The moment a sound came from the walkie-talkie held by Kim Woojin, some members of the Monster Sweepers team were seen running out of the campsite.
I turned on the map app to find the nearest hospital, specifically one with an emergency room.
“The closest one is Gangnam Hospital across the bridge. It’s right there if you take the World Cup Bridge.”
There were three large hospitals nearby in Gangbuk, but the closest one was south of the Han River.
“We’re going here.”
I pointed to a hospital on the map. A Gangbuk hospital that was relatively far away.
“Team 1 is going to Gangbuk Hospital. Please contact us if you find the child elsewhere.”
Kim Woojin started the car as soon as he finished the radio call and simultaneously turned on the siren on top of the car.
“I asked the emergency rooms of nearby hospitals to let us know if they find any injured people. But why this place instead of a closer hospital?”
“If the culprit is a person, they’re likely hiding in the campsite or running away nearby, but if it’s the work of an evil spirit, I don’t think it’ll deviate much from the path of previous incidents.”
Lee Geon, who had been fiddling with the map app on my phone, nodded.
“Gangbuk Hospital is inside the Four Great Gates.”
It might be a wrong decision.
But if we get a call from the emergency room, we can immediately change direction, so shouldn’t we head to the farthest place for now?
Not long after we started, Kim Woojin’s phone rang.
Kim Woojin answered the phone on speakerphone.
– “All the injured people from the campsite are at Gangnam Hospital emergency room.”
Ah, completely wrong.
Kim Woojin slowly reduced his speed and changed lanes towards the center line.
“Is the child there too, even though they’re not injured?”
The car waited for the next signal to make a U-turn.
“Wait a minute! One ambulance went to another hospital…”
– Tick-tock, tick-tock.
The sound of the turn signal blinking was unusually loud.
Where did one ambulance go?
A hurried voice came from beyond the speaker again.
“The child’s father is receiving emergency treatment, but the wife and child are not visible. The hospital is also looking for a guardian because of the surgery.”
Tick-tock.
The sound of the turn signal stopped.
“We’ll keep going to Gangbuk Hospital.”
At the same time as he spoke, Kim Woojin stepped on the accelerator.
The car shot out as if kicking off the road.
The phone call continued while we were driving.
– “L Hospital emergency room is temporarily closed due to quarantine measures.”
– “S Hospital emergency room said they don’t have any beds available.”
And when the car we were in was stopped at a traffic light near Gangbuk Hospital, the phone rang again.
– “A patient with stab wounds and a child just arrived at Gangbuk Hospital.”
The person delivering the message sounded relieved. But I couldn’t relax.
I quickly checked Jang Hawoon and Lee Geon’s attire.
Black training suits, okay.
My attire was casual business wear because I had participated in the event.
So I took off my jacket and held a ball cap in my hand.
“Don’t go through walls in front of people. Baek Moong is too noticeable, so go into the ring.”
“Master, I need to be out to detect the evil spirit’s energy faster.”
I need the Baek Moong radar, but carrying a doll around…
“Then can you get smaller?”
I asked Baek Moong to transform into something small and flat.
And I pointed to the front of my hat.
“And stick here.”
This way, people will think it’s a patch, they won’t think it’s a talking spirit beast.
And I put on my hat and mask.
“There are a lot of people, so I might be exposed, and if an evil spirit appears, people could be in danger.”
“It’ll be a little better when the Monster Sweepers team joins us.”
Before people notice, before the evil spirit takes people hostage, we have to find the child or catch the evil spirit.
As soon as the signal changed, the car quickly entered the hospital.
* * *
The car stopped in front of the emergency center.
An ambulance was in front of the emergency center.
While Kim Woojin was taking care of the parking attendant with his ID, I got out of the car and examined the ambulance.
The back door of the ambulance was wide open, and there was no one inside.
The driver’s seat was also empty.
“I don’t feel anything in the car.”
Oh, my goodness.
I was newly surprised by Baek Moong’s voice coming from the hat.
Speak in my mind.
Grumbling, I went into the emergency center. I went inside, watching Kim Woojin, who came in after me, take out his ID.
Quickly scanning the inside, I saw a paramedic in an orange uniform in the waiting room in front of the emergency room.
Next to him sat a woman with an injured arm.
“Are you from the campsite?”
I quickly approached and asked. But there was no child next to her.
“Ah, yes.”
“Where’s the child?”
“Pardon?”
“Aren’t you the child’s mother?”
“Yes, I am. How did you…”
The bewildered woman turned to the paramedic next to her as if asking what was going on.
Come to think of it, why is there only one paramedic?
“Aren’t there any other paramedics?”
“She said she went to the bathroom with the child. But who are you? Do you know her?”
Leaving the paramedic’s question to the woman behind, I started looking for where the bathroom was.
There were a lot of people in the hospital, so I couldn’t run, but I went at a fast pace, and Jang Hawoon and Lee Geon passed me and went ahead.
The two were pretending to walk, but their feet were slightly off the ground.
“It’s here.”
The bathroom we found in such a hurry.
The child had to be there.
But the men’s bathroom was empty.
“Could it be a girl?”
At Lee Geon’s words, I unknowingly hit my head.
Ah, why didn’t I think of that? But how do I go into the women’s bathroom?
“I’ll go.”
Watching Lee Geon hide his body, my conscience pricked me, wondering if I should let even a ghost go into the women’s bathroom.
