Holy Idol [EN]: Chapter 107

< Look Behind You >

Looking up, Rembrandt saw the silhouette of someone with a cow-shaped head slinking past the window.

Rembrandt put his phone in his pocket, quietly opened the door, and peeked out. The cow-headed monster was carefully walking somewhere.

‘He’s after Senior Im Yu-han again!’

Rembrandt hurriedly looked for Manager Sa. But Manager Sa was nowhere to be seen this time either.

‘Is that grim reaper really only interested in revealing swimsuits?’

Rembrandt was dumbfounded, but since things had turned out this way, if the cow-head tried to attack someone, he had no choice but to stop it himself. He left the van and cautiously followed the cow-head.

The cow-head, looking around, finally spotted Im Yu-han.

‘As expected, Senior Im Yu-han is the target.’

Rembrandt swallowed hard and watched the cow-head.

However, when the cow-head saw that Im Yu-han was surrounded by people, it immediately turned its head and approached Maeng Woo-shin this time.

‘Doesn’t it have a specific target?’

It really doesn’t seem to have a target.

Maeng Woo-shin was standing by the pond where Rembrandt had filmed his underwater scene, texting, and the cow-head went behind Maeng Woo-shin and stealthily reached out with both hands. It looked like it was trying to push him.

‘Is it just trying to kill anyone who’s famous?’

Anyway, Rembrandt deliberately approached Maeng Woo-shin and cleared his throat.

The cow-head was startled and ran away in another direction.

Maeng Woo-shin was startled and turned his head, frowning when he saw Rembrandt.

“Hey, tattletale. What are you doing here, clearing your throat like you did something good?”

“Who are you calling a tattletale? You swore at me first, senior.”

“Saying ‘shit’? Hey, that was just swearing at myself. Anger according to the situation, that kind of thing. Swearing just comes out automatically when you’re angry, right?”

“That was me swearing at you too, senior.”

“Oh, really? … Hey, you little punk?”

“Behave yourself before I tattle again, senior.”

Rembrandt pulled the fuming Maeng Woo-shin and pushed him towards the staff.

This time, he went around looking for the cow-head that had run away earlier.

But the cow-head had disappeared somewhere in the meantime.

Well, seeing it hide behind the curtain without a trace before, it seemed to have a great ability to conceal itself. It must have gone into some gap between objects again this time.

Rembrandt eventually stopped looking for the cow-head and called Manager Sa.

“…”

But Manager Sa didn’t answer the phone at all. That guy really has no interest other than in swimsuits.

Rembrandt clicked his tongue and pressed the end call button.

‘Then what should I do…’

It would be fine if the cow-head had just run away, but he was worried that it might be hiding, waiting for a chance when he wasn’t looking to target someone else.

He didn’t really want to call the ‘Spear Guy’ who might be a Nakru [a type of supernatural being or monster], so he was just fiddling with his phone when, unexpectedly, that ‘Spear Guy’ was standing among the people watching the filming.

‘Why is that guy here again?’ Rembrandt was surprised and widened his eyes, and the Spear Guy also found Rembrandt and waved his hand.

Rembrandt frowned and ignored him.

Maeng Woo-shin, who had been standing blankly among the staff, belatedly came to Rembrandt to ask what he was doing, and smiled when he saw Rembrandt desperately pretending not to know someone.

“Hey. Someone over there is acting like they know you?”

“Aren’t there one or two people who act like they know me?”

“They’re being particularly friendly?”

“Aren’t there one or two people who are friendly to me?”

“Really? Still, just in case, should I go talk to them?”

Rembrandt reluctantly looked at Maeng Woo-shin and frowned.

Maeng Woo-shin stared at such Rembrandt curiously. It was unfamiliar to see someone as brazen as Rembrandt avoiding someone.

Rembrandt reluctantly spoke, afraid that Maeng Woo-shin would approach the Spear Guy and actually talk to him.

“That person might be a Nakru.”

