Whisper Chapter 1

Are they ghosts, huh? I can’t find them, huh? Are they playing games with me?

 

The mountain had no parking lot, so Cha Gyeol parked in the village and walked 20 minutes to the mountain entrance and then 30 minutes further up the trail. Finding the shaman’s house so easily felt anticlimactic—no, it was infuriating.  

 

“Are they all out of their minds?” Cha Gyeol ground his teeth. It was to the point where he suspected they might be putting on a show to deceive him. With each stride of his long legs, more of the house came into view—a tiled roof in perfect condition, tall walls, and an old wooden gate weathered by time. The house, surrounded by trees, looked like something built during the Joseon dynasty. It wouldn’t have been surprising if it were designated a cultural heritage site. It felt as if time had stopped here. The atmosphere was strangely peculiar.  

 

In the uninhabited mountain, with only the sound of rustling leaves in the wind and cicadas chirping, a faint voice began to rise.  

 

“Can’t you please be quiet?”  

 

It was a clear, gentle woman’s voice. Her tone was steeped in gentleness, almost pleading.  

 

The shaman wasn’t supposed to live with anyone, right? Cha Gyeol had heard the shaman was over 80 years old.  

 

“It’s not that I’m annoyed, it’s just that I’m reading right now. That’s all.”  

 

No other voices could be heard, but the woman’s voice sounded like she was having a conversation. Cha Gyeol’s well-shaped eyebrows furrowed.  

 

“I’ll be there in a bit.”  

 

As he deliberately made his footsteps louder and approached the gate, the voice abruptly stopped. He could hear someone’s startled breathing.  

 

“Is anyone there?”  

 

Cha Gyeol knocked on the gate lightly, loosening the strength in his fist. After a moment of dead silence, there was a loud shuffling noise, as if someone was frantically putting on slippers.  

 

“Wh-who are you?”  

 

The voice grew closer. The person must have been standing just behind the gate. Looking at the gate, Cha Gyeol tilted his head slightly, hands in his pants pocket, as if he should answer that he was just a passerby.  

 

“I’m a guest.”  

“A… guest?”  

 

From the sound of the voice, the person seemed pressed up against the gate. The voice sounded like that of a young girl. She was so surprised that her voice even trembled. The gate looked like it might fall over with just a few kicks. Cha Gyeol’s gaze swept over the gate and stopped. It seemed like it wouldn’t be too much trouble to break through.  

 

“Isn’t it rude to keep a guest waiting? Didn’t anyone teach you that?”  

 

It was a smooth and pleasant voice. Cha Gyeol could sense the hesitation in the woman beyond the gate. After a brief pause, he heard the sound of the lock being fiddled with.  

 

Creak.

 

The gate slowly opened, about the width of a handspan. Eyes peeked out, landing slightly below Cha Gyeol’s chest—a consequence of her height. Cha Gyeol patiently waited as those eyes slowly traveled upward. The gaze paused at his jaw for a moment, stopped again at his nose, and finally, their eyes met. He watched with faint interest as her wide pupils grew even larger.  

 

Her exposed eyes were strikingly beautiful. They were large and elegantly almond-shaped, giving her a gentle and melancholic look despite their slightly upturned corners. The whites of her eyes were spotless, without a trace of blood vessels, and her irises were a deep black, almost unnaturally dark even in the sunlight. Her long, curled eyelashes were dense and thick, fluttering like graceful wings each time she blinked.  

 

“…A ghost?”  

 

Her voice was so faint it almost got swallowed by the sound of the cicadas.  

 

Ghosts again, here and there. What nonsense. Cha Gyeol raised his hand and ran it through his hair irritably, but suddenly, her hand darted out only to retract just as quickly. Startled by her own action, she tried to pull back, but Cha Gyeol swiftly grabbed her wrist.  

 

Her eyes widened even further, as if they might spill out of their sockets. Her thin wrist was barely half the size of his. But what surprised Cha Gyeol more was her body temperature. How could she feel this cool in the middle of summer? Her touch was cold, yet the texture of her wrist felt as smooth as silk, making him absentmindedly rub his thumb along it.  

 

“I don’t think I’m the ghost here.”  

 

He suddenly grew curious about her face. Without hesitation, Cha Gyeol pulled her wrist and pushed the gate further open.  

 

***

 

Lee Heewoo was not ordinary.  

