The Skeptic XII
I didn't bother hiding information about Cheon Yo-hwa from my companions. In fact, I was quite proactive about sharing it. Arguing something like "That route is permanently closed, so we'll never be able to meet her anyway" would be pointless. By that logic, I wouldn't have needed to explain Old Man Scho either.
"Ho hum..."
As the one with an especially keen interest in receiving any and all intel for my autobiography project, Dok-seo listened to the whole story about Cheon Yo-hwa and tossed out one blunt comment:
"Isn't she basically a defeated heroine?"
No one had asked, but as soon as Dok-seo decided something fell into her "area of expertise," she would babble on like any good otaku.
"Look, mister. She had a bit of a childhood-friend vibe going on because she knew you even before the main story began. If we're going off of chronological order, she's the heroine who developed feelings for you earlier than anyone else. But guess what? She got Time Seal placed on her. You get what I'm saying? She's stuck, and there's no way for her love to come true in the real world. She's a defeated heroine, no doubt about it."
Dok-seo possessed a "magic eye" that transformed anything she saw into a subculture phenomenon. Considering she even tried to pair Do-hwa and me, you could guess how powerful that magic eye was.
True, from an outsider's perspective, Cheon Yo-hwa did indeed lose. Her time had ceased its flow. In reality, though, she hadn't given up on all time. She had only abandoned the "future," removing herself from the timeline where we could have walked together, and in exchange, what she took hold of was the "past."
To conquer me, a regressor, she realized that instead of seizing a future that stretched out infinitely, she should aim for a white canvas of a past that was still blank. Cheon Yo-hwa had grasped that truth more clearly than anyone else.
"I've been waiting for you, sunbae."
A girl in a black sailor uniform sat on a classroom desk and gave me a bright smile.
"Of course, going by my own sense of time, it's only been ten minutes since we said our eternal farewells and... well... kissed. But it's good to see you again."
Ji-won snapped her head around to stare at me. Beyond her deadpan expression, I could see her mind demanding, Did that person just say what I think she said?
I grimaced. "We didn't kiss. I don't know where you got that bad habit, but you sure twist history as easily as breathing."
"Oh, did I?" Cheon Yo-hwa covered her mouth and giggled. "Don't worry. Before long, our past will 'change' so that's exactly what happened."
I didn't grace that with a response.
"If you came here alone, I'd guess you just wanted a little heart-to-heart. But now you've brought a companion, hmm? Maybe in other cycles it didn't happen, but this is the first time in this one, right?"
I nodded as Ji-won took half a step forward, still holding my right hand. "Is this our first time meeting?" she asked.
"Hmm. Who knows?"
"Then I should at least give you a proper hello. I'm Yu Ji-won."
"Sure. I'm Cheon Yo-hwa. Nice to meet you, sunbae's adjutant. From my viewpoint, it's not actually the first time, but let's just say it is."
Ji-won took a moment to process that. "I see. So this is what it's like to meet someone isolated from the normal flow of time. It's rather novel."
With those brief introductions done, I wasted no time getting to the point. Letting this girl in front of me dictate the flow of conversation would be a bad idea.
"I'll lay out the situation," I began.
"Please do."
Cheon Yo-hwa listened lazily, sometimes nodding, sometimes adding a little interjection as I talked.
"Leviathan has grown to the level of an Outer God," I concluded. "Its mental corruption is so overwhelming that we can't fight it by normal means. Our plan is to turn Ji-won into Leviathan's Miko... And we've formed a temporary alliance with Go Yuri as well."
"Heh. With Pinky, huh?"
"I have something to ask about that. I can't figure out why Go Yuri is so wary of Leviathan."
"Huh... Maybe you're overthinking it, sunbae?" Cheon Yo-hwa swung her legs as she asked, "As you know, Anomalies fight for authority and dominion, right? Pinky's and Leviathan's powers revolve around distorting human perception, so they're basically the same 'genre.' They're competing."
"So they're just rivals?"
"Yup. Maybe there's some deeper grudge involved, but from the surface alone, it's clear they're enemies."
"So if Leviathan is defeated..."
"Pinky's dominion gets bigger. A lot bigger."
I clamped my mouth shut.
Killing with a borrowed sword. Go Yuri was simply using me as a blade to stab Leviathan. If I grew weaker because of the fight, she could enthrall me. And if Leviathan fell, she'd have free rein over the mental-manipulation sphere.
