Chapter 11
Fwoosh―!
My vision turned pure white.
It was dust.
An enormous amount of old dust shot up in every direction.
The precariously piled books lost their balance and came tumbling down in a heap.
“Cough, cough!”
I reflexively covered my face.
Through the hazy cloud of dust, the books slid down to my feet and scattered chaotically.
“……Ah.”
A moment ago, I had felt as if I were briefly bewitched by something.
Was I wrong?
Was it just my imagination?
For a second I wondered if I'd been hit by some sort of curse, but nothing was wrong.
I spread out my palm. I clenched and unclenched my fingers.
They were perfectly fine.
“……What. So it really was just my imagination.”
Guess it was nothing after all.
I brushed off the dust and lifted the book in my hand.
A leather cover.
Its corners were rounded and worn, as if it had passed through countless hands over many years.
Letters were engraved in the center of the cover.
I wiped the dust away with my sleeve.
[Apprentice Diary]
This is… an apprentice diary? A diary?
As a kid, my mom had forced worksheets on me, telling me to study hanja, so I could at least read it haltingly.
Well, I'd pretty much forgotten most of it by now.
Apprentice Diary.
There was nothing on the cover besides those four characters. No author, no publisher, not even a simple book band. Just letters deeply embossed into the worn leather.
It seemed to be a diary written while learning something.
'Mm-hmm. A diary, huh.'
For some reason, the fact that it was someone else's diary suddenly made me want to read it.
I carefully turned the first page.
“……?”
It was blank paper.
I turned to the next page.
Blank paper again.
I flipped another page.
“…….”
Rustle.
I pinched the edge of the pages with my thumb and flipped through to the end.
From beginning to end, there wasn't a single character. It was nothing but yellowed paper, with not even a dot on it, let alone any writing.
'What's this. Did they start writing it and then stop?'
The worn leather corners made it look like someone had carried it around often.
And yet the inside was completely blank.
Or maybe the book itself had some use.
'Hmm. Maybe I should ask the old owner about it.'
I was just tucking the book under my arm while mulling over that trivial thought.
I should probably go settle up now.
As I turned my head.
“……!”
My heart dropped.
He was right in front of me.
Somehow, the gaunt old man I thought had been dozing was standing right before my eyes.
'Jeez…….'
I hadn't sensed a trace of his presence.
But the old man's expression was strange.
His eyes behind his magnifying glasses were bulging as if they might pop out.
His mouth hung wide open around the pipe clenched between his teeth, as if his jaw were about to drop off.
He had frozen in that expression, staring at me without moving.
“…….”
“…….”
What? Why was he acting like that?
Ah.
Something suddenly clicked.
The pile of books that had just come crashing down.
I quickly apologized first.
“Ah, I'm sorry. I was pulling out a book and ended up kicking up a bit of dust.”
They were already all piled up messily, but still, I had gone rummaging through someone else's shop goods and made them collapse.
“…….”
But the old man only kept looking back and forth between the pile of books and me, mouth still gaping open.
What was he looking at? The books? Or me?
He glanced at the book in my hand once, then slowly looked me up and down again.
Well.
Come to think of it, I must have looked ridiculous. With half my face wrapped in black cloth and wearing a baggy black T-shirt, I was crouched in the corner of the used bookstore digging through bargain piles. I must have looked exactly like a suspicious person. I couldn't complain even if he suspected me of being a thief.
Was he maybe treating me like some guy who came here hoping to nick a book without even having money?
“……Um, I do have money.”
“H-How did you……?”
The old man's voice cracked.
Huh?
“……You mean this?”
I tapped the book tucked under my arm.
Then the old man jumped back in alarm, as if I'd just shaken a bomb in front of him.
“You fool! Th-that's a cursed item……!”
Cursed?
Hm? I don't really know about that.
The old man took the pipe out of his mouth and, pointing at the book with a trembling hand, began to spill everything.
According to the owner's explanation, that book was under an enormous curse.
A very long time ago, some mad sorcerer had stopped by this used bookstore, secretly slipped that book into the pile, and left.
And he hadn't just left it there; he'd also placed a powerful barrier and a vicious curse on it.
After that, nobody could touch the book, or even the pile of books around it.
“……There have been more than a few people who tried to pull that thing out.”
The old man swallowed hard.
