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Chapter 196

I shook my head.

“Thank you, but I\'ll go alone. It\'s more convenient for me."

"Ah, I understand. Well then..."

The servant quickly paced back into the mansion. I quietly watched their retreating figure and went to the dormitory after the gate closed.

I checked on the flower I was growing. Thanks to the watering I had done earlier, the soil was still moist. I lay on the bed, thinking about when it would sprout and flower.

Sung Yu-Da knew.

Since when? He could have known from the beginning, or he could have found out midway, or maybe he had just been suspicious until our conversation, and that’s when he became certain.

Either way, he knew that I was the Cult Leader of the Voodooists and was keeping quiet for some reason.

[How audacious, Legba. Don\'t you also know about their relationship?]

Baron Samedi\'s words must be related to that reason. The ‘their’ in ‘their relationship’ would be referring to Sung Yu-Da and my father, and it could possibly include my mother as well.

So what happened between Sung Yu-Da and my father that made him stay silent about my secret identity? I didn’t have a clue. It didn\'t seem as simple as merely feeling guilty for betraying a friend. Legba or Baron Samedi might know what happened between Sung Yu-Da and his father, but...

[I can\'t tell you about that incident either.]

For now, it seemed like Legba had no intention of speaking about the topic.

"What happened that was so significant that you are keeping it a secret?" I said, feeling a bit frustrated.

Legba pretended to be helpful but remained silent when it came to providing the information I needed.

The bitter sound of Legba\'s laughter echoed softly in my mind.

[There’s too much to explain once I start talking about what happened back then.]

"Since we\'re already talking, you might as well explain everything."

[No, I can\'t.]

"Why not?"

[It\'s not the right time. Your doubts won\'t be resolved even if I tell you the story. Instead, they will only accumulate and deepen your confusion.]

"Ha, I see..."

Seeing he wasn’t budging despite my earnest request, it seemed like he had no intention of speaking about the topic. I resigned, covered myself with the blanket, and closed my eyes. If neither Legba nor Baron Samedi told me, then my mother and Sung Yu-Da were the only ones who knew about what had happened back then.

Unfortunately, there was no guarantee that my mother was in a state to speak correctly. Then, that left only Sung Yu-Da. However, Sung Yu-Da seemed visibly shaken after I showed him the ring today. He would have realized that it was a clear threat with an aggressive message along the lines of: “I know you, and I know that you know me.”

Because of that, he wouldn\'t be able to report me to the Holy See, but he would be highly cautious of me, making it difficult to get the answers I wanted even if I asked. I could secretly extract the information through Ha-Yeon, but it seemed difficult because Ha-Yeon didn’t seem to have a good relationship with Sung Yu-Da. It was also a problem that I don\'t know what Sung Yu-Da might have said to Ha-Yeon after I left.

Although I had told Ha-Yeon in advance, just in case...

[Wait for when the moment is right.]

At the moment, there was no apparent path. As Legba had said, waiting for the right moment seemed fitting.

[Yes. The bait has been cast, and they’ll bite at it eventually.] Baron Samedi intervened, chuckling.

[Be satisfied that you showed the ring today. Wasn’t it amusing to see him trembling over just one ring?]

"No, not as..."

It wasn’t that amusing.

Ignoring Legba and Baron Samedi’s words, I went to sleep. There were too many things to worry about, and I couldn’t get any proper sleep. As a result, I had an immense amount of accumulated fatigue.

Sleep came quickly, but I had nightmares of the Holy War repeating over and over, nightmares of fire swallowing me whole, things like that. They felt strangely familiar, almost cliché. It felt like I had experienced countless instances of these when I was a child.

When I woke up, it was still dark. It was so dark inside and outside that I couldn\'t see anything, so I couldn\'t correctly gauge the time. Instead of feeling refreshed, I felt groggy, probably because of the nightmares.

Still, I felt a little relieved from the fatigue. I felt thirsty and tried to get up from bed to drink water.

"..."

At that moment, I felt someone\'s gaze on me. A yellow glow emerged from the darkness and flashed. There was a horizontal line drawn within the pupils. The gaze was venomous, like that of a snake. No, those were the eyes of a snake.

"Hello, little one."

