Chapter 36
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 36
Chapter Title: Monster Tale Specialist Office: The Centipede's Child (16)
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Okbun couldn't bring herself to answer Hanseol's question.
She knew it in her head. She had to affirm it, even if it tore her heart apart.
But she still couldn't say it.
In that instant, a sharp sting pierced the back of her hand.
It was the centipede. The tip of its antenna had jabbed Okbun's hand.
The centipede was telling her to stop now.
"No, I can't stop."
It was Okbun's final wish. It had to be her final wish. But the centipede expressed its refusal once more. It was the first time since they had set off on their journey together.
"Why? Why are you against it!"
The centipede conveyed that they should stop exchanging words that hurt each other. And that if there was a way for those people to keep Okbun from vanishing, they should accept their help.
Kiriik, kiririk—
"Even so… even so…!"
When Okbun had said she would vanish together with it, the centipede had actually hated the idea. It didn't want Okbun to disappear.
But since what Okbun wanted was for Hanseol to thrive, the centipede hadn't opposed it.
But now, another way had emerged.
A way for Okbun to live.
If Hanseol was the one Okbun wanted to see surpass her, then to the centipede, Okbun was that existence.
Even if it meant dying itself, or becoming something worse than dead, the centipede could accept it.
Okbun realized that now.
"God…."
Hanseol approached Okbun, who had her head bowed, and crouched down beside her.
"Sister. I want to live with you."
"…Is that so."
Okbun spoke in a tone half-resigned. Hanseol nodded.
"Yes. No matter what kind of life I live from now on, I want you watching over me. If I go out into the world without you, it won't feel as fun as before. I won't be happy."
Okbun didn't reply and simply stroked Hanseol's hair.
"I didn't know about the centipede's existence, but you and it have lived together for so long, haven't you?"
Hanseol was still afraid of the centipede. But seeing her sister embrace it tightly, she understood. They were indispensable to each other—not forced together, but choosing to be for one another's sake.
And the one who had wedged between them was Hanseol.
"Was I just holding you back, Sister?"
Okbun shook her head at Hanseol's question.
"No, you weren't."
"But if I hadn't been there, you could've traveled much longer."
That was true. Even so, Okbun shook her head.
"That was my choice. Ending the journey was my will."
"Then not going out into the world was my choice and my will. Coming back here was my will too."
Okbun fell silent at Hanseol's words. After a moment's silence, she asked,
"Suppose, just suppose."
It was practically a declaration of surrender as Okbun posed her final question.
"If I have to die here in the end, what will you do?"
"I won't leave this place either. Even if it means being alone."
Okbun met Hanseol's eyes. A faint blue glimmer flickered in them. The eyes she had once sealed were opening again. Okbun clicked her tongue.
"Before coming here, I asked those two. What would happen if I went out into the world."
It was Hanseol's first question about her future.
"Taeju said there were two options. Go to high school with support and then become independent, or work and live with those two in the same place. Those two paths."
"And what did you decide?"
Okbun asked Hanseol, already guessing her answer to some extent.
"I didn't know back then. What answer I should give. But now I think I do. If I choose to go to a normal high school, it would be hard for us to meet again."
"So in the end, you'll walk the same path as them."
Living entangled with the mysterious is dangerous. Once you're flung into this side, you can never return to a normal life.
"There'll be a lot of danger. You might even die. It won't be easy."
"I know. But it's the only way."
Okbun finally accepted Hanseol's choice. Instead, she turned to Taeju.
"Hanseol's request was to save me."
"Yes, that's right."
Taeju answered plainly. Okbun asked again.
"Then is there a way?"
At Okbun's skeptical question, Taeju nodded.
"There is a way. But you'll have to suffer quite a bit. For starters, you'll have to abandon those bodies."
Okbun spoke with an unwilling expression.
"You're talking about transferring the soul somewhere else."
Perhaps because she had lived so long, Okbun quickly grasped what Taeju meant. It certainly wasn't dying.
"You're using a dangerous method."
A soul bound to an object won't vanish until the object does. But conversely, if the object disappears, so does what's bound to it.
"You're saying you'll hold the leash, literally."
"We'll make the leash, but Hanseol will be the one holding it. If she threatens you, just obey her cutely."
"You could threaten Hanseol to control us."
Okbun said it unenthusiastically.
"There's that possibility, but why worry about it when you've already done far more dangerous things?"
Taeju chided her.
At the end of that dangerous act, the centipede's body had been torn apart.
Ultimately at a loss for words, Okbun shut her mouth.
The centipede rubbed against Okbun as if to say it was fine.
"So, assuming you give us someplace to inhabit, what happens to Hanseol after that?"
"She'll need training first. To communicate with you, she'll have to learn a lot. If she wants, we'll send her to school too."
