Ethan gripped his leather briefcase, his knuckles white, and turned to leave the dim sanctuary of the lounge. He had reached the door when Lara's voice, cold as a winter snap, cut through the silence.
"Hold on."
Ethan froze, his hand hovering over the brass handle. He turned back slowly, swallowng hard. Lara hadn't moved, but her presence seemed to fill the room, pressing against the walls.
"Since you are my client, I guess you should know this," she said, her eyes tracking a stray swirl of smoke in the air. "I have one principle: I don't do good deeds, no matter how trivial. I can't risk cultivating more virtue and accidentally becoming human. As for the wrongdoeds, I only avoid the major ones—things like killing people. I am trying to avoid becoming human, not trying to diminish my spiritual powers. Because my life as a nine-tailed fox? It is like a festival that never ends."
Before Ethan could process the terrifying weight of her words, his phone erupted in a frantic ringtone. Lara tilted her head, a ghost of a smile appearing on her lips.
"You can go now and look good for a good shot," she said, dismissively waving a hand. "And also, I have taken the money from the trunk of your car, so there is nothing to worry about. Our transaction is complete."
Ethan staggered out into the night, leaving Lara alone in the shadows, a fox in a silk dress, satisfied with her stagnant divinity.
The high-end shopping district of Gangnam was Lara's natural habitat. She moved through the boutiques with an appetite that only a creature of centuries could possess, her arms laden with bags that represented a year of a human's salary.
As she stepped out of a flagship store, the world suddenly glitched.
The blinding neon lights flickered once, then died, plunging the street into an impossible, velvet darkness. The roar of the city—the engines, the chatter, the distant music—vanished. People froze mid-stride, turned into living statues of ice and cloth.
Lara's heart, usually so steady, gave a sharp thud of irritation. She wasn't scared; she was annoyed.
"You're a beast cultivating yourself. What in the world are you doing here?"
The voice came from directly behind her, ancient and heavy with the authority of the stars. Lara spun around, her eyes flashing gold as she glared at the figure standing in the center of the frozen street.
Minutes later, they sat in a nearby cafe, the only two living souls in a world that had stopped breathing. Lara leaned back in the plush chair, tapping her manicured nails on the table as she stared at the man across from her.
"At cafes, you have to buy one drink per person," Lara said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Those are the rules in the human world these days."
Lord Pagun did not look at the menu. He looked through her. "I am a being far greater than any rule made by humans."
"I know you are," Lara sighed, crossing her legs. "After all, you are the Deity of the Big Dipper. What brings you here anyway, interrupting my hobby like this?"
"You call this a hobby?" Pagun asked, his gaze sweeping over her designer shopping bags.
"Of course. There isn't anything more human and fun than spending money," she countered.
Lord Pagun leaned forward, his presence vibrating with celestial light. "If you enjoy living like a human so much, why won't you become one, while deceiving the eyes of heaven?"
Lara laughed, a sharp, melodic sound that echoed in the empty cafe. "You are missing the point. Who said I want to live like a human? Squeezing into the subway to go to work... working for over ten hours a day, only to collapse to sleep from exhaustion. Even if you make a few bucks like that, you don't have time to spend it. That's what it means to be human—a moment of sweetness and a lifetime of bitterness. But life as a nine-tailed fox? It's like spending money on a pay-to-win game. You get to enjoy all the fun stuff without any of the inconveniences."
She pointed a finger toward the ceiling, toward the hidden stars. "I wonder if the big shots up there would even understand what I'm saying, since they are divine and all."
"You are still wicked and irreverent," Lord Pagun noted, his voice unyielding.
"Oh, whatever. Anyway, I don't think we are on good enough terms to sit and chat. So let's get to the point, Lord Pagun. You want me to become human? Are you asking why I'm still like this when all the other nine-tailed foxes have already become human, lived out their lives, and died?"
Lord Pagun nodded slowly, his expression grim.
"I refuse," Lara said flatly. She stood up, smoothing her skirt. "If that's all, I can go now, right? I'm going home to unbox my new things."
"Your scale..." Pagun's voice dropped, turning into a low rumble of thunder. "...is tipping."
Lara's hand froze on the handle of her shopping bag. Her eyes blazed with sudden, hot anger. "That can't be. I put an insane amount of effort into keeping that balance aligned. I even earn my own money just to appease all of you up there! So how could the scale be tipping?"
"There will come a time when you must choose," Lord Pagun warned, his form beginning to shimmer and fade as the world prepared to restart. "Whether to become a human or be forever annihilated."
Lara barked out a laugh, leaning over the table until she was inches from the deity's face. "Don't make me laugh. They may be deities, but how dare they threaten me? Let them try."
Her voice turned into a whisper of pure defiance. "Do they still think I'm the same naive fox who believed everything the ones above told me? They won't get their way. Even you guys don't really get the so-called Law of Heaven, do you? Because it's so vague and messed up."
She turned on her heel, her shopping bags rustling as she walked toward the door. As she stepped out, the lights slammed back on and the world roared back to life, but Lara didn't look back. She had a festival to attend, and she wasn't planning on letting heaven crash the party.