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“To the defiled ones, I declare. You must come out from Sheol (שְׁאוֹל) to welcome those who ought to be your friends, subordinates, and those who you must serve.”

[And so they will become beings like us.]

[Skin will cool to a chill, and hearts shall cease to beat.]

[The insects of the body shall multiply and gnaw at the flesh, and the soft parts shall all become prey to beasts.]

[The blood that sustains the body will seep underground and reach Sheol.]

[That pulse shall reach the souls suffering in Sheol, frozen while waiting for the day of their rightful salvation.]

—

The three ignored Watanabe’s concerns for their safety and stepped outside.

“Here we are.”

Using the route they had scouted beforehand, they moved through the sparsely populated streets and finally arrived at their destination.

A rather decent spot, but oddly enough, it was a desolate building resembling an abandoned structure with no shops to occupy it.

It was the ‘lodging’ where Park Jinseong was said to reside.

“Who would have thought a shaman would be holed up in a place like this…”

Upon arriving at the building, they clicked their tongues at its unappealing appearance.

Could the darkness of night be the reason?

The building looked utterly unattractive.

Had it not been for the papers stuck all over the glass windows, one could easily mistake it for a site still under construction, so barren was it.

There was not the slightest trace of human presence; instead, through the dirty windows, only trash and materials lay scattered. Furthermore, thick dust was clearly visible to their eyes piercing through the dark!

The dust was so thick that dragging their feet a bit would stir it up and scatter it in all directions, and even slight movements risked inhaling the dust that swirled into the air.

Did this novice shaman know nothing about cleanliness?

“Who would have thought these Joseonjing would be so filthy.”

“Where else would uncivilized people go?”

“Old Joseon folks were said to be this messy. Even after we modernized them, you can’t change their nature, can you?”

They clicked their tongues while looking at the scene beyond the dusty glass.

They cursed Park Jinseong and scorned the nature of Koreans, who lived so differently from tidy and orderly Japanese.

It was not that they had a particular aversion to dirt.

Unlike the wizards cooped up day in and day out staring at computers or dusty machines while scribbling blueprints, they were warriors.

Accustomed to physical movement, sweating freely, and rolling in mud was the everyday life of a warrior.

They took pride in being real men who did not flinch at such things unlike the pampered capable people.

However, just because they didn’t shy away from dirt did not mean they had a hobby of crawling into it voluntarily.

Moreover, this wasn’t the always-clean Japanese dust; if it were the Korean kind, it was even more unpleasant to touch.

They vented their rising irritation by bashing Korea and thought that if they ever ran into that brat named Park Jinseong, they would make sure to give him a proper beating as they approached the building.

There was something that looked like a CCTV in front of the building, but they strode ahead without care.

After all, thanks to the items provided by their clan, they wouldn’t show up on the CCTV.

As they approached, they couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.

“Wow, they call this security?”

The security was so laughably inadequate.

The defenses for a shaman’s residence were beyond flimsy.

Two tiny locks installed at the top and bottom of the glass entrance door, a door lock that seemed to have cost just enough not to make a cheap sound, and a thin metal chain carelessly wrapped around the handle.

It was astonishingly pathetic.

There were no shutters, and no traps in sight. Not even one trace of a firewall to prevent someone from entering, nor a hint of any security device using magic was to be found.

An artifact?

The locks were in such a state.

There was no way anything like that would exist.

“This is so simple, even a thief could break in.”

“I can’t believe this….”

“What a rookie.”

They snickered as they began to dismantle the ‘incredible’ security set up by the rookie shaman.

They disabled the electric door lock by applying heat to it, and lightly flicked the tiny locks at the top and bottom with a surge of energy from their fingers.

*Tink!*

*Tink!*

The locks were immediately rendered useless with just a flick.

Of course, they crumpled under pressure and bounced away, the locks flying off into the distance.

The metal chain?

*Clink!*

As one of the warriors infused his sword with energy and sliced through it like a cutter, it was effortlessly and neatly severed—much like cutting a meat chunk with a finely honed sashimi knife—leaving behind only the pieces that clattered uselessly to the floor.