"In other words, for the time being, I can shelve Pinky's motives and backstory."
"And focus on beating Leviathan without getting caught up in Pinky's schemes," I finished. "That's it."
"Right. You catch on quick, sunbae."
So turning Yu Ji-won into Leviathan's Miko truly was the only real solution.
"Ji-won exhibits an almost invincible defense against mental manipulation. If she shoulders Leviathan, she'll be able to manage it without succumbing to an Outer God's influence."
"Oh? You're putting a lot of trust in that unnie, huh?" A sly smile tugged at Cheon Yo-hwa's lips. "You know what it means to become an Outer God's Miko, right? It's like gaining near-complete control of Leviathan's authority. Unless you seal it away with something like Time Seal, it's basically a giant time bomb right next to you. You think you can handle it?"
"I'm fine with it."
In some ways, Ji-won was more dependable than Dok-seo.
I added on to Ji-won's affirmation by saying, "She knows how strong I am. She's also aware that Go Yuri is an opponent, and she just learned about you, who could be a wild card... Plus, compared to you or Go Yuri, I've already shared more goodwill with her on multiple occasions. We can talk it out. There's no reason for her to betray me."
If I ever grew weak, Ji-won would chew me up without hesitation, but I would never let that happen. As long as I remained strong, there was no reason for Yu Ji-won to turn on me.
"Exactly, Your Excellency. How could I possibly team up with such a shady individual and dream of usurping your position? If only Cao Mengde had followed my example, he would have gone down in the record books as a loyal subject of the Han, a timeless exemplar."[1]
Cheon Yo-hwa waited for a moment to see if I would reply, and when I didn't, she said, "Huh... So you really trust that unnie so much?"
I turned my gaze aside.
What else could I do? If I didn't have warriors like Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, I had to form a decent battle line with whomever I had.[2] People had to make do with what was given to them.
"So far, it looks like Leviathan hasn't chosen a Miko," I said while jotting down notes in a little notebook. "But Outer Gods don't just make a Miko for no reason. If they want to intervene in the real world, they have to designate a single agent on Earth."
"But Your Excellency, Leviathan's been meddling in the world just fine on its own so far."
"That's true. Which leads us to this possibility."
I scrawled a line of text in black ink: Maybe Leviathan has chosen a Miko, but that fact has been hidden all along?
I looked at Cheon Yo-hwa, seated next to me.
"We don't know who this Miko could be. There's even a chance they themselves don't realize it."
"Hmm. Like with Dok-seo?"
"Yeah. And judging by the circumstances so far, the Miko was probably chosen from those close to me."
Leviathan had specifically singled me out in this cycle, so it followed that it would have picked someone who had substantial influence on me.
"And so, I'm going to rewrite things so that the Miko is—and always has been—Yu Ji-won."
The would-be Miko in question tilted her head. "I'm sorry, Your Excellency, I don't follow. Do you mean I won't 'become' a Miko from this point on, but that I was one from the very beginning?"
"Exactly."
"That... seems strange," she admitted, her brow furrowed. "I am not Leviathan's minion, Your Excellency. I've never corrupted anyone's mind or brainwashed them for my own benefit."
"No, you have done that."
A blink. "I beg your pardon?"
"You're actually Leviathan's Miko. You've been hiding it from me all along. You've even contaminated people's minds before. You just concealed that from me or twisted part of the truth."
No response.
"We'll make it so from here on out." I glanced the other way. "Hey, Yo-hwa."
"Yup, sunbae."
"You've got the power to color my past in any way you please, right?"
"Well, it's more like a data-mining Infinite Void and certain Mastermind simulations, but yeah. I can."
"In that case, it should be possible to set things up so that Ji-won and I actually met before the apocalypse—back when I wasn't yet a regressor."
Cheon Yo-hwa's smile broadened, and for a second, I could have sworn that the four seasons drifting outside the classroom windows trembled.
"Of course it's possible," she chirped, "as long as sunbae wants that from me. And if unnie here agrees to it."
"What do you think, Ji-won?" I turned back and locked eyes with her. "If you consent, we'll define the past between us. We didn't first meet in that convenience store after the world fell, we actually knew each other before that."
"Hmm."
"We may go pretty far back, but starting from then, we'll build up a timeline in which you were actually Leviathan's Miko the entire time."
