Dongti
Yu-yeong stared in wonder at the bell that had rolled to a stop at her feet. It was as if it had slipped out from that corner, weaving past every wire and prop in its path, racing toward one fixed destination—hers.
She bent down and picked it up.
"Oh, this is—"
The moment she straightened her back and lifted her head, her eyes met Cha-mu's, and he was glaring at the bell in her hand with a razor-sharp intensity.
Their gazes locked in midair.
As Yu-yeong's eyes darted between the bell and Cha-mu's glacial face, he strode toward her without a word.
When that enormous frame, nearly 190 centimeters tall, came bearing down on her, Yu-yeong instinctively stumbled backward. No—it wasn't his height that cowed her. It was those piercing, frost-blue eyes that drained the strength right out of her.
They were anything but gentle or kind. His gaze felt like it could see straight through her.
"Give it back."
The words that came out of Cha-mu's mouth as he stopped before her were brusque to the point of rudeness.
Most men turned courteous and obliging the moment they stood in front of Yu-yeong.
It was only natural. She was the hottest actress in the business. But the voice asking for his bell back held no warmth whatsoever. If anything, it carried a strange edge of irritation.
"H-here you go."
Cowed by that killing intent, Yu-yeong stammered out her reply and held the bell out to him.
Cha-mu took it off her open palm without a flicker of hesitation. And in the instant their fingertips brushed, her shoulders gave a visible shudder.
Her soft, gentle eyes settled on his face.
"..."
So that's what Yu-yeong's eyes actually look like. Cha-mu recognized it at a glance—eyes so guileless they didn't hold so much as a speck of malice or venom.
Born with eyes that soft and defenseless, no wonder her vessel shattered and every crooked thing out there treats her body like its own front door.
A slight nod.
Cha-mu swallowed the countless words clawing their way up his throat, dipped his head a fraction, and turned his back on her without a trace of regret.
I don't get entangled with humans.
Once inside the van, Yu-yeong slumped against the seat and closed her eyes.
"Rough day? Let's get a sports drink into you first."
Seul-a's heart ached at the sight of her wilted like a snapped stem, and she quickly twisted the cap off an electrolyte drink and pressed it into her hands.
Yu-yeong looked as though even lifting it to her lips was more than she could manage.
"I'm okay."
"Okay, my foot. Should we head home? Or do you want to nap a little?"
"I'll sleep a little, and then—"
Her strength had run so dry she couldn't even finish the sentence. Seul-a gave an understanding nod.
Saying she'd go pack up the remaining gear, Seul-a headed back into the set, and Yu-yeong leaned against the seatback and shut her eyes.
She was so exhausted her whole body felt like it was melting.
The fatigue had been getting worse lately. And every time it did—
"Ah."
Yu-yeong didn't know the rules governing the beings that took over her body. No—even if she'd tried to work them out, each ghost behaved differently, making it hard to find even the faintest pattern.
She knew only this much: the one who most often claimed her body appeared without fail when a performance began—when she stepped onto a stage, in front of a camera, before a crowd.
As for the others... she couldn't be certain, but they tended to surface when she was sick or drained of strength.
When her whole body grew heavy as waterlogged cotton and even breathing became a struggle, that was precisely when the stray spirits slipped in.
The first ghost to enter her body and spark a dating scandal had been a fan of an actor. Whether the woman had been a fan in life or became one after death, Yu-yeong never knew, but the ghost had seized her body and relentlessly seduced the actor she'd been filming alongside.
That was how it went. Whenever Yu-yeong grew especially weak, the ghosts who hijacked her body committed every attention-seeking stunt imaginable. They chased after actors and idols they fancied. They took her credit card to the department store and shopped until they dropped.
The one mercy was that not a single ghost had ever crossed the final line with her body.
As though bound by some unspoken pact—you must never sleep with a man—they would abandon her body at the very brink of the act.
Not that that was much of a mercy. What good was leaving at the last second? The men she'd been entangled with, though they'd never once touched her flesh, bragged shamelessly to their friends that Yu-yeong had fucked them senseless in bed, and to the public she became nothing but a slut who dropped her panties for any man who glanced her way.
"Haah... I'm seriously so tired... please..."
A cold premonition whispered that another possession was coming, and Yu-yeong murmured the plea in a pitiful voice.
