Chapter OneIt’s a cold night on Halla Mountain (할라산). Crickets cast creepy choruses on the forest floor. We’re hunting a group of vampires who’ve been lurking on the far side of a ravine. I keep myself alert with my Japanese partner, Master Seiji Inada (稲田 誠治) on the opposite ridge. I was having very little success and I was about to call it a night, until I see a lone bat dashing across the moonlit canopy. I reload my .45-caliber revolver with fresh silver bullets and watch in silence as it morphs into its human form. As the wind blows bitter cold through the leaves, I see the shape-shifted figure moving through the underbrush. My finger hangs wearily over the trigger as I wait for the creature to come into range. There’s no time to check further—I peer around a boulder in time to see the vampire making a mad dash across the ravine. I take aim and mow it down, then slowly walk towards it to see if it’s dying. If this vampire is fully subdued, the Governor will pay me a quarter million Korean Won for this feat.
(picture source: Vampire Knight Anime)My name is Jackie Chang (张杰齐) and I’m a Vampire Hunter. I'm average built, average weight and have a below-average vocabulary for the Korean language. Not surprising, since I’m from Singapore and my mother tongue is Mandarin. I have chosen to be a vampire hunter because I have always wanted to be different. If I’d followed my country’s blueprint for “economic success”, I’d be mugging for my exams, get a degree, and eventually get holed up in an office cubicle. Or worse, after years of hard work in a company, a new CEO comes in and you get retrenched.
Instead, I bought a one-way flight ticket to Japan and travelled to the Yamaguchi prefecture. There, I enrolled myself into the Tokuyama Academy of Demonology (徳山 殺妖者 学社), and I was trained to be a vampire hunter. My course instructor, Master Seiji Inada has now become my working partner. Although I feel that I’m rather talented, Master Seiji always tells me that my success has more to do with sheer luck than with skill.
(picture source: google earth maps)
Under the invitation of the local government, we arrived here in Jeju Island six months ago to set up a hunting agency. Our office is in the Samdo-1-Dong (삼도 일동) district, which at first glance might not seem like one. Well, the office actually functions as our home and we have a female member living under the roof together. Han Mirae (한미래), our secretary of sorts, helps with the paperwork and housekeeping. She sometimes tags along with us when we do our vampire slaying thing.
Mirae was orphaned at a tender age, and had been raised in a Catholic Convent, until she was old enough to work and make a living. That’s how we met her and invited her to work for us. Apart from secretarial work, Mirae also treats the wounds and injuries that we receive after fighting and killing the vampires. Mirae just doesn’t enjoy that feeling of stabbing a sword across, or gunning a bullet into a vampire’s chest. She feels really bad about having to kill a fellow Korean. It just doesn’t seem right to her about killing a fellow countryman. In fact, this girl had saved the life of a vampire recently, and his name is Shin Taewoo (신태우).
Earlier this evening, I caught her packing a few make-up items into her bag, along with a comb and mirror, and she was out the door before I had time to ask her where she was going. Her hair was pulled into a ponytail, and she was wearing black winter stockings, a red long jacket and a white sweater with a turtleneck. Nevertheless, as she was hurrying away down the street, I poked my head out the door and yelled. “Hey Mirae! Where are you going?”
“Out!” she called back, waving and skipping around a corner. Without further guessing, she must have gone to see Taewoo. I blew out a sigh of resignation, failing to understand why Mirae is so mesmerised by that vampire. However, what pisses me off is that Mirae isn’t the only one who’s being kind to Taewoo. If it wasn’t for Master Seiji, I could have easily finished him off on several occasions. The Japanese hunter seems very protective of him, and there’s just something odd about this. I can’t quite place it, but I know there’s something fishy going on.
I don't actually know if Taewoo is good or bad. Truth is, no one knows much about this vampire. The only thing I know for sure is that he's one of the Guerillas (former rebels). And they have been at war with the Regiments (former soldiers) for more than fifty years.
Chapter Two
Walking along the deserted street towards Taewoo’s house, Mirae rubs her hands and blows her breath to keep them warm, as the chilly autumn night envelopes her. Taewoo had brought her home a few nights before, so the route to his house is still fresh in her mind. She has a talent for memorizing things, and her memory is serving her flawlessly now. The house is standing on the high part of a sloping acre, and the surroundings has an unkempt look, pebbled and weedy. A deserted motel, Taewoo’s house has layers of old paint snaking off the exterior. The Korean girl squints at the building before her, looking for any sign of life, and seeing none. Maybe the two brothers aren’t at home, she ponders, beginning to pick her way through the grass toward the front door. The blades of grass reach mid-shin, and it’s a bit itchy, but she carefully skirts the high clumps, and makes it to the front door unscathed.
