A Forest flowing with Milk and Honey - Chapter 5.2

“Who’s there?”

A sudden voice, belonging to a young girl, broke the silence. She appeared to be about high school age, with short hair and eyes closed as if she couldn’t see. She wore a colorful saekdong jeogori that looked more gaudy than elegant. The old wooden floor, which creaked under everyone else’s feet, remained eerily silent as she approached.

“We’re here to see someone called Kang Dosa,” Taeo said, glancing at the girl’s strangely quiet steps.

Taeo had heard that Kang Dosa was a beautiful woman with brightly dyed red hair—a shaman of great renown. This blind girl wasn’t what he expected.

“My mother’s dead,” the girl said with a twisted smile, opening her eyes to reveal pale, pupil-less whites.

“I’m not like her. I don’t care much for money. But if you insist on paying a fee…” Her empty eyes fixed directly on Urim.

“How about giving me your pretty eyes, sister?”
The girl’s pale, eerie eyes reminded Urim of the torn-lipped son gaksi she had encountered before. A chill ran down her spine, and her face turned pale.

“Is that how you treat your clients, fortune-teller?” Taeo grumbled, annoyed at how easily Urim was scared. But even Taeo, who normally brushed off such things, began to feel a strange, suffocating weight in the air. The incense swirling around them seemed to fog his mind.
The girl giggled, her lips stretching into a wide grin.

“Don’t be mad. I was just joking. I’ll take money instead,” she said, holding out her hand. Now, she looked more like the fortune teller they had come to see. Taeo, here to get some answers, handed her a bag without much thought.

The bag was filled with crisp bills, but the girl barely glanced at it, as if she already knew what was inside or simply didn’t care. Tossing it aside, she sat cross-legged on the floor, her gaze lingering on Urim.

“Sweet honey drips from this treat, but who would dare covet something guarded by a mountain god…” the girl murmured, licking her lips like a snake. She continued to stare intently at Urim, as if she were a delicious meal waiting to be devoured. Urim, feeling the weight of the gaze, stiffened.
“Sit down, sit down,” the girl beckoned. Urim bit her lip and sat, realizing there was no avoiding this situation.

“Do you know what this is?” Urim asked, brushing back her hair to reveal the two remaining petal-shaped marks on her neck. The girl nodded knowingly.

“It’s a peach blossom mark. Looks like someone’s already put a claim on you.”

“A… a claim?”

“The gate to the spirit world has opened. You’re practically a walking corpse at this point. If you were anyone else with such weak life energy, you would’ve been a plaything for spirits long ago. But you’ve been lucky so far. You haven’t been fully taken, right?”
“The gate to the spirit world? What do you mean taken?”

The girl made a crude gesture, mimicking something obscene. “It means you’re getting played by spirits,” she said. Urim felt a wave of dizziness wash over her.

Beside her, Taeo’s jaw clenched as he ground his teeth. The girl, sensing the tension, shot him a glare, like a cat hissing in warning.
Taeo struggled to keep his temper in check. If she weren’t just a kid, he might’ve already let out a string of curses.

“Explain what kind of nonsense you’re spouting,” Taeo demanded, though he already sensed she wasn’t lying.

“It’s not a pleasant story. You think someone like me would be born from something nice?” the girl sneered.

“What do you mean, ‘someone like you’?” Taeo asked, irritated.

“I’m a guitae—a child born from the union of a human and a spirit.”
The girl’s tone was sharp, and her words seemed too bizarre to believe, yet there was a strange ring of truth in them.

“Don’t worry. Since you’ve paid me, I’ll give you a solution to prevent something like me from happening to you,” she said with a smirk.

“Are you going to give us a charm or something?” Urim asked, hopeful.

The girl laughed loudly. “You’ve got a living charm right next to you. Do you really think something I make would be better?”
“A living charm?”
The girl pointed to Taeo. “Him.”

Urim blinked, confused. “The director…?”

“Think about it. You’ve been plagued by strange, dangerous events, yet here you are, still alive. How do you think you survived with such a fragile fate?”

Taeo’s eyebrows twitched at the girl’s cryptic remarks.

“You were fated for tragedy, for misfortune—what we call the White Tiger’s Great Killing Fate. But here you are, still breathing. That’s because you’ve got a living talisman right next to you. This guy here not only survived, but he defied death itself. He’s your guardian, and that’s why you’ve been kept safe.”

The girl let out another cackling laugh. “So just stick close to him and, well… keep doing what you’re doing. That’s the only way you’ll survive!”

Her laughter echoed eerily through the shrine, leaving both Taeo and Urim unsettled.

After she finished laughing, the girl suddenly became dismissive, waving them away. “I’ve said what I needed to say. Now get out,” she snapped, as if she’d grown tired of their presence.

Taeo narrowed his eyes at her, clearly annoyed by her attitude, but Urim gently tugged his arm, trying to calm him. She looked back at the girl.
“What’s your name? I’m Urim, Baek Urim,” she said, her voice soft, concerned about leaving the girl alone in such an eerie place.

The girl, arms crossed and glaring at them as they prepared to leave, hesitated for a moment, sensing Urim’s genuine concern. Her lips parted slightly.

Humans instinctively recoiled from guitaes—children born of spirits and humans. They were unnatural, and people sensed that danger subconsciously. Yet, Urim’s kindness was odd and misplaced. That’s why the spirit world had taken an interest in her.

For the first time, the girl smiled, a genuine, innocent smile.

“I know. Urim—’forest’—a name meant to attract noble people,” she said. “But don’t be fooled. The one meant to protect the forest is not a ghost. Don’t let yourself get lured by them.”
With that, the girl refused to share her own name and simply waved them off.

Urim leaned her warm forehead against the cool window of the car, replaying the girl’s unsettling words in her mind: just keep doing what you’re doing.

“Are you feeling sick?” Taeo asked, cracking the window open for fresh air.

“No, I’m fine.”

Despite her response, Taeo pulled the car over in a quiet, rural spot, where a field of sunflowers bloomed brightly under the summer sky. It seemed like a good place for a break, and Taeo knew Urim liked flowers.

“Director, take a picture of me!” Urim said with a smile, running toward the sunflower field.

Taeo, unfamiliar with the camera on his new phone, turned it on and pointed it at her. Urim posed, tilting her head slightly, the sunflowers framing her face.

Click! The shutter sounded. It had been a while since there was something new in Taeo’s photo gallery.

“How does it look?”

Taeo shrugged and stepped into the dimly lit house. The entire place, from the living room to the hallway, was engulfed in shadows, with only one room lit up.

“It looks like a shrine…” Urim whispered.

Colorful lotus lanterns hung from the ceiling, and the walls were adorned with vibrant red flowers.

A row of candles emitted a bitter scent, and their flickering flames cast eerie shadows over the intimidating statues of deities.