An Office Worker Is Good At Exorcism - Chapter 184

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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 183
Part 1. You Have No Right (1)
It was broad daylight.
Therefore, it was the hour of humans, not spirits.
Slam!
Shin Yoseph burst through the Italian Restaurant’s door and caught sight of Kang Hyung-seok, Shin Jung-ah, and Lee Jang-woo in the distance.
It happened immediately after.
Zzzzzing!
“Yes, Secretary Jo.”
Shin Yoseph answered the call while keeping his gaze fixed on them, and Secretary Jo’s measured, deliberate voice came through.
(Director, I’ve looked into Lee Jang-woo a bit.)
That man was there in the distance.
Shin Yoseph’s eyes locked onto Lee Jang-woo as Secretary Jo’s voice continued.
(The bar he worked at before wasn’t a legitimate establishment. Lee Jang-woo didn’t just work as a waiter there either.)
A disreputable drinking den.
Secretary Jo had phrased it euphemistically, but it was a place that provided expensive liquor and companionship to those eager to flaunt their wealth.
“Sigh.”
Shin Yoseph exhaled deeply.
(Three years ago, the day before Lee Jang-woo quit, there was a traffic accident in that area.)
“…What did you say?”
(The victim was a woman in her twenties. Someone who worked with Lee Jang-woo. It was serious enough to be the talk of the town.)
“Lee Jang-woo wasn’t involved?”
(He was one of the witnesses, apparently.)
It made no sense.
Then why had that Victim Spirit clung to Lee Jang-woo?
(Director?)
Secretary Jo’s voice followed the silent Shin Yoseph.
Yet he simply shifted his gaze toward Kang Hyung-seok without speaking.
“I’ll call you back later.”
He muttered the words and hung up.
Still in front of the restaurant.
Since they hadn’t gone far, he could easily approach them.
Yet Shin Yoseph stood motionless like a stone sentinel, merely watching Kang Hyung-seok.
‘Go on. Look. See what happened.’
Kang Hyung-seok was shifting his gaze from Lee Jang-woo toward the road.
As if peering into the past with a supernatural power that Shin Yoseph found difficult to comprehend.
Screeeech! Boom!
Indeed, that was exactly what was happening.
Lee Jang-woo’s memory began with a deafening sound that only Kang Hyung-seok could hear.
“Kyaaaaaahhh!”
“Aaaahhhhh!”
Drunks passing by the street shrieked in terror, and some clutched at the roadside trees before retching.
‘So you’re finally showing me.’
Kang Hyung-seok silently posed a question to the Guardian Spirit, who had remained silent until now.
It was a command to look.
To observe and judge for myself whether this man was truly someone worth helping.
And so Kang Hyung-seok gazed upon Lee Jang-woo in the vision.
“Hah, hah! Huh!”
Before the crosswalk in the dead of night.
Since it wasn’t far from the accident scene, blood droplets had splattered across Lee Jang-woo’s face and body.
“…Damn it. Damn it.”
They knew each other.
Kim Hee-hyun and Lee Jang-woo, scattered across the ground from the accident.
Yet Lee Jang-woo turned and fled without a moment’s hesitation.
This was the vision the Guardian Spirit showed me.
Everything was so vivid that I could feel Lee Jang-woo’s innermost thoughts and emotions laid bare.
‘So you’re the cause of the accident.’
Even if the surrounding people and the car driver hadn’t noticed, I could see it clearly.
Lee Jang-woo had violently shoved away Kim Hee-hyun’s arm as she clung to him—that was what caused the accident.
“Ha, ha! Huh! Huh!”
Passersby scattered left and right as they watched Lee Jang-woo sprint past at full speed, not even wiping the blood from his face.
Lee Jang-woo was laughing.
Thinking he was finally free.
Thinking that at last, that tiresome burden had fallen away.
“Haha! Hahahaha!”
He laughed so hard he didn’t even notice the stares of the people around him.
“C-call an ambulance! Call an ambulance!”
“Aaaahhhhh!”
“Ugghhhhh!”
People crowded around Kim Hee-hyun, whose upper and lower body had been separated.
Thump, thump, thump!
Bystanders pounded on the car with their palms, while the driver reeked of alcohol, trembling violently in body and eyes.
