Chapter 441: Interlude - A Deal |
Kwon Oh-Jin slowly opened his eyes.
This is…
Darkness smothered the world as pitch-black as a moonless night.
Even if he reached out, nothing was there. Even if he kicked his legs, he found no foothold. A crushing helplessness pressed down on him as though he were drifting alone through endless space.
Ah…
He couldn’t see, hear, or feel as if he had been thrown into a starless void. The emptiness felt unbearable.
Who… am I?
He couldn’t remember who he was, where this place was, or why he had thrown himself into this suffocating cloud of darkness. Nothing came to mind.
No…
To take back everything I had given up.
For that reason, he had come to this lightless abyss.
He drifted aimlessly through the black clouds, barely holding onto his consciousness. The massive sea of darkness suddenly roared.
Rumbbbble!
The violently churning black clouds began to split in two.
This is…
No, it didn’t split. It was being torn apart like a giant stuffed toy being ripped in half.
The two Black Heavens forcefully divided.
My lost memories are inside that.
Kwon Oh-Jin tried to kick off with all his strength and propel himself toward the gap forming between the two halves.
“K-Kugh!”
The moment he approached, the raging black clouds instantly pushed him back. A mere human couldn’t resist this primordial darkness born before creation itself.
The Black Heaven didn’t reject him because it sensed his plan. It rejected him the way a person unknowingly crushed an ant while walking. This simply happened when something overwhelmingly powerful moved slightly.
I have to go.
This moment of the two Black Heavens tearing apart would only come once.
Like a salmon forcing its way upstream, Kwon Oh-Jin pushed against the current of black clouds.
“Agh, ugh.”
An electrifying pain, as if tens of thousands of ants were tearing at his flesh, ravaged him. The excruciating pain disoriented him. It shredded his body like being shoved into a meat grinder and being put back together countless times within a mere second.
“Aaaaaaaaaah!”
Just like he had been told, he wouldn’t die. However, he remained in the state right before death.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it fucking hurts!
Every time he tried to push forward against the current of clouds, the pain tore through him like madness. His body in the subconscious space was being destroyed, splintered, crushed, ripped apart, mangled, and shattered endlessly.
The pain felt real. It warped his thoughts and made him insane. He could never have even imagined such pain.
Endure this? Bullshit.
Only someone who had never actually experienced this would spout something so absurd. The pain was real even if this space wasn’t.
The smashing impact felt like a hammer pulverizing his flesh. The slicing agony felt like blades shredding his entire body. It felt all too vivid. He couldn’t believe this was anything but reality.
A sudden wave of despair washed over him as he staggered in the torrent of black clouds.
Why do I have to endure this much pain?
He only had a month’s worth of memories, which amounted to barely anything. Most of those memories were nothing but humiliating, desperate attempts to cling to the past he couldn’t remember.
Wouldn’t it be better to just throw away such wretched memories? Were they even worth remembering in the first place?
That’s right.
He had no reason to desperately endure this agony and struggle any longer. Hadn’t the man in the video said so himself? That he would entrust everything to the choice he made.
Just give up.
All he had to do was abandon everything. Then, he could be freed from this pain. One step back, and he could finally rest.
Just then, Song Ha-Eun’s voice echoed through his mind.
“It’s okay. You can stop now. You can stop trying to retrieve your memories.”
To him, who had been desperately struggling to force back memories that refused to return, she had looked at him with the gentlest smile. “Even if you forget, I remember.”
Song Ha-Eun had told him that he didn’t need to recall them anymore while holding back her own emotions and crushing down her own heart. She had told him that.
He took one more step forward. The terrible agony sharpened even more.
“Ah… ugh.”
It hurt unbearably.
I-I…
The Black Heaven’s blacks cloud writhed violently as if thrashing in protest.
Rumbbbbbbbble!
Suddenly, he saw something between the two split Black Heavens.
That’s…
A faint starlight appeared.
The star brilliantly glimmered with dignity even while trapped deep within the thick, black clouds.
Ah…
Drawn by instinct, he moved toward the faint starlight.
Why did it feel so familiar? It was his first time seeing it, yet it felt like something that had been by his side his entire life.
The Stigma of Lyra.
