WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
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◈ Incarnation of the Malevolent Star ◈
Chapter 22: Part 1 - Whispers of the Dark Brother (22)
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After the funeral, Onik had five business cards left in his possession.
Two had come from Yo-han's brothers, while three had been left by mourners who had traveled from overseas.
Holding them, Onik found himself curious about the parts of Yo-han's life he had never known.
America. Switzerland. And the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The addresses from those three countries stirred both his longing for Yo-han and his imagination.
By coincidence, Pi-deuk and Philip also wanted to know about the parts of Yo-han's life that had been unknown to them.
Pi-deuk said, "Yo-han talked about you so much that I heard about you until my ears practically hurt. Maybe that's why you don't feel like a stranger. It feels like meeting a nephew I'd only heard about."
"Yes..."
"We plan to stay a few more days after the funeral. If you're all right with it, make some time for us later. We want to hear about the Yo-han you've known.
"How he lived in this village. What the two of you did for fun. And how you tried to bring Yo-han and Ms. Eun-jeong together."
"Did Yo-han-hyung even tell you about that?"
"Of course. He told us every little detail."
"Then would there be anything more for you to hear from me?"
"You can't see yourself through your own eyes, can you? We want to know what Yo-han looked like through yours."
As they spoke, Philip waved at Onik from behind Pi-deuk.
Onik stole a glance at Pastor Kim's third son and his dark skin, feeling strangely fascinated.
Not because Philip was Black. It was simply unfamiliar to think that Yo-han's brother looked like that, though Onik had heard about him.
"By the way, kid. I heard you're a Lotte Giants fan. Is that true?"
"That's right. I'm a proud Busan Seagull. I've never been to Busan, though."
"Oh dear."
Pastor Kim's eldest son looked sympathetic.
"You've had it hard. Even I, someone who lives in Busan, think being a Lotte Giants fan is too cruel a fate."
"No. The Lotte Giants are the best baseball team in the world."
"They never win the championship."
"That is their weakness. I think they're hiding their strength on purpose. It's the giants' own handicap."
The great giants on the mound possessed such overwhelming strength that they had to give themselves a handicap, or there would be no exciting games.
After all, a sports team's purpose was not simply to win. It was to bring joy to its audience...
Watching the boy desperately defend the great Giants' less-than-great slapstick on the field, Kim Pi-deuk let out a low chuckle despite his reddened eyes.
"You're a funny kid, just like Yo-han said."
"Thank you."
"All right. We're going to spend time as a family today, so let's meet again tomorrow or the day after. Come to the church during the day, and you'll find us."
"All right. I'll definitely come. There are lots of things I want to hear from both of you too."
"Is that so? All right. We'll wait for you. You should get going now."
"Yes."
Onik bowed his head to say goodbye to them.
As he walked away from Pastor Kim's family, he heard Pastor Kim's regretful voice behind him.
"I should have reassured you all sooner..."
The sharp-eared boy slowed and listened in secret. It seemed Pastor Kim's decision to settle in this village had also come from concern for his children.
There was the heart of a pastor who wanted to serve people whose lives were at risk in more dangerous places. There was also the heart of a father who wanted his children to worry no longer.
After struggling between those conflicting feelings, Pastor Kim had chosen to be a father.
The pastor regretted not making that choice a year or two earlier, because Yo-han might still be alive if he had.
If he had, Yo-han might already have gone somewhere else and made a home for himself.
A frightening darkness settled in the lonely boy's eyes.
‘Someone else is the one who should really be sorry...’
People who should never have had cause to grieve were grieving. People who should not have been regretting anything were regretting.
For the first time in his life, it made Onik want to listen to his dark urge to kill. It made him want to let go of the reins.
Even though he already knew he should not.
A black blade flashed through the boy's mind.
He knew the shape of that cold, dreadful blade well because it was a real knife.
Suppressing his dizziness, the frightening boy reasoned with himself.
‘I have to hold back. Until the very end. Because I have to remain a good boy.’
Onik wandered through the corners of the village, which felt lonelier than before.
