CNC 188

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For several weeks now, when the weather was cloudy, it rained instead of snow.

Yesterday, when the sky had been a dull gray all day, the end had also been the sound of rain.

“Haa.”

White breath rose from Choi Hong-seo’s sigh. He raised his head. Against the backdrop of the dark blue pre-dawn sky, white snow was fluttering. It was the first snow they had waited for.

When he left the hotel, the rain had already long since turned into heavy snow. Perhaps because of the snow, the world was quieter than usual. The heavy noise of large vehicles like buses and trucks from the distant road could be heard faintly.

He had known the location of Teacher Lee Jong-ik’s shrine for a while.

He had found out the day he received Kim Yi-jung’s business card. It was on a steep slope in Seongbuk-gu, where houses were packed closely together. The modest, ‘ㅁ’-shaped hanok had no common flag indicating it was a shaman’s house.

With the decline of the shamanistic faith, it was said that even most successful shamans now rented and paid for Gudangs when needed. Even in this day and age, the Teacher was so influential that he had a large Gudang deep in the Gangwon mountains, but he had not left this shrine, which he had first properly established in his youth.

Choi Hong-seo looked up at the white snow blanketing the roof tiles of the hanok.

Little by little, blue light was pushing away the black from the edge of the sky.

Even after leaving the hotel and getting into a taxi to give the address, he hesitated for a long time before calling the Teacher.

But the Teacher answered before the bell had rung twice, his voice showing no sign of sleepiness. As if he had been waiting. At the end of his words, saying the door would be open anytime as time was not an issue, tears he couldn’t explain had flowed.

Sir…

He hoped he wouldn’t be too surprised.

As he slipped out of his side like a ghost without substance, Lee Hae-sung was asleep, groaning as if suffering from nightmares, his brow deeply furrowed. Forgetting his haste, he gazed at his pitiful appearance for a while before leaving a memo on the pillow and exiting the room.

He would wait.

He wouldn’t meet that person alone before he arrived, but he would wait.

“He’ll come…”

Stroking his arm downwards, Choi Hong-seo muttered. The coat he had worn yesterday to meet Jo Seong-hyeon wasn’t enough to ward off the cold of the winter dawn. He rubbed his bare hands together, blew his breath into them, and then put them back in his pockets. He pulled the collar of his coat up high.

He’ll come.

And he probably won’t even get angry.

The light from a distant streetlight cast a faint glow on Choi Hong-seo, who was lingering in front of the old wooden gate.

Crunch.

Crunch, crunch.

His heart pounded at the sound of footsteps approaching through the softly piled snow. His heart beat faster, and heat rose to his face.

With my chin tucked, my gaze naturally fell downwards, and a pair of shoeless sneakers stopped in their tracks. They were facing Choi Hong-seo’s sneakers, no more than a step or two away.

Haa…

A sigh, as if emptying all the air from his lungs, could be heard. Even that was enough to make his eyes sting, and Choi Hong-seo couldn’t lift his head. He didn’t want to cry. He didn’t want to be seen as a child who needed to be comforted and protected any longer. He clenched his fist tightly in his pocket.

“Our Baby has quite the stubborn streak.”

“……”

Creak.

He took another step closer, and a warm muffler was wrapped around Choi Hong-seo’s neck. He’s not angry, then… Only then did he slowly lift his head.

“Why did you come alone, when you’re looking around nervously like Tiffany after causing trouble?”

As he wrapped the muffler, Lee Hae-sung glanced down at Choi Hong-seo, chiding him lightly.

“If I had asked you to come with me, you would have said no, wouldn’t you, Ajusshi.”

“……”

“Are you angry?”

“Should I tell you honestly?”

Choi Hong-seo nodded his head vigorously. Lee Hae-sung, who had tied the muffler with a neat hand after wrapping it around his neck a couple of times, met his eyes while holding the end of the muffler.

“Deep down, I think I might have wanted you to do this. I don’t think I would have had the courage to bring you here myself…”

Haa, with a heavy sigh, Lee Hae-sung looked up at the roof of the hanok.

“Even now, I don’t expect that shaman can do anything.”

“……”

“That it’s no use even if I take you to America. I’ve just come to accept that.”

Lee Hae-sung’s hand, which had been holding the muffler, dropped down. Choi Hong-seo gently took hold of his fingertips.

