The Price of Ritual

The things needed for recovery. And so, the day of shock and terror passed, and time flowed on.

Lee Serin, who had asked to sleep the moment she regained consciousness, naturally had a nightmare. In that nightmare, all sorts of animals with only their heads remaining appeared in swarms, flying through the sky. And there was Jinseong, sitting like a commander, as the severed heads formed a bridge beneath his feet—just like the magpie bridge that the Cowherd and Weaver Girl crossed.

'Could this be some kind of prophecy? A prophetic dream?'

Lee Serin stubbornly insisted that the dream she had was deeply connected to symbology and surely held some meaning. She scoured the internet and the mansion's library, trying to prove her claim to the demon. Meanwhile, the demon recalled the sorcery and foundational knowledge it had witnessed over its long years of existence, attempting to make its own inferences.

But both of their efforts came to nothing. Even two days after witnessing that shocking ritual, Lee Serin ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and the demon could only guess that the ceremony had been intended to create 'some kind of object.' They couldn't even begin to fathom what regional sorcery it belonged to or what mechanism it operated on.

That was why, when Lee Arin came to see her—complaining that 'my non-blood-related family register roommate, who isn't biologically programmed to be my mortal enemy, is acting weird'—Lee Serin had nothing much to say.

She could only recall how Jinseong had tried to treat them well and speculate that the ritual probably hadn't been something that would harm them.

"Arin, our brother has gotten a little... a little strange, but still..."

"Ah~ You mean he doesn't cause any harm? I already know that~"

Lee Arin fanned the chest area of her yellow pajamas as she spoke.

"Ugh, it's so hot~"

"If you're hot, why are you wearing that..."

"Ah~ It's not because of the clothes. You know. That... ah, I don't know anymore."

Lee Arin stopped fanning herself and let out a small sigh. Her slightly flushed face wasn't red from the heat or fever, but from some other reason.

"I'm saying that older brother of ours might be doing something weird to his own body."

"Pfft."

Lee Serin unconsciously let out a laugh at the sight of her embarrassed twin, but when Lee Arin glared at her with a dead-serious expression, she instantly stiffened her face and said,

"I-it'll be fine. Probably..."

Lee Arin carefully studied her gloomy twin's face as she said it would be fine, then smiled.

"Well, he's always done weird stuff anyway. As long as he's healthy, there shouldn't be a problem."

"I am healthy."

Jinseong muttered while sitting in the lotus position inside his room.

'At this point in time, my body is extremely healthy.'

He even felt a small sense of wonder at the fact that his body remained perfectly fine despite having performed a ritual, albeit a small-scale one. Before his regression, performing a ritual usually resulted in him coughing up blood. In severe cases, shredded pieces of his internal organs would mix with the cough. His flesh had rotted while still attached to his body, and there had even been times when mold completely covered him.

'To think that the aftermath of performing a ritual would end with just a slight cold lingering for three days. Truly satisfying.'

A ritual always demanded a price. Whether that price was very small or enormously large. The problem was that this price was utterly unpredictable.

Rituals were usually conducted on a large scale and performed by multiple sorcerers. Sorcery rituals offered tremendous benefits but came with nightmarish difficulty, and the risks were so massive that no single person could possibly bear them alone.

Yet even when performing the exact same ritual, the price each person paid was completely different. Some suddenly developed gallstones filling their gallbladder, while others got away with nothing more than a burst of age spots. One might think it simply applied differently to each person, but the unpredictable 'price of ritual' could make the same person performing the same sorcery ritual cough up blood and be rushed to the hospital one time, while only ending with a stye on the eye the next.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

There was clearly some kind of rule, but there was no way to discern it. Therefore, sorcerers referred to the price of such sorcery rituals as 'the will of heaven' or 'the choice of chaos.'

'But there are definitely ways to reduce the risk.'

Just because the price differed didn't mean there were no methods to lighten it. Among all supernatural abilities, sorcery was overwhelmingly superior when it came to offering something as a sacrifice to disperse disaster and ward off misfortune.

