Footprints in the Rice Flour
Bzzt!
The message had come in at two in the afternoon. Thanks to it, Kang Hyeong-seok found himself rubbing the sleep from his eyes as he picked up his phone.
"What now?"
The sender was Shin Jeong-ah. It was not the kind of message anyone should be sending at this hour.
Tap, tap-tap, tap.
Bzzt!
Kang Hyeong-seok sucked in his lower lip and let a heavy sigh escape through his nose. The hunch that something had started up again — that much, at least, was surely not just his imagination.
"Haaah."
This is my fate. My destiny. My lot in life.
With exactly that sentiment, Kang Hyeong-seok pressed the call button without further delay.
"Yes, Manager."
"Ahaha, sorry for bothering you on a day off~."
An awkward laugh paired with an awkward tone made for an altogether awkward mood.
"Is something the matter?" Having already resigned himself to the likelihood that something had indeed happened, Kang Hyeong-seok asked evenly, and Shin Jeong-ah hesitated a moment before going on.
"Well, the thing is... um, how about we grab a quick cup of coffee? My treat!"
"If there's something you need to say, please just say it. You wouldn't be calling unless something had happened, wouldn't you?"
"Eep."
"Is it serious?"
"Well... yeah. See, it's not actually my problem — it's a friend of mine's..."
'So that's what this is — a friend's trouble.'
She was thinking she had no shame, calling like this. That was why her voice kept burrowing into the ground.
Wearing a look of understanding, Kang Hyeong-seok switched the phone to his other hand.
"What happened?"
"Here's the thing. A friend of mine just opened her own office, and she says a ghost keeps showing up there. She stayed the night once and woke up with sleep paralysis. There were even footprints pressed into the glutinous rice flour she'd scattered across the floor."
"So precautions were taken in advance?"
He'd tossed out the quip to match her words, which came pouring out as briskly as a mountain stream, but the answer that came back was from left field.
"Yeah. Actually, I was the one who sprinkled the rice flour before I left."
"Mmm."
Shin Jeong-ah even seemed to be imitating the exorcist's mannerisms she'd only ever picked up by watching over someone's shoulder.
'Footprints in the rice flour...'
Brow drawn tight, Kang Hyeong-seok pressed his lips firmly together. His thoughts were piling up.
Rice flour held the power to ward off unclean things. A mere stray ghost would never dare come near it — so if Shin Jeong-ah's story was true, then whatever this was, it was no half-hearted stray spirit.
"I'm sorry. It's your day off and all..."
"No. It's fine."
"Whew... hoooh."
A sigh burst out of her without warning, and a long silence flowed past.
"You know, it's just... now that I've actually said it all out loud, I feel like I'm being awfully shameless."
Kang Hyeong-seok cracked a small smile, and Shin Jeong-ah went on in a gentler tone.
"I'll just stop by a shrine close by and pick up a talisman. That's easier on you too, isn't it?"
"Don't do that."
He stopped her on reflex.
"Huh? Why?"
"Have you forgotten? Back when you moved into that apartment."
"...Ah."
Only now did Shin Jeong-ah seem to recall what she had just proposed. When she'd moved into that apartment, she and Kang Hyeong-seok had been through sights neither of them could unsee. It had all started with a strange talisman — scribbled by a shaman who served a deity known as Heoju — pasted onto the bathroom window. Her home had turned into a den of stray spirits back then, and she had no wish to live through any of it a second time.
"But, Manager Kang, you..."
"I'll go take a casual look myself first. If it turns out to be nothing serious, I'll introduce you to a reputable shaman."
"Really? You'd do that for me?"
"Yes. That much is no trouble at all."
"Thank you, Manager Kang! And about that friend of mine — she's someone worth having in your corner, you know. She runs her own law office."
Kang Hyeong-seok's eyes widened, caught off guard.
"Oh — is that so?"
"Yep! Not a bad arrangement, right? The shamanic expert gives counsel to the legal expert, and if anything ever happens to the shamanic expert down the road, the legal expert gives counsel right back."
