WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 83: Throne and Chariot
──────
After the Samgakji Sanctuary appeared, Mystic Association employees became busy as well.
With evil spirits and yokai around Samgakji being wiped out, an unintended consequence emerged.
Evil spirits and yokai had started gathering to prey on ghost refugees.
The ghosts and powerless yokai that had once been prey were fleeing into the sanctuary, so their hunters were hunting them before they could get there.
"What do we do about that? Leave them alone?"
"It's not like we're obligated to save them."
While observing and investigating the sanctuary, the Association employees refrained from intervening to help the incoming ghost refugees.
They weren't living humans, after all. The employees weren't obligated to rescue ghosts too.
"It doesn't sit right with me. They were people once."
"Don't get emotionally invested. You'll have trouble performing spirit banishment later."
People with deep grudges became ghosts every year.
It would be nice if they could achieve passage to the afterlife, but if passage to the afterlife were that easy, why would they have become ghosts in the first place?
Most failed to achieve passage to the afterlife, wandered the world, and eventually accumulated enough resentment to become evil spirits.
From the Mystic Association's and exorcists' perspectives, ghosts were nothing but potential evil spirits.
They were targets for spirit banishment, not rescue or protection.
"Still... I guess there's no need to worry too much. The sanctuary is close."
"Do you think they'll make it safely?"
"That's not what I mean. The pigeons are out."
At the senior officer's words, the rookie Association employee looked up.
But the pigeons the senior officer mentioned were nowhere to be seen.
"There's nothing there."
"Don't just stare at the ground through the scope. Check the sky too."
The rookie began observing the sky. A flock of pigeons was flying overhead.
"What the hell are those?"
If they appeared in the bronze mirror scope, that meant they were spiritual beings.
But why were there so many pigeon ghosts?
Just as the rookie wondered about that,
【Devour~!】
【Devour~!】
Gigantic female ghosts suddenly raced across the ground.
They burst out of the sanctuary and launched flying kicks at the yokai preying on the refugee ghosts.
Screech!
The yokai died instantly.
No wonder. A body over two meters tall had slammed into it at 150 kilometers per hour.
Any ordinary yokai would have part of its body cave in from that hit, or have broken bones pierce its organs.
【Devour!】
The two Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts weren't fighting barehanded, either.
They swung enormous clubs and axes, literally butchering the evil spirits.
Even with equipment empowered to repel evil, overwhelming a spirit body wasn't easy. Yet they carved them up like radishes.
"Th-Those are Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts, aren't they? And there are two of them? I heard one recently entered Korea..."
"Looks like you haven't kept up with the news. At least ten more have come in."
"What?"
That wasn't wrong.
More than ten Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts had recently been confirmed to be active around the sanctuary.
Over ten beings rated at least quasi-Grade 1 were active in one place.
Seeing them patrol around the sanctuary in perfect coordination, rescuing refugee ghosts and eliminating evil spirits and yokai, they had to be someone's familiars.
"They must be familiars controlled by the sanctuary's owner. Is it even possible to have that many Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts as familiars?"
"Wouldn't controlling high-ranking ghost spirits or yokai as familiars consume enormous spiritual power? Can they handle it?"
"If they're borrowing the power of the domain itself, maintaining them shouldn't be difficult. They'd have limited activity time outside the domain, though..."
Who in the world was the sanctuary's owner?
The Mystic Association higher-ups seemed to have already guessed.
The field agents knew Gangnam Holy Temple Church was involved, but they didn't know who owned the sanctuary.
"Assistant Manager, isn't that dangerous? The evil spirits are especially determined today."
"The pigeons have joined the battle too. You're right... the evil spirits are really determined today."
The Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts were ruthlessly sweeping through the evil spirits and yokai at the battlefield, but they had reached their limit.
There were an unusually large number of evil spirits and ghosts today.
The pigeons were guiding the ghosts toward safety, but at this rate, there would be casualties...
Rumble!
Something.
Something was coming.
A pressure that seemed to crush space itself could be felt.
