Honbul: Flame of the Soul

After drifting off for a short while, Jaegyeom opened his eyes in a familiar room.

Blinking slowly, he stared up at a ceiling darkened by age. The wooden beams and yellow clay walls felt strangely familiar. As he looked around blankly, realization finally dawned on him.

It was the thatched-roof house where he had once lived with Myojeong.

At first, he thought he might be dreaming. But it felt far too vivid and real for a dream. Not only could he move freely, his mind was perfectly clear as well.

Come to think of it, something similar had happened once before.

Back on Geoyeo Island, when he had nearly died after his chest was pierced through, his consciousness had sunk deep into the abyss inside ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) himself. And there, he had encountered the disaster god sealed within him.

Why am I here again?

This time, he was neither gravely injured nor in danger of dying, so he had no idea why he had returned to this place.

Then it occurred to him.

Maybe the boy had summoned him first this time.

As he thought about it, he decided that might actually be for the best. There were things he wanted to ask the boy anyway. Back then, everything had been too urgent to talk properly, and afterward, no matter how many times Jaegyeom called for him, the boy had never responded.

Slowly looking around, Jaegyeom pushed himself upright.

He reached for the paper-covered door.

Last time, no matter how hard he had pulled on it, the door had not budged, as though it had been sealed shut. But now it opened effortlessly.

Clatter.

The moment he stepped outside, he saw a familiar figure sitting in a corner of the sunlit yard.

The boy was crouched in the dirt, playing by himself.

Jaegyeom stared at the boy’s back for a moment before calling out,

“Hey.”

The boy ignored him.

Jaegyeom stepped down from the wooden porch and walked over. Peering down, he saw the boy scratching something into the dirt with a stone. It looked like some unfamiliar script—or maybe a formation.

“What are you doing?”

The boy continued scribbling as though he had heard nothing.

“......”

Annoyed by the blatant disregard, Jaegyeom swept his hand through the drawing and smeared it apart.

“I’m talking to you. Quit pretending you can’t hear me.”

Only then did the boy snap his head up.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

The boy threw the stone down furiously.

“Do you seriously want to die? You should’ve stayed asleep and gone back quietly. Why are you starting shit?”

Jaegyeom stared at him in disbelief.

“What? Starting shit?”

The boy had broken his promise to help him, demanded Jaegyeom’s body, thrown a tantrum asking whether he liked Yoon Taehee that much, and then spitefully dragged him into a hallucination after being rejected—getting Yoon Taehee hurt in the process.

And now this bastard was acting offended?

“You’re freeloading in my body and still acting like this? The nerve you’ve got turning this around on me. Hey, think about what you did first. You’re the one who should be getting beaten half to death right now. What exactly gives you the right to glare at me like that?”

As Jaegyeom’s expression hardened, the boy flinched slightly before turning his face away.

“Why’d you come here?”

Arms folded, the boy muttered sulkily.

Unlike before, he clearly did not welcome Jaegyeom this time. In fact, he looked deeply offended about something.

Jaegyeom paused.

What do you mean, why did I come...

“Weren’t you the one who called me?”

Something about this felt strange.

If the boy had not summoned him, and if his consciousness had not sunk the way it had last time, then how had he entered this place?

For some reason, the threshold to the abyss felt far lower than before. Even opening the paper door and stepping outside had been incomparably easier this time.

“Then... does that mean I can leave whenever I want now?”

“Yeah. You can come and go freely now.”

“Why?”

After a moment of silence, the boy stared at him.

“Why do you think? It’s because you broke the taboo rope last time.”

The boy answered irritably, as though the question should have been obvious.

Still, since the boy had previously claimed that once someone entered this place they could never leave, Jaegyeom felt relieved to hear he could escape on his own now.

There were many things he wanted to ask.

But right now, one question mattered more than anything else.

Myojeong.

Judging from their previous conversation, the boy clearly knew far more about Myojeong than Jaegyeom did.

“Did you know Myojeong was the previous Bangsangsi?”

“Yes.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?”

“You never asked.”

The shameless response left Jaegyeom speechless.

“Then... Myojeong really wasn’t an ordinary human?”

“Myojeong was a human marked by the hometown.”

