Chapter Text
The underworld was a lot less bleak than Romance feared. Gwi-ma’s realm was oppressive, dark, miserable; the mortal realm was subject to any number of annoying weather conditions, most of which messed up his hair; the underworld proper was perfectly…fine. His human disguise melted away and he could exist comfortably as himself, looking around at the place. It resembled an ordinary garden park, albeit one filled with unearthly plants of many strange colors, with a line of souls wrapped around it heading into an enormous building that seemed to have no top. It was at the end of this line that Charlie deposited the soul they were shepherding.
“Alright, sir, welcome to the underworld. King Yeomra will be with you shortly,” he pulled a clipboard from his pocket and scribbled some arcane symbols on a piece of paper he then stuck to the soul. “Keep track of that, if you lose your place in line, that will help you get served in a timely manner. When you get to King Yeomra, if you could mention the quality of your service…um, leave out the temporary abduction part, please.”
The soul said nothing, simply hovering in line. When the line inched forward, so did the soul.
“How long will he be in line?” Romance asked as another jeoseong saja came behind them with another fresh soul.
“Perhaps a thousand years or so? Impossible to tell, really.”
“A thousand years?!” Romance blanched.
“Oh, don’t fret. Souls don’t experience the passage of time. As far as he knows he’ll be passing into the cycle of reincarnation again in no time.”
“Why does it take so long?” Romance asked, watching the line inch forward bit by bit as they headed past it into the building. The line continued onto a series of stairs that spiraled up past his visual range.
“Well, there are a lot of souls and only one King Yeomra. He’s good, though. He can do almost a hundred souls per minute!”
“Almost,” Romance said flatly.
“I’ll have you know that’s slightly faster than the rate people typically die,” Charlie huffed. “If humans could stop killing each other for a second maybe we would catch up, but no! I can’t wait for these blasted opium wars to end.”
“Opium - “ Romance really wished he’d studied some history, because he was quite sure there wasn’t any “opium war” happening. “Alright, whatever. Are we going to your supervisor?”
“Of course,” Charlie said, leading them into an elevator. He pressed a symbol Romance couldn’t identify in the panel and the elevator hummed to life - though Romance couldn’t tell if it was headed up or down. Or sideways, for that matter. “It’s, um. A bit of a long trip.”
They stood in silence for a while, fidgeting nervously and staring at the elevator lights, which spiraled in a fashion deeply unhelpful to discerning the length of their journey. Eventually, Romance’s hatred of silence caught up with him. “Will we have to stop for others like a normal elevator?”
“Goodness no,” Charlie said with a dismissive wave. “Infinite elevators. As soon as one moves away, a new one replaces it. Great for convenience, terrible for maintenance. I’d never want to be a level twenty. Poor bastards.”
Another minute of quiet humming passed. “So I’ve been wondering,” Romance began, “Where do jeoseong saja come from?”
“Oh, well, some of us were made by King Yeomra himself, of course. We had to start somewhere. But he hasn’t made more in a long time, not from scratch, anyway.”
“So where do the rest come from?” Romance prompted.
Charlie fidgeted behind his clipboard, suddenly becoming very interested in its contents.
“Charlie,” Romance pressed.
“That’s not my name,” Charlie huffed. “It’s Jeoseong Saja one-three-five-eight-one-three-two- “
“Can we please stick with Charlie? I’ll never remember that.”
“The sooner I get rid of you the better,” Charlie grumbled.
“You were saying about the new jeoseong saja?”
“I don’t think I was.”
“Could you?”
Charlie fidgeted with his clipboard again - or tried to, before Romance snatched it. “Hey! That’s official underworld property?”
“If you tell me about the other jeoseong saja, I’ll give it back and I won’t ask any more questions the rest of the ride. Even if it takes a hundred years.”
“Oh, it won’t take that long. Not this time of the century, anyway,” Charlie sighed. “Alright, fine. It’s just a touchy subject. But jeoseong saja can also be…recruited.”
