Episode 69:
The Shaman Bride’s Dark Secrets

On March 3, 2021, a 43-year-old man named Choi in Daejeon was busy preparing to reopen his store when his phone rang around 11 p.m. — an unfamiliar number, then a voice from the Cheongju Police Station.

"Are you Choi Jang-hoon's younger brother? Your brother passed away in a studio apartment. We need the family to come in." His mind went blank. He rushed to Cheongju with his family — but on the way, something didn't add up.

The brothers had lost touch. What happened in between?

A Sudden Rupture

Choi Jang-hoon, 45, had supported his mother and siblings from a young age after their father died, working his way up to store manager at a large supermarket and earning over $60,000 a year. His only lingering worry was that he'd never married. In 2018, their mother died suddenly, and Jang-hoon struggled to cope — until one day he called his younger brother with a bizarre accusation: that his sister-in-law had performed a curse ritual that killed their mother, and that everyone had known and said nothing.

No amount of reasoning reached him. He declared he was cutting ties completely, refused every attempt at contact, and vanished from his family's life. His brother, devastated, fell into depression and had to close his own shop for nine months before finally pulling himself together to reopen it — the same week the call came.

Four Months, Undiscovered

The body was found by the studio's landlord, who'd fielded weeks of complaints about a foul smell, initially blamed on the drains. Going unit by unit, he reached Jang-hoon's door, got no answer, and called police. Inside, what first looked like a charred mannequin was Jang-hoon's severely decomposed body. The cause of death was hanging — but decomposition made it impossible to pin down when. Phone and bank records eventually placed his last normal activity on November 6th, four months before he was found.

Everyone who knew him — colleagues, friends, family — said the same thing: none of it made sense for a man who was financially secure, well-liked, and mentally strong. The real estate agent who'd handled his lease had an emergency contact on file, a woman who claimed Jang-hoon was simply on Jeju Island and unreachable — an odd excuse in a country with cell coverage nearly everywhere. Records showed he'd bought an expensive foreign car despite being famously frugal, one no one had ever seen him drive. A dealership employee recalled a woman calling in December 2020 — a month after his estimated death — apologizing for missed payments and claiming he was hospitalized in Seoul. In January 2021, someone paid off his overdue electricity bill in full. On the day his body was found, a woman was seen pulling a bill for the overdue luxury car straight out of his mailbox.

The Shaman

That woman was identified as Jang-hoon's girlfriend, known by the alias Lim — a traditional shaman who ran a home shrine and had first met him as a regular customer at his supermarket, buying offerings for her rituals. They grew close after his mother's death, when he asked her to perform the traditional ritual guiding his mother's spirit to rest. Introduced to his family, welcomed warmly, he fell hard for a love that came late in life — and it was Lim who fed him the curse-ritual accusation that severed him from the brother he'd once been closest to.

With his family gone from his life, Lim announced she was pregnant, and Jang-hoon was overjoyed — then began funding everything: baby supplies, hospital visits, and, at her insistence, a luxury car "for comfort." His roughly $380,000 in savings disappeared. He quit his job and handed over his severance. He sold his apartment and moved into a cramped studio near her, a man who once earned six figures a year now struggling to cover $230 in rent, borrowing from friends and taking out loans that all flowed straight to her — without a single thank-you. The ultrasound photo she'd shown him belonged to someone else entirely; she was never pregnant at all.

Final Thoughts

Once his money ran out, Lim vanished behind a wall of excuses — praying, hospital visits, anything to avoid him. Isolated from his family and abandoned by the woman he'd given everything to, Choi Jang-hoon died alone in that studio apartment. His last message, found afterward, asked only that she not skip meals, reassured her she wasn't alone because of the baby he still believed existed, apologized for no longer being able to help with her car payments, and wished her a better life with a wealthy man in her next one.

When police finally reached Lim, she claimed she hadn't spoken to him since November and had no idea he was dead — despite being the one calling dealerships and paying his bills on his behalf. She admitted to lying about the pregnancy but insisted the money had been given freely, out of affection. Investigators concluded she had manipulated him into handing it over willingly rather than taking it by force or direct threat — and under Korean law, that left nothing to prosecute. Both the criminal case and a later fraud lawsuit from his family were dismissed for insufficient evidence. Lim walked away having taken everything from a man who died still trying to provide for a child that never existed, and having learned, in the process, exactly how to do it again without consequence.