The Conjurer of the Academy

Chapter 65

Whether it was because he noticed the barrier was lifted or sensed the Fortune Pig was gone, Seol Baek-san was waiting at the exit.

“You finished earlier than I expected.”

I worried it might be the middle of the night, but fortunately, it was morning outside.

“Even looking like this?”

I tugged at the collar of my shirt, showing it to Seol Baek-san.

‘Ugh, the smell.’

After days of not properly washing and rolling around on the ground, I must have looked like a mess.

“How long did you think it would take?”

“To be honest, I didn’t think you’d finish it during the vacation.”

“…I still have to go back to school.”

Had he planned to keep me there even after school started if I hadn’t defeated the Fortune Pig?

“Yet you did it. What would take even a common person over a year, you managed in just two weeks.”

“Well, that’s a relief.”

I thought I was running late, but apparently, that wasn’t the case.

“Anyway, you did well.”

The tiger-like expression on Seol Baek-san’s face softened, and he looked at me over with concern.

“Are you hurt anywhere? Aren’t you hungry?”

[I’m hungry, so bring out the meal, old man.]

“You wretched Fox! Still alive, I see!”

While the two reunited and squabbled, I whispered to the goblin hidden in my sleeve.

“Let’s keep your help a secret from Father, okay?”

[Goblin, goblin!]

The baby goblin nodded its head and then left my sleeve to approach Seol Baek-san.

“Come here.”

[Goblin!]

I watched quietly as Seol Baek-san interacted with the goblin.

“You brought this upon yourself! All your friends got hurt because of you!”

Every time I looked at Seol Baek-san, that memory kept resurfacing. This must be what they call trauma. Perhaps Seol Ha-baek’s excessive timidity stemmed from a similar reason.

“Father.”

“Yes?”

Through the past memories, I saw it.

The fact that Seol Baek-san barely held back his tears when he slapped my cheek.

“Thank you.”

Because of him, Seol Ha-baek didn’t turn into a villain. I’ve never been a parent, but it must be an unimaginably hard role.

“Hmm.”

Seol Baek-san cleared his throat.

“Wash up while I prepare the meal. I have something to tell you.”

* * *

While the meal was being cooked, Seol Baek-san began to speak.

“Where should I start? Yes, I supposed I should begin with the Rabbit.”

With that, Seol Baek-san shifted his gaze to the high mountain beyond the yard.

“To get straight to the point, our three Shaman Families failed to seal the Rabbit. We were utterly defeated.”

Seol Baek-san clicked his tongue in frustration. However, there were some parts of his statement I couldn’t understand.

“But you succeeded in sealing Yomi, didn’t you?”

“To be precise, it was the past heads of the three Shaman Families who sealed the Fox. At that time, the Fox had lost its power because it was deceived by the Rabbit. If the Fox had been at full strength, our ancestors would have struggled greatly to seal it.”

[Puhaha, did you hear that? I was quite formidable back then.]

“Remove the watermelon seed stuck to your face before boasting.”

Yomi, who was eating watermelon, burst into laughter. It seemed like she preferred a human form while eating since watermelon seeds kept flying out of her mouth.

‘Well, she did manage to conquer Seoul in the original storyline.’

Not that I’m denying Yomi’s strength. Somehow, in the original storyline, Yomi broke free from her seal and turned Seoul into a sea of fire.

‘Why is she…’

So subdued now, like that gentle white pig.

“Anyway, be wary of the Rabbit. Its grudge against humans is on a different level compared to other yokai. If you encounter it, don’t think about fighting—just run. You should be able to manage that now.”

“I understand.”

If I faced it head-on, I’d die.

I knew that much. In the game, the proper method was to lead a party of fairly well-developed characters to subdue the Rabbit.

While it wasn’t impossible to clear it solo, it came with significantly higher risks.

“There’s something that the Rabbit mentioned that I remember.”

“What is it?”

“It said it was working with a ‘client.’”

That day, the Rabbit indeed mentioned someone else. Based on Yomi’s words so far, I could infer the Rabbit’s role.

“The Rabbit seems to be simply refining and spreading the curse. Based on what Yomi said, the Rabbit likely didn’t weave the curses itself…”

“That’s true. That Rabbit is a notorious merchant. The act of weaving curses itself carries significant risk and backlash to the practitioner. No matter how powerful the Rabbit is, creating and spreading curses on a large scale would have shattered its spirit due to the backlash.”

This naturally leads to an inference about the role of the “client” mentioned by the Rabbit.

“So, the client creates a large number of curses and gives them to the Rabbit.”

Seol Baek-san nodded.

In essence, the relationship between the Rabbit and the client is as follows:

1. The client creates the curses in large quantities and hands them over to the rabbit.

2. The Rabbit refines the curses by infusing them with grudges and its own yokai energy.”

3. The refined curses are then spread among monsters and humans.

“But that’s not all. Have you ever considered how the cunning Rabbit gathers so many grudges?”

Yomi, having finished eating all the watermelon, patted her stomach.

“Gathering that many grudges is no simple feat. Think about it. While unjust deaths do occur, they are not commonplace.”

“Traveling around to collect grudges each time would also be impossible.”

“Exactly.”

Yomi nodded.

She looked at me with a sly smile, befitting a yokai.

“So think about it. Isn’t there a very easy way to gather many grudges?”

“That would be…”

Only one scenario came to mind.

I recalled the time during the lucid dream.

“By causing unjust deaths directly.”