“The hometown?”

“Yep.”

The words made no sense at all.

“The hometown means the place where you were born and raised.”

“Yeah. Because the hometown is the starting point of all causality.”

“Then what exactly is this hometown?”

The boy yawned lazily and looked off into the distance for a while before his eyes settled back on Jaegyeom.

Those eyes, shining like embedded glass marbles, were inhuman.

With the eyes of a god that could see into the deepest depths, the boy lightly clenched his fist and tapped the ground beneath them.

“The hometown is the land where you were born and raised.”

Tap.

“The road you’ve walked until now.”

Tap.

“And the road you’re destined to walk in the future.”

Tap.

“Everything you’ve accomplished so far.”

Tap.

“And everything you’re fated to accomplish from now on.”

Tap.

“The thing that surrounds your life itself.”

Tap.

“And the totality that makes up this entire world.”

After finishing his careless explanation, the boy spoke casually.

“This is the hometown.”

Jaegyeom fell silent.

The concept the boy described was too vast, too abstract, too incomprehensible.

“This hometown you’re talking about...”

Jaegyeom slowly lifted his head from where he had been staring at a line of ants crawling through the dirt.

“Do you know what humans call it?”

“What?”

“Destiny.”

The instant their eyes met, something strange flickered across the boy’s face.

“......”

He stared intently at Jaegyeom for a long while, as though looking at something deeply fascinating.

Then he slowly repeated the word under his breath, savoring it.

“...Destiny?”

Suddenly, the boy burst into laughter.

It started as a snicker before rapidly growing louder. Soon he was laughing so hard he threw his head back, even stamping his feet on the ground.

For some reason, he seemed delighted.

“Yes. That’s it. You’re right.”

Still laughing, the boy cupped Jaegyeom’s cheeks.

“So to humans, the hometown is destiny.”

Then he grinned.

“In that case, Myojeong would be ‘a man who betrayed destiny.’”

“What does that mean?”

“Because Myojeong was someone marked by the hometown.”

“...What does it mean to be marked by it?”

“It means the hometown favored him especially.”

Seeing Jaegyeom’s confusion, the boy elaborated.

“To put it simply, he was a precious human beloved by the world.”

“Beloved?”

“Yeah. You could say this world is the hometown’s game board. Everything exists within the flow it creates and under its control. It’s like the hometown is playing a game of shogi against itself, taking turns on both sides.”

Those sides could become the human world and the next world, life and death, light and darkness, good and evil, humans and ghosts.

“Spiritual creatures, sacred beasts, humans, ghosts, animals... everything can become a piece on the hometown’s board. But not all pieces are equal. If you look throughout human history, there have always been pieces given stronger roles and greater purposes than others. Humans marked by the hometown are those kinds of pieces.”

After finishing the explanation, the boy looked back at Jaegyeom.

“Do you get it now?”

Jaegyeom thought he understood a little.

Just as he was about to nod faintly, the boy rubbed at his eyes and muttered listlessly while staring off into the distance again.

“Myojeong was one of them.”

Then he added quietly,

“...Though he was abandoned in the end.”

Jaegyeom froze.

“What? Abandoned? What do you mean?”

“As I said before, most things that happen in this world are causalities fabricated by the hometown. Only a handful of humans have ever realized that truth.”

The boy looked at Jaegyeom.

“And Myojeong was clever enough to understand it from very early on.”

Jaegyeom listened in silence.

“That’s why he eventually betrayed the hometown.”

“Myojeong betrayed it?”

“Yep.”

Jaegyeom frowned slightly, struggling to grasp the abstract explanation.

“How? Why?”

“Myojeong cast aside the taboo the hometown gave him and strayed from the path.”

The boy scratched his cheek carelessly.

“Well, the taboo forced onto him was pretty cruel by human standards.”

“...What was it?”

Still staring into the distance, the boy answered flatly.

“Never take anyone’s side.”

“...What?”

“Never give your heart to any side.”

“Wh-what does that even mean?”

“You seriously don’t understand?”

After a long silence, the boy finally turned back toward Jaegyeom.

His clear, straightforward gaze fixed directly on him.

“It means Myojeong was never supposed to love anyone.”