The Tax Collector
The sound of scraping echoed endlessly across the floor. Scraaape. Scraaaape. It was as if doors had never existed to separate the outside world from the inside—the raw, unfiltered noises from beyond reverberated straight into the house.
“Aaaaaaaaagh.”
“Gaaaaaaaagh.”
Screams like the moans of the damned rising from the deepest pits of hell. The only difference was that these were still living souls.
Jeong Min-hee swallowed hard, her throat dry. Tick. The second hand of the clock moved with cruel indifference. And then—
Creeeeak.
The front door, which had been wide open from the start, swung open even further as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
A massive frame. Its body was covered in crude stitching, as though some entity that had never understood what it meant to be human had haphazardly sewn it together. The wrinkled bald head was grotesquely deformed—too hideous to even call bulldog-like. Except for the stark white crown of its skull, countless eyes, mouths, and noses dotted its entire form, each shaped like the faces of its victims. Chains rattled and wrapped around its torso and one arm, while both hands gripped hooks whose purpose was impossible to guess.
…Both hands?
Jeong Min-hee immediately regretted examining the creature in such detail. Protruding from its neck was a malformed arm resembling a child’s limb, crudely jammed in backward and forward, waving the hook up and down. A long chain extended from a massive iron core embedded in its split-open abdomen, where its organs were fully exposed. If one followed the other end of that chain, which seemed fused to its intestines…
“Ugh, urk.”
She couldn’t hold back the wave of nausea and dry-heaved on the spot. Several human shapes with rolled-back eyes, bleeding from every pore, were being dragged along the floor, leaving wet trails behind them.
[Collecting… the maintenance fee…]
“Fucking hell, you hot mess of a bastard,” Lee Han muttered. His words briefly drowned out the dreary screams.
“I get the retro vibe, but showing off your guts like some see-through fashion trend? That’s a thousand years out of date. Doesn’t that strike you as brain-dead?”
[Target… identified.]
Was it called takeoff? Fresh red blood welled vividly from the boy’s shoulder. A solid red circular pattern.
[Commencing collection…]
“Fuck off. You’re not taking anyone.”
A massive hook spun high above the Tax Collector’s head before shooting straight at I-ryuk in a deadly straight line. Lee Han moved at a speed too fast for the eye to follow, knocking it aside. The deflected hook flew back at a perfect angle and buried itself in the creature’s own neck. In that same instant, Lee Han was already clinging to the monster’s back. The small blade in his hand flashed as he drove it in, ripping out the third arm swinging toward him from the root. Then he yanked hard on the hook embedded in its neck.
“Just go quietly, damn it.”
Spluuuurt.
A fountain of blood dyed Lee Han’s face crimson as the monster’s hideous head flew off.
“…Did we get it?”
The tension drained from his voice with those words, but Lee Han shot me a terrifying glare.
…Why?
[Error detected.]
[All materials in this space have been judged defective.]
Greeeeeaak.
An unidentified mechanical groan rang out.
“You piece of shit…!”
Lee Han was hurled away as the remaining three arms flailed wildly. He smashed into the wall with a thunderous boom, then stood up as if nothing had happened, casually brushing dust from his clothes. Meanwhile, the Tax Collector’s already wide-open abdomen split even further, revealing the true nature of the massive iron core at its center. It was some kind of enormous grinder.
Crunch.Wiiiiiiiiiir.
The Tax Collector extended an arm from behind, roughly yanking the chain and shoving the upper body of one of its chained victims straight into the grinder.
“Guh, guh-guh-guhk.”
A short, final scream was cut off by the whirring of machinery. Then—
[Proceeding with total disposal.]
A new head and arms sprouted in its place.
“Damn it. Yena, take care of the people.”
“Yes, Master.”
Lee Han threw himself straight between the four vicious hands that looked ready to tear him apart. Blood sprayed. Riiiiip. Flesh tore away. The wet plop of falling chunks of meat looked maddeningly unreal.
Come to think of it, everything had started feeling like a dream at some point. Zombies appearing in Seoul… twisted monsters. The metallic stench of blood I’d never smelled in my entire life, and the occult rituals that used it. Blades swinging at the cost of lives, and lives crumbling in response. Choi In-cheol, who had only just died moments ago, had been one of the few people from my real world. Yet he had been devoured by the unreal and perished.
