Money Loving CEO's Detective Lover

Chapter 172: Gayoon's Story (8)

Ahjusshi entered the house wearing his glasses. These were special glasses which were made by a fellow parapsychologist, containing an EMF chip which measured the electromagnetic particles. As a spirit hunter, ahjusshi entered the house, checking for areas with high frequency. Spirits had higher frequency than humans but without an EMF reader, they were invisible to the eyes of normal people. Only when they possessed a person, were spirits easier to identify.

He quietly put salt on the doorstep and scanned the area, pouring salt in every opening as he walked towards the cabinet. The temperature in that area was unusually low and the particles in front of his eyes were beginning to spiral, forming a figure in front of him. 

The ghost was looking at him warily, ready to attack. The human seemed to have spotted him and was probably somehow related to that seer.

"Who are you?" ahjusshi demanded. "Why are you following her?"

"Because I wanted to!" the ghost cackled. "Such a pretty little girl. Too bad no one tainted her-"

Suddenly, its skin began to burn as ahjusshi threw a handful of salt at him. The ghost hissed and floated in the air, its maliciousness engulfing the whole area. It wanted to kill that man who dared to throw salt on it. 

"You can't defeat me old man!" he claimed. "I, Jung Kyung, has been wandering the earth for the past decade! I'm stronger than you think-"

"You're the dumbest spirit I've ever met," ahjusshi scoffed. "You just gave away your weakness."

Kyung glared at him and scooped down to attack him but ahjusshi sprinkled holy water at him. The ghost's skin was ablaze as it fell backwards and ahjusshi began to chant.

"Oh you who has gone astray," he chanted. "Jung Kyung, the son of the world, who rejected the heaven beyond and chose to create havoc in the world of living, go home! Go away! Go to your world!"

With every word, he threw holy water on the spirit, causing it to yell in agony. Gayoon, who was sitting on the steps outside, was too scared. The spirit's cries echoed in her ears and she tried to shut it out. But the screaming would not stop and no matter how hard she pressed her ears, the sounds seeped through, scarring her soul.

Tears came out of her eye and she was not able to tolerate this curse anymore. Her grandmother claimed it was a gift from a shaman but for Gayoon, it was nothing but a curse. In a family of freaks, she was the freakiest one. The other women were able to hide their abilities with ease, only helping the passing spirits while their lives were mostly unaffected. 

They did not attract the ghosts the way Gayoon did. Not even her grandmother's abilities were this powerful. Gayoon, on the other hand, kept on running into ghosts. Like her, they also sensed her and were attracted to her. Whether it was the good ones or the bad ones, they would seek her out to fulfill their last desires.

It sickened her to be the medium between two worlds. Her whole skin crawled whenever a creature of the dead was nearby. Sometimes the whispered things into her ears, popping in and out of her dreams to make their voices heard. They tormented her, wanting to take her away with them but she would not let them. 

She shivered violently, not out of cold but out of fear. The spirit inside was still screaming as ahjusshi tortured it. Its cries made her feel even worse and even guilty for inadvertently bringing it home.

Finally, after a while, the screams stopped. The front food creaked open and ahjusshi came out, looking a little tired. Spirit cleansing was a difficult ritual and could sap out the energy from the person performing it. Ahjusshi had just returned from one exorcism trip and this one only exhausted him more.

"It's gone," he said gently, patting her head. "Don't worry."

To his surprise, Gayoon began to cry. Ahjusshi was at a loss as he tried to console the teenager. She felt so vulnerable at that time, her mind full of many ominous thoughts. What if ahjusshi had not come? What if the ghost had assaulted her? What if she had died?

All these things were too much for her to bear and she longed for a normal life where she would be blissfully oblivious to these things.

"Why am I not normal?" she wailed as she cried on ahjusshi's shoulder. "Is this why dad left me? Is this why my mom died? This ability? Why is this happening to me? Am I really cursed?"

Ahjusshi did not say anything to her but waited until the girl cried her heart out. He did not know what to tell her. False assurances would not work because Gayoon had lost almost all hope of having a normal life. She was devastated by the effects of her hereditary ability and the burden of it was too much for a young girl like her.

"When you were born," he began. "Your grandmother used to dread your future. Your mother had fallen sick and the doctor had said that she might not survive the labor. All of us were worried about how to prepare you for your powers. We had sensed that unlike the other women in the family, your abilities were going to be far stronger and possibly even dangerous."

"Your dad could not stand the burden and abandoned you," he went on. "Called you a lot of names and broke off all ties. I was dealing with my own demons at that time. I had drowned myself into hunting that monster who destroyed my family."

His tone hardened as he remembered those dark times. The months after his wife's death were the hardest for him. He had trained himself in fighting, learning everything he could on spirits and how to get rid of them. Immersed in a deadly obsession, he did not care about Gayoon's impending birth much but on the goal of his life to destroy that demon.

"I was in a dark place," he whispered. "I was putting myself in danger, traveling to the most haunted places in search of that demon. I thought I had lost all happiness and hope once my wife was dead."

Gayoon was a little surprised to hear all that because ahjusshi was usually a very optimistic person and while he hid his pain from her, he never came as the type who also had a darkness in him. 

"Your mother passed away shortly after labor," he said in a heavy voice. "She was a good friend to me and my late wife. Even though I did not believe her claims about the spirit haunting my wife until it was too late, she still supported me and gave me shelter here. So when she passed away, I was too afraid of how to face you. I was barely surviving. How could I have taken care of a baby that wasn't even mine?"

"But then the doctor handed you to me," he mused. "I could fit you in one arm! You were so tiny! In that moment, I felt as if I was holding my own daughter when she was born. You had really chubby hands though."

"Ahjusshi!" Gayoon exclaimed in annoyance causing him to chuckle.

"But at that moment, I felt a sense of hope," he smiled, ruffling her hair. "Your father might have thrown you away by calling you a curse. But you were simply a little baby who came to this world with a lot of hope and joy. So when you looked at me with those tiny eyes, I felt the darkness in my heart slowly fading away. The pain of losing my wife will always remain, but you gave me hope that someday, I'll reunite with my family."

Gayoon was sobbing once again but this time, she was not scared. Her tears were for the man who had raised her despite having a family of his own. The man who had risked many things in order to give her a good life and did not treat her as a curse.

"So don't ever think of yourself as a curse," he stated firmly. "Not even for a moment. A person who brought hope in another person's life can never be a curse."

Gayoon smiled at him and gave him a tight hug. Ahjusshi smiled and hugged her back, showering his fatherly affections on her.

"Thank you, ahjusshi," she whispered. "Thank you."