In that moment, Kang Hyung-seok gazed upon Kim Hee-hyun with pity.
Should I be grateful she died instantly?
Or should I lament that even in death, her ears remained open?
Her eyes, which she never managed to perceive, were hollow and vacant.
“Hahahaha!”
The moment Lee Jang-woo’s laughter reached her ears from afar, tears that had gathered at her eyes streamed down her face.
“What was your relationship to him?”
Kang Hyung-seok asked, looking down at Kim Hee-hyun lying motionless on the cold asphalt.
“What was your relationship with the author?”
That was when it happened.
The surroundings shifted as if responding to his question.
Thirty minutes before the accident.
It was the back door of the Bar’s Back Door where Lee Jang-woo and Kim Hee-hyun worked.
“Oh, oppa!”
“Damn it! Let go! Fuck! Hey!”
As Lee Jang-woo threateningly raised his fist, Kim Hee-hyun lifted her arm to shield her face.
Dark bruises marked her skin clearly.
Lee Jang-woo’s eyes narrowed savagely as he watched Kim Hee-hyun tremble, yet strangely, the emotion in his pupils was fear and annoyance.
“Damn it, just back off! Why can’t you understand what I’m saying! Hey, you think I was nice to you because I actually liked you? Huh!”
“Oh, oppa, don’t do this. Don’t leave me. Please.”
“Leave you? We were never in that kind of relationship! Fuck!”
Kim Hee-hyun’s body shook violently as tears streamed down her face.
Even that sight only deepened Lee Jang-woo’s rage.
“Why are you like this? Why are you acting like this! Hey!”
“Sob, sob! Sniff.”
“It was just fooling around! Just, it was nothing!”
No.
Perhaps it was nothing to Lee Jang-woo, but it was far from nothing to Kim Hee-hyun.
Thud! Crack! Thud!
The surroundings shifted again.
It was a worn, dilapidated Villa/Apartment Building.
“Gag! Cough!”
Kim Hee-hyun being beaten by her father.
Merely a middle school student.
A young girl in her school uniform.
“Get your mother! Call her! You bastard!”
Crash!
A poor household, a violent father, relentless beatings.
Unfulfilled love.
A hunger for recognition.
‘Was it Lee Jang-woo who filled that void…?’
The surroundings shifted once more.
It was the Bar’s Private Room.
Glug glug glug.
“You’re the new girl, right? If you’re curious about anything, just tell me anytime.”
Lee Jang-woo offered Kim Hee-hyun a glass filled with whiskey.
Kim Hee-hyun, barely an adult, accepted it shyly, and Lee Jang-woo smiled like a good person.
“If you can’t drink it all at once, take it in sips. But you’re really pretty.”
“No, that’s not it.”
Even as Kim Hee-hyun blushed, Lee Jang-woo’s tongue did not cease its work.
It became poison to her.
His tongue, carefully concealing his true nature, toyed with Kim Hee-hyun’s heart—a heart starved for love.
“Don’t get involved with that bastard.”
What appeared this time was the Bar’s Back Door again.
Plastic crates filled with empty bottles were stacked high, and the night street below was thick with spit and cigarette butts.
“Why, why would you say that?”
“Why? That bastard’s garbage. A dog.”
“No! Don’t talk about my brother like that!”
“Listen to her talk? Hey, look, look.”
The Female Coworker who had been speaking with Kim Hee-hyun switched on the voice recorder on her phone and lit a cigarette.
Click, whoosh!
The lighter’s flame and cigarette smoke cast a red glow across the woman’s furrowed brow, while her phone played back the voices of the woman and Lee Jang-woo.
『How much longer are you going to stick with Hee-hyun?』
『What do you mean. We haven’t even started yet.』
『Don’t tell me you’re doing it again?』
『Again, what…』
『Don’t. Poor girl.』
『Sister, you know how this world works. She’s literally begging, “Please help me with construction.” Anyone who doesn’t exploit that is an idiot, right?』
『Hey…』
『Just once. I’ll max out her credit and get one loan. At most a few thousand, and that pays back quick anyway.』
『You garbage bastard.』
『If you’re going to nag, I’m hanging up.』
Click.
Kim Hee-hyun’s hand holding the phone trembled violently.
“No, this isn’t… this isn’t it.”
“You know that voice better than anyone.”
