One week ago.
In a quiet, low-lit tavern.
Five men and women who had arrived early greeted Hyun-deok Jang and Yeon.
“Hello!”
“Wow, nice to meet you!”
“I’ve been so curious what you’re like.”
“Ah, yes. Hello. I’m Hyun-deok Jang.”
His tone was calm and wholesome, his attire neat, his face free of makeup—and above all, those unnaturally clear eyes.
‘They all give off the same vibe as Yeon.’
If he’d been a bit more experienced, Jang might have recognized in their gazes the fanatic gleam of people absorbed by some creed or ideology. But lacking that insight, he only felt a slight awkwardness as he took a seat.
The first to introduce himself was a handsome man in a black jacket over a white tee.
“Please call me Cheol.”
“Cheol?”
“Yes, Cheol.”
They introduced themselves in turn, each with a single-syllable name: Hee, Woon, Rae, Myung.
One such name might seem merely unusual, but together they looked like members of some strange sect following a peculiar rule. Sensing this, Jang asked cautiously, “Why do you all have one-syllable names?”
They laughed. “It’s like a nickname. You get the feeling, right?”
He nearly asked, What feeling? but their matter-of-fact expressions silenced him. He glanced at Yeon, whose eyes sparkled as she looked up at him. Emboldened, he said, “Ah, a trend? I get it now. So, should I be called Hyun?”
“Wow, perfect! Then we’ll call you Mr. Hyun!”
Ordinary people felt alien to Jang. Every day he dealt only with mad troubleshooters and surreal criminals—so much so that for a time his only real contact was with Kim Sinhwa. ‘Are these really normal people? They seem so... leisurely. Compared to the Mage and me, they’re from another world.’
That mild envy made him miss another chance to escape. And Yeon’s whisper drove the wedge deeper: “I’m so glad everyone likes you, Hyun-deok.”
The words hardly mattered—it felt as though her breath, full of warmth, tickled his ear. Ah, well. Whatever it is, it’s good? Great. The best.
Seven glasses of liquor appeared on the table.
“Toasting!”
“Cheers!”
“Let’s have fun!”
Everyone clinked their glasses, but only Jang’s glass was actually raised. The others discreetly dumped their drinks onto the floor or merely wet their lips before placing the glasses back on the table.
Another toast.
And another.
After about three rounds, an odd topic surfaced.
“Lately we’re really into musicals.”
“Musicals?”
“Yes. Not watching them—we’re the performers, preparing a stage production.”
First tennis, then religious activities, and now a musical. Do ordinary people really do so many different things? ‘I’m a little jealous.’
He felt a faint pang of envy. I was just tracking an octopus monster truck with the Mage recently—our lives truly are worlds apart.
“Want to see the script? You might get hooked, too, Mr. Hyun.”
“Our group has some religious themes, but it’s still fun.”
Someone set down what they called the musical’s script on the table.
“This is the script?”
It looked far too grand for an amateur production—a lavishly bound book, even with a gilded, strange symbol stamped on the cover.
‘All that flair, and there’s no title.’ The gilded symbol served as the title itself. Enchanted, Jang picked up the book as if in a trance.
‘Maybe I’m drunk?’ The symbol seemed to writhe under his gaze. No, was it really gold leaf? He almost felt a strange energy emanating from it. A familiar sensation.
‘Oh—yes, I think I saw this in a dream before.’
Unaware that he’d even turned the page, he began reading.
Around him, people spoke in low voices.
“It’s divided into Acts One and Two.”
“Act One is just the prologue; Act Two is the real deal.”
“Act Two isn’t just drama.”
“It lists the future we will reach.”
“Yes. Keep reading. You’ll find it fascinating.”
“You will gain true faith.”
“If you read to the end, all your anxieties and confusions will disappear, replaced by true happiness and love for all creation.”
“Once you finish, we will introduce you to our teacher.”
“He is truly magnificent.”
“You will join us, too.”
The cultists around him began to reveal their true colors. Their words, laced with sinister suggestion, fell like incantations. Strangely discordant music seemed to drift in. Even the tavern owner and the other patrons fell silent.
They were special evangelists deployed by a fake church calling itself the Hwangrim Church. Yet Jang, lost in the book, noticed none of it.
‘What is this even about?’
Though labeled a script, the words were nearly incomprehensible: obscure terms, unfamiliar proper nouns... visions of a beautiful world beyond a distant horizon... a supreme, absolute being... hymns, prayers, supplications offered to that being... weak humans doomed by their own foolishness... and the emergence of the “Fragrant One.”
A vessel made to receive the Absolute, a living altar born to be used in golden Mass, a Fragrant One who burns and melts their flesh to release incense for the King.
