Chapter 17 — The Sorcerer And The Rank-Two Ability Exam (5)

“Shin Hae, Shin Hae! Snap out of it!”
“What in the—!”
“I didn’t sense any particular power from them. How could this be.”

When Shin Hweein collapsed without warning, blood streaming from his nose, the three sorcerers around him scattered into alarm, each in their own way, and rushed to check on him.

“He’ll be all right.”
“What.”

A golden-haired woman appeared at Shin Hweein’s side out of nowhere and stopped them before they could.

“Those creatures only recognized their most threatening adversary and laid a snare for him.”
“You. You’re the one from the Shin House. Your shape is a little different, but it is unmistakably you.”
“Of course.”

Ham Seoyeon and Yun Juna already knew Geum Moa, so they did not react strongly.
Yun Jinseong was a different matter.
He had known the Shin House kept a handmaid named Geum Moa, but he had not known she was a being formidable enough to deceive him and walk past him unseen.

“You. You were a yokai! And no less than a great yokai of Rank Two or above!”
“Yes, terribly frightening, isn’t it? Your whole body trembling, gooseflesh rising. But rest assured, I have no intention of harming you. My business is solely with the young master.”

Yun Jinseong was more on guard against her than against the overseer of this region, and did not dare take his eyes off her.
Geum Moa only let out a scornful little laugh and paid him no mind.

Her piece said, she extended a hand toward Ham Seoyeon, and Ham Seoyeon, lips pressed bitterly together as if she loathed it, handed Shin Hweein over.

“It was the perfect chance to nullify the Three-Year Pact, and you stepped in so swiftly. Wretched bat of a woman…”

The venom was on her tongue, but Geum Moa’s face wore a smile of relief as she gathered Shin Hweein into her arms and looked him over.
She knelt where she stood and laid his head upon her knee.

Then she called out the all-purpose shikigami that turned up at every such moment.

“Heal the young master, won’t you.”

— Meow.

The myodusa came slithering out of her sleeve, glared up at its mistress once, then knocked Shin Hweein’s mask aside with its tail.
The transformation art had unraveled when he lost consciousness, and his bare face was now wholly exposed.

“You—”

— Nya!

Geum Moa, who detested baring Shin Hweein’s true face before strangers, scowled fiercely.
But the myodusa snapped back that without this it couldn’t perform the healing, and settled itself beside Shin Hweein’s head.
When the creature began to give off a blue light, the bleeding from his nose gradually ceased, and color returned to his pale face.

— Miyaa.

“Now come back. Hah. If only the mental damage could be settled too… This is exactly why I told him he needs to learn another mental sorcery, really.”

— Myeh.

“Come back. Quickly.”

When the myodusa refused to leave Shin Hweein even after the healing was done, Geum Moa pried it away by force, wiped beneath his nose clean with one hand, and brushed his cheek.

“You…”

It was as though the people around her did not even register.
Toward such a Geum Moa, Yun Jinseong spoke with his teeth clenched.

“If you stepped forward, you could turn the Shin House itself upside down. Then why don’t you? Are you toying with that child?”
“Toying with him? However much a yokai I may be, I do not fall in love with my toys.”

Geum Moa answered with a bitter smile, then turned to face Yun Jinseong and added,

“You must know it too. That even the shikigami of the Shin House, those renowned as its strongest, have fallen silent in these days.”
“That is only because there has been nothing worth their stepping forward.”
“Surely you don’t believe that.”

Geum Moa snorted a laugh at his words.

“There was a covenant binding every great yokai in the world. A covenant whose hour of breaking draws near.”
“Such an absurd contract. Who in the world could have…”
“Surely a man at the very heart of Aeshin’s Spell Army has caught the scent that the world will soon grow restless? When that hour comes, all of us shall be free. The present world and the Specter Realm will be joined again, and I shall be able to step into the open. No. I should rather say I will have to step into the open.”
“Hah.”

Yun Jinseong pictured the future she had described for a moment, then shook his head as though the very imagining of it appalled him, and spoke in a hardened voice.