She propped her chin on one hand. About a minute later, she parted her lips and said, "I have no reason to refuse. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to cement my bond with Your Excellency, and also to secure my position as an Outer God's Miko."
"I'll ask again. You're fine with having your past changed?"
"I have no special attachment to my past, anyway. All I really remember is killing people," she revealed without a hitch in breath or pitch. After a moment, when I didn't respond, she added, "Oh, it'd be a bit of a pity if you go too far back to when I was younger than a high-schooler. I did have to put some effort into learning Latin and Ancient Greek back then."
We had her agreement.
Cheon Yo-hwa and I exchanged glances. She nodded.
"Great! Well, it's been a while, or in my own sense of time, barely an hour since last time, but either way, I'll tweak sunbae's precious past once again, so this time it's got you and that unnie woven into it as well."
Then, she let out a deliberately exaggerated laugh, one that belonged to an old man rather than a young schoolgirl.
"Sure you're okay with this?" she repeated. "The price for borrowing my power is pretty big, y'know, sunbae? You ready?"
"Just tell me what the price is."
"Ah, I'm not going to demand it verbally."
I blinked. "Then how—"
Cheon Yo-hwa was cupping my chin, then without hesitation, she pressed her lips to mine.
Crimson eyes.
Soft warmth brushed over my lips, a breath and then some. As I tried to say something, she pulled my chin even closer.
A beat later, an orange scent grazed my teeth.
Time seemed to drag on. The classroom windows, each tinted by a different season, showed trees swaying in four distinct breezes.
Finally, our lips parted.
"You..."
"What? I already told you, sunbae. This is how it would go."
Still inches away, Cheon Yo-hwa whispered to me.
"You decided to borrow my power on your own, thinking that since I'm Time Sealed, it'd be 'relatively safe.' That's on you... And there are three prices to pay, not just one."
"What?"
"Don't call me shameless. I'm actually trying to be as fair as possible, okay? You're the one requesting an absurdly powerful ability."
She tapped my chest with her forefinger.
"First price is that kiss just now."
Her middle finger joined in, pressing my chest.
"Second price is that, from now on, our history will say, 'When I confessed my love to sunbae, we actually kissed.'" Her giggle tinkered between us. "Hard to forget that sensation, right, sunbae? You only just did it."
Sure enough, I was already picturing the scene with the moment she was Time Sealed and we shared a kiss. Whether it happened from the start or was newly inserted into my memories, I couldn't tell anymore.
"And the last, third price is..."
Her ring finger pressed into my chest.
"Sorry, sunbae. One more time... because I liked it."
She leaned in once more, connecting our lips again.
This time, the kiss wasn't as hurried as before. Instead, it was a bit softer, and it lingered just a little longer.
Her three fingers on my chest slowly began to move. They were tracing letters with her nails. Even with just the feeling, I could make out the rough shapes of the words—I'd gotten used to reading letters with my skin thanks to the Saintess. Thus, I could decode it.
Actually, a long time ago,
I wanted to tweak our timeline so that we stole a kiss back when you tutored me.
That was my mistake.
I couldn't hold back.
I feel kind of underhanded too.
After all, I'm going to forget this in a day, anyway. Silly me, right?
But at least you'll remember it, sunbae.
That's not so bad.
Only her crimson eyes filled my vision now.
Her nails scratched over the very spot in my chest where my heart was beating.
Off you go, sunbae.
Here's a little hint:
Make use of perfume.
Perfume?
Before I could ask what that meant, one of the four windows—the second one, where summer sunlight shone—flared with blinding brightness.
It was so bright that I reflexively had to close my eyes.
And then.
And then—
When I opened my eyes again...
"Huh?"
I found myself standing in the middle of a road.
No more sign of Cheon Yo-hwa's classroom, her Divine Realm, or the person herself who'd just scratched my chest.
Instead, what I faced was an old neighborhood on a narrow downward slope. Alleyways and walls seemed to wrestle for the slightest bit of space. A neglected flower pot perched forlornly to provide the only bit of greenery. The summer sun was scorching the anemone's leaves, baking the uneven layers of concrete underfoot.[3]
"Excuse me."
I heard a voice from behind. When I turned around, there stood a slight girl with black hair, looking up at me with arms loaded with trash bags.
"If it's not too much trouble, could you move aside so I can get by?"
