Myst, Might, Mayhem (Novel) - Chapter 65 - Galjeo (2)
Chapter 65 – Galjeo (2)
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Translated by Jinmu
Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net
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Not far from the valley where the iron-ball struggle had taken place and the mountain where the flag battle was underway,
there was another cave.
-Kiririk! Kiririk!
A procession of five carts continued into that cave.
Warriors with red belts were pulling the carts into the cave lit by torches.
The carts that entered the cave stopped at a certain spot.
There, the corpses of many boys had been laid out.
“Whew. Is this the last of them? Then shall we move them?”
The warriors with red belts who had brought the carts began setting the corpses down beside them in rows.
The remaining carts that arrived afterward were the same.
-Thud!
“Maybe because we took it out late, the body’s swollen.”
One of the red-belted warriors clicked his tongue as he looked at the corpse bloated with water.
The valley water had been shallow, but there must have been deeper spots, so the whole body seemed to have been submerged.
At that moment, a middle-aged man in a robe marked with yin and yang approached and said,
“Leave that one out.”
“Wouldn’t this still be fine?”
“This one cannot be used for the work.”
“Good grief.”
At that, the red-belted warriors moved the corpse to the cart on the left side of the cave.
While they were moving corpses onto the cart, one warrior could no longer hold it in and vomited.
“Urk.”
Watching him, the other warriors clicked their tongues.
“Tsk, tsk.”
“You can tell he’s a rookie.”
Of course, they said that, but in truth it was understandable.
At least the corpses lying over there had few wounds and still retained human shape.
But the ones on the cart were the “dropouts.”
There was nothing intact about them.
Crushed heads were common, and many were missing a leg or had their organs torn out.
They were gruesome enough to make anyone retch at the mere sight of them.
“That’s enough, rookie.”
“Y-yes, understood.”
The warrior who had vomited what was in his stomach barely got himself up and answered.
When the work of sorting the corpses was more or less finished, nearly three carts’ worth of dropouts had come out.
Then the middle-aged man in the robe from before came over and said to the warriors,
“Let’s go.”
The middle-aged man in the robe took the lead, and the red-belted warriors pulled the carts piled with corpses.
The carts moved along a narrow sloping path and only stopped once they reached a cliff at the foot of the mountain half a shichen later.
The middle-aged man in the robe pulled a large bundle of something from his bosom.
They were talismans.
[Lock]
was written on them, and as the middle-aged man in the robe attached the talismans one by one to the dead bodies in the carts, he said,
“When you throw them, do not look below the cliff.”
“Understood.”
The red-belted warriors answered casually and, as if used to it, threw the corpses with talismans attached down below the cliff one by one.
Watching this, the rookie warrior could not understand inwardly.
If they were corpses that could not be used, burning them would be cleaner, but if they threw them all here, then below would literally be overflowing with bodies, would it not?
Even in broad daylight, it would be horrifying enough that no one would dare go down.
The rookie warrior asked the senior carrying corpses with him.
“Senior. If they’re just going to burn them anyway, why throw them off this cliff?”
“Just do as you’re told. Why are you so curious?”
“S-sorry.”
Looking at the discouraged rookie as he shut his mouth, the senior clicked his tongue and spoke in a low voice.
“Hear it and let it pass through one ear. I only heard that the stream coming down from this cliff connects below to a tributary of the cave.”
“What does that have to do with this?”
“I told you I don’t know. Something about it becoming nutrients or whatever, but lowly men like us just do what we’re told and that’s it. If you start getting curious for nothing, it only causes trouble. Got it?”
“…Understood.”
‘Nutrients?’
Just what was supposed to become nutrients?
He could not understand it at all.
Besides, this meant they had done this every time the gates of Corpse Blood Valley were held, so just how many corpses had been thrown below this cliff?
Even now, there were over a hundred.
-Shiver!
He had looked down without thinking, and a moment later goosebumps broke out all over his body.
In the darkness that seemed as if it could suck him in, he felt as though some unpleasant, baleful thing was creeping upward.
-Tap!
“Huh!”
At that moment, someone grabbed his shoulder.
It was the robed man who had been attaching talismans.
To the startled rookie warrior, the man in the robe said in a low voice,
“What did I say earlier?”
“Pardon?”
“I asked what it was that I said a little while ago.”
“T-that I shouldn’t look below the cliff…”
“Then it would be best if you absolutely do not look.”
“Y-yes?”
To him, flustered, the man in the robe warned in a meaningful tone.
“You could be lured.”
Lured? What was that supposed to mean?