He was trying to calm his churning heart before an important time came, but it did not help much.
The thought that he would never walk all these familiar roads with Yo-han again only made his heart more troubled.
His aimless feet, as restless as his mind, stopped at the stream.
The water flowed with a soft murmur, clear and transparent.
Unlike Onik's heart.
Standing beside the water where he had cut open dead stray dogs and washed their entrails, Onik quietly turned Yo-han's death and absence over in his mind.
Like this stream, which remained thoughtlessly clear despite all the bloody water Onik had poured into it, Onik's own time would continue to flow despite the death of Yo-han, who had been precious to him.
Still, the mark of that loss would remain for a long time. Like the dark-red stain caught in the flat rocks.
Perhaps until the day Onik died.
Without realizing it, the frightening boy's thoughts continued for almost half a day.
At the end of those long thoughts, the boy, now more frightening than before, took three or four deep breaths and called the Village Youth Association President.
「Oh, Onik. What's going on?」
"Hello, mister."
The boy's voice resembled the dry wind of a cold season.
"There's something I want to ask about Yo-han-hyung. Could we meet alone for a little while tonight?"
The murderer's reaction was harsh.
At first, he seemed to stammer helplessly. As the conversation went on, his voice rose, and his tone grew more vicious.
The boy did not care.
Before, the anger of a “good adult” would have cowed him.
Not now.
To Onik, the Village Youth Association President was no different from a stray dog barking fiercely.
He looked fierce, but he was only a cowardly dog barking because he was afraid.
No.
He was less than a dog.
"Then I'll see you later."
The boy ended the call without waiting for an answer. It was coldness covered over with indifference.
Afterward, he went to the abandoned house he had made into his secret base.
He had told the Village Youth Association President that he would be hiking and would not return before their meeting, but that was a lie. The boy still needed quiet time.
He wanted to light the traditional stove hearth and stare blankly at the burning firewood, but smoke would rise from the chimney.
If the Village Youth Association President saw it and came looking for him, it would be troublesome.
Instead, the boy brought out a brazier. It was a round ceramic brazier, unlike the brass brazier in the Master Bowyer's house.
He had found it while exploring a house roofed with Japanese tiles.
The two-story wooden house had lost its owner before Onik was even born. It was old and worn, and it felt very different from the other houses in the village.
When Onik's grandfather saw the brazier and kettle his grandson had brought home, he told him they were a summer brazier and teapot used by the Japanese bastards long ago.
The lonely boy dusted off the brazier, filled it with charcoal, and lit it. Since he used kindling and oil, the charcoal quickly began to glow red.
Then he filled the well-washed kettle with water and set it on top.
The old lever pump at the abandoned house squeaked rustily every time he worked it, but it still poured out clean groundwater.
One side of the brazier was open like a tiny traditional stove hearth. Even after placing the kettle on it, Onik could enjoy the glow and heat of the slowly burning charcoal.
When white steam began to rise from the kettle, the boy opened the lid and dropped in a handful of tea leaves.
They were Korean stewartia leaves he had roasted himself.
He did not put the lid back on.
He wanted to watch the tea turn yellow as it steeped. As he watched the slow process, he hoped to calm the burning anger in his chest, if only a little.
‘Yo-han-hyung liked it when I gave him this...’
He had first learned how to roast tea leaves during a school visit to a traditional green tea farm, part of a local cultural experience program.
The sense that had allowed him to judge the temperature of the Master Bowyer's brass brazier proved useful here as well.
That same sense let him easily estimate the heat of the iron cauldron used to roast tea leaves.
Near the former Japanese house where he had found the brazier and kettle grew a healthy grove of Korean stewartia trees.
His grandfather had told him that, in his youth, people picked the new shoots and leaves every spring to make tea.
So Onik made Korean stewartia tea exactly as he had learned during the experience program.
It had turned out well. Not only his grandfather, but every adult who received it as a gift had been truly pleased and generous with praise.
The same went for his precious teacher and Yo-han-hyung.
"..."
There were no teacups at this secret base.
