Chapter 38
Goo Do-gyeom could hardly believe what he was seeing.
Swoooosh.
By now, how many had it been?
Another spirit was sucked into that palm-sized gourd.
“Where to next?”
“Ah, yes! T-this way.”
Goo Do-gyeom ran ahead again.
A rope loaded with empty gourds was slung over his shoulder.
He had brought them out in a big bundle from the Sealing Vault just in case.
But he hadn't actually managed to use even one of them.
There hadn't been any time to use them.
He'd only run ahead because he'd been asked to guide the way.
The moment they arrived, Do-hyeon had already sucked them all up.
Originally, while the other professors held the spirits in place, Goo Do-gyeom was supposed to go around sealing them.
It had been the president's orders.
If they eradicated every last one they saw, the school would take a serious loss.
Each of those things had either been entrusted to the school for safekeeping or painstakingly acquired for research.
In other words, they were all the school's property.
Still, the matter was so urgent that he thought a few of them would have to be exorcised no matter what.
Swoooosh—
Another one.
Not a single one had been lost so far.
“P-Professor Goo! Just who on earth is that person?!”
Another professor, who was restraining a spirit, shouted the question.
“…….”
Instead of answering, Goo Do-gyeom could only let out a hollow laugh.
He himself had long since been reduced to nothing more than a guide.
After clearing another area like that, the two of them were heading toward the dormitory, where the spirit had been spotted.
“Kyaaa!”
A scream rang out.
A large lake lay on the way to the dormitory.
In the middle of it, some female student was flailing helplessly, splashing water everywhere.
“What do we do! Hey, somebody please—!”
The other students nearby couldn't bring themselves to go in and just stamped their feet on the shore.
There was something in the water.
A dark blue shadow had a grip on the ankle of the girl who had fallen in, slowly dragging her toward the depths of the lake.
“...Damn it.”
Goo Do-gyeom hurriedly pulled out his phone.
On the screen was the group chat where the professors exchanged updates in real time.
The locations of the released spirits were marked one by one without fail, but this lake wasn't on it.
“...So there was a water ghost.”
Of all things.
Those things always hid all their main power in the water, making them hard to detect.
The problem was that sealing a water ghost required a special ritual implement. It was too far to run back to the Sealing Studies Hall.
And if they tried to exorcise it, the thing was already dragging the student into the depths of the lake.
If they attacked recklessly, the student might get caught in it too.
They were stuck, unable to do anything.
“Professor, could I have one empty gourd?”
Do-hyeon held out his hand beside him.
“……?”
‘A normal gourd shouldn't be able to catch a water ghost...’
Even so, he untied one from the rope over his shoulder and handed it over.
After everything Do-hyeon had shown him so far, his hand moved before he even realized it.
Do-hyeon took it and brought his other hand over it.
Blue spiritual energy seemed to gather at his fingertips.
Crackle, crackle.
Tiny sparks began to snap along the surface of the gourd.
Where his fingertips passed, something was being etched in as if burning red.
It was a ritual engraving.
“…….”
Goo Do-gyeom doubted his own eyes.
‘Is he engraving it with his bare hands right now?’
And at this speed, too.
He couldn't believe it.
While he stared blankly, Do-hyeon finished the engraving and immediately pulled out the stopper.
Then he pointed the gourd's mouth toward the lake.
Swoooosh.
The black mass in the water was sucked right into the mouth of the gourd together with a stream of water.
Brrrrr— Brrrrr—
The gourd vibrated wildly in his hand.
Once the water ghost was sealed, the students who had been hesitating at the shore finally rushed in all at once.
“Hey! Pull her up!”
“Got her, got her!”
Fortunately, it hadn't been that deep, so the students quickly hauled the girl who had fallen in back up.
“Kuhk, cough...!”
The girl spat out a mouthful of water and gasped roughly for breath.
“T-thank you... thank you...!”
The girl, now coming to her senses, bowed her head again and again.
Goo Do-gyeom could only stare blankly at the scene, no, at the gourd in his hand.
“...What in the world.”
