Chapter 13

Chapter 13 — Agwi (1)

“Thank you for your hard work. I’m Detective Kang Hyun-woo from the Violent Crimes Team at Jungbu Police Station. I’d like to check the convenience store’s CCTV footage because of a case I’m investigating. I’d appreciate your cooperation.”

I politely asked the convenience store clerk.

He was extremely skinny, with cheekbones sticking out so sharply that his face almost looked like a skull.

Surprisingly, this convenience store was located almost exactly in the middle of the area where Kim Constable and the two missing women lived.

“W-What kind of case is it...?”

The clerk really did look slow and clueless.

To put it simply, he looked pitiful, almost like someone suffering from malnutrition because he hadn’t eaten properly.

“It’s classified, so I can’t tell you the details. I just need your cooperation.”

I held my detective ID right in front of his face as I spoke.

“Ah... yes. Then, this way...”

Even the way he spoke was sluggish.

What a frustrating guy.

Following his guidance, I went into the back of the convenience store and sat down in front of the CCTV recorder.

Then, just in case, should I start with the footage from three days ago?

I placed the mouse cursor on the timeline, set the starting point to three days earlier, and played the footage at the maximum speed of twenty-four times normal.

As expected, the effect was incredible.

Even footage running at twenty-four times speed looked slower to me than ordinary footage played at normal speed.

There. Found it.

At around four in the morning two days ago, the two women who had been reported missing appeared on the screen, entering the convenience store together.

They live nearby, so I guess they finished work and went home together.

The two women laughed cheerfully as they walked around the store and bought a few things.

After finishing their shopping, they approached the counter and handed their items to the clerk.

Huh? What the hell is that?

As I watched what happened next, I doubted my own eyes.

Something completely unexpected was unfolding on the CCTV footage.

“Detective... y-you’ve... finished watching...?”

The clerk suddenly spoke from behind me.

I flinched and turned around.

Before I knew it, the convenience store clerk was standing directly behind me.

“Yeah. I’ve seen everything. Thanks for cooperating.”

I offered him my hand.

The clerk took it.

His wrist was so thin that it looked like it would snap if I applied even a little pressure.

After shaking hands with him, I left the convenience store.

That bastard... I squeezed his hand, and he didn’t react at all.

I possessed enough strength to smash a concrete pillar.

Yet the convenience store clerk had shaken hands with me as though nothing had happened.

What I had seen on the CCTV footage was even stranger.

The moment the two women finished paying and turned their backs, the clerk stepped out from behind the counter and struck both women in the head with his fists.

The clerk looked weak enough that he probably couldn’t even twist a chicken’s neck.

Yet a single punch from him had dropped both women like bundles of rotten straw.

Then he casually picked up the unconscious women, one in each hand, and carried them outside.

Even if the two women weighed around a hundred kilograms combined, he hadn’t looked burdened in the slightest.

About five minutes later, the clerk returned to the convenience store alone.

The women were nowhere to be seen.

That was everything I had confirmed through the CCTV footage.

It was difficult to believe what I had seen.

But after testing him by shaking his hand, I confirmed that the clerk possessed monstrous strength comparable to mine.

That was proof enough that the bastard wasn’t human.

And it meant that the two missing women had been kidnapped by something that wasn’t human.

He doesn’t seem like a spirit... What the hell is that bastard? And he obviously knows the store has CCTV cameras. So why did he just leave the footage there?

Suspicious, I turned around and entered the convenience store again.

“Detective... did you... forget something?”

“No. I just thought I’d buy some gum.”

I randomly grabbed something and placed it on the counter.

Just as I thought. He doesn’t seem to have noticed anything about the CCTV.

After paying, I walked out of the convenience store and activated Gwian while looking back at him.

Information about the convenience store clerk appeared before my eyes.

