Chapter 107
Chapter 107
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 107
Chapter Title: Birth of the Sixth Ghost Soul
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"C-rank."
Issuing a license for a low-rank hunter didn't take much time.
Seongmin gazed at the freshly issued C-rank hunter license and pulled his hood back down.
The hood had been meant to hide his wounds and bruises, but amid the crowd, Seongmin removed it without a second thought.
Thud.
"Huh? What was that?"
The man whose shoulder bumped into Seongmin's turned back with a puzzled look, tilting his head.
Unaware of Seongmin standing there perfectly fine, the man soon shrugged it off as nothing and headed toward the license issuance counter.
'Even if I vanished, no one would notice.'
He gripped the C-rank hunter license tightly in his hand.
In truth, the hood held no real meaning for Seongmin.
He possessed the ability to completely erase himself from others' sight, just like now.
Yet he had pulled the hood low over his face to find some purpose in his existence.
Through the hunter exam, he wanted to leave even the smallest mark in this world, where his disappearance wouldn't cause the slightest ripple.
"Hey, C-rank? Hahaha!"
"Shut up, you're C-rank too."
The world spun on without even noticing Seongmin was there.
"Whoa! B-rank! Awesome!"
"For real!? Aren't you getting scouted by Unwoo Guild? That's huge! Your life's set!"
Watching people laugh and share their joy with friends or family,
it felt like he was breathing the same air in the same space, yet utterly detached.
As if he had never existed in the first place...
'It's okay. At least I've proven I was alive like this.'
He looked at the hunter license, clenched so hard it left imprints on his palm.
It was proof that Seongmin lived and breathed in the same world as everyone else—not some other realm.
Taking comfort in that, he forced his mind to settle.
"What are you doing standing here all spaced out by yourself?"
A faint smile had just crossed his face when someone placed a hand on Seongmin's shoulder—unseen by anyone else.
Seongmin's eyes widened in shock.
'No, he must be talking to someone else. The touch was just a coincidence.'
Even as his rational mind dismissed it as impossible, a sliver of hope made him lift his head.
And there stood Myung-su, locking eyes with him directly.
"A-are you... talking to me?"
"Who else would I be talking to?"
Myung-su beamed with a bright smile.
At that smile, tears Seongmin had been holding back spilled out unbidden.
"Wha... huh? I didn't mean to make you cry..."
Had he hidden his presence too well?
Myung-su floundered at the sight of Seongmin suddenly bursting into tears.
"No, I'm just happy."
Seongmin grinned brightly in response.
"You're the first person who's ever found me when I'm hidden..."
"Is that so."
"Yeah. If I die, will you remember me?"
Dark words, far too heavy for a mere high schooler.
Yet Myung-su smiled at them.
"I'll remember you."
Then he flicked Seongmin's forehead sharply.
Crack!
"Ow!"
"And you're not going to die. Who said you were?"
Caught off guard by the flick, Seongmin still managed a smile.
"That's a relief."
"Come on. Didn't I tell you I'd take you with me?"
Myung-su ruffled Seongmin's hair and led him out of the Hunter Management Agency.
Once outside, Myung-su hardened his expression where Seongmin couldn't see.
'I don't know your story, but you're a Ghost Soul of the Ghostly Soul Exterminators.'
Those were tears far too heavy and dark for a child not yet fully grown.
But Myung-su, raised as an assassin since childhood, knew their weight all too well. Gazing at Seongmin, he made a vow.
'I'll do my best to let you feel it too. The grace I received from the Supreme One...'
In the past, none of the Ghost Souls of the Ghostly Soul Exterminators from the Heavenly Demon Cult had lived ordinary lives.
The Ghostly Soul Exterminators were the result of those misfits filling each other's gaps and combining their strengths.
The ten Ghost Souls forged that way had merged their talents, unique abilities, and mutual loyalty into something monstrous—even among the Heavenly Demon Cult, they were called the Killing Ghosts.
'No different this time, it seems.'
Yong-un arrived at the Ghostly Soul Exterminators' home, drawn by the strange aura, and spotted Myung-su laughing with Seongmin.
He wasn't sure if the other Ghost Souls could see it, but Yong-un could clearly make it out.
Amid the laughing group, invisible entities swarmed around Seongmin, locked in a precarious, unseen war—like tightrope walkers on the edge of oblivion.
"The Ghostly Soul Exterminators, indeed. Heh."
Yong-un snorted softly.
None of the Ghost Souls were normal.
Starting with First Ghost Soul Myung-su, once the elite assassin of the Night Slaughter Society.
Second Ghost Soul Cheon-il, who had contracted with demons.
Third Ghost Soul Poison Witch, born a poison master for whom death was an old friend.
Fourth Ghost Soul Mu-hee, who had lived her life as the Night Slaughter Society's top spirit sorceress.
And finally, Barum the demon, who could be called humanity's enemy—now Fifth Ghost Soul.
Yet here was a prospective Sixth Ghost Soul whose bizarre history seemed right up there with theirs.
'At least in my eyes.'
After eyeing Seongmin intently, Yong-un decided they'd handle it themselves and left the Ghostly Soul Exterminators' home.
"What...!? A shaman?!!"
The Poison Witch shouted in shock at Seongmin's nodding confirmation.
"I haven't received the divine descent yet... but I think it'll happen soon."
Seongmin fidgeted bashfully as he spoke.
The Poison Witch and Cheon-il, the only other Ghost Souls left at home, exchanged stunned glances.