Because the alley was so narrow, she couldn't pass unless I stepped away.
"O-oh, right. Sorry."
"No need to apologize. Thank you for granting my request."
She bowed her head politely, despite carrying two heavy trash bags. The angle of her bow was so impeccable it felt oddly out of place with her shabby outfit.
That perfect bow could only belong to one person, someone whose greetings were always impeccable. Her hair color was different, her eyes were different, and she was definitely a lot shorter. Still, considering I'd just been yanked into this "rewritten past" by Cheon Yo-hwa's power...
Could this polite, grown-up-sounding girl in front of me be...?
"Yu Ji-won?"
"Sorry?"
"Oh, uh... Is your name Yu Ji-won by any chance?"
The black-haired girl's eyes fluttered twice in two blinks.
"Yes. I'm Yu Ji-won, Class 1-2 at Shinseo Middle School. Do... Do you know me?"
I was at a loss for words.
Holy crap.
Sure, we'd said we'd rewrite the past so that Yu Ji-won had always been Leviathan's Miko. But this? Come on, Cheon Yo-hwa, you've sent me too far back!
In that cramped alley, 14-year-old Yu Ji-won tilted her head in confusion.
The cicadas were in full chorus.
It was summer.
Footnotes:
[1] Cao Cao, or Cao Mengde, was a Chinese statesman, warlord, and poet who rose to power during the end of the Han dynasty, allowing his son to eventually usurp the throne after his passing. His cruelty and success as a conquering warlord have led him to be vilified over time, due in no small part to the antagonistic role he takes in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
[2] Guan Yu and Zhang Fei were key generals and statesmen of the early Three Kingdoms period who both shared a brotherly relationship with Liu Bei, the ruler depicted in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms as an example of a humane and benevolent ruler.
[3] In the language of flowers, anemones can symbolize passionate love or stand as the flowers of the dead.
-x-X-x-
The Skeptic XIII
This might not sound too convincing, but I actually care more about my companions' personal privacy than you might expect.
I'm not like some typical subculture protagonist who goes, "Oh, you've had such-and-such trauma in your past? Then let me heal you!" and then starts prying into every painful detail, and there are many reasons as to why.
"Mister. Actually, I've been bullied since fourth grade... Ahhh, thinking back on it, my life started falling apart back then. That's when I learned how to loathe people, hate society, and give up on hope."
"Didn't you say it was third grade last time?"
"Huh? Did I say that? Well, anyway—"
First off, human memory isn't accurate. As someone who has Complete Memory, this still amazes me. Even when it comes to their most painful, life-defining traumas, most people still somehow hide them away in a haze that never quite clears.
For my part, each of my runs spans about twenty years. By the time I entered my 776th cycle facing off against Leviathan again, my total lifespan had already sailed past ten thousand years.
Just imagine. How many contradictory "testimonies" do you think I've collected from my companions in that time?
At some point, I picked up a certain habit—or you might call it an attitude—in how I deal with people:
"Don't be too quick to judge."
As Scott Fitzgerald once said, reserving judgments is a matter of infinite hope. A person's character isn't determined by their words or actions in a single moment—it's proven over time.
This is the monologue of a regressor who's outlived ten thousand years.
Does Oh Dok-seo sound like an idiot sometimes? Yes, that's undeniably true.
Idiotic speech aside, though, she never betrayed us, or me for that matter, even when she was mentally corrupted by an Anomaly. (She just ended up punching her fans at a meet-and-greet.) Therefore, I don't assign too much weight or importance to remarks about a companion's "past" or "trauma."
A slight mistake in their memories? Who cares? They've already proved themselves with countless years of loyalty and action.
The same goes for Yu Ji-won.
It didn't matter whether she was some psycho who seized control of a convenience store the moment the apocalypse hit, or whether there was some past event that twisted her sense of humanity. Unless she took the initiative to tell me herself, "Your Excellency, to be honest, I carry a very tragic trauma from my past," I saw no need to dig into her history.
Among all my companions, Yu Ji-won ranked first place by a landslide in the "Never Talking About My Past" competition.
Even when we all drank together...
Even when just the two of us were chatting over drinks...
Even when she was on the brink of death, leaving her last words for the next run...
She never really divulged the details of her past.