“Even if the Manshin tells you to, I won’t do anything you say no to. I won’t make you worry. Truly.”

“Even though you didn’t keep your promise not to make me anxious?”

“That…”

He let out a weak chuckle. Then, Lee Hae-sung pulled the fingertips Choi Hong-seo was fiddling with, guiding his arm around his body. Nestled in his embrace, burying his lips in his shoulder, the chill that had penetrated to the core of his body seemed to melt away.

“Hong-seo-ya.”

“……”

“Do you remember what you said before?”

“I remember everything I said to you, Ajusshi.”

He was the only person with whom he had shared affection in his short life. The moments with him were the only times worth remembering.

“That someone like me could do anything I wanted in the world.”

“It was a childish thing to say.”

“No, actually, I lived my life thinking I was like that too.”

“……”

“But, someone I met… someone who had no one else in the world to rely on but themselves… I couldn’t protect them. Yet, that person still had only me… even in another body, they came to find me, and even though that person was sick and scared and crying… I couldn’t fix them. This time again… when I think I might not be able to protect that person…”

His voice trembled more violently than ever. Choi Hong-seo deliberately didn’t lift his eyes to confirm his face. He just gripped his coat tighter and listened only to his voice.

They held each other, sharing warmth in the falling snow. It was the first snow they had waited for. It was the first snow he had seen with him. It was the first snow.

After a long while, finally regaining his composure, he carefully pulled Choi Hong-seo from his embrace.

“Even if this shaman can’t solve it, by any means necessary…”

Lee Hae-sung’s hand cupped Choi Hong-seo’s cheek. His thumb gently brushed over his skin. Over the spots.

“I will make all of this heal. I will make sure you don’t collapse.”

Rubbing his cheek against his warm hand, Choi Hong-seo nodded his head several times.

“Yes, I have no worries.”

Piercing through the gray clouds shedding snow, a deeper blue light began to rise in the world. The city was waking from its deep slumber. The two held hands tightly and ascended the stairs towards the gate.

The moment he grasped the ring-shaped doorknob to knock, creeeak. The door swung inward. They looked at each other. Just as the teacher had said they would leave the door open anytime.

From the annex visible on the right, someone carefully closed a door and came out. The man was not surprised to see the two strangers entering the gate. The man, who introduced himself as the teacher’s disciple, guided them in with a polite demeanor.

It was a small, simple room, with nothing but a vibrantly colored scroll hanging on the wall, cushions, and a table. The ceiling of the old hanok was so low that Lee Hae-sung had to stoop.

Choi Hong-seo, who had expected a room housing a shrine adorned with colorful decorations and paintings, with candles lit in rows, looked around the small, unremarkable room repeatedly.

“If they’re not a client coming for divination, is there a need to treat this as a shrine?”

As if reading his mind, the teacher muttered and entered the room. The two rose from their seats and bowed respectfully. The teacher, who had taken a seat on a cushion beyond the table without acknowledging their greeting, scrutinized Choi Hong-seo’s face with sharp eyes.

“So you’ve come only after reaching this state.”

The accusatory tone was directed at Lee Hae-sung.

Lee Hae-sung still seemed displeased about their visit. Fearing a potential clash between them, Choi Hong-seo quickly stepped closer to the table and spoke.

“Um, Teacher, I have something I want to ask. Last time at the Gutdang, you asked me… why ghosts gain bodies and corpses gain souls… I want to know the reason you said that.”

“Don’t you already know well?”

“……”

“The body you inhabit has already reached its end, so it is a corpse, and you within it, having only a soul without a body, are a ghost. Did you come because you didn’t know that?”

“Then… you know that I am not Yoon Hye-an, right?”

It was a story no one would believe. He didn’t expect to be understood by anyone other than Lee Hae-sung. Just knowing that someone recognized that fact made him feel like he could breathe a little easier. He felt happy and grateful.

Choi Hong-seo, who had knelt and moved forward, unconsciously fumbled for Lee Hae-sung’s hand. His hand reached out and held his tightly.

“When you say the body’s end has come, meaning it’s a corpse… does that mean Yoon Hye-an’s body was originally supposed to have died?”

The teacher’s sharp eyes gazed at Choi Hong-seo.

“If you hadn’t donned that fellow’s clothes in the Three Realms and ascended from the underworld, that’s what would have happened.”

