An Office Worker Is Good At Exorcism - Chapter 247
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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 246
Part 7. A Fate Decided from the Beginning (1)
Thud! Thud!
Hong Kyung-soo continued to strike the stake with his bare hands.
As he did, he muttered some incantation, but the words came so rapidly that they were incomprehensible.
Yet it was clear this was no ordinary chant.
“Kyaaaaaaagh!”
With each strike of the stake, bloody foam churned from the Jangsan Tiger’s mouth.
“Kang Hyung-seok!”
Hong Kyung-soo called out to Kang Hyung-seok, blood-tinged saliva spraying from his lips.
His words were fragmented, making it impossible to discern what he wanted.
Thud!
“Eaaaaaaagh!”
The scream—so piercing it seemed to tear the very soul of the listener—made Kang Hyung-seok tighten his grip on the spirit blade.
He then swung the spirit blade toward the Jangsan Tiger’s eyes.
Squelch!
Unlike when the blade had pierced its hide, the spirit blade now drove deep into the Jangsan Tiger’s eye socket.
“Kyeaaaaaaagh!”
An even more terrible scream.
A torrent of malice and venom poured forth.
Kang Hyung-seok retreated from the Jangsan Tiger, gasping for breath.
His right hand, gripping the spirit blade, was drenched in warm blood.
“Aaaagh! Ueaaaagh!”
The Jangsan Tiger, its eye burst open, thrashed across the ground.
It had been struck in the head by the force Hong Kyung-soo had unleashed, and now dark crimson blood poured from its eyes, mouth, and nose, causing the talisman that had covered its eye to slip and dangle loosely.
Through that gap, Kang Hyung-seok caught sight of the Jangsan Tiger’s eye and involuntarily flinched.
‘Those eyes…’
They were not the eyes of a beast.
The Jangsan Tiger’s eyes, with their whites more exposed than their pupils, were far closer to human eyes than to those of any animal.
With those eyes, the Jangsan Tiger glared at Kang Hyung-seok, its black lips twisting with what seemed like resentment.
The Jangsan Tiger lunged again.
Whoooooosh!
A stronger wind swept in, scattering the Jangsan Tiger’s venom, and Hong Kyung-soo’s chant became audible at last.
“By the Eight Gates Golden Seal Formation, I invoke the divine generals and beseech the fulfillment of this prayer.”
The Eight Gates Chant.
A scripture that establishes the formation through the Eight Gates Golden Seal Formation, invokes the divine generals, and drives out malevolent spirits and demons that trespass and cause chaos.
“The Void-Hearing Divine General of the Northern Realm’s Gangjung Lotus, with the celestial stems of Jiazi, Bingzi, Wuzi, Gengzi, and Renzi, commands the five generals of the left position with spears and swords in all directions.”
Kang Hyung-seok turned to look at Hong Kyung-soo and swallowed hard.
Then he too began to recite the incantation.
“Radiant Divine Iron Armor, Demon-Binding Great General, Jade Emperor’s Lion Guide, Iron Net Great General, Celestial Realm’s Lion Guide, Iron Net Great General.”
The iron mesh mirror produced an effect similar to the Eight Gates Mirror.
Whoooosh!
With the wind that shook the entire mountain added to this, the Jangsan Tiger was firmly bound in place and couldn’t lunge at me.
“Gyaaaaaaah! Gyaaaaah!”
The Jangsan Tiger thrashed its head wildly, shrieking with a blood-curdling cry.
With each movement, blood sprayed in all directions, and droplets splattered across my face.
“Celestial Venerable of Heaven, Iron Mesh General. Primordial Sovereign, Iron Mesh General. Five Elements Sovereign, Iron Mesh General. Eight Winds Sovereign, Iron Mesh General.”
Yet I continued chanting the incantation.
‘I must restrain it at all costs.’
If that creature used its dark sorcery again, there was no guarantee things would go as smoothly as before.
I had to seize the opportunity while it presented itself.
I had to completely end the Jangsan Tiger’s power.
“Twenty-Eight Mansions, Iron Mesh General. Thirty-Three Heavens, Iron Mesh General. Earth Division Commander, Iron Mesh General. Water Division Dragon King, Iron Mesh General.”