[Type of Soul: Evil Spirit]

[Type of Evil Spirit: Agwi (餓鬼)]

[Evil Spirit Rank: Gwi (鬼) Rank]

[Hybrid Status: No]

[Past-Life Karma: A high-ranking official who committed corruption and devoured children]

After leveling up, a new category called Past-Life Karma had been added to the information shown by Gwian.

So he really was an evil spirit...

After confirming through Gwian that the clerk was an evil spirit, small beads of sweat formed on my forehead.

—It’s an Agwi. Judging from its past-life karma, it was an evil spirit punished in Hell for greed, corruption, and even eating people. It’s just a low-level spirit that escaped when the Three Evils of the Afterlife broke out of Hell.

Arang’s voice entered my head.

For some reason, hearing Arang’s voice at a time like this made me feel calmer.

Arang, I tested him earlier. That bastard is about as strong as I am...

—It’s only a Gwi-rank evil spirit. It’s stupid and only knows how to use brute strength. At your current level, Inhwang Chasa should be able to subdue it even without an offensive skill.

Sounds annoying. Should I just call Jeonghu and have him deal with it?

—Do you really want to do that?

...No. I was joking.

For some reason, that answer wounded my pride.

—This is the first evil spirit you’ve encountered since returning to the past. I believe Inhwang Chasa will handle it well.

Don’t believe in me. Every time someone expects something from me, I end up accomplishing nothing.

—Even so, I’m looking forward to seeing what you do. Yeomra and I will be watching how Inhwang Chasa handles this.

What is this, some kind of documentary? Isn’t that a little too much? You dump all the work on someone else while you guys sit comfortably and watch.

—Hehehe. How did you know? Then, good luck.

Even though Arang spoke like that, I knew the reason.

The Afterlife had rules preventing it from directly interfering with the living world.

That was why they had chosen me as their representative.

It didn’t look like there was any other choice.

The reason that Agwi bastard had kidnapped the two women from Doremi Noraeju was obvious.

He intended to eat them.

I had to deal with him before those women ended up inside his stomach.

But what should I do about Kim Constable? Park Detective is going to be pissed...

My six free servings of samgyeopsal were in danger of being canceled.

Still, after carefully calculating everything, this case had three days of paid leave and Madame Jang’s drinking bill riding on it.

Solving this case first would definitely be much more profitable.

First, I needed to call Park Detective and sweet-talk him a little.

But when am I going to meet Aizeu? At this rate, am I only going to meet her after she becomes a wrinkled old granny?

It was seriously worrying.

The next day.

The current time was 8 p.m.

Following the basics of investigation, I was staking out the convenience store.

My highest priority was obviously rescuing the kidnapped women safely.

Of course, that depended on the assumption that they weren’t already inside that Agwi bastard’s stomach.

To save them, I first needed to know where they were being kept.

That was why I was staking the place out.

Park Detective surprisingly accepted what I said without making any complaints...

Before beginning the stakeout, I had called Park Detective.

I told him I couldn’t go with him to Kim Constable’s house today because of the work the old-fashioned squad chief had assigned me.

Technically, that was a violation of our agreement, but Park Detective had simply replied with something along the lines of, “Then it can’t be helped.”

None of that really mattered to me anyway.

The only thing I cared about was my six free servings of samgyeopsal.

According to him, the deal was still valid because the case hadn’t been solved yet.

Putting everything together, it meant that when Park Detective was with Kim Constable, I was actually getting in the way.

Then why the hell did he say he needed my help in the first place?

Maybe he had only used me as an excuse so he could spend some time alone with Kim Constable.

Apparently, once a guy got a woman, he became blind to everything else, just like Park Detective.

As someone who had been single from birth for twenty-nine years, I still couldn’t understand it.

Stakeouts were boring.

There was absolutely nothing you could do until your target moved.

You could only wait.

Wait.

And wait some more.

It passed nine o’clock.

Should I just storm in there and beat the bastard up? No... I can’t do that if I want to save the women.

