Honbul: Flame of the Soul

“I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to forget this ever happened.”

At last, the boy lifted his head, his eyes steady.

The gentle smile faded slowly from Suhyang’s face.

“......”

Their expression went completely blank as they stared coldly at him. Tightening his grip on the knapsack slung over his shoulder, the boy spoke firmly.

“I’ll ask Myojeong myself when he comes back. And even if he refuses to tell me, that’s fine. He said he’d stay with me forever. That’s enough.”

Suhyang’s lips curled slowly upward.

It was the first truly twisted expression they had shown all night.

They glanced down at the hand they had held out to him and let out a faint scoff.

“How moving.”

A quiet laugh escaped them.

If this went any further, there would be no turning back now.

Still, it was impressive. They had managed to push him this far.

Which meant they could not let him walk away.

“You really are a loyal dog.”

The boy did not react to the sarcasm at all. He simply turned away.

The conversation was over. He intended to go home.

At that moment, Suhyang reached out and snapped off a nearby branch.

CRACK.

Though it was thick, it broke cleanly in their hand. Holding the sharpened branch like a blade, Suhyang approached soundlessly and aimed it at the boy’s throat.

“......”

The boy slowly turned his head, expressionless.

His gaze flicked briefly toward the branch pointed at his neck. Even at a glance, he could tell it was saturated with highly refined spiritual force.

“What are you doing?”

A branch infused with spiritual force was no different from a honed sword.

Despite Suhyang’s sudden change in attitude, the boy showed neither fear nor surprise.

Suhyang frowned faintly.

“Like master, like disciple.”

“I asked what you’re doing.”

“It means I can’t let you leave like this.”

The corner of the boy’s mouth lifted mockingly.

“Why?”

Instead of answering directly, Suhyang merely smiled.

“You said you were Myojeong’s friend. So why are you doing this to me?”

For the first time, killing intent surfaced clearly in the boy’s eyes.

“If my precious friend is walking the wrong path, shouldn’t I guide him back where he belongs?”

“The wrong path?”

The boy frowned, unable to understand what Suhyang meant.

“For the sake of a greater cause, sacrifices are sometimes necessary.”

Suhyang looked up at the night sky and murmured softly.

“False faith makes people foolish. Twisted conviction throws the world into chaos. The reason Myojeong turned his back on suffering people was because he became blinded by vermin like you.”

As Suhyang muttered coldly to themselves, they suddenly stepped forward and seized the back of the boy’s neck.

The movement was rough and violent.

Caught completely off guard, the boy had no chance to avoid it. He crashed backward into the stacked stone cairns before the shrine, scattering them apart. Sharp stones scraped painfully against his skin.

Suhyang walked toward him while he lay sprawled among the fallen rocks.

Their icy eyes looked down at him without emotion.

For some reason, their face was filled with deep disgust and contempt.

As though they were staring at filth.

Then Suhyang sliced through the straps of the knapsack with the branch infused with spiritual °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° force.

“I’ll be taking this.”

Contrary to expectation, Suhyang had not attacked the boy himself.

They had targeted the knapsack.

The night before, when Suhyang visited the house, the boy had happened to be using a makeshift talisman against thieves. Since it had been made using the boy’s own blood, its effect was unusually strong.

If Suhyang had tried to steal or extort something by force back then, they would have suffered backlash immediately.

Besides, confronting the boy head-on inside the house had been impossible in the first place. Only Myojeong could suppress him.

That was why Suhyang had lured him all the way out here.

This was the opportunity they had been waiting for.

“What are you doing? Give it back.”

The instant the knapsack was taken, murderous spiritual force erupted from the boy’s back like a crashing wave.

Red bled into the energy surging around him.

He strode toward Suhyang.

“Give it back before I kill you.”

Suhyang tossed aside the branch and slipped a hand inside their robes.

“Now that I think about it, I’d rather not dirty my hands with the blood of something like you.”

What they pulled from inside their clothes was a straw doll woven by hand.

Three of them.

Each was roughly the size of a palm.

Suhyang attached talismans to the dolls, muttered an incantation under their breath, and tossed them onto the dirt.

The moment they touched the ground, the dolls writhed violently and swelled in size.

In an instant, the straw figures transformed into the shapes of armed men.

The crude straw bodies vanished completely.

Soldiers stood there instead.

The boy’s eyes widened.

He had never seen anything like it before.

At that moment, one of the soldiers drew the sword at its waist and charged him.

Startled, the boy immediately shifted his stance. Like Suhyang earlier, he snapped off a nearby branch and poured spiritual force into it with all his strength.

CLANG!

He blocked the sword strike with the branch.

Suhyang narrowed their eyes as they watched the exchange.

The branch and the soldier’s blade collided once more—

—and the sword snapped apart instantly.

Suhyang’s expression hardened.

So it really is a monster.

The spiritual force on the boy’s side was overwhelmingly stronger.

The straw soldiers, lacking intelligence, staggered around in confusion after losing their weapons.

