Chapter 17
The flames were gradually rising.
The current ruin where no one lived, and the house from the past where the family had lived harmoniously.
And as the fire began to spread.
Even the horrific sight of the family in the photo wailing desperately.
All of it was unfolding before my eyes.
“Aaaaaaaa!”
The painful wails of the family burning in the photo.
A sense of despair, as if to burn everything away and leave no grudge behind.
I was witnessing every bit of the hell created by the fire. The haunted house of the urban legend was turning into an inferno.
“Step back,” the Medium said softly.
Even as the flames spread through the living room, she was not flustered but remained calm.
She held ‘Naksha’s Dagger’ and stayed alert to her surroundings.
“Be careful. The ghost is watching.”
A voice telling me not to panic. Her unwavering presence seemed to steady the situation a little.
“Yes.”
“To get out of here, we have no choice but to find and eliminate the bastard.”
If the house caught fire like this, it wouldn't be long before everything was completely incinerated. We had to get out.
But.
Rattle.
Unlike before, the door was closed.
“The door won’t open.”
It seemed the ghost had shut it. We were now completely trapped in the ghost’s urban legend. Within that blazing hellfire. Inside the massive flames burning with wicked malice.
“Ghost.”
I looked around. The house was gradually turning into a furnace. There was no time.
“Just who is the ghost?”
The problem was that we could only catch it if we figured out its identity.
There were four people in the family photo. It was a picture of a harmonious family, but neither the Medium nor I knew who they really were.
“Yu-chan.”
“Yes.”
“You said you remembered the family photo, right?”
“I know it for sure.”
This family. The Medium said something.
“Did you happen to notice?”
“Pardon?”
“What happened to that family.”
What did she mean? She threw out a riddle-like question.
“To find out who the ghost is, we have to figure out what kind of grudge they held. Only then can we guess their identity.”
“That’s true, but...”
“The only hint is that photo.”
The family photo was the only hint.
At the Medium’s words, I retraced my memory once more.
The family photo I remembered earlier. I brought back the image of the four peaceful, harmonious family members to my mind.
The father and mother, each holding a child. What tragedy was hidden here?
“Huh?”
It was then. I saw a gap I had brushed past. It looked like a mark from being cut by something.
“There was a cut mark on the picture.”
“A cut mark?”
The Medium fell into thought for a moment and asked back.
“Was it cut by something sharp?”
“I think so.”
I didn't know at first.
I couldn't recognize it immediately from just a faint cut.
However, as the picture burning in the flames curled up, the cut marks were visible for a moment.
“Then they might be knife marks.”
The Medium gripped Naksha’s Dagger.
And she asked again.
“Where were those marks?”
“The mother, and the boy, the girl.”
The Medium’s eyes distorted for a moment.
“...Now I know.”
Her tone of voice was as if she were letting go of a heavy weight.
The Medium caught her breath for a moment in the burning house.
From the mouth of her who seemed shocked, the truth was slowly coming out.
“What happened to this family.”
I was listening quietly.
The Medium lowered her eyelids and spoke lowly.
“It was murder.”
“Pardon?”
“A family murder.”
Unexpected words.
The Medium spoke as such.
“No matter how much they keep past memories. Even if they want to hold onto their happiest times. Ghosts have grudges. The grudge from when they were most cruelly victimized remains in that family photo.”
“Those marks on the picture... were they the grudge?”
“Yes.”
The Medium nodded.
There was a slight trembling at the tip of her chin.
“If someone killed the family... who was the culprit?”
“They’re in that photo.”
“Pardon?”
“The person who doesn't have the knife marks you saw.”
Goosebumps broke out all over my body at her words.
The people with the knife marks were...
The mother.
The boy.
The girl.
But there was one person who didn't have them.
“The husband.”
That's right.
The culprit of the family murder was none other than the father.
“…….”
My whole body began to tremble.
A tragedy that befell a family in a house engulfed in flames.
Why this place became a haunted house, and why there was a ghost with a grudge.
Only then could I understand.
“I don't know the reason. There must have been discord between the husband and wife.”
A family murder-suicide due to business failure?
An affair?
I didn't know what the reason was.
But one thing was certain.
“The ghost has a deep grudge.”
The hand of the father they trusted.
How much deep shock and despair the family members must have felt as they died at those blood-stained hands.
I felt like I knew the deep terror they must have felt as they died.
“There were two ghosts in the haunted house.”
The Medium spoke calmly.
“You mentioned that last time. That only one ghost followed me from the haunted house.”
“Yu-chan, the ghost that appeared in your dream must be the first evil spirit.”
The flames didn't stay still.
The sparks flowing along the ceiling covered everything in all directions as if to swallow it all.
“I know who that ghost is.”
The ghosts of the haunted house were two from the beginning.
The ghost that stuck to the ceiling and drooled while targeting me.
That evil spirit followed me into my dream and tried to drown me.
At that time.
