WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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Chapter 15: Demon Decarabia (2)

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Yohan looked back and forth between Demon Decarabia and Gari, comparing them.

'Yeah, Gari is definitely scarier-looking.'

How badly had he freaked out the first time he saw Gari?

The very idea that something like that existed had been absurd.

Still, after living with Gari, Yohan had gotten used to it.

He had gotten even more used to it after watching Gari chew up all those terrifying evil spirits.

His threshold for fear had simply gone up.

The prayer's effect was still lingering, but even if it had worn off, he probably would have only found it disgusting.

【H-How are you here...?】

At Decarabia's trembling voice, Yohan tilted his head.

'What, can it see Gari?'

Until now, not even the mages had noticed Gari.

Was that because it was a demon? Was it really different from humans?

What mattered was that the demon called Decarabia seemed to know Gari.

Yohan wanted to ask if it knew anything about Gari, but Kim Mun-ryong spoke first.

"Th-That can't be! There's no way!"

Kim Mun-ryong couldn't understand the situation.

No, he didn't want to understand it.

The demon was trembling.

Decarabia, one of the seventy-two demons, was afraid of Yohan.

No, was it afraid of the existence beyond that exorcist?

A demon could probably perceive something Kim himself couldn't.

Did that mean it was an existence above the demon he had summoned?

Impossible. That couldn't be.

"It's a demon! A demon! There can't be anything in the human world that can oppose one! This is wrong! It's a lie!"

What were demons?

They were beings that transcended every ghost and monster in this world.

Their very nature set them apart, even before their strength came into question.

Yokai, evil spirits, urban legends. They were closer to remnants that arose naturally.

They existed because people feared them, because people created them freely, or because they had inherited ancient bloodlines.

Strictly speaking, they were on the same level as humans or even lower.

Demons were different.

They were evil itself. Symbols of evil. Sentient transcendent beings.

Because their very rank was different, demons held superiority over every living thing in this world.

So what kind of being could make a demon afraid?

It would have to be a god, yet demons would never fear some heathen god.

There was only one god they feared.

Then that thing was... an existence with the same nature as the god demons feared?

"An... angel."

"Huh? Correct."

Really...?

Kim Mun-ryong fell into despair at Yohan's immediate confirmation.

It had only been a guess before, but the other side had confirmed it for him. The result was decided.

An angel. And if even a low-ranking demon was terrified of it...

"Gari, bite."

Clack-clack!

* * *

The members of the Abnormal Ability Response Special Task Division could barely keep their senses amid the Ghost Vein's increasingly violent rampage.

"Ugh! Move in a little closer!"

"It's packed in here already! Go over there!"

Their lifelines were the protective barriers activated around utility poles and throughout the alleyways.

They did not protect only the living.

"Team Leader Joo, you have the bronze mirror, right?"

"Yes, here."

Team Leader Joo Seoyul took out the bronze mirror and aimed it inside the barrier.

There were a lot.

Just an obscene number of them.

Ghosts were packed inside the barrier.

They too were desperately clinging to the barrier, trying not to be swept up in the Ghost Vein's rampage.

The living and the dead alike depended on these barriers to survive.

It was cramped, but they would be safe here.

The problem was that they could do nothing but stay safe.

"Team Leader Kang! Shouldn't we hurry? What if those mage bastards accomplish their goal at this rate..."

"I know! But the situation is terrible! If we leave here, we'll get flattened by the ghosts being swept around like it's a traffic accident!"

The Mystic Association's Abnormal Ability Response Special Task Division was an organization made up of elites.

Their combat abilities were excellent, and they were exceptionally capable when it came to dealing with ghosts and monsters.

Still, there was nothing a small number of people could do against such overwhelming numbers.

Only a handful of monsters could survive an environment this insane.

Just as everyone was forced to wait helplessly.

Flash!

"Th-The sky?"

"What? It's back to normal?"

The world, once dyed red, returned to blue.

The Special Task Division members stood there in confusion, unable to understand what had happened.

"What happened?"

"We need to check! Hurry!"

The Special Task Division members rushed off.

A crowd of people in suits running together was conspicuous, but this was no time to worry about that.

As they approached the source of it all, piercing screams rang out.

"Aaaaaah!"

"W-What is this? The bodies!"

The Special Task Division arrived at the screams and saw the carnage before them.

Corpses lay scattered across the empty lot.

Heads severed, waists cut apart, bodies savaged as though chunks had been bitten out of them. It was a brutal scene of slaughter.

"Drive people away and secure the witnesses!"

"Yes!"

Team Leader Joo used a talisman spell to turn people away.

It was a spell that made people unconsciously avoid approaching.

Those who had already seen the bodies were temporarily restrained so their witness statements could be secured.

After that...

"All right, look here. One, two, three!"

