Chapter 843 |
“Are you all right?”
I hurriedly jumped down from Peace’s back and ran over to Chief Song. Strength seemed to enter Chief Song’s legs for a moment, only for his knees to thud back against the ground. I reached out, about to tell him not to force himself up, when the tips of my fingers tingled sharply. It felt almost like static electricity.
“I am… fine. Hunter Noah, do not use your healing skill.”
Chief Song spoke while sitting with one hand braced against the ground.
“There is still… mana left in me. Once it is fully dispelled, I should be able to move.”
What on earth had happened? Had that bastard Gardener made some final desperate move? Yerim and Noah quickly checked the top of the building and the surrounding area.
“There’s nothing!”
“I cannot sense any presence at all.”
It seemed the Gardener had vanished completely. What the hell had been going through his head, flying off like that?
Yerim asked, worried. I didn’t think there was any need to go that far, but making sure couldn’t hurt. If the Gardener suddenly revived now that Yuhyun had returned to normal, he would be hard to deal with.
Of course, before that, we had to take care of Chief Song.
“Chief Song, what happened? Did the Gardener attack you?”
Instead of answering, his deep, dark eyes took in my face. I saw strength enter Chief Song’s hand, the tendons standing out.
“…Han Yujin.”
The short breath that left him sounded painful. He really did seem to be having a hard time. Was even a potion out of the question?
“I don’t… know what I’m supposed to do.”
His strained voice flowed out as though he were making a confession. Confused, I bent one knee as well and lowered myself toward him. I had no idea what had happened. I turned it over in my head, but I couldn’t think of a single thing. Had the Gardener spouted some nonsense about Chief Song’s origins before he died?
“There was… someone who saw me as their death.”
It felt like the sort of thing other people shouldn’t overhear, so I quickly signaled Yuhyun and Hyunah to give us some space. The two of them took the others and moved away.
“And I found comfort in that fact.”
I couldn’t open my mouth easily. Had Chief Song ever had someone like that? Since I didn’t even know who it was, I obviously didn’t know the details either. But just from those few short words, I was certain that whoever it was had been deeply important to him.
“For someone like me, who had rejected myself, guarded against myself, and kept myself suppressed, the goal of stopping that person was the only clear path I had. Han Yujin, I was a shadow that should never have existed.”
I wanted to shout that he was wrong. But I held it back. Because instinct told me this was the time to simply listen.
“And then I was given a reason to exist: to watch over that person’s end.”
…
Chief Song had always kept himself restrained. How was someone who denied his own existence supposed to find a reason to live? He said that someone I didn’t know had become a signpost for him. I couldn’t fully understand what it meant for someone to see Chief Song as their death, but the man in front of me was not someone whose attention could be caught by any ordinary purpose.
“But… not anymore.”
“Chief Song.”
“He came to want to live. And because of that, he said he would no longer make me his death. No, perhaps I simply lost the right.”
“What do you mean, lost the right?”
“Because I… came to want to live too.”
Chief Song’s gaze dropped to the ground. His eyes were lost, confused, without a road to follow.
“What’s wrong with that?”
“…”
“Chief Song, I don’t know much about that person. I haven’t even heard his name yet.”
At my words, Chief Song’s expression grew even heavier. A dark shadow seemed to fall over his entire large body.
“But I do think one thing is certain. That person cared about you very much. Otherwise, there’s no way he could have embraced you. Honestly.”
I smiled a little.
“I went through a lot trying to persuade you myself, you know. Even when I braced myself and charged straight in, I could barely make a dent. If someone managed to shake you up this much, then he must have been a good person.”
“…I am not sure about that. I don’t think he is a bad person, but.”
Mm. For someone who had made Chief Song lay himself bare this painfully, the assessment wasn’t all that glowing. What kind of person was he, really?
“In any case, I don’t think he changed his mind because you lost some qualification. If anything, maybe he told you not to be his death anymore because he wanted you to live your own life.”
His thick, broad shoulders trembled faintly. A long, heavy sigh sounded.
“…I don’t know.”
Chief Song looked down at his own hand. A faint black shadow lingered over his clenched fist.
“Han Yujin will not give up.”
“…What? Ah, well, I guess I do have a bit of a history.”
“I am certain… you will not. That person knows it as well.”
“…He, he does?”
A strange feeling came over me. The person Chief Song was talking about knew me well. Then didn’t that mean I knew him too? No, it would be stranger if I didn’t. This was someone so close to Chief Song, someone who had influenced him this much. And if he had been around until recently…
‘There are holes…’
It felt like there were holes here and there in my memories. Chief Song had been with me all along. Only a limited number of people had entered and left the world of dreams. I knew all of them. I had to know all of them. And Park Hayul, the master of this place, had been at my side, so there was even less reason for me not to know.
