An Office Worker Is Good At Exorcism - Chapter 23

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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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Chapter 23
Part 8. Spirit, Spirit, Spirit (1)
A low rumble echoed through the darkness.
The road to the Bean Field felt unfamiliar.
It was the difference between day and night.
An ordinary desolate highway seemed sinister now, and the distant Mountain appeared as something fundamentally wrong.
Kang Hyung-seok kept his expression rigid as he guided the car toward the Bean Field, following the navigation system’s instructions.
A crackling sound burst from the speakers.
To dispel the silence, I had turned on the radio, and a monotone news anchor’s voice drifted through the car.
“An unidentified mutilated corpse has been discovered in the foothills of Gangwon Province, and police have launched an investigation.”
This wasn’t the kind of news I wanted to hear.
Kang Hyung-seok shifted his gaze toward the radio, his heart heavy.
“Police found a body at the scene that had been severed into multiple pieces. The victim has been identified as a young girl between seven and eight years old…”
Kang Hyung-seok exhaled a deep, weary sigh through parted lips.
I lived an ordinary life while walking the path of Shamanism.
That’s why such incidents struck me with such brutal clarity.
The terror, suffering, and resentment the victim endured didn’t feel distant.
Among the countless Victim Spirits I had encountered, many wailed in despair.
Having heard their sorrow so vividly, Kang Hyung-seok could only pray that the victim’s soul would find salvation.
“You will arrive at your destination shortly. Navigation complete.”
Kang Hyung-seok parked the car a short distance from the Bean Field and stepped out, bag in hand.
‘Can it really be this dark?’
The remote Bean Field that had seemed ordinary in daylight now emanated an ominous aura beneath the darkness.
Chirp, chirp, chirp!
Surrounded by the chorus of insects, Kang Hyung-seok retrieved a small lantern from his bag.
Click.
True to its bargain-store origins, the brightness left something to be desired.
Still, it was sufficient to avoid the rocks and holes that lurked in the darkness, waiting to trip him.
Step, step.
Illuminating only a narrow circle about the size of two open palms, Kang Hyung-seok moved forward slowly.
A wooden post marked with nails.
That’s where I would start my search.
Step, step.
As Kang Hyung-seok approached, shining the lantern on the nail marks in the wood, he rotated his backpack to the front.
He unzipped the pencil case inside and withdrew the Shaman’s Bell, gripping it in his right hand.
Ring, ring!
As the Shaman’s Bell chimed, the air around me grew lighter.
It wasn’t imagination—it was real.
The oppressive weight that had been pressing on my chest, the stagnant energy that had blocked my path, began to dissipate.
“Heaven is pure, earth is pure, origin is pure, proximity is pure.”
Warang! Wa-ra-ra-rang!
“Cleanse the great impurity, the middle impurity, the dog impurity, the horse impurity.”
Kang Hyung-seok stood before the tree, driving away the surrounding spiritual energy with the purification ritual.
“Today, with the sincerity of my disciples’ eyes witnessing, ears hearing, mouth speaking impurity, food impurity, fishiness impurity, rankness impurity, upper gate impurity, true impurity, spirit impurity.”
This tree definitely harbored something.
The malevolent aura was so potent and toxic that it felt like it was pushing against my body.
Wa-ra-ra-rang!
Kang Hyung-seok shook the Shaman’s Bell vigorously, then reached out and traced his fingers along the hollow in the tree.
The hollow wasn’t particularly deep.
Wood had grown back inside it.
‘Ten years? Twenty years?’
At minimum, that much time had clearly passed.
Who on earth had performed a ritual offering here, and for what purpose?
Kang Hyung-seok stood staring at the tree, his lips pressed firmly together.
Wa-rang!
Suddenly, a chill from behind made Kang Hyung-seok spin around so sharply the Shaman’s Bell rattled.
The lantern followed his gaze, illuminating the darkness.
“…Who are you?”
There had been no one there moments before.
But now a tall woman in black clothing stood beyond the bean field.
A spade in one hand, a straw doll in the other.
Wa-ra-rang!
The Shaman’s Bell rang of its own accord, yet the woman’s form did not disappear.
