Chapter Seventeen Sunny
Chapter Seventeen
Sunny
I glance at the menacing black door a few steps behind us. My friends and I finally made it out of hell, but we didn’t get very far.
“Fuck my life,” I sigh as very tall, very broad males—dressed in tailored black suits of all things—swarm us, brandishing caveman clubs covered with inch-long spikes. I glare at Minju. “I thought dokkaebis didn’t use spiked clubs. You said I was being offensive.”
“I will allow this once that I was mistaken,” the historian says primly, even as she presses up against me.
“Ya think?” I yell.
“Perhaps we should shelve that discussion for another time.” Captain Seo stands with her back against mine and raises her twin swords.
“Right.” I sandwich Minju between myself and the captain, then hold out the Shin’gwangdo, taking a defensive stance.
The ten mountainous goblins sprint headlong toward us. My blood pounds in my ears. I bounce on the balls of my feet to stop myself from paralyzing in fear. A battle cry rips out of my mouth when they’re almost on top of us. Then . . . the males rush right past us, like they don’t even see us.
What in the ever-loving hell?
The dokkaebis collectively heave the black metal door shut, inch by arduous inch. It seems much heavier than when I pushed it open with next to no effort. My friends and I can’t help but flinch when the door shuts with an ominous thud.
Gods, I never want to go back in there.
It occurs to me too late that maybe we should’ve made a run for it while they were distracted.
Because with the door to hell shut, the dokkaebis swiftly surround us in various threatening poses.
They move awfully fast for such ginormous people.
They would actually be intimidating, if it weren’t for their ridiculous sunglasses.
“I appreciate the nod to Men in Black,” I drawl, gripping the hilt of the Shin’gwangdo with both hands. “But are the shades really necessary in the middle of the night?”
I can’t tell where we are. Dull, gray fog surrounds us as far as even my magic gi goggles can see. There are no trees, buildings, or anything at all, except for hell’s door behind us and the towering goblins looming in front of us.
I can see the night sky above us, though. The moon seems impossibly far away, as small as my pinky nail, but it is nighttime, so no sunglasses necessary.
“Sunny.” Minju tugs on the sleeve of my T-shirt. “Goading them might not be the best idea.”
“We can remove the sunglasses, if you prefer,” the biggest of the big dokkaebis says in a smooth, dark voice. He steps toward us and takes off his sunglasses with one hand, angling his head just so.
“Oh my,” Minju breathes.
Oh my is right. The move is so blatantly sexy that I bite my index finger, considering asking him to do it again . . . mostly to aggravate him but also because I wouldn’t mind seeing him do that again.
The saucy request, however, dies on my lips when he raises his head and meets my gaze. A chill runs down my spine, and this time, it isn’t the good kind.
His eyes are completely black. No pupils, no irises, no sclera. Just all black.
“Please don’t trouble yourself on our account.” Captain Seo clears her throat, not quite meeting the male’s eyes.
“Thank you. That is very thoughtful of you.” The goblin gives her a crooked grin as he puts his sunglasses back on in a reverse striptease.
I swear the captain sighs like a smitten teenage girl when the sunglasses slide back in place. I gleefully tuck away the moment as future teasing material. Absolute gold.
“Now then,” the biggest dokkaebi continues, “shall we discuss what brings you to our kingdom?”
“Why don’t we start with a round of introductions?” I quip. “You go first.”
I feel another tug on my sleeve. I ignore her, but she tugs again. I turn to Minju with bulging eyes. “What?”
“I know who they are,” she whispers, sneaking a peek at them. “They are the Judges of Ten Hells.”
I study the ten males consideringly. Sure, they have chilling eyes—I focus my magic gi goggles on them—but their life force, while powerful, is not god level.
As a matter of fact—I squint and look more closely—something depleted a chunk of their gi recently, but they are recovering quickly.
Either way, they are mighty as they come and should not be trifled with.
But trifling is so much fun.
“Hmm.” I lower my sword a smidgen. “I’m not familiar with the Judges of Ten Hells. Are they special or something?”