Was it because she genuinely placed no value on her pre-apocalypse life? Or was she silently taking into account my own situation of having lost all memory of my pre-apocalypse past?
Whatever the reason, her past remained as silent and nebulous as a Void.
Hence...
"A little more natural, please... Okay, good."
The photographer kept pressing the shutter, and the camera click-click-clicked away. Ji-won struck poses without so much as batting an eye at the nonstop camera flash. She turned her head this way and that, her face blank.
"All right. Now give me a little smile."
She offered a faint smile.
It might have been an earthshaking, mind-blowing event to me, but the photographer hardly found it special. He just kept singing her praises—it was perfect, perfect!—and snapping pictures.
"Great, wow! You're just perfect again today, Ji-won."
"Thank you."
"All right, next up we'll have you sit in that chair over there, reading a book."
So, yeah.
It turned out that in her first year of middle school, the 14-year-old Yu Ji-won—black-haired, because it'd be a while before her powers Awakened and turned it silver—was indeed a born psychopath in many ways. However, in this era, she was also a professional model.
"You've got to be kidding me."
I was hiding behind the scenes at the photo shoot, suppressing my presence with Aura and stealth, my mouth hanging open in disbelief.
"That's just cheating."
To the camera's lens, Yu Ji-won was playing the quintessential star student, all dressed up in a crisp school uniform and wearing a flawless smile that was practically perfect in every way.
Over two weeks of practicing my stealth game and sneaking around, I pieced together the story of this so-called "14-year-old con artist."
Yu Ji-won was born into poverty.
As a girl, she lived on the third floor of a leaning villa on a steep hillside slum. Hers was a household of four: a grandmother with dementia, a father with anger management and alcoholism issues, and a mother who had gotten sucked into some shady religious group.
"It's like the trifecta of misery or something..."
A messed-up home, no doubt.
At this point, we'd usually delve into a squalid sob story of how deeply unfortunate Yu Ji-won's home life was, how her personality flaws were both innate and shaped by her environment, and how that forces us to feel sympathy, yet also reprimand her for stooping to killing people, but...
"She doesn't look miserable at all."
Sure enough, Yu Ji-won was not your average kid. All of that "tragic family backstory" was just a minor inconvenience to her. Even if you just listened to the snippets of conversation with the photographer, you could guess how well she was managing.
"Oh, right, Ji-won. You have any interest in modeling for eyeglasses? A friend of mine is looking for a few student models these days."
"If you can put me in touch, Director, I'd be glad to work hard."
"Oh man, our Ji-won is so polite! Not like most kids these days! Everybody I introduce you to says nothing but good things."
"Thank you, sir."
Case in point, even in an environment where you'd expect a deluge of misery, she managed to live perfectly well. Despite being only 14 years old, Ji-won had already learned to distinguish between her family's poverty and her own. She'd freed herself from relying on her parents' allowance, instead filling up her own bank account through her own labor.
"Is this for real?" I muttered.
As you all know, Ji-won's face was basically at the Status Ailment: Kingdom-Toppling Beauty level. That was as true in middle school as it was later. She put her naturally extraordinary looks to work, making a living as a fashion model.
It wasn't just her face that captivated people either.
"I may be polite, Director, but I owe it to your generosity. Not all adults would lend a helping hand to a child like me. Being able to work with someone as wonderful as you is my good fortune."
"Huh? Wow, Ji-won, you sure talk in a unique way! Haha!"
No matter which set she went to, Ji-won delivered her compliments in a flat tone of voice that sounded deeply sincere.
She was "pretty," "polite," and "young," and people found it painfully hard to brush her off, so all the modeling gigs out there practically fell into her lap.
"This is a middle-schooler's idea of socializing?"
She was truly a force that broke the ecosystem.
She had a mature build for her age, a distinctively expressionless face that intrigued people, an air about her that could look childlike or strangely grown-up, and that disarming bit of charisma that soothed the hearts of weary adults.
Thus, 14-year-old "serial-killer-in-the-making" model Yu Ji-won was basically inhaling all the possible gigs in her age bracket like Kirby on a binge.
"...Seriously?"
Every day, she juggled classes and modeling jobs until well past 10 PM, then transferred from subway to local bus on her way back home.
"What are you doing coming home at this hour?!"
No sooner had the villa's front door slammed shut than I heard a man's shout from the third floor, her father's voice.
Yesterday it was her mother who blew up, and now it was his turn.
