Mad Hatter.
The hitman for the club ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and leader of the Tea Party team was gasping for breath.
‘Fuck!’
The mace he swung felt dozens of times heavier than usual.
A Grade C Exorcist.
He had prided himself on being someone the industry could never dismiss. He had handled most jobs alone and faced more than a few notorious evil spirits.
But the energy filling this room now was on an entirely different level.
There was a murderous edge that pricked his skin like needles, and an overwhelming pressure bearing down on the crown of his head.
“Damn it, they just keep coming!”
“T-Team Leader!”
Occult objects came alive and attacked from every direction.
A mummy's bandages lashed out like whips, while rusted crusader swords swam through the air, aiming for their necks.
He fought by setting off Holy Light from time to time to drive them back and casting defensive holy magic, but…. It was draining his spiritual energy at a terrible rate.
He was barely holding on through his teamwork with the others, and they had yet to lay a finger on Annabelle herself.
Dealing with the toys she controlled was already more than they could manage.
On top of that, their escape route had been cut off.
‘Damn it, am I going to die here….’
Just then, a scream came from the side.
“Urgh!”
A subordinate was caught in a mummy's arm and thrown to the floor.
A massive statue raised its foot to crush the fallen teammate's head.
“Dormouse!”
Mad Hatter lunged forward, but the objects surrounding him blocked the way.
The situation was hopeless.
At that very instant, a cold voice cut through the air and struck his ears.
“You're in the way. Move.”
“Huh?”
A shadow emerged behind him and slipped between the team members.
It was the Asian exorcist, Kang Do-jun.
FWOOSH—!
No sooner had he spoken than an enormous firestorm swept through the air.
A raging inferno of vivid red flame.
The attacking objects turned to ash and scattered in an instant, without even a chance to scream.
“……!”
As they stared, stunned by its tremendous power, Kang Do-jun pulled Dormouse up and shouted sharply.
“Don't just stand there! Get back! Stop getting in my way!”
“Y-yes, sir!”
“We're sorry!”
A chill ran down their spines.
All three could only stare in shock.
‘What the hell…. What kind of magic was that?’
‘That was incredibly powerful.’
They had never heard of, seen, or performed a spell like it, and its power was far beyond anything they knew.
Do-jun stood in the middle of the burning warehouse and calmly gathered his energy.
‘Hmm, it's much more useful than I thought.’
What he had just used was a Navajo spell he had learned through the secret manual… ‘Beast of Flame.’
It might have lacked finesse, but its sheer destructive power far surpassed that of Korean fire spells.
Perhaps the aggressive way of life of the Native Americans, who often had to fight other tribes, had found its way into their spells.
It looked as though it would prove invaluable when fighting many opponents alone.
‘For now, though…. I should cut off Annabelle's head instead of fighting like this forever.’
Do-jun turned his gaze to Annabelle at the far end of the room.
He concentrated the fire energy within his body in his legs.
WHOOSH—!
Earth-Shrinking Art (Shrinking the Earth).
When he combined it with an Eastern technique, his body hurtled forward at the speed of light.
He closed the distance to Annabelle so quickly that he left no afterimage.
‘Now!’
At his inward cry, the spirit jar in his lower abdomen vibrated violently.
The vision of a gigantic beast rose behind Do-jun and opened its jaws.
Just as it was about to swallow the doll whole, Annabelle's form dispersed like a heat haze.
CRASH—!
A display case shattered, and a voice came from the air.
《You make me feel bad…. You're not a friend. Bad adult. Die. You have to die.》
“Ngh, I knew it…. Taking her out in one blow was too much to hope for.”
Do-jun scratched his head in disappointment.
RUMBLE—!
The entire warehouse shook violently, and evil spirits surged in from every direction.
A hellish realm of inhuman horrors unfolded.
Then the walls of the warehouse filled with thousands, even tens of thousands, of dolls that looked exactly like Annabelle.
《Die, die….》
《Adults are bad beings. Die.》
《You're not a friend.》
Auditory hallucinations layered over one another from every direction.
This was no mere illusion.
It was a world created by an evil spirit, what was known as a ‘Domain.’ Inside it, all abilities were amplified, and the caster's will became law.
“A Domain? That's impossible!”
“T-Team Leader! No one told me this evil spirit could deploy a Domain!”
The three members of the Tea Party, some distance away, went deathly pale.
George Goldwyn had said nothing about this danger.
An evil spirit capable of creating a Domain of its own.
That meant their opponent was a monster most exorcists could not even hope to face.
But Kang Do-jun gave a thin, crooked smile, as if he could not care less.
‘I was hoping to finish this easily in one hit. Guess I can't get something for nothing.’
《She looks delicious…. Let me eat her. Human, put her in my mouth at once.》
Wakan Tanka smacked his lips greedily.
‘Yes, yes. Just wait. Cooking takes time.’
《Die! Dieee!》
Annabelle's attacks came in a fierce onslaught.
Evil spirits reached from the darkness on all sides, trying to seize their bodies.
Visions of dismembered bodies, corpses, and more gnawed at their minds.
Between those attacks, he also had to deal with ghostly objects possessed by evil spirits. Even ten bodies would not have been enough.