“With each direction’s spear and sword forming the formation, and the Commander of the Closed Gate directing, the Closed Gate Seal is firmly shut and guarded.”
“Five Directions Eight Directions, Iron Mesh General. Direct Subordinate Eight Gods, Iron Mesh General. Five Elements Guardians, Iron Mesh General. Nine Luminaries Nine Yangs, Iron Mesh General. Six Heavenly Stems Six Heavenly Stems, Iron Mesh General.”
“Compress and bind within, so that the spirit cannot escape. In the Axis Gate of the Life Gate Deity of the Ox Axis Direction, the Ox Axis Five Generals are foremost.”
Hong Kyung-soo, of one mind with me, focused on reciting the Eight Gates Mirror.
“Kyyyyaaaah!”
The Eight Gates Mirror and the Iron Mesh Mirror.
And the wind blessed by the dragon’s protection.
Resisting these forces, the Jangsan Tiger tried to rise but collapsed as if bearing an enormous boulder, its face pressed to the ground as it gasped for breath.
Then its belly heaved and it retched violently.
“Guuuueeeech!”
The partially digested calf it had swallowed flowed from the Jangsan Tiger’s mouth in fragments.
My face hardened like stone as I saw the calf’s remains that had already begun to decompose.
“…You should have eaten you too.”
The Jangsan Tiger, its face pressed to the ground, looked up at me and continued speaking.
“Should have torn open your belly the moment you were born.”
“…What?”
“Should have bitten the throats of your mother and father and eaten their livers after tearing open their bellies.”
The Jangsan Tiger rolled its eyes back and forth, alternating its gaze between Hong Kyung-soo and me.
As if it had known all along that if it had eliminated these two long ago, this moment would never have come.
“Insect bastards, monkey bastards, wretches whose limbs I’ll tear apart.”
That was when it happened.
I watched as the Jangsan Tiger’s tongue increasingly swept across the inside of its mouth.
It was buying time.
It was trying to retrieve the White Fox Seal from inside its mouth.
“Hong Kyung-soo, Shaman!”
I shouted loudly while looking at the Jangsan Tiger, and Hong Kyung-soo pulled out the stake and brought its sharp end to where its eyes would be.
Then he brought his right hand down with all his strength, driving the stake downward.
“KYAAAAAAAAAAGH!”
A scream tore from the Jangsan Tiger’s mouth.
It was a shriek as if his entrails were being ripped from his living body, yet the Jangsan Tiger’s vicious tongue did not cease.
“I should have killed you! Should have killed you! I should have killed you! I will kill you!”
Kang Hyung-seok felt a chill running down his spine.
There exists something called verbal karma.
Karma accumulated through words spoken aloud.
If words carry no power, no karma is accumulated.
“I’ll tear you to shreds! When you set foot in the village, I’ll bite off your head and swallow it whole!”
But these words carried power.
This is also called a word-curse.
“You will not die peacefully! You will die in agony, and your descendants and kinfolk will all meet untimely deaths.”
What poured from the Jangsan Tiger’s mouth was no mere insult.
It was the word-curse of a creature who had lived for countless ages, a curse with tangible force.
Feeling his mouth go dry, Kang Hyung-seok forced his lips open.
“…Why curse like this?”
The Jangsan Tiger’s eyes flickered as he glared at Kang Hyung-seok with murderous intent.
“There must be a reason for this.”
There had to be a clear reason for such obsession.
Just as Kang Hyung-seok, conscious of the spirit blade in his hand, was about to approach the Jangsan Tiger—
CRACK!
Hong Kyung-soo drove a stake deep into the straw effigy.
Then he thrust his hand into the position where the effigy’s mouth would be and yanked the stake out.
“KYAAAAAAAGH!”
Though it was the straw effigy’s head that was pierced through, it was the Jangsan Tiger who writhed in agony.
“Hyung-seok.”
Hong Kyung-soo’s cry seized Kang Hyung-seok’s attention.
“Don’t listen to that creature’s tongue!”
Hong Kyung-soo’s eyes gleamed with vigilance as sharp as the Jangsan Tiger’s own.
“It’s not over yet! That beast’s breath must stop!”
“Gack! Wheeegh!”
A severed tongue spilled from the Jangsan Tiger’s mouth.
