by Charles Dean
Lars took the silverware laid out next to the meal and began to eat the food in the best way he could. The only thing he didn’t touch was the tofu. Whether it was him or the voice in his head, there was one thing they both agreed on at all times: tofu was made by the most evil being in the universe to torture people with tastebuds.
“So, what errands do you have to run? Perhaps we could have one of the lesser servants do them for you so that you may take a rest after you finish eating,” Maggie suggested.
Matthew nodded. “If the servants can’t do it, then I will be happy to.”
“A disciple must keep her master satisfied at all times,” Jill added, giving a suggestive smile, “and in all ways.”
“No.” Lars shook his head. Previously, the idea of having two Stage 2 Qi-Gathering Cultivators with him on an adventure would have been welcomed. However, he was stronger now. If he brought them along, there was no telling whether the bodies he had to procure belonged to beings strong enough to crush them instantly. They would be useless at best and a hindrance that might get him killed at worst. “I must do these errands alone. They are ones that my master gave me, and so if I do not tend to them myself, then I will have failed as a disciple too.”
“Dutifulness to one’s master is rare outside of the canine clans,” Maggie said, putting a hand on Matthew’s shoulder before he could blurt out whatever he was about to say. “We fully understand your sentiment and wish you luck. But, even if you must insist on doing the chores yourself, perhaps if you shared a little of their nature with us, we could point you in the right direction?”
Lars’s eyebrow rose at the offer of helpful information. Of course, they run a mercenary guild, and they’ve been situated as a formal house within this city since . . . well, whenever the First Era of Kings was . . . Lars still had trouble grasping the timeline of this city. But yeah, they definitely might know something.
Or mentioning your target might give them some sort of political leverage that they’ll use to even further snare you. Don’t open yourself up to entanglements so easily.
I’ve kind of already made my bed with them, haven’t I though? Didn’t someone already . . . lower my standing here?
Lower what? In a week, you’ll be able to kill everyone in this house. Even if she rats you out to the queen, who will care? Stop regretting stuff, eat your meal, and get out of here.
“Do you know anything of a two-striped, two-tailed yeou-nim?” Lars asked, half because he wanted to see what they knew and half because he wanted to do something of his own volition. “Or a dokkaebi?”
While the kids just stared at him blankly, the mother’s eyes widened.
“Do you know something?” Matthew asked her, seeing the same surprise.
“I know nothing,” Maggie said. “Nothing at all.” She shot both Jill and Matthew a look. While Lars didn’t know for sure, he was positive that expression was part of an inside code the three must have had to communicate when the oppressive father was around. It was such a specific twisting of facial muscles: the eyebrow raised right at the center brow, the lips pursed, and the eyes shooting down. It looked ridiculous, and it only lasted a second, but there was no way it wasn’t a code. No one naturally made that face.
“But . . .” Jill clearly felt the need to be a little rebellious, not unlike Lars when it came to the voice in his head.
“It sounds like what you’re looking for will be very difficult to find. I wish you the best of luck,” Maggie said and then turned to her two children. “You two should show your sincerity to your new master by focusing on the cultivation methods he diligently produced just for you.”
“Yes, Mo—” Matthew almost said “Mom” or “Mother” once more but was pinched again before he could finish his sentence, only giving his mom an angry glare before leaving.
When the room was empty, Matthew and Jill having run off immediately at their mother’s suggestion, Maggie began to walk Lars out of the home. Just as he reached the main door, she stopped him.
“I don’t know what trouble you’ve gotten mixed up in that you need a dokkaebi, but thank you for not including us in that mess,” she said. “I am glad you did not drag those stalwart children along with you. One would have followed for loyalty, the other for gain.”
Lars nodded. “Right . . .” He hadn’t known the question he would be asking was so dangerous and hadn't even considered the risk it could place on those around him. He just didn’t want to deal with dead weight during his search. However, if it made him look more considerate, he shrugged off the issue. “Thanks for the meal.”