The moment Kwon Oh-Jin’s outstretched fingers touched the Stigma, a radiant silver brilliance ignited and illuminated the pitch-black sky.
Woooong!
A warm starlight enveloped him.
“Ah.”
The memories he had forgotten, each one returned to him.
Kwon Oh-Jin faintly laughed. “Ha.”
He reached toward the Stigma engraved over his left chest. Beside it were twelve strokes.
Twelve stars.
No other Awakener had ever reached this realm. He had now set foot in an uncharted domain.
Bathed in a silver halo, Kwon Oh-Jin slowly closed his eyes. “Ha-Eun…”
His memories with Song Ha-Eun flooded back in. Among them were also memories that had vanished right before his final battle against the Heavenly Demon.
“Vega, Isabella, Cassia, and Riarc…”
He remembered all of them now.
“My memories… They’re back.”
His swelling emotions washed away even the lingering pain that had been crushing him moments before. However, his relief lasted only an instant.
Rumble!
With a deafening roar, the two halves of the Black Heavens began merging back into one.
Kwon Oh-Jin frowned and raised his head. “So it noticed.”
The tide of black clouds charged toward him as if to swallow him whole.
Where do I go?
As the darkness rushed in from every direction, he couldn’t tell which way would lead him out.
Just then, a beam of light shot out from the Stigma of Lyra engraved on his chest. It pointed in a single direction like the needle of a compass.
Woong!
Instinctively, he understood that he could escape the Black Heavens if he followed this starlit path.
“Kugh…!”
Rumble!
The moment he took a single step, the black clouds coiled around him like snakes and yanked him back.
“Like hell…!”
Blue lightning flashed, burning away the clouds constricting him.
Crackle!
That only lasted for a moment. The darkness surged back in, grabbing hold of him again as if to say that he couldn't leave.
“So damn… clingy!”
Kwon Oh-Jin took one step, then another. He inched forward while burning away the dark clouds that bound him.
“Haa, haa!”
He gasped for breath when a stabbing pain flared up from his Stigma.
Just… a little more!
Only ten steps remained until he could fully escape the Black Heaven.
Kwon Oh-Jin clenched his teeth and focused on the Stigma of Lyra.
“Kugh.”
One step.
Blue lightning burned through the black clouds.
Two steps.
The black clouds swelled up to his ankles like a swamp.
Three steps.
Coiling like snakes, the clouds climbed up on him and seized his right arm.
Four steps.
He shaped lightning into a sharp blade and severed the arm caught in the darkness.
Five steps.
His left arm, the one wielding the lightning blade, became bound by the clouds.
Six steps.
He twisted his body violently and tore his left arm off from the shoulder down.
“Just a little more…!”
A chilling fracture echoed from within him as the clouds crushed down.
Crack!
However, this wasn’t his actual body. It only existed within the realm of subconsciousness.
Even if he lost his limbs, he could regenerate endlessly as long as he didn’t lose consciousness.
“Ah, ugh. Aaaaah!”
Seven, eight, nine steps…
The split Black Heavens merged back into one.
Rumbbbbbble!
With only a single step left, the dark clouds completely swallowed Kwon Oh-Jin’s consciousness.
He quietly sighed as the darkness tightened around him. “Ah.”
Then, black flames burst forth and devoured the clouds in a violent blaze.
Fwoooooosh!
“This is…?”
“Going to let yourself get trapped here because you couldn’t take that last step?”
Through the black fire, another Kwon Oh-Jin with the same face as him approached.
“Heavenly Demon…?”
“Why do you look so surprised? My Black Heaven and your Black Heaven merged. Of course, my consciousness is trapped in here too.”
Since their two Black Heavens had fused into one, the Heavenly Demon’s consciousness naturally also lingered in this realm.
“You…” Kwon Oh-Jin trailed off, staring at the Heavenly Demon.
The black clouds also bound him from head-to-toe. No, the clouds connected to him as if he had become one with the Black Heaven.
“Let’s make a deal.”
“A deal?”
“Yes, a deal.” The Heavenly Demon stepped closer. “If you agree to one request of mine, I’ll help you get out of here.”
Kwon Oh-Jin couldn’t refuse.
When he heard what the request was, he could only faintly laugh and nod.