Now would be the time to relent, yet the Jangsan Tiger’s eyes still glimmered with hatred.
“Ack! Aaack! Ack!”
Prostrate on the ground, the Jangsan Tiger retched—was it to cough up blood?
Or to expel the White Fox Incantation?
“Sever its life force!”
Hong Kyung-soo was urging him on.
Kang Hyung-seok knew it had to be done.
Otherwise, the Jangsan Tiger would continue to resist.
“Cut that bastard’s throat with the Exorcist Blade!”
At Hong Kyung-soo’s cry, I pressed my lips firmly together.
Then I sheathed the Exorcist Blade and slipped it into my pocket.
The Jangsan Tiger’s eyes and Hong Kyung-soo’s gaze converged upon me.
I could sense what they were thinking, but I shook my head.
“I’ll finish this myself.”
Speaking in a murmur, I gazed down at the Jangsan Tiger with a calm, settled expression.
The Jangsan Tiger’s expression darkened as his eyes alone moved upward to meet mine.
It seemed as though he sensed something in my gaze.
“Dong-gwan?”
Hong Kyung-soo called out to me.
What he wanted was to annihilate the Jangsan Tiger with the Exorcist Blade.
But that would not do.
Hong Kyung-soo had certainly offered his aid.
Yet the situation could not end according to his will.
The instinctive conviction that it must be this way flooded my mind.
“Eastern Azure Emperor’s Lion, Southern Crimson Emperor’s Lion, Western White Emperor’s Lion.”
Chanting the exorcism sutra, I placed the Shaman’s Bell into my pocket as well.
The Exorcist Blade and Shaman’s Bell that hadn’t fully fit jutted out awkwardly, but I paid no mind and stepped forward, my gaze fixed upon the Jangsan Tiger.
Toward a place other than the Jangsan Tiger.
Toward where the bonfire burned.
“Eastern Azure Emperor’s Lion, Southern Crimson Emperor’s Lion, Western White Emperor’s Lion.”
Clatter.
Then I seized a burning wooden branch from the bonfire and a vessel of potent spirits in each hand.
“Northern Black Emperor’s Lion, Central Yellow Emperor’s Lion—each shall command the exorcist soldiers.”
Fire.
It must end with fire.
Fire symbolizes purification; only fire can completely annihilate that vicious White Fox.
Thud.
I approached the Jangsan Tiger, the vessel of spirits and burning branch in hand.
“Twilight fire returns, male and female ghosts; sudden violent death, male and female ghosts; poisonous demons, male and female ghosts.”
Heaven and earth, male and female ghosts; accidental death, male and female ghosts.
Innocent lives invaded by ghosts; death spirits and malevolent spirits.
Timber yard and lumber spirits; earth-bound vengeful ghosts.
“Wandering souls and stray demons; those who kill like tigers; lawless villains and carriage-axle demons.”
Not resolution of grudges, but exorcism.
I advanced toward the Jangsan Tiger, whose hateful gaze still burned upon me.
“Eaaaaaaah.”
The Jangsan Tiger met me with a vicious glare, his vocal cords trembling as he cursed through his lips alone, and I opened the lid of the vessel.
“…Exhale.”
Hearing Hong Kyung-soo’s disapproving sigh, I poured the liquor from the barrel over the Jangsan Tiger.
It was potent soju infused with Chinese spirits.
Liquor prepared specifically to lure the Jangsan Tiger.
The acrid stench of alcohol pierced my nostrils, drenching the creature’s fur and pooling across the ground.
Splash, splash, splash, splash!
Having emptied the entire barrel, I raised the burning wooden torch in my hand to chest height.
“Burned to death—the fire spirit. Drowned to death—the Water Spirit. Cut to death—the sword spirit.”
Then, watching the Jangsan Tiger still glaring at me, I hurled the torch.
Whoosh! Crackle, crackle, crackle!
“Eeeeyaaaaaahhhhh!”
The Jangsan Tiger began to burn.
Pitch-black smoke erupted skyward, and the acrid reek of burning flesh spread in all directions.
Backing away from the massive inferno that the Jangsan Tiger had become, I continued chanting the exorcism scripture.
So that it would be completely annihilated.
So that it would vanish from this land forever.
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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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