An Office Worker Is Good At Exorcism - Chapter 178

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 177
Part 6. The Rain Has Stopped (1)
Kang Hyung-seok waited for Lee Nak-yul’s response.
More precisely, he waited for the Imoogi’s response.
I did not yet know what her choice would be.
Yet I could not believe she would make the wrong one.
Drip, drip.
Water droplets gathered on the Cave ceiling fell into the Lake, creating ripples that dizzied the surface.
And as those ripples gradually stilled and vanished, Lee Nak-yul opened her mouth.
“…I carry so much sin.”
“I know.”
She had taken lives.
That was Lee Nak-yul’s sin—one difficult to wash away.
“You have suffered. Sin can be forgiven through repentance and action.”
Lee Nak-yul would need to accumulate many good deeds.
Very, very many.
For a very, very long time.
“Please, do not let despair consume you.”
Lee Nak-yul’s eyes shifted to the bones behind Kang Hyung-seok. She saw the eggshell, then returned her gaze to him.
“Can I be forgiven?”
“If you wish to be forgiven.”
“Then can I forgive?”
It was humans who had harmed the Imoogi’s family.
Forgiving is as difficult as being forgiven.
An Imoogi becoming a dragon is similar to a human becoming a Buddha.
It is only possible by achieving liberation of the heart and breaking free from shackles.
Lee Nak-yul’s eyes were asking if that was possible.
“If you can forgive, then it is possible.”
Kang Hyung-seok’s answer resonated deeply within Lee Nak-yul.
Then Lee Nak-yul squeezed her eyes shut, and soon her head nodded heavily.
“I will ask the Village people to hold a funeral for my family. I will ensure they can truly pray for you—please forgive them in turn.”
Lee Nak-yul’s face contorted, and tears streamed from her tightly closed eyes.
That became her answer.
Lee Nak-yul had made her decision.
“Let us go. To the Sea. To where you belong.”
Lee Nak-yul buried her face in her palms and wept silently.
Kang Hyung-seok gathered the bones and eggshell in the discarded clothes and wrapped them carefully.
Taking only the Shaman’s Bell, he approached the Lake first.
The abandoned lantern cast a faint glow on the weeping Lee Nak-yul.
***
Tear! Unroll, tear!
Kim Jae-sik was unfurling a roll of paper towels.
The Youth Leader and Village Chief, though flustered, distributed them one by one to the villagers.
The people sitting in the Village Community Center covered their eyes with towels torn lengthwise or rolls of paper towels.
“Now it is only us.”
The Village Chief spoke, and Kim Jae-sik, his hands still unwinding the paper, cast his gaze toward the window.
Though covered with newspaper and paper towels, there remained tiny gaps that had not been fully sealed.
“Now we must cover our eyes as well.”
“W-what is the reason for doing this?”
Kim Jae-sik shifted his gaze from the Youth Leader to the people.
“The Imoogi will ascend to heaven now.”
“Pardon?”
Several villagers flinched, and the Youth Leader, startled, asked in return.
“You must not look under any circumstances. If even one of you sees the Imoogi, the calamity will never end!”
Kim Jae-sik deliberately withheld the most crucial detail.
If even a single person saw the Imoogi and called it a Snake, everything would be for naught.
The Imoogi would not become a dragon.
And once again, the regret of failing to become a dragon would take root.
“Steel yourselves! You must not open your eyes under any circumstances! And above all, do not look outside!”
“Hah!”
The old man, usually called Kim, exhaled a breath trembling with fear.
Kim Jae-sik regarded him with a heavy expression and tore off more paper towels.
He handed them to the Village Chief and Youth Leader, and soon covered his own eyes as well.
He feared that even the smallest misfortune might befall Kang Hyung-seok.
***
Crack-crack-crack-crack!
Watching the sea where lightning flashed and thunder roared, Kang Hyung-seok gripped the Shaman’s Bell and the divine blade.
The typhoon had drawn much closer.
Whoooooosh!
Rain fell so heavily that I could barely see an inch ahead.
The rain stung against my bare chest, and it was difficult even to keep my eyes open.
Yet Kang Hyung-seok’s chest heaved as he breathed heavily, watching the sea.
Lee Nak-yul must become a dragon.
I had to help her achieve this.
Clang-clang-clang-clang!
The Shaman’s Bell rang out louder than ever before, its tone crystalline and pure.
The time had passed 11:30 at night.
‘The Hour of the Rat.’
A sacred hour, when spiritual energy grew strongest.
The boundary where yin and yang forces intersected, where the darkness of night met the brightness of dawn.
Prayers offered at this hour held far greater power.
Clang-clang-clang-clang!
“Taishanglao-jun shuo ling huang miao zhen jing taisang yuan ji da dao taisang san shi liu bu zun jing.”
All divine spirits of heaven and earth, I beseech you.
“Taishanglao-jun yu huang da di hou tu zun shen bei ji zi wei da di zi wei zhu sheng da di.”
Grant me your aid.
“Zuo yi zhen jun du jiang zhen jun san guan zhen jun si xing zhen jun suo zai zhen jun jiu gao zhen jun zuo bao zhen jun you bao zhen jun.”
Now one burdened with sin seeks forgiveness, and wishes to forgive those who caused her pain and ascend to heaven.
“Yue pai zhen jun bao ming zhen jun jiu yao zhen jun tai yang zhen jun tai yin zhen jun mu xing zhen jun huo xing zhen jun tu xing zhen jun.”
Please clear that path for her.
“Jin xing zhen jun shui xing zhen jun la hu zhen jun ji dao zhen jun wu du zhen jun dong du zhen jun xi du zhen jun nan du zhen jun.”
Help end the calamity that has befallen this village.