“One guy was doing just fine, then that very day his shop went belly-up and he ended up sleeping on the streets. Another guy started feeling weak and sickly after three days, caught some major illness, and was laid up in bed. Another was walking along the road just fine and then got hit by a freak accident…… Anyway, I've never seen anyone who touched that thing and come to a good end.”
'……No, wait.'
If it was that dangerous, put up a fence or at least a warning sign.
Do you want to kill off the whole neighborhood?
As I was inwardly exasperated, color suddenly returned to the old man's tense face and he started laughing heartily.
“Heh-heh. So I just left it alone. Figured someday some fearless guy like you would show up and yank it right out for me.”
Ah.
So that's why the bookstore was especially messy.
They couldn't touch it, so they couldn't clean up either.
'Ah…… so that's why even here.'
Without thinking, I pointed to the opposite corner of the shop. There too, books were piled haphazardly with no room to step.
“Ah…… then is that why the books were piled up over there too? Because of the curse…….”
“Hm? That's not it.”
“…….”
“I just didn't clean over there.”
“…….”
Ah.
……So it really was just laziness.
Maybe this book too had been left there not for some grand reason about curses, but simply because it was too much of a hassle to clean up.
Well, anyway.
A book said to be cursed, huh.
If what the old man said was true, then just touching it should have made my whole body go numb, to the point I couldn't even pull it out.
But I was fine. Completely fine.
Rather, strangely enough, I didn't want to let it go.
Cursed or not.
The leather cover was sturdy and felt pretty high-end, so if all else failed I figured I could use it as a notebook later. I decided to think of it that way.
More importantly, I should get ready to pay now.
I stacked the book on top of the ones I'd picked out at first and set them on the counter.
“How much for all of this?”
The old man stared down at the books on the counter for a long while.
Then he slowly opened his mouth.
“……Fifty million won.”
……Huh?
Damn.
Is the sorcery world really that expensive even for books?
They said a single bell costs five million won, and now five shabby theory books are fifty million?
When my expression stiffened for a moment,
“Heh! Puh-heh-heh-heh-heh! Just kidding, kidding! You jumped!”
The old man suddenly burst out laughing like a madman.
He slapped his knee with the hand holding the pipe, tears even welling up at the corners of his eyes.
“I won't take anything, I won't. Feels like ten years' worth of indigestion just went away. Thanks to you, I can finally do a proper cleaning for the first time in ages.”
“Then what about the prices of these other books…….”
“Aw, I said I won't take it! Take those too! Go on, off with you, off with you!”
As I awkwardly hugged the pile of books, a price tag on the back cover of the talisman primer sitting on top caught my eye.
[￦ 3,800,000]
'……3.8 million won?'
This? This cheap magazine-looking thing?
I slyly flipped up the theory books underneath. Every one of them had zeros lined up in a row. The thinnest one was over two million won.
'……If I add all this up, it'll easily go over ten million won.'
Even if the fifty million won was a joke, these definitely didn't seem like things meant to be taken for free in the first place.
“Shoo, shoo! I need to clean!”
The old man waved me off and pushed me toward the door.
He was so excited about something that he'd already pulled a broom from somewhere and was humming to himself.
Before I knew it, I'd been shoved out of the used bookstore with a free pile of books worth millions of won in my arms.
***
As soon as I got back to the workshop, I collapsed straight onto the bed.
“Haa…….”
On the way back, I got lost in the alleys again for quite a while.
It was definitely the same way I'd come, but I only managed to find my way to the main road after circling the same alley three times.
There had to be some sort of sorcery on these neighborhood alleys making them hard to navigate. No, maybe that really was the case. In a town full of sorcery and barriers and whatnot, that wouldn't be impossible.
……I seriously thought that for a moment.
Well, probably not. It's just that I'm hopeless with directions.
Anyway.
Lying on the bed, I lifted the suppressor hanging around my neck.
'……I guess this thing has something to do with it.'
Maybe because it blocked spiritual power, wearing it made me feel oddly drained of stamina.
I took the suppressor off my neck.
Ssshhk―
In an instant, my body became as light as a feather.
I could feel something warm starting from my lower abdomen and circulating through my body.
In no time at all, the fatigue from wandering the alleys faded away.
Like something that should have been there all along was returning to its rightful place?
“……Huh.”
I clenched and opened my palm once.
Sensation was vivid all the way to my fingertips. It was a lightness I could never explain with my rotten stamina from spending ten years cooped up playing games.
'This kind of thing.'
So this is spiritual power.
I stared blankly at the ceiling, then sat up.