“What would you like me to tell your bed slave when she wakes up?” Maggie asked.
Oh, that’s right . . . Desdemona . . . Lars paused. He hadn’t even considered what to do with that one.
“Just tell her to keep focusing on what I taught her,” Lars said.
She nodded her head. “Certainly. And if you’d like, I can instruct her on a few of the clan’s techniques. That way—”
Lars quickly shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. Just tell her to focus on what I taught her. That’s all.”
Didn’t want to bring along old Bird Brain?
She’s still not as strong as I am, Lars thought. But . . . in a few days’ time, maybe she will be. Who knows? If she can get a bit tougher though, her chance and my chance of survival will go up.
Well, I shouldn’t second guess it when you make good decisions, but why didn’t you listen to me earlier and hold your tongue about what we’re hunting?
Why did they overreact?
Because you basically just told them you’re hunting boogiemen. The dokkaebi isn’t just a simple beast you have to hunt and kill. There won’t be pelts of it in a hunter’s lodge or heads mounted above a royal’s desk. It is . . . a demon.
A demon? Then why would she have that sort of reaction? Lars asked as he walked over to the tteokbokki stall that he had eaten at yesterday. The old man hadn’t done him wrong. Not only had he hooked him up with amazing street food, but he had been incredibly helpful. Shouldn’t she have wanted a demon to die?
It’s more complicated than that. Most demons are pure evil. They attack, crush, and defeat their prey the moment they sense an opportunity. The dokkaebi, though . . . They aren’t regular demons. They’re tricksters. They aren’t even part of the natural cycle of beast eating beast like other demons. Instead, they’re often builders, carpenters . . . more messengers of the gods sent to play tricks on people and harass them or play favorites and bless them.
So, they may be good things, and they may be bad things, and trying to hunt one is akin to meddling in a god’s will . . . Lars frowned. He understood now why she had that reaction. She was superstitious. Lars knew better than to believe superstition. He had grown up with the voice, who seemingly knew anything and everything in existence and had taught him all about the Clockmaker instead of the other gods and devils that everyone else in the world grew up learning about. It left a knowledge gap for him as he knew nearly nothing about Dalnim, the goddess that his mother had grown up worshipping, or any of the other gods prevalent in the town. He only knew of the Clockmaker, and it left him ridiculing the superstitious when he would probably seem mockable to others in turn.
Which is why you need to keep your mouth shut around people whose favor you still need. Look, I can tell you this much: dokkaebi are real. They are red two-horned people with wrinkly skin who love wearing the fanciest suits and outfits they can get their hands on. From the moment they first appeared in Gyeongju during the Silla era, they’ve always been the best-dressed demons a man could ever see. However . . .
However, they’re not really demons, are they? Lars asked as he considered the description. They had varying morality, animalistic features like horns, and even differently colored skin. There was only one explanation he could think of without being superstitious himself.
Right. They’re not. It’s exactly as you imagine.
They were probably s
ome of the first cultivators of that era . . . Could there still even be any alive today?
Wouldn’t know.
You, the all-knowing voice in my head, wouldn’t know? Lars found that hard to believe. He had just thought about how wise she was, about how there were no questions she couldn’t answer, so for her to say “wouldn’t know” was a tough pill to swallow. Is it that you wouldn’t know, or is it that you can’t tell me because of the contract?
Can’t it be both?
Can you at least tell me the nature of the contract? Lars hesitated to ask the real question that was in the back of his head, which just sat there untouched. It was the question that had been weighing on him every second of his life from the moment he had first heard her voice, yet he never found the strength to ask it.
You know, we’re linked at the mind, you and I. Two souls joined in a single body. What is yours is mine, yet you still haven’t asked. Why is that? It’s the first thing you ask everyone else. Why can’t you ask it of me? Why won’t you ask it of me? I’m your oldest friend, I’m your closest confidant, I’m your teacher and your master, and you’re my teacher as you show me pieces of humanity that I didn’t understand before you. Why can’t you just say the words and ask the question? I’ve been waiting.
