ROA 6

The shout was so loud it echoed through the empty hallway. As “did it— did it— did it—” reverberated, Shim Seo-woo slowly blinked his eyes and just tilted his head slightly.

The two seemed to be in extreme shock, but in fact he didn’t understand what they were talking about at all. He only thought they were expressing the act of brushing dust off the doll very uniquely.

The woman with the hairpin cried out in a tone soaked with emotion.

“The dream I had must have been pointing to this person. Brilliant light! My hope!”

After pouring this out tearfully, she hurriedly ran in front of Shim Seo-woo and grasped both his hands tightly. No, she tried to grasp them, but just before she did, Shim Seo-woo stepped back.

Whether he looked at her awkwardly or not, the woman looked back and forth between Shim Seo-woo and the doll with a delighted face and said,

“Do you happen to know the ghost story connected to this library?”

“…Yes? The story about an angry librarian because books were shelved wrong?”

“Hm? Well, it’s similar, similar though!”

The woman tilted her head with a confused expression for a moment, then straightened her posture again. As if she just needed him to know the ghost story existed regardless of how he remembered it, she clapped—clap!

“The protagonist of that terrifying ghost story was dwelling in that thing!”

“…In this bear doll?”

“Yes! Because it looks cute, people passed by without thinking it was the cause of the ghost story. A cunning method targeting humans’ carelessness! It’s an object that’s been sitting in the corner of the reading room for so long no one knows when it started.”

In Shim Seo-woo’s mind, the image of ‘bright red eyes meeting between library bookshelves’ changed from an angry librarian’s bloodshot eyes to the bear doll’s shiny eyes. It became much smaller.

……No, meeting a bear might actually be much more dangerous than a human?

While he was quite seriously spreading his wings of imagination, the woman explained eagerly.

“Coincidentally, the school is a good place for ghost stories to spread, so the evil spirit’s power gradually grew stronger. The school didn’t like it getting noisy over pointless talk and just tried to simply demolish it since the building was getting old, but in the process an accident occurred where a worker was seriously injured. Only then did they judge it wasn’t simple and commissioned ‘us.'”

The woman carefully took out a business card from her bosom. Holding only the edge of the paper with the thumbs and index fingers of both hands, she held it up so Shim Seo-woo could see it well. Gold-leafed letters glittered in the sunlight on the thick deep red paper.

[HN Business Management Department Field Team 2 Director Do Seon-hwa]

The small man beside her tactfully joined in. Unlike Do Seon-hwa’s stiff business card, it was a paper crumpled up as if it had rolled around in his pocket. He was Jin Gwang-min, an assistant manager from the same organization.

While silently looking at the two business cards, Do Seon-hwa spoke confidently.

“Let me introduce properly. We’re from ‘Heun,’ an organization whose goal is to maintain the balance between the world of the dead and the world of the living. An organization that erases the traces the dead dare to imprint on the living!”

“To put it intuitively, we hunt evil spirits and purify cursed objects.”

Jin Gwang-min also added. He summarized it as an organization that prevents harm evil spirits cause to people, without needing to think complicatedly.

“That’s right. Those two are Heun’s main tasks, and while hunting is dangerous, purification must be carried out very carefully. But the benefactor just erased the curse inhabiting that object with a few touches! It’s an old, deeply ingrained curse that would normally require purifiers to work on it for days…”

She explained it was an object with considerable negativity since it had sucked the vitality of college students in the library for a long time. The reason the construction worker got hurt was also because he carelessly touched this doll.

As the series of explanations continued, Shim Seo-woo only blinked, then asked,

“…Do ghosts really exist?”

“Ah, we should have started from there.”

Jin Gwang-min let out a deep sigh. Seeing how bewildered he’d looked the whole time, he hadn’t expected they’d have to begin with the very existence of ghosts.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never even seen a ghost…”

If he’d seen ghosts until now, no, if he’d witnessed even slightly suspicious things and experienced strange events, he would have been glad to hear about ‘Heun.’ Normally people would be happily relieved saying they weren’t the strange ones, but his reaction was completely different.

This meant there was a high probability his spiritual sight wasn’t even open.

“…Did that person really purify it? How can you use purification techniques when you don’t even know ghosts exist?”

