Chapter 148: Ghost City (12)
It wasn’t an illusion.
In the past, when he met Baek-Song-Wol for the first time and guided them to the swamp, pretending to be a clumsy child, Seol Young went through a lot of things with them.
At that time, he saw them wearing black masks to imitate demonic beings.
They changed their voices and made their teeth look like those of monsters. When they mixed in with them, no one could tell who they were.
‘Song Ok-rang. It has to be him.’
The three Hwarangs were always together, always.
Seol Young looked around, and as he thought, there were two more fake ones.
“It smells, so get out!”
Song Ok yelled. He did talk about how he followed his father, who was a merchant, and learned a lot of things, including vulgar words.
That guy disapproved of Seol Young from the moment they met. And when Seol Young was scammed because he pretended to be dumb and didn’t speak, he got so angry that he dragged him away, wanting to be paid back properly.
“What are you looking at? Maybe I should put a hole in your head to get you to your senses?”
Since that guy was from a rich family, he stood out awkwardly among the monsters. Still, he had this rough way of talking, and he blended in right away. Baek Eon and Hyo Wol were silent the whole time.
“It should rain… When will it…”
Hyo Wol rolled his eyes and continued to mumble like a madman while Baek Eon held a knife in his hand. All of the demonic beings didn’t even make eye contact with the three of them, yet the awkwardness didn’t vanish.
“…”
Seol Young looked at them.
Seeing these three here, it seemed like they weren’t sad. So Baek San must still be alive, and this made him relieved.
‘How did they get here? Why did they come? Is it all because of me?’
At the time, the three of them looked at Seol Young. Then they made a whole scene to announce that the three of them had arrived.
‘But you cannot come here.’
Seol Young’s gaze turned to the door inside the training ground.
If one passes through it, they would be on their way to becoming evil, and humans should never go there.
‘Get out.’
He warned with his lips, but the three of them didn’t have any intention of doing so.
Song Ok shouted,
“If you have something to say, say it out loud!”
The demonic beings who were guarding the place frowned at this.
“How dare you say that here? Elder, let me educate him.”
Seol Young just made a gesture.
Then the three of them were taken to a small corner of the training ground. Occasionally, there would be aggressive ones like them coming here.
And during those times, it was common to drag them aside and kill them. So this wasn’t strange.
As the door closed, Seol Young went toward them and said,
“What are you three Hwarangs doing here?”
Song Ok just snorted.
“You cheeky bastard! Being so pathetic. And making our Big Hyung come here by doing this!”
He reached out and pulled Seol Young’s cheeks.
Just like in the swamp, the guy would never stop talking. Seol Young was moved to tears, as if he were back in the past.
“Let go!”
He shook Song Ok’s hand off.
Baek Eon and Hyo Wol looked at him with a ‘now he is the guy we know’ look.
Seol Young had a stiff face.
“I definitely said I wouldn’t be going…”
“We knew that you would say that, so I asked you. On the contrary, I would have thought it was strange if you had followed me back.”
Baek Eon calmly said,
“The entire Hwarang troops are in a rush to find you. You wouldn’t have been hiding here for nothing. You must be depending on him now, so how can you get out of your own will? I knew you would say you could not come. So on that day, I only approached you to follow you and the one who had bound you.”
“…”
“Even though I don’t know anything about this place other than the fact that it’s called the Devil Lair…”
Right.
The Devil Lair was connected to the real world, but it was the devil’s world.
Only those who have dipped their feet into the darkness of the world know about it, and these three came here relying on their intuition.
The eyes of the three Hwarangs turned to the door that led to the lair, then Song Ok asked,
“What happens inside?”
To which Seol Young said,
“When a human enters there, they become prey. All the demonic beings will hunt the people, and even the strongest people will get killed.”
“You? Did you see it happen?”
Hyo Wol asked anxiously.
“Uh? You didn’t see it with your own eyes, right?”
Seol Young didn’t answer and changed the subject.
“How is Baek San…”
He finally mustered some courage to ask about it, and a gentle smile appeared on Baek Eon’s face.
“I told him I found you, and he improved after that. That is why we came here.”
Seol Young was relieved.
“Master is sincere in his thoughts about you.”
Hyo Wol said softly.
“If Teacher usually meets a child on the street who needs help, he will definitely help them. A couple of his close friends passed away in an accident in the past, and the child he was supposed to be teaching went missing. But he worked hard to save children and prayed that the child he missed would be treated nicely in the same way…”
“But he said that among them, there wasn’t a child like you. He was thinking of making a counterplan so you could get away from this bond, and all we had to do was come. And that you were waiting.”
Baek Eon said.