Captain Seo makes a choking sound from behind me, and Minju covers a scandalized gasp with her hand. The sexy dokkaebi chuckles darkly, the sound rumbling in his chest. I start to fan my face, but I catch myself and pretend to scratch my neck.
“I still think introductions are necessary.” I dig my heels in because I am a gumiho of conviction. “Do you guys go by numbers or names?”
Minju emits a high-pitched squeak, and the captain kicks my calf with her heel. I ignore them both.
“I am the Judge of Tenth Hell.” He dips his head in a gallant bow. “My friends call me Gyun.”
“And my friends call me . . .” I remember the nickname Haesan, my suhoshin-cadet buddy, gave me. Stormy. I suddenly miss the massive merman so much that my breath hitches. “I’m Sunny.”
“Why are you here, Sunny?” The Judge of Tenth Hell cocks his head to a tantalizing angle. “And how did you escape the Tenth Hell?”
“That was Tenth Hell?” It’s an honest question since I had no idea that was Tenth Hell. And also, I’m stalling. “Is Tenth Hell the worst hell? With First Hell being the nicest? Or is it the other way around? Although, I can’t imagine any hell being nice—”
“Sunny,” he says my name so softly that I barely hear him, but his tone scares me enough to shut me up. For a second.
“Now would be a good time to help,” I hiss at my friends from the corner of my mouth.
Do we tell him the truth? How much of the truth do we tell him? My gut tells me he isn’t our enemy, but that doesn’t make him our ally either.
“We walked the moonglade from the Mortal Realm to return to the Realm of Four Kingdoms,” Minju explains succinctly.
I guess we’re going with the truth.
Surprise rumbles through the judges, but they grow silent when the Judge of Tenth Hell holds up a hand. “Why did you choose that deadly path instead of entering past the Gray Void?”
“Because the Gray Void no longer exists, and . . .” Minju takes a bracing breath. “The Amheuk now lies in its place.”
There are no surprised murmurs this time around. The judges simply lose their fucking shit.
“The Amheuk?” cries one judge.
Others whip their heads around every which way, as though the ancient force of darkness is descending on them right this second.
“But how could that be?” another yells, shaking the poor dokkaebi next to him by the shoulders.
Maybe the whole truth wasn’t the best idea.
I shrug with a tilt of my head. Who can stay calm when somebody basically tells you that you’re all going to die? Their alarm is to be expected. What I didn’t expect was for them to take Minju at her word.
People tend to become angry when they’re scared.
And when they’re angry, they start pointing fingers to cast the blame on the easiest scapegoat.
I expected them to accuse Minju of lying, of trying to trick them for her own gain.
They should be vilifying her—punishing her—to hide from their own fears.
But apparently, the Judges of Ten Hells don’t point fingers and cast blame on others. They feel and express their fear authentically. That is a sign of true strength. I respect them for it, and maybe I can even . . . trust them.
When the Judge of Tenth Hell raises both hands, the other judges finally fall silent, even as they continue exchanging alarmed glances past their sunglasses.
“We have many questions, but I believe the most pertinent one is this.” The Judge of Tenth Hell looks at Minju, Captain Seo, and me in turn. “Why did you risk your lives to return to the Realm of Four Kingdoms when you knew the Amheuk has breached the realm?”
“To stop it from destroying the worlds.” The captain offers Minju and me a solemn nod of solidarity. “Or die trying.”
The dokkaebi’s eyebrows rise over his sunglasses. “Is that true for all of you?”
“Yes,” Minju and I answer as one.
“Huh.” The Judge of Tenth Hell turns to me. “May I ask why you would do that?”
I open my mouth to tell him I’m doing it for the adrenaline rush, but I hear myself saying, “To protect the one I love, because he is my beating heart. And to save my friends, because they are my family. I will give my life for them, because there is no life without them.”
My eyes do their best to mimic saucers, and I clap a hand over my mouth, hard enough to sting.
Did I just say those things out loud?