Then she was not a malevolent spirit.
Yet she didn’t seem to be real either.
What person in this world could emit such an aura?
‘A phantom? An illusion…?’
If not that, then the house spirit was showing me what had transpired in this place.
Soft, soft footsteps.
Her unkempt long hair scattered in the night breeze as the woman turned her head rapidly, surveying her surroundings as if searching for something.
She was certainly not a real person.
If she were, she would have spotted Kang Hyung-seok by now and either fled or attacked.
Crack, crack.
As if concealing her anxiety, the woman bit her thumbnail until it cracked, slowly approaching Kang Hyung-seok.
As the distance closed, I could finally see the woman’s face.
Was that really a person?
Her disheveled hair was unsettling, and her all-black attire like a reaper was grotesque, but nothing compared to her eyes.
Her upturned eyes were shot through with blood vessels.
Soft, soft. Crack!
Biting her nails as she passed Kang Hyung-seok, the woman looked around and brought the doll to the tree.
Then she pulled out a nail and placed it on top of the doll’s head,
Thwack!
swinging the hammer to drive the nail through the doll and into the tree.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
Kang Hyung-seok, illuminating the woman driving nails at a frenzied pace with his lantern, shifted his gaze to the doll.
Thwack!
Each time the hammer swung, the doll’s chest flinched like a living person, strands of hair protruding from it.
“Die, die! You damn bitch! You worthless whore! I’d tear you to shreds and it still wouldn’t be enough!”
The woman’s voice was so saturated with malice that merely hearing it sent chills down one’s spine.
Why, exactly?
For what reason?
Who was she cursing with such venom?
“Yoon Bo-mi, you damn bitch! Die! Please!”
The woman’s eyes rolled wildly as she shrieked her curse at the doll.
***
Crunch.
At the motel, Namgoong Min-ah was enjoying a quiet moment.
She munched on potato chips she’d bought from the convenience store, had an OTT streaming service playing on the TV, and held her phone wedged between her shoulder and cheek.
Ring, ring.
“She’s not picking up,” Namgoong Min-ah muttered.
With a resigned expression, she gripped the phone in her hand.
Perhaps because she’d come to Danyang after so long.
About five years ago, when SNS was trending, she’d happened to reconnect with an elementary school friend and decided to call her.
Namgoong Min-ah was about to hang up on the unanswered call with a disappointed look.
“Hello?”
“Hey! Why aren’t you picking up?”
“Um? Who is this?”
The woman who had spoken in a high voice now opened her mouth with a polite tone.
“Is this Seo Jin-ah’s phone?”
“Yes, it is. Namgoong Min-ah?”
“Oh! What?”
“Haha, what’s up? Calling out of the blue?”
Namgoong Min-ah patted her chest and brought the potato chip to her mouth.
“I came to Danyang on a business trip. I just thought of you after all this time, so I called.”
“Really? You should’ve let me know beforehand. Should I come over to where you are?”
“No, I’d feel too bad about that. I just wanted to hear your voice, that’s all.”
Namgoong Min-ah sat on the edge of the bed, swinging her legs slightly as she smiled faintly.
A call with an old friend always brings back memories.
“This is nice, brings back the old days. You know that friend who used to do that spirit summoning thing with me?”
“Ah…”
While Namgoong Min-ah’s excitement soared, Seo Jin-ah’s response grew subdued.
“Huh? You don’t remember?”
(No, of course I remember. You two were close.)
“Yeah! Do you have a friend who’s still in contact with her? Let’s all meet up next time.”
(…You really don’t know.)
A voice so low it couldn’t be dismissed as mere mood.
Namgoong Min-ah, who had been reaching for the potato chips, furrowed her brow and opened her mouth.
“Know what?”
(She… things weren’t good for her. In a lot of ways.)
“…What wasn’t?”
(Was it about six months after you moved? Her mom died and then her dad remarried right away? But apparently there was some talk about it.)
Hearing something she’d never known before, Namgoong Min-ah pressed her phone tighter against her ear, her brow furrowing deeper.
“What do you mean? Did something bad happen to her?”
(Well. Um….)
“Tell me. What happened?”
