The Knots of Han
This was no simple illusion. Not only the pain of the flesh came through — the pain of the heart did as well. Every moment of it was vivid, as if he had become Kim Soon-hee himself.
BANG!
The instant Kim Soon-hee kicked the door, Kang Hyeong-seok's face twisted with despair. The door would not open.
BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG!
"Somebody help me! Somebody, please! There's someone in heeere!"
Kim Soon-hee screamed until her voice tore, then seized the doorknob. The scorching-hot metal seared itself to her palm, and the stench of her own burning flesh rose into the air — yet she had no room even to feel the pain, shaking the door with everything she had.
"Save me! Please! Pleeease! AAAAAAAAGH!"
'What is this?' A jolt of dissonance struck him. Anyone would fight to survive in a situation like this. But Kim Soon-hee seemed to have some other reason — something more she had to live for.
Then a different image was transmitted into Kang Hyeong-seok's mind.
A shabby lodging house, somewhere between a boarding house and an inn. Kim Soon-hee lay sprawled across the bed like a rag, her voice coming out in a hoarse murmur.
"Boss... I'm pregnant."
Her gaze went to the man perched on the edge of the bed, burning through a cigarette. He was much older than her — old enough that, at a glance, the two of them could have passed for father and daughter.
"I'm pregnant. It's your baby, Boss."
"What?"
Kim Soon-hee flinched and shuddered under the owner's stare, and in the same instant the blanket slipped away, laying bare the scars and bruises printed vividly across her body.
"You bitch. What did you just say?"
"I-It's your child, Boss."
"You go whoring that filthy body of yours around, and now you tell me it's MINE? You fucking bitch."
The owner stubbed out his cigarette in a fit of temper and picked up the ashtray. Then, bringing it down on her forearms and chest without mercy, he shrieked like a demon.
"Bitch! I fucking spoil you a little and now you're trying to shackle me! You fucking bitch!"
THWACK! THUD! THWACK! WHUMP!
"Agh! Aaaagh! Agh!"
"Whose kid is it! Huh? Say it again. WHOSE KID IS IT!"
With a face twisted into abject pleading, Kim Soon-hee grabbed the owner's ankle and clung to it.
"P-Please, spare me. Please, spare me."
"You filthy bitch..."
The owner glared at her belly — then raised his fist. Kim Soon-hee snatched both hands over it and stared back at him, fierce and defiant. Something caught in the owner's chest for an instant; he hoisted the ashtray high, but did not bring it down, and muttered under his breath instead.
"Haah... fuck... ugh!"
He shot Kim Soon-hee one last sidelong look, as if she were something filthy, and walked out of the room. Left alone, Kim Soon-hee wrapped her arms around her belly and shook with sobs. She cried so much, that day.
'Dammit. So that's what this was.'
Other information began pouring into Kang Hyeong-seok's mind as well. That was how he came to know it all. A relationship forced on her, backed by threats to tell her family. Wages that were never properly paid — at home she had her hair torn out over it, and at the factory she had to endure the endless whispering behind cupped hands.
It wasn't that she hadn't tried. But this was the tail end of the twentieth century, when awareness of human rights was nothing like it is today. Even the police had treated Kim Soon-hee as though she were something tainted, and in the end she had to walk out of the station as if fleeing a crime.
Even as his chest clenched tight, aching with empathy for everything that had been done to her, the image shifted back to the warehouse.
FWOOOOSH!
Engulfed in flames that warped her skin, Kim Soon-hee pounded on the door, arms wrapped around her belly.
"Somebody help! Somebody, pleeease!"
And then—
"B-Boss! There's someone in—!"
"Shut up and push! That bitch can't come out!"
Two voices carried in from outside. Kim Soon-hee's hands stopped dead, and the words that followed set fire to Kang Hyeong-seok's fury.
"Manager Ma! Push down harder on that door! That woman's still alive!"
"Boss, I don't think this is right!"
"Manager Ma! You idiot! You know how bad things are at the factory. It's going under either way — unless I collect the fire insurance money, there's no severance to pay anyone. You know that!"
"B-But still — is this, is this something a human being does? There's a person in—"
"One person dying in that fire is what makes the story look right, doesn't it!"
