Chapter 17 — The Sorcerer And The Rank-Two Ability Exam (2)

That day, from the morning onward, there were guests at the cathedral come to call on Shin Hweein.

He remembered Yun Juna saying the exam would fall around now, so he half-wondered whether the visitors might be people connected to the Yun House. They were not.

“Hi. I’m done with work, so I came by. Thought I’d fill you in on Shin House news while I was at it.”
“Big Bro!”

It was Ham Seoyeon and Do Yumi.

Do Yumi was supposed to be lodging at the cathedral, but she had been nowhere to be found during his own stay there, and he had wondered about it.
It seemed she had been trailing after Ham Seoyeon, learning the shaman’s trade out in the field.

“Big Bro, are you really going to keep staying at the cathedral from now on? In that case I’ll—”
“Ah, there you are at last.”
“Eek!”

No sooner had Do Yumi finished greeting him than Sister Barbara, passing nearby, caught her by the arm and hauled her off.

“Your catechism lessons are piled up sky-high, so come along quietly.”
“No, Big Brooooo…!”

Even as the nun dragged her away, Do Yumi stretched a desperate hand toward Shin Hweein.
It was a wonder to him exactly when she had begun acting so familiar with him.

He returned a wave only to Seonu, who clung to her shoulder and waved at him.
Once the two had turned the corner and vanished down the corridor, Shin Hweein looked over at Ham Seoyeon.

“Bodhisattva of Contradiction. Been a while.”
“Aw, come on, when it’s just the two of us, just call me by name. …Hey, you look kind of more solid, don’t you?”

Ham Seoyeon looked him up and down, blinked, and as she said this she abruptly took hold of his upper arm.

“And you’re not even wearing extra layers.”

She kneaded his arm up and down, cocking her head.
Dumbfounded, Shin Hweein answered her.

“Did the Ghost-Sword Maiden tell you already? Even so, you’re exaggerating. It’s only been a week since I started training, after all.”
“…Ha.”

At that, Ham Seoyeon’s expression sharpened on a dime, her face shifting so fast it was like watching the bian lian¹ face-shifting opera of the land of Jin.

“Training? She came all the way here?”
“You didn’t know, then. Come inside, I’ll explain.”

Staff in hand, Shin Hweein led her into the cathedral.
Following meekly after him, Ham Seoyeon suddenly spoke up.

“You look really at home here.”
“It’s been more than a week, after all.”

Since the business in Suwon he had taken on two or three simple commissions and gone out briefly, but each had been a job of only a few hours, and the rest of the time he had stayed entirely within the cathedral grounds.
Beyond merely being used to it, the holy power hanging in the cathedral’s air had even begun to feel quite comfortable to him.

Father Lucas, too, had originally been staying at a hotel, but he had cancelled his room and moved into the cathedral, and lately, when night came and there was nothing in particular to do, the two of them would sometimes play a game of baduk together².
The priest had hinted more than once at including Sister Barbara in a drinking gathering as well, but Shin Hweein had seen through that for what it was, Lucas’s underhanded scheme to push his own little sister at him.
Besides, a second drinking appointment had already been set with Geum Moa, so for the moment he had no choice but to refuse.

“Master Shin Hae, good morning. About tonight—… ah.”
“Ha?”

Just as he was leading Ham Seoyeon to a room where they could speak with guests, Yun Juna came down the corridor the other way, spotted him, and was about to say something.
Then she caught sight of Ham Seoyeon and stopped mid-sentence.
Ham Seoyeon, for her part, had somehow taken on a thoroughly indignant expression.

“Gorilla. What are you doing here?”
“It just sort of happened that way. Don’t call me Gorilla, would you, Sham-Shaman.”
“So I’m asking what you’re doing here. And what was that about ‘tonight’?”
“Both of you, don’t make a scene out in the hall. Come this way.”

It was an area off-limits to civilians, but priests and nuns kept passing through, and their eyes were on the three of them.
He’d had a rough guess before, but it seemed the two of them really did not get along.
Threading himself smartly between them, Shin Hweein led the women along to his own room.

“Is this… where you sleep?”
“My first time in here.”

The cathedral being what it was, the room they had given him was somewhat austere, though it had everything one needed.
Shin Hweein, catching sight of three cups set out on the table, twitched an eyebrow.
Steam was already rising from them; the tea had clearly been poured only just now.
The culprit, of course, would be Geum Moa.

“Have a seat.”
“Wow, you actually look like a sorcerer.”
“Because I am a sorcerer.”

With the air of a man who had foreseen all of this, Shin Hweein calmly took up his own cup and began to explain to Ham Seoyeon what had befallen him over the past several days.
How Yun Juna had figured out his identity and come looking for him, why even she was now lodging at the cathedral… and what Shin Hweein was about to undergo.