“Even while knowing that, he handed it over to me.”
Chief Song’s jaw tightened. I faintly heard the sound of his teeth locking together. It was a sound tangled with all kinds of emotions.
“I cannot, Han Yujin.”
“Yes.”
I pushed aside the disorder in my head for a moment and focused on Chief Song.
“Even knowing that you will be put in danger… I cannot.”
For an instant, Chief Song’s voice felt as though it had cut off and then resumed. Like the middle of an audio file had been snipped out.
“I am still bound by rank. It is impossible to shake it off completely.”
“Well, so am I.”
I shrugged and continued.
“Before saying F-ranks can do things too, protecting someone weaker than you is just obvious, isn’t it? Even without F-ranks and S-ranks, if there were an old person walking with a cane and a healthy young adult, of course you’d shield the older person first and pay attention to them. Give up your seat, carry their bags.”
It was also natural to worry about and stop an F-rank from entering a fight that didn’t match their rank. If Myungwoo or Hamin said they were going into an S-rank dungeon alone, I’d call them insane and smack them on the back myself.
“I just hate it when people block someone off with, ‘No, you can’t,’ no matter what. When they say you’re weak, so there’s nothing you can do.”
Even if someone was old and frail, it didn’t mean they could do nothing. They could still have their own work, and it was said that doing so could actually help their health. The same went for many other people as well.
“I heard that kind of thing constantly, you know, because my younger brother just had to be S-rank. Compared to Yuhyun, I’d be about the level of a kindergartener or an eighty-year-old man. No, maybe worse.”
What could you possibly do when an S-rank was involved? Staying quiet and out of the way was helping. At a glance, it sounded right. That was why it hurt me even more. I kept acting defiant to the end, but on the inside, I couldn’t help thinking, well, that is true.
“Even now, it’s not like I never wish I were stronger. If someone told me they could make me S-rank right away, I’d accept with a bright smile.”
Though I would be suspicious as hell that they had some ulterior motive.
“But at the same time, I also think that I’m glad I was F-rank. For starters, Chief Song, if I had been S-rank, we never would have talked this openly, would we?”
He would have kept his distance from me as something to be wary of, just like the other S-ranks. At most, he would have thought our family was unusually close for a family of S-ranks, nothing more and nothing less.
“If I hadn’t felt the limits of my own ability, I wouldn’t have tried to bring Myungwoo and Yerim in either. And the other S-rank Hunters too. If I had been S-rank myself, they would actually have been harder to persuade, wouldn’t they?”
Even at Chatterbox’s party, I stood out even more because I was F-rank. Of course, normally an F-rank couldn’t even get into that party, and the fact that I made it that far was, well, pretty impressive, but still.
“So Han Yujin the F-rank is fine. I like him quite a bit.”
I had suffered like hell, though. Still, now my rank was… more or less to my liking. It was hard to say F-rank was the best when S-rank was way too good. That much couldn’t be helped. Just being physically healthy, aging slowly, and living long would make anyone jealous. It really was a cheat.
“Around the time I regressed and first met you, I was a little rough too. Even if I said, ‘I turned back time, so let’s call it water under the bridge,’ what I went through still stayed with me. I started by being wary of high-rank Hunters outside of my kids.”
I had also bristled at Hyunah at first. And among them, especially… especially… who was it? Choi Seokwon? That bastard was annoying, but it felt like there had been another kind of annoying on top of that.
“Mm… anyway, I’m different now. I changed, but… so, a perfect example would be…”
What was it? There was a hazy memory, almost within reach but not quite. Chief Song quietly looked at me.
“Without question, I respect the current Han Yujin in a way I did not before.”
“Before, you only told me to stay away from S-ranks and keep quiet.”
Rather harshly, too. At my words, Chief Song looked apologetic. I told you, it’s fine now.
“That is why… even though I think I should do it, I cannot clearly tell it apart from my own selfishness.”
“Selfishness?”
“Yes. I wonder if I am… putting Han Yujin in danger for the sake of what I want.”
I was so startled I nearly wanted to clap. Chief Song was even agonizing over things like this now.
“Do what you want to do, Chief Song.”
“…But.”
“I did the same. Whether to save the world or protect the people precious to me until the end. In the end, I pushed ahead with what I wanted. Back then, Hyunah stood on the opposite side from me.”
It had been an incredibly hard thing to choose. But I had not been alone.
“If Hyunah hadn’t been there, I probably would have kept agonizing and wavering. But there were people who shared my burden. Chief Song, you were one of them. Back then…”
I felt like he had made a different choice from mine. For some reason, I couldn’t remember it clearly. Chief Song nodded as though to say that he had. What had it been?