Maeng Woo-shin, who had been grinning, paused.

“What?”

“You know what a Nakru is, right?”

“Do you think I’m an idiot?”

Well, since the Nakru directly attacked Dae-ju’s secret place, there was no way Maeng Woo-shin, who freely came and went to the secret place, wouldn’t know about the Nakru.

Anyway, if Maeng Woo-shin knew about the Nakru, it was convenient to explain.

Rembrandt took Maeng Woo-shin to his van and explained in more detail.

“That person who was acting friendly to me earlier is a Nakru. It’s best not to act like you know them.”

“How do you know that person is a Nakru?”

“I’m not sure.”

“What?”

“But they’re a bit suspicious.”

“In what way?”

“They were chasing a strangely 생긴 [strangely 생긴 means ‘looking’] monster with a spear.”

“What?”

Maeng Woo-shin was startled and repeatedly asked, “A monster?”

Rembrandt raised his eyebrows and looked down at such Maeng Woo-shin.

He thought he knew a lot because he talked about angels. Did he perhaps not know much about the organization he belonged to?

As Rembrandt stared, Maeng Woo-shin swallowed hard and asked.

“Where is that monster?”

“It was trying to push you from behind earlier, senior.”

“What?”

“You’ve been saying ‘what’ a lot since earlier.”

“How can I not be surprised?”

“Can’t you see monsters, senior?”

“Usually, no one can see them! No, but really, it was trying to push me? A monster?”

“That’s why I took you among the staff.”

“…So, because you can see monsters, Dae-ju treats you preciously.”

That probably wasn’t it, but Rembrandt didn’t refute it for now. But one question arose.

“Doesn’t the group you’re in exorcise monsters or anything?”

In the original world, the temple fought well against monsters and 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] that harmed people.

There were even holy knights who specialized in that, and Rembrandt wasn’t a holy knight, but he had been dispatched a few times before becoming a high priest.

However, even though they worshiped the same god, this place was very different from Rembrandt’s world.

The priest seemed to only have Dae-ju, and there was no temple system, so whether they could fight 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] with people like Maeng Woo-shin… he was skeptical.

As expected. Maeng Woo-shin answered blankly.

“No. We don’t. Dae-ju seems to be able to, but they usually don’t step forward. I can’t even recognize a 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] even if it’s next to me.”

They need to perform some kind of miracle to bring in believers. Then how is Dae-ju increasing the number of believers?

Does only accepting ‘high-class’ celebrities have something to do with it?

“But why that? It doesn’t matter anyway, does it?”

***

After urging Maeng Woo-shin not to be alone as much as possible, Rembrandt went outside and called Manager Sa again, searching for a secluded place.

Fortunately, Manager Sa answered the phone this time.

– Someone died nearby, so I’m on the job.

Whether he answered the phone or not, it wasn’t very helpful, but,

“A cow-head appeared. How much longer?”

– I’m almost done.

“I’m amazed you haven’t been fired and are still working as a manager.”

– Humans instinctively don’t want to harm grim reapers. And no matter what I do as a side job, my main job always comes first.

“Just hurry up and come.”

Rembrandt clicked his tongue and hung up the phone, put his phone in his pocket, unfolded the script, and leaned against a tree.

As he did so, he heard the sound of people snapping photos with their phones from afar, and the staff asking them to be careful about spoilers.

Rembrandt let the sound flow in one ear and concentrated on the script.

Im Seo, who received the full brunt of Deung-baek’s anger in the last episode, does something crazy in this episode.

Yang Hong is stabbed with a knife, and Deung-baek is very worried and sad. Im Seo becomes curious about this, wondering if Deung-baek would be so sad if he died.

Eventually, Im Seo deliberately jumps into the pond in front of Deung-baek.

That pond was the pond Rembrandt had jumped into earlier. The actual depth was 1.5m, but they were planning to lie that it was quite deep in the drama.

Anyway, Im Seo is rescued safely.