They giggled at the surprisingly easy dismantling of the security devices and stepped inside the building.

Perhaps it was the sheer ridiculousness of how inadequate the security was?

There was not a shred of tension to be found in their demeanor; instead, arrogance and pride clung to them thickly.

“It seems this rookie ought to be grateful to us.”

“Hehe. With such lax and foolish security in his own dwelling, how has he managed to survive?”

“He’d really owe us a debt of gratitude. How about we really hear a thank you?”

Even though they held their opponent in contempt, the operation was still an operation.

Naturally, silence and vigilance were the norms, but instead of maintaining that basic principle, they busied themselves chattering excitedly.

There was no awareness of needing to be cautious, nor did they feel any sense of crisis despite being in enemy territory.

Their behavior was beyond lax, almost completely devoid of any discipline.

Despite being merely decorated existence as the privileged warriors of an aristocratic clan… this was extreme.

“Hmm. Oddly, I don’t feel tense.”

“It strangely feels cozy.”

“What’s the big deal? If I don’t feel any threats with the warrior’s instinct, that just means there’s nothing to worry about, right?”

Their attitude wasn’t solely derived from their inflated ego.

Strangely, the moment they entered this building, they felt a peculiar warmth and comfort that cozied them up, and the warrior’s instincts sensed no threat at all. On top of that, nothing was detected, even in the aura they had dispersed just in case.

Thinking back, it was a strange situation.

From an objective standpoint, the building looked suspect.

Not a single shop was open, and not even a security guard was present.

Moreover, with thick dust covering everything, human traces were distinctly hard to find, and it appeared as though no one resided in this building.

Additionally, the desolate atmosphere, along with the eerie absence of people on the street this building was situated on.

To put it frankly, it resembled a vacant house or a haunted place.

Yet stepping into such a building brought feelings of comfort instead of the discomfort or fear one would expect?

Especially, they were so unperturbed that they didn’t even sharpen their senses, even while conducting an ‘operation’?

Wasn’t it bizarre?

It was downright peculiar.

Yet…

“Well, it’s trivial enough that it could be like that.”

“Is the land here good?”

“East Asian shamans always talk about feng shui. Looks like the location’s decent.”

The warriors failed to recognize this oddity.

Though they should have felt strangeness and incongruity, they brushed it off as trivial and moved on.

They rationalized their comforting feelings with an assortment of reasons.

Perhaps this was a mistake occurring because they believed too strongly in their physicality and the intangible sense they possessed—a trait inherent to warriors.

This basic philosophy of trusting one’s trained body and developed senses led them to their current conclusions.

Thus, the warriors advanced.

Clinging to their beliefs of ‘proper judgment’ and ‘valid reasoning.’

They soon arrived at the place with the elevator.

“An elevator.”

“Hmm.”

They stopped in front of the elevator.

Was it because Park Jinseong was using the elevator?

In contrast to the empty shop lot, this place had been thoroughly cleaned.

“The elevator is up on the top floor.”

“Using the elevator will probably get us caught, right?”

“Indeed.”

They decided to forego the elevator and opted to use the stairs instead.

If they tried to use the elevator, it would inevitably make noise, and even the most foolish would notice something was off.

No matter how easy it seemed, one should never underestimate straightforward tasks.

The warriors opened the emergency exit door located beside the elevator and moved to the landing.

As they stepped onto the landing, they were greeted by the suffocating blackness filling the staircase.

The windows, spaced at certain intervals, seemed to have had something black stuck to them, preventing any outside view, and the sensor lights on the ceiling didn’t react at all to their movements, as if broken.

Moreover, the air felt filled with a chilling atmosphere, reminiscent of a cool autumn dawn, as if the very space itself wanted to declare a difference solely from the emergency exit door.

It was hard to even casually claim it was a nice place.

“…Let’s go.”

Could the chilling air have made them more alert?

Unlike their previous demeanor, they began to move forward with serious faces.

One went downward.

Two went upward.

Thus, they commenced their ‘operation.’

 

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