“My elder brother, Shin Yuhyeon, is still here. If the Shin House’s shikigami gather under that name, Aeshin will be safe.”
“Well now. Whether they will truly follow Shin Yuhyeon, that is something we shall only know when the time comes.”
“What did you say?”

Yun Jinseong could not let pass a remark that slighted the master of the Shin House, Aeshin’s mightiest warrior.
But Geum Moa, as though she had said all she meant to say, closed her mouth and turned her eyes, all at once, to Shin Hweein.

It was because she had felt a stirring of spiritual power from him, and sure enough, the Indulgence that always made its presence known at his breast was, just now, withdrawing from sight.

Having grasped the situation, Geum Moa gave a soft cough of a laugh and raised her head.

“It seems it will take a little more time still. Until then, I shall stand in for the young master.”

At those words, all of them came back to themselves.
They had forgotten, distracted by Geum Moa’s sudden appearance, but this place was the battlefield guarding the Specter Realm Gate.
The swarms of low spirits that had filled the field on every side had slipped away at some point, and what was closing around their throats now was not chaotic yokai aura but a refined, honed killing intent.

“Rank Three, then…”

Sensing the overseer’s presence, Yun Jinseong murmured under his breath.

A Rank-Three yokai was a heavyweight no one could face without an exceptionally accomplished First-Rank sorcerer, or a Special-Grade sorcerer, stepping forward.
As with the sorcerers’ grading system, so too with the yokai grades, each step upward marked an entirely different order of strength.
No number of lower-grade sorcerers, however many they were, could prevail against a higher.

“Rank Three? Uncle Jinseong.”
“Don’t fret. A Special-Grade sorcerer stands right here, does he not. I shall take that one.”

Having answered with such confidence, Yun Jinseong wore a sour look as he added a moment later,

“The trouble is that the ones following behind it are two of Rank Four.”
“Ah…”

At that, Yun Juna and Ham Seoyeon turned to look at one another and shook their heads at the same moment, then sent their gazes to Geum Moa.
But she, too, only smiled faintly and shook her head.

“We’re done for.”
“Done for, indeed.”
“I shall be of help only as a Rank-Two fire sorceress.”

The two of them lamented yet had no thought of fleeing.
They were, instead, readying themselves for battle, and to them Geum Moa said, almost as though singing,

“I will support you from behind. Each of you take one, and hold out as long as you can. If only the young master rises before you die, the situation will surely change.”
“Are you joking? A Rank-Four yokai is a great yokai. The sort you need to be at least a First-Rank sorcerer to stand against…”
“Even so… there’s nothing for it but to try.”

The two heaved long sighs and looked at one another again.
With expressions of the deepest displeasure, this time they nodded, at the same moment.

Yun Juna drew the greatsword strapped at her back and gripped it.
Ham Seoyeon murmured an incantation and called forth a spear and shield that radiated a holy aura.

Looking upon the two who poured forth an aura unfitting for their years, Yun Jinseong gave a low laugh and declared,

“First I shall sweep away the rabble, and when I take on the Rank Three, you two will keep the Rank-Four yokai from interfering. Can you do that?”
“…Yes!”
“With our lives.”
“Then… here we go!”

Yun Jinseong leapt skyward and conjured the same colossal sorcerous array he had displayed in the earlier Rank-Three exam.
The array filled the sky with brilliant light, seeming almost to stand defiantly before the enemy and declare war.

— Kihi…!

The Rank-Three yokai approaching from beyond noticed it and made to react, and in that very instant the sorcerous array flashed like lightning and discharged a spear of finely honed spiritual power down toward the ground.

— Kahaaht!

A vast spear, loosed to strike only the overseer-class beast at the head of the pack.
But the very moment the creature reflexively shielded itself, the spear split into hundreds, then thousands of fragments, fanning out in every direction and striking the surrounding yokai indiscriminately.

— Kuaaaagh!

— Kihek!

Rank-Six and lower low spirits, to say nothing of even the Rank-Five yokai who supposedly required at least a Second-Rank sorcerer to oppose, were pinned down by the area sorcery and either killed outright or wounded so gravely as to fall incapacitated.
Watching it, Ham Seoyeon and Yun Juna trembled side by side.

