Chapter 32

“In that shrine of hers, there’s an obligation passed down through generations that feels like a curse from heaven. What could I do when I was never cut out to shoulder something like that? I’m the sort of person who can barely even manage the duty of paying taxes.”

It was obvious enough what friction had driven her to strike out on her own—she had practically described herself when talking about the others earlier.

Naturally, then, she wouldn’t know what kind of child Mu-yeong had been, let alone his whereabouts after his disappearance. Mindful of the voice recorder, Mu-yeong pressed ahead with his next question.

Mu-yeong asked, mindful of the recorder, “The young girl Baek Woon-dang was said to have raised—do you know what became of her?”

“How would I know?” The shaman waved a dismissive hand. “Dead or alive, who can say?”

“You saw what became of her mother and father,” Mu-yeong pointed out calmly. Slamming her palm flat against the desk, the shaman snapped, “That was because I could tell the second I saw you! As for that kid’s life or death, I asked the Fairy Maiden and received no answer!”

“That was because I could tell the second I saw you! As for that kid’s life or death, I asked the Fairy Maiden and received no answer!”

Mu-yeong replied in a soothing murmur, “Understood.”

Switching off the voice recorder, Mu-yeong pushed the cash envelope toward the bristling shaman. She snatched it up instantly.

“Watch your step on the road heading back if you don’t want to die in an accident,” the shaman warned bluntly, her parting admonition resolute and stern. “And don’t go wandering into that mountain around here. Ever since they put in hiking trails, the spiritual energy has turned terribly sinister. If an outsider strays in there, you’re in for serious trouble!”

Mu-yeong nodded politely. “Understood, ma’am.”

Given that all sorts of errand center operatives had been injured or killed on that mountain, there was no way rumors hadn’t spread this far. Mu-yeong nodded meekly, another curious thought surfacing in his mind.

“By the way, do you happen to know of any way to alter fate?” he asked. “Like stealing someone else’s good fortune, for instance?”

The shaman tilted her head with sudden curiosity. “Hmm? What, you mean daesudaemyeong—a life-substitute scapegoat ritual?”

Rattling her brass bells, the shaman brightened as confidence flooded back into her expression.

“For that sort of thing, you’ve gotta slaughter a chicken or a pig. Transferring the doom onto the beast and lopping its head off works like a charm. What, things not panning out for you lately? In that case, an estimate would run you about eight million—”

Mu-yeong simply stepped out of the consultation room. Figures. She doesn’t know the first thing about buying and selling names.

He had once posed the same question to a shaman in Busan who had been a client of his. Back then, she had given a similar answer, even if her perspective was slightly different.

—“Didn’t folks use to do daesudaemyeong rituals all the time? But people rarely do that sort of thing nowadays. How could anything ever turn out well when you stubbornly butcher a living creature just to prolong your own life? It’s not like the old days when we held a gut and shared the feast with the whole village, either. Felt too much like racking up sins, so I haven’t touched a ritual like that in quite some time.”

In any case, some people shrank from slaughtering a chicken, while others thought nothing of ruining a fellow human being—so long as it ensured they could eat well and live in comfort.

Leaving the academy with a somewhat hollow feeling, Mu-yeong reflected that perhaps his grandmother’s stern warnings never to seek out shamans hadn’t stemmed from some profoundly sacred principle, but merely from the worry that he might get swindled. No matter how preposterous a shaman appeared, the success rate of a scam was always directly proportional to the victim’s desperation.

Fortunately, Mu-yeong had never once been conned. A lifetime spent surviving on the mercy and cues of others had rendered him acutely sensitive to ill intent.

Mu-yeong placed a phone call to Choi Yook. Yet the line only rang on and on, unanswered. Snapping a photo of the Post-it note, Mu-yeong attached it alongside the audio recording and sent him a text message.

—“Section Chief, I found the list of Kang Shim-soo’s disciples!!”

Having produced tangible results, a reply was bound to arrive. Mu-yeong strolled slowly through the residential neighborhood back toward his vehicle. Uncovering the personal backgrounds of the disciples would take time anyway, so there was no wrapping everything up within the day.