Lars gulped. He wanted to know. He wanted to know more than anything, but he couldn’t. He didn’t know if he could handle the answer. He had no idea how deep the rabbit hole went, but every time he imagined what was on the other side, it felt like madness engulfing him. There was no logic to his situation that didn’t terrify him, and these last few days had only added both to the curiosity and the fear. After all, she was indeed every single thing she said. Even between his mother, the woman who had raised him and nurtured him through every hardship and every good year, and her, he would say he was closer to the floating boxes and their familiar voice. She was his closest friend indeed.
Fine. Don’t ask. But you don’t have to make such a big deal of it.
Deciding to take a small risk, feeling the slight hurt in her voice, Lars asked at least one question: What’s your name? It wasn’t the question he was avoiding, but it was close enough to it.
Ah, so you ask me that now? Well . . . I don’t know if I want to tell you. You took so long to ask it after all. Now I feel like you’re only asking because I pointed it out.
Hi, I’m Lars. I’m the guy’s head you live through sometimes. It’s nice to meet you. What’s your name?
I’m Ophelia. It’s a pleasure to meet you too.
Ophelia? Hmm . . . Lars pondered the name. It’s a lot prettier than I imagined.
What? What are you trying to say? I’ll have you know I was named after an amazing woman, and I myself am an amazing woman. The name has been used throughout history for amazing women.
After a brief pause, Ophelia began to chide Lars again.
Are you actually trying to imagine how hot I am just because I said I’m an amazing woman? Dear Clockmaker, you need to get laid.
Lars laughed. You’re only saying that because you want to feel what it’s like for me to get laid, aren’t you?
“Something funny?” The tteokbokki-dealing old man asked, looking around. “Did I miss it? Did that little boy trip again? Five years straight since the kid learned how to walk, and he still hasn’t learned how to look where he’s walking. Cracks me up every time.”
“No, not that,” Lars said. “Unfortunately, I think the kid might be fine. I was just amusing myself with a question about . . . a subject I heard of earlier.”
“The great disciple of Hsein Ku amused with a question? Should be good. Should be real good, shouldn’t it?” came a cackle from behind Lars.
“Disciple of Hsein Ku?” The old man stroked his beard. “You don’t say? I had no idea I was in the presence of royalty. This changes everything!”
“How so?” Lars asked, looking over his shoulder in search of the speaker.
“You should know how,” Nick, the cackling mad man who had approached Lars from behind answered.
“It’s eight copper per tteokbokki bowl now,” the old man said with a chuckle.
“Call it a royalty tax or a luxury tax,” Nick said, throwing an arm over Lars’s shoulder as if the two were fast friends.
Stage 4 Qi-Gathering Cultivator—he’s got to be worth some points. Even if he’s not, someone would have to pay just to get him to stop that annoying cackle.
“So, we did a prison break yesterday. What’s on the agenda today?” Nick asked.
“I just have some errands to run.”
“And I have a debt to pay, or my name isn’t Nickolas Kim!” Nick exclaimed proudly.
“It’s not; it’s Lee. It’s Nickolas Lee,” the old man corrected, throwing a few of the little wooden sticks that came with the tteokbokki servings at Nick. “Get out of here with your dumb jokes.”
“Oh, right. Been locked up so long I had started to forget my own name,” Nick jested.
“It wasn’t even a year!” The old man threw a whole sauce-covered, hard-boiled egg at Nick’s face. Nick, while still laughing, just caught the egg in his mouth and started eating it.
Nick held his hands up in surrender after swallowing. “Alright, alright. But I still have a debt to pay, so what’s on the agenda?”
“Errands. Errands I’m going to be doing alone if you don’t mind,” Lars said, remembering Ramon and exactly how badly it could end when he tried to include people in his activities.