It wasn\'t a joke or a metaphor, but it was really a snake. It was the manifestation of Damballa. Damballa\'s enchanting and sweet voice echoed in my ears. In the blink of an eye, Damballa had climbed up my body and whispered sweetly in my ear, flicking her tongue.

"Damballa..." I managed to utter, but my voice was still deep from just waking up.

I was slightly taken aback. Usually, there were omens before the manifestation of a Loa. For instance, Legba could only be met at the Crossroads, Baron Samedi scattered purple mist before appearing, and Sobo and Bade always appeared together, accompanied by a storm.

Damballa appeared without any of these omens, so I couldn\'t help but be confused. However, there was another reason why I was confused.

"...Why have you become so small?"

Damballa appeared not in her original size but rather in what could be described at best as a cute, pet snake-like form.

***

In-Ah was getting ready to go out for the weekend.

While picking out what clothes to wear, In-Ah suddenly checked her phone. There were countless messages from her friends, but not one of them was from Sun-Woo. Worried because he said he wasn\'t feeling well, she tried calling him, but he didn’t answer. Not only that, but she had gotten no response at all. She didn\'t know what state he was in or if he was even alive.

She felt a complex mix of feeling disappointed, anxious, and a little sad, and it was difficult to express her emotions in words. In-Ah tried to brush off her thoughts and continued picking out clothes when she suddenly heard the sound of her phone ringing.

She rushed frantically to take out her phone. It wasn\'t Sun-Woo but her mom.

"...Ah!"

She realized that her parents were coming home soon. It seemed like her mom was calling to say hello before coming back. In-Ah cleared her throat and answered the phone.

"Yes, hello?" In-Ah answered the call while choosing her clothes.

Because she had been too lazy to dress up, she chose comfortable clothes that looked somewhat dressy. Through the phone, she heard her mom\'s voice asking how she was doing.

“Me? I’m doing fine. I\'ve just been having fun since the end of exams. Yeah, I have plans today, going out for a bit." In-Ah responded vaguely to her parents\' questions and casually threw the chosen clothes on the bed.

After all, she couldn\'t change while holding onto the phone.

"Exams? I did well on the written exams. Around second place? I made it within the scholarship range. Huh? We don’t need to throw a party to celebrate. Maybe when I get first place next time. As for school... not much has happened since then. Honestly, I still feel a bit anxious... Oh, don\'t worry about food. I\'m eating well on my own. I know how to cook now. I even made it for my friend, and they said it was tasty. Oh, I\'m not lying!"

Actually, it was a lie.

"It got postponed again? Ah... but you\'re still coming this month, right? Anyway, come back quickly. I miss you. Okay, bye!"

There were signs that a Satanist who had been active near the UK was planning to move, so the immigration inspection had become very strict. This led to a delay in her parents’ return, which was expected to take around two weeks.

In-Ah tried her best not to show her disappointment and ended the call.

Once she ended the call, the tip of her nose felt tingly. In fact, she thought tears would come out as soon as she heard her mom\'s voice, but she was barely able to hold them back.

In-Ah wiped away the welled-up tears with a tissue and looked at herself in the mirror after putting on the clothes she had picked out. Her nose was swollen from holding back the tears.

"Ha..."

There wasn’t a lot of time left before her meeting, so In-Ah left the house without being able to reduce the swelling adequately. And because she was pretty tight on time, she ended up having to run at the end.

She was out of breath after only a few seconds of running because she had been avoiding and distancing herself from exercise.

"Oh, In-Ah! You came just in time."

In-Ah barely made it to the meeting location on time. She didn\'t even have the energy to say hi and greet her friends, so she focused on catching her breath.

Gasping for breath, she looked around with a puzzled expression. Six people were supposed to meet up, but only three were present.

"...Where are the others?"

"They\'re always a bit late. I told them not to be late today, but these idiots... Ah, there they are." In-Ah\'s friend pointed while answering her question.

When In-Ah turned her head in that direction, she saw three people walking leisurely from a distance. The three of them noticed the other three waiting for them and pretended to run toward them.

The friend who had arranged the meeting approached the three of them with a frown.

"Hey, didn\'t I tell you not to be late today? Why are you guys always late? Huh?"

"I wasn\'t that late today. This is considered on time."

"Why are you late? Give me an excuse. I’ll let it slide if the reason’s valid.”