Killing people to gather large quantities of resentment. This way, not only would it be easy to accumulate grudges, but the Rabbit could collect them without having to travel around.

By directly killing people to gather large amounts of grudges,

The prime example is the attack on Shin Seo-ha and Shin Seo-jun. The Rabbit seemed to take delight in the massacre, seemingly pleased, as it estimated the amount of grudges it could harvest.

Shin Seo-jun was fortunate to become a Guardian Spirit, but had that not happened, he would have simply become one of the countless grudges that day.

‘Absolutely insane.’

Leading its minions and cursed monsters to hunt humans, the Rabbit sought to create denser grudges through unjust deaths. Ambushing civilians during their happiest moments was the most efficient method.

However, even considering the Rabbit, there was still one aspect I couldn’t understand.

“So the client created a large number of curses. How is that even possible?”

When Yomi had taught me about curses in the special training room, even a minor curse like causing tickles brought backlash to Yomi.

A character capable of doing what was impossible for the Rabbit or Yomi didn’t come to mind from the pool of characters I knew.

“Unless…”

There was one person who hadn’t been mentioned yet, through the process of elimination.

“It must be someone from the three Shaman Families, right?”

“It’s a speculation, but…”

Seol Baek-san nodded.

The only person not mentioned until now was from one of the three Great Shaman Families.

“The Shaman Family that deals with curses, the Heo family.”

Seol Baek-san began his explanation by mentioning an unfamiliar surname.

“Just as the Jin family mastered the art of maximizing the power of talismans, the Heo family succeeded in maximizing the effectiveness of curses over generations. Not only could they craft all kinds of curses, but they also found a way to negate the backlash that would normally affect the caster.”

“That ‘monster’, you mean.”

Yomi, having returned to her true form, leapt onto my shoulder with a pop.

“Monster?”

It was rare to hear such a word from Yomi’s mouth.

[Yes. Curses are bound with such strong backlash that they are incomparably restrictive compared to other forms of magic. Despite being human, he spread curses freely without restraint, as if they were ordinary spells.]

Yomi chuckled quietly.

[But his appearance was so hideous that even I couldn’t stand to look at it.]

“His appearance?”

“That’s due to the traditions of the Heo family.”

Seol Baek-san continued, answering my question.

“If the Jin family inherits their divine energy through spirit possession, the Heo family…”

He paused for a moment.

His gaze and expression seemed anxious.

“They bombard the next head with various curses from a young age.”

“Bombard with curses?”

Confused, I asked again, and Seol Baek-san nodded.

“Literally. They bombard their children with various curses from a young age. Think of it as an extremely potent vaccine. It doesn’t nullify the curse’s backlash but rather desensitizes the individual to the backlash.”

“For example, what kinds of curses are they bombarded with?”

Seol Baek-san sighed deeply as he sat cross-legged.

“They are varied. Other shamans wouldn’t even comprehend such horrific curses. Some curses cause the body to decay, others induce hallucinations or make them vomit blood for three continuous days and nights. Many couldn’t survive this and died.”

[Because of that, the surviving members of the Heo family often looked like the living dead.]

If I thought the Rabbit was insane, there were even crazier people.

“So the head of the Heo family is the client the Rabbit mentioned—”

“The head of the Heo family, Heo Cheol, is dead.”

Seol Baek-san showed no sign of emotion about the death of someone who might have once fought alongside him.

“But Heo Cheol had a young child. By now, the kid would be about your age. Currently, the child’s whereabouts are unknown.”

“Do you happen to know the child’s name?”

“Let’s see, it was…”

Seol Baek-san stroked his beard.

“Heo Mang. The child’s name is Heo Mang.”

* * *

‘Six months from now…’

Lying in bed, I stared up at the ceiling. The blanket, pulled out from the wardrobe, carried a familiar, comforting scent.

‘Why does Seol Ha-baek disappear? And why does Yomi go berserk?’

I hadn’t been able to figure that out yet.

Six months from now, in the timeline of the story, Seol Ha-baek would go missing, and Yomi, who had been slumbering in the ancestral shrine, would lose control.

What exactly happened in the parts of the game that were not monitored?

“Yomi.”

[Mm…]

Yomi was sleeping soundly beside my pillow. I tried poking her tiny forehead with my index finger, but she didn’t budge.

“No use, huh.”

Lying in a soft bed for the first time in a while was making me restless instead of sleepy. I hoped to chat with Yomi if she had been awake, but it seemed that wasn’t happening.

I turned my body away from Yomi, making sure not to wake her.

‘Modern conveniences. How long has it been?’

I picked up my smartphone, which had been charging. It had been about five minutes since I started recharging it after the battery died while I was in the underground.

When I turned on the smartphone, the bright light illuminated the dim room,

Ding-!

Ding-!

Ding-!

As soon as the data connected, a flood of unread messages poured in.

‘Most of these are probably spam or cult recruitment messages from Han Yu-seong.’

I didn’t have high expectations, but there were several messages from an unexpected person.

[Shin Seo-ha: Hey, if you get a message or call from an unknown number, don’t pick it up pretending to be me.]

[Shin Seo-ha: You damn bastard!]

[Shin Seo-ha: Are you ignoring me?]

[Shin Seo-ha: You piece of s*!]

What’s this? Is it some kind of phishing scam?

‘She’s freaking out in an unusual way for Shin Seo-ha.’

I didn’t take it seriously until I saw the message at the top of the screen, which made my eyes widen.

[010-5664-XXXX: Hello, I’m Seo-ha’s mom~]

What the heck is going on?