Just as the yokai the Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts hadn't dealt with yet were about to attack the fleeing ghosts,
Flames appeared.
No, a ring wreathed in flames appeared.
Like Saturn's rings spinning around a center point, rings spun wildly without interfering with one another.
The fire burning on each ring made them look like wheels.
The mind tried desperately to make sense of it.
It tried to understand that bizarre, grotesque, chilling shape within the bounds of human reason.
The conclusion it reached was this.
"A chariot?"
A burning chariot.
A chariot with wings.
It tore across the ground and charged toward the swarm of yokai.
Squawk?
Screeech!!
The moment they faced it, the yokai realized it.
Something they couldn't stand against was coming.
They made their decision quickly.
Run. They had to get away from that chariot.
Crunch!
One yokai was too late and suffered the first impact.
A ring of fire spinning at incredible speed pulverized it.
No flesh, bones, or soul remained.
Only burning wheel tracks were left where the chariot passed.
Rooooar!
And the chariot still didn't stop.
A massacre of crushed flesh, bones, and souls began.
A second.
A third.
Dozens, hundreds.
Wherever the burning chariot ran, evil spirits and yokai were pulverized.
Those already crushed by pure physical impact were trampled and incinerated by the fiery wheels.
There was no battle.
A merciless slaughter was taking place outside the sacred space called the sanctuary.
* * *
【Th-Thank you! Thank you!】
【Thank you, my king!】
After the battle ended, I climbed down from Gari and received the ghosts' thanks.
"All right, keep heading toward Munjeong-dong. There's a place where petitioners wait. The little fox will show you around."
【Y-Yes!】
The ghosts kept bowing, but they couldn't bring themselves to look at Gari.
Gari did look pretty terrifying now.
It had already been terrifying, and transforming into a chariot had only made it worse.
"Gari, go back to normal now."
Clack! Clack!
Gari's form gradually changed.
The rings that had acted as wheels began circling Gari again, and the blazing heat died down.
The top of its head, which had been perfect for riding, returned to its vague spherical shape.
What else was there to say?
Gari's new transformation form, Chariot Mode.
It was a power gained by absorbing the demons Marchosias and Auns.
Of course, it had gained the demons' magic as well.
From Auns, the fire demon, it had acquired fire magic. From Marchosias, the beast demon...
"Did you ladies finish collecting the yokai corpses?"
【Devour~!】
【Devour~】
The full-time and intern Eight-Foot-Tall Ghosts I'd brought from Tokyo enthusiastically carried over usable yokai corpses.
They had all been smashed apart and incinerated, but for summoning spirits, even pieces of flesh were enough.
"Rise."
After I delivered a line that felt a little plagiarized, spirits began rising from the yokai one by one.
Most were beast yokai.
It was Marchosias's beast command magic.
Like Decarabia's magic that summoned birds, this magic could summon beasts that walked the earth.
Unlike Decarabia, though, its actual magic seemed to go in a different direction.
【W-What is this?!】
【A-Am I alive?】
I looked down at the dog yokai and cat yokai, grinning.
【Welcome to the army, recruits.】
For the record, they had no right to refuse.
* * *
Making a lot of money was a good thing.
But earning an absurd amount of money inevitably brought problems.
Taxes.
That was especially true if I made billions or tens of billions of won.
If I was earning well, then naturally I would spend a lot too.
I'd buy nice cars and good food, invest, buy some real estate, buy some stocks.
Anyway, if I had that much cash, who would be keeping an eye on me?
The National Tax Service.
Oh, look at this guy driving a nice car.
No inherited wealth in his twenties, yet he's driving a Benz and living in a standard-sized apartment in Jamsil?
But how does he make his money?
Huh? He doesn't work? Then who's giving him money?
Ah. This bastard's a tax evader?
We should crack down on him.
Even Al Capone, the legend of American crime, got caught because he didn't pay taxes.
Watch out for taxes day and night.
Evade taxes wisely.
Taxes were a sensitive issue.
It might seem like plenty of people evaded taxes and lived well, but there was something people didn't know.