"You little brat! Watch your tone, huh? Huh? Huh?!"
"I'm sorry. I was held back at school studying."
"Don't lie to me! I called your teacher, you know! Don't you try to—"
"I apologize. I really was studying."
"Hey! You... You little...!"
"I'm sorry. Please don't hit my face, Father. If there's a mark, everyone will notice."
The yelling didn't stop even after fifty minutes. The verbal altercation broke out into physical violence a few times, but Ji-won always tried to shield her face. She wasn't the only victim either. Her mom and grandmother were also caught in the abuse, until everyone was hurling insults back and forth.
So it wasn't by chance that Yu Ji-won adapted so quickly when the apocalypse came. Her world had fallen to ruin from the start.
During these two weeks, I didn't just learn about Ji-won. I also investigated the area around her.
The slum rested on a steep hill, with crooked concrete poured through different decades so the alley and stairways resembled geological strata.
I stepped into the multiplex building across from the villa where Ji-won lived. On the building's first floor, there was a small monthly-rent apartment, and I rummaged through the mailbox in front.
National Health Insurance
Personal and Confidential
■■■
The recipient's name was all static, blurred out by some glitch.
"So even Cheon Yo-hwa, who built this 'past timeline' for me, couldn't fully create a name in place of the real occupant's identity..."
Inside the run-down building was a tiny studio apartment about 7 to 8 pyeong in size.[1] A battered desk stood inside, stacked with ID cards like a driver's license and a resident registration card.
■■■
The same glitch. An unreadable name.
Yet the photo was clearly me—or rather someone who looked exactly like me, except younger by a few years.
I silently flipped the license over and over. Only the name was censored. The face was obviously that of a "younger Undertaker."
There was no point trying to hide it.
"In this timeline, or at least in the world Cheon Yo-hwa is showing me, the 'past me' was apparently living in this neighborhood."
Then, another burst of shouting from beyond the shabby window. The father's furious hollering echoed out, followed shortly after by the clipped and composed replies.
"You think I'm doing this just to squeeze money out of you? Huh? You—!"
"I'm sorry. I'm out of cash. Please forgive me."
It was so loud I could easily hear it all from my one-room across the street.
"Huh."
So, incredibly, it turned out that in the "forever-lost memories" of my past, I was a resident of the very same neighborhood as a 14-year-old psycho middle-schooler.
"...Is this for real?"
It was real.
For the time being.
Breaking news.
The 20-year-old Undertaker (I learned my age from the ID card) used to be neighbors with 14-year-old Yu Ji-won.
"This is crazy. I can't tell if it's all Cheon Yo-hwa's trick or if it's some actual reconstruction from a database of the past."
Whether it was real or not wasn't that important anyway. My past was always a blank canvas, and my present mission was to paint a "connection to Yu Ji-won" onto that empty space.
The quest requirements were basically this:
(1) Intervene in Yu Ji-won's life.
(2) "Imprint" the idea that she was "destined to be Leviathan's Miko" all the way back in this era.
(3) Return to the present so we can use the newly affirmed "Miko of Leviathan" to defeat the Outer God.
Steps 2 and 3 could be figured out with time. The first step was my immediate priority.
I had to intervene in her life.
"Easier said than done..."
Think about it. Neighbors in the same town can be both close and incredibly distant. Adding in a status gap of a "college freshman in a studio apartment" and a "middle-schooler victim of domestic abuse" only made that equation more awkward.
At least Cheon Yo-hwa had the "tutor-student" connection with her older sister. Me? I had nothing.
"Let's see... How would I realistically get close to a 14-year-old kid?"
Forcing closeness out of nowhere would be pointless.
I could do something like rob a bank, hand Ji-won a huge pile of cash, and proclaim, "Hey, now you're free! Problem solved!" However, that wouldn't matter. What actually mattered was that the version of me in this era formed a "natural bond" with the 14-year-old Ji-won.
If it wasn't at least somewhatbelievable from the vantage point of my past self, I couldn't accept it, even as a rewriting of history.
"Well... That younger me would definitely have tried to help her somehow."
I drummed my fingers on the flimsy plastic desk, thinking.
"When the Void came, I risked everything to rescue the Yo-hwa sisters. That implies I had a soft heart, even as a teenager. No way I could ignore the kid next door getting beaten up every night."