(It’s just that… her Stepmother apparently despised Yoon Bo-mi terribly.)
At the troubling news about her closest friend, Namgoong Min-ah’s face grew increasingly rigid.
“So? What happened to the Stepmother?”
(I’m not entirely sure about that part, but more importantly… Bo-mi, she…)
“Yeah.”
(You probably won’t be able to see her anymore.)
It was at this moment.
Namgoong Min-ah felt her lips trembling involuntarily, her eyes growing moist.
It was intuition, but she understood.
That something terrible had happened to Yoon Bo-mi—something grave enough to make Seo Jin-ah speak in such a hushed tone.
(She disappeared. There’s been no word since.)
She’s probably dead.
At Seo Jin-ah’s added words, Namgoong Min-ah felt the world darken before her eyes.
***
Crack!
With a loud sound, the final nail drove home.
The woman’s gasping breath, her eyes wide and fierce.
Watching the woman perform the ritual right beside him, Kang Hyung-seok felt as though he had stepped into someone else’s dream.
Whoooosh!
But the sound and light of a cargo truck passing on the distant road forcefully reminded him of reality before disappearing beyond the darkness.
Swish.
He shone the lantern at the woman, but received no response.
As if she couldn’t perceive Kang Hyung-seok or the light at all.
Thanks to that, Kang Hyung-seok could observe the woman calmly.
There was nothing particularly special about her, but the straw doll was different.
‘Cinnabar ink…?’
A yellowed talisman made of red characters clearly written in cinnabar ink.
It made no immediate sense.
Cinnabar ink was difficult for ordinary people to obtain, and talismans were even more so.
A Shaman had helped with this ritual.
What kind of insane Shaman would have done something like this, prepared to face severe punishment?
Ding-a-ling!
As if answering Kang Hyung-seok’s question, the Shaman’s Bell rang and the woman’s figure vanished.
And a different vision began to fill the Bean Field.
The darkness disappeared and the location changed to a home, where the woman and a young girl appeared.
Smack! Crack! Crack!
“I told you not to go into the Spirit Shrine!”
“Waaaaah! Waaaaah!”
The child looked to be around fourth grade at Elementary School.
As the brutally beaten child screamed, the woman hastily covered the girl’s mouth.
Mmmph!”
The woman, who had even covered the child’s nose so she couldn’t breathe, struck the girl’s belly with a vicious glare in her eyes.
Thwack! Thud!
With each blow, the child’s body convulsed.
It was a sight almost unbearable to witness, yet Kang Hyung-seok could only watch.
This was a vision revealed by his body’s guardian spirit—a past event.
A skilled Shaman’s guardian spirit reveals the past.
By the same principle, his guardian spirit was now revealing the incident entangled with this Bean Field.
Whack! Thud! Crack! Smack!
The woman, who struck only the areas cleverly hidden by clothing, breathed heavily.
“If only you didn’t exist, I could live a normal life…”
Why did a child like you have to come along?
Everything would be fine without you.
Why do I have to raise someone else’s brat?
And why does such a woman even possess divine power.
As the woman’s thoughts invaded Kang Hyung-seok’s mind, he whipped his head around.
Beyond the half-open door lay the Spirit Shrine.
Like any Shamanic Temple, it displayed shamanic paintings and statues embodying the divine, with a small altar platform standing before them.
‘So you wrote it.’
The talisman affixed to the doll had not been written by another Shaman.
It was the girl’s mother.
Kang Hyung-seok stared at the woman as though she were something that should not exist, his face contorting with revulsion.
“Why? For what reason….”
He stopped mid-sentence, his lips trembling at the edges as they clamped shut, rigid as a strangled man’s.
Even now, in this very moment, the woman’s thoughts poured into his mind.
Thoughts no human should harbor.
Thoughts no Shaman should harbor.
Swish.
The woman, who had been pouring out violence, suddenly brushed back the girl’s hair.
The hatred had vanished from her eyes.
Instead, they gleamed with a different, more repugnant emotion.
“Will you give it to me?”
Your life. Your divine power.
The woman—a Shaman and the girl’s Stepmother—looked down at the girl with unmistakable murderous intent blazing in her eyes.

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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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