The National Tax Service was always ready to drag them in and crack down on them.
The problem was that this applied to the exorcism world too.
Exorcism was a lucrative profession.
Naturally. They risked their lives hunting ghosts and yokai. If they didn't make much money, who would do it?
The problem was that it wasn't recognized as a profession.
You couldn't exactly tell the National Tax Service, "I made this money by exorcising things."
The Mystic Association took this issue seriously too.
Exorcists needed to work, catch evil spirits, and eliminate yokai, but what if they got branded tax evaders and arrested because of the reward money they received?
Who would become an exorcist then?
So, up to a certain amount, the Mystic Association handled the tax processing.
They treated it as payment for government project services and the like.
But that only worked when the amount was in the hundreds of millions of won.
When sums climbed into the billions or tens of billions of won, it was beyond what the Association could handle.
"The most common way to evade taxes is to run a business."
You establish or buy a solid company.
Then I become the owner of that company.
After that, I mix the money the business earns with the money I earn as an exorcist.
White money and black money get mixed and mixed until they turn something close to gray.
I go from being a suspiciously wealthy young man to a respectable businessman running a thriving company.
The problem was, if tax evasion worked like that, could the National Tax Service really not catch it?
"No. The National Tax Service is busy, but if they decide to investigate, they catch everyone."
"Then do I have to live on edge, worrying about when they'll catch me?"
"That's the part the Mystic Association takes care of."
Kang Gihan had joined the conversation.
Kang Gihan was the Team 3 leader of the Mystic Association's Special Task Division for Supernatural Response.
It seemed Kang Gihan had noticed us talking in front of the bank at the Mystic Association headquarters.
"The Association designates businesses registered by high-income exorcists as exempt from tax audits. On paper, the National Tax Service treats those businesses as compliant."
"Oh..."
"So you've finally decided to establish a business, Gari Bodhisattva. I was wondering when you would."
A government agency team leader anticipating tax evasion.
It was odd, but considering the nature of this work, I supposed it couldn't be helped.
"If it's all right with you, may I look over the paperwork? The Special Task Division gets involved in designating businesses anyway."
"The Special Task Division?"
"Yes. Businesses run by Black Knot exorcists like Gari Bodhisattva are usually large. That means there's more work to process, so the Association sometimes assigns suitable quests as well."
Quests?
Ah, it looked like I had to handle requests in exchange for the Association designating me as exempt from tax audits.
"A hotel... Is it Yurim Hotel after all?"
Team Leader Kang glanced at me, then Kang Gihan's gaze moved to Pastor Go.
"It seems you've finally decided to acknowledge it. You said Gangnam Holy Temple Church had nothing to do with the demon extermination."
"Well, we had matters to handle internally too."
Right. Pastor Go had said the exorcism rite at Yurim Hotel was kept secret from the Association too.
The reason was simple.
"That was a wise decision. Now that the Elder has returned to Korea, demon worshippers in the country won't be able to move carelessly."
Pastor Park's return to Korea.
They had said that if it became known that I had exorcised a demon, demon worshippers would come after me.
I was supposed to hide it for as long as possible.
"It seems you've decided that isn't necessary anymore... and the timing is perfect."
"Perfect?"
"We'll designate Yurim Hotel and the Junggok-dong bio-medical device factory as exempt from tax audits. In exchange, we'd like Gari Bodhisattva to accept an Extermination Request."
An Extermination Request?
Was it a request to chase someone down and kill them?
It wasn't my first time doing that. I'd caught a few wanted criminals who committed crimes using transformation magic, like tanuki yokai.
Kang Gihan immediately pulled up a photo on their phone and showed it to me.
A middle-aged man with a gloomy expression was in the picture.
"Huh? This guy?"
I recognized him.
I'd happened to see his face before while attending church.
"Hah... You want me to catch this man?"
Pastor Go seemed to recognize the face too and let out a hollow laugh.
"Kim Gicheol. The former leader of Eden Salvation Church. A cult leader."
Footnotes:
Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried
