Little Pink Starfish

“Now that I think of it, a couple of mine have disappeared recently too.”

“Yeah, same here. Probably taken down by a hunter or something.”

The yokai whispered among themselves, sharing information only they had known. Igok puffed on his reed pipe indifferently as he listened.

“Maybe it’s some clueless rookie grabbing dokkaebi for no reason? Humans always say it’s for revenge, but they end up catching innocent ones.”

“Even that’s rare nowadays. There’s some kind of Hunter Association now, and they train them or whatever.”

“Humans are always making up all kinds of useless stuff.”

Their talk of sharing information soon turned into gossip about the Heavenly Soldiers. Every yokai here had one assigned to monitor them. It was obvious there were several Heavenly Soldiers stationed nearby tonight too.

“What the hell are the Heavenly Soldiers doing? If that Wandering King loses it, even they’d be in trouble.”

“You know how it is. They only monitor us. If we touch a human, they show up foaming at the mouth, but if humans hurt us, they just let it happen.”

“Yeah, Heaven’s always favored humans. The world’s full of them anyway, what’s wrong with eating a couple?”

“They turn a blind eye to one or two a year… but honestly, one or two isn’t enough.”

Complaint after complaint poured out. Igok had said this was supposed to be a relatively human-friendly gathering, and yet this was the tone. Even yokai who didn’t eat humans listened to the conversation without reacting much. The topic had drifted so far that Igok sighed and began to rise.

“…Come to think of it, isn’t there that one kind of crazy hunter lately? What if he’s the one hunting dokkaebi?”

“Eh? All hunters are at least a little unhinged.”

“No, I mean really nuts. Always hunts alone, never dies. I heard he once dug a hole for a month to ambush a centuries-old earth dragon. And he can’t even tell friend from foe—sometimes kills fellow hunters too.”

“You’re telling me a human killed a centuries-old earth dragon? What kind of monster is that?”

Ebi, who had been listening with interest, nodded internally. Normally “earth dragon” meant worm, but one that old was a different story. The older they got, the closer they were to true dragons.

“They say he’s the one who killed the spider of Mt. Gamun…”

Ebi froze mid-groom. The spider of Mt. Gamun…? Could it be that spider?

“Oh, I know who you mean. That hunter who goes around using his real name, right? Yoo Saeon.”

Igok, who had been about to leave and dissolve his smoke-made chair, paused mid-step. He turned around and asked:

“Yoo Saeon?”

“That guy’s even got a record of catching dokkaebi a few years back. He hunts at least one of every kind of yokai.”

At this, Ebi let out a small squeak without meaning to. Igok glanced at him curiously, and Ebi’s whiskers trembled. The conversation confirmed that other yokai thought Saeon was a weirdo, but it didn’t make Ebi feel better. He even wondered: Had Saeon hunted dokkaebi recently just to figure out how to catch him?

“I see. So the name is Yoo Saeon.”

Igok showed interest, and the yokai who brought him up beamed, shouting not to forget to share any blessings if the information was useful. Ignoring the noise, Igok left the gathering without hesitation.

What if Igok goes after Saeon…?

Ebi didn’t think Saeon could stand against Igok. No—even beyond that, just imagining Saeon getting hurt by Igok… or worse, Saeon harming Igok—it was unbearable. Nervously squirming, Ebi was noticed, and Igok lifted him from his sleeve.

“What troubles you?”

Ebi immediately returned to his original form. Even then, he hesitated to speak. Igok reached out and, as if to read his mind, gently held his chin and stared.

Unable to resist the gaze of the king he had served for so long, Ebi was about to tell him everything about Saeon—when Igok suddenly pulled him close and shielded him with his wide robe as he turned around.

“King of Wandering Spirits.”

It was Arang. She had silently approached and now stood in human form, smiling softly.

“What do you want, fox?”

“I just came to greet you since it’s been so long.”

As always, Igok was cold to anyone not a dokkaebi—Arang included.

“I don’t need greetings from the likes of you.”

“I wanted to greet Ebi too.”

Ebi wanted to bow gratefully to Arang, who’d appeared at the perfect time—but Igok lifted his robe and blocked Ebi’s view. Ebi flinched at the sudden darkness.

“Igok-nim…?”

“I have no intention of wasting any more time on nonsense.”

Apparently, Igok was even more displeased with this Yayeon than Ebi had thought. Flustered, Ebi stayed still. As a dokkaebi, he had no choice but to prioritize his king’s word over Arang’s.

Peeking subtly through the robe, Ebi saw Arang still smiling kindly. Arang called to Igok’s back as he turned away without looking back.

“King of Wandering Spirits. That hunter will never harm a dokkaebi. Not a single one.”

“He may do worse.”

Igok’s voice was like frost, tinged with hatred, and Ebi shrank. His skin crawled—not like when he met Saeon. This was pure, undeniable fear.

“As humans always have.”

Igok looked at Ebi. He raised his hand and covered Ebi’s face. A moment later, a flickering blue dokkaebi flame hovered in the air. With a hand, Igok caught the startled flame and stuffed it back into his sleeve. He shot a cold glare at the white fox and vanished in a blaze of massive blue fire.

“…Right.”

Arang murmured, watching the embers flicker and disappear. But he knew: yokai could commit worse acts than humans too. His face—aged by deep loss—wore a bitter regret.

🍬

Ebi had said he’d cut back on his schedule, but he couldn’t cancel everything already under contract. So he was still busy. On his way to a talk show shoot, he found himself deep in thought—recalling the memory of that Yayeon.

More precisely, the hatred Igok had shown toward humans. The memory left a bitter taste.

I guess… Igok-nim still hates humans.

It was a story from more than 200 years ago. Back then, dokkaebi would freely mingle with humans at night, playing tricks and laughing. One night, a particularly sociable dokkaebi got drunk and bragged loudly:

“Our king has way, way more gold than all of us combined!”

Human greed for gold knows no bounds. They coaxed the dokkaebi gently, asking where they got their gold.

Of course, dokkaebi gold wasn’t mined. It came from their innate fortune—jibok (祉福). Thanks to this blessing, they could endlessly produce gold. Each dokkaebi had different amounts of fortune, but the king, Igok, possessed fortune beyond mere gold-making.

At first, the humans were satisfied tricking a few innocent dokkaebi for some gold. But then they wanted more. They started capturing dokkaebi, forcing them to produce gold. When they heard the king could share his jibok, they got greedy. Eventually, they took dokkaebi hostage to threaten him.

“Wandering King! If you don’t give us your fortune, we’ll burn and smash these creatures!”

It was a foolish and cruel move. The dokkaebi—objects that had gained life from human hands and soaked in human blood—were destroyed by humans. Watching them shattered and burned in front of him filled Igok with wrath.

Dokkaebi can terrify humans—but they cannot kill or harm them. Igok was no different. He didn’t take their lives—instead, he cursed them.

Thanks to the stolen fortune, their descendants would be rich and long-lived. But they would also live with unimaginable suffering from birth to death.

After that, Igok gathered all dokkaebi who had mingled with humans. He took custody of objects that might give rise to new dokkaebi. Any who were born, he raised and protected within his domain.

Ebi understood his king’s heart—and so had decided to keep quiet about Saeon. If Igok knew Saeon was trying to hunt him, he would never let it slide. And he wouldn’t tell Saeon about Igok either.

A hunter who spent a month underground to catch an earth dragon… if he heard about the dokkaebi king, he might come running just for fun.

Even imagining it made Ebi feel a tight pull in his gut. It was an unbearably uncomfortable thought.