Chapter 1: Ocean Acne (1)

One day, I came across a post on my favorite online community. It was titled: Would you rather live in isolation for a year and receive a 100k salary or keep your current lifestyle?

I clicked it and scrolled down.

- You’ll be isolated in a room and can cook simple things like instant food. You’ll have internet but will be cut off from the outside world.

Tap tap tap. I typed a comment.

- 100k salary? I can do it for even a quarter of that lolol

Ding. Someone replied to my comment.

- Stop bluffing, you dimwit. Humans CANNOT live alone. This famous university conducted a research doing exactly this to study social psychology. Most people gave up the compensation money and dropped out halfway LOL. You’ve got no chance, dude.

I paused for a moment before typing my reply.

- I’m already living like that, f*ck.

How is that possible, you ask? Well, I’m a lighthouse keeper.

* * *

My name is Eojin Lee. I was born in 1991, which makes me thirty-one years old. I’m in regular government service for the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries. After competing against fifty others, I became a civil servant working in a lighthouse under the Seaway Navigation Office.

Guldeok Island, the place I’m working at, is a tiny island located about fifty-six miles from Port of Incheon. Unlike most other lightkeepers these days, I live at the lighthouse while tending and caring of it. Originally, I was supposed to switch shifts every month. However...

“The next guy never showed up, dammit,” I grumbled.

I’ve been stuck here for three months already. Someone who’s never worked before might ask, “How can someone be so irresponsible?” But the world is full of more ridiculous people and things than one might think.

I turned toward the window. The pouring rain and the thrashing waves weighed on my mind. I couldn’t help but sigh due to more reasons than one. “Can I even get my supplies on time?” I murmured.

Baekjeok Island, located nearby, is about an hour away, while it takes a good three hours to get to Incheon. But that’s only when the tide is low. The ferry schedule goes out the window in this kind of weather. And there’s no such thing as rescheduling. It just gets delayed for who knows how long. It’s like that in an island.

“Crap, it’s raining too much. Even the Internet’s not working.” I scratched my head while gazing at the lost Internet connection screen. It’s been days since both the phone and the Internet stopped working. Something definitely must have gone wrong.

“I hope the generator’s not damp. Is my blanket still dry? I’ll take a look first thing tomorrow when the rain stops.”

Well, I’ve been pretty lazy with the maintenance as of late. There’s this chief at the fishing village who sends me supplies once a week. Would I be pushing it if I said his laid-backness was rubbing off on me? I felt lazy to even boil water. So instead, I cracked open a packet of instant noodle. On days like this, eating raw instant noodle or grilled fish jerky is the best.

“Aw, man. I’m out of beer.” I sighed.

The only things I had left in my cupboard were a few cans of tuna and luncheon meat, instant rice, and a couple of instant coffee packets. The rest were mostly instant noodles. I was wondering how to transform this simple diet into a decent one. Then I heard a knock.

Thud thud thud.

The sound of the iron gate rang from the stairs below. It was a rainy night and I was in a deserted island. Someone was knocking from the first floor of the lighthouse. It was the perfect opening scene of some horror story, but I wasn’t scared.

“Okay, I’m coming,” I said nonchalantly.

“Holy smoke, it’s pouring outside! What were you doing, Eojin?” Mr. Park opened the gates and stepped inside. I’ve been seeing him around for the past month.

“You still haven’t left, sir?” I asked.

“Hey! It’s been pouring nonstop for days. Why would I go out there now? My boat will flip over! Are you telling me to go die? Geez!”

“Alright, I get it. So, what brings you here?”

“Oh, I wanted to get some hot water. I was going to use my portable stove but it’s raining way too much. My God, I can’t even tell if I’m walking or swimming through all this rain.” Mr. Park laughed like a clown as he wrung out the sportswear he was wearing inside his raincoat.

He was one of the two fishermen who fished for days on end. True fishermen had personalized gear and went to their favorite spots during specific seasons. There, they’d camp out for months at a time, fishing. And it just so happened that Mr. Park’s favorite fishing spot was located close to my workplace.

Well... At least the island’s somewhat safe. I heard some of these fishermen camp out on a rock and drown to death when the tide rises.

“You’re imagining me drowning, aren’t you?” Mr. Park said.

I snapped out of my thoughts and said, “Um, nope!”

When I waved my hand no, Mr. Park chuckled and held out an icebox. “Look, I’m not here to mooch off you. Voila! It’s a live fish. I caught it today.”

“Wow. It’s a black seabream. It’s huge,” I marveled aloud.

“You know your stuff now, Eojin. You can tell apart big fish from small. You’ve really grown.” Mr. Park laughed heartily before setting the fish on top of the kitchen sink. Thunk. The fish seemed to be quite heavy.

“You can eat it raw or boil it in a soup. Whatever you want,” said Mr. Park.

“I don’t have soy sauce or wasabi though...”

“Oh please! Freshly caught black seabream tastes sweet without any of that. Or just make it into a soup.”