This wasn't the time to be lying around.
***
“Mm… so that's roughly how it works.”
I spread out the books I'd gotten from the used bookstore on my desk and quickly skimmed the parts I needed.
It was the process of translating in-game concepts into the terminology of the real-world sorcery world.
What I'd called mana was spiritual power (靈力) here.
What I'd called a mana circuit was a spell formula (術式).
Sorcery attributes included yin-yang and the five elements, and the five elements were further divided into wood, fire, earth, metal, and water.
The overall framework was roughly the same as in the game. Only the names were different.
And lastly.
[You Can Make It Too! From Today, I'm a Talisman King Too]
When I opened it, sure enough, it was packed with exaggerated illustrations like a cheap magazine.
But.
'……This one is at least a little better.'
The other books were packed with nothing but text, so I couldn't get them into my head at all, but this one at least had pictures.
The shape and flow of the formula engraved into talismans were sketched out, albeit crudely, in diagrams.
As expected, in this world talismans weren't made by carving circuits into them.
They were made by drawing Chinese characters and patterns on a special paper called gwihwang paper, using cinnabar or blood.
'……How can it work without a circuit?'
That did seem a little strange.
Well, I'd find out once I tried it.
I had definitely gotten the big picture of the setting.
***
“Let's give it a try.”
Now that I had the theory sorted out, it was time for practice.
Anything sticks in your head better when you actually do it with your hands rather than just look at it.
I took bundles of gwihwang paper, cinnabar, and fine brushes from the supply room.
With everything laid out on the desk, it really had the air of a talisman maker's workshop.
“Ahem.”
I loosened my wrists lightly.
What I was going to make today was the most basic pass-the-exam talisman.
I opened the introductory diagram printed boldly on the first page of Chapter 1 of [You Can Make It Too! From Today, I'm a Talisman King Too].
[Good, You Can Pass the Exam Too! Passing Talisman.]
There was nothing complicated about it.
One circle. A few short patterns inside it. And finally, a single Chinese character in the center.
It seemed to be a structure that enclosed spiritual power by drawing a circle around it and then guided that power along the patterns.
I dipped the tip of the fine brush lightly into the cinnabar.
I focused my spiritual power at my fingertips.
I could feel the cinnabar flow along the brush tip.
The sensation of riding that flow with spiritual power had a strangely satisfying feel.
Swoosh―
I drew a circle on the paper.
Then the inner patterns.
And finally, the large Chinese character in the center.
[合格]
The moment I lifted the brush from the paper.
Vwoom―
The talisman trembled faintly. Barely.
“Oh.”
Look at that.
It really is reacting.
I could feel a little rush of dopamine welling up in my chest.
It had a different kind of thrill from engraving circuits into metal.
Easier than I thought, huh?
“……Huh?”
But.
I had drawn everything, but something was strange.
I'd definitely filled it in according to the diagram, and the talisman had reacted. But something still felt off.
It felt like I'd made a beautiful vessel, only for the inside to be completely empty.
I tried channeling spiritual power into it.
It seemed to seep into the circle, then quickly leak out through my fingertips and scatter into the air. The energy wouldn't stay trapped.
“……Is this actually working or what.”
I held the talisman up to the light. The red writing looked fine, but I couldn't feel anything from it; it was just a dead picture.
At this rate, I couldn't tell how this was any different from just writing hanja on paper.
I flipped through the talisman king book again.
The 'how to draw it' part was written in almost absurd detail.
How to make the circle, what order the patterns go in, where to place the character.
But that was all there was.
There wasn't a single line explaining the fundamental principles—why the spiritual power leaked out, or how to keep it trapped inside.
The other theory books were the same.
Maybe because they were old books, the explanations weren't very friendly, and more than anything, half the text was in hanja, which made it a pain to read.
Why the hell did they write every word in hanja for no reason?
I set the brush down and leaned back in my chair with a sigh.
Then, idly, my eyes fell on the old leather book I'd shoved to one side of the desk.
Apprentice Diary.
“……Huh?”
My eyes stopped short.
“…….”
It had definitely been blank paper when I'd flipped through it at the bookstore earlier.
But now, in the middle of the yellowed first page.
I could see words neatly written in black ink.
[First Day]
First Day.
……the first day.
“……What?”
I rubbed my eyes and looked again.
It was definitely written there. On the yellowed paper, dark ink marks were stamped in, deep and clear.
It had definitely been an empty blank page.
“……How did this happen?”