“Hmm. A Rank-Two promotion is certainly an opportunity hard to pass up…”
“So then, Yun Juna. Tonight, you said?”
“Yes. He said to come alone, just the two of us.”
“Tonight, then…”

It stood in for the national Rank-Two sorcerer’s exam, so it was bound to be no easy thing.
That he would be told to bring Yun Juna along, he had expected from the start.
Yun Jinseong, of all people, would not have laid down some pointless trap.
He had reinforced his talismans and drilled hard at defensive sorcery in particular, but there was no helping the tension that still rose in him.

“Did he say anything else to you privately?”
“Nothing. But my uncle seems to put considerable trust in Master Shin Hae, so there is hardly need to worry, is there.”
“The more he trusts me, the more likely he is to hand me something truly difficult.”
“That… is certainly true.”

Letting out a faint sigh, Shin Hweein drained his cup and threw a glance at Ham Seoyeon.

“You’ll have heard, then. That’s how it is. As far as I came to see you, I’d have liked to talk at leisure, but I’ll have to set another day for it.”
“Of course you should. More to the point — Yun Juna, can’t I come along too?”
“You’ve heard already that the two of us are to go alone. No.”
“…”

At Yun Juna’s flat refusal, Ham Seoyeon narrowed her eyes and glared at her a moment, then promptly pulled out her phone and called someone.
The other two watched her in disbelief, and when the words “Uncle Jinseong” came out of her mouth, their faces went slack with sheer incredulity.

“I don’t know what kind of job you’re calling him out for, but you know what he can do anyway, so the more people helping the better, right? Now that I think of it, when I was taking my Rank-Two exam, the mu-gyeok examiner was unusually hard on me — looking back now I’m sure that person was taking bribes from the Ham House to— ah, you’re saying I should go along too? Understood! Then I’ll see you tonight!”

Hanging up, Ham Seoyeon flashed a V-sign at Shin Hweein, then turned and snorted through her nose at Yun Juna.

“That’s settled, then.”
“This is exactly why I can’t stand the direct-line lot…”

Muttering it in a tone of utter aversion, Yun Juna let out a sigh and rose from her seat.
His eye drifted naturally to the cup she had been drinking from, and today, again, she seemed to have taken only a single sip.

“Master Shin Hae, let’s go and train.”
“What was that? Today there is an important matter to attend to, and I must compose mind and body and gather spiritual energy.”
“Training is a matter of consistency. Better to get the training done now and compose yourself afterward.”

Seeing that Yun Juna was beyond reasoning with, Shin Hweein turned his gaze away and looked at Ham Seoyeon with the eyes of a peasant praying for deliverance.
She was on bad terms with Yun Juna; surely she would find some excuse and rescue him. So he believed.

“A healthy body, after all, is the foundation of a healthy mind. I’ll train with you.”

But what stood there was yet another devotee in the pursuit of exercise, or perhaps of muscle itself.

“Tch. Suit yourself. Don’t get in the way. And don’t wear anything that shows skin.”

Yun Juna clicked her tongue but did not refuse.
Shaking with rage at Ham Seoyeon’s betrayal even as he was, Shin Hweein rose from his seat with the mournful eyes of a cow being led to the slaughterhouse.

“Hey, what’s with the couple-set workout gear?”
“Don’t get the wrong idea. They were borrowed.”
“From a couple?”
“From a priest and a nun.”
“…That sounds even weirder, but never mind. More to the point — no matter how I think about it, isn’t she working you way too hard? Even granting that spiritual power covers for it.”
“Honestly, I didn’t expect him to keep up so well either. Thanks to that, his body’s changed dramatically in just a week.”
“That much is true. …Thanks.”
“Why on earth are you thanking me?”

That night.
His preparations all in order, Shin Hweein emerged to catch the exchange between Ham Seoyeon and Yun Juna, and stood there with his mouth open in shock.
Yun Juna realized belatedly that he had come out.

“Ah.”
“Yun Juna. Did you not tell me that all sorcerers train in that fashion?”

Yun Juna averted her eyes from him slightly and answered.

“Sorcerers who go to such pains with muscle training tend to be the ones short on spiritual power. Their ability to handle spiritual power is poor to begin with, so they cannot put it to such active use in their training. So… cases like yours, Master Shin Hae, are rather special.”
“Then is my current condition…—”
“Hey, hey, you’ve still got a long way to go, you know.”

Ham Seoyeon cut in hurriedly and came over to him.

“Your body was in a really rough state to start with. It’s only because you have so much spiritual power that you can repair it like this at all. It’s hard for now, but bear with it a little and keep at it. From here on I’ll train alongside you too.”
“Repair, you say…”

It was certainly true that, compared with a week ago, he seemed to have put on a respectable amount of muscle.
It was not so much that it showed visibly on the outside; rather, the effort needed to make the same motions had been cut to less than half of what it had been.
The upshot was that he was conserving both stamina and spiritual power, and in fierce combat that would be of some help.