But unlike expected, Deung-baek is angry, calling him crazy instead of worrying, and Im Seo asks Deung-baek why he’s angry.

“Why are you angry? Why aren’t you sad for me?”

Rembrandt muttered his few lines in a small voice.

“If senior falls into the water, will I be angry or sad? …Finding out what I’m curious about comes first.”

Yang Heung, who heard about the situation afterward, suggests that Deung-baek, who is not a professional, cannot control Im Seo and that Im Seo should be treated in the hospital.

Deung-baek defends Im Seo, saying that ‘he’s the kind of kid who doesn’t know if others will be sad or angry if he falls into the water, but he knows that setting others on fire is a sin,’ and that Im Seo is much better than people who impulsively commit crimes.

Then Deung-baek and Yang Heung have a serious fight for the first time, and this fight becomes the pretext for them to understand each other’s feelings later. That was the content of episode 8.

“Why are you angry? Why are you angry?”

But as Rembrandt was reciting Im Seo’s lines in this tone and that tone, the commotion he had been forcibly ignoring grew even louder.

Eventually, he stopped looking at the script and looked up. It seemed that a fight had finally broken out between the onlookers trying to film the set and the staff trying to prevent spoilers.

There was nothing he could do even if he stepped in, so Rembrandt eventually decided to take the script and go back into the van.

However, Rembrandt stopped after a few steps.

The cow-head was standing beyond the fighting people. In front of the cow-head… was the Spear Guy.

But as if he couldn’t feel its presence unless he saw it, the Spear Guy was still only looking at Rembrandt.

Rembrandt was surprised and pointed to the back of the Spear Guy with his finger.

The Spear Guy didn’t understand Rembrandt’s signal and waved his hand with a smile.

Rembrandt shook his head hastily, saying that wasn’t it, and then pointed behind him again, but the Spear Guy still only waved his hand.

Even thinking that Rembrandt was doing fan service, other people who were watching gathered there and waved their hands together.

‘This isn’t it.’

Frustrated, Rembrandt took out his phone and hurriedly searched for a phone number, then found the Spear Guy’s phone number.

The Spear Guy answered the phone immediately, less than a second later, and said cheerfully.

– Wow. You didn’t delete my phone number and kept it? The fact that you called me means the cow-head has appeared again, right?

The Spear Guy’s voice was bright.

Completely unaware that the cow-head 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] was quietly pulling out his one remaining horn right behind him.

Rembrandt shouted urgently.

“Behind you! Look behind you.”

– Huh? What is it?

“It’s behind you.”

At Rembrandt’s words, the Spear Guy flinched and turned his head.

At that moment, the cow-head 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] 확 [sound effect for sudden action] stabbed the Spear Guy’s chest with the raised 양뿔 [yangppul, meaning ram’s horn].

The man dropped the phone he was holding.

As the cow-head 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] pulled out the 양뿔 [yangppul, meaning ram’s horn], blood splattered.

The people who had been watching Rembrandt looked to the side, surprised by the droplets that splattered on their faces and clothes.

There, a man was collapsing to the ground, spilling blood.

“Ah… Aaaagh!”

The screams finally erupted.

The cow-head 요괴 [Yōkai are a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore] stuck the blood-stained 양뿔 [yangppul, meaning ram’s horn] back on his head and smiled at Rembrandt.

Then he quickly turned around and ran away elsewhere.

“Someone’s collapsed!”

“A robber stabbed someone!”

“112!”

“119!”

As screams spread in all directions, the people gathered around all flocked to one place. The staff also hurriedly ran towards that side.

Rembrandt anxiously pressed Manager Sa’s number.

There were too many people surrounding the Spear Guy for Rembrandt to run and help.

Besides, the phone, the phone that Rembrandt was talking to at the time of the attack, was dropped on the floor by the Spear Guy. That phone was now rolling on the floor, kicked by people.

At that moment.

Someone wearing a black hat to cover their face bent down and picked up the phone that had fallen on the floor.

< Look Behind You > End