Meanwhile, Do-hyeon was feeling quite pleased with himself.
‘I tried applying what I saw in the Sealing Vault earlier.’
He was satisfied.
A water ghost was made of water energy.
So you had to bind it with the element of earth.
‘As expected, it works.’
Of course, it would've been better if the material's properties matched from the start, but if it was urgent, all you had to do was draw over the circuit like this.
This was fun, fun.
A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth.
In the end, Goo Do-gyeom couldn't hold back and spoke up.
“How on earth did you do that just now?”
What he'd handed over had definitely been an ordinary sealing gourd.
“Ah, I just adapted the structure I saw earlier a bit.”
The craftsman began explaining as if he had no intention of hiding his method.
But everything coming out of his mouth was hard to believe.
He knew that a sealing implement for a water ghost was made by framing it with peach wood, wrapping it in earth, and firing it.
Of course, he knew the principle behind it too.
Goo Do-gyeom was a man who had made a name for himself in sealing studies and risen all the way to a professorship.
It was the principle of the mutual overcoming of the five elements: suppressing yin energy with peach wood and restraining water energy with the force of earth.
But.
‘...He read the ritual pattern engraved into the material?’
That the tiny lattice structure of the earth produced such an effect had only been discovered very recently, and it hadn't even been made public yet.
What little there was existed so minutely within the material itself that, from the start, it was impossible for human hands to engrave it.
So even if you knew the principle, all you could do was bake it with earth and borrow the material's properties.
And yet that man had engraved it on the gourd on the spot, with his bare hands.
Only now did Goo Do-gyeom truly realize it.
Just what kind of absurd person he was facing.
‘...So this is what an E-rank craftsman is like.’
***
In the open lot in front of the dormitory where they had arrived, two spirits were roaming around.
Then, after noticing their presence, they started slithering closer.
Swoosh—
Do-hyeon sucked in the one that lunged ahead first.
He gave the gourd a light shake.
Brrrrr—
‘Hmm. The capacity's starting to run low.’
He'd crammed in everything he knew, including the circuit that expanded the subspace used for making the inventory and the circuit that increased suction efficiency.
On top of that, he had even chosen the highest-grade gourd lying around the workshop.
For something made as a test piece, he'd put quite a lot of effort into it.
Still, there was a limit.
Just as an inventory had slots and weight limits, this gourd also had a fixed total amount of spiritual power it could hold.
‘If I add one or two more like this, it'll be about full.’
Was this how a fisherman felt looking at a full net?
Seeing the gourd already packed with spirits made him feel pleased all on his own.
But he'd been feeling a prickly gaze on him for a while now.
When he turned his head, Professor Goo was staring at him intently.
Anyone could tell he wanted to try it once.
And just behind them, there was still one left.
It was the one that had come running only to freeze up helplessly after seeing its comrade get sealed.
“Professor, would you like to try it too?”
“R-Really, is that all right?!”
Professor Goo answered at once, as if he'd been waiting for it.
Just as I thought, he'd wanted to try it for ages.
“Just pour in your spiritual energy the way you usually do.”
Goo Do-gyeom took the gourd with trembling hands.
He was, after all, an authority on sealing studies.
He had been working with sealing implements for nearly twenty years already.
A little gourd like this was nothing.
Thinking that, he let his spiritual energy flow in as usual.
But.
Ssssh—
‘……?’
His spiritual energy was drawn in very smoothly.
A sealing implement was a ritual tool that swallowed up an entire spirit's power, so it normally took quite a lot of energy.
And since there was no need for weakening, it should've needed that much more spiritual energy.
Yet the energy that actually left him was less than half of normal.
Swoooosh.
The one loitering off in the distance was sucked into the gourd.
Brrrrr— Brrrrr—
The sensation of the gourd thrashing in his hand.
‘This feeling is...’
Then a memory he had long forgotten came back to Goo Do-gyeom.
It was from his graduate school days.
A dawn fishing spot he'd been dragged to against his will, following his advisor.
At daybreak, after having gone all night without a wink of sleep and barely holding on with hollow eyes.