“Does King Yeomra make deals like Gwi-Ma does with humans?”
“Heavens, no. Nothing so crass,” Charlie waved the idea away as if it were a particularly irritating fly. “But young men who…choose to end their lives prematurely, they’re…recruited into the jeoseong saja.”
“Recruited,” Romance echoed. “As in they’re offered a chance to join?”
“Not…as such, no,” Charlie stammered.
“Who decided this? Yeomra?”
“No one decided it, it just…is, and always has been,” Charlie muttered.
Romance could only remember scraps of what happened to Jinu, and nothing of what happened to himself. Gwi-Ma never wasted a chance to remind Jinu he left his mother and sister to die, and Romance knew Jinu had been tormented by it constantly, unable to enjoy the life of luxury his soul purchased, until he was taken into Gwi-Ma’s service. But for the first time, Romance wondered if there was a missing piece in that story.
“Which kind are you,” Romance asked.
Charlie kept looking at the lights above the elevator door. His expression betrayed no particular answer. “I thought you wouldn’t ask any more questions.”
Romance felt something stirring in his gut - something he didn’t like at all. He reached out and squeezed Charlie’s shoulder in a gesture he hoped was conciliatory.
Charlie just nodded, not objecting to Romance’s touch, and the two of them waited in silence until the elevator announced their arrival. The doors opened to an enormous hall filled with row after row of desks, a different jeoseong saja seated at each one, writing a seemingly endless amount of notes on scrolls that rolled for yards beyond their positions. Periodically, another one would arrive from a different elevator, speak briefly to a desk-bound spirit, and return with a scroll. Charlie led him to one such desk.
“Demon, meet my supervisor, two-four-six - “
“Can I just call you Supervisor?” Romance interrupted. He bowed to the spirit as respectfully as Jinu taught him.
Supervisor, a rather plain, round-faced man wearing gold-rimmed glasses perched above a profoundly bulbous nose, scoffed. “That just seems confusing, but fine.”
“Supervisor, this jeoseong saja claims to be formerly in the service of Gwi-Ma.”
Supervisor at last looked up from his scroll. “Gwi-Ma? The dokkaebi?”
“We know him as the demon king,” Romance added, to Supervisor’s utter incredulity.
“I haven’t heard that name for centuries. But last I heard, he was just a troublemaking dokkaebi that liked to sneak into the mortal realm and trick people into trading their souls for fame and fortune. Not that he had any real power to do so, he just enjoyed tormenting people. King Yeomra banished him for eternity.”
“Banished him where,” Romance pressed.
Supervisor shrugged. “Wherever banished spirits go?”
Romance felt a pain forming right behind his eye. “And you don’t know where that is? There’s no…spirit jail, or anything like that?”
“Not that I know of,” Supervisor said. “You say that Gwi-Ma is calling himself demon king, now?”
“Yes, and he’s consumed thousands or even millions of souls. He even had the power to influence the mortal realm until recently.”
“Well, that’s just ridiculous,” Supervisor scoffed.
“Yeah, he said that too,” Romance sighed. “But look, here I am, a jeoseong saja with different markings and no loyalty to Yeomra. How do you explain that?”
“King Yeomra,” Supervisor corrected before the statement caught up with him. He looked up at Romance fully for the first time. “Goodness, but you are handsome. Other than the snake eyes and the claws and the blue skin, anyway.”
“Thanks,” Romance sighed. “I had some other questions, if you don’t mind.”
“I do,” Supervisor grumbled, rising from his seat which made a cacophonous, shrieking groan. “We need to take this upstairs, test the truth of these claims. It’s above my pay grade.”
“Of course,” Romance groaned. “But really, just a couple of questions on the way - “
“He’s really very persistent,” Charlie said, apologetic, “But I promise it’s just a couple of simple questions.”
“Right,” Romance said, not waiting for confirmation as he followed Supervisor to the elevator bank. “Do you know anything about two souls joined together inside a living mortal? Also, what happens to a jeoseong saja when they get killed?”
