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Join the ServerIn front of the only mirror remaining in the practice room.
Questions and answers exchanged alone.
It was a sight that would make an ordinary person feel terror.
However, knowing the reality, the aspect was different.
“Who are you?”
– Can’t you tell just by looking?
“I cannot tell, though?”
– Though? Why is your way of speaking like that?
“It is originally full of majesty. Will you worship?”
– Huh? What, do what?
“Worship.”
Making even the trainee living in the mirror take a step back inside….
Such an existence was precisely the Demon God.
“You become blurry when you take a step back? Step forward.”
The trainee, whose initiative was completely seized, was flustered.
– What is this? For someone incredibly handsome, he is very strange?
“I am from overseas.”
– …….
The trainee was confused.
There had been quite a few people who visited the practice room until now.
People who came seeking the ghost story or were drawn up by the energy.
When the trainee actually appeared, they were busy being terrified.
That was the reaction of an ordinary human.
There was no human who reacted like this.
In other words, a strange person had entered.
Even that strange person was unhesitating.
“The answer to the question is late. Who are you? For your information, make sure to know that I only endure when I wish to endure.”
The trainee got indignant and shouted.
– I am the prettiest and most successful trainee in this company!
“Is that so?”
– Of course! Look!
The trainee struck various poses and expressions inside the mirror.
“Oh?”
Seeing that, admiration arose on the Demon God’s face.
Lively.
Whether the existence living inside the mirror was a trainee or a CEO, a spirit or an evil spirit, she was first of all lively.
“Passed!”
– Huh?
If she was crying inside the mirror after he came all this way, he couldn’t learn ‘lively’.
In that sense, the start was good for now.
He wasn’t satisfied with the description of ‘the prettiest and most successful trainee in this company’, but he did not press further.
Now was the time to squeeze the secret of being lively out of the trainee.
But.
– Hey, strange person!
“I am called Lee Sun-woo.”
Although he was a Demon God, not a person.
He made sure not to startle her too much.
– Lee Sun-woo, anyway, you answer my question too! I asked first from the start.
This was news to him.
“Was there a question?”
– Grr! I asked if I am pretty, didn’t I?
“Ah.”
Along with the mirror, it was one of the cores of this ghost story.
The question.
A binary question, at that.
It is an established theory that if you receive a question when facing a spiritual existence, you must choose carefully.
Yes, no.
Furthermore, even the hidden option, ‘I don’t know’.
One is bound to choose among these three—
“It is none of my business, though?”
– What?
There was bound to be an existence that escaped the given options.
And the Demon God was always on the side of escaping.
– What on earth is that kind of answer?
It was an answer even more irritating than choosing no.
None of his business? And with that tone of speech, at that?
Veins even stood out on the forehead of the trainee in the mirror.
“Oh, it is well-implemented.”
– What are you saying!
“Anyway, I have no reason to choose, so it is none of my business.”
– ?
“What choice soever is made, is the conclusion not the same?”
– !
It was the same principle as the Red Paper, Blue Paper ghost story.
Although one must answer carefully to a spiritual existence’s question, some existences present the identical conclusion regardless of what the answer is.
Humans choose out of fear, cornered before spiritual existences.
“I do not know what it is, but try to do it.”
The Demon God does not feel fear.
Furthermore, he is familiar with such existences.
Rather, at the Demon God’s exceedingly calm attitude, the trainee felt pressured.
– U-Ugh.
The trainee could not hold out.
– I shall show you my terror!
The Demon God waited, wondering if she was about to manifest an Authority.
“?”
Creak— creak— creeeak—
The Demon God turned around at the creaking sound.
It wasn’t the chains.
It was merely the door that the Demon God had opened and entered strugglingly closing….
Furthermore, it didn’t even close completely. It was even slightly left open.
– Hah, hah, hah!
“…….”
Because he was keeping silent without saying anything out of sheer absurdity.
– There! You saw, right?
“Yes.”
He saw her struggling well.
– I will only let you go if we take a thousand selfies together!
“What?”
Things were getting more and more ridiculous.
“Such a thing is…, a threat?”
– Yes! Scary, right? You saw the door close just now without even touching it, right?
“Naturally, it did not close completely, though?”
– I, I left it like that so the wind can pass!
The Demon God suddenly realized.
‘Is this trainee not just bored.’
At this rate, it wasn’t even a ghost story.
And the Demon God realized one more thing.
‘This seems to be an opportunity to learn lively?’
Having obtained the second realization, the Demon God slightly postponed scolding the trainee.
“Scary. Then I have no choice but to try taking selfies.”
– Why do I feel like I am being mocked?
Nonetheless, the Demon God stood beside the mirror nonchalantly.
Apart from the trainee’s feelings, preparation for the selfie photoshoot was finished.
– Now, we shoot! One, two, three!
Click—
Only the sound of the camera echoed in the empty practice room.
And the photo?
It appeared in the trainee’s hand.
– Now, shall we see? The pretty me and…
The trainee’s expression crumpled.
She held up the photo and showed it to the Demon God.
There, the expressionless Demon God was captured.
Exactly like during Life Four Cuts.
“…….”
– What is this! There is absolutely no expression!
“Well, that is my best. My expression is originally like this. A lively expression like yours does not come out.”
– What? Try mimicking me.
The Demon God’s plot successfully bore fruit.
The trainee, failing to grasp the Demon God’s intention, ended up stepping forward to guide his lively expression.
– Like this!
She smiled brightly along with a V-sign pose.
And the Demon God tried mimicking it.
– No! Like this! Like this!
Before long, the practice room where all the mirrors were broken became the scene of a passionate lecture.
– Expression! Expression is important!
“…….”
– Ah, frustrating!
However, the student was the Demon God.
It was still not smooth sailing.
And at this moment.
Two pairs of pupils appeared in the gap of the door that wasn’t completely closed.
“How is it?”
“Sun-woo Hyung is actually practicing? While murmuring.”
It was Zion and Yoon-seo.
The two who were just waiting could not bear the boredom and fear, and approached the door of the practice room.
In the eyes of the two, the trainee was invisible.
Only the Demon God trying out various selfies was visible.
“It’s true…. Sun-woo is practicing….”
“Fufufufu. I must send this to the members.”
Yoon-seo put his words into practice.
A few photos arrived in the members’ chatroom.
—
Yoon-seo: [Photo]
Tae-young: Sun-woo? Is that Sun-woo?
Ha-gyeom: lolol What are you doing? Sun-woo is doing a V-sign!
Ji-ho: What? Alone? Or is the woman reflected in the mirror coaching him?
Yoon-seo: Yes?
—
Yoon-seo rubbed his eyes and peered inside the practice room again.
“Eh, there is nothing. Ji-ho Hyung is making this kind of joke too?”
Ji-ho originally had a possession-prone constitution, and on top of that, there were things he had experienced together with the Demon God.
He alone approached the truth. But because no one responded, it ended up buried just like that.
Meanwhile, inside the practice room—
– Why is this not working?
“It is absolutely not working, though?”
– Gyaaack!
“There is no use in screaming if it is of no use. My expectations must have been high.”
The student went so far as to blame the instructor instead.
– Ugh. Put plenty of affection toward yourself into it, I say…!
The trainee couldn’t endure it and made another remark.
However, at those words, the Demon God’s ears pricked up.
“What? What did you say just now?”
Put affection toward himself?
“Lively wouldn’t be that kind of emotion?”
– Huh? There is this kind of lively too, you know.
Lively.
A word meaning that facial expressions or actions are bright and full of energy.
When is the Demon God bright and full of energy?
When being mischievous to others, when witnessing malice, when dissipating an evil spirit—
there were various times, but it also applied when he was infatuated with himself.
“I see.”
The Demon God clapped his hands.
“If so….”
He finally felt like he knew something.
“Trainee, try taking a photo.”
The Demon God drew out his emotions.
‘The terrifying existence that shook the universe.’
‘The lofty status to which countless races submit.’
‘To think such a me is doing idol activities right now.’
‘Hmph. Nonetheless, I am also good at this.’
Myself, who is well-enduring even the harsh punishment, I am proud of you.
Self-love raged like a storm inside the practice room.
Raging so much that Zion and Yoon-seo near the doorway actually felt the wind.
“What is this? From where is the wind blowing?”
“Right? A strangely unpleasant wind….”
The Demon God’s storm of self-love.
Self-love that shook even the laws of nature burst forth from the Demon God.
And simultaneously.
Grin.
The corners of the Demon God’s mouth lifted.
He was filled with self-love and exceedingly arrogant, but thanks to that, a bright and lively expression was created.
Click! Along with the sound, a photo was taken.
– This time?
The trainee lifted the photo with expectation, then paused.
– T-This is…?
“Show me.”
The trainee turned the photo and showed it.
The Demon God in the photo was definitely smiling, but—
– You are handsome, but how does such a terrifying expression come out?
A precursor of massacre.
A harbinger of war.
A sentence of death.
No matter how one looked at it, it was so.
The trainee stared at the Demon God with a fed-up face.
“No, it is sufficient.”
– Huh? Sufficient?
The Demon God himself was satisfied.
Of course, it was still on the lacking side to be seen as ‘lively’.
However, compared to when the Demon God took Life Four Cuts, there was a minute, very minute change.
“Gaining a hint is sufficient. Because I did not expect it to be accomplished at once.”
If it were swordsmanship or magic, he could accomplish it at once.
But being lively was an even more difficult task.
It was a task included in the idol punishment.
If the idol punishment were that easy, the gods would not have handed it down as a punishment.
– Y-Yeah…. Since you are satisfied, then so be it.
A moment of silence flowed.
The Demon God was satisfied, and the trainee seemed to have lost the desire to take a thousand selfies.
“Now, then let us have you dissipated.”
– What?!
The Demon God obtained what he needed.
Now he revealed his Aura without subtraction.
– Huh? Uh-uh? Gyaaack!
Facing his status, the trainee ended up screaming.
Being an existence inside the mirror, she couldn’t run away anywhere. It was one thing to take a step back, but she could not escape the mirror.
“Taking a thousand selfies together is bothersome.”
The reason for dissipation heard in the midst of this was also dumbfounding.
– You dissipate me for such a reason?
Of course, that wasn’t all.
The Demon God was the Demon God.
The moment he entered the practice room, he had already grasped what the trainee’s existence was.
It wasn’t a spirit, nor was it an evil spirit.
“Trainee in the mirror, do you not know yourself that you are not a spirit?”
– T-That is….
“You are merely a thought-form.”
The trainee’s identity was a thought.
A person dies and a spirit remains sometimes, but occasionally, only emotions or thoughts harbored for a long time remain. That is called a thought-form.
“The actual trainee?”
– She is probably living well. Extreme self-infatuation was her problem, but she snapped out of it when the company went under. She discarded the self-infatuation in front of the mirror and left.
“Rare.”
It was a case where a thought-form remained even though the person had not died.
A case where a resolutely severed emotion remained alone and nested somewhere.
“You must be the self-infatuation discarded in front of the mirror back then.”
– Y-Yeah…. Anyway, it’s an emotion harbored for a long time, and a mirror is a good object to receive such emotions.
“Merely a thought-form, yet you influence people.”
– I was just…. Bored of taking selfies alone.
“But if you remain like this, you will become an evil spirit.”
The trainee’s face turned pale.
– If I become an evil spirit?
“I must dissipate you before that.”
However, if taking into account the merit of teaching this Demon God to be lively—
“Otherwise, go to SNS.”
There was also this kind of method.
The Demon God held out his cell phone.
Though she was a thought-form, she was a fellow who did no harm.
If she was a thought-form who asked if she was pretty and took selfies full of self-love, there would be no problem with her remaining a bit more.
– SNS?
At the completely unexpected proposal, the trainee thought-form opened her eyes wide.
“Then I shall stop by occasionally to manage you. If it seems you are turning into an evil spirit, I will dissipate you without delay.”
– T-That kind of thing is not called management…!
“So do you dislike it?”
No, there was no way she disliked it.
Whether to be dissipated here, or to live as an influencer on SNS.
The trainee nodded vigorously.
“SNS! I’ll go! Thinking about it, I think that is my stage!”
“Hmph. Make sure to think of every day as your debut.”
The Demon God held out his phone.
Soon, the thought-form disappeared from within the mirror.
The tuition fee would be more than enough with this.
***
When the Demon God opened the practice room door, Zion and Yoon-seo looked this way while grinning.
“What is it?”
“Did you practice selfies well?”
“Has your expression improved a bit?”
A situation where they couldn’t see the last selfie due to the storm of self-love.
The two merely thought the Demon God had been dedicated to practicing alone.
“Hmph.”
The Demon God confidently showed a lively smile.
As he learned.
Containing affection for himself.
Grin.
“Hmph. Is it not lively?”
““…….””
The subtle frustration spread across the faces of the two.
In any case, the Demon God was satisfied.
Because he had acquired the idol Authority [Lively].
The excitement doesn't stop here! If you enjoyed this, you’ll adore The Girl Who Returned from Hell Doesn’t Want to Depend on Her Best friend. Start reading now!
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