As True as a Dream Chapter 72

It is late at night.

 

Yi Ho and Hae-Joo are resting in their rooms at the Gongju City Inn.

 

*Tick! Tick! Tick! Tick!*

 

Lying on the thick futon with his eyes closed, Yi Ho heard a noise at the window and opened his eyes to look out.

 

Under a bright full moon, a crow was perched on the windowsill.

 

Raising an eyebrow, Yi Ho stood up and opened the window.

 

The crow swooped down and pecked at his leg with its black beak.

 

Yi Ho tore off the white paper tied around the crow’s ankle and unfolded it.

 

“The moon jar is broken, and all the seaweed has been burned.”

 

Hongo’s handwriting was neat, but the words were anything but.

 

Yi Ho frowned.

 

There were dozens, perhaps hundreds of sea serpents in the moon jar, but they were actually a single entity that had split into many growing entities.

 

They were one and hundreds, hundreds and one.

 

Therefore, the report of all the sea serpents being burned to death means that all the sea serpents that should have been in Mao Saito’s body are also dead.

 

Yi Ho wiggled his eyebrows.

 

No one would ever touch the hagiography in the moon jar in the secret room.

 

Therefore, the problem must have come from the hagiography on Mao Saito’s side.

 

‘But how? Someone had discovered the existence of the Hae-Seo and taken care of it? And who?’

 

Yi Ho crumpled Hongo’s note in his hands as he pondered the problem.

 

He stuck his hand out of the window and let a light breeze blow through, scattering the paper into dust.

 

There are only two options.

 

Either youkai or true shamans or shamans with a history of divine power.

 

But the remaining youkai in Gyeongseong were scavengers at best, and they were busy examining Yi Ho’s complexion.

 

‘So was it a shaman? Or is he the Man Insa of the Guishan Dao, who might have already appeared in Gyeongseong…?’

 

But Yi Ho quickly dismissed that possibility.

 

Man Insa is a voracious snake demon that feeds on human blood, not a benevolent creature that saves people from bizarre boils.

 

A small smile tugged at the corners of Yi ho’s mouth as he ran through the various theories in his head.

 

He didn’t know who was working on his theories, but he found them amusing.

 

‘How dare they ruin his plans for Mao Saito.’

 

A hint of irritation flashed across Yi Ho’s face as he remembered the twisted madness in Saito Mao’s glassy eyes.

 

A person like Mao Saito is like a cockroach.

 

Even if you kill them, they will always come back to life to bother and annoy you.

 

If you leave them alone, they’re a nuisance, and if you kill them, many problems will follow.

 

It was time to think about whether he should take another chance and use his hands.

 

*Ding!*

 

“Boss?”

 

Yi Ho turned around in the doorway at the familiar sound of Hae-Joo’s voice.

 

“Boss? Are you sleeping?”

 

When he didn’t answer, Hae-Joo called back from the other side of the door.

 

Yi Ho went to the door, opened it, and suddenly looked down at his feet.

 

Five shadows with fluffy tails were dangling in the moonlight streaming through the inn window.

 

Yi Ho turned and closed the window, pulling down the cloth that was blocking the light before opening the door.

 

In the doorway stood Hae-Joo, groggily looking up from her sleep.

 

“I thought I heard a noise in the other room, so I came over.”

 

Hae-Joo was in the room right next to him.

 

She must have heard the noise when a crow tapped its beak on the window.

 

“Are you okay? Are you alright?”

 

When Hae-Joo asked, rubbing her eyes, Yi Ho was about to say that he was fine, but then he changed his mind and leaned his upper body toward Hae-Joo.

 

“I think I have a fever, but I’m not sure.”

 

“Fever?”

 

Yi Ho leaned closer to her and Hae-Joo froze, raising her hand to cover his forehead.

 

She soon looked confused and moved her hands to his cheeks and neck.

 

“You don’t have a fever. Is it fatigue or do you feel heavy?”

 

Yi Ho looked down into the clear eyes of Hae-Joo, who had stopped looking at him so closely.

 

A strange feeling of satisfaction soon filled him, and an easy laugh escaped.