* * *
It was around one shichen and two gak after the flag-guarding battle had begun.
Since a considerable amount of time had passed, nearly half the flags had been found by the boys, and battles to defend and recover them were in full swing.
But amid that flag battle, an unexpected variable appeared.
It was
-Kkwek, kkwek!
the appearance of the strange creature Galjeo.
It had already been so vicious that it could not be compared to ordinary wild beasts, and for boys whose internal power was sealed and who had no weapons at all, it was the worst possible variable.
In particular, boys who were searching here and there alone for flags without teammates were being attacked indiscriminately and killed.
-Crunch!
“Kyaaaaak!”
In the middle of the mountain slope, another boy fell victim to the Galjeo.
The Galjeo liked human heads, and every time it caught one, it crushed and devoured the head with its savage teeth.
It did not eat any other parts.
Because of that, corpses with crushed heads were being found all across the mountain, heightening the boys’ wariness to the extreme.
“Damn it. What is this? Are we sure this really happened from fighting?”
One team that still had not found a flag discovered a corpse and could not hide their shock.
No matter how they looked at it, this was not the trace of someone who had died in a fight.
“Even if internal power is sealed, did he seriously get taken down by a wild beast?”
“He’s right. These are bite marks.”
“No, even if it was a wild beast, can one bite off a whole head? Even a great tiger would have stripped the skull clean instead.”
A corpse with the whole head gone.
No matter how they looked at it, it made no sense.
The area under Mok Yu-cheon’s eyes was hollow as he stood with them.
‘Haa…’
This place really was like hell.
After fighting in the flag-recovery battle and losing three boys who had been his companions, the five of them had been roaming around looking for another flag.
But in that process, they had seen over twenty corpses.
Of those, only about three looked as if they had died after fiercely fighting over a flag, while the rest had met bizarre deaths.
Ten corpses like this one had no heads.
And they had found seven corpses that were cleanly dead.
‘…Most of them had broken necks.’
Not all of them had broken necks, but most seemed to have been killed in a similar way.
It did not seem as though they had fought hand to hand or struggled fiercely, but as though they had been killed by someone without even being able to properly resist once.
‘What is this? Who is it?’
Those killed like this seemed to have lost their lives for reasons unrelated to the flags.
That was the problem.
The flag battle alone was already making everyone strain themselves with their eyes blazing, and yet it seemed some unknown things were killing boys wherever they pleased.
‘Who on earth is doing all this?’
On a mountainside about two hundred jang east of where Mok Yu-cheon stood,
one of the true culprits he wondered about was absorbing death aura with a hand placed on the chest of a headless corpse.
That person was Mok Gyeong-un.
Mok Gyeong-un, who had been rapidly absorbing death aura, soon removed his hand.
Then he muttered as if displeased,
“There’s too little.”
-You mean death aura?
“Yes.”
-Naturally. Corpses killed by strange creatures are eroded by demonic energy, and most of the energy they possessed is rapidly consumed.
At Blue Spirit’s words, Mok Gyeong-un clicked his tongue.
Even the energy that came out as they died was being consumed that quickly.
That was quite troublesome.
“Hmm.”
He had tried to move diligently and kill more boys than the strange creature Galjeo to gain death aura, but instead he was falling behind.
“This is starting to irritate me.”
Unlike him, who needed time because he had to absorb death aura, the strange creature called Galjeo simply ate the heads and went on to look for another prey.
It should have been full by now, and yet it kept eating.
“It feels like I’m eating leftovers someone else left behind.”
-Hmm.
“What is it?”
-Still, this thing… it seems to be eating more than expected.
Mok Gyeong-un shrugged and said,
“I suppose it still isn’t full.”
-No. Even considering that, it’s too much. At this point it ought to be full, yet it is eating an awful lot.
“It could be because it’s still in the middle of growing.”
-…I see.
“See what?”
-It may be one that is right before becoming an adult.
“An adult?”
-Yes. Among strange creatures, there are some that require a great deal of energy in order to reproduce or become adults.
“And you’re saying Galjeo is that type?”
-Perhaps.
At Blue Spirit’s words, Mok Gyeong-un stroked his chin as if troubled.
If it kept eating like this, his own share would be noticeably reduced.
At that, Mok Gyeong-un decided to change direction.
“This won’t do. I should just kill that Galjeo first.”
He had thought that if he left it alone, it would cause confusion around the area and would actually benefit him.
But in its current state, it only got in the way.
That was why Mok Gyeong-un resolved to kill the Galjeo first.
-And how do you intend to do that?
“Can you help me?”