 

To begin with, she was born the granddaughter of a family of shamans, and both her biological father and mother were actors. Her biological father, who had fled from the shamanic household he despised, became an actor but abandoned Lee Heewoo to his mother as soon as he realized that she could see strange things from the moment she began to speak.  

 

The couple left Lee Heewoo behind and went abroad the next day, only to be caught in a terrorist attack and shot to death.  

 

Since she was too young at the time, Lee Heewoo didn’t even remember the faces of her biological parents.  

 

Her grandmother never spoke of them, not even once. Not even to this day.  

 

Heewoo, don’t talk about what you see.

 

Even though she was abandoned by her parents, Lee Heewoo didn’t realize she was abandoned. Her world had always been like this, so she didn’t think she was strange.  

 

Her grandmother told her not to speak to or acknowledge the things she saw in the air, but it wasn’t easy for Lee Heewoo to comply. She was too young to act as if nothing was there in front of others.  

 

But Grandma… they’re pitiful. They haven’t done anything bad to me.

 

Lee Heewoo didn’t know that seeing such things was inherently wrong.  

 

Once she started attending school, Lee Heewoo began to understand that she was different from others. Smart as she was, she started pretending not to see things, but she wasn’t very good at it. Moreover, she was the granddaughter of shamans without parents.  

 

No one wanted to befriend Lee Heewoo, and the other children disliked her.  

 

In the end, she didn’t advance to middle school.  

 

Around that time, something new began to appear before Lee Heewoo. When she looked at people, numbers would surface in her mind. Not everyone, but for certain people.  

 

It started with the husband of a lady who helped with house chores. When Lee Heewoo saw the man and numbers floated in her mind, she didn’t know what it meant at first.  

 

A month later, the man passed away.  

 

After witnessing the deaths of village elders she had seen at the market, Lee Heewoo realized the numbers in her mind represented the dates of their deaths.  

 

She didn’t tell her grandmother about it. Her grandmother was already busy, and Lee Heewoo knew she was preoccupied with the fact that Heewoo could see the dead.  

 

She also knew that her grandmother went to the mountain every week to pray because of her.  

 

She was already a strange child. Adding more strangeness to herself wouldn’t change that.  

 

I need to make sure my Heewoo lives a proper life.

 

After declaring she would no longer perform divinations, her grandmother spent most of her time with Lee Heewoo, except for when she went to the mountain to pray.  

 

When her grandmother was nearby, spirits couldn’t approach. They stayed at a distance, murmuring faintly. For Lee Heewoo, that was the quietest time.  

 

“Is anyone there?”  

 

When a man’s voice called out, her heart nearly stopped. Startled, she jumped in fright.  

 

“Wh-who is it?”  

 

No one was supposed to come. It was impossible for anyone to find this house in the mountain. The spirits Lee Heewoo saw made sure of that—at her request.  

 

“A guest.”  

 

“A… guest?”  

 

Approaching the gate, she placed her palm against the grain of the wood. Her trembling voice repeated his words.  

 

There were no guests for this house anymore. Could it be… a spirit?  

 

As the thought crossed her mind, an odd sense of unease crept in.  

 

“You shouldn’t keep a guest waiting. Didn’t anyone teach you that?”  

 

The man’s voice flowed into her ears and refused to leave. It was low and gentle, yet chilling and firm. Lee Heewoo hesitated but reached for the lock on the gate.  

 

She had to confirm who it was.  

 

Her hand on the lock froze, and she bit her lip, forcing herself to continue. She undid the lock with effort, took a deep breath, and cracked the gate open just slightly, peeking out.  

 

A white shirt appeared in front of her. The closeness made her uneasy, and she slowly lifted her gaze.  

 

A tall man exuded a pleasant scent. It was a mysterious blend of wood and grass, lightly tinged with the refreshing sweetness of fruit. The scent tickled something deep inside her.  

 

Her eyes moved from the open collar of his shirt, up his neck to his chin, and finally rested on his lips. His red lips were beautifully shaped—too delicate for a man. Her gaze shifted again, pausing at his sharp, high nose.  

 

It was so perfectly sculpted that it seemed impossible to create anything better.  

 

Her wide eyes, as if marveling at something incredible, traced from his nose upward until their eyes met.  

 

The man’s brown irises glinted faintly in the sunlight, carrying a cold intensity. His piercing, sharp gaze stung like needles.  

 

He had pale, flawless skin, strikingly handsome features, and an aura of power that was uncommon among ordinary people.  

 

“…A… ghost?”