The first big catch he'd ever hauled up.
That heavy, satisfying pull on the fishing rod.
He later went on to become completely obsessed with fishing, but strangely, he'd never felt the same thrill in his hands as he had that first day.
And yet the sensation in his hand right now was even better than that.
Brrrrr—
The vibration of it sucking in the spirits like a vacuum cleaner tingled up through his palm.
“...Kyaaaaa.”
An exclamation slipped from his lips before he knew it.
His hands trembled.
‘...That's a monster catch.’
He'd worked with sealing implements for nearly twenty years.
And in all that time, he'd never once felt anything like it.
‘So this is the taste of sealing...?’
Maybe this was the first time he'd ever truly sealed something.
Just as Do-gyeom was being entranced by the exhilarating feel in his hands.
“Professor?”
“Y-yes?!”
“You should close it now.”
“...Ah. R-right.”
Goo Do-gyeom snapped back to his senses and firmly pressed the stopper back in.
Clack.
The thrashing gourd immediately became still.
Then Do-hyeon held out his hand.
He meant to give it back.
But his hand wouldn't let go.
Was it because the sensation from earlier had been so vivid?
‘...I don't want to give it back.’
He felt like a child having his toy confiscated.
His grip on the gourd tightened slightly.
*
I took the gourd back from Professor Goo.
Heh-heh-heh.
It was obvious at a glance that he didn't know what to do with that exhilarating feel.
Pretty amazing, right?
Of course it is. Who do you think made it?
Buzzz—
Professor Goo's phone buzzed.
His expression stiffened slightly as he checked the screen.
“...Master Craftsman.”
He said as he put his phone down,
“It seems there's one last one left.”
Professor Goo came back from somewhere, pushing an old scooter.
“Get on. It's a bit far from here.”
Vrooom—
The scooter raced toward the edge of campus.
After riding for quite a while, they were nearing their destination.
“...That.”
Up ahead.
A shape draped in something like black rags was floating there.
A deathly pale face showed between the rags.
Its mouth was split wide to the ears, grinning grotesquely.
It was attached to a student, sucking something out of them.
A pale, hazy something was slowly seeping out of the student's body.
“It looks like a Soul Stealer.”
Soul Stealer.
Now that he thought about it, he'd vaguely read about it in Dokkaebibul.
A Western spirit that was said to suck up a living person's soul whole.
Before the scooter had even come to a full stop, I jumped off first.
But when I got closer, there was another person beside it.
A woman was slumped on the ground, dazed.
A pale yellow soul was half slipping out of the woman's body.
And that soul was clutching the student's soul in both arms, keeping it from being sucked in by the thing.
It was a bizarre tug-of-war, as it desperately pulled out its own soul to keep the student's soul from being taken.
It was a familiar face.
The assistant I'd seen in the sealing studies lab—Si-yun, I think her name was.
A close call; if we'd been any later, she'd have had her soul devoured whole along with the student.
Anyway, the first order of business was to pry that thing off.
“Professor Goo.”
“...Understood.”
The moment the words left my mouth, Professor Goo pulled an old danso from his sleeve, put it to his lips, and blew a long note.
Wheeeeee—
The spiritual energy that rode the sound waves slammed into the Soul Stealer mercilessly.
“[Kkigi-gigik—!]”
The instant the thing flinched and lost its grip on the student's soul.
I was already right in front of it, pulling out the gourd's stopper.
Swoooosh—!
The Soul Stealer was sucked in whole, along with a fierce whirlpool.
Once the force pulling it vanished, the pale, misty soul of the male student that had been half pulled out slipped smoothly back into his body.
“Hup—!”
The pale yellow soul that had been holding on to it also returned to the woman's body.
“S-student! Snap out of it!”
Si-yun hurriedly crawled over, grabbed the limp student's shoulders, and shook him.
Fortunately, the student was still breathing shallowly.
Only then did the woman finally lose all strength and collapse in place.
That assistant's spell for pulling her soul out of her body.
‘...That's it.’
Grin.
Looks like I've already found the method.