 

Seeing his smiling face, Hae-Joo felt a little drowsy, and she gently removed her hand from his neck and blinked.

 

“You’ve been like this since this morning…!”

 

Yi Ho raised an eyebrow and smiled a mischievous grin full of mischief.

 

Hae-Joo frowned and looked up at him, then waved her hand as if that was enough.

 

“You don’t look well, get some sleep. We have to go back to Gyeongseong tomorrow and it’s a long way.”

 

“Okay, come on.”

 

He wondered if his bad mood made him feel weak, so he obediently retreated.

 

Yi Ho swallowed his laughter and unconsciously raised his hand to tuck a stray strand of hair behind Hae-Joo’s ear.

 

Hae-Joo hesitantly tried to pull away, but it was too late.

 

With another disapproving look, she turned and opened the door to the next room.

 

After closing the door, Yi Ho stepped into the room and pulled back the window shade.

 

His grotesque shadow was once again visible in the exposed moonlight.

 

Ears pointed up at the top of his head, and five ravenous tails extended from his hips.

 

Staring blankly at his shadow, Yi Ho suddenly wondered if she would be as worried about him as she had been before if she could see his shadow in the light of the full moon.

 

Or if she would accept the fact that he wasn’t human at all.

 

“There are no ghosts in the world, that’s an old story for children.”

 

He remembered what Hae-Joo had said in the afternoon and passed it off as a joke.

 

He was only in the stories she told.

 

He remembered the looks of contempt and disgust in the eyes of people who had despised him long ago, one after another.

 

He wondered if Hae-Joo would look at him the same way if she knew what he was.

 

Just thinking about it made him feel cold.

 

But then he realized that he didn’t know why he was thinking that, and a self-deprecating laugh escaped him.

 

The moonlight was so bright, his shadow was so clear, and he wanted Hae-Joo to appreciate him… That’s why he had these silly thoughts.

 

He has no intention of telling her, no intention of being found out.

 

* * *

 

The next morning, Saito arrived at the Governor General’s office to find several newspapers on his desk.

 

Saito’s brow furrowed slightly as he solemnly scanned the papers.

 

There was an article about an old woman’s body with a cracked skull found near the Cheongyeopjeong shantytown last night.

 

Saito called out his secretary’s name, and soon the door to his office opened and a diminutive middle-aged man walked in.

 

“[I want you to follow up on this article. I don’t care who the villagers are, I want the culprits caught quickly!]”

 

“[Can we chalk it up to a superstitious murder committed by barbaric Koreans like last time?]”

 

“[Yes. Where are you stirring up the people with such a lousy article? Bokyung Ilbo? Take this newspaper to task!]”

 

“[Yes, Your Excellency.]”

 

The man leaves, and Saito crumples up the newspaper on his desk.

 

“[You’re telling me to look for food in a place called a slum instead of the streets? Why?]”

 

“[I’ve heard that the slum is a place where farmers from the provinces and the poor from Gyeongseong has no way to make a living, so you never know who’s coming in and who’s going out. If one or two people disappear, no one will think anything of it.]”

 

Saito advised Lord Man Insa, who returned to Joseon in the body of a boy not long after his arrival.

 

And for a while, things were quiet when he returned from hunting.

 

But time and again, even the most insignificant insects in the village began to talk to the reporters from the Gyeongseong floor.

 

He is the governor general of Joseon Province.

 

It’s not enough to cajole and control the foolish Koreans to keep them loyal to Imperial Japan, but it wouldn’t do him any good to draw attention to something like this.

 

So, he scattered public opinion and covered up the truth by saying that it was an attack by Western ghosts and a custom of the superstitious and barbaric Koreans.

 

In addition, Mao’s illness kept him quiet in his private residence for a while.

 

However, it was reported that they were afraid to send him out hunting.

 

It would do no good to cause any more trouble in the province.

 

Saito rose from his seat and went to the window.

 

Man Insa had barely tasted blood in mainland Japan and had to suppress his greed, but now that he was in Joseon and had begun to taste blood for real, his hunger became more and more unbearable.

 

He had to think of a way to fill the vicious snake’s empty stomach with a child’s skin.