Jin Gwang-min quietly whispered to Do Seon-hwa. Doubts crept in that perhaps they saw wrong.

“Maybe that person hunted so intensely last night they completely erased even the curse…”

“Then the curse would get even worse, it could never weaken!”

“That’s true but…”

While Jin Gwang-min scratched his cheek, Do Seon-hwa made a groaning sound. In fact, she sympathized with Jin Gwang-min’s doubts, but even so, she had an intuition they shouldn’t let go of the existence before their eyes.

From the moment she faced him holding the doll under the gentle sunlight pouring through the window, no, perhaps from the moment they met on the tree-lined street last night, she felt this emotion. A gladness as if meeting someone she’d hoped for a very long time.

The pure white light she witnessed in her dream must surely be this person.

“Benefactor, could you spare just a moment? I’d like to talk at the company…”

Do Seon-hwa re-clasped her hands and pleaded desperately. To confirm whether the doll was really purified, they needed to go to the organization and investigate. While doing so, she thought it would be good to convince him of ghosts’ existence and also introduce ‘this’ industry while giving a tour of the organization building.

But the benefactor gave no answer. Still looking bewildered, no, now rather reluctant as he looked back and forth between the doll and himself, Do Seon-hwa spoke with the most harmless smile possible.

“Because your soul looks so clear—”

“I don’t believe in cults.”

Shim Seo-woo left cleanly.

Having reacted slowly with a spacey face until now, he suddenly moved at an incredibly fast speed. At the sight of him disappearing sharply with a serious expression, Do Seon-hwa let out a cry—ah! It was a cry filled with injustice.

“Benefactor! We’re not a cult!”

“Ah, Director! Have you ever seen a cult say they’re a cult?!”

While Do Seon-hwa desperately extended her hand, Jin Gwang-min shouted loudly. In that time, Shim Seo-woo had already left the library and was heading quickly toward the tree-lined street.

“Pl-please, benefactor! Just for a moment…!”

“I’m busy because of exam period.”

Shim Seo-woo walked almost running to avoid the two chasing him. Whatever they said from behind, it didn’t enter his ears at all.

If it was a cult, he was sick of it.

It was a creepy aversion beyond the level of being tired of frequently encountering them in front of the university.

In fact, Do Seon-hwa’s proposal also approached him uncomfortably, and he was just pondering it. He had very bad memories related to following others to unfamiliar places.

‘Seo-woo. Shall we go somewhere during this vacation?’

Suddenly a certain moment from the past came to mind.

A matter buried deep in his mind suddenly raised its head and came up, making Shim Seo-woo let out a sigh. Even for him who passed over everything as ‘that can happen,’ there existed things that shouldn’t have happened.

Becoming tired in an instant, just as he was increasing his walking speed to shake off his thoughts, he saw someone trembling while clinging to a tree by the roadside.

[Run away. Run, run, must run away. From the monster, run away and…]

It was the man he encountered while walking yesterday. The one who had staged a late-night fashion show in a dark red fur coat.

[Hide, must hide, must hide, where on earth should I go to avoid that monster…]

His behavior of rapidly muttering something was strange.

But when Shim Seo-woo noticed him, he simply thought that today, for some reason, he kept running into the people he’d met last night, and walked past. There would be no need to greet him, so he was walking past, swoosh, when suddenly the man sharply raised his head!

[You…!]

“Yes, your fashion is cool today too.”

Shim Seo-woo casually showed a thumbs up and moved. No, he tried to.

[I must eat your soul! I must replenish my vitality…!]

If only that man hadn’t suddenly lunged at him.

As he jumped and spread both arms wide, the man’s fur coat spread as if tearing in midair. He clearly remembered the clothes were worn backwards, but now they opened like a curtain, and the man’s body revealed that way was very strange. A body so emaciated that bones protruded, bluish skin, and…

Shim Seo-woo thought he should be arrested for public indecency.

“What petty ghost dares rush at our benefactor!”

Smack!

Just before the dark red fur coat covered Shim Seo-woo, something flew and hit the man’s forehead. It was a wooden hairpin with pearls dangling abundantly, stuck deeply into the man’s face.