The Cycle (Complete)

The sacred conference hall

was defiled by a beast.

“Ah, I want to sleep snuggled in Miho’s plump bosom! Click click, click click.”

“…”

The identity of that beast was

a squirrel so cute that anyone, male or female, young or old, would want to embrace.

Yet an unusually talkative squirrel.

Even the squirrel’s way of speaking was strange:

“So, Miho’s friend Yi Haneul. Why did you bring me here?”

“Gu…Gumddakji? Speak properly…”

“Isn’t that what you are? Gumddakji.”

“No!”

Dapoh was

a yokai who had been attached to Miho 24/7 for 2 whole years.

Of course, Miho in the past spent 365 days a year sleeping to conserve her spiritual power.

But whenever she was awake, she conversed with Dapoh 100 out of 100 times.

As a result, Dapoh unconsciously picked up Miho’s way of speaking.

Just as a youth sincere about internet culture uses internet lingo when conversing with friends in reality, it is not easy.

When conversing with Dapoh, Miho used human slang, memes, and the like with Dapoh as well.

And she explained their meanings to him too.

“So what am I supposed to do then? Click click. I really don’t know.”

This was the result.

At Dapoh the squirrel’s fluent Korean speech, everyone present was taken aback.

First, Yi Haneul calmed Dapoh down.

“F…First, just stay still. Didn’t Lord Beast tell you anything?”

“Yeah. Click click. He just told me to do as I please.”

“…Answer honestly if people ask you anything they’re curious about.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.”

Click click.

Pat pat pat pat pat.

Soon, Dapoh headed to the center of the conference hall.

Since Yi Haneul had cleanly destroyed the table, everyone’s gazes were lowered.

The yokai living in the other world of Jirisan are not hostile towards humans.

Originally, they have no reason to be hostile since they never encounter humans.

Among the yokai of the other world, Dapoh was uniquely friendly.

It was for this reason that Dapoh, rather than any other yokai, was dispatched to this important place.

Of course, while Grandfather Mangtae is a yokai, his appearance does not differ greatly from humans.

In terms of appearance, it would have been more appropriate for Grandfather Mangtae to come here instead of Dapoh.

However,

Grandfather Mangtae had a critical flaw –

he does not interact with anyone for more than 10 seconds unless they are a child.

Moreover, if someone like Miho with her large bosom and butt from manifesting over seven tails, or a muscular physique like Baek’s, he not only refuses to interact but even tries to hit them with the walking stick he carries.

Well, fortunately there were no women here with figures comparable to Miho’s seven tails, so that’s a relief at least.

Anyway, Grandfather Mangtae is problematic.

The other yokai are problematic as well –

Yokai with the appearance of ferocious beasts,

Yokai of an alien appearance unlike humans,

Yokai without legs floating in the air, and so on.

The chances of giving a bad first impression were far too high.

In contrast,

Dapoh is lethally cute in appearance.

If asked who is cuter between the two-tailed Miho and Dapoh, one could answer it’s a matter of taste – that’s how cute he looks.

Lord Beast

had experience exterminating goblins alongside humans when serving the ‘King of Yuldo Kingdom’ in the past.

So he understood human nature well.

In that sense,

Lord Beast’s choice to dispatch Dapoh to the conference was an excellent one.

With his unique friendliness, Dapoh merrily conversed with the people gathered.

Of course, no matter how cute his appearance, Dapoh was still a yokai.

As distrust towards yokai lingered, some asked Dapoh aggressive questions.

“You said your name is Dapoh? How can we trust a yokai like you…”

However,

Dapoh’s friendliness exceeded what people imagined.

Click click click click.

Pat pat pat pat.

Dapoh scampered on all fours to the martial artist who bombarded him with aggressive questions, and then sat on that martial artist’s knee.

The flustered martial artist said,

“Wh…What is this, an ambush?!”

“No. Sniff sniff. You have a familiar scent.”

“A…good scent?”

“Yeah. Click click. Mister, do you keep a dog at home?”

“I…I do.”

“Click click. The dog food you feed your dog, does it have a picture of a smiling white dog on it?”

“How would you… As expected, yokai cannot be trusted…”

“Oh, Miho eats that too!”

“…R…Really?”

In this way,

while having silly conversations with the questioners, Dapoh answered their questions squarely without any concealment.

Indeed,

Dapoh is a master of small-talking.

