The villagers rushed in.

[He has come, the Blessing of Jisan!]

The voice of the one holding the megaphone grew louder and louder. Before long, the sounds of songs and small gongs violently revived.

A whirlpool of people.

“This way!”

I followed Agent Cheongdong and slipped into a gap, trying to hide from the villagers—but it wasn’t enough.

“Wow, unbelievable.”

“Is he the one who’s getting the golden rooster?”

Whispers from those who hadn’t yet grasped the situation. Villagers throwing everything aside and swarming toward me. People falling prostrate on the ground and praying toward the mountain. Baek Saheon vanishing amidst it all.

And then—

“Run.”

I grabbed Agent Cheongdong, who had pushed Deputy Eunhaje and me back and now looked ready to stand against the villagers.

“Calm down. At this point, my chances of getting out ‘safely’ are very low.”

“……!”

“And it was definitely in the rulebook.”

We locked eyes.

“About what to do in a situation like this.”

Occasionally, during extraction operations, one of the agents might get captured by villagers.

But unless it's the final day of the festival, do not charge in or engage the entire village.

Villages mid-festival can always be re-entered. That means you can return, fully prepared.

Don't let your emotions take over and throw away a rare opportunity with nothing but chaos. Act wisely, and boldly.

The captured, the escaped, and the would-be rescuers must all survive and escape the disaster.

“Go.”

“……”

“Go, and quickly figure out a way to rescue me. Come back. That’s how I survive.”

I could see the fierce conflict in Agent Cheongdong’s eyes. The struggle between emotion and rational judgment.

But soon, reason won.

“Tomorrow.”

“……”

“I’ll return without fail.”

I quickly tucked the Five-Colored Sneaker Laces he handed me into the Inventory Tattoo.

In the worst-case scenario, it was the card I’d use to escape—risking disappearance or even suicide.

And Agent Cheongdong tore through the crowd with terrifying speed, sprinting toward the exit.

“He has come! The Blessing of Jisan!”

At the same time, the villagers swarmed me.

I blinked.

I must’ve lost consciousness for a moment.

And when I came to… I was on the wide, antique wooden floor of a traditional room.

Sliding paper doors on two sides of the square space.

“……”

I’d seen this layout recently.

That tiled-roof house.

Deputy Eunhaje was nowhere to be seen. …He must not have been captured with me.

That was a relief.

“……”

I looked down at my legs.

Both ankles were tied with a sacred golden rope.

The rope trailed through a hole in one of the sliding doors and extended outside.

When I tugged slightly, it resisted. It was anchored firmly.

This is serious.

Just then—

Drrrrk.

The sliding door opened, and people entered.

No—just two.

One carrying a small tray of festival food, the other holding a bottle of liquor. They bowed deeply before setting the clean, elaborate meal and drink before me.

And then faint music began to play.

Outside, it sounded like a frenzied festival was raging all night long.

“……”

The two lifted a small raffle box and each drew a stick. The one who pulled the rod adorned with a rooster feather remained; the other bowed and quietly exited.

The one who remained was the man who had brought the liquor.

“Saheon-ssi.”

“……”

Baek Saheon—the villager who brought the liquor—looked at me.

The likely suspect behind why I suddenly drew the Special Prize.

“Was it you who deliberately made me draw the ‘Special Prize’ from my pocket last night?”

…Check my pocket.

He’d definitely said that to me naturally—leading me there.

The only suspicious moment explaining how someone like me, who had pulled blanks the day before, could now draw the Special Prize.

“You made it so I’d already become someone who had drawn the Special Prize, so that I’d be seen as a ‘suitable’ choice?”

“……”

“And then, you guided me into drawing it again the next day.”

A flash of deep satisfaction crossed Baek Saheon’s eyes.

Then, in a hoarse voice, he said:

“What if that’s true?”

“You planned this for a long time.”

“……”

“Up to predicting how this might work out, and what to do if the agents failed to rescue you.”

A smile of ecstatic release spread across Baek Saheon’s lips.

“That’s right.”

Liberation.

Madness.

“I thought about it every day. What would I do if I won someday? I never wanted to end up like that. Every damn night in that fucked-up house, every time someone died, even when my sister died!”

He spat the words out like vomit.

“I told myself I would never end up like that. Fuck, if I’m going to die—god or not—”

“God?”