Feeling lonely, the boy scooped up the tea with a small dipper with a bamboo handle. He blew on it and took small sips.
It hardly looked like a proper way to drink tea, but the tea was fragrant and nutty.
This fragrant tea carried a small but special meaning.
It was one of countless pieces of proof that the talent he had for killing things could also be useful for other purposes.
The frightening talent of a boy born strange did not have to be used only for frightening things.
But tonight, he might use that frightening talent in a frightening way.
The boy closed his eyes and focused on the tea's taste and fragrance.
Yet even as he tried to focus, the presence of the knife he had deliberately sat with his back to became clearer and clearer.
Though he was not looking at it, it felt as if he could see it. Though he was not touching it, he could almost feel the cold blade in his hand. Though he had not used it, it felt as if his hands were wet with blood.
...Human blood, of course.
Hating the part of himself that was about to become even more frightening, the boy let out a quiet sigh.
‘Sitting with my back to it doesn't help...’
Even so, the boy understood his own contradiction.
If he truly did not want to become more frightening, he should not have come here in the first place.
He should not have delayed without reporting the matter to the police.
Especially when he had obtained clear evidence.
No matter what else he told himself, he wanted to kill someone himself.
A person.
Yo-han-hyung's enemy.
He wanted revenge.
At the same time, it would guarantee his precious teacher's safety. There could not be a second loss, not even by chance.
Still, his heart had not fully tipped one way.
He hesitated between wanting to kill and knowing he must not. But if the Village Youth Association President took his final chance tonight...
Then the lonely boy could remain a good boy.
He took the kettle down and put it back on the brazier to warm it, again and again.
He replaced the charcoal in the brazier, again and again.
Once the kettle was empty, Onik sat beside it and warmed himself by the fire until darkness deepened. Then he rose.
He had already told his grandfather that he would eat dinner outside, go on a nighttime outing, and return home afterward.
Though it was not raining, Onik put on a raincoat and faced the black knife he had only ever kept his back turned to until now.
A weapon made for a murderer.
A sinister blade forged only to kill people.
Unlike his other treasures, it was the one weapon that had truly tasted human blood.
Until now, he had never casually held the long bayonet from the Japanese colonial era, even when alone.
At last, the boy took it in his hand.
Just holding it sent pleasantly chilling possibilities through his nerves and into his mind. It felt as though he were holding not a blade, but heat gathered into the shape of one.
He had maintained it well, so there was no need to sharpen it now.
A blade honed by innate talent and extraordinary senses. That gleaming edge could easily cut through any living thing.
The frightening boy left the secret base with the blade in his hand.
Behind the squeaking door, he left only the shadows where he had melted away his hesitation, and the faint light of charcoal dying within them.
#
The house of the late Grandma Gwi-rye, where Onik had summoned the Village Youth Association President, stood at the farthest edge of the village.
In a mountain village, the farthest edge meant the foot of the mountain lay directly behind it.
The vegetable garden, left unattended since the last year its owner had been alive, had become nearly a patch of wilderness thick with weeds.
Still, the field ridge remained intact. Stones fitted together had been stacked as high as Onik's knees, as though marking the boundary between the village and nature.
Onik arrived an hour before their appointment and stood atop that ridge.
Then he waited for the murderer.
The mountain was behind him. He held the knife made for killing people in one hand, hidden behind his back.
Even if the Village Youth Association President came from another direction, he would not escape Onik's senses.
The murderer appeared ten minutes before nine.
With his sharp night vision, the boy could see the murderer's anxious gaze wavering from far away.
Perhaps he had been smoking until just before coming. His scent carried strongly on the wind.
"Stop there."
Onik stopped him in the middle of the vegetable garden.
About five meters lay between the boy and the murderer.
Words held no physical force, but the smartphone screen Onik conspicuously held up in his free hand made the murderer stop where he was.
「112」
If Onik pressed the call button, the signal would ring, and he would soon be connected to the police emergency control center.
The number on the white screen was easy for the murderer to see. Onik had turned the screen brightness all the way up.
