An Exorcist Magical Girl!

The exposure is over.

 

My eyes went white as I fell over the railing.

 

In that split second, I remember wondering if I was being transported to the other side or back to reality.

 

I couldn’t think straight as my body floated in midair.

 

Luckily, when I opened my eyes again, I saw the faces of Seo Jun and Cha Hanbyul.

 

“Wow. I thought I was dead.” “Wake up, wake up! Seo Jun, come here, wake up!”

 

This damned play had finally come to an end.

 

“Where are Ji-won and Yuri?” “Their bodies are in the real classroom, I’m sure they went back there.”

 

Seo Jun said and pulled me to my feet.

 

“Let’s get out of here. This place will be gone soon enough.” “I almost died, only once.” “…Tough.”

 

Seo Jun grabbed me with one hand and Hanbyul with the other and headed for the rift that led to reality.

 

Just before we left, Hanbyul poked her head out of the rift and surveyed the situation.

 

“Oh, Yuri and Ji-won are upstairs. What? But the instructor isn’t here.” “That’s actually good. I don’t have to pretend to be a ghost.” “Let’s go.”

 

As we  stepped out of the rift into the real world, I could feel the students outside gasp in surprise.

 

“Wow, I’m still not used to seeing you come out of nowhere like that.” “Hey, they’re here!” “Already?”

 

I looked at my watch and realized that it had only been a minute or two since we’d gone into the crack to try to make contact.

 

Oh, yes. Time passes differently inside and outside the rift, and inside the rift, the 60-minute time limit for the

“mirror that reflects sound to the count of three”

hadn’t expired.

 

I’m glad I didn’t keep my classmates waiting impatiently.

 

“Hey guys, thanks for everything. Thanks to you, Yuri and Ji-won are safe.”

 

The class president, Min Jiyoon, came forward to thank them.

 

“You’re all okay, right? No injuries, right?” “Yes. Everything is fine.” “Well, the CPR instructor had to make an urgent call, so he left for a while, and I’m not sure when he’ll be back.” 

Min Jiyoon talks about the situation after Seo Jun and Cha Hanbyul disappeared.

 

There were attacks from here and there.

 

“Will you come back?” “If it were me, I wouldn’t come back.” “This will be a long call.”

 

Aha, you’re right.

 

“Yang Ji-won, go to the nurse’s office. Do you understand?” “Oh, thank you.”

 

Yang Ji-won still looks a bit nervous.

 

Cha Han-byul stood next to her and asked her if she was really back to her senses.

 

Later, Yang Ji-won made eye contact with me and apologized.

 “I don’t know what I was thinking, I must have been crazy. You’re not hurt too badly, are you…” “It’s okay, I’m fine, you didn’t do it on purpose, you were manipulated by the ghost story, so why should I blame you?” “Well, but…” “I just wasn’t fast enough to get away.” “I’m sorry.” “Ji-won, you were so fast. I mean, you ran up three flights of stairs.” “I’m really, really sorry!” “Hahahaha! Don’t worry, I’m just teasing you. Your reaction is funny.” 

While we were having this conversation, Min Jiyoon and Seo Jun were having a very serious conversation.

 “I called the exorcist, it’s settled, you don’t have to come.” “Okay. Is there a penalty or something…?” “No, I know her well, so it’s okay.” “Oh good, that’s good.”

 

Min Jiyoon paused for a moment and then burst out in frustration.

 

“Ack, that’s the school’s responsibility!” “That’s right.” “And it happened because the school didn’t take responsibility in time.” 

Yang Ji Won dragged me into their conversation, which made Min Jiyoon cry.

 

“Honestly, aren’t you the ones who should be the most supportive in times like this? When you three disappeared into the dream, I didn’t know if I should tell them or not. I wondered if I should tell them or if they’d stop the exorcist Seo Jun had called at the school gate. Just as I was thinking about it, Hyuna came by. Is it right to make a student worry like that? Is that right?” “Ji-won, calm down. “Ah! I really want to blame the school for this somehow! Damn it!” “Well, in that dream or whatever it was, it was hours, but here in the real world, you were asleep for about four or five minutes, and you’re lucky if you don’t get paranoid as a group. It’s not like there’s video surveillance in the classroom…” “That’s what I’m saying! I’d rather you had slammed my head into the floor so hard when I fainted that I hurt myself, then I could have gotten something out of it!”

 

Min Jiyoon is furious and says that it would be better to hit her head now.

 

Yang Ji-won calms her down.

 

“If that was the case, I would have said something like you were fooling around in the classroom and blaming the school for your own injuries. “Ha…”

 

Such grim stories went back and forth for a while.

 

I left it to the others to discuss the awfulness of the school and dug into other topics.

 

“The ghost killed himself.”

 

This whole saga began when the ghost destroyed its own core.

 

The red glow from the shards of that core created the testing ground and stage for the play that was to follow.

 

In many ways, it was similar to the escape from hell, but different.

 

This ghost had tied a red thread around the core and set a condition for the ritual to be performed:

“Just before the core is destroyed,”

and then sent me to the playground.

 

However, the dummy ghost did not perform the same ritual. For one thing, there were no strings or animal carcasses for the ritual.

 

Besides, if escaping from hell was the last straw for the ghost, this time it’d brought it on itself.

 

Oh, and why was this dummy playing the part of the

“former valedictorian who was killed by the runner-up”?