Kang Do-jun was driving them off with Navajo spells, but…. If this stalemate continued, it was obvious which side would run out of strength first.
“Aaaagh! Daaamn it!”
“Get away!”
And there was a bigger problem.
Those Tea Party bastards looked as though they could not hold out much longer.
‘Let's see….’
Even so, Do-jun calmly assessed the situation.
This thing was no single evil spirit.
It was an enormous vessel swollen from devouring thousands of souls.
Fighting each one head-on would be like pouring water into a bottomless jar.
He had to find the ‘core’ among those countless souls that maintained this vast Domain and collective.
The problem was that there was no way to tell which one was the real Annabelle in this immense space.
‘Hmm, let's try that.’
Do-jun kicked away an evil spirit in armor that rushed him, then thrust a hand deep into his inner pocket.
He pulled out the FSM (Flying Spaghetti Monster) badge he had picked up at the gas station diner.
As Do-jun's mouth curled into a grin, Wakan Tanka asked,
《What are you going to do, child?》
‘Something fun.’
《Fun? Hmm….》
He poured spiritual power into the badge without holding back.
He hurled the badge, now hot enough to burst, into the darkest corner of the Domain.
And then….
BOOM—!
Amid a cloud of thick smoke, a gigantic meatball appeared and began to run amok.
The ravenous hunger that had devastated the gas station diner was unleashed again inside the Domain.
The meatball extended tentacle-like strands of pasta and began indiscriminately sucking in nearby souls and occult objects.
“W-what is that, Team Leader?”
“I… I don't know either!”
The situation descended into even greater chaos.
The meatball spaghetti that had appeared out of nowhere was running wild, and another little battle had broken out around it.
《What's that…. Are you an adult too? Or…. a friend?》
As Annabelle's voice sounded, Do-jun saw her energy gather toward the meatball.
And then… hundreds of dolls rushed toward it at once to subdue it.
She probably intended to overpower the thing and make it her own.
But none of that mattered.
‘Found you.’
He activated the Eye of Dispelling Evil and Revealing Truth and watched the flow of spiritual energy.
Among the countless attacks, one direction stood out as the source of a particularly powerful and distinct ‘will.’
He caught that momentary shift and threw the talisman he had prepared.
“Seal!”
The talisman shone blue and lodged in a point in midair, fixing the space in place.
《W-what is this?!》
Before Annabelle's true body could even appear, Kang Do-jun kicked off the floor and launched himself with the Earth-Shrinking Art.
In an instant, his hand closed the distance and seized the doll by the hair.
“Got you, kid.”
He reached out and caught the doll.
His eyes flashed blue as forced communion with Annabelle's spirit began.
A vast sea of resentment poured into Kang Do-jun's consciousness like a waterfall.
……
……
A cold, gray landscape spread before him.
The corridors of an orphanage reeked of mold.
There was a child there.
The girl's name was Annabelle.
Her thin arms and legs were mottled with bruises, and her eyes held nothing but terrible fear where life should have been.
“I'm sorry, Director. Please….”
“Aaaaaah!”
The man gripping the pleading child's hair was grotesquely fat.
The director treated the children like animals.
Beatings were routine, and abuse was his amusement.
Then, one day, Annabelle's one and only childhood friend died on the cold floor.
She had resisted the director when he tried to do something vile to her, and his merciless beating had ruptured her organs.
“W-what do we do, Annabelle? Julia's dead…. D-do you think the adults will help us this time?”
“No…. They won't.”
Her world had collapsed, but Annabelle did not cry.
Instead, she picked up the sharpest knife in the kitchen.
She had already asked adults for help many times.
She had sent letters to the police, to the politicians who sometimes visited, and to countless others, but…. Each time, all she got in return was the director's merciless violence and indifference.
Late at night, when everyone was asleep, Annabelle went to the room where the director slept.
A creature bloated with fat and steeped in greed… an adult.
She plunged the blade into his chest.
“Ggh! Ggh! A-Annabelle! What are you doing?!”
“Die, you piece of trash.”
When she ended that piece of trash's life, Annabelle felt only emptiness.
Killing the director would not bring her dead friend back.
And a dark curtain had fallen over her own future.
So Annabelle, covered head to toe in blood, stood on the rooftop ledge to take her own life.
If she crossed over to the world of the dead, she could see Julia again.
“Hey, kid. Before you jump, let's… talk.”
She turned her head and saw Kang Do-jun.
Annabelle's face filled with anger and wariness.
“Get lost, adult…. There's nothing you people can do for me.”
“I'm not so sure. I think there is something I can do for you.”
“Shut up!
Annabelle lunged forward and reached for the Seven Stars Sword in Kang Do-jun's hand.
But before her fingertips could touch it, the sword spun once through the air and returned to Kang Do-jun's grasp.
“A sword's too dangerous for a kid.”
“What the hell are you?! Why… why are you doing this to me? What did I ever do wrong?!”
Then Kang Do-jun folded his arms and said,
“Let's make a deal, kid. You let yourself be sealed away quietly, and I'll grant you the wish you want.”
“Shut up! I have no reason to make a deal with an adult….”
“I'll destroy the director. And I'll make it hurt.”
“…What?”
Confusion crossed Annabelle's face.