Click!

As the talisman's light flashed, the witnesses' eyes went blank.

The Mystic Association's biggest duty was concealing the supernatural.

To prevent panic in the modern world, they used hypnosis to alter the memories of ordinary people without spiritual abilities.

Sometimes those people remembered later, but it did not matter.

With only a few people speaking out, they would simply be treated as attention seekers.

"Team Leader Joo, this..."

"Yes. They're demon worshippers."

Kang Gihan and Joo Seoyul sensed demonic power from the horribly murdered bodies.

Evil spiritual power was called demonic power, and it could only be found in people contracted to demons or evil spirits.

Every one of the dead was a demon worshipper.

All of them had been brutally murdered.

What was even more horrifying was...

"This is the same case as that exorcist, right?"

"At this point, it's practically a fingerprint."

The bodies had melted into lumps of gelatin.

They were identical to the corpse that had melted together with the Possession Stake earlier.

"You know about the sighting report from the elderly shaman woman in this area a while ago, right?"

"Wolryeong Bodhisattva? She was pretty famous in her younger days."

"Yes. She said she found a Possession Stake with the character for six written on it at Hallym Hospital. She thought it was probably part of a Sevenfold Correction Curse ritual."

The Sevenfold Correction Curse.

It was a large-scale ritual performed by driving seven stakes into the land.

It was difficult because it took a long time to prepare, was troublesome to carry out, and came with many obvious signs.

Normally, it took years.

This Sevenfold Correction Curse had not been very noticeable.

That meant things had moved quickly before anyone could notice.

"Team Leader! It's Kim Mun-ryong! We've confirmed that the second-degree wanted criminal is Kim Mun-ryong!"

"Kim Mun-ryong? He's a real mage?"

He was one of only seventy-two mages in the world who had made direct contracts with demons, not merely brokered a contract.

Kim Mun-ryong was wanted for kidnapping and murdering more than three hundred ordinary people in Busan.

Yet that infamous mage had become a half-melted gelatinous corpse.

"Senior, look here."

Joo Seoyul pointed at pieces of flesh that had been torn apart and scattered in every direction.

At first, they had assumed the flesh belonged to the demon worshippers, but the demonic power compressed within it was too dense to believe it had come from a human.

"Team Leader Joo, don't touch that. It could kill you."

"...I've been doing this long enough to know what's dangerous."

The two looked down at the fragments of flesh scattered across the ground.

"It materialized. It seems beyond the level of Kim Mun-ryong's summoned creature, though. What are you doing, Team Leader Joo?"

"Taking pictures. It shows up normally in photos."

That meant it was not a spirit body.

It had been summoned with an actual physical body.

"...Don't tell me it was a demon."

"They prepared and performed a ritual this big. It would be stranger if it wasn't a demon."

"...No, it's strange either way."

A real mage had taken the time to prepare evil spirits, turn the land into an Ill-Omened Site, and perform a grand ritual.

That usually meant the result was connected to summoning a demon.

And if a demon had been summoned...

"How the hell did they catch it?"

"...Well, it's not impossible. There have been quite a few cases even in modern times."

Joo Seoyul thought of the powerful figures known as <Demon Hunters>, those who had hunted demons.

Madam Park, head of the Mystic Association's Special Task Division.

The thirty-seventh head of the Tsuchimikado Clan in Japan.

The former director of the Black Site of the American Paranormal Phenomena Bureau.

A Paladin of the Vatican Holy Order of Knights.

Going even farther back, Pastor Kim, known as 《Collector》, had also been a famous exorcist.

They were top-tier figures in this line of work, people anyone would recognize by name.

Each one possessed abilities considered representative of the modern age.

"If they're that strong, shouldn't the Association have known about them already?"

"You visited Gangnam Holy Temple Church, didn't you? Didn't they say they were hiding the person there?"

"Right. An exorcist who uses strange familiars. They gave me a warning in person."

An ability user who had seized every familiar that had snuck in as spirit bodies and thrown them outside the church.

They had thought the exorcist was formidable.

They never expected that person to be capable of repelling a demon.

"A new divinity has appeared."

A divinity who was cruel and merciless.

* * *

Once the prayer's effect wore off, my heart pounded for quite a while.

I really had fought mages like that.

"No, Gari. Couldn't you have stopped me? I almost died."

Clack-clack?

"Don't give me that 'I didn't die' crap!"

The prayer's miracle had worked way too well.

I had thought that was a good thing, but it came with side effects too.

"Phew... Still, I somehow managed to solve everything."

I took the Han couple among the freed ghosts and headed to where Gyeoul was.

"Gyeoul!"

【Big brother? Mom! Daaad!】

【Gyeoul!!】

The three, reunited as a family after several months, embraced one another and cried.