“Bei dou zhen jun zhong dou zhen jun nan dou liu sha zhen jun bei dou qi xing zhen jun er shi ba xiu zhen jun.”
As I offer this prayer now,
Hear my plea and open the gates of heaven.
“Shi er yuan zhen zhen jun shi fang zhen jun ben ming zhen jun tian shang ying ri ling gong di xia qi shi er shen.”
It was at that moment.
Screeeech!
The dark, murky sea churned and heaved.
Kang Hyung-seok shook the Shaman’s Bell vigorously and gazed upon the roiling sea.
Uuuuuuung!
A fierce wind swept in, scattering the rain and roaring deafeningly.
The wind was so violent that even Kang Hyung-seok struggled to remain standing.
Click.
Kneeling on one knee, Kang Hyung-seok continued to ring the Shaman’s Bell toward the heavens.
And then,
Roooaaarrr!
Seawater began surging upward.
A waterspout.
A phenomenon where a powerful vortex of wind draws seawater skyward—the ancients called this the Imoogi ascending to the heavens.
They were right.
Flash! Roooaaarrr! Whoooosh!
As lightning crackled, thunder roared, and torrential rain poured down, Kang Hyung-seok saw it clearly.
A colossal Imoogi ascending toward the sky.
Waaaaang!
Shaking the Shaman’s Bell, Kang Hyung-seok staggered violently in the wind.
But he quickly steadied himself and, watching the ascending Imoogi, opened his mouth wide.
There was something the Imoogi still had to do to become a true dragon.
“It is a dragon!”
Roooaaarrr!
Lightning illuminated the ascending Imoogi.
And so I could see it.
Legs sprouting from its smooth body.
“It is a dragon!”
Kang Hyung-seok shook the Shaman’s Bell, his voice raw with passion.
Now horns budded from the Imoogi’s head, and long fur grew along its spine.
“It is a dragon!”
Three proclamations.
And the Imoogi became a true dragon.
The dragon reached the heavens.
With his head thrown back, Kang Hyung-seok’s eyes beheld vast forms undulating within the clouds.
Other dragons welcoming Lee Nak-yul, now newly transformed into a dragon.
The sight seemed to Kang Hyung-seok like Lee Nak-yul had found a new family, and he laughed, exhaling deeply.
‘Please, I beg you, cast aside that sorrow and find happiness.’
For a long time, a very long time.
May you become a dragon and wash away that sin, and find happiness as much as you once knew suffering.
Waaaaang!
Ringing the Shaman’s Bell, Kang Hyung-seok raised his palms together toward the heavens.
Roooaaarrr! Roooaaarrr!
Thunder still rumbled, but the rain was steadily diminishing.
As if there were no longer an Imoogi to summon the rain.
The downpour was subsiding.
***
Clatter.
It was dawn.
The time I returned to the Village.
Throughout those hours, I had offered prayers and blessings without cease, and now I returned to the Village Community Center with a pallid face, setting down the cloth bundle containing bones and eggshell fragments.
“P-Park Su!”
“Oh, oh my!”
The people gathered in the Village Community Center threw away the towels and tissues they’d been holding to their eyes and rushed forward.
And I unwrapped the cloth I had bundled like a wrapping cloth before them.
“Gasp!”
“W-what is this?”
“What… oh dear.”
I opened my mouth as I looked at Kim Jae-sik, whose body was rigid and stiff yet whose eyes conveyed the hardship he had endured.
“This is the root cause of everything.”
“Th-this!”
Someone took a step forward, their anger evident.
But Kim Jae-sik quickly restrained them, and I continued in a calm voice.
“It was an Imoogi that had lost its family.”
The angry one lowered the foot they had raised, and their fiercely raised eyes gradually subsided.
“That Imoogi forgave what had happened to it.”
I sent the villagers a solemn gaze and bowed my head.
“So I earnestly hope that you will forgive as well.”
Had anyone other than myself spoken these words, the villagers would not have listened.
But because of my earnest demeanor and the nature of being a Shaman, they could not dismiss my words lightly.
“…Is it all over?”
The Village Chief spoke with a voice hoarse and strained.
“Yes.”
“The Imoogi won’t return again?”
“Since it has become a dragon, it won’t return. Perhaps it will even protect this Village.”
I looked into the eyes of the villagers.
Some were angry, others relieved.
And some were lost in melancholy, while others had eyes that questioned whether such a thing could even be possible.
“Very well then.”
The Village Chief spoke as though sighing, then bowed deeply toward me.
“Thank you. Thank you. I am truly grateful.”
The Village Chief was genuinely grateful that I had ended the calamity that had befallen this Village.
With the highest authority showing such gratitude, the others also tempered their emotions.
Some had lost family, others had lost precious livestock.
What had happened was already done.
Though it was a disaster difficult to accept easily, the Imoogi that was its cause was no longer here.
“We have received a debt of gratitude that is difficult to repay, Park Su.”
The Village Chief spoke in a voice that trembled ever so slightly.
Kang Hyung-seok bowed his head to him and opened his mouth.
“I have a request.”
“I will grant it. Please, tell me everything.”
“When you hold the funeral for the deceased, I would like you to conduct funeral rites for these as well.”
In the end, they had all been victims.
Of course, the villagers had not directly harmed the Imoogi.
It was their ancestors who had done so.
Yet they too were a distant, ancient family.
“Hhhhhh.”
The Village Chief exhaled a deep sigh, squeezed his eyes shut, and then nodded with great difficulty.
“…I understand.”
“That will suffice. With that, this village will be safe now.”
After Kang Hyung-seok spoke thus.
Thud.
The Village Chief bowed deeply to Kang Hyung-seok, and the other people standing nearby bent their waists in a grand gesture of respect toward him.
It was the villagers’ tribute to Kang Hyung-seok, who had halted the calamity.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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