‘Maybe I drank too much...’ The more Jang read, the more fatigued he felt. ‘The Mage could explain this...’ If Kim Sinhwa could check the message window, she’d identify the book’s nature and detect the mental effects overtaking him. But he had no such aid now.
His reason felt eroding, madness tightening its grip. He grew dizzy, his eyelids heavy, his forehead hot, his heart pounding. He brushed his flushed face with the back of his hand. Why such a fever? Was he sleepy from reading literature? He didn’t want these people to look down on him, but he was so tired, as if his brain were melting.
Even among the evangelists speaking their hypnotic words, a change occurred.
“There’s a strange... strange... strange scent.”
“A fragrant aroma. Somehow so loving, so nostalgic.”
“Oh—like the incense from the censer during worship?”
“Ah—yes, yes, yes. But why in such a tavern?”
‘What are they suddenly talking about?’ Jang looked up at the six faces surrounding him. Each wore an expression of odd longing—faces as if in love or overtaken by religious ecstasy.
Alarmed, he closed the script and said, “Um, is everyone all right?”
“Ah!”
“Oh...”
“Yes?”
They started awake like from a long daydream, startled, as if they’d just seen some mystical vision. Cheol looked at Jang in confusion.
“You... you... who are you, really?”
“Yes?”
“We can feel something special from you. This scent, this fragrance—it’s our Lord, the one from our dreams, the Yellow-Robed King. Isn’t that right?”
“W-what?”
“Could it be... could you be our Lord?”
Only then did Jang fully perceive the weirdness. It wasn’t just the six around the table—every person in the tavern stared at him, eyes filled with distorted desire.
The words they’d spoken...the objects they’d mentioned...the whole situation...the book in his hand. It had clearly triggered a surreal phenomenon.
‘Uh...’ Jang recalled something a troubleshooter had once told him about a cult. ‘They have a strange grimoire... they trick victims into reading it and it brainwashes them...’
He looked at the script again. The gilded symbol on the cover writhed grotesquely.
‘Ah... Mage, where are you now?’
It seemed he was in grave danger.
“Um, sorry, but I just remembered a pressing appointment... would you mind moving aside?”
He rose hastily, his voice awkward. He knew this wouldn’t free him, but intoxication stole his wits.
“Ah... yes.”
Surprisingly, the cultists stepped back without protest, their eyes showing a mix of fear and reverence at his every move.
“Thank you... it was fun tonight. You can send payment details over messenger later.”
Jang awkwardly walked toward the exit. Only then did he notice the table he’d sat at was the innermost spot in the tavern. The patrons nearer the door were even more burly than the Vasiliisa crowd—muscle arranged to trap victims.
“Excuse me.”
“Yes, yes...”
Yet even they stared at him blankly, as if in awe. Jang felt the strangeness of it all but couldn’t understand why it had happened.
And the cultists in that fake tavern shared his bewilderment.
“What... what is he? Who is he?”
At last, Jang exited the tavern unimpeded—the first time anything like this had ever happened there. Unaware of his unique feat, he hurried home in a daze.
‘Yeon must be a cultist—no, that’s too small a word. An evangelist, surely.’
The moment he lay on his bed, he thought, “So that’s why everyone was so nice to me.”
Now that he considered it, he knew almost nothing about Yeon. He’d told her everything, including his home address, yet knew nothing of her. Clearly, he’d been deceived. Sorrow, betrayal, and lingering fever drove him to tears before he collapsed into unconsciousness.
Six days ago.
Somewhere unknown to Hyun-deok Jang.
“Brother, could you explain it once more in terms I can understand?”
A voice so eerily beautiful it sent shivers down the spine.
“Sister Hee-in, the moment that man opened the book, I sensed the scent and presence of our Lord, the Yellow-Robed King. I’m certain he is our Lord incarnate.”
“So you believed his commands were divine orders and simply released him?”
“Yes. I had no choice.”
“Hmm.”
The combinations of words still made no sense. Hee-in studied the mask in her left hand—a grotesque shape with three eyes.
‘Just as things seemed to settle, something strange crops up.’
All who’d witnessed ‘that Jang Hyun-deok’ claimed he was the Yellow-Robed King incarnate. If true, that meant he’d either received a fragment of divinity or possessed one of their sacred relics. Nothing less could explain it.
But such a notion was absurd. Why would such a being wander here without affiliation? Perhaps he belonged to another lineage worshipping the Yellow-Robed King?
“May I see the report Sister Yeon submitted again?”
Hee-in reread Yeon’s report thoroughly. A line about resolving a special incident in Sejong City caught her eye, along with several other, less certain details.
After deep reflection, Hee-in reached a conclusion.
“I understand. I’ve finally found him.”
She knew now who he was—the very fiend who destroyed the Masquerade and stole the relic that rightfully belonged to them.
“Heo Sang-hyeon. That is the one.”