When I heard they had become Earthbound Spirits at the hospital, I thought they would never meet again.

Yet getting captured by the mages had freed them from being Earthbound Spirits.

Life had a funny way of turning bad luck around.

"Bodhisattva!"

"Wolryeong Bodhisattva, you're here?"

After contacting Wolryeong Bodhisattva, I asked her to perform a soul-guiding rite for the three of them.

It felt a little strange for a Christian to ask a shaman to perform a ritual, but people had to be saved.

"What should we do, having to hold a soul-guiding rite twice?"

"No, don't worry about it. We owe our lives to you, Bodhisattva. But..."

Wolryeong Bodhisattva smiled warmly.

"It seems a soul-guiding rite will not be necessary. Their resentment has been resolved simply by reuniting. The dark ghostly energy around them has completely disappeared."

"Uh... So should we just watch?"

"Hmm, yes. Since things have worked out this way, why don't you offer a prayer for them, Bodhisattva?"

"Me?"

A prayer?

This was the situation I found most awkward, even though I went to church.

As I hesitated, Han Taek-su, the father, spoke.

【Yohan, thanks to you, our family was able to reunite like this. We were not religious, but... in the end, we want to follow the One you believe in.】

"Uh... Are you converting?"

【We had no religion, so I suppose calling it a conversion isn't quite right.】

Hmm. I had heard at church that I should evangelize whenever I had the chance, but I never expected to evangelize to ghosts after they died.

It felt like I had done something meaningful, and I sank into thought.

"Your wife and Gyeoul too?"

【Yes. More than anything, we have no choice but to believe now. There is even such a radiant angel here.】

【It was a little scary, but I'm okay now!】

Clack-clack!

Gari's teeth clacked happily.

"Then... for you three... No, for everyone who is wandering, I will pray."

I began to pray not only for the Han family, but also for the other spirits gathered nearby.

"God the Father. Merciful God of love. Here are Your lost sons and daughters."

I thought of the spirits.

Why had they become ghosts?

Because they had unresolved resentment.

Regret and pain, fear and bitterness... we called the complex weight of those emotions han.

"Look upon the souls that departed amid tragedy and pain. If they carry lingering regrets, pain, fear, or bitterness, please take them away."

I hoped their han would be resolved.

If it was not something they could resolve themselves, I hoped someone would hold them gently.

So they would not wander in darkness, nor be held captive by sorrow.

"Lead them onto a peaceful path. Let their bitterness return to the earth, and leave only the memories of those they loved."

I hoped they would be comforted.

Even if it was not in God's name.

"Rest and peace. So please, go in peace."

Amen.

At that moment, the Han couple saw light burst outward.

It was a gentle, comforting light, like spring sunshine.

Wings fluttered as though they would embrace everyone and carry them to His side.

【Ah...!】

As their consciousness scattered, the couple... no, every spirit there felt the same thing.

The white wings spread behind the young man's back.

The halo that shone so brilliantly.

They would carry them into the Father's embrace.

* * *

"Phew, we did a good thing."

"Yes, you did a good thing."

After helping the Han family achieve passage to the afterlife, it was time to part ways with Wolryeong Bodhisattva.

"Then I'll get going too. You worked hard today."

"Yes, Bodhisattva. May you be blessed as well."

On the way home, I asked Gari, whose teeth were clacking with delight.

"Are you that happy? Because I made them converts at the end?"

Clack-clack!

Maybe angels were sensitive about evangelizing.

Well, Gari was an angel.

"By the way, demons really can't do anything against angels. I never thought it would get thrashed that badly."

The fight between Demon Decarabia and Gari had been completely one-sided.

Gari bit it, and the demon resisted, but the sight of Gari tearing it apart and chewing it alive was chilling.

Did that mean the demon was dead?

It would be strange if it survived after getting torn apart and swallowed like that.

"But Gari, is it really okay for you to eat demons like that?"

Clack-clack?

Would it get sick?

An angel that ate demons was not exactly the image of an angel I had in mind.

Gari had always been a biter, so I guessed I just had to roll with it.

Then it happened.

Light came from Gari's body.

Huh? Was something happening to Gari?

"Wait, what now?"

It was a reaction similar to when Gari had swallowed the mage's pentagram necklace last time.

A halo had appeared then. What was going to appear this time?

"Huh?"

The moment the light swallowed Gari, I opened my eyes and saw something rotating around it.

It was... a ring, I guess.

A single band circled Gari, like the rings around Saturn.

Countless closed eyes were set densely along that ring.

A huge number of them.

An impossible number of closed eyes circled Gari in a ring.

And then...

"Uh, what? Since when..."

Something felt strange on my finger.

When I checked, a cold metal ring had slipped onto it.

It was a brass ring.

Footnotes:

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