…

…

…

Thanks to Dapoh’s efforts(?), people’s distrust towards ‘the yokai of the other world’ markedly decreased.

It was only natural.

Dapoh spoke well,

was cute,

kind,

and fun.

More importantly,

he did not exude that unique, eerie aura that one feels from yokai.s cannot sense spiritual power without equipment,

but they can instinctively feel ‘discomfort’ to some degree.

Of course, as a 200-year-old squirrel yokai, Dapoh possessed quite a significant amount of spiritual power.

Yet the current Dapoh did not trigger the spiritual power radar,

let alone any eeriness –

rather, a faint spirituality could even be felt.

It seems Lord Beast

worked some trick.

After the question and answer session, Dapoh climbed onto Yi Haneul’s shoulder and began munching on snacks given to him by one of the ‘martial artists’.

Yes,

a martial artist distrustful of yokai shared food with Dapoh.

Thanks to Dapoh, they could finally hold a constructive meeting.

The meeting

lasted until sunset.

---

Dapoh returned.

As soon as he came back to the other world, Dapoh scampered over to me and slipped into my chest before I could react.

“Click click. Home is still the most comfortable after all.”

“Hey, you didn’t act rude, did you?”

“Manners?”

“…”

Wrong question.

It seems Dapoh does not even know the concept of ‘manners’ to begin with.

I asked simply,

“How was it?”

“It was fun!”

“…That’s it?”

“Yup. That’s it.”

Sheesh.

I’m the fool for asking.

But since he said it was fun, the atmosphere itself must have been alright.

Dapoh hates holding back words, so he’s a chatterbox.

“Looks like you had good conversations.”

“Yeah. They’ll accept the yokai’s cooperation. The rest was boring stuff so I didn’t listen.”

“Okay, I didn’t plan to ask you anyway.”

I wasn’t particularly curious either.

As I said,

my role is not to deal with miscellaneous yokai,

but to aim for the king directly.

Useless information is unnecessary.

Now that Dapoh has returned,

I gathered all the yokai of the other world in one place.

The gathering spot was undoubtedly in front of the giant singing tree, Jang Hwa-hyeon.

[Oh, my goddess!]

“Aing… tsk tsk tsk… How dare this vulgar fox summon this ancient dame.”

…Those two old ladies are at it again.

While their senility tires me out on some days,

they are still precious existences to me.

In this battle,

I want all the yokai gathered here to survive.

That is why I plan to reveal their weakness to them.

I don’t know what trick was used, but

right now, from all the yokai gathered here,

faint spiritual power can be felt.

Perhaps Lord Beast worked some trick to distinguish between ‘yokai of the other world’ and ‘ascension-qualified yokai’.

…I never imagined spiritual power could be used in such a way.

Anyway,

with even faint spiritual power imbued in them,

it will help to some degree in exterminating ascension-qualified yokai.

Surprisingly,

among the yokai gathered here, I had the most combat experience.

“From now on, I will teach you how to deal with ascension-qualified yokai and goblins.”

Originally, the yokai race is extremely individualistic, utterly incompatible with ‘groups’.

However,

in the distant past, Lord Beast created the other world and trained an army to oppose the goblins.

The yokai gathered here

are already accustomed to groups, unlike other yokai.

In other words,

we can form squads

to deal with ascension-qualified yokai and goblins.

This is undoubtedly an immense advantage, beyond what words can fully express.

Before I could begin my teachings,

suddenly, Jang Hwa-hyeon spoke to me:

[Wheeeee, wheeeeeeee.]

[Fox, oh fox,]

[What is the best song?]

“A song with great vocal ability, a trendy melody line, and punchy rhythm.”

“…You said that was wrong before.”

“The best song is”

“Becoming the protagonist of the song yourself.”

[Correct! Wheeeee, wheeeeeeee.]

[I am Jang Hwa-hyeon, the singing tree who loves to sing.]

[However,]

[Today,]

[I shall yield the song to the fox.]

[Wheeeee, wheeeeeeeeee.]

“…So you’re telling me to sing a song right now?”

[Wheeeee, wheeeeeeeeee.]

From the lack of response, it seems Jang Hwa-hyeon is simply waiting for me to sing.

A song, huh.

I don’t have confidence in my singing ability.

But I think I know

what song I should sing.

This is

the story of an evil eight-tailed fox

postponing the cycle,

and a benevolent eight-tailed fox

stopping the cycle.

So I began to sing, and

my voice spread far and wide throughout the other world.