“So you should hand some of it off too, Chief Song. It’s all right. In the end, the people who will share your burden are people you created yourself.”
People who wanted to help him had appeared at his side because Chief Song had lived in a way that made that possible. So it was all right. Though, of course, it would be wrong to throw your burden at a stranger you didn’t even know and tell them to carry it for you.
“…I.”
I quietly waited, looking at his anguished face.
“Trust Han Yujin.”
“Thank you.”
“And… I believe that both Han Yujin and that person should live the way they wish to live.”
“You too, Chief Song.”
Anyone should. The shadow over Chief Song’s hand deepened. Chief Song extended that hand toward me. I took his faintly trembling fingertips. The shadow surged into me.
“…Ah.”
I remembered. Hey, you.
“Seong Hyunjae!”
Right, that man! Memories rushed in. The surroundings turned pitch-black, then changed into the ruined rooftop of a building. In front of Chief Song and me, who were standing side by side, Seong Hyunjae was smiling.
“Seong Hyunjae! What the hell were you thinking?”
The last memories the two of them shared were passed to me. It cut off there, but I could guess what had happened. When Crescent Moon’s attack stopped. At that moment, Seong Hyunjae must have handed himself over to Crescent Moon.
“You said you wanted to live! And then you dump the memories on Chief Song? Give them back to me yourself!”
It was not his real body, only a trace left behind mixed into my memories, but I couldn’t help shouting. Seriously, he was driving me insane.
“Hunter Seong Hyunjae.”
Unlike me, Chief Song spoke in a calm voice.
“In the end, I passed the memories on to Han Yujin. Even knowing that Han Yujin would try to save you despite the danger.”
“I see.”
“What… choice did you want me to make?”
Chief Song asked. Seong Hyunjae smiled gently.
“Either one. Because that is what Song Taewon means to me.”
“…Excuse me?”
Seong Hyunjae said something impossible to understand. Chief Song seemed not to understand either. Seong Hyunjae’s face remained infuriatingly tender.
“Death does not leave simply because one rejects it. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“…”
“Whether you accept my words or reject them is entirely Song Taewon’s share to decide. And Song Taewon made his choice.”
Chief Song had made his choice. Whether to return my memories of Seong Hyunjae to me or not. And Seong Hyunjae had once called me his life. Then, in the end…
“If I had not returned the memories to Han Yujin.”
“Song Taewon would have remained Seong Hyunjae’s death.”
“But you clearly told me–”
“That is not something I can choose or decide. Nor should it be.”
Seong Hyunjae spoke firmly.
“The final choice must always belong to oneself.”
Seong Hyunjae had become Chief Song’s signpost and taught him the road forward. But he was saying that, in the end, the one who decided his own road had to be Song Taewon himself.
“You…”
“Should I say I now have two lives?”
The corner of Chief Song’s lips lifted. He gave a short laugh. It was such a rare sight that it stole my attention.
“No. I will leave that to Han Yujin.”
Chief Song’s shoulders, which had been hunched this entire time, straightened.
“If Han Yujin safely brings Hunter Seong Hyunjae back, then I will return as well. You will still be the same, and I have no intention of standing by and watching. I will stop Hunter Seong Hyunjae, and if I judge him dangerous, I will use Plunder.”
His unwavering voice continued.
“As long as you remain yourself.”
Seong Hyunjae stared at Chief Song with rounded eyes, then burst into laughter as though delighted.
“Oh dear. As expected, it is not something I can decide. How pitiful for the me who will know nothing of this.”
Seong Hyunjae had made Chief Song decide for himself whether he would become Seong Hyunjae’s death or his life. But in the end, Chief Song had not stayed bound to those options.
“If you think about it, you have to be alive for someone to kill you. So it wouldn’t be strange even if Chief Song decided he needed to keep you alive, would it?”
“Keeping someone alive in order to kill them yourself is rather frightening.”
“That is not what I mean.”
“It means wash your neck and wait.”
“It does not.”
“Then I suppose I’ll have to hide behind Han Yujin.”
“If Hunter Seong Hyunjae causes no trouble at all, I also–”
“Then I’ll tie you up tight and give you to Chief Song as a present.”
“My partner is terribly cold.”
“Ah, well, I’ve got plenty weighing on my conscience too. I should offer you up as a bribe in advance.”
“…”
Chief Song let out an enormous sigh. I ended up laughing. I did feel sorry toward him, but still, this was what I liked. It felt like peaceful everyday life.
“So, Seong Hyunjae. What are you planning to do?”
About being dragged off by Crescent Moon. Seong Hyunjae went, ah, and smiled.
“I plan to hold out with all my might.”
“Mm. How?”
“By trying hard and doing well.”
…
Don’t tell me this man went without a plan. Seriously? Stop smiling!
–TL Notes–
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