“I don’t have any seasoning to make soup,” I muttered, “Well, anyway, thank you. Should I boil some water in a tea kettle for you?”

“Yeah, and give me some instant coffee packets while you’re at it,” Mr. Park replied.

“But I don’t have many left,” I said.

“Oh, come on. Don’t be so cheap. I’ll bring you a hundred of them the next time I bring my boat over. Just give me two.” Mr. Park smirked as he rummaged through the cupboard and pocketed a couple of instant coffee packets.

Why did he bother asking for my permission? I thought, annoyed.

Just then, Mr. Park gazed at the first aid kit beside my chair and said, “Oh yeah, can I have some ointment and gauze too?”

“What? Sure. Did you injure yourself?” I asked.

“Well, my friend did. I’m a little scratched up too,” Mr. Park said as he scratched his face and wrist.

The lighting was dim and Mr. Park was backlit, so I couldn’t really see his wound. Well... I guess it’s nothing serious. He made it here after all. I nodded briskly and sprang up.

Mr. Park poured the hot water into his thermos and turned to leave. On his way out, he boasted about the sixteen-inch-long black seabream he had caught.

Once he was gone, I mumbled to myself, “Hm. What do I do with the black seabream? Should I eat it raw? Or should I cut off its head and put it in my instant noodle?”

Either way, I had to gut the fish and put it away in the fridge, so I picked up the black seabream.

“Whoa!” I muttered, astonished by its weight. “What’s up with this fish? Why’s it so damn heavy?”

Normally, huge fish caught from the sea were unbelievably strong and heavy. But this one was especially weighty. Plus, its appearance was a little bizarre. There were weird bumps everywhere, just like...

“Huh. Are these acne? Do fish even have any?” I cocked my head and picked up a kitchen knife. The fish flapped weakly on the board. It’s not very strong for its size, I thought. I held the fish by its head and began scraping off the scales.

“Aagh!” I jumped in surprise, almost dropping the knife.

When I removed the fish scales, the skin—way thinner than usual—also peeled off, revealing grotesque things inside. If the ocean had acne, then it would look exactly like this. Numerous bumpy lumps were formed underneath the fish skin.

I stared at it at length before finally realizing what it was. “Huh. Are these barnacles?”

The lumps attached inside the black seabream were indeed barnacles. Wait... Aren’t barnacles usually attached to a rock or something?

“Ugh, I’m losing my appetite,” I muttered distastefully. With a grimace, I scraped off the barnacles. Next, I flipped over the tattered fish and slit its stomach. It was time to remove its guts and entrails. When the knife slid through the stomach, something clacked. Again, I was filled with apprehension.

“Aaagh!” I gasped, appalled when I spread open the stomach and took out its guts. The red, blue, and yellow fish guts were packed with tiny pellets much like grains of sand. They were barnacles again, formed even on the deepmost skin and entrails inside the fish.

“Blech... It’s disgusting. Were these barnacles trying to break through the fish skin?” No wonder the black seabream weighed so much for its size. The fish was filled with calcite shells.

“It looks painful as hell.”

I scrubbed off the sharp barnacle shells and tossed them into the sink. Now, I had zero appetite to even eat this fish.

Just then, I heard something unusual from outside the window. Thwack! It sounded slightly different from the raging storm, the violent sea, and the rumbling thunder.

“Huh?” I poked my head out the window.

Outside, I saw a mysterious boat approaching in the dark. I rushed up the stairs. How did I not notice a boat that big until now? It didn’t make sense.

As I hurriedly ran up the stairs, I again glanced at the sea from the window.

“Huuuh?”

I didn’t see anything outside. Only the raging storm continued.

“Am I seeing things?”

Could the boat have disappeared in such a brief moment? Well... Of course, it could. Human senses were no match for the great ocean.

“The radars are functioning normally. I have enough electricity too thanks to the generator,” I thought aloud.

I was a little too old to believe in things like ghost ships and the mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle. I concluded that my brain must have played a trick on me.

“I mean, if there really was a boat approaching recklessly, the village chief would’ve had a fit already.”

Guldeok Island and Baekjeok Island may be small, but that didn’t mean one could just waltz right in. It was quite difficult to attain entry.

“If I wasn’t seeing things... then the boat must be headed to Port 3 at Baekjeok Island,” I mused.

Baekjeok Island had a population of about a thousand people. It was a sizeable island, so even if something happened, they knew the drill. Or so I thought and stopped thinking about the boat. There were loads of other things to be worried about.

“I have to contact the remote system control company to request a routine maintenance service, write an order form to send over, review my task orders, prepare to train the next person in charge of security management, and... right. I also have to remove the blanket around the generator before it gets soaked.”

On top of that, I had to clean the rusted guardrails, unclog the toilet, and change the lightbulb... Basically, I was slammed with work. For now, I decided to finish the raw instant noodle first and tackle my tasks after.

...

Whenever I look back to this moment much later, I always think of two things—what I did right and what I did wrong. What I shouldn’t have done was dismissing the mysterious boat. What I did do right was that I did not eat the black seabream that Mr. Park gave to me that day.