Still holding the phone to his ear, Kang Hyeong-seok drummed his fingers against the back of it. Not bad at all. If everything he had done as an employee of Daejeong Mulsan had been trade between companies, this felt like a deal struck between Kang Hyeong-seok and another human being. And with a legal professional on the other side of it, the contact struck him as a remarkably fine one to have.
"That does sound good. And I'm not just saying that — I mean it."
"Oh? Do you have any legal matters you need advice on?"
"Nothing of the sort. But it never hurts for people in the shamanic trade to be on good terms with people in the legal world."
"...You're not planning something weird, are you?"
Suspicion was seeping out of Shin Jeong-ah's voice, as if she half believed he was plotting something genuinely strange.
"Things like a kut rite, or trespassing on private property."
Those were the things that always caused trouble. A ritual would get cut short midway, and in the worst case he would find himself summoned to a police station, where he'd be asked things like, "And why would a person of your standing be doing such a thing in the middle of the night?" Having a lawyer in tow at moments like those — nothing was more reassuring.
"Well, perfect. I'll make the introduction properly, so do me this one favor."
Kang Hyeong-seok huffed a small laugh and nodded.
"Understood. Where should I be headed?"
"I'll grab a taxi and head over your way! Don't bother bringing the car out — we can just ride together."
"Understood."
Beep.
Call ended, Kang Hyeong-seok began hurriedly pulling on his clothes.
"This is the place."
Following Shin Jeong-ah's lead, Kang Hyeong-seok arrived at the law office and spent a while gazing up at the building. It stood on a commercial street with a residential quarter pressed right up against its back, other offices and hospitals crowding the vicinity — as locations went, it could hardly have been better situated.
Which was exactly what he couldn't understand.
The living are yang energy; wandering spirits belong to yin. A district this full of people ought to be brimming with yang — so why on earth would something sinister be showing itself here?
"Do you feel anything?"
Shin Jeong-ah asked carefully, and Kang Hyeong-seok shook his head, shifting his gaze.
"I don't see anything. But something does seem to be here."
Shin Jeong-ah's face clouded over as if the matter were her own. Seeing her like this, you could tell just how much this friend meant to her.
"She's a close friend of yours?"
"We go back to high school."
If a bond forged back then had held all the way to the present, then a treasured friend was exactly what she was.
While Kang Hyeong-seok gave a silent nod, a woman came down the stairs from the office building.
"Jeong-ah!"
"Oh...! Um, hey."
Shin Jeong-ah had reflexively started to slip into the easy register of old, then caught herself and answered with polished courtesy — and Lee Ha-yoon, sensing something off in that, turned her wide round eyes on Kang Hyeong-seok.
"Oh, uh, hello. So you two came together, huh."
"A pleasure to meet you. I'm Kang Hyeong-seok."
"Come on in."
One thing was plain: this was a woman who did not believe in ghosts. He could tell as much from Lee Ha-yoon's reaction alone. Kang Hyeong-seok climbed the stairs alongside Shin Jeong-ah and stepped into the office.
"Can I get you something to drink?"
"Three coffees."
Shin Jeong-ah answered for everyone, and Lee Ha-yoon slid an askance glance at her as she switched on the capsule coffee machine.
In the meantime, Kang Hyeong-seok settled onto the sofa and let his eyes wander over the office. Clink. A cup of coffee was set down in front of him, and Lee Ha-yoon took the seat across from him, her gaze a blend of disbelief and hope.
"So, um... I did hear the explanation and all."
"Yes."
"You're Jeong-ah's junior from work, she said..."
Lifting his coffee cup, Kang Hyeong-seok gave a small dip of the head — conveying both his assent and his thanks for the coffee. Lee Ha-yoon angled her knitted brow toward Shin Jeong-ah, and Kang Hyeong-seok spoke first.
"I heard you signed the lease knowing the place had a ghost."
"Oh — did you?"
"In the taxi, on the way here. And that the sleep paralysis happened this morning."