He had also set the screen timeout to the longest possible setting. It would not go dark while they talked.
"If you want to talk to me, you should stay there. You aren't confident you could catch me if I ran, are you?"
Everyone in the village knew how fast Onik was.
Even the legal hunter, who climbed the mountains almost every day, could not keep up with the nimble boy. A potbellied chain-smoker who drove everywhere stood even less of a chance.
"Onik..."
The murderer fumbled, unsure what to do, then forced a smile.
He was trying to rely on their usual relationship, but he did not know what to say first in this situation.
How could he soften the atmosphere with the child, even a little?
His eyes darted around before he finally forced out a question.
"Why are you wearing a raincoat in weather like this? I don't think there's any forecast for rain anytime soon."
The boy hiding the knife answered without expression, as though discussing someone else's business.
"That's true. Why am I wearing one? Maybe because it's raining in my heart."
It was an answer that made conversation difficult.
The pot-bellied murderer tried to keep smiling. It was a pointless effort, and his expression eventually collapsed.
Anxiety. Unease. Worry. Fear. Anger. Restlessness. Depression.
Every emotion tormenting him fiercely fought for space across his thick, ugly face.
Without realizing it, the murderer clenched his fists.
His head was boiling wildly, leaving him dazed.
Just as it had on the night he killed Yo-han.
"Onik. I don't know what you're thinking, but whatever it is, you've got the wrong idea."
Even through his daze, the murderer squeezed out the words.
"What are you even going to report me for? What was that about me regretting it when we talked earlier? You said you had something to ask about that bastard Kim Yo-han."
"Yes. I do have something to ask."
"What is it?"
"Why did you kill Yo-han-hyung?"
The murderer caught his breath.
His breathing grew harsher. His pulse sped up, and his pupils widened.
Silence passed, filled only by one person's breathing. Then broken words slipped out between the murderer's gasps.
"Who... killed whom...?"
"Go on pretending."
"Proof... do you have proof...?"
"Of course I do."
"What...?"
"When you stop somewhere briefly, you don't bother locking your car doors each time, do you? You did it when you came to the funeral hall too. So I took the memory card from your dashcam."
The murderer's ragged breathing stopped abruptly.
He was so startled that he forgot to breathe for a moment.
The aging Village Youth Association President made his living going everywhere to load and unload goods.
Leaving the keys in the car while he stepped out to do something had become a habit because locking up was bothersome.
Everyone in the village knew the blue Porter truck was his, and nobody was likely to steal it.
Even if he had locked the doors, the boy would have gotten the memory card anyway. He could have broken a window or pried open the door with a crowbar and taken it.
He even knew how to pick locks.
The dashcam footage on the memory card recorded the vehicle's location, speed, and direction with the time.
That meant there would be an exact record of where the murderer had been when Yo-han died.
Of course, it was illegally obtained evidence, so it would not be admissible in court.
But at that moment, with his thoughts wiped blank, the murderer had no time to consider that far.
"Even if I didn't have that, I have more evidence!"
The boy calmly made the murderer's blood run cold.
"It looked like you smoked a lot there. There were cigarette butts everywhere. The day after Yo-han-hyung died, I picked them up and took a video too. I recorded where I found them and how they were scattered."
"Gasp, gasp..."
"I saw on the news that they can do DNA tests with saliva. So I wrapped them in plastic and put them in the freezer."
That was not quite correct. DNA could be identified from the epithelial cells in saliva.
Either way, it could be valid evidence, especially combined with the other evidence the boy had gathered.
"Next, there were the tire tracks left on that farm road. I took lots of pictures and videos of those too.
"Isn't it strange how the tracks match the tread on your truck's tires exactly? If you didn't kill Yo-han-hyung, it would be an incredible coincidence!"
"..."
"I took dozens of photos from different angles, so I think they could compare the level of tire wear and the cracks too! What do you think, mister?"
The murderer's hands and feet shook. Cold sweat formed on his broad forehead and ran down.
The boy kept pressing the silent murderer.