The owner's voice — crueler than the flames — brought Kim Soon-hee's heart crashing down.
"She broke in to steal and started the fire by accident! The factory burned to the ground because of her! Fuck — settle it like that and everything's clean, so what's so hard to understand! Manager Ma, you crippled bastard!"
Madness rang in the owner's voice. Kim Soon-hee had to die — that much was certain. And since she had to die anyway, it was better if her death turned a profit. He truly seemed to believe it.
Kang Hyeong-seok, who had been staring at the door, moved his eyes to Kim Soon-hee.
"Boss! Bo-o-oss!"
Kim Soon-hee must have felt the very emotions coursing through Kang Hyeong-seok — and still she called for the owner, her voice pitiful.
"Save me, pleeease!"
"PUSH! PUSH HARDER! SHE'S NOT DEAD YET!"
"Uuugh... uuughh!"
"Manager Ma! Get your head straight! You bastard!"
Kang Hyeong-seok felt the air strangle in his lungs. Was this something a human being could do?
Then the image he was seeing widened further, until he could see past the door — to Manager Ma and the owner outside. Manager Ma, frozen in terror, was pinning the door shut under a wooden panel. And the owner, gazing up at the factory as the flames reared and spilled out of it, was smiling a grotesque smile.
"Tighter! Push! That woman has to die! She has to die! She HAS to die!"
The owner's face was unmistakably ecstatic — born of the belief that killing Kim Soon-hee would solve everything. With the fire of the factory blazing over that smile, a smile that belonged to nothing human, he looked like a demon.
"AAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
Kim Soon-hee's scream burst out of her, drenched in despair, and Kang Hyeong-seok turned his eyes back to her. Her endless despair felt like his own. Toyed with to the very end and robbed at the last of even her life, a grudge had taken root in Kim Soon-hee's heart.
'So that's why. That's why you became a vengeful spirit.'
Kang Hyeong-seok felt a grief that split his chest open. Engulfed in flames, Kim Soon-hee crumpled to the floor, then carried her hook-clawed hands up to her eyes. Watching her unleash on herself the urge to tear the owner apart, Kang Hyeong-seok felt something that made breathing difficult.
And when Kim Soon-hee moved no more, the image ended.
Cold. Dark. Back in the warehouse as it had always been, everything had even fallen quiet.
Kang Hyeong-seok stared at Kim Soon-hee through eyes brimming with tears, and Kim Soon-hee — who had no eyes — gazed back at him through two hollow sockets.
"I..." Kim Soon-hee's voice rasped out.
"I hate it. All of it."
"...You are not the one who was at fault."
"I hate people."
While she struggled, everyone had turned their backs on her — and pointed fingers besides.
"It wasn't because you were worthless."
"What do you know? What could you possibly know!"
Kang Hyeong-seok reached out. He wrapped his hands around her shoulders — charred black and warped from burning to death — and went further, pulling her into a fierce embrace. Just as when he had held the ghost of the Spitz, no touch reached his palms, but Kang Hyeong-seok did not let go.
"I understand you."
Kang Hyeong-seok said it with everything he meant behind it. It was an act that had no place in the shamanic tradition, but the heart of it — the wish to soothe a spirit — was one and the same.
"Those who commit sins receive heavy punishment through their own karma. Even without you, the victim, lifting a finger, Heaven itself will deliver that punishment."
All sin leads to punishment. Those who drove nails into another's chest with their tongues. Those who harmed others with their hands. Those who set out to wound another's feelings. Those who betrayed, who stole, who took a human life. All of them receive Heaven's punishment.
That punishment does not answer to the laws made by men. And so, though divine punishment appears not to exist at all, it inevitably strikes at the cruelest of moments — when their children marry, when they build a business, when they change jobs — or it falls upon their descendants.
"Let go of your lingering regrets. Do not pile sin upon sin. Cross over, and in the life to come, receive your reward for the suffering you endured in this one."
Do not count this suffering as meaningless. Every moment you lived, every act you committed, carried meaning — and its result would surely follow. However much this moment hurt, the recompense would come, as spring comes after winter. For it was not only punishment that was inevitable. Recompense was just as inevitable.