Supervisor took off his glasses and rubbed at his temples. Even though he’d risen from his seat, he was still a bit shorter than Charlie - if only because he had dreadful posture. It reminded Romance of the demon husks in Gwi-Ma’s domain, like he had been. “When we die or are destroyed, we return to King Yeomra, and he releases our souls back into the cycle of reincarnation. Unless he feels he needs our services still, I suppose.”
“So Yeomra holds your souls,” Romance murmured. “Does that mean, if Gwi-Ma is trying to copy Yeomra, that he currently holds mine?”
Charlie looked at Romance with a raised eyebrow, but said nothing.
“I suppose so,” Supervisor grumbled. “And call him by his title! You’re being very rude.”
“Sorry. Anyway, what about my other question, about the two souls?”
“Not sure,” Supervisor said, pressing the elevator buttons again as if that would make them go faster. “If I were to guess, something like that would allow two souls to pass into the cycle of reincarnation together. Anything clearer than that, you’ll have to ask my manager.”
Manager turned out to be a taller, lankier spirit, with a much cheerier disposition than Supervisor, if somewhat less hair. He had a magpie on his shoulder not entirely unlike Sussie, and it had Romance feeling a bit homesick. This realm’s cubicle-based structure wasn’t helping, nor was the revelation that Manager was precisely tall enough to loom over the cubicle walls of everyone working this level. “Oh, hello down there! What brings you up here, two - four - “
“We’re calling him Supervisor,” Romance interrupted. “You’re Manager now.”
“Bit rude,” Manager mumbled, but he didn’t protest as Romance barreled on, quite fed up.
“My name is Romance. I am a jeoseong saja, but I used to work for Gwi-Ma.”
“The little fire guy? Oh, he was a character. Whatever happened to - “
“Gwi-Ma has crowned himself demon king and created a realm from which he sends his minions out to gather souls, until very recently, but we have reason to believe he’s still active, despite being trapped.”
“Goodness, that’s a lot to digest,” Manager said. “I’m afraid this is - “
“Above your pay grade,” Romance sighed. “Can we just go to King Yeomra already? I see where this is headed.”
“You don’t just ‘see King Yeomra’,” Manager scoffed.
“Yes, yes, you fill out a thousand forms and shove them up your ass and wait three to six business decades.” Romance could feel himself speaking with Baby’s voice, but he couldn’t force calm for much longer.
“Business centuries, now, actually,” Manager corrected, as if that were a minor inconvenience.
“Of course,” Romance sighed. “Alright, fine. Back in the elevator.“
“Oh, I haven’t ridden the elevator in ages,” Manager said, unfairly gleeful. He pressed the button to summon it.
“Just uh, out of curiosity,” Romance said, all innocence, “Do these elevators go directly to Yeomra? Sorry, King Yeomra?”
“They go anywhere,” Manager said eagerly as the elevator appeared.
“So, hypothetically,” Romance asked as they stepped inside, “Which of these many buttons would you press to go directly to King Yeomra?”
“Hypothetically speaking,” Manager said, clueless and hovering his finger directly over a button holding a rune that resembled a demon’s pointy head, “This one would - “
“Oops!” Romance shoved Manager forward, forcing him to press the button. “My bad. Guess we have to go talk to the king.”
“Oh dear,” Manager gulped.
“Oh crap,” Supervisor choked.
“Well…fuck.” Charlie finished.
The three bureaucrats turned to glare at Romance, who put on his most charming smile.
“Wow, he’s handsome,” Manager gasped.
“I know, right?” The other two replied.
*
“This is taking too long,” Baby whined. “I’m gonna kill him, I swear in the name of all things unholy, if he comes back, I’ll kill him. And if he doesn’t, I’ll find him and kill him twice!”
Rumi stood at the entrance to her apartment watching a tiny, angry, blue haired demon stomp around her living room. There were claw marks all over the furniture, everything except couch, upon which Mira and Zoey sat defensively. “Is, uh. Is everything okay?”
