Osaek-ri, Seo-myeon, Yangyang County, Gangwon Special Self-Governing Province.
It was the place where a northern weasel had arrived after being taken far from home.
It was also the address of the mountain commonly known as Mount Seorak.
The weasel had not come here of his own free will.
The young northern weasel had once lived in a cold land. One day, while searching for food, he was caught in a trap set by humans. Imprisoned in a dark iron cage, he could do nothing but wait for death. Then, when his captors let down their guard, he managed to escape.
But the white snowfields he had hoped to find were nowhere in sight. Instead, it was the height of summer, and the blazing sunlight seemed to pierce his skin.
He was hungry. He was cold despite the heat. His hind leg, injured during his abduction, refused to obey him.
Some instinct told him he did not have long to live.
After hesitating for a moment, the little weasel returned to the cabin where he had been imprisoned.
Dozens of iron cages, large and small, filled the place. Most of the animals trapped inside were already dead. When he had first arrived, cries for help had come from every direction. Now, nothing could be heard except faint breathing that seemed ready to stop at any moment.
The little weasel bit at the cage locks with all his strength and hurled himself against the rusted bars. Some cages opened. Others would not budge. The commotion made the animals struggle to raise their heads. A few that still had some strength managed to escape, offering the little white weasel grateful looks as they passed.
Their desperate escape did not last long.
A human came down from upstairs carrying a long gun. The weasel darted between the ankles of the enormous figure blocking the doorway and fled.
The monster pursued him, shouting in a language he could not understand.
Desperate to get away, the weasel raced toward the mountain, forcing his way through dense undergrowth and thorny bushes.
Bang!
A single gunshot rang out.
The little weasel collapsed and tumbled down a low hillside. The bushes concealed him so well that the human passed without finding him.
All the strength had drained from his body. He could not move his front paws, his hind paws, or even his tail.
He could only breathe in shallow, ragged gasps and wait for death.
His mind was filled with blazing red hatred.
I hate humans.
I hate them so much.
I curse them.
Even after I die.
I'll curse humans forever.
Rage and hatred engulfed his tiny body.
Never in his life had the weasel felt such intense hatred.
He had always been a cheerful little creature.
He loved rolling around in fields of pure white snow. He loved splashing through puddles of half-melted snow, too. Even a passing breeze was enough to make him laugh with delight.
And he cried just as easily as he laughed.
The smallest things could move him to tears. Once, he had come across a solitary flower blooming in the snow and wept because it seemed so precious and pitiful.
Yet the final emotions of this little creature, who had laughed and cried so freely, were blazing red rage and hatred.
As though he had never known happiness.
As though nothing had ever moved his heart.
That was how his story would have ended.
In tragedy.
If that being had not appeared.
At first, he thought it was the snow he had been searching for so desperately.
He thought the pure white snowfields of his homeland had appeared before him.
Its fur was a dazzling, immaculate white. Two horns rose from its forehead, branching into beautiful silver antlers. Their shape was so exquisite that, if they were placed in the sky, they might have formed a constellation.
Its eyes were black and deep as darkness.
It was far too enormous to be a roe deer, its tail was much too long for a reindeer, and a faint, delicate fragrance surrounded it, unlike any ordinary deer.
Are you the spirit of this forest?
The little weasel asked.
No answer came.
Eyes as black and fathomless as the universe gazed silently down at the dying weasel.
The weasel gazed back up at the pure-white spirit.
A profound silence stretched between them.
And at last, the little creature breathed his final breath and died.
When he opened his eyes again, he was still in the same place, his entire body still drenched in blood.
Only one thing had changed.
He was no longer a weasel.
He had taken human form.
A married couple who gathered wild ginseng happened to be passing nearby and took the child home.
The county office determined that he was four years old, and he was officially registered as a human citizen of South Korea.
And so the weasel became human.
He often thought about the spirit.
What did it mean by bringing me back to life like this?
What were those impossibly deep eyes trying to tell me?
Will I ever see it again? That mysterious, pure-white spirit?
Someday... just once.
1. The Suspicious Weasel
The young man lifted his teacup and gazed down at the Han River at noon.
The clear blue sky was reflected perfectly on the water's surface, while sunlight glittered across the gently rippling waves.
Some might have called the view beautiful.
But his gaze remained utterly indifferent.
His final examination of the third-year fall semester was coming up. He supposed he ought to go. He had no intention of continuing at the university, but he did not want to finish with poor results. After forcing himself to attend for so long, he at least wanted to bring things to a proper close.
He sighed and took a sip of tea.
The tea leaves had cost hundreds of millions of won per kilogram, and the tea itself was served in an exquisite designer teacup.
Of course, the price meant nothing to him.
After a single sip, he casually poured the rest down the sink and prepared to leave.