She knocks a few times on the door, waits, and tries again when she doesn’t get an answer. She then presses her ear to the door, listening for noise from within. She thinks she’s hearing a slight rustling, but that may be something else. Like the rats from the basement. Mirae shivers at the thought. She edges back and tries to open the door, but it doesn’t budge at all. She then leans over to peer in through a window, only to find it boarded up. She scowls, and stomps off around the house, trying to find another way in. To her disappointment however, all the windows on the ground floor are boarded up, and there’s no way she can pry them away, no matter how hard she tries. She growls in frustration, stomping her foot angrily.
Mirae just wants to see Taewoo, that’s all. Do the Shin brothers really have to board their windows up and not answer the door so she can’t get in like this? She growls again, and is just about to try the front door again when she spots a drain pipe conveniently placed right beside an open window. The pipe is rusty, but this seems to be her only option now. Mirae hangs the strap of her bag between her jaws, clenching it with her teeth, and begin to scale the pipe.Gripping the pipe tightly in her hands, she takes a swing and manages to cling on to the window sill. She then struggles with the partially open window pane, hauling herself halfway over before losing hold of her bag. It drops all the way down to the ground, and she stares at it for a moment, her eyes narrowing. She then huffs and - deciding she doesn’t much want to scale the pipe again, and that she can simply pick it up on her way out - leaves it there, hidden beneath the tall grass.
Mirae dusts the flakes of rust off her hands. The room she finds herself in once she climbed over the window sill is sparsely decorated with cobwebs. The motel bed is now reduced to a dusty mattress on box springs, but her eyes are immediately drawn to the silver flute resting on it. She walks slowly to it, her footsteps seeming unusually loud in the quiet house. Fingering the holes on the instrument, she experiments with blowing, but it’s a lot harder than it seems. Her face is getting red from the exertion, and she eventually lays the flute back down. The door suddenly creaks open, and Mirae gives a little squeak of surprise.
A figure appears, dressed in a black fleece jacket. At first Mirae thinks it’s Taewoo, because of the black wavy hair and red eyes. But she soon realizes it’s Shin Eunwoo (신 은우), Taewoo’s elder brother. She finds the sharp edge of a sword against her throat, not even realizing the blade had been drawn. It glimmers maliciously in the moonlight, and she gulps.
“Annyung haseyo,” she greets with a slight bow, smiling weakly, hoping the blade doesn’t slip on accident. Or on purpose.
Eunwoo observes her silently for a few more seconds, then lowers his sword to sheath it. “How can I help you?” he asks with an aloof scowl on his face, still-crimson eyes watching her. With an unblemished face and two large eyes, Mirae could be more beautiful if Eunwoo hasn’t startled her with his sword. Mirae squirms a bit under his gaze, but replies in a steady voice.
“I would like to talk to Taewoo,” she replies, and Eunwoo nods slightly, then gestures slightly to the door. Mirae walks out, shutting it behind her, and almost instantly hears the sound of the flute she’d been examining not a minute before.
"How beautiful", she reflects as she wanders through the house, searching for Taewoo’s room. She’d found it before in the same manner, and she manages to do it again this time.
Taewoo is lying on his bed, hands interlaced behind his head as he stared up at the ceiling, but he looks up when Mirae pokes her head in. He blinks a few times, clearly not expecting her to pop into his room like that.
“What are you doing back?” he asks, and Mirae can’t stop a slight smile from crossing her face. The exact question his elder brother had asked of her.
“I just wanted to talk to you,” she replies...
.......................................................................
This excerpt is found in the sequel to Curse of Jeju Island,
BLOOD ENEMIES OF JEJU ISLAND,
which will be released depending on the sale performance of the first book~
For those of you reading this and have bought and read my first book, I'd like to say A BIG THANK YOU~!! :)
For those of you who have not bought or read it yet, I encourage you to pick up a copy at a bookstore near you, so that the second book may be released sooner...
Thanks for all your continuous support~!
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