Settling into the driver’s seat, Mu-yeong pulled a cream pastry from his backpack and stuffed it into his mouth. Just as he finished the pastry, a text arrived from Choi Yook.

—“Gangnam-gu Seolleung-ro ○○-gil ○○–○, 9:00 PM.”

Mu-yeong searched the address he had sent. It was an izakaya arranged with private dining rooms. Moving his thumbs swiftly, Mu-yeong fired off a reply.

—“Section Chief, are you having dinner with me??”

A short while later, Choi Yook texted back dryly, —“Be on time.”

The message, sealed with a neat period, felt distinctly uncharacteristic of him. At any rate, following blood sausage soup with a place like this proved that having a first meal together was hard, but the second was easy. Mu-yeong tapped his thumbs across the keypad.

—“Whoa, are you treating me??

If the man said he liked sashimi, Mu-yeong was fully prepared to stop by Noryangjin Fish Market at dawn every day to bring him fresh fish and curry favor. For a while, no answer came from the other end. Just as Mu-yeong gave up waiting and turned the ignition, a message popped up abruptly.

—“Quit spamming question marks. It’s obnoxious.

Mu-yeong sent back an obedient reply. What Choi Yook had ordered him to fix was an old habit dating back to when Mu-yeong used to exchange written notes with his hyung.

Still, accommodating something of this level was effortless. He had long since forgotten what it felt like to be embarrassed.

—“Do you enjoy sashimi, Section Chief?

Mu-yeong rephrased his query with consummate politeness. No reply returned. Utterly typical of Choi Yook.

Late in the evening, the night streets of Gangnam were ablaze with dazzling lights. Making his way toward the rendezvous point, Mu-yeong mentally reviewed the names of the disciples he had uncovered today.

Hong Soon-ja, Kim Seo-gyeong, Yang Ui-ju.

There were only three of them. Hong Soon-ja was likely in her sixties or seventies, while the other two were probably in their forties or fifties. Aside from Hong Soon-ja, the names offered no clear indication of gender.

Going by what the shaman academy director had said, one man among them harbored ill will toward his grandmother. That likely made it either Kim Seo-gyeong or Yang Ui-ju. Perhaps he was the very culprit who had spread those malicious rumors.

The remaining two were said to have nursed bitter disappointment toward her. If they had bought into the rumor that Grandmother had suffered divine retribution, they wouldn’t prove cooperative with Mu-yeong under the current circumstances.

When affection soured, hatred was bound to swell even larger. Faith was an essential pillar supporting a human being, and nothing broke a person quite as easily as the sense of betrayal left behind when that pillar gave way.

How could you do this to me? That was invariably the first thing Mu-yeong’s clients shrieked at their partners upon confirming an affair. It meant the taken-for-granted laws sustaining daily life had been shattered—as though the sun had crashed into the earth and the heavens had fractured into shards.

Fortunately, Mu-yeong had never experienced such betrayal himself. Perhaps it was because the number of people he placed absolute trust in was vanishingly small.

Mu-yeong stepped into the izakaya. With exposed concrete walls, the interior was dimly lit right from the entrance. The bamboo planted beside a trickle of flowing water cast shadows far sharper than their colors, while low-wattage recessed lighting barely illuminated the walkway beneath his feet. A Japanese-style string melody drifted faintly in the background.

Led by an employee dressed in a black uniform, Mu-yeong was escorted toward a private room. Despite the white wallpaper, the complete lack of windows lent the space a stifling, confined atmosphere.

Choi Yook was already waiting inside. Elbow propped against the low table, he rhythmically tilted a pair of pitch-black chopsticks between his fingers. That understated motion commanded attention far more forcefully than any decorative fan or hanging scroll embellishing the chamber.

“Sit,” Choi Yook ordered curtly.

His gaze turned toward him as he spoke. Among every pair of eyes Mu-yeong had seen today, this was the first to meet his own.

That direct, unblinking stare anchored Mu-yeong with an undeniable sense of stability. It felt as though he had been drifting helplessly through midair all day, only now setting foot on solid ground.