"Th-that's right..."
The reason Lee Ha-yoon spoke like this was less distrust of Kang Hyeong-seok than doubt of herself. Was what she had seen really a ghost? Could it not have been just an ordinary dream? And the footprints — what if she or Shin Jeong-ah had left them herself and simply forgotten? Such questions packed her head so full that she was starting to feel genuinely confused.
"I'll need to see it for myself before I can say anything for certain."
"But, um, well — I heard you can even see ghosts. Is that actually true?"
"Hey!"
Shin Jeong-ah's voice cracked out like a whip, but Lee Ha-yoon only wore the look of someone wondering what she'd said wrong.
"It's quite all right, Manager."
"See that? He's brushing you off."
With a short smile and a nod, Kang Hyeong-seok met Lee Ha-yoon's eyes.
"Wherever you saw the ghost — I doubt it was here."
"Oh. Okay."
Just as Lee Ha-yoon was thinking, There's no way he heard even that, Kang Hyeong-seok swept his gaze around the office and pointed at the section curtained off behind a partition.
"That room over there — am I right?"
In an instant, Lee Ha-yoon's face went stiff. It was the spot she had hidden away as thoroughly as she could manage with partitions and potted plants — hidden so well that no stranger could ever have found it.
"No — how could you possibly—"
"Would it be all right if I took a quick look?"
"Ah — yes. Yes, of course."
Lee Ha-yoon rose in a daze, and Shin Jeong-ah, rising with her, jabbed an elbow into her side. Go on, watch him. This unnie brought someone you can actually trust. That was the look in Shin Jeong-ah's eyes.
Swooosh.
Having moved behind the partition, Kang Hyeong-seok laid his palm flat against the door. Then, with eyes gone taut and focused, he glared at it — all while Lee Ha-yoon and Shin Jeong-ah looked on.
Sssswoooosh.
As his hand drifted across the door as if stroking it, Lee Ha-yoon's face steadily hardened into a question mark.
'What is he doing? He's not even opening the door.'
It wasn't as if Kang Hyeong-seok couldn't guess her thoughts. But right now, this was the correct approach. This was a spirit that excelled at hiding. He had to close in slowly, provoking it as little as possible.
Having confirmed the presence inside from just beyond the door, he pursed his lips and blew a faint whistle.
"Fweeeeeee."
It was the very moment Lee Ha-yoon's brows bent into an even deeper puzzle.
Having pinpointed the thing's exact location with a minor rite, Kang Hyeong-seok flung the door open without hesitation.
BANG!
Lee Ha-yoon's and Shin Jeong-ah's eyes snapped to the room in the same instant — and found nothing there. At least, nothing their eyes could see.
"Huh. Looks like there's nothing?"
It was the moment Shin Jeong-ah, who had been through scenes like this a few times before, tried to step into the room. Kang Hyeong-seok threw out a hand to stop her, his face grave.
"Manager, please stay outside."
"...Why?"
Thinking something must be in there, Shin Jeong-ah pressed him, and Kang Hyeong-seok shook his head.
"You must not go in."
Shin Jeong-ah was constitutionally vulnerable to ghosts. She could see the things others were spared from seeing, and the effects ran through her that much deeper. Hers was a body that even possession could take easily. Which was precisely why she could not set foot in that room.
"Wh-what's in there?"
Perhaps more frightened by the gravity in the air than by anything else, Lee Ha-yoon asked in a trembling voice, and Kang Hyeong-seok's gaze rose to the ceiling.
"Yes. There's something here."
Clamped to the ceiling like a spider was a spirit. Long black hair spilled down from it — and the head it grew from was not attached to any neck, but cradled in one of its own hands. The head had rotted a deep, pitchy black, its eye sockets and lips shriveled inward, the joints of its arms and legs twisted and snapped the wrong way around. And it looked, for all the world, as if the thing were waiting for someone to step inside.
Never taking his eyes off the spirit, Kang Hyeong-seok drew out the Mudang Bang-ul — the Sacred Shaman Bells.