-You said you could do it alone, yet it seems even you have no choice in this situation.
Blue Spirit snorted and said,
-Then take me out of this cramped place.
At that, Mok Gyeong-un lifted the wooden doll in which she was enclosed, formed hand seals, and recited a spell.
“Origin and source, return to the primal path, release!”
-Seureureureu!
Soon a great shadow formed out of the wooden doll, and then Blue Spirit slowly appeared above it, holding her smoking pipe.
Once outside, she stretched and said as if refreshed,
-As expected, being out is far better than being trapped. Hoo.
Blue Spirit drew once from the pipe and slowly exhaled a long stream of smoke.
To her, Mok Gyeong-un said,
“Can you check where that thing is? No, if Blue Spirit can get rid of it on your own, that would be fine too.”
-Even if you do not rush me, I was already going to. Wait.
-Pat!
Blue Spirit at once rose into the sky.
Unlike lower-grade spirits, she was of high rank, so even without possessing a body her range of movement was extremely broad.
Thus Blue Spirit, who had flown higher than the tops of the trees, surveyed the surroundings.
Her blood-colored ghost eyes slowly swept across the whole mountain.
‘Hmm.’
Then, while looking around, Blue Spirit lifted one eyebrow.
She had thought she would find it quickly if it was that obsessed with eating humans, but contrary to her expectation, the thing did not appear in her ghost eyes.
It should have been right before becoming a monster beast, so demonic energy ought to have been overflowing from it. It was strange.
‘Where on earth did it go?’
Was it not nearby?
At that, Blue Spirit flew even higher.
That was because she thought the Galjeo might have moved farther away.
As she was looking around,
-Flinch!
her gaze fixed on somewhere.
‘Ha!’
An exclamation escaped Blue Spirit’s lips.
When she had been inside the wooden doll, she had been unable to feel outside energy, so she had not known it.
But now, naturally, it could not help but be visible.
No, it would have been stranger if one’s eyes and ears were not drawn to something this tremendous.
From a distant cliff she was looking toward, the screams of countless agonized voices were spreading out.
At that, she immediately dropped back down.
Mok Gyeong-un asked,
“Did you find it already?”
-No. I do not see it. More importantly, hurry and follow me now.
Mok Gyeong-un could not hide his puzzlement at her somewhat excited voice.
Regardless, Blue Spirit flew ahead as if guiding him somewhere.
Mok Gyeong-un followed her.
* * *
It was not all that far.
The place, about two gak away, was in the direction of a cliff deep within the mountain’s boundary.
Looking at the ground,
‘Wheel tracks?’
The sloping path was full of wheel tracks, as if carts had been dragged there.
He was walking on in puzzlement when
-Flinch!
Mok Gyeong-un’s steps faltered for an instant at the baleful energy spreading from ahead.
‘What in the world is this…’
Ever since his ghost eyes had opened and his sixth sense had been unlocked, he could not help but become sensitive to such things, so why had he not noticed this until now?
With that doubt, he looked around.
Then he found something.
‘Ah…’
Talismans pasted between the cliff and the trees, and incantations carved there.
They were controlling the balefulness that was flowing out, preventing it from escaping outside.
But even with this many talismans attached, such a tremendous balefulness was still leaking out when he drew close, so what on earth was there?
When he reached the point where the wheel tracks ended, he saw Blue Spirit sitting on the edge of the cliff and smoking her pipe.
-Can you see it?
At her question, the skin on Mok Gyeong-un’s body trembled.
-Kyaaaaaaaa!
-Kkeuaaaaak!
-Save meeeee!
-Please! Please!
The endless screams spreading up from below.
Together with those sounds, the baleful energy crashed upward as though frantic that it could not rise any higher, enough to make his skin sting.
-Look more closely.
Mok Gyeong-un walked to the cliff edge and looked down.
“Ah…”
It was like a bottomless pit.
Countless grudges were mixed into one and spewing endless malice and balefulness.
Even though talismans were pasted all over the cliff, if it was still this severe, then anyone with even slightly weak mental force might be left dazed from merely looking at it.
-Sentient being. Do you know what gu poison is?
“…How could I not?”
There was almost nothing he did not know concerning medicinal herbs and poisons.
Of course, he had never seen gu poison in person, but he remembered hearing of it from his grandfather.
It was a secret art that originated in the southern barbarian lands, in which dozens or hundreds of venomous creatures were put into a single jar, and the lid was not opened until only one remained alive.
The single worst survivor was called gu poison.
“Why are you asking that?”
The corner of Blue Spirit’s mouth twitched as she said,
-There is gu poison below there.