Lee Geon returned in less than a minute.
“She’s not there. Neither the child nor the person wearing orange clothes.”
When I came out of the bathroom, Kim Woojin was coming with his phone up, and the child’s mother, holding her injured arm, followed behind him.
– Ding
I opened my phone when I heard the notification that a text message had arrived, and I saw a picture of the girl shared by Kim Woojin.
“They say it’s a picture taken at the campsite today. We can’t get in touch with the paramedic either.”
“What’s going on? She said she was going to the bathroom.”
At Kim Woojin’s words, the child’s mother went straight into the women’s bathroom.
In the picture, the child was wearing a yellow top and bright-colored jeans.
It was fortunate that she was wearing clothes of a color that was easy to spot.
“Let’s split up and look.”
“We’ll try to find her while hiding our forms.”
“Just in case, Mr. Kim Woojin, it’s better for you to stay by the child’s mother.”
“…Ah, I guess I should. Then I’ll stay and protect her until the Monster Sweepers team comes. Oh, and the missing paramedic is also a woman.”
Kim Woojin decided to stay next to the child’s mother, and Lee Geon and Jang Hawoon scattered.
I pulled my hat down further and headed to the passage connecting the emergency center to the main building.
Where would be a good place to take the child?
Another bathroom on the first floor, a convenience store or cafe.
If the paramedic just took the child out of kindness, I could find her by just scanning this much.
But if the paramedic is possessed by an evil spirit, where would she go?
A secluded place with no people or outside the hospital? Did she take her to harm the child?
I quickly scanned the surroundings while walking quickly.
And when I arrived in front of another bathroom on the first floor, Baek Moong shouted.
{Master, over there!}
Through the glass window, I could see the paramedic and the child holding hands and going somewhere.
{The woman in orange clothes seems to be an evil spirit of level 1.}
I looked for a door to go outside.
There was a door to the left a little further away, but that would mean going back the way I came.
Then I would be separated from the two.
So I kept my eyes on the two and ran to the right as I was.
But the door didn’t appear right away.
Just then, the two people outside seemed to have stopped and were talking about something.
Now was the chance.
Should I go out through the window?
{Jang Hawoon and Lee Geon went outside.}
Looking outside while looking for the door, I could see Jang Hawoon pretending to come out from behind a tree and stepping forward in front of the two. Is Lee Geon hiding?
Only then did I stop and breathe heavily.
Even if the paramedic is possessed by an evil spirit, there’s no way those two would miss one level 1, so I can just find out slowly now.
Just then, a door to go outside appeared.
I was waiting for someone coming in from the outside to pass by when Baek Moong called me.
{Master, another one has appeared.}
A man appeared behind Jang Hawoon.
The man holding a sharp knife had bloodstains on his clothes here and there.
It was clear that he was the man who had committed the stabbing at the campsite.
The man’s shadow was cast long even though it was daytime.
The strange thing was that it stretched in the opposite direction to the shadows of other people.
The end of the man’s shadow was meeting the paramedic’s shadow.
Could it be that the two evil spirits are connected?
I went out the door and shouted.
“The child first!”
The talisman that appeared in the air went up and then split into two, flying towards the paramedic and the man.
However, the talisman heading towards the man disappeared as if crumbling when it was hit by the knife the man was wielding.
Is it fortunate?
The talisman was attached to the shadow of the paramedic, who was a level 1 evil spirit.
I quickly ran and cut the shadow with the talisman attached to the paramedic, and caught the falling paramedic’s body and gently lowered it to the ground.
In the meantime, Jang Hawoon was blocking the man who had blocked the talisman.
“Are you okay?”
I checked the child’s condition first, before anything else.
Wouldn’t she be surprised since the paramedic she was just talking to had collapsed?
But the child’s reaction was quite different from what I expected.
The child was looking back and forth between me, Lee Geon, and Jang Hawoon with sparkling eyes.
“What is that paper that that mister is throwing?”
Talisman? Lee Geon is hiding his body? Hey, why can you see Lee Geon?
“Is that a puppy on oppa’s hat? Can I touch it?”
Not only Lee Geon. Even Baek Moong, who was disguised on the hat.
This child seems to be able to see ghosts and spirit beasts.
Is that why she was targeted by the evil spirit?
– Clang
Jang Hawoon and the man’s swords were facing each other tightly. A talisman flew again, aiming for the gap.
The man tried to avoid the talisman, but allowed his shadow to be cut by Jang Hawoon’s sword.
“Ugh!”
The man let out a painful groan even though it was his shadow, not his body, that was cut.
It was when another talisman was heading towards the man.
The man suddenly fell to the ground.
“I thought he was level 3, why is he like this?”
{Master, I think there are still evil spirits around.}
“It seems like he abandoned his body and hid.”
Then that meant that the evil spirit was hiding its form somewhere around here.
I took Baek Moong off my hat and handed it to the child.
I had to prevent the child from being possessed or attacked by an evil spirit.
“Can you hold this for a second?”
The child’s eyes widened as she looked at the very small Baek Moong.
Then she nodded several times.
{Master, are you going to do that?}
‘Protect the child from getting possessed by an evil spirit.’
After several hours of training at Jongmyo last time, Jang Hawoon and Lee Geon obtained sword energy.
Kim Woojin’s Four Tiger Sword shone a little more.
And I gained this ability.