Slaaaash.
Yena sliced a massive chunk of flying flesh in half with the edge of her hand. The blood parted like the Red Sea, not touching a single hair on her head, and sizzled as it melted the floor on both sides. From the split meat, grotesque parasites with unknown teeth writhed and devoured the flesh.
“Oh?”
Yena elegantly drew blood from her fingertips across the fan in her arms. It immediately caught fire. Whoosh. The wings of that flaming fan stirred up waves of fire, incinerating every last writhing, multiplying parasite.
“Master, aim for the parasites inside the flesh! They’re the main bodies controlling the meat!”
Lee Han slid between the monster’s legs and, by some incomprehensible logic, appeared on its shoulder, ripping its neck apart.
“I’ll try!”
I—and the rest of us—were nothing but baggage. Jung Ji-soo, I-ryuk, and I simply stood there watching the scene unfold, protected by Yena.
“It’s no good! The parasites are multiplying too fast!”
“I’ll provide support!”
In the heat of battle, Yena let her guard down for a single moment. And the boy at that age was full of reckless bravado.
“This is my—!”
“Stop!”
The lump of flesh that had been helplessly rolling on the floor, soaking it with acidic blood, suddenly sprang up and latched onto I-ryuk’s body.
“Ugh, this won’t—aaaaagh!”
The sickening smell of burning flesh filled the air as I-ryuk collapsed.
“Kid…!”
My feet froze, but Jung Ji-soo moved faster.
“Get out of the way!!”
At Lee Han’s shout, a shadow fell over I-ryuk and her.
Boom!
“Ah.”
My outstretched hand futilely swept through empty air. Was that sound a sigh of grief… or a sigh of relief that it wasn’t me?
When the thick dust cleared, I saw Jung Ji-soo collapsed with one leg crushed, and I-ryuk struggling in the Tax Collector’s grip, its hand clamped around his head.
“Damn it.”
Lee Han kicked away one of the creature’s twitching legs, where bugs were already crawling out again, and raised his shabby blade.
“Hey, you. Touch that kid and I’ll end you.”
Lee Han growled low. Despite the threat, the Tax Collector slowly dragged I-ryuk toward its dripping, acidic belly.
[Fresh… material.]
“Hey! Hey! You wanna die that badly?”
The moment Lee Han bit his lip hard, the Tax Collector’s movements froze completely. And from between the resonant, choral voices, a single frail one slipped through.
[Material…?]
I-ryuk, whose eyes had been half-closed, slowly opened them at the sudden silence and looked toward the source of the voice. Confusion flashed across his face for a single second—then pure shock.
“M… Mom?”
I-ryuk’s gaze was fixed on the palm of the hand gripping him. Between the sticky bloodstains from battle, a face was embossed like a relief. It looked as if a human body had been molded like clay into the shape of an arm, with only the head forcibly attached.
“Ah, aah. Mom! Mom!!”
I-ryuk’s voice trembled uncontrollably. The victim sacrificed under the name of offering had manifested before us in the flesh.
[S… son?]
“Yes, Mom. It’s me, I-ryuk. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I tried so hard to protect Byeol… I really did…”
As I-ryuk wept, forgetting his own dire situation, one of the Tax Collector’s other arms twitched ominously in the corner. At the same time, Lee Han—who had been wearing a troubled expression—moved like lightning and severed the arm. He was leaping toward the Tax Collector’s swinging arm that still held I-ryuk when—
“No! Don’t! It’s Mom! She’s my mom!”
Lee Han froze for a split second. Everything seemed too late. The Tax Collector would swallow I-ryuk, and the connection we had formed last night would be severed so simply. Maybe he would become fuel for the creature and we would meet again that way…
I squeezed my eyes shut at the horrifying thought.
Thud. Thump-thump. Crunch.
Gwoooooooor.
At the sound that was completely different from what I expected, I cautiously opened my eyes. Far away, I saw Lee Han barely landing while cradling I-ryuk in his arms. And then—
[Error… Part malfunction.]