“A Special-Grade truly is…”
“Magnificent. …But even Uncle cannot cast sorcery like that without paying some price. Will he be all right?”

It went without saying that even among Rank-Three yokai there were differences in level, and in matchup as well.
A Rank-Three yokai was a foe whose defeat even a Special-Grade sorcerer in full readiness could not guarantee, and now he was to fight that creature, freshly enraged, after expending such a great sorcery.

“Is now really the time to be worrying about him? Look ahead. We have to take one of those each.”
“That is…”

Across the air, a misshapen monster came leaping, vast, swathed in darkness, with limbs made of scythes bristling thick from its body.
Between the shadows formed where Yun Jinseong met that creature one could not bear to look upon, the two of them spotted a pair of monsters leaping forth to aid their master.

— To hell!

— Every last one of you, I shall drag you down to hell!

One bore the head of a horse, one the head of an ox; otherwise they took the form of enormous, muscle-bound men, monsters easily eight ja (about 240cm) in height.
The ox-headed one might, from its shape alone, briefly call to mind the Minotaur of Greek Crete.
But the fact that a horse-headed one stood beside it, that each gripped an iron pike in one hand, and that they spoke of hell, these gave away its true origin at once.

“The Oxhead-Gui and the Horsehead-Gui…”
“They’re the prison-warders of the hells the Buddhists speak of. Don’t tell me a gate to hell is opening up in the Capital.”
“Don’t know. Run!”
“I really don’t know either!”

The two heaved sighs at the same instant and broke into a run.
Without need of any signal, Ham Seoyeon trained her weapons upon Oxhead, Yun Juna upon Horsehead.

Compared to the misshapen monster that had clashed with Yun Jinseong they looked far more manageable, yet given that each of these creatures bore Rank-Four yokai force in its flesh, they could be no easy mark.

— These are women who have committed the sin of killing!

— Drag these ones to hell too. We shall not be lonely from now on.

— We must be quick about it, for there are far too many sinners in this world!

— You cannot know how long we have waited for this day to come!

In the face of the spiritual power the two women gave off, Oxhead and Horsehead abandoned their attack on Yun Jinseong and levelled their iron pikes at their new foes.
The next instant, blistering fire burst from the tips!

“Tch!”

Ham Seoyeon raised her shield, and Yun Juna turned the broad flat of her greatsword forward, blocking the blast.
Even as they wondered whether they could meet a Rank-Four yokai’s spiritual power head-on, neither of them so much as thought of dodging.
They strove as best they could to clear the spot, but the unconscious Shin Hweein lay within the straight-line range of the long-stretching flames.
No. The creatures had likely loosed the fire at once because they had known that too.

— I shall burn to death every wretch who has recklessly committed killing!

— These are the flames of the Hell of Repetition!

Of the Eight Hot Hells whose torment is fire, the lightest in punishment is the Hell of Repetition.
And yet even the flames of this Hell of Repetition felt, to mortal women, as though their very souls were being seared away.
Ham Seoyeon clenched her teeth, poured her spiritual power into the shield, and was murmuring the name of the goddess she served, when, at that very moment,

“What…? My general?”
“Hah, haah.”

The flames that had been pouring forth fierce enough to melt their weapons dropped, in a single instant, to less than half their heat.
It was still scorching, but that much, a Rank-Two awakened could somehow ward off.

“From here on out, you’ll be less harmed by the flames.”

Behind them, Geum Moa, one arm extended, spoke in the tone of one who had done them a great favor.
The two women, even though Geum Moa had restricted herself to roughly the Rank-Two level, were astonished that she wielded this much power, and at the same time, irritated.

“It would have been nicer of you to use it from the start.”
“What if my skin’s burnt…”
“If I had used it from the start, you wouldn’t have known to be grateful, would you.”

Truly the words of a fox, every line picked to be the most galling.
She had the perfect bearing of one who would help and still earn a curse for it.
The two ground their teeth.
But she had, after all, helped them, and they could not say a word against her.