To Kim Soon-hee, who had not moved an inch, Kang Hyeong-seok spoke, packing each word down carefully so that his sincerity would reach her.
"I will open your road for you."
Kang Hyeong-seok stood just like that for a long while. Then he felt Kim Soon-hee's hands rising up against his back. A spirit's touch, something that could not possibly be felt. And yet Kang Hyeong-seok distinctly felt Kim Soon-hee's hands wringing at his back — and felt her nod.
"Hnngh... hkk... waaaaaah!"
She, too, must have been lonely. Must have been in agony. What Kim Soon-hee had needed most desperately in all the world was someone who understood her. Having finally met, only after death, someone she had never been allowed to meet in life, Kim Soon-hee wept like a small child.
Fwap! Stepping back, Kang Hyeong-seok shook out the hemp cloth in one great sweep.
"Go now, in sorrow. Go now, in sorrow. Untie your knots and go now, in sorrow."
The knots bound into the hemp cloth stood for han — the sorrow and resentment carried through a lifetime. And to untie them required the sincerity of the mudang and the will of a spirit ready to cross over.
"Receive the devotion offered on this day. Untie the han left unfinished in this world, here and now, and through the merit of those who honor you, receive the resolution of your grievance and the chanting of the sutras."
So Kang Hyeong-seok shook the hemp cloth with his whole heart and all his strength, praying for Kim Soon-hee's han to come undone.
"O spirit who departed in the springtime of youth — untie your knot of youth, and go."
Snick. The knot nearest the wrist came loose — the first of Kim Soon-hee's han had been untied.
"O spirit who left your parents behind — untie the knot of the unfilial child, and go."
Snick. Then the second knot came undone as well.
"O spirit who left your brothers and sisters behind — untie your knot of sibling love, and go."
Kang Hyeong-seok kept shaking the hemp cloth in great sweeps, carrying the knot-untying onward. The knot-untying was an act of guidance — guiding a spirit who lingered on the earth, held fast by unfinished attachments, up into heaven. Kang Hyeong-seok cleared the road; Kim Soon-hee walked it. And so the rite could only be worked through communion between the mudang and the spirit.
"O spirit who left with your life still unlived — untie your knot of lingering regret, and go."
Nothing went wrong in the process. Strangely enough, each time Kang Hyeong-seok shook the cloth, the knots slipped loose one after another, as if someone had been waiting all along for the chance to let them go. Perhaps Kim Soon-hee had spent all this time waiting for someone like Kang Hyeong-seok to appear.
"O spirit who met a sudden, violent death before your time — untie the knot of the masterless dead, and go."
To answer that heart, Kang Hyeong-seok gave the knot-untying everything he had. And with every knot that came undone, the energy pressing down upon the warehouse grew ever fainter. At the same time, even the demon vultures began to blur.
'Go in peace. Leave not one attachment, not one thread of han behind. I will untie even that final han for you.'
Snick. When the last knot came undone, Kang Hyeong-seok raised the mudang bang-ul — the sacred shaman bells — his eyes still closed.
"As you go to the Land of Supreme Bliss, offer the dharma's sacred gifts, receive the guidance of the Eight Great Bodhisattvas, mount high the prajna dragon boat, and as you cross the great sea of birth and death, receive the prayers of Jijang Bodhisattva and pass into the Land of Supreme Bliss."
May every road you walk be gentle and at peace.
With the knot-untying complete, Kang Hyeong-seok slowly opened his eyes. Then he let his arms sink down — one hand still holding the sacred shaman bells, the other the hemp cloth with every knot undone. In the pitch-black warehouse, no other presence remained to be felt.
DUM-DUM-DUM-DUM-DUM-DUM-DUM!
The beopsa who had been driving the drum at a blistering pace brought his sticks to a halt. Cheong-geum, in the middle of her gut to press down the sal, froze where she stood.
"Hah... hah..."
Cheong-geum let out the breath she had been holding, then shook her head at the beopsa. He gave her an uncomprehending look and lowered his drumsticks, and she likewise gathered up the many-colored flags in her hands.
"Are you taking a rest, ma'am?"
At his question, Cheong-geum shook her sweat-soaked face.
"No. It's finished — all of it."
The sal she had been pressing down was gone. The vengeful spirit's han had been untied.