“Excuse? Um..." The boy being questioned looked up and stared at the sky.

"...Ah! The sun was too bright today."

"What does that have to do with being late?"

"Uh, it means I don’t have an excuse for being late. My bad!"

"You... do you want to fight?"

"You think you have a chance? We can use blessings, right?"

While the two of them argued, another boy who had come with them approached In-Ah. He was the guy who used to hang out with Sung-Hyun’s group at the beginning of the semester. The boy scratched the back of his head nervously.

"Um, In-Ah, right?"

"Ah... yeah, why?" In-Ah coldly returned the greeting.

Even when she tried to be non-judgmental, she still couldn’t help it because of one reason: that the boy used to hang out with Sung-Hyun. Although he said that he wasn’t close to Sung-Hyun now, this boy would have continued to hang out with him if Sung-Hyun hadn\'t been expelled. She didn’t like how he kept it on the low after Sung-Hyun’s expulsion because it felt like he was trying to launder his identity.

"No, it\'s just... You know, the way I acted at the beginning of the semester... If I did anything to upset you back then, I want to apologize," he said.

"No, it\'s okay. What\'s the point of..." In-Ah said, waving her hands.

At first glance, it sounded like she was accepting the apology, but in reality, it meant she had no intention of accepting the apology because it was overdue.

The boy also vaguely knew that In-Ah wasn\'t friendly toward him and nodded.

In-Ah’s friend, who had been arguing with another boy, came over and casually started a conversation. "What? Are you two already friends? We were the most worried about you two."

They hadn’t become close, and if anything, their relationship became more uncomfortable than before, but In-Ah smiled and nodded.

"Just, you know. We just said hey."

"Yeah?"

The friend nodded, looking back and forth between In-Ah and the boy. Then, she suddenly put her hand on In-Ah\'s shoulder and started walking and talking.

"Before we do anything, let’s eat! I came out in a hurry and didn\'t get a chance to eat."

"I think it’d be best for you to skip out on a few meals..." The boy who had been arguing with In-Ah’s friend butted into the conversation and started a dispute.

In-Ah’s friend glared at the boy with a scowl.

"Are you looking for a fight?"

"I’m kidding. Ah, I\'m hungry too. What do you want to eat?"

"Oh, there\'s a Chinese place nearby. Let\'s go there..."

As the students walked, they talked about what they were going to have for lunch. In-Ah listened quietly and played along to some extent. She didn\'t really have a particular craving for anything. Lately, she had been frequently skipping meals. Even now, she didn\'t feel like eating anything.

After roughly deciding what to eat and heading toward the restaurant, the students kept talking nonstop. From discussing exams to rumors and dating stories, their discussion topics had quite a range. In-Ah played along, just as she had done before.

At that moment, someone looked toward the road and exclaimed, "Oh? Isn’t that Ha-Yeon\'s car?"

Although they were engaged in conversation, the students’ eyes shifted to the road. A car that looked expensive even to the untrained eye was passing by on the road.

The car window wasn’t all too tinted, and it was possible to make out the people that were inside the car. The person who appeared to be in the driver’s seat seemed to be the driver.

The students all exclaimed in admiration upon seeing it.

"Hey, you’re right. Ha-Yeon always takes that car to go to school."

"Is Ha-Yeon the only one who rides that car?"

"Who else would ride a car like that? Do you even think before you speak?"

"Wow... but how much does a car like that even cost?"

“Why do you care? You won\'t be able to afford it even if you work your whole life."

"Can\'t I be curious? This guy always starts an argument whenever he opens his mouth..."

"Look at how other cars just automatically make way for them. You need an expensive car like that..."

"If you saw a car like that, would you want to drive near it?"

While the students were exchanging banter, In-Ah remained silent. She simply blinked her eyes while watching Ha-Yeon\'s car get further away. She wondered if she had seen it wrong, but no matter how many times she looked at it, she saw the same thing. In-Ah felt strange. More precisely, she felt her mood becoming strangely unpleasant.

"Huh? But the person riding with her, isn\'t that Sun-Woo?"

It was because she saw Sun-Woo sitting in the back seat with Ha-Yeon.

WonSuk: Ho ho ho... I would love to see another showdown between In-Ah and Ha-Yeon.