“You can only tell the truth to the Judges of Ten Hells.” Minju runs a soothing hand down my back. “They can’t decide the fate of a passing soul based on lies, so it is literally impossible to lie to them.”
“I guess sarcasm counts as lying,” I mutter, shaken from baring my fucking soul to total strangers. In front of my friends. I don’t know which part is more embarrassing.
Also, the judges decide the fate of the passing souls? Not the god of Underworld?
“Please, call me Gyun,” the Judge of Tenth Hell says with a warm, open smile, oblivious to my monumental mortification and confusion. “There is no reason more noble than yours, and I would be proud to call you my friends.”
“I might not want any more friends.” Loving the ones I already have is overwhelming enough. “But I guess it’s better than being bludgeoned to a pulp with a spiked club. Wait. If we make friends with one of you, does that mean we have to be friends with all of you?”
“I’m afraid so,” a younger looking dokkaebi says with laughter in his voice. “Hi, I’m Jun. I’m the Judge of First Hell—the nicest hell.”
He’s teasing me. We really must be friends.
“Sunny gets loopy in dangerous situations. It’s her coping mechanism,” Captain Seo explains on my behalf. “Hi, Jun. I’m Cheyun, and this is Minju. Now that we’re all friends, can one of you show me the quickest way to the Kingdom of Mountains?”
His smile dims by a fraction of a watt. “Why are you in such a hurry to go to a war-ridden kingdom?”
“So General Bak followed through with his plan,” Minju murmurs in toneless dejection. “He waged war on the Kingdom of Mountains—against his own grandson.”
My molars grind together as my entire body clenches with helpless rage.
If the general hurts Ethan—if anyone hurts him—I might set the whole world on fire.
It kills me that I can’t go to him when he needs me.
But it’s my own fault for foolishly letting the tyrant king trick me into the blood oath, keeping me away from Ethan.
For a split second, I consider going to the Kingdom of Mountains anyway. But I stare down at my left palm and trace the circle of blood branded on the mound beneath my thumb. If I break the oath, I will bleed from the circle until I die a quick but painful death.
I am not afraid of pain or death, but I am no use to Ethan or my friends if I’m dead. I need a chance to do better. I owe it to them. I owe it to myself.
“That war is why I have to return to the Kingdom of Mountains without delay.” Captain Seo answers Jun’s question.
“I need to help them stop the Kingdom of Sky’s unprovoked assault—to end a senseless war waged to satisfy one male’s thirst for vengeance.
Only then can the four kingdoms unite to fight the real war against the Amheuk. ”
Captain Seo is right. The four kingdoms must unite. If they can’t work together, we might as well hand over the realm to the Amheuk.
I draw a sharp breath, goose bumps blanketing my skin. Ethan must unite the four kingdoms and defend the realm from the eternal darkness. That is his destiny as the King Foretold.
“I will take you to the portal,” a soft-voiced dokkaebi says. “I’m Mun, the Judge of Fourth Hell.”
“They really should go by numbers,” I murmur without thinking, still reeling from how the prophecy of the King Foretold will be fulfilled. “There’s no way we’ll remember all these na—”
“Thank you, Mun.” Captain Seo raises her voice over my blabber, then glares at me.
I cringe sheepishly. Right. I probably shouldn’t insult the only beings who can take us where we need to go. But where do I go from here? I can’t return to the Kingdom of Mountains without dying. Maybe I can help Ethan from the Kingdom of Underworld.
“I am a historian with the Order of the Suhoshin.” Minju pulls back her shoulders, determination in every line of her lovely face. “I need access to the nearest Suhoshin library. I must do my part to defend against the Amheuk.”
“It would be my honor to escort you to the Kingdom of Underworld’s Suhoshin headquarters.” Jun executes a gallant bow.
“Is there anywhere you need to be, Sunny?” Gyun asks dryly.
“As a matter of fact, there is.” My heart pounds in my chest with half nerves and half determination. I know how to help Ethan. “I need an audience with the King of Underworld.”