Boy Monster Chapter 13

SuperDevillishGiantBig

You just have to do it with your hand once, and I will do everything you ask for. I’m amazing at sucking and fucking.

Eunho yelled, his face burning red. Jiguksnim had read all of this, and it was a relief he hadn’t replied. How embarrassing would it have been if he had played along!

Eunho berated himself. No matter how lonely the years of solitude were, how could he have considered having such a conversation with SuperDevillishGiantBig?

Just as he was about to delete the app, the remaining messages caught his eye.

SuperDevillishGiantBig

Why is there no answer. Are you asleep?

SuperDevillishGiantBig

I hope nothing is wrong.

It was around the time he was being subjected to Lim Geonhwi’s disgusting acts and having his picture taken, so something must have happened. In any case, Eunho couldn’t reply, fell asleep, and then ran away from the residence. After that, just before getting into the taxi, around 1 a.m., a single letter arrived.

SuperDevillishGiantBig

Ah~

It was a cryptic response. No matter how much he thought about it, he couldn’t figure out what it meant. About 20 minutes later, the other person sent the last message.

SuperDevillishGiantBig

I’m busy. I won’t be in touch for a while.

SuperDevillishGiantBig

We shall meet soon in a secret place.

Chat ended.

It was as if they knew exactly when and where they would meet again. He decided to dismiss it as the sender being crazy and pressed the delete button. Finally, the chat app disappeared from his phone. He was deleting other apps one by one when someone knocked on the door. The monk entered, carrying a bowl of rice.

“I could have gone out to eat.”

“No, Jiguksnim instructed me to bring your meal.”

Eunho sighed briefly, looking at the monk’s shadow.

It was characteristic of a Hwelju unskilled in shapeshifting. The silhouette of the helmet worn by the Four Heavenly Kings appeared at the edge or a part of the shadow.

And, there was only one Hwelju who would appear at this temple and seek out Jae Eunho.

“Hyeon Jaewoong? Why did you shapeshift?”

“Whoa! Chief!”

Startled, the monk quickly undid the transformation. Hyeon Jaewoong knelt, looking flustered.

Hyeon Jaewoong was a 2nd-grade Suhwelju, but he hadn’t yet paired with a Yeonri, so he wasn’t officially part of S.E.T.U. Twenty-year-old Hwelju were all busy looking for their partners, but this kid, using his close friend Jiguksnim’s connections, kept following Eunho around.

“You need to practice shapeshifting a lot more. What was that? Is that how I taught you?”

“Hehe… I’m usually much better, but I got nervous in front of the Chief…”

Blushing, Hyeon Jaewoong fidgeted and laughed foolishly. Jae Eunho, picking up the rice bowl, asked.

“Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be at school?”

“I heard you left in the middle of a dinner party and came here last night, so I came to attend to you! And also to help with the Lotus Lantern Festival preparations. Hahaha! It’s almost Chilwol Chilseok.”

“School?”

“It’s the school’s foundation day!”

“Tell me the truth.”

“Sick leave!”

“Should I call the department office?”

“I just skipped.”

Hyeon Jaewoong replied sullenly. He, who turned twenty this year, was harboring an impossible dream. Unaware that Eunho didn’t have a connected Hwelju, he aimed for that position. To that end, originally born a 3rd-grade Suhwelju, he gritted his teeth and honed his abilities, rising to 2nd-grade. He’d said once he reached 1st-grade, he’d be on a similar level as Jae Eunho and would propose.

Changing one’s innate grade, the vessel of their supernatural power, was as difficult as moving mountains, so his mental fortitude and natural talent were commendable. Therefore, Eunho treated Jaewoong not as a nuisance but as a cherished disciple.

“Sit comfortably. And what’s the idea of bringing only rice? You should serve it with scorched rice tea.”

“Ah! I lacked sense. I’ll bring it right away. Just a moment!”

Eunho chuckled, watching Hyeon Jaewoong, who had been kneeling, jump up and rush out of the room. He remembered Choi Jungkyung calling Jae Eunho, who was admired by Hyeon Jaewoong, a “younger-man killer.” Eunho had retorted, “Since it’s almost impossible for me to be with someone my age or older, you’re right.”

Hyeon Jaewoong knew very little about Jae Eunho. The tragedy with its amplified violence wasn’t included in the basic Hwelju curriculum. The truth and secrets that shattered illusions were taught only upon joining S.E.T.U. His admiration was pure because he knew nothing about Eunho’s past.

“Here’s the scorched rice tea! Tell me if you need anything else, Chief.”