Working with the mysterious doesn't mean you can't go to school. But if they did send her, it'd have to be the same grade and class as Woli.
Figuring the Director would handle that much, Taeju stood there with a shameless face.
"I'm worried the child will suffer."
"We'll help, so it'll be fine. Might be tiring at first, though."
Okbun knew that handling objects inhabited by souls required great effort. And since it was an object housing a once-mighty god, even decayed, it would be all the more difficult.
"Why go this far to help us?"
To Okbun, who wouldn't let go of her suspicions until the end, Taeju answered honestly.
"We're short-staffed."
In the end, they pulled an all-nighter again. Dawn was about to break soon.
"Having one more person would help a lot. She seems talented, so she'll be useful in no time."
The Director had probably brought Hanseol here with that in mind from the start.
It was certain, given how he'd prepared the third floor for four people to live there.
"Of course, it might take a while. To freely release you from inside, amateur skills won't cut it. But if she wants it, we'll help to the end."
Okbun clenched her fist tightly. Hanseol probably couldn't live a normal life anymore. The centipede's legs wrapped around that fist. Just like the day Okbun had first cried, the centipede enveloped her.
"It'll be tough. But you'll do it, right?"
Woli asked Hanseol. Hanseol nodded.
"It's the only way for all three of us to be together."
Taeju, who had been listening, nodded.
"But how do you make a soul inhabit an object?"
Woli asked Taeju.
Implanting a soul was difficult—even someone who knew how to separate it from the body had to prepare for a long time and could still fail.
It happened naturally often enough, but artificially recreating it was hard.
"Well, it's always been tricky. Normally, we wouldn't even attempt it. Binding a soul to something requires waiting ages. But this time, we've got the perfect object ready."
Souls don't inhabit just any object. It needs history built up, meaning beyond mere utility, for something to take root.
But this time, they didn't need to invest that long anew. There was one thing the centipede and Okbun had always kept together, never leaving it behind.
"The hairpin."
Okbun pulled the hairpin from her hair. Her locks cascaded down. With her long hair unbound, she held the hairpin and gazed at it for a moment.
"Lend it to Hanseol for now."
Okbun handed the hairpin to Hanseol.
Hanseol took it, staring blankly, unsure what to do.
Taeju said to the two before him,
"Now you need to enter it. Abandon your current bodies."
"You make it sound easy."
Human souls easily inhabit dolls, and malevolent spirits settle into grotesque masks. Matching the form makes it easier, they say.
Conversely, the farther from human shape, the harder for a human soul to settle.
"Normally, we'd shape it to make inhabiting easier. But no choice here. You'll have to tough it out."
"Hmph. Just do your part well."
Taeju picked up a dry twig and lit it with a lighter. He told Hanseol to hold the twig together with the hairpin.
It would guide them as ethereal bodies.
Incense was ideal, but without it, this would substitute.
As the flame kindled, the centipede's ethereal form began fading first.
It dissolved slowly from the severed base upward, then floated away like dust.
"Go on ahead. We'll follow soon."
Shortly after, Okbun too started turning transparent.
"We might not meet for a while."
Okbun gazed at Hanseol as she spoke. Hanseol smiled and replied,
"We'll meet soon. I promise."
"Heh, then I'd better get used to it quickly."
I'll be waiting. With those final words, Okbun vanished too. Both were gone as if they'd never existed in this world.
The revolting slime on the sign Woli held had also disappeared entirely. The only trace left was the stump where it had been severed.
Hanseol looked at the hairpin, her sister's remnant, and said,
"I asked about this before. I hated that you had one and I didn't."
Hanseol gripped the hairpin tightly. Then she looked up at Taeju.
"Sister said it's something a married woman wears her hair up with."
"Because that's what hairpins are for."
A faint warmth emanated from Hanseol's tightly clenched hand. Whether from her body heat or the hairpin itself, she couldn't tell.
"They're definitely in here, right?"
"Yeah."
The centipede and Okbun were inside.
They were probably asleep now. Just as it would take Hanseol time to master releasing them, they needed time to adapt to their new form.
Hanseol was smiling, but tears welled in her eyes.
Taeju debated comforting her but held back. The smile and tears didn't seem like a bad thing.
"Kids, look at the sky."
At Taeju's words, Hanseol wiped her tears and looked up.
It felt like a crack splitting open.
Fissures spiderwebbed through empty air. The sky was crumbling. Yet still, no sound came. Overwhelmed by an indescribable crunching sensation, the three stared.
"Man, for a space made to kill one person, it's awfully grand."
Taeju watched the world collapse in awe.
The moon split in two, stars plummeted. What had happened here would now be as if it never was.
"Pretty…"
Woli murmured.
Knowing they'd get dizzy if they kept staring, the three still gazed upward.
In the distance, the sun began to rise, and from the mountains came birdsong, the chirp of insects.