Just then, there was a knock on the door.
“Is everything alright?”
Since it was so quiet inside, they must have thought it was odd.
Baek Eon said,
“If you agree to come with us, we will definitely take you to Mount Seondo. We will be waiting for you there. Find us when you make up your mind.”
They opened the door and left. Seol Young calmly returned to the Devil Lair, but his heart was pounding hard.
Baek San, who had been poisoned, seemed to be healing. And the three of them came here to bring him back. It was like the sun shone in the darkness.
-We will definitely take you to Mount Seondo.
Tears welled up as he thought of it.
He didn’t want to stay here any longer. His heart was already on the run with the three of them.
‘I can get away. I just need to deal with this.’
Seol Young looked at the bracelet on his wrist.
If he took it off, the Lord couldn’t track him. However, the demonic beings under him would run insane and cause more havoc.
And if he chose to run away at that moment, no one could catch him. And with the thought of the three waiting for him on the other side, hope bloomed inside of him.
The Lord was somewhere celebrating these days.
Seol Young went to the Great Hall of the Devil Lair.
It was the hall where he had been caught for the first time.
At that time, he resisted and asked why he was caught, which resulted in him being kicked. Soon after, the demonic beings were stomping on his chest.
-Who kicked him?
The Lord screamed at them and threw the shackles off.
Now that he looked at it, he only thought of keeping Seol Young tied up in here from the start. He managed to avoid it because of the mistakes of the demonic beings, but he ended up being tied up like this.
‘But that ends now.’
Seol Young raised a flag that was hanging on the wall and moved the bricks. All this time, he hated the thought of someone watching him, so he used to find an empty space whenever he had a chance.
And then he found this.
As the saying goes, ‘It is the darkest under a lamp.’ This was the safest place here. This place was always empty, and no one came here.
The bricks slid back, and dark space was revealed.
It was a secret passageway, but it seemed to have lost its function since the place had expanded so much.
Seol Young went inside there and tried to take the bracelet off.
‘How do I solve this?’
The snake-shaped bracelet was originally the Lord’s, but as soon as it saw Seol Young, it moved on its own. It wrapped itself around his wrist and bit its own tail.
‘If I open its mouth, it will loosen it.’
Seol Young summoned his power through sorcery. There was a strong power in his thumb and index finger, and he pressed the snake’s head. However, the snake didn’t open its mouth.
Even when he used some talismans, the snake didn’t budge.
‘Not this then. There has to be something.’
Seol Young thought.
‘Since the bracelet moved by itself… What is it?’
He took out a bamboo leaf from his pouch.
With a spell ready, he wrote his name and cast a spell. When he clapped his hands, a human shadow jumped up.
.
It was another Seol Young.
‘…!’
Finally, the bracelet opened.
Just like how it moved on its own when it saw Seol Young, it did the same now, and it seemed to be confused about which side to go to.
‘As I thought…’
It was a technique made for him. Thankfully, he managed to make the fake one look real.
Seol Young was proud of it and thought to himself.
It was Teacher Seo who taught him this.
-Wonderful! Truly wonderful!
When he thought about what happened then, his heart ached. After thinking about that for a while, he came to his senses.
‘The snake will not be fooled twice. This method can only be used once.’
He tried to get out, but then he heard a faint sound moving outside.
Seol Young was sensitive, so he noticed it right away. The ghosts were coming.
Who?
And he looked through the gap in the bricks.
Were they the five tomb spirits?
Seol Young hid himself further in the dark until he bumped into someone.
“…?”
He looked up, shocked.
He noticed there were two other people in this dark room. One had golden, glowing eyes and a sly smile. The other had a serious face and said,
“Now you see us.”
He turned to the one with the golden eyes.
“Shouldn’t we start leaving now, High Governor?”
“Just watch. I think this is important. No matter how smart Chun Kwang is, there is something missing here.”
Seol Young was shocked.
“You know me? Humans shouldn’t come here. Who are you?”
“You don’t know me? We came here together.”
The man called the High Governor said, and he held out something. It was a stick.
He remembered seeing it before.
‘Ah, right.’
When Seol Young came here, he wasn’t alone. He took the confectionery stick and put it in his mouth, but the other person stopped him.
“Wait, do not eat it. Just hold it.”
Seol Young felt good at the thought of escaping from this place. He didn’t understand why they didn’t let him eat it, but he held onto it.
The guy with the golden eyes frowned. As if a gentle wind passed by and vanished, he smiled lightly very briefly.
At that time, an adult-like figure, who was observing from the outside said,
“What are you doing?”
As if wondering, he pointed to the actions of the tomb spirits.
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