Anyway, Eunho was certain that Hyeon Jaewoong would soon meet another Yeonri, join S.E.T.U., learn all the facts about Eunho’s past and his relationship with Lim Geonhwi, and naturally distance himself.

Outside, preparations for the Lotus Lantern Festival were in full swing. Jiguksnim entered the room and slapped Hyeon Jaewoong on the back.

“I told you not to interrupt! You came in here and bothered him! Get out!”

“I wasn’t bothering him, I was attending to his meal….”

“We have a very important meeting right now. Get out!”

“I’m a Hwelju too, can’t I listen?”

“Get out!”

Jiguksnim kicked Hyeon Jaewoong’s backside and chased him out of the room. Hyeon Jaewoong left with a sulky expression. Eunho put down his rice bowl and bowed.

“Was there an important meeting? I thought I was just here to relax.”

“I was just about to meet you to tell you about it.”

Jiguksnim, bowing in return, sat in front of Eunho. This was what he wanted to discuss with such a serious tone.

“You said you were continuously connected to an unknown Hwelju, right? Who knows? Maybe a Sashwelju secretly visited your nightmares and violated you.”

“Violated…? What are you talking about? It’s novel to hear that in a temple.”

Jae Eunho, who had entertained such thoughts countless times, hid his embarrassment, feeling exposed.

The monk retrieved a bundle from the closet. Carefully wrapped in the bundle was a thin tablet PC, mainly used by the National Intelligence Service to transmit classified information.

“Did you hear about the recent sinkholes around here?”

“Yes. I’ve seen it mentioned frequently in the news.”

“The sinkholes aren’t the real problem. It’s just a show. They caused such a commotion because no matter how many messages they sent, we didn’t understand.”

“…What messages are you talking about?”

The data Jiguksnim presented was seismic observation data. It was an analysis of seismic activity statistics, epicenters, hypocenters, and seismic wave intensities in Jongno District, and it showed something peculiar. Minor tremors, barely perceptible to humans, had occurred several times over the past three months.

“I’ve been monitoring the movements of animals in the area for the past three months because they’ve been acting strangely. Birds, field mice, snakes, they’re all desperate to get away from this area! I asked Chogwangsnim directly to get me the data secretly.”

Eunho quickly scrolled through the data on the tablet. Compared to the average values from the past 50 years of seismic observations in downtown Seoul, the magnitudes were significantly higher.

“They barely stayed within the 3.0 magnitude level.”

“Animals know. That this kind of thing hasn’t happened in their territory before. The land in Euljiro shakes this much, and nothing happens, so humans like us are oblivious.”

“The hypocenter depth is also 5km… all the same, and the frequency is regular.”

Particularly noteworthy was the fact that these weren’t sporadic earthquakes. The ground in the area trembled at regular intervals. Strong tremors occurred at midnight at consistent intervals. The most recent earthquake was last night at midnight.

Eunho noted the period between the earthquakes. They occurred at regular intervals of a few days. The earthquakes, occurring every three or four days, initially seemed to coincide perfectly with the lunar cycle, but recently, they had been happening a day or two before the last day of the lunar month.

“It’s the lunar cycle.”

“Precisely on the new moon, the last day of the lunar month, the third quarter, the waning crescent, the full moon, the waxing gibbous, the first quarter, and the waxing crescent, the ground shook. And you’re saying this isn’t a message? That it’s just a coincidence?”

“…….”

There was definitely something going on. But even if it wasn’t a coincidence, it wouldn’t be a supernatural phenomenon. It was probably a problem with the underground drainage system or gas pipelines. Or maybe a crazy terrorist group was conducting explosives tests underground. Exasperated by Eunho’s cold logic, Jiguksnim sighed deeply.

Jiguksnim flipped through a few pages of the data and showed a table summarizing the locations of the earthquakes.

“Then what about this? What do you think?”

“…….”

Looking at the table, Eunho was momentarily speechless. The locations recorded as the epicenters were identical from beginning to end. The monk pressed the frozen Eunho for an answer.

“Where is it? You know, right?”

Eunho struggled to catch his breath. But he couldn’t control the violent pounding of his heart.

The epicenter of the tremors was near Hwangudan Park and the Chosun Hotel, where the former Sashimcheon family residence had been.

“Don’t you have any ideas?”

Jiguksnim always believed that the Sashwelju was still alive somewhere. No matter how coldly Eunho dismissed him, he stubbornly held onto his belief. Now, with the monk’s decades-long belief approaching reality, Eunho felt paralyzed, as if he had been hit in the head with a heavy lump of iron.

“See, what did I tell you? The Sashwelju is calling you. By shaking the very earth…”

Jae Eunho, suddenly drained of all strength, hung his head. A heavy dizziness washed over him.