Sacrificial goods. Living sacrifices.

Power-hungry individuals and sorcerers who could not forget the sweet taste of large-scale sorcery rituals constantly sought ways to reduce the risk. What they eventually discovered were these two elements.

Offer a living sacrifice to take on the misfortune in your place and lighten the price. Offer material goods to lighten the price once more.

It was impossible to avoid paying any price at all, but they had found ways to make that price lighter.

Turning death into serious injury. Turning serious injury into minor injury.

That was why modern sorcerers, when they had to perform a large-scale sorcery ritual, always chose to mobilize extremely expensive goods and sacrifices to reduce the risk as much as possible. On top of that, they were careful to avoid impurities and maintained bodily purity through practices like ablution.

The money required for such processes was naturally astronomical, but... it was still better than sorcerers dropping dead one after another with each ritual.

'But no one knows why that method reduces the risk.'

As was typical with sorcery, there was no answer to the question of 'why does it reduce the risk?' Nevertheless, countless sorcerers throughout history had learned that such methods lessened the risk of rituals, and it had long since become the manual and bible of sorcery rituals.

'But I know. I know that this thing called a sorcery ritual calculates the price in a bizarre way...'

It was the fruit born from Jinseong's madness—the madness that had driven him to endlessly pursue sorcery even with a body that was like a walking corpse.

'Roulette.'

Even while World War III raged, Jinseong had wandered as a mercenary and come into contact with countless sorcery rituals. Some he excavated from ruins, others he found among the wreckage of fallen factions. Sometimes they were offered as rewards for mercenary requests. He participated in rituals at the request of groups he had positive relations with, and conversely, he stole ritual methods from hostile groups through threats or brute force.

And then, one day while living by pouring all the money he earned from mercenary work into acquiring those sorcery rituals he had gathered...

Jinseong realized something.

Sorcery rituals had evolved in the direction of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠high risk, high return. A ritual praying for a single field to yield a bountiful harvest expanded to an entire village, then from a village to an entire nation. A ritual used to beg for a single mouthful of water in a drought that cracked the earth evolved into a rain-calling ritual. As humanity's domain expanded and society grew larger, sorcery expanded alongside it, eventually reaching even the largest unit humans could conceive—the 'nation.'

Naturally, the old rituals that granted small benefits over small areas were forgotten, while rituals that granted massive benefits over massive areas became the mainstream and survived.

But Jinseong, who was obsessed with sorcery, continued to collect those forgotten rituals despite the people around him dissuading him, saying they were 'inefficient,' 'offered nothing compared to the effort,' and 'were outdated and useless.'

He prepared all the materials with his own money and performed the rituals alone, without any other sorcerers to assist him.

And while continuously performing those forgotten ancient rituals, Jinseong discovered a strange fact.

He first felt the sense of incongruity when he used a recovery sorcery ritual. Since he worked as a mercenary and lived a rough life, he was frequently injured. Among those injuries were ones that didn't immediately threaten his life but would certainly affect it indirectly if left untreated. For example, wounds to the stomach or intestines, strong impacts to the eyes, or blood clots forming in the brain.

Such injuries might seem fine for a short while, but if neglected, they would lead to hospital stays or force him to take long breaks from mercenary work, leaving lasting aftereffects. That was why he would use recovery sorcery rituals to treat them, even if it meant accepting the risk.

It was far better to endure a brief risk than to live with a time bomb inside him.

Fortunately, among the rituals he had collected, there were many related to recovery and many for treating internal injuries. The method of violently shaking and destroying the internals was convenient for assassination, and in response, sorcery for healing internal injuries and detoxifying poisons had naturally developed.

But of course, the effects differed slightly with each ritual, so Jinseong would use different ones depending on the situation.

Then one day, on the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠third time he performed the Starlight Grace Phenomenon Rite—a sorcery ritual for healing internal organs—Jinseong noticed something strange.