Baek Saheon swallowed hard. A mix of dread and pleasure crossed his face—the thrill of speaking a forbidden word.

“This holiday festival is a ritual to serve a god, isn’t it.”

“Serve? No!!”

Baek Saheon screamed the word.

“This is a ritual to create a god!”

“……!”

“They say: ‘Pick an auspicious day and turn it into a holiday. Enshrine the chosen winner in the Seonang Shrine, and from there, create a god—the Blessing of Jisan who will liberate us from worldly truth.’ They actually believe that crazy bullshit and go through with it!”

“Is that even possible?”

“I don’t know! But…”

Panting.

“There’s something real going on here.”

“……”

“If no outsider draws the Special Prize during the holiday, then we collect the leftover sticks and draw amongst ourselves. And if someone wins from that…”

Baek Saheon’s face hardened.

“When the final day of the festival ends, they blindfold the winner like an animal for slaughter and drag them to the Seonang Shrine.”

“……”

“And then inside the shrine, they do something.”

“What do they do?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t. But… but there’s something.”

His face turned pale.

“When the ones who got dragged in come out in the morning, their faces are all different. They can’t speak. Then they start helping prepare for the next year’s holiday…”

“……”

“And when the holiday they helped prepare ends, they hang themselves in the shrine.”

…!

“But then, every holiday… they come back. Even though they’re dead, they come back. They walk out of the Seonang Shrine.”

He wailed.

“They play the festival music!!”

…!

“They’re doing it now. Outside!”

Hiyahhhhhh!

 

“I won’t end up like that. I won’t die. No way.”

Baek Saheon’s eyes gleamed—fear, rage, the instinct to survive, and the relief of having succeeded—before gradually cooling into rational calculation.

“Now that you’ve drawn the winning stick, the holiday and the lottery are both over. I don’t have to come back here anymore. No more being trapped in Jisan Village. It’s all over.”

……

“I understand.”

I nodded.

Baek Saheon muttered.

“So now you can talk because you’re an insider too? Haha. …I used to think guys who blabbed about this stuff first were all dumbasses, but this… this is what it feels like?”

A situation only one person has experienced. The kind of secret information you’re forced to swallow without speaking.

It’s funny, but I might understand what Baek Saheon is feeling right now more than anyone else.

……

To be honest, I probably should’ve been angry or panicked right now.

This insane bastard Baek Saheon just shoved a government agent—someone who came here to save him, who only said there was no way to rescue him—into the role of sacrificial lamb so he could save himself.

I should’ve been furious, disgusted, sick with anxiety over what had happened to me, brain spinning to figure out how to escape.

That would’ve made sense.

But strangely, that wasn’t how I felt.

Instead, weirdly enough… I felt at ease.

A slight haze cast over tomorrow and the near future.

Since I’m trapped here, I don’t have to think about anything else right now.

No more worrying about the wish ticket. Or Director Ho’s taboo seal. Or the intel I had to gather within the month. Or what to do with the agent whose identity had already been exposed.

This is just straight-up escapism, isn’t it.

It’s kind of absurd, kind of pathetic, to find peace in the threat of death.

But it was true.

Which is why I was able to speak plainly.

No sympathy. No anger.

“That’s fine. I understand.”

“Understand?”

Suspicion returned to Baek Saheon’s eyes.

“Pity, empathy, ‘I understand’… is this the part where you try to say it’s wrong and beg me to let you go?”

“Maybe. But… spending each day afraid you’re going to die, unable to feel safe, with no peace in your mind.”

“……”

“I know what that’s like.”

He looked at me with a subdued expression.

“Still, you got lucky, picking the right one of the two agents.”

“What, you want to die or something?”

……

“Maybe a little?”

Right now, I wasn’t sure myself.

“Haven’t you ever wanted to die? Not even once?”

“……”

“You have, haven’t you.”

“That’s not happening.”

Baek Saheon spoke abruptly.

“I don’t want to die. If you want to die, good for you. Then just stay where you are.”

“……”

How strange.

There wasn’t a hint of mockery in his voice, like he was trying to ridicule me for falling into his trap. He didn’t even seem amused despite clearly having the upper hand.

All I could sense was his selfish desperation to survive.

