’m going to study everything about goblins. I’ll dig through every book in the Taoist Association if I have to.”

His words caught me off guard.

“The Taoist Association has information on goblins?”

“It does. I just never bothered reading it because it wasn’t necessary.”

“...”

“I have a feeling it’s going to be necessary from now on.”

An unexpected windfall. Or maybe the perfect opportunity. I was the one who saved his life. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to ask for a reward, right?

I went straight to the point.

“Take me to the Taoist Association.”

“Don’t talk crap.”

“...”

Shot down in one sentence.

“You have no idea how stubborn those old bastards in the Taoist Association are. You want me to vouch for a fox like you in front of them?”

“...”

“Don’t get any ideas, fox. No matter how much you shake those fancy tits, I’m not falling for it.”

“I never shook them, you crazy bastard!”

“You did. I saw it.”

I didn’t shake them, you son of a bitch.

“Still…”

“...?”

“I’ll at least put in a recommendation.”

“R-really?”

“Yeah. The old men aren’t completely inflexible. It’ll take time to convince them, but… they’ll probably come around eventually.”

“...”

“What? Got a problem with that?”

“No problem, I just don’t get it. I’m a yokai. You’re human.”

I hadn’t actually expected him to accept. He was human. I was a fox yokai. The two weren’t supposed to coexist…

“There you go again with the nonsense. Can’t shake those canine habits, huh?”

“Huh?”

“Where exactly do you see a yokai when you look at yourself?”

He pointed straight at me.

“You’re not a yokai. You’re a spiritual beast.”

“?”

Come again?

The fox yokai—no, the fox spiritual beast—had already left.

Typical of those high-and-mighty types who only move after everything’s over. Soon this place would be swarming with humans. If Miho stayed here, it would only cause trouble for both of us.

Obviously, Hojun decided to leave the fox spiritual beast completely out of his report. Just in case, from the moment he first encountered her he had secretly used Taoist arts to alter all the nearby CCTV footage. There was no chance of anyone tracing it back to him.

‘...To think she was a spiritual beast.’

Spiritual beast. He had read about them in the Taoist Association’s ancient texts.

A spiritual beast was both yokai and not yokai. Unlike regular yokai, they were friendly toward humans. Instead of the malicious energy of yokai, they radiated sacred spiritual power. In some ways they were even rarer than goblins, which was why the Association’s books didn’t go into much detail.

One thing was certain. In the old days, when the King of Yuldo and the Taoist Uchi joined forces to hunt goblins, there had been one spiritual beast assisting the king. A tiger-shaped spiritual beast named Sangun.

My beloved home. My hometown.

As I flew toward Jirisan, I sank deep into thought.

A spiritual beast. What evidence did Hojun have to call me that with such absolute certainty? There hadn’t been a trace of doubt in his eyes, so he probably wasn’t lying.

…It was true. If I was using spiritual power instead of yokai energy, I could no longer be called a yokai.

I tried to figure out when and how I had evolved from yokai to spiritual beast, but no matter how hard I thought about it, the reason wouldn’t come.

Confusing. So confusing. Who am I? Where am I?

Oh, right. I’m in the sky. Riding the geunduun that Hojun summoned with his Taoist arts on the way to Jirisan. Carrying this massive goblin club on a train seemed like a terrible idea even to me, so I asked him to summon something like a flying cloud and he actually did it.

…Whatever. I’m too tired to think about my body right now. I must have pushed myself too hard. What I need more than anything is rest.

I need a cool sprinkler. I need chewy dog gum. I need a bowl of dog food to fill my stomach. I need those female officials and Lee Ha-neul to ruffle my hair like crazy.

Ahhh. I just want to roll over on the office lawn and expose my belly.