Of course, that younger me probably didn't know all that much about Ji-won. At best, maybe I had some basic sympathy for her.
"But to Yu Ji-won, sympathy and concern would be worthless."
Even if I "happened" to meet her whenever she took out the trash or said hi because we were neighbors, she'd likely see no value in me.
"So I have to solve her problem. That's the only thing that matters to her."
And the main problem in her life is her family. If she had enough money, that might solve it.
However, as I said, abruptly giving her a wad of cash would break narrative causality.
"How can the me of this era naturally, and believably, help Yu Ji-won make money...?"
At that moment, my eyes fell on my driver's license lying on the desk.
Yu Ji-won had to shuttle from subway to subway to get to her photo shoots...
"Yes, that's it!"
I'd found a way for "a random local college student" to get close to "a middle-schooler from an abusive household" in a way that seemed natural.
One week later, same as the first time I entered this rewritten past, I met Yu Ji-won in the middle of the narrow alley.
"Hello. If it's not too much trouble, could you move aside so I can get by?"
She greeted me with the same line as before. The difference was that last time, she carried trash bags in both hands. Now she was lugging a large duffel bag full of modeling gear.
I offered a friendly smile.
"Hey, Ji-won. How are you?"
"Do I know you...?"
"Nah, I'm just a neighbor. I live in the building across from yours."
"I see." She gave a subtle twitch of her nose, then lowered her head slightly. "Pardon me. I'm not very good at remembering faces. Next time I see you, I'll be sure to greet you properly."
Well, yeah. If she decides you're useless to her, she won't bother remembering your face.
"Actually, I'm in a hurry. Could you please let me pass?"
"Where are you headed?" I asked instead.
"Uijeongbu. I have work."
Uijeongbu. Practically on the opposite side of Seoul.
It wouldn't be easy traveling that far on public transit, carrying all her gear and trying to keep up her condition for her job.
I pretended to be surprised. "All the way to Uijeongbu? That's pretty far."
"Yes. It's my usual routine. It's no problem."
"Still, that looks pretty tough..." I glanced at the heavy duffel bag slung over her shoulder. "How about I give you a ride?"
"Pardon?"
"I've got a car. It's an old Matiz I picked up secondhand, but it still runs."
She blinked and tilted her head. "Could you say that again?"
"I'll drive you. I don't have any plans today, so I can take a spin and drop you off."
That's right. The idea was to become Yu Ji-won's "road manager."
Balancing school and work had to be exhausting. The time lost in commuting must've been her biggest burden. I had a way to fix that: a used Daewoo Matiz, which I'd hurriedly purchased a few days prior.
If I approached it from that angle, I could definitely get closer to this expressionless, psycho-in-training middle-school model. It was a perfect tactic.
"Hmm."
While I patted myself on the back, Ji-won tilted her head the other way.
Amusingly enough, that tilt was the same gesture she'd do in the future.
"Let me summarize. A certain Mr. Matiz, who claims we've met before, though I don't recall it, an adult male older than me, offers to drive me, a 14-year-old girl, all the way across the city to Uijeongbu. For free. Simply because he has nothing else to do, and also the car is a dingy, old, second-hand Matiz. Is that correct?"
"Uh..."
"So you agree with that statement upon review?"
"Huh, well... Yeah, it's definitely suspicious. Sounds a bit like a stalker, doesn't it?"
Ji-won nodded, tilting her head back to center to stare directly at me.
"Thank you. Then we are in agreement on that point."
I stared at her. She stared back.
I didn't respond. Her head tilted more.
Um.
Was it safe to assume our first meeting just failed spectacularly?
Footnotes:
[1] A pyeong is a Korean unit of measurement that is used for area and floorspace. One pyeong is about 3.31 square meters or 35.58 square feet.
-x-X-x-
The Skeptic XIV
Allow me a moment to defend myself.
It's not that my cognitive abilities are defective just because I failed to reach the blatantly obvious conclusion until Ji-won pointed it out. Rather, after living roughly ten thousand years in a ruined world, I simply forgot how society functioned back when law and order still functioned as normal.
No, before that, is it even right to be learning about "the normal social processes under law and order" from Yu Ji-won of all people? Doesn't that violate some fundamental law of the universe?
Either way, I decided to provide a bit more of a "Yu Ji-won–tailored" service, and the result was a success.