"And there were marks on the guardrail post where you tied the trellis twine! Maybe the impact was strong when Yo-han-hyung's motorcycle caught on the line, because the plastic coating had crumbled away.
"What if my testimony that I saw you taking the trellis twine on the day of the accident were added to that?"
"You, you..."
"Please listen a little longer. This is the last one."
"There's... more...?"
"Yes. Unfortunately, there isn't any CCTV on the stretch where the accident happened. But as you know, the road between our village and the town is the only route, right?
"So if they check the CCTV in town and the CCTV in front of Three-Way Intersection Restaurant, I think they'll be able to tell roughly where you were that night. Don't you?"
The murderer was dizzy now.
It felt as though the whole world were falling apart, and thinking became difficult.
Even without the illegally obtained SD card, the evidence the clever boy had gathered and listed was enough to convict him.
The boy asked the murderer with a calm face.
"What do you think? I'm pretty smart, right?"
The question came from a frightening boy pretending to be innocent. Yet its chill stole every last trace of composure from the murderer.
Driven into a corner, he was overcome by an unreasonable sense of grievance, and tears welled in his eyes.
"You... Why are you doing this to me...? Did I... did I ever do something wrong to you...? Our Onik... you're a good boy... A good boy... shouldn't do this... right? I've... I've always treated you so well..."
The boy nodded.
"That's right. I still want to be a good boy, so I'll give you a chance."
"A chance...? What chance...?"
"Turn yourself in. Here. In front of me."
This was the final line of resistance the boy drew against his dark instincts.
If the murderer chose to turn himself in, Onik could remain a good boy.
There might be another day when he faced temptation, but at least tonight, he would not stain the knife hidden behind his back with blood...
Struggling between dark desire and clear reason, the boy urged him on.
"Come on. You brought your smartphone, didn't you? Show me you pressing 112 where you are, then call them. My hearing is good, so don't think about trying to fool me. You can't call somewhere like the police substation instead of 112."
The boy carefully cut off every route of escape.
The murderer knew exactly how sharp the boy's hearing was.
Whenever dog meat soup was made at the village hall, Onik could hear the voices leaking from his calls and know every elder who would be invited.
Once more, silence settled over them, filled only by the murderer's breathing.
The child who wanted to be good waited a long time for the bad adult.
But every wait had an end.
No matter how long he waited, the bad adult did not seem willing to take the final chance he had been given.
He only stared at the child who wanted to be good. Tears trembled in his bloodshot eyes, and his shoulders rose and fell with rough breaths.
"Aren't you going to turn yourself in? I don't want to become a bad boy like this."
"..."
"I looked it up, and if you turn yourself in and show remorse, even murder doesn't seem to get such a long sentence. Maybe ten years?"
"Hngh..."
"At your age, even ten years means you could be out before you're seventy. If you take care of your health, you could live well for another ten or twenty years after that. You should meet a nice grandma and get married too. So please turn yourself in quickly."
"Pant, pant..."
"...Are you really not going to?"
The child let out a deep, gloomy sigh and dropped the smartphone in his hand with a thud.
The fallen phone struck the ridge and rolled into a furrow. Bright screen light leaked through the yellow, dead weeds.
"Oops!"
Blinking, the boy recited clearly in a tone like he was reading from a school textbook.
"My hand slipped?"
As though all the clever, meticulous things he had done until then had been a lie, the boy climbed down from the stone wall with his guard down.
There was not the slightest wariness toward the bad adult in the boy as he looked down.
The next moment.
The bad adult's eyes widened, and he rushed at the boy with ragged breaths. Both hands shot toward the boy's neck, fingers curled like hooks. His intention to strangle was plain.
The boy flicked his gaze upward.
For the briefest instant, his gaze swept over the two hands trying to choke him, then the murderer's eyes beyond them.
There was no anger or murderous intent in the murderer's eyes as he tried to kill Onik.
Only urgency churned there.
The boy bent his knees and sprang from the ground like a mountain goat.
It was the leap that had once made Yo-han marvel that he seemed to fly more and more each day.