“Tch… here we go!”
“Hwaaaaaaah!”

Teeth clenched, the two took the streaming flames head-on and charged at the creatures.
It was not as though they were deliberately matching their movements, and yet, uncannily, their motions were the same.
Both of them were aware of it, and irritated by it, but as such things had been frequent for some time now, by this point they tried not to dwell on it.

— How does a feeble human bear the flames of the Hell of Repetition.

— Surely it is the work of that yokai watching from behind, eyes glinting.

— Mean you to obstruct the prison-warders of hell in their duty?

— Should you meddle further, Yama himself will see you punished.

Geum Moa did not so much as twitch.
But Horsehead and Oxhead took fright of their own accord and, spitting petty threats as though to cow her, ceased pouring out their flames and struck the earth with their iron pikes in unison.

— I shall skewer you wenches on a spit!

— You fool, what good does it do to say so beforehand!

In nearly the same instant the earth was stained black, and iron spits came bursting up haphazardly from every quarter.
The two had been on guard from the very moment the aura of hell began to spread across the earth, and they moved nimbly aside, but they soon flinched at the spear-blades erupting until there was not a foot of clear ground left to stand on.

“Don’t let them cut you! The aura of hell clings to them. The moment you’re cut, you really do come closer to hell.”
“Right. I can fly. You?”

Yun Juna ordinarily preferred not to make much use of her psychokinesis, on the grounds that it had little to do with the Yun House’s swordsmanship, but she could afford no such luxuries against Rank-Four yokai, and at once rose into the air.
Meanwhile, Ham Seoyeon tried to weave a path between the rising spear-blades and, in the end, let out a sigh.

“A mudang is like a bird perched on a sotdae pole¹. She must join the spirits of the heavens to the people of the earth.”
“That’s a long way of saying you can’t fly. Sorry, I can’t lift you, either. You, fall back and support me at range. I’ll try to handle both…”

— Taht!

There was no time to leisurely discuss tactics.
Horsehead, displeased to see Yun Juna take to the sky, gave a violent thrust of his iron pike and sent forth a sword-wind that shattered hundreds of the iron spits, hurling the fragments toward Yun Juna.

— Down to the earth. No, down to hell with you!

“What in—!”
“Tch…!”

It was an assault Yun Juna alone could never, in this life or the next, hope to block.
Ham Seoyeon, brandishing Athena’s shield as it shone with dazzling light, hurled herself bravely into the air and swept aside the whirling sword-wind.
But as though the creatures had been waiting for just that, a sharp iron spit was surging up from directly beneath her landing point.

“Sham-Shaman!”
“—Who did you just call a Sham-Shaman?”

To Yun Juna’s shout, flicking the fragments flying at her aside with her greatsword, Ham Seoyeon replied in a perfectly composed voice.
By now she was balanced on the tip of an iron spit so fine it looked as though it could scarcely hold up an ant, perched there on tiptoe.

“Look. This is what it means to ride the spirit-blades. After seeing this, can you still call me a Sham-Shaman?”
“You. That’s what you’re calling spirit-blades…”

— A mudang?!

— A mudang. Mudangs are beings who pile up good karma…

— No. She said Sham-Shaman. She is no doubt a sinner who has duped and killed people with foul sorcery!

— Yes, a sinner who has committed killing, clearly!

Even if a high monk who had stacked great virtues had been standing there, the creatures would have called him a sinner.

Balanced upon the tip of the iron spit, Ham Seoyeon snorted a laugh, flung her shield into the air, and gripped a single spear in both hands.
As she rode the spirit-blades in earnest, a divine air was gathering ever more thickly about her.

“If this is all there is to them, the Rank Fours are more doable than I expected, aren’t they? Let’s finish them both off before Shin Hae wakes.”
“You. The one who was about to die from those flames just now—”

— But it’s a good idea.

Yun Juna, her face hardened with anger, gripped her greatsword and lunged in a straight line through the air at Horsehead.

The faces of the two women, staking their lives upon battle with a great enemy, were, there was no denying it, alike enough to draw the wonder of any onlooker.