Chapter 54
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[Entity Report]
SoulOrb (Duplicate)
Grade: Level 3
Classification: Entity-type
‘SoulOrb’ is an entity discovered at the ■■■■ Shrine on Mount Osore in Aomori Prefecture, Japan.
Its existence was first confirmed when visitors to the ■■■■ Shrine reported encountering “the soul of a dead person” during the Osorezan Grand Festival held from July 20 to 24, 1978.
Because there had been almost no cases of entities related to the afterlife or souls being classified at a low grade,
the Aomori Branch of the Management Bureau deployed a large number of personnel to surround the shrine and began an entity recovery operation.
Unlike previous cases, the priest of the ■■■■ Shrine was extremely cooperative with the Management Bureau’s investigation.
The investigation revealed evidence that the Entity Liberation Headquarters had been demanding that the ■■■■ Shrine hand over SoulOrb even before the recovery operation.
At the time, there were presumed to be a total of ten SoulOrbs inside the shrine.
The Management Bureau lost one during an attack by the Entity Liberation Headquarters on the day of the recovery operation, but successfully recovered the remaining nine SoulOrbs.
However, subsequent analysis confirmed that all nine SoulOrbs recovered by the Management Bureau were duplicates.
The one held by the Entity Liberation Headquarters was highly likely to be the original, and research through ■■■ ■■■■■■ confirmed that the original was capable of producing additional duplicates.
Accordingly, whenever SoulOrb’s existence is confirmed, the Management Bureau designates its immediate recovery as the top priority.
However, as numerous cases have been reported in which the Entity Liberation Headquarters exploited the Management Bureau’s recovery policy to set traps or mobilize other entities,
the Field Response Team must submit corroborating evidence to a team leader or higher-ranking personnel before beginning an operation.
SoulOrb has been confirmed to detect souls existing in reality and use them as an energy source or control them according to the user’s will.
It can also produce phenomena resembling the way shamans, miko, and other practitioners of shamanism handle souls, and some experiments confirmed that it could conduct attacks and extract information through souls.
The duplicates possessed by the Management Bureau each have different abilities, and based on their combined results, the original SoulOrb is presumed to possess the following functions:
※ All entities possess the ability to accumulate energy using souls as a basic function.
Possession
Sending killing curses
Summoning souls within a certain range
Reproducing the voices of souls
Binding souls
Absorbing the memories of souls
Most abilities other than possession and sending killing curses have been confirmed to function within a 10-meter radius of SoulOrb.
However, the original’s range may be far greater than that of the duplicates, and its exact limit has yet to be confirmed.
SoulOrb is a dangerous entity even on its own, but its greatest danger lies in the possibility that the Entity Liberation Headquarters possesses the original.
The Management Bureau expects the original SoulOrb to be a Level 4 entity and is investigating its location in cooperation with the Shamanic Council.
The following are the results of experiments conducted using the SoulOrb duplicates possessed by the Management Bureau.
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***
During the operation to prepare the Entity Report for the Napolitan at Hammond Hotel, I remembered a phone call with the team leader.
“Can you take responsibility for what you’re saying right now?”
“Have I ever said anything I couldn’t take responsibility for?”
“You’d be less detestable if you couldn’t even talk.”
“You can hate me if you want, so please return to the branch. You’re important.”
I continued the call while barely enduring a splitting headache with painkillers.
“You’re saying our promising prospect is more valuable than this operation?”
Three hundred people a year. That was how many people the Hammond Hotel right before my eyes swallowed.
Considering the bastard’s taste for deliberately picking out newlyweds to devour, the number of expected victims would only grow if one thought about the future.
Our team leader had told us to postpone this operation, which would help preserve Children’s Day.
And this was after we had barely figured out the lobby’s rules through ninety-four deaths.
“I’m telling you in advance: unless the life of a single new employee is worth more than a thousand lives….”
“Seven hundred and twenty thousand.”
“What?”
“That’s the answer given by the ‘Roster Revision Tape’ to how many scheduled deaths within three years were canceled after Mr. Park Seong-bin joined the Management Bureau.”
Because of Imina’s answer, the preparation of the Entity Report for Hammond Hotel was postponed.
In truth, even after meeting Park Seong-bin in person, it still hadn’t felt real.
He would blithely trust someone just because they were a Management Bureau employee and rush into mortal danger, and his emotions showed plainly on his face; everything about him was clumsy.
But as I looked at the scene before me,
the thought that none of that mattered became firmly established.
“The Great Shaman has shown us the righteous path!!!!”
“Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman!”
“Everyone, I will make both of my parents remain and live!”
“We will remain and live! We will remain and live! We will remain and live!”
Even if he was wearing an entity that prevented the people around him from becoming suspicious, if that junior of mine was standing on the platform, riling everyone up to the shaman’s dance with blood smeared across his face,
if that employee’s pupils only trembled whenever he glanced at me, while he otherwise behaved as though he were more deeply consumed by madness than anyone else,
I thought he could easily save around seven hundred and twenty thousand people.
***
After going through the Backrooms, the Forest of the Nameless, and Yeondoo High School, I realized something.