He slipped into a one-of-a-kind cashmere coat, custom-made by the chief designer of a luxury brand, who had personally taken his measurements. Then he climbed into the premium sedan he had received as a university entrance gift and drove to campus.
By the time he emerged from the department building after finishing his examination, his ears were already filled with noise.
It was the dead of winter. The campus flower beds were barren, and not a single withered leaf remained on the trees. One might have expected the place to feel desolate.
Surprisingly, however, the campus was brimming with life and energy.
"How'd your exam go?"
"Are you done for the semester?"
"I've still got one left."
"What are you doing over break?"
"I'm thinking of taking a semester off."
"I'm getting a part-time job..."
Bright laughter and friendly conversations filled the air.
To the young man, every sound was noise that tormented his ears.
And every sound was a reminder of his relentless loneliness.
Interacting with people. Belonging among them.
Such things felt impossibly distant to him.
"Oh, hey... Look. There he is."
"You're right. At least he still shows up for exams."
There had been a time when he had resolved to live among other people.
He could not go on like this forever, he had told himself. It was time to stop running away and learn to get along with everyone.
He had made that resolution with all his heart.
There had even been occasions when he had forced himself to turn around and head toward the crowded square, despite his feet instinctively carrying him toward deserted places.
"Should we ask him to eat with us?"
"Nah, he'd never agree. He's never come to a single beginning-of-semester or end-of-semester party."
"Still, break's almost here. Let's try asking him just once."
But not anymore.
Loneliness is my closest friend and my brother.
My destiny. My fate.
"Hey, you—"
The young man abruptly turned and headed behind the science building, toward his own private refuge.
The noisy voices faded into the distance.
As expected, there was no one there.
He sat on a cold bench and stared blankly at his shadow.
Time did not pass in silence.
It was always unbearably loud.
And that endless clamor had mercilessly worn away his determination and his will to change.
He had been so certain he wanted a different life.
But achieving it demanded far more effort than he could bear.
In the end, here he was again.
Somewhere deserted. Somewhere people rarely ventured.
Even after leaving campus, he would seek out places like this.
Places no one visited.
Places where not a single sound could be heard.
At first, he had been restless and anxious.
Now even the restlessness and anxiety were gone.
His time here had taught him one thing beyond any doubt.
Living among other people was impossible for him.
I really do have to leave.
It's my fate.
I was born this way.
It's not something I can overcome through effort.
Some people are simply born unable to change.
He had finally accepted that truth.
And now that he had accepted it, all he wanted was to leave as soon as possible.
Right this instant, if he could.
He even found himself wondering why he had suffered so much, clinging to something he could not let go of, when giving up everything could bring such relief.
The young man rose from the bench.
He slipped his hands into the pockets of his cashmere coat (42 million won) and was about to head toward the parking lot where his car (280 million won) was waiting.
That was when it happened.
Rustle.
The dry shrubs in the flower bed shook so violently that he could not simply ignore them and walk away.
He stood still and watched.
A moment later, a yellow cat sprang out.
Even someone as uninterested in campus life as he was knew this cat.
It was a famous campus resident called Nuteori, named for its yellow fur.
Nuteori was carrying something white in its mouth.
A long, white loaf of bread.
"Nuteori, you shouldn't eat things like that."
There was no chance the cat would understand, but he tried to stop it anyway.
Nuteori stared up at him.
Then, moving surprisingly quickly for a cat normally so slow and unbothered by the world, Nuteori approached and dropped the object at his feet.
Is that for me to eat?
I've never eaten bread that wasn't made by the head chef of a five-star hotel, though...
With such thoughts running through his head, the young man crouched down in front of it.
Only then did he realize that it was not bread.
"An animal...?"
"Meow!"
Nuteori gave something resembling an answer before darting back into the flower bed.
The creature had a slender, elongated body covered in fur as white and pristine as freshly fallen snow.
Its face was small and round, with a pink nose. Its tiny ears lay flat, almost buried beneath the soft, fluffy fur.
From the top of its head to the tip of its tail, it was entirely white, like a little doll sculpted from snow.
Its eyes were closed, and it was not moving at all.
It appeared to be dead.
Nuteori would not so much as lift a paw at a sparrow hopping around right in front of it, so there was no chance the cat had killed the creature.
It must have been in an accident.
A weasel?
But I've never seen a weasel this white.
Maybe someone's pet ferret escaped and froze to death in the cold.
At the very least, he thought he ought to move the body off the path and into the flower bed.
He reached out and touched it.
"......!"
It was warm.
An unmistakable warmth spread into his palm.
He placed his fingers against its chest and felt a tiny heart beating rapidly beneath them.
It was alive.
The heartbeat was so fast that it seemed to be urging him to hurry, warning him that it would be too late if he did not act immediately.
The young man gathered the white weasel into his arms and hurried away.