Chapter 141
Sun-Woo had drawn some sort of painting on the floor with his own blood.
It wasn’t a spell array, but it seemed to be a symbol that represented something. It was impossible to tell what it symbolized. Just the fact that it had been painted with blood gave it a dark and eerie atmosphere.
After Sun-Woo finished the painting, he used a Voodoo spell to heal the wound on his palm. Obviously, there would be drawbacks if he used a restoration spell to heal his own injuries. Additionally, the pain would still remain even if the wound was healed, but Sun-Woo's expression remained ridiculously calm. It was as if he couldn’t feel any pain at all.
"What is this supposed to be?" Soo-Yeong asked with a trembling voice.
Her hands and feet, which had gone cold after seeing the blood, still hadn't regained their warmth.
Sun-Woo didn't answer. Instead, he sat in front of the painting he had drawn and began muttering something. He wasn't muttering in Korean. It was not English either. It was impossible to tell what language it was. But judging by how Sun-Woo had his hands clasped together and his eyes closed, she vaguely understood that it was prayer.
Eventually, the prayer ended. However, nothing happened. Had he really gone through all that trouble of taking off his clothes, harming himself, and causing a ruckus all for nothing? For a moment, she felt so flabbergasted that she was about to say something, but then the wind began to blow.
It was not a mountain breeze or blades made out of wind, but a strange breeze that contained a mysterious resonance. The resonance of the wind was preventing her mouth from opening.
Flutter.
The wind made her collar sway and her bangs flutter. And then, everything went dark in an instant. Within the darkness, dozens of stars appeared. A thread that shone white tied together all the haphazardly scattered stars in the sky. The light that radiated out from the stars and the thread cut through the darkness. The light swallowed up the darkness, and the view in front of them shone brightly.
The light that shined so brightly that it would shine forever gradually faded. Soon, once it became possible to properly see the world, the dying tree in the corner of the wasteland disappeared. Only faint char marks remained as if faintly declaring that life once occupied that spot.
The moment she belatedly realized that the shining thread that had tied all the stars together was actually a single streak of lightning, Sun-Woo said, “You saw that, right?”
Soo-Yeong gazed back and forth between the tree that had turned to ashes and Sun-Woo's nonchalant face.
"Sobo...?"
"Correct. You’re smarter than I thought."
It was the Loa of Thunder and Lightning, Sobo. He was capricious and noisy, but he was known to be occasionally kind or cute in some aspects. That was why Soo-Yeong found it difficult to believe that the lightning she saw was Sobo's power.
The lightning was too calm to have been triggered by Sobo’s power. It was intense, as if dozens or hundreds of lightning bolts had been condensed into one point, but it wasn’t noisy. It came down silently, and after leaving a slight breeze, it quietly disappeared.
It was calm and elegant, which was why it couldn't have been Sobo's power.
"I heard that Sobo was extremely fickle and noisy."
"That's true, but it's different if you use vévé."
Vévé was a symbol that represented each of the Loa. It appeared that the picture Sun-Woo had drawn with his own blood was the vévé. Sun-Woo continued his explanation. He explained that if one prayed after drawing the vévé, the power would be much stronger than normal and that it would also be possible to manipulate the intensity or form of the power as needed.
"You don't necessarily have to draw it with blood like I did. You can make it with animal bone dust, leaves, or something similar to that."
"Ah... but do you have to take off your clothes?"
"You don't have to take them off. But..."
Drip.
Before Sun-Woo could finish his sentence, blood started flowing out his nose. The blood poured out like a waterfall and dripped down his chest.
Soo-Yeong had just barely managed to regain warmth in her limbs when she once again felt her hands and feet go cold.
Sun-Woo wiped away the blood that was flowing out of his nose with the back of his hand and said, "I took off my clothes because of the drawbacks. I didn’t want to leave bloodstains on my clothes."
"Wh-why are the drawbacks so severe?”
"I didn't expect it to be this bad either. It must be because my stamina weakened while I was at the hospital... Ugh. It smells like batteries in my head," Sun-Woo said while grimacing and pinching his temples.
She had no idea what he meant when he said that his head smelled like batteries, but that wasn’t important at the moment. Soo-Yeong quickly took off her outerwear and handed it to Sun-Woo.
"Use this to wipe the blood. Why on earth did you do something like that...."
"I can just wipe it off with my own clothes, can't I?"
"Argh, if you get blood all over your clothes, Dad and Mr. Yeom Man-Gun might think that I hit you!" Soo-Yeong shouted before handing over her clothes to Sun-Woo.