“You!” Baby shrieked, pointing at her, looking an awful lot like a vengeful witch. “You did this to us! You got Jinu feeling THINGS, and then they spread to US, it’s like a DISEASE, it’s SICKENING, I hate you sO MUCH - “
Rumi raised her hands in self-defense, which only seemed to make Baby angrier, given he threw up his hands with a cry of sheer frustration and resumed storming around the place, cursing. “What have I missed, exactly?”
Zoey and Mira frantically gestured for her to approach while Baby’s back was turned, as if they had to operate outside of his visual range. She leapt cleanly onto the couch, woes forgotten as she observed the chaos.
“Romance went with the jeoseong saja to get some information from the underworld,” Zoey whispered. “Baby’s…not taking it well.”
“He’s crashing the fuck out,” Mira clarified, much less quietly.
“I’m not crashing out! You’re crashing out!” Baby yelled, digging another set of grooves into the wall.
“Bobby’s gonna have a fit,” Zoey sighed.
“We’ll get the Twice girls to send him their latest photocard set and he’ll pretend it never happened,” Rumi said, waving away the concern. “As far as this goes, I have an idea. Zoey, you get behind him. Mira, get ready to jump in front of him on my call. I’ll go get backup.”
The girls nodded, and Zoey started creeping behind Baby as ordered, who didn’t notice her movement in his raving. Rumi slipped behind them into her room, where Derpy was splayed out atop her bed. She crept up to him and scratched the top of his head, waking him up. “Listen, your little buddy in there is having a bad day. I think he needs a hug. You wanna help us out?”
Derpy responded with the same face he always made.
Rumi turned to the bird instead. “Think you can help him figure out what I mean?”
Sussie nodded, all six eyes looking determined.
Rumi nodded, pointing at Baby. “As soon as we take him down, you show Derpy where to go.”
Rumi crept out of her room, pets quietly dissolving away behind her. She waited until Baby was perfectly positioned between her and Mira, then “Get him!”
All three girls launched on Baby at once: Zoey from behind, the other two at his flanks, until they had the flailing ball of claws, limbs, and shrieks on the ground. “Cuddle time!” Rumi shouted.
“Cuddle time?!” Baby protested. “What the f - “
A very large tiger descended from the ceiling, materializing very quickly, rapidly, and softly atop Baby, pinning the slight demon beneath its furry bulk.
“How dare you,” Baby cried. “I am a fully-grown demon and I will not be treated this way, get off me you stupid cat, I hate you so much - “
Unperturbed, Derpy licked a huge, wet, slobbery stripe up the side of Baby’s face.
Baby went entirely slack.
“Did we kill him?” Zoey whispered.
“No,” Baby said, suddenly calm. “I actually feel much better now. Thank you. Could someone get this cat off of me? It’s really quite heavy.”
“Aw, poor baby,” Zoey cooed.
Rumi seized her by the collar. “That is such a trap, don’t you dare buy this nonsense.”
Denied, Baby resumed his squirming. “Let me out, dammit! I have to go murder someone! Someones! Everyone!”
“You’re not making a great case,” Mira said, returning to couch.
But Rumi and Zoey knelt at his sides, and Rumi even reached out to squeeze his shoulder. He hissed at her like a cat, but she didn’t move. “You’re worried about Romance, huh?”
“Worried?! I’m livid! How dare he go off without me, leave me alone like this, I swear I’ll - I’ll - “
Without warning, Baby’s shouting turned to sniffles, his eyes wide and wet.
“Aw, Baby,” Zoey cooed even louder. “He’ll come back! I bet he misses you just as much!”
“He better,” Baby whispered. He wriggled one hand free of the tiger’s bulk, but rather than viciously clawing at one of them like the girls feared, he instead used it to tug Derpy’s huge empty head down, hiding his face in the fur and sniffling.
Rumi smiled at the sight despite her trying evening. Celine’s words had shaken her resolve somewhat, but…Baby and Romance, if nothing else, they cared about each other. Maybe more than either of them knew. And that was a start.