When I get tangled up with these orphaned bastards called entities, I can’t take the initiative in anything.
To achieve even the bare minimum of a psychological victory, I couldn’t afford to be picky about things like that.
If so, here was the problem.
“Those who arrived late in the back, you must also show your gratitude to those who have remained!”
What would be the appropriate response to that?
Shouting at everyone looking at me to come to their senses?
Looking at Yoo Se-chan with a flustered expression because I didn’t know what the badge did?
Threatening them by saying, ‘Fuck off, there’s a Level 4 old geezer behind me, so don’t try anything’?
All wrong.
“Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman!”
The correct answer was to join in with the mood from a moment earlier, whether it turned out to be porridge or rice.
Even if something transparent was leaping out from the severed necks of the dead.
“Woooooooooo!”
Before the people busy praising and praying could notice, five transparent somethings began drifting around the ceiling of the room.
Jingle! Jingle!
At the same time, the bell in the shaman’s hand shook violently and rang out.
There was nothing strange about a bell making noise. It was made to make noise, after all.
Jingle! Jingle! Jingle! Jingle!
But it was another matter if the shaman stood perfectly still while the bell alone went berserk, dancing some goddamn freakout blues and vibrating like a vibrator.
“Wooooooooooooo!”
The souls drifting around the ceiling began seeping into SoulOrb amid sharp, mournful cries, like dust being sucked into a vacuum cleaner.
Jingle, jingle, jingle, jingle!
An icy blue energy emerged from SoulOrb after it absorbed the souls and began flowing up the shaman’s wrist.
The situation was so vividly visible that anyone would have had trouble keeping their expression under control.
Yet, naturally, everyone except Yoo Se-chan and me continued repeating their prayers and praises as though they couldn’t see this bizarre spectacle.
Was that the accumulation of energy using souls?
If so, why was SoulOrb pumping energy into the shaman?
One problem had been solved, and another had piled up, but based on everything that had happened so far, it was certain that the object was SoulOrb.
Should we wait for an opportunity and take it from the shaman’s hand?
I turned my gaze toward Yoo Se-chan, who was pretending to be worked up below while uttering prayers and praises he didn’t mean.
Immediately, Yoo Se-chan’s voice rang out in my head.
[Don’t forget, Park Ppit-pi. Our objective is information gathering. And there’s no future in which we get out alive except by escaping quietly.]
The ‘Inferior Tightening Headband,’ an entity included in the Entity Report.
A tool-type entity that could send ten telepathic messages to someone nearby, with the pain growing worse each time until the final use resulted in death.
Yoo Se-chan’s face twisted painfully and his complexion visibly worsened after sending the thought. He was someone who couldn’t possibly be unaware of the importance of controlling his expression.
If he looked that bad after the first use, there was no one who could make it through all ten.
Apparently, calming the situation by riding on my seniors’ carry, as I had in the past, was impossible this time.
“I declare! I will never live out my natural lifespan! Like those who remained today, I will remain when I am at my brightest!”
Even while thinking nonstop, I spat out everything someone not in their right mind would say in order to avoid arousing suspicion.
I had absolutely no talent for acting, just as Counselor Cheon Jin-seong had said.
“You must all find the courage! By remaining, I can make all the people precious to me happy!”
“Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman! Long live the Great Shaman!”
For some reason, my insane behavior felt absurdly natural.
Like someone who had experienced being consumed by even greater madness.
‘That bastard, with such a big mouth, will make a good opponent for my pride.’
‘I’m going to kill youuuuuuuuu!!!’
No way.
The fervor, which should have died down much earlier because of my unexpected participation, seemed to last much longer than anticipated….
But night was not eternal, and the ceremony steeped in madness ended as the sun rose.
When the entrance opened, the fresh air diluted the smell of incense.
When I looked toward the platform, the shaman holding SoulOrb had already disappeared.
The believers seemed completely unaware of what had happened moments earlier, chatting about ordinary things with the people they had come with as they began leaving the basement according to the instructions.
There seemed to be something affecting their minds, but it had no effect on Yoo Se-chan and me, who had taken the red pills in advance.
Judging from the believers’ conversations, perhaps the smell of incense was the cause.
“It looks like we can leave like this.”
I nodded at Yoo Se-chan’s whispered words, his face already haggard, and was about to join the end of the line leaving the basement when—
“Wait there.”
A man’s voice came from behind us. It was the man who had been watching the emcee until a moment ago.
“Did you call me?”
I answered in a tired voice, putting on a slightly vacant expression.
He looked extremely satisfied.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a believer whose devotion to the Great Shaman and our Bonhyang Haewondang ran this deep.”
“How could I not feel that way toward this perfect heaven?”
“Ha ha ha! It’s good to see that you feel the same way I do.”
The emcee approached us, who were standing in the long line still stretching from the entrance.
“If you don’t mind, would you like to have a somewhat deeper conversation?”
A deeper conversation, huh.
[It’s okay. This is the route we entered on attempt 252. The badge is working normally.]
Yoo Se-chan turned around, furrowing his brow like a madman.