If the Medium hadn't noticed, sought me out in my dream, and stabbed that ghost with her dagger.
Would I really have been able to face it alone?
That eye in my body.
‘Naksha’s Eye.’
I possessed it, but…
Could I have done it?
“I look the ghost straight in the eye. I never avert my gaze.”
The Medium was calm. She said she had seen it clearly while stabbing the ghost with ‘Naksha’s Dagger.’
“You must make direct eye contact with the ghost. If I lose focus for even a second, I’ll be the one who gets caught.”
The Medium said she stares at the ghost until the very end.
She said she does not avoid fear.
She said she looks directly at the intense anger and grudge of the evil spirit.
She was a medium. A medium was the only human who did not avoid ghosts.
At the final moment.
As she stabbed the first ghost with ‘Naksha’s Dagger,’ she clearly saw the ghost’s face glimpsed through the fluttering hair of the evil spirit.
It was the face of a ghost distorted with a cold expression, yet seemingly in wailing pain.
“It was the mother.”
The identity of the first ghost was known. The mother who likely took a knife while protecting her child from her husband.
That grudge must have turned her into the ghost of this haunted house.
If it was the mother.
If that mother was gone.
Then who is the second ghost remaining in the haunted house now?
“Then?”
I shouted while looking at the house engulfed in flames.
“Just who is the remaining ghost?”
The second ghost that was with the mother. Could a ghost perhaps possess maternal love?
The boy.
The girl.
Which of the two was it?
“Kim Yu-chan.”
“Yes.”
“Recall the memory again. The ghost will surely be there.”
The family photo was a record containing all the secrets of this haunted house.
A place where the grudges of a family that met an unhappy end at the hands of the husband remained.
However.
If the mother became a ghost of grudge from being brutally murdered.
Which of the two children had also become a ghost?
“…….”
I looked at the family photo again while retracing my memory. There would surely be an answer here.
The boy.
The girl.
Which of the two would have a deeper grudge?
Even while I agonized incessantly, the flames were spreading mercilessly.
Hot flames blazed everywhere, and now we were being driven to our limits, backing away bit by bit from the intense fire.
“Gasp.”
Even the Medium could not block the flames spread by that ghost.
I was out of breath, and it was painful as if my lungs were burning.
The flames of intense grudge can never be extinguished unless the ghost itself is caught.
“Where is the ghost?”
Within the blazing flames, the Medium was looking in all directions. But even in these hot flames, the ghost did not reveal even a shadow.
“Such flames must be too hot even for a ghost. If it can withstand this, the grudge must be incredibly strong.”
We could no longer just keep waiting for the ghost to appear. The second ghost of the haunted house was not ordinary.
“Hiding somewhere in a fire like this... it’s almost impossible. Maybe it’s a thoughtform created from intense malice.”
“A thoughtform?”
“It might even be at a level where it doesn’t feel pain. A more primordial being than a soul. An existence made of thoughts and emotions.”
It was the first time I had heard such words. But if there was a ghost in those flames, it would only be possible if it could not feel pain.
A thoughtform…
Hearing those words, I felt as if my blood stopped for a moment. If it truly was close to a thoughtform, as the Medium said.
If it was a being like that.
“…….”
I momentarily thought of the worst possibility.
As soon as I realized it, I got goosebumps and hoped it wasn't true.
If that was right. If it was truly the truth.
I realized just how tragic and sad it all was.
The mother, who was the first ghost, had tried to protect the second ghost even after she had become an evil spirit.
It explained why her grudge was so severe, and it also explained why she had tried to protect the second ghost.
As everything was explained, I could understand the endless, infinite cycle the ghost must have endured.
It must be a pain from which there is no escape—only despair and anger.
I thought. Recalling the family photo from earlier in my mind, I examined it slowly.
“…….”
In the family photo, I saw the husband smiling with a comfortable expression.
He was the patriarch who had murdered his entire family, yet in the photo, he was smiling broadly with an innocent-looking boy on his lap.
The wife’s expression was slightly awkward for some reason.
One of her hands was holding a girl with a bright smile on her lap, and the other hand was placed on her stomach.
And then, while examining the photo, I realized the truth. I found the identity of the second ghost.
“Ms. Medium.”
The Medium, while coughing from the soot and smoke, kept her gaze fixed as she tried to find the ghost within the pit of fire.
She displayed a will that would neither let its guard down nor back away.
At that moment, I spoke a decisive sentence.
“The second ghost. I know who it is.”
The Medium faltered. Still keeping her gaze fixed forward, she slowly moved her trembling lips.
“Who is it?”
“…….”
I found the secret hidden in this photo.
I recognized the many secrets and pains contained within that single photo—the real truth hidden in this haunted house.
“The ghost is….”
I spoke the identity of the second ghost.
Like the flames distorting and twisting as they burned down the house, I spoke the truth from the scene of this tragedy, my own heart feeling as though it were burning up inside.
“It was inside the mother.”