They had always thought shamans were frauds.
Like so many others, just con artists making a buck.
But for one to actually exist...
"So the skill that lets you vanish from sight..."
"Yeah, my ghosts hide me."
Myung-su's face betrayed his shock, even as he tried to hide it, now that he knew Seongmin's secret.
"That explains it. I knew something was off."
Myung-su gave an awkward smile.
The first time he saw Seongmin, unlike the other exam waiters, an inexplicable negative aura emanated from him, drawing Myung-su's steps without thought.
And when Seongmin first used his stealth, Myung-su couldn't hide his confusion.
No mana or energy stirred.
Yet Seongmin faded away, enveloped in a hazy mist, his presence erased.
It screamed skill, but without mana or energy? Impossible by Myung-su's logic.
Now, hearing the secret, it all clicked.
'That mist... was ghosts?'
A chill ran through him, his body shuddering.
Seeing the Ghostly Soul Exterminators react just like any normal person after hearing his secret, Seongmin bowed his head.
"I shouldn't have said anything."
Here it came.
'Monster.'
'R-run away!'
'Get out! Get lost!'
'Aaaahhh!'
The screams laced with scorn and terror.
Seongmin's lips trembled.
He'd heard it all before—not just once or twice.
Each time, it carved deep wounds into his heart, etched indelibly into his soul.
After dozens of repeats, he could recall every horrified face.
'Yeah, I should just die.'
Seongmin clenched his fists and shut his eyes.
'Go on. Curse me out already! So I can leave this place!'
He screamed inwardly.
Abandon me, call me a monster, cast me out—now!
It started two years ago.
That's when the dead began appearing, and Grandma fell ill.
He couldn't describe the initial terror.
In the middle of class, he screamed. His homeroom teacher, hearing the story, seriously recommended psychiatric help.
Back then, he truly believed something was wrong with him.
Until Grandma told him everything.
"I'm sorry, child... I should have taken it... If I had, your mom and dad wouldn't have died..."
Confined to her hospital bed by an unknown illness, Grandma wept after hearing everything from the teacher.
Clutching Seongmin's hands, she sobbed apologies, blaming herself.
That was when he understood.
From Grandma's time, to Mom's, to his own.
They were fated to take in the divine to survive.
"My poor grandchild... Grandma's so sorry~ I should have accepted it and died... Why was I so scared back then? Why didn't I, and hurt my precious grandchild like this..."
Grandma poured out all her long-hidden truths, repeating it like a mantra.
"I should die. I have to die."
It wasn't long ago, but those words from Grandma shook Seongmin to his core.
Two years later, he grasped their meaning.
To escape this hell and the ghost tormenting Grandma, he had to accept the divine—and die.
"Sob sob..."
That hell had stripped everything from Seongmin over two years.
Unpaid rent piled up at Grandma's restaurant; the landlord's demands led to debt collectors.
And yesterday, the collectors' thugs stormed Grandma's hospital room.
They beat her. He stepped in to protect her, only to suffer massive wounds to body and soul from their violence.
"Yes, I have to die. Only then will this all end."
It was so unfair.
Why us? Why our family?
Why this hellish fate for him of all people?
Despair tightened around his throat, pushing him toward the ultimate choice.
To the weeping Seongmin came Myung-su's calm voice.
"Why did you take the hunter exam?"
What did that matter?
Was the sweet whisper that planted false hope—only to deliver greater despair—because he was a hunter?
"To leave my name in this wretched world!"
Just dying felt too regrettable.
Too unjust to bear this pain alone and vanish.
He had etched the name Jo Seong-min into the Hunter Management Agency's records.
Hoping someone, anyone, would acknowledge his suffering—remember it.
"Before I die! So the world knows how hard it's been for me!!"
Seongmin's anguished cry echoed through the entire Ghostly Soul Exterminators' home.
In the heavy silence that followed, only his sobs remained.
"Sob sob..."
Just as death loomed as his choice,
Myung-su's voice shattered the quiet.
"That's nothing special."
"...?!"
Nothing... special?
Seongmin stopped crying, eyes wide.
"Heh, you're talking about dying over that?"
Over that?
Seongmin looked up at the Poison Witch's shout.
Her response to his raw honesty was the last thing he expected.
'Just... that?'
His pain, his ordeals—mocked? Rage should follow.
But first came something stranger.
A dazed disbelief at the absurdity.
'This is ridiculous.'
Yes, that fit.
The absurdity faded as reality sank in, anger rising.
"What do you even know..."
"You came to the right place. At first, I thought you were just another kid, but now? Perfect fit for the Ghostly Soul Exterminators."
The Poison Witch cut him off, hand on his shoulder.
Cheon-il stepped forward and took Seongmin's hand.
"Bro, he's in! First Ghost Soul bro! Like when Barum—no, Fifth Ghost Soul bro joined, we're doing a feast today, right?"
"Wh-what's going..."
Seongmin felt his boiling fury snuffed out cold.
Not absurdity this time.
Their casual expressions, as if it were no big deal, brought an inexplicable relief.
His head screamed it made no sense, but his heart accepted it all calmly—this bizarre scene.
"Welcome. Tonight's feast—we'll swap stories. Yours, ours. It'll be good for you."
Myung-su's hand rested on Seongmin's head, eyes twice as wide as before.
Warmer than at their first meeting, his touch affectionately ruffled Seongmin's hair.
The moment the Sixth Ghost Soul of the Ghostly Soul Exterminators was born.