If even this was okay, what would they say wasn’t okay afterward?
Either way, refusing didn’t seem like it would make for a good outcome.
Fortunately, I had one thing I could rely on.
“I’ll just tell the people I came with to go on ahead, then I’ll follow you.”
“The person who was beside you? Go ahead!”
After receiving the emcee’s permission, I approached Yoo Se-chan.
“Hyung, I’m sorry since I was the one who brought you here, but go home first. I think I have to stay here.”
“…All right. I’ll tell them you’re taking the day off.”
With those words, Yoo Se-chan joined the line of believers.
[It’s safe up to here, Park… Ppit-pi. But under no circumstances are you to go to the innermost room. I’ll request support from the Emergency Response Team and Security Team as soon as I get out, so don’t worry.]
“Huh… haaahhh…!”
At the same time as I received the telepathy, a pained groan came from the line leaving the building.
“Shall we go, then?”
“All right.”
When the emcee took the lead after hearing my answer, the people by the entrance split to either side without exception, making a path.
“Let’s go.”
Following the path they had made, we arrived at….
the second room on the right, deep inside the long corridor.
When I entered, a room with a familiar-looking backdrop came into view.
Dozens of lotus lanterns hung from the ceiling, while paintings of unknown guardian deities densely covered the walls.
An incense burner, candlesticks, and small dolls sat on the table.
The scene was almost identical to the main hall of Sim Bak-su’s Mine Philosophical Hall, which I had seen a few days earlier.
The differences were that a sofa and table for receiving guests stood in the center, and the incense burner was emitting the same dense scent of incense I had smelled in the room on the left.
“Sit down and wait for ten minutes. The hall master will come.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t move. Stay quiet as a dead mouse.”
The emcee suddenly changed his attitude and began speaking down to me.
The smell of incense seemed to be affecting the mind after all.
What choice did I have? I had to cooperate.
“Yes.”
The emcee didn’t respond to my answer and slammed the door shut with a bang!
I had ten minutes before the person called the hall master appeared.
Or perhaps less than that. Taking the enemy at his word would be foolish.
I had to do the best thing I could in the current situation.
I took out my terminal with my right hand and opened the gallery, while my left hand pulled out the note that had been sitting in my pocket.
‘The generals say it’ll be a disaster if we don’t help, so what choice do I have, you little punk?’
‘What did you give me?’
‘How would I know? I didn’t write it. Open it when you think you’re about to die.’
The note supposedly written by the spirits of the generals served by Sim Bak-su.
If this wasn’t the time to die, then when would be?
With the dignity of a gallery addict, I checked the note while roughly typing the current situation into a post without looking away from the screen.
“Huh……”
Contrary to my expectations, the contents of the note were incredibly simple.
[After the first question, answer everything honestly without hiding anything.]
It was absurd. How was I supposed to know what questions people who even used mind-affecting incense would ask?
But as someone who had survived by accepting help from absurd things more than once, I couldn’t reject it.
Just as I uploaded the post and was about to open the previous one to check the comments on the post I had written earlier—
Tap, tap, tap.
I sensed someone outside. Ten minutes, my ass. It hadn’t even been five minutes.
Why didn’t they know that arriving early when visiting someone was rude?
I hurriedly put away my terminal, straightened my back, and faced forward.
If someone told you to stay still, that was usually the posture they expected.
Soon, the door opened, and the person who entered the room was the shaman who had matched my rhythm perfectly until a moment ago.
The difference was that the shaman had been wearing a veil earlier, but wasn’t wearing one now.
Looking openly at the shaman from the corner of my eye would arouse suspicion, so I couldn’t examine the shaman’s appearance any further.
“What were you doing while you waited?”
A question delivered in a voice laden with force.
Since the first question was exempt from the note’s command regarding honesty, I answered as though I were hypnotized.
“You told me to sit still, so I sat still.”
“You were sitting still.”
The shaman who came into view looked extremely similar to Sim Bak-su.
An old man’s face, wrinkled hands, a perfectly straight back, and a sturdy build that didn’t suit the shaman’s age…. But that was all.
The face of a young woman overlapped the shaman’s face and disappeared, followed by the face of a young man overlapping it and disappearing.
The faces of the five people who had been designated as today’s sacrifices and rolling around on the floor moments earlier.
Those faces repeatedly emerged through the old man’s skin in turn, then disappeared again.
Several sturdy men, including the emcee, entered behind the shaman sitting across from me and surrounded me from behind.
“You lit the incense beforehand?”
“Yes. We prepared twice the amount used for a Management Bureau employee.”
“Good. I’ll add a little more the next time I distribute merit.”
“Thank you!”
After the conversation resembling a discussion of rewards for services rendered ended,
the shaman, whose five faces continued changing, turned the shaman’s gaze toward me.
“You must answer the questions I ask from now on properly, and the Great Shaman will let you remain.”
The shaman’s voice, which changed between an old man’s, a man’s, and a woman’s voice with every word, asked the question referred to in the note as the first one after the initial question.
“Tell me why you infiltrated this place, you Management Bureau bastard.”