The hand that had been gripping I-ryuk ignored its main body’s commands and plunged itself into the grotesque belly. Kiiiiiiiing. Creeeeeaak. The sound of that hand ripping the grinder out from inside its stomach was utterly grotesque. Blood leaked from the joint where I-ryuk’s mother’s face was attached to the arm.
“Master! I will burn it! Please…!”
Yena wrapped even greater flames around her fan and tossed a fallen hook toward him.
“Got it! Trust me!”
At the same time, Lee Han dashed forward and caught the hook in his left hand. The blade danced. Reflecting the yellowish glow of the fluorescent lights, it added color to the spurting blood. Clang. Clang. The hooks swung by the Tax Collector’s malformed arms collided with Lee Han’s left-hand hook again and again, scattering sparks and noise.
It was a flash of light. Sparks erupted all over the massive Tax Collector’s body, leaving countless new lines. The moment those fresh cuts began to gush blood—
Fwoooooosh.
“I’m ready!”
Lee Han’s body launched high into the air as a wave of fire engulfed the spot. The blood that had been spurting out evaporated instantly, releasing thick, acrid smoke. Hssssss. The flames licked their way into the wounds. At the same time, a massive quantity of larvae rained down onto the floor. Plop. The sound of shredded flesh burning, losing all shape, and crumbling. In the space once occupied by the Tax Collector’s enormous body, only a pile of burning flesh, crawling larvae, and a single massive grinder with one arm still embedded in it remained.
While Lee Han and Yena dealt with the Tax Collector’s remains, the left arm bearing I-ryuk’s mother’s face finally pulled the grinder free from among the organs. Lee Han must have realized that its regeneration would be blocked for a while after seeing that.
Lee Han, drenched in blood, swept his hair back once and spoke to me with emotionless eyes.
“Are you alright?”
“Yes…”
“Good. Hyeon-a would have been devastated.”
“…”
…Hyeon-a?
With those words, he turned and walked away. Then, without another word, he drove his blade into the maw of the flesh-eating grinder.
Krrrrrrrk. Kiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeek.
With a bizarre, ear-piercing scream, the grinder shattered. Countless larvae, human eyeballs, brains, and other organs poured out from inside.
“Yena, I’ll leave the cleanup to you. I’ll perform the rites for the dead.”
“Yes, Master.”
Lee Han finally covered the pitiful remaining left arm with pure white flames. Strangely, no toothed larvae escaped from within it.
Lee Han stared silently at the sight for a moment, then—
Click.
He tore the necklace from his neck and held it quietly in his hand.
“O Mother of Eternal Flames.”
Kneeling in the silence, his figure looked so solemn that it created an atmosphere no one dared approach.
“In this land that has forgotten you, where only duty-abandoning sisters and fallen servants of a corrupted god remain, death fills every corner.”
Yena continued burning the remaining flesh in silence, gently closing the opened eyes. Her actions resembled those of a mortician. Was it because of the bright flames? The dreary space somehow felt a little brighter.
After kneeling for a long time with his eyes closed, Lee Han’s voice finally broke the silence.
“This fallen servant of yours beseeches you. Grant a small miracle for those who would otherwise be cast into the edge of the abyss.”
The moment Lee Han drove what he held in his hand into the floor—
Whoosh.
The flames died. The lumps of flesh that had served as fuel for so many flames turned to ash in an instant and scattered. Only the flames consuming the writhing larvae in their death throes remained as proof that fire had once burned here.
“M-Mom…”
I-ryuk, who had fainted from shock, suddenly sprang up and ran forward. Though he tried to embrace her with both arms, all that remained was a handful of ash. As he sat there in despair, a voice reached his ears—and ours.
"…It’s okay. Thank you for surviving, son."
⟨ [Final Words] ⟩
“Ah…”
"I’ll take care of Byeol. I’m sorry, Mom. You have to be happy."
“Aaaaaaaaah…”
Do souls have substance? I, who knew nothing of such matters, could not answer. But if someone asked me at this very moment—
"Thank you."
"Liberation… I am free."
"I’m… no longer hungry."
"Has… hell finally ended…?"
I would say that the pale smoke rising from the dying embers of the extinguished flames was not mere smoke at all.