 

Even the way it chose to impersonate someone else when it got tired of its shell was bizarre. The only way to escape was to disappear.

 

“Oh, shit. I don’t get it.” 

As I pick at my hair, Yuri sneaks up and pats me on the shoulder.

 

“Good job, and thank you.”

 

My head is still spinning, but it warms my heart.

 

***

 “Hey, I heard you got in trouble at school today.”

 

That was the first thing Seon-yeo said when we arrived at the training center.

 

“The news has already spread.” “Of course. They called the teachers.” “But we fixed it.”

 

“I know that,”

I said, poking Seo Jun in the arm, and she said,

“I know that too.”

 

“Oh, hello, you comet-like genius!”

 

The greeting was from Hwang Hanju.

 

Hwang Hanju had called me that many times since the incident at Banho Mall.

 

“How long are you going to be like this, Hanju?”

 

He looked at me pitifully.

“Hehe, of course, forever!” “Ew, asshole with no self-respect.”

 

In this case, I just let him talk.

 “Oh, right. Seo Jun. I’ll be joining the sophomore class next week.” “So this is your last class with that teacher?” “That’s right.” “It can’t come soon enough.” “I thought so at first, but it’s already been almost two months.” “Oh, right. Time flies.” 

While Seo Jun and I were chatting to pass the time, Senior Shin arrived at the training center.

 

“Oh, Baek Iri. I heard that something happened at your school earlier.” “How did you know?” “Because I was with the director when Seo Jun called.” “Ah.” “I thought you two worked it out?” “Yep. Somehow we worked it out. Oh, and we used the mirror.” “Good job, teaching you about it is worth it.”

 

Senior Shin asked me about the new function of the mirror, and I had to spend a few minutes in the classroom explaining what happened and how I came to use it.

 

“Oh, I can’t believe this feature is disposable, what a waste.”

 

He reacted like a spectator. He was fun to talk to.

 

It was fun to talk to him because he always exuded such a bright energy, and I was a little sad to think that my  class with him was going to end today.

 

But that’s it, I have to make sure I get the last lesson right.

 

***

 “I have a question for you.” “What is it?” “I’m almost done with my basic course, when do we learn how to close the link “properly”?”

 

Seo Jun had said once, looking at me and feeling an eerie chill in the cafeteria.

“You can’t just leave the gate open at 0%, you have to have layers of defense to keep the ghost from invading your senses. That’s called closing the link “properly”.”

 

And today Seo Jun closed the link

“properly”

so that she wouldn’t be dragged to the test alone.

 

I thought it would be one of the basic courses because she said it would be easy to learn quickly.

 

But when I realized that it wasn’t even mentioned at the end of my basic class with Senior Shin, I asked him about it.

 

But Senior Shin’s answer was more subtle.

 

“Where did you hear about how to close the links properly?” “It’s from a friend of mine in my sophomore class. She talked about it like it was so obvious?” “What?! What?!”

Senior Shin exclaimed with a look of disbelief on his face.

 

“That’s a hard course that you don’t really learn until your senior year! There are tons of kids who can’t even do it in their junior year. I mean, they might mention it briefly in freshman or sophomore year, but it’s hard to master it at that age unless you’re A-plus rank.” 

Ah, so Seo Jun’s talent is at least A-plus rank.

 

“Uh, well. I guess I can do it if I’m at least A-rank?” “Huh? Uh, yes. You might be able to do it. You’re a month or two into your exorcism, so it’s a little early to learn, but you should be able to do a decent imitation by now.” 

Sure. Seo Jun said I’d get the hang of it, not that I’d learn fast.

 

He knew my talent level was at least S, so he probably meant that if I ever learned it, I’d be able to make it my own in no time.

 

“Can’t you teach me how?” “Why not. You’ve wrestled with a ghost before, right?”

 

He was referring to the ghost that had pulled me out of hell.

 “Uh, yeah. It kept trying to close it.” “All you have to do is reverse it.” “That’s easy…” “See? There’s really nothing wrong with it in theory, it’s just hard to do in practice. There’s a separate hand gesture to “close” it, like the one you do when you first open the link.” “Can I skip those gestures?” “If you’re skilled enough, you can, but it’s really hard to do even in high school, so let me show you what the “closing” hand gesture is.”

 

Senior Shin lifted his arm to demonstrate.

 

“Look. It’s easy if you think of it as lowering the clasp and then holding it so it can’t go back up.” “Oh, like that?”

 

I repeated the hand gesture three or four times, trying to get the shutter to go from 80% open to 0%.

 

“That’s great, too bad we can’t practice it now.” “Well, I’ll try it later in the real world.” “Wow, you’re so confident.” 

He demonstrated a few more times and then changed the subject, saying that it was enough for the first try.

 “Have you heard the story?” “What story?”

 

I asked through clenched teeth, and Senior Shin lowered his voice as if someone else could hear him, even though it was just the two of us in the classroom.

 

What is he talking about?

 

“You know, the culprit who did the Banho mall and the hand mirror in the park.”

 

The word

“culprit”

surprised me.

 

“The culprit? What did he do again? Has he been caught? Is he someone in the criminal gang?”

 

After I finally calmed down from the barrage of questions, my senior got to the point.

 

“The killer didn’t target high school exorcists, he just targeted “high school students.”“