The woman drew deeply on her cigarette with a look of disgust, then spat on the ground.
“That bastard’s been saving you up, waiting for the moment you cross the line so he can trap you for good. Break up with him while you still can.”
Kim Hee-hyun, struck by the revelation, trembled.
Now she knew everything about Lee Jang-woo.
And yet, Kim Hee-hyun still loved him.
‘…Sigh.’
The human heart is not strong.
That is why everyone has moments when they become vulnerable.
And there are malevolent spirits—people who approach to exploit those moments.
Lee Jang-woo was such a person to Kim Hee-hyun.
Vroom!
With the sound of an automobile engine, all illusions came to an end.
The surroundings were bathed in bright daylight, and Lee Jang-woo stared at the place where Kim Hee-hyun had died, clutching his head.
“Shin Manager…?”
I heard Shin Jung-ah’s cautious voice from behind me.
I turned around and shook my head silently. Then I shifted my gaze back to Lee Jang-woo.
Now I had only two choices left.
Would I help Lee Jang-woo?
Or would I stand for Kim Hee-hyun?
-Hehehehe, hahaha.
I heard the laughter of Kim Hee-hyun, who had become a Malevolent Spirit.
Depending on the circumstances when a person dies, they can become a spirit.
Just as those consumed by resentment become Victim Spirits.
Kim Hee-hyun, who had loved Lee Jang-woo, had become a Malevolent Spirit.
‘Do you still love him…?’
Even knowing it was never love from the beginning?
Even knowing you were merely used?
Yet you would believe that fleeting lie he told to comfort your pain in that brief moment?
‘…How cruel.’
The fate of Kim Hee-hyun, who had been toyed with by Lee Jang-woo and become a Malevolent Spirit with feelings she could never express, felt unbearably harsh.
Gulp.
I swallowed saliva that tasted strangely salty and moved forward.
Toward Lee Jang-woo.
Thud, thud, thud.
My heavy footsteps, laden with emotion, drew Lee Jang-woo’s gaze to me, and he immediately panicked, stumbling backward toward the road.
Screech! Bang!
I grabbed his arm and pulled him back, then twisted my lips as I stared into Lee Jang-woo’s eyes.
“Now I know everything.”
“W-what? How? Here?”
“But there’s something more important than that.”
Lee Jang-woo’s pupils trembled violently, as though he had seen a ghost.
Don’t give me that look.
You have no right to.
“Lee Jang-woo, you are not afflicted by a curse.”
Lee Jang-woo flinched in surprise, his eyes widening.
“What is attached to you is a Malevolent Spirit. Her name is Kim Hee-hyun.”
“…A M-Malevolent Spirit?”
“A Victim Spirit born from your own words.”
“…W-what are you… No!”
Lee Jang-woo trembled violently.
Just as Kim Hee-hyun had when she was being beaten by him.
“Salvation is impossible. The spirit attached to you finds happiness in that state—how could salvation ever be possible?”
“Ah, ahhh!”
Thump.
Lee Jang-woo’s legs gave out beneath him, and he staggered backward before collapsing to the ground. Far away, Shin Jung-ah turned her gaze aside, silently cursing under her breath.
Shin Yoseph, watching them both, brought his clenched fist to his chest.
His expression had sunk so deeply that it seemed as though he were offering a requiem prayer for Kim Hee-hyun.
“I will not help you. Live as you do now until the moment your life ends.”
Lee Jang-woo’s face contorted miserably.
His lips hung open grotesquely, and his eyes had turned desperate.
“Please, please. Please help me. Help me. Please.”
“Lee Jang-woo.”
“Please! Damn it!”
Lee Jang-woo’s face twisted hideously as he spat out the curse.
“Get this damn spirit off me, you bastard!”
Shouting as though seized by a fit, he immediately threw his arms around Kang Hyung-seok’s thighs.
“Please, please! I’m dying like this. I can’t sleep, I can’t eat! I’m really dying! Living people need to live. Don’t they deserve to live?”
“No.”
Kang Hyung-seok continued, his voice carefully controlled as he looked down at Lee Jang-woo clinging to him.
“You don’t deserve that.”
You are not someone worthy of receiving help.
With those words, Kang Hyung-seok gazed down at Lee Jang-woo with eyes as cold as ice.

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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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