When a possession took hold, the exhaustion vanished—but then she had to do whatever the spirit inside her wanted. Her body moved on its own, the ghost's voice echoed in her ears, and she felt every last second of it, remembered all of it. To Yu-yeong, it was like living five or six people's daily lives in a single body—bone-deep fatigue and quiet torment that never ended.
Ting.
Ting.
Ting.
Then the sound of a bell rang at her ear.
At first she thought she'd misheard. If there were a convenience store nearby, sure—but this was a film set in Paju, a place so remote it barely registered on the map.
And then she remembered—the bell that had rolled right up to her feet earlier, the one she'd handed over to that frightening-looking man. Yes, a bell. A pretty, golden one.
Ting.
Ting.
"Ah."
The moment that crystal-clear chime sounded again, Yu-yeong felt her mind flood with light.
It was like sucking on a mint—her head opened up, cool and clean. The sensation was utterly foreign to her.
When the spirits took her body, her memories stayed sharp, but she had never once felt clear-headed.
Even after the spirits vanished and she was left alone to gather her wits, her mind always walked through a half-lit fog—murky, never quite whole. Forever inexplicably clouded...
"What is this...?"
Murmuring to herself, Yu-yeong's hand found the van's door handle. A minute ago she'd felt like she'd die if she didn't sleep; now her head was so bright and her body so light she felt she could float away.
Ting.
Ting.
Ting.
The bell rang out again.
And Yu-yeong had no choice but to step outside and follow it.
"..."
Once out of the van, she scanned her surroundings—but too many people were coming and going. There was no tracing the source of that mystical chime.
One thing, however, was certain: her head felt impossibly clear.
A body that had seemed ready to collapse at any moment now felt scrubbed clean, purified, and the sensation lifted her heart to bursting.
"That man from earlier..."
He'd been a face she'd never seen on set before. Far too handsome to be mere staff.
For a moment, Yu-yeong's thoughts drifted back to him.
The owner of the bell...
Cha-mu frowned as he felt the bell rattling and ringing inside his pocket.
He wanted to plunge his hand in and clamp it silent this very second, but a force stronger than his grip kept shaking it loose.
"Full of tricks today, aren't we."
The words that spilled from Cha-mu's mouth were far harsher than usual.
The power of a spirit spitting out its resentment was a mighty thing.
"..."
His sharp eyes swept over the spirits that had been clinging around Yu-yeong's van.
Three, by a conservative count. Possibly more. Whatever deep-seated grudges had chained them to this world, every one of them was thrashing to force its way into Yu-yeong's body. But when the bell's chime cut across the set, they froze mid-motion, heads snapping around, frantic to find the source of the sound.
Had it been the work of some greenhorn shaman weaker than themselves, they would have torn the spirit apart on the spot. But the instant they laid eyes on Cha-mu, their bravado guttered and died.
Even departed spirits know their place.
They read a being's rank by pure instinct, and it was plain they had seen, clearly and unmistakably, exactly what kind of existence Cha-mu was.
The things that had been drifting lazily about vanished like smoke. Not ascension—merely withdrawing, keeping their distance from Cha-mu and Yu-yeong for the moment.
"Idiots, every one."
Just then, Yu-yeong climbed down from the van with a stunned look on her face, and at the sight of her, Cha-mu's expression twisted with displeasure.
To be perfectly honest, he couldn't stand the sight of her.
What soured his mood even further was the instinct nagging at him—that Yu-yeong was the one who'd tossed the black hat he'd found abandoned in the alley by his front gate this morning.
Which meant the reason a god had shipped him off to this place, ostensibly to help some poor soul, was probably Yu-yeong herself. That thought alone made his skin crawl.
"..."
I don't form ties with humans.
Women his own age, least of all. Get careless and let one in, and there was no telling what mischief a spiteful god might play with his life.
He meant to walk right past her without a word.
He owed her no pretense of acquaintance, and even if she was the reason he'd been drawn here, he refused to care. What he was looking for was the owner of that black hat—the one who had laced it with deathly energy.
"Wow..."
What stopped him in his tracks was the sight of Yu-yeong gazing up at the sky, smiling with unearthly brightness.
Her upturned face was pale white, flushed with a faint rose glow. Like someone seeing the sky for the first time in years, she soaked in the dazzling sunlight and let the corners of her mouth curve into a radiant smile.
"Dongti struck."
That was what Cha-mu muttered as he watched her.
She's caught dongti.