He didn’t seem to feel guilty either, but it wasn’t that he was shameless—he just didn’t have the capacity to afford guilt.

Now that I think about it, he’s always been like this.

Only ever scrambling for his own benefit, his own survival.

Still, if he wasn’t someone who got a kick out of watching others suffer because of him… then there might be another way to approach him.

Something I could use.

…No matter what, I can’t just keep hiding from reality until I die.

Eventually, I opened my mouth.

“Saheon-ssi. If there’s a way for both of us to live—would you help me?”

“…What?”

“It’ll be harder for you than it is now. And you’ll have to take a risk that you’ll be exposed.”

“You serious? Are you insane?”

That was when it happened:

—Heavens, that’s enough! There’s a limit to what counts as dramatic tension! How could someone be so rude?!

—Ah, my friend. These days it seems everyone repays kindness with betrayal! Even Brown’s heart aches.

…The plush doll had started speaking again.

—I’ll help you. First, let’s get out of here.

—After that, let’s give them a taste of what karma really is. Won’t that be deliciously thrilling?

…….

Ah. It’s okay.

The plush doll fell silent.

Let me try doing it alone. Won’t that be more fun?

—Well… I suppose. It would flow better with the right assist, though!

It’s fine.

I ended the mental exchange with the plush doll and looked back at Baek Saheon.

I wasn’t expecting anything from him, so the words came out easily.

“But Saheon-ssi. I’m going to die because of you.”

“……”

“I came here to rescue you. I failed because there was no way. But it’s because you pushed me into this position that I’ll die.”

“How the hell is this my fault?”

Baek Saheon’s face twisted.

“Did I tell them to kill someone if I drew the fucking Special Prize? Did I drag people into the shrine and kill them? The ones doing the killing are someone else! What, should I have just died instead? That—”

Cursing and anger bring misfortune.

“……!!”

Baek Saheon and I both turned toward the sliding paper doors.

A murmuring could be heard.

Cursingandangerbringmisfortune. Cursingandangerbringmisfortune. Cursingandangerbringmisfortune.
Forgetfulone, begone. Forgetfulone, begone. Forgetfulone, begone.
Sansanbaekjisanbokjusiopgedaeirijaya. Sansanbaekjisanbokjusiopgedaeirijaya. Sansanbaekjisanbokjusiopgedaeirijaya.

The voices echoed.

Baek Saheon, pale as chalk, stared toward the door.

There was nothing there—but the sound of the festival percussion grew louder and louder…

“Baek Saheon-ssi.”

“No—”

He stumbled to the other side of the room, crouching and covering his head.

It was hard to believe this was the same guy who’d casually pulled off reckless stunts so many times before.

A trauma response?

I wondered if this might work.

I hesitated for a moment, then spoke.

Toward the door.

“I apologize. I cursed because I was startled.”

The noise stopped.

“That was an inappropriate attitude for the festival. I’ll try to speak more politely from now on.”

The sliding door remained motionless, quiet as death.

And then—

Hiyahhhhhh!

The festival percussion started again—and slowly began to fade.

Until it completely dissolved into the background festival noise.

“……”

“……”

“Baek Saheon-ssi.”

He stood up from the corner of the room, drenched in cold sweat.

And looked at me with disoriented eyes.

“I just saved your life again.”

“……”

“Don’t you feel even a little bit grateful?”

“…Are you gonna ask me to die in your place just because I said thanks?”

“You speak like saying thank you comes with a massive price tag.”

Baek Saheon looked at me like I’d just said the most ridiculous thing.

So be it.

“Suit yourself. You seem to value your life quite highly.”

Then I looked down at my own feet.

“But I value my life too. Even if I sometimes think about dying.”

“……”

“……”

A long silence.

Then Baek Saheon finally spoke.

“What exactly is this method where both of us live?”

“……”

“What is it?”

I slipped my free hand into my pocket and rolled the silver badge between my fingers.

Silver Heart.

“It’s simple.”

Because just now—listening to Baek Saheon—I realized something.

What kind of ghost story this is.

“I’m going to plant doubt in their beliefs.”

Creating a god. Liberation from worldly truth. Coincidence and fate. A sacrificial ritual shared by only a few. The return of the dead. The offering…

Everything pointed to one thing.

This was an urban legend under the jurisdiction of the Brilliant Nameless Sect.