As more time passed, I could feel my patience rapidly disappearing.

Wait. Did I even have patience in the first place?

Blessings come to those who wait...

It almost felt like I could hear the voice of an angel comforting me after growing exhausted from the stakeout.

At last, the clerk came out of the convenience store.

He was carrying something inside a convenience store plastic bag.

The bastard walked toward a nearby parked vehicle and got inside.

It was an SUV.

He had probably used that vehicle to transport the kidnapped women.

Heukryeonghaenggong—Seungryongbi!

As the vehicle began moving, I used Heukryeonghaenggong and leaped from building to building as I followed him.

At this point, the only thing I was missing was a web.

I practically felt like Spider-Man.

Finally, his vehicle came to a stop.

It was a place about five minutes away from the convenience store.

A building stood there with nothing but its structural frame completed.

Maybe the construction company had gone bankrupt halfway through the project, because the place looked completely abandoned.

There wasn’t a single person anywhere inside.

The clerk stepped out of the vehicle, picked up the plastic bag he had brought from the convenience store, and disappeared into the building.

After watching him from a nearby building, I jumped down and lightly landed on the ground.

Heukryeonghaenggong really is an amazing skill. At this rate, even the AvenXers might try to recruit me.

Just then, I noticed a woman standing beneath the construction barriers surrounding the building.

A woman standing alone in such an isolated place this late at night immediately looked suspicious.

I had a bad feeling.

I activated Gwian.

[Type of Soul: Vengeful Spirit]

[Type of Evil Spirit: Not Applicable]

[Evil Spirit Rank: Not Applicable]

[Hybrid Status: Not Applicable]

[Past-Life Karma: Once a famous gisaeng in Hanyang]

As expected, she was a vengeful spirit who still remained in the living world because of her lingering resentment.

Damn it... Don’t tell me she’s a spirit that bastard Agwi ate.

I desperately hoped my guess was wrong.

“Miss, it’s dangerous to be alone in a place like this so late at night.”

Talking like that to a vengeful spirit made me feel like I had lost my mind.

—It’s unfair... I can’t... go anywhere else... I was only... playing a prank... but that man... ate me...

The woman spoke to me with a gloomy expression.

I had no idea what she meant by saying she had only been “playing a prank,” but one thing was obvious.

The Agwi had eaten her.

“If I get rid of that bastard, will you be able to let go of your resentment and go to the Afterlife?”

—Yes... please...

She quietly answered me.

That son of a bitch. Of all the things he could eat, he eats people?!

There had already been at least one victim of that Agwi.

Fortunately, I couldn’t see any other vengeful spirits nearby.

That probably meant the two missing women were still alive.

Leaving the woman behind, I entered the building.

The inside was pitch-black.

But I had absolutely no trouble seeing.

Apparently, Gwian wasn’t limited to seeing and searching for ghosts.

My eyesight seemed to have surpassed normal human limits as well.

Even in complete darkness, I could see as clearly as if it were broad daylight.

I had heard that my stamina and physical strength had increased dramatically after my Inhwang Chasa level-up.

It seemed my vision, hearing, and other senses had also improved at the same time.

I thought about where the Agwi might have gone.

Choosing an abandoned building like this made perfect sense from the Agwi’s perspective.

And once inside, there was an obvious choice for a place where it could quietly enjoy its meal without anyone seeing it.

I found a nearby staircase and headed underground.

The basement was divided into several rooms.

Then it’ll probably be the room farthest inside.

According to criminal psychology, bad things always happened in the most secluded corner.

Suddenly, a woman’s desperate voice reached my ears.

“Please save me... Mister, please... save me...”

Then came another sound.

Scrape. Scrape.

The sound of a knife being sharpened.

This didn’t seem like the time to worry about being careful.

The Agwi was apparently about to begin its meal.

My body moved almost on instinct.

I immediately activated Maengryongbo from Heukryeonghaenggong and shot toward the direction of the sound.