“The Three… Realms?”

The teacher added calmly as his disciple poured tea into a cup.

“It’s a metaphor. After death, who governs the world, God, Buddha, or the tens of thousands of Hindu gods? Who knows? It’s a metaphor. It’s not your fault. It’s, shall we say, an error that occurred.”

Choi Hong-seo turned and looked at Lee Hae-sung.

“Because the underworld attire was wrongly put on, caught on the spirit tree, due to the mistake of the Three Realms’ ghost grandmother… May the spirits have mercy. This spirit’s sin is not theirs.”

The teacher’s words at the Gangwon-do Gutdang faintly came to mind.

“How can we correct that error?”

This time, Lee Hae-sung stepped forward. The teacher’s eyes, which had been silently drinking tea, turned towards him.

“Is it a Gut? We will pay any amount of money. However, it must show results as confidently as you speak.”

Choi Hong-seo was anxious, wondering if the teacher would scold him immediately. However, contrary to his worries, the teacher smiled, lifting his thin lips. It was a smile as cold as if he were biting a knife.

“The murderous intent is so sharp, it’s like an Indian goblin ravenously hungry for a taste of blood.”

Lee Hae-sung’s eyebrows twitched for a moment.

He had thought the divinations thrown by shamans were just vague wordplay, like ‘earrings for the ears, rings for the nose.’ But these words seemed to precisely discern his plan to harm Jo Seong-hyeon.

“So, you say you’ll pay any amount of money? Do you think you can buy a god’s favor with money? What have you saved this person with, with the value of your worldly name, your money?”

The teacher pointed at Choi Hong-seo and clicked his tongue loudly at Lee Hae-sung. Then, after taking a couple of sips of tea, he changed his expression and gave a crooked smile as if finding it amusing.

“Go ahead and try.”

“……”

“Even if I tell you, you won’t reach it in your current state. It’s a door that no human without faith can even glimpse.”

“What do you mean, ‘that place’?”

“It’s not something I can fix. And it’s certainly not a Gut. It’s not a specific god or religion as spoken of in the secular world.”

“Then what is it? Stop talking in riddles and get to the point.”

The teacher rubbed the warm bottom of the teacup with his palm and swayed his body back and forth slightly.

“Forget this foolish idea of going to America and turn your plane around.”

“……”

When the teacher mentioned his plan to go to America, Lee Hae-sung was speechless this time. He held Choi Hong-seo’s hand, which he had been holding all along, even tighter. As if he might snatch Choi Hong-seo away from the shaman before his eyes, he pulled that hand closer to his side.

“Even though it’s not the face of the person who was your lover, how did you believe this person was them? It’s a fact different from what your eyes see.”

“……”

“Isn’t your affection for them ultimately a belief in an unseen concept, showing devotion?”

Lee Hae-sung held Choi Hong-seo tightly by his side, pulling his shoulder strongly. The teacher looked at him, glaring threateningly, with a cold smile as if intrigued.

“Go to Ubud and find Taripa.”

“……”

“With just belief and devotion towards an unseen concept, you will meet that person very simply.”

The teacher did not provide specific locations or much more information. He just told them to go to Ubud and find ‘Taripa.’ He didn’t say if it was a name, or if the person was male or female. He only said he couldn’t provide more information because he didn’t know.

Ubud.

The old town in Bali, Indonesia, where the breath of the ancient Ubud dynasty remains.

Ubud was an unfamiliar name, but Choi Hong-seo knew a little about Bali. Lee Hae-sung’s mansion in Bundang was designed with Bali’s ‘Palace of Water’ and ‘Gate of Heaven’ as motifs. However, he hadn’t expected to go there anytime soon. Therefore, he knew very little.

They left the house’s gate like people possessed by ghosts or goblins. By then, the snow had stopped, and the sky was dyed a deep blue. It was the hour when the city was stretching itself awake.

As if they had been underwater, their breath suddenly cleared. After descending the stairs in front of the gate, they looked at each other. They hesitated to say anything rashly.

Without a word, they held hands and carefully descended the snow-covered alley, getting into the waiting vehicle.

Choi Hong-seo typed ‘Indonesia Bali’ into his phone’s search bar.

Along with the introduction as the world’s best resort and the world’s number one honeymoon destination, another descriptor was added.

Island of the Gods, Bali.

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