Sun-Woo reluctantly accepted the clothes, but he didn't use them to wipe his blood. The expression on his face seemed to indicate that he didn’t really want to do so.
"Isn't it also strange if there's blood on your clothes?"
"We just have to throw them away somewhere before we leave. The clothes are not expensive, and since it’s summer, I don’t really need outerwear. On the other hand, if you throw away those clothes, you won’t have anything to wear.”
"That's true... Wait, now that I think about it, I can just wipe away the blood using rainwater."
"Rainwater? But it's not raining now."
"We can just summon rain with the power of the Loa," Sun-Woo said nonchalantly.
Soo-Yeong raised her voice in frustration and said, “...You’re crazy! No wonder you’re saying such nonsense about life and death. What are we going to do if you faint? I don't want to carry someone like you."
"It's okay. I won't faint that easily."
"Yeah, whatever. Just wipe it off with my clothes," Soo-Yeong said with a deep sigh as if she was sick of Sun-Woo’s antics.
That was why I conducted a simple experiment with vévé and prayers, and the results were successful. Through this experiment, I discovered that by using vévé and prayers, I could manipulate the Loa's power as I desired to a certain extent.
The drawbacks were stronger than I thought, but that was because I had recently been discharged from the hospital. If I maintained a healthy diet and exercised diligently, the drawbacks would naturally decrease.
I also had an idea on how to reach the state of acquirement that Legba previously mentioned. It was an idea that came to mind during the battle with Jun-Hyuk, and I was planning to immediately experiment with this idea once I returned to the underground chapel.
[You’re a monster!]
At that moment, I heard a voice in my head. It was not from Legba but from another Loa. It was Granbwa.
"What’s up?"
[To kill a perfectly healthy tree just for the sake of an experiment... I'm really disappointed in you, Prophet!]
"It was a tree that was going to wither and die soon anyway. I just put an end to its suffering."
[Unbelievable...!]
Granbwa let out a gasp as if she was astonished by my cruelty. I continued speaking without hesitation. "And strictly speaking, that was Sobo's doing."
[But it was you who prayed!]
"I wasn’t the one that prayed, but my hands and mouth."
[Do you think that's a reasonable excuse? You monster, you trash!]
"Legba, please cut off Granbwa's voice."
[All the plants in the world won't forgive you—]
[Alright, I've cut it off.]
Finally, it was quiet.
My uncle glanced at me with a puzzled look from the driver’s seat. He seemed very tired earlier, but he now had a refreshed look on his face. Perhaps it was because he took a nap not too long ago.
When the car exited the unpaved road and entered the highway, my uncle said, "What was that just now? Were you talking to those what-you-ma-call-its? The Loa?"
I nodded.
My uncle continued, "What were you talking about? The car’s not going to break down like before, right?”
"There was this strange person, and we had a little argument."
"A strange person?"
"Yes. Someone who really hates vegetarians..."
"Oh dear. So, is that person a carnivore?"
"Hmm, I wonder... I'm not really sure."
It was a question I had never thought about. Was Granbwa a carnivore? Of course, she obviously wasn’t a vegetarian...
By the time I came to the conclusion that she was a fasting enthusiast, Legba said, [Granbwa says that she will curse you. What are you going to do?]
“Will she calm down if we console her?”
[I'm not sure if that will work. She seems extremely angry.]
"Please let them know that I will prepare something very nice for the next offering."
[She says she doesn’t need it.]
"One less mouth to feed. I’d say that's a win."
[Oh... Granbwa seems to be screaming. This is a truly rare sight,] Legba said before chuckling happily.
It looked like I needed to apologize to Granbwa later. I could also give her an apple as an offering while doing so. It would be a truly symbolic and ambiguous apology. [1]
[Oh dear, has she lost her mind?] Legba said.
I ignored Legba’s words and checked my phone. There were a few messages from Ji-Ah asking about my well-being and a message from Florence Academy announcing an extended school closure. Other than that, there were no other messages. No messages from In-Ah, Jin-Seo, or Jun-Hyuk.
Ah, that’s right. I killed Jun-Hyuk. Anyway, it seemed like everyone was busy. Just as I was about to reply to Ji-Ah to tell her that I might return earlier than planned, my phone vibrated.
[Please call once you check this message.]
It was an unknown number, but I had a feeling I knew who the caller was. It was because the intention behind the message was all too clear.
"It must be voice phishing."
"What? Scammers are still doing voice phishing these days?"
"Seems like it."
After sending another text to Ji-Ah, I put my phone in my pocket.
1. Apple and apology are homophones in Korean. ?