The boy did not miss the opening.

Red spiritual force roared around him as he swung the branch in a wide arc—

—and severed their heads in a single blow.

The heads rolled across the dirt.

Though they looked human, no blood spilled from them.

The inside of the necks was packed tightly with straw.

The headless soldiers collapsed limply to the ground like scarecrows.

“Give it back.”

The boy tightened his grip on the branch and glared at Suhyang with murderous eyes.

“......”

Red spiritual force surged violently from his back.

He advanced toward Suhyang step by step.

For the first time, Suhyang instinctively sensed danger.

Their expression stiffened.

Without realizing it, they took a step back.

The boy suddenly frowned and looked over his shoulder.

The fallen soldiers were writhing.

Then they slowly began standing back up.

“Shit. What the hell are these things?”

The moment the boy’s attention shifted toward the straw soldiers, Suhyang struck.

A violent gust of wind exploded from their spiritual force and slammed into the boy.

Caught off guard, he lost his balance completely and was hurled backward.

THUD!

The direction Suhyang sent him flying was deliberate.

Straight into the shrine.

The entrance was marked not by doors but by a sacred straw rope strung with strips of white paper and five-colored cloth.

The twisted rope existed to ward away and purify contamination.

It was a sacred boundary.

A taboo protecting holy ground.

The boy crashed through it.

The rope snapped apart.

He stumbled against the altar and tried to stand—

—but suddenly his legs gave out beneath him.

Something was wrong.

The instant he crossed the broken barrier and entered the shrine, weakness flooded his body. Dizziness crashed over him.

It felt as though an enormous weight were crushing him from every direction.

Seeing the strange reaction, Suhyang’s lips finally curved upward.

There had been a reason they summoned him here.

Especially to a mountain shrine.

If something went wrong, this would be the easiest place to suppress him.

And just as expected—

it worked.

Shrines usually housed the deities that protected villages.

But mountain shrines often enshrined mountain gods, beings of far higher rank.

Something impure had broken the sacred boundary and invaded the domain of the gods.

Of course it would be crushed under divine pressure.

Suppressing their thoughts, Suhyang let out a quiet scoff.

It seemed the boy still knew nothing about the thing dwelling inside him.

“Ah... ngh...!”

Sudden agony ripped through him.

The boy clutched his head and groaned.

The red spiritual force surrounding him began twisting wildly out of control.

Blood tears welled from his eyes.

At some point, his pupils rolled back completely.

Then the boy screamed curses.

“I’ll tear you apart! I’ll rip you to pieces and kill you!”

His staggering body convulsed violently before he vomited blood onto the ground.

The boy stared at Suhyang with eerie white eyes, muttering incoherently.

Blood vessels burst across his eyes.

The sight was grotesque.

“You’ll be killed by your own descendants someday...”

It was as if he had become an entirely different person.

And the longer it continued, the worse his condition became.

Soon he was coughing blood uncontrollably, collapsed on the ground clawing at the dirt.

Blood streamed from his nose and eyes alike.

In a weak voice, he muttered,

“I’ll make sure of it...”

Only after waiting for the boy’s strength to fail did Suhyang move again.

They seized the back of his neck and dragged him out of the shrine.

Unlike the boy, who had been half-mad with pain inside the sacred grounds, Suhyang appeared completely unaffected.

The boy was dragged helplessly like a wounded animal caught in a trap.

Suhyang planted a foot on his chest and lowered their face close to his.

The backlash from violating the taboo had left the boy barely conscious.

“Now that you handed over the item, I’ll tell you why Myojeong took you in.”

Suhyang grabbed the boy’s chin and forced him to look up.

As soon as he was pulled outside the shrine, the blur clouding his eyes slowly began to clear.

The eerie whiteness faded from his gaze.

Then Suhyang finally spoke.

“Myojeong killed your parents.”

The boy’s eyes flew wide open.

“Your parents were sinners. You’re the child of sinners. You should’ve died alongside them.”

Suhyang looked down at him coldly.

“...What?”

“I argued for mercy. Myojeong didn’t. He said people like them never should have set foot on this land in the first place. So he killed your parents in front of everyone—then hunted down their child. You.”

Suhyang’s voice remained mercilessly calm.

“He intended to kill you too.”

“Th-that’s... what are you saying...?”

The boy’s eyes shook uncontrollably beneath the flood of cruelty pouring over him.

If he could have covered his ears, he would have.

But he lacked the strength even to move a finger.

“He kept you beside him because he planned to kill you once the time came.”

The world tilted violently.

His vision warped.

His heartbeat spiraled completely out of control.

The boy’s face drained white.

It felt as though someone were carving straight through his chest with a knife.

“The reason Myojeong hid the fact that he was a Naja... the reason he kept you away from other Naja...”

Suhyang crookedly lifted the corners of their mouth.

“...was because he feared you might meet one of them someday and learn the truth.”

Then they smiled.

“Do you understand now?”

“This is the ‘fate’ between you and Myojeong.”