“If you don’t tell him now, you’ll be stuck with him every morning,” the old man said. “I helped him get a discount on ham once, and it took three months to sweep him away from my stall.”
“He means he finally got tired of my charming company and beat me with a broom until I left,” Nick explained.
“Fine, fine,” Lars said, relenting. “I’m off to chase dokkaebi and yeou-nim.”
“The red goblins and the double-tailed foxes, eh?” The old vendor seemed to know exactly what Lars was talking about, causing Lars’s eyes to open wide with excitement.
“You know about them?” Lars asked.
“Know about them? Of course I know about them. Who doesn't know the stories of goblins? Those tricksters can get in your head. Are you going to the temple to perform a ritual to get them removed?” he asked.
“Get them removed?”
“From him.” The old man pointed a fresh toothpick at Nick. “I mean, that is why you brought them up, right? You’re worried about poor Nick’s sanity, right?”
“I think it’s actually our young lord’s sanity that’s in question,” Nick said, shaking his head. “Can you not tell that he actually means he wants to find the real ones? I think no matter what the case, we need to drag him to a temple. That head of his isn’t right, chasing after dokkaebi and yeou-nim . . . He’s worse than me,” Nick cackled.
“Hey! This is a young master you’re in the presence of, you little ingrate,” the vendor said, sending yet another toothpick flying at Nick. “One who saved you. The least you could do is be polite when you drag him off to the temple to get checked on.”
“Well, now . . .” Lars sighed. He thought about ignoring them and walking off on his own, but if the subject really was a chase of mythology, a temple might not be a bad place to start, and having a guide wouldn’t hurt at all. “Where is this temple?”
“Ah! He still has reason enough to know he’s lost his reason!” Nick laughed. “What a perfect level of sanity to have. I say we leave him like that.”
“Take him to the temple, or I’ll be telling Brandon about how you like to load all the players' dice to roll an insane number of ones right before their Castles and Cave Trolls games when you’re the DM,” the old man threatened.
“HEY! I did that one time!” Nick exclaimed.
“Boy, I’ve been tending this stall for longer than you’ve been alive. Who are you fooling?” The old man threw a small cylinder of rice cake at Nick this time. Once again, Nick ate it without issue.
“Alright! Let’s go!” Nick said, full of enthusiasm and licking his lips after being assaulted with the free snack.
Lars expected Nick to talk nonstop the entire way to the temple, but instead, he just gave a rough distance of how much farther it was and then went quiet. He’d occasionally cackle to himself, a chortle here and there, and for every few women they passed, he’d tap on Lars’s shoulder and say something inappropriate. It only took four blocks for Lars to learn that Nick, in all his saintly ways, had a specific system for judging women: the number of seconds a man’s involuntary “wow” lasted. If, upon looking at a girl, the man’s “wow” lingered for two seconds, she was given a two rating. That was just the way the world seemed to work for Nick.
When they were about four blocks from their destination, Lars noted that Nick seemed to be sketched out by something.
“What’s going on, Nick?” Lars asked.
“Just some . . . umm . . . people,” he said, turning and pulling Lars into a back alley. Lars had personally never felt comfortable in the city to begin with, but the alley, with the smell of urine emanating from the walls, a humidity that Lars didn’t want to breathe in, and a shadow that cast itself over everything and everyone inside it—Lars included—produced a whole new sensation of unease. The clay walls felt just like the prison walls from yesterday if not worse.
“I don’t like this area,” Lars commented. “Those people ain’t worth this much of a turn, are they?”
“They’re just, umm . . . They’re . . . Ha ha ha . . . They’d mean a bit of a delay is all,” Nick said as he turned around.
Lars turned too. There, having followed them into the alley, stood five men. Lars couldn’t tell what type of cultivators they were, as it was too dark to see much of anything in the alley, but he could tell even without seeing their faces that they were staring right at him. It was that sort of magical sense a person had, that despite an eyeball being smaller than a fingernail, one could always feel when it was looking at you, even if it was practically a mile away.