Holding back the long breath threatening to slip from his lips, Mu-yeong seated himself across from him. The round platter on the table was blanketed with translucent slices of raw fish. Beside it stood several bottles of sake. Taking hold of a bottle, Choi Yook poured into Mu-yeong’s cup.

“Drink this first,” Choi Yook told him, setting the bottle down.

Taking the cup, Mu-yeong replied politely, “Yes, thank you.”

Mu-yeong obediently raised the cup to his mouth, not forgetting to turn his head slightly to the side in deference. Knocking back the contents in a single gulp, a burning warmth traced down his esophagus and spread into his empty stomach.

Mu-yeong dipped a piece of sashimi generously into soy sauce before slipping it into his mouth. He had eaten raw fish several times before, but he still couldn’t fathom what flavor people were supposed to enjoy. It might have been somewhat palatable with spicy red pepper paste. As he chewed slowly, Choi Yook studied him in quiet scrutiny.

Resting his hand on the table, Choi Yook asked, “When did you learn to drink?”

“After I started working,” Mu-yeong answered with a modest nod. “My boss taught me.”

It had happened at the agency’s welcome party. Mu-yeong looked down at the man’s empty cup.

“Shall I pour one for you?” Mu-yeong offered, gesturing toward the bottle.

“No,” Choi Yook declined flatly.

Instead, Choi Yook filled Mu-yeong’s cup to the brim once more. He was exceptionally taciturn and stony-faced today. He had seemed in better spirits even while hurling curses at the red bean cake, so what on earth was vexing him now?

Under these circumstances, steering the conversation toward work seemed the wisest move. Taking a measured sip of the sake, Mu-yeong broke the silence.

“Regarding the three disciples of Kang Shim-soo I reported today,” Mu-yeong began, setting his cup down. “We’ll need to visit them one by one, but I think we ought to at least tell them that someone else set the fire, not Kang Shim-soo.”

It wasn’t as though he were rallying them to march on Yeongchwi Moneylending and burn it down; saying that much felt reasonable. Choi Yook’s reaction, however, was skeptical.

“Does that even accomplish anything?” Choi Yook grunted.

“It certainly does,” Mu-yeong argued. “Everyone assumes Kang Shim-soo started the fire herself and died alone, writing it off as divine retribution. The sense of betrayal toward a spiritual mother they once revered must be staggering. If we merely hint that might not be true, they’ll loosen their tongues.”

Chewing a piece of sashimi, Choi Yook kept his eyes locked on Mu-yeong.

“Are people going to believe what an out-of-nowhere Seo Mu-yeong tells them, or what the police announced over ten years ago?” Choi Yook questioned coldly.

“That depends entirely on what those people want to believe,” Mu-yeong replied with quiet confidence.

His tone remained gentle and unhurried. Choi Yook gestured with his chin for him to drain what remained. When Mu-yeong drank it down, Choi Yook refilled both of their cups. Mu-yeong watched the clear liquid rise within the white ceramic.

“Even when looking at the exact same incident, some call it a murder-suicide, some call it divine retribution, and others call it murder. Everyone thinks differently.”

“Is ‘murder’ your personal verdict, Seo Mu-yeong-ssi?” Choi Yook inquired, his tone inscrutable.

“Isn’t that what you think as well, Section Chief?” Rounding his eyes in feigned innocence, Mu-yeong said pointedly, “Yeongchwi Moneylending is the one that torched Kang Shim-soo’s house. Doesn’t that mean Kang Shim-soo was murdered?”

Choi Yook let out a dry snort, his expression resembling that of an adult humoring the gibberish of a toddler.

“You seem convinced Kang Shim-soo was an innocent victim, Seo Mu-yeong-ssi.”

“Because she was,” Mu-yeong maintained, meeting his gaze.

“No, you shouldn’t be so certain. Kang Shim-soo was nothing more than a shaman whose spiritual power had run dry.”

Choi Yook tapped a fingertip against the rim of Mu-yeong’s cup, an unhurried rhythm to the motion.