Of course, my body is still as diseased as before.

If he did not maintain it steadily with spiritual power, the muscle he had built up at such cost would only wither away again.
To begin with, there were several curses bound to the muscle itself.
But if one day he were freed of every curse, then…

“All right… I’ll push myself a bit harder, then.”
“Good thinking. Let’s build you a six-pack by next summer and go play at the seaside together.”
“That will not do. How could one bare one’s skin so easily before others?”

At Shin Hweein’s firm refusal, Ham Seoyeon shot him a sidelong look.

“It’s not as if I go around showing skin in front of just anyone myself, you know?”
“Yes. I know. Now let us go.”
“…I don’t think you actually do know.”

And just then, as Shin Hweein was about to step out of the cathedral with the two of them…

“Young master.”

Geum Moa appeared abruptly before him.

“Did I not say that I would not have your help today?”
“Yes, of course you did. And so I was hurrying my own work along.”
“Your work?”
“May I have the staff for a moment, please?”

At the word “staff” Shin Hweein caught her meaning and held it out without a word.
Receiving it with a smile, Geum Moa balled her hand into a fist and seized the head of the staff.
Brilliant blue and red light spilled out from between her fingers.
The two women had been watching blankly, wondering whether she had appeared out of nowhere only to perform some sort of conjuring trick, and they stood gaping as Geum Moa loosened her fist, raised her hand, and revealed a splendid ornament now bloomed upon the head of the staff.

“How is it, young master?”
“…Beautiful.”

It was as though his design had been transcribed exactly onto the staff.
The head was wholly encased in phantom-gold of five colors, and from it, spreading outward like wings, extended two pedestals, on which sat a dragon wrought of aquamarine and a kumiho wrought of ruby, facing each other.

The scales have been carved one by one. How fine the work.

He had been somewhat anxious that Geum Moa’s ill-feeling toward the North Sea Dragon Princess might mar the piece, but his worry had been needless.
Small though it was, the sea-dragon brimmed with so much life it seemed it might take flight at any moment.
And the kumiho’s nine tails, though plainly carved from gemstone, boasted a texture so vivid one half-expected them to ripple in any passing breeze.

“Moa, there is nothing you cannot do.”
“Not anything at all, young master. Only the things I can.”

There was a limit to humility.
To take materials each of strong individual character and unite them into a single ornament, to harmonize their auras so exquisitely with the staff itself: what had until now been a staff capable of borrowing only a little of the powers of the dokkaebi and the Pagoda-Tree God was now, with this, fully established as a top-grade sorcerous implement.
The phantom-gold would assist his dream sorcery, the aquamarine the authority of the Dragon King, the ruby the authority of the vampire and his fire sorcery, and at times it would harmonize them all with one another.
It was, in every sense, a Special-Grade sorcerous implement crafted to fit Shin Hweein himself.

“This ornament — it resembles Miu… and you, Moa. Thank you.”
“Hee hee. If it is what the young master wishes, there is nothing I cannot do for him.”
“You just said, only a moment ago, that there were things you could not do.”
“If it is for the young master’s sake, anything is something I can do.”

There was truly no winning with her, Shin Hweein thought, and let a small laugh escape him.
Then, all at once, Geum Moa turned her gaze on the two women accompanying him today and gave a sharp little smirk.
For all he knew, the reason she had gone out of her way to appear now and reinforce the staff lay precisely there.
She might count every woman who drew close to Shin Hweein an enemy from her vantage, but she really ought to spare a little consideration for the bewilderment of women made the targets of her arbitrary misreadings.

‘At our next drink, I shall have to speak with her in earnest. Once I step out into society I shall meet a great many people, and it will not do for her to carry on like this at every turn.’

Pondering this in earnest, Shin Hweein realized that the tension he had been carrying over the Rank-Two qualification exam had, somewhere along the way, slipped entirely away from him, and at that he let out another quiet laugh in spite of himself.
After sending the priest a message that he would not be able to play baduk tonight and could they please reschedule, he had Geum Moa cast her stealth-art upon him.

“We’ve reinforced the equipment too. Now let us be off.”
“And a stealth-art on top of it.”
“There’s a vehicle out to meet us in front of the cathedral anyway, isn’t there.”

And yet on this night Shin Hweein’s caution shone splendidly.

“Ah, Seoyeon — it really has been a while. Juna, it’s been a while as well.”

Astonishingly, beside the Yun House vehicle that had come to meet their party in front of the cathedral stood a man, in the middle of some trivial dispute with the driver, who caught sight of the women and called out to them with a smile.
The name of that handsome man, who carried a faintly melancholy air about him, was Shin Jain.
He was Shin Hweein’s middle elder brother.