With that leap, the boy slipped diagonally past the murderer's grasping hands.
At the peak of his jump, as his body brushed against the bad adult's shoulder, the boy's right hand, hidden until then, swung the black blade with the snap of a whip.
「Swish!」
The sound of cleaving wind was quiet, which made it more chilling.
The bayonet had a non-reflective black finish, dark as the night, but its honed edge reflected the moonlight with a cold gleam.
The blade's path flashed pale in the darkness.
The sharp point of the knife made for killing people sliced shallowly into the left side of the bad adult's neck, beneath his fat chin.
The cut was only as deep as one knuckle.
"...!"
Ruled by adrenaline, the bad adult only felt a sharp sting in his neck.
After losing his balance and flailing, he desperately twisted to grab the boy. Then his vision suddenly spun, and he collapsed where he stood.
The boy landed on the opposite side and turned with his hands behind his back.
He looked down at the foolish adult, who kept weakly reaching for him until his final moment alive.
His expression was complicated, neither clearly gloomy nor excited.
"Goodbye."
A person whose carotid artery has been cut cannot remain conscious for long.
If it is completely severed, they usually lose consciousness within seconds. Even when it is only partially cut, as with the Village Youth Association President, it is rare for them to last a full minute.
By controlling the depth of the cut with his innate talent and senses, the frightening boy had made time to say goodbye to the bad adult.
"...Thank you for all the praise you gave me. If you meet Yo-han-hyung, make sure you beg him for forgiveness. Though I don't know if you'll be able to meet him."
Just as the existence of Mr. God was beyond what the boy could know, whether the Christian afterlife existed was also beyond his understanding.
Even if it did, it would be hard for the Village Youth Association President to meet Yo-han.
One would be in Heaven, and the other would fall into Hell.
But one could never know.
Mr. God was not such a good god, after all.
There was no guarantee that Heaven and Hell were exactly as Pastor Kim had described them. So Onik gave the Village Youth Association President one last request, in case he should meet Yo-han after leaving this world.
The Village Youth Association President's life faded quickly.
Blood gushed out in bursts with every beat of his heart. It took less than forty seconds for the focus to vanish from his clouded eyes.
His first murder was far too easy.
By killing a murderer, the boy became a murderer.
And the boy sensed, with transcendent perception, the instant the Village Youth Association President's life ended, the moment his brain died.
At that moment, a great fullness unlike anything he had gained from any other hunt surged through the boy's inner self like a rushing current.
The boy let the knife hang at his side and felt his own soul.
He could also feel that soul swallowing death and growing.
The dark urge inside him rejoiced wildly and raged in ecstasy.
Lightning flashed through his mind. An unburning liquid fire swirled through his heart and blood vessels.
His rational resistance was powerless. In the pleasure violently forced upon him by black instinct, the boy's fingertips, breath, and pupils trembled faintly.
With the corpse before him, he looked up and thought that a star that had not been there before was shining in the sky.
As he watched that unfamiliar star, the boy rose and fell at the same time.
He rose frighteningly high, and fell frighteningly far.
The first was the rising of his very existence into something more frightening.
The second was the psychological fall of a boy who had crossed a line he could never return from.
His cheeks burned red, while tears overflowed from his eyes in drops.
「Bark, bark!」
A pack of stray dogs barked from somewhere nearby.
The boy, more frightening now than before he committed his first murder, wiped away his tears and turned.
There stood the dog he had seen by the stream where he washed entrails, the dog he had known he would see again one day.
The familiar dog peeked at him from the darkness of the woods and the dense dry brush. It seemed to have formed a new pack, because many unfamiliar dogs stood behind it.
After staring at the leader of the stray dogs for a while, Onik picked up his phone and stopped the recording application that had been running in the background.
Then he left the vegetable garden, leaving the Village Youth Association President to grow cold, and walked down the slope.
He intended to return to his secret base.
It was still winter in the mountain village, and winter was a hungry season not only for wild boars, but for stray dogs too.
Hungry dogs never let an opportunity like this pass.
Footnotes:
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