Du-du-du-du...
My used Matiz rattled and groaned, as if its engine were muttering, "Just... kill me... now..."
Ji-won, who had been ready to report me to the police as a would-be stalker just moments before, now sat in the back seat, feeling every vibration of the Matiz.
A heavy duffel bag lay at her feet.
And across her lap rested a hand axe.
I turned the wheel with ease and spoke to her via the rearview mirror. "So? Feeling more secure now?"
Driving posed no problem for me. Maybe in this era, with civilization intact, a Matiz would be considered a piece of junk, but after living in an apocalypse, it felt like a top-of-the-line sports car. No random ghosts stowed away, no actual wails emerging from the engine. To me, it was practically a racing vehicle.
"If I try anything fishy at all, just swing that axe and crack me in the back of the skull."
She pursed her lips and clutched the handle of the hand axe on her lap, apparently not used to its weight. "There are a few dozen things I could point out here, but first, you just ran your third red light."
"Huh? Did I?"
"Yes. Luckily no other cars were passing. You should be more worried about dying in an accident than being killed by an axe."
"Ahh, sorry about that. I'm still not used to this 'traffic light' contraption. And are all these lanes really necessary? One lane could handle everything."
"Pardon me, sir. Did you immigrate here from some third-world country?"
Adapting to modern civilization wasn't easy. Still, I delivered Ji-won to her job site safely.
And that's the crucial part: safely. Had my senses been any duller than the average Awakened superhuman, we'd probably have ended up in "seven collision accidents" rather than "arriving without incident."
"That was... quite the unusual driving style."
She got out, her legs shaking like a newborn goat's. Future Yu Ji-won would have had no trouble keeping her balance, but this version of her was still young.
"At least we got here fast, right?" I said breezily.
"That was closer to racing to meet death, but yes. At least it's clear now that you don't intend to harm me."
"Oh! So you're finally going to trust in my earnest good will?"
"Not exactly. If I do go missing, the police can just pull CCTV of your driving. It'll stick out like a sore thumb."
Anyway, from that day on, Ji-won regularly used my "commuter service."
Sure, the path she took to "trust" me was bizarre, but hey, a win is a win.
Yu Ji-won was a strange kid.
Well, that went without saying. She would one day grow up to be a kidnapper and torturer, so it stood to reason that her personality wasn't exactly normal.
Still, the adult Ji-won hid that abnormal side very skillfully. She turned "lack of emotion" into "cool-headed judgment" and "sadism" into "ruthless but daring execution." These inborn flaws became strengths that someone in society "had to" shoulder. It was basically her survival strategy.
On the other hand...
"I'm sorry..."
Fourteen-year-old Yu Ji-won was different. She still hadn't learned enough tactics to blend in with the world.
"Do you know me?"
For a beat, I was silent. "What do you mean, 'Do I know you?' Ji-won, I drove you all the way to Uijeongbu just yesterday."
"Ah, so you're Mr. Matiz."
Bow.
When we met again in the alley, she greeted me as if only just realizing who I was.
"I'm really not good at recognizing people's faces. My apologies."
She was clearly abnormal.
Granted, I knew from the future that Ji-won generally didn't bother remembering people she deemed useless. If you could offer her even a slight advantage, however, she'd show off an uncanny memory. Dang Seo-rin, Noh Do-hwa, Cheon Yo-hwa, and especially me, the Undertaker—she remembered all of us from the moment she first met us in that convenience store.
"Now in this timeline, I am helping her by saving her a ton of commuting time, which can be quantified in real numbers. Yet she still forgets my face?" I grumbled.
Not that it happened forever. Over time, she started mixing me up less and less.
"Mr. Matiz, I look forward to your help again today."
Nowadays, she'd greet me politely in the alley, almost like we had our own little rendezvous point. If we ran into each other somewhere else, like the supermarket, though...
"Oh, hey there, Ji-won. Doing some shopping?"
She tilted her head and aksed, "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
Just like that. She'd act like she had amnesia or something.
Once again, it was blatantly abnormal.
"Let's test something..."
I went out to the alley at my usual time but in a different outfit. Instead of my usual crisp summer shirt, I wore a worn-out T-shirt, hunched my back like an old grandma, and even held a cane for good measure.
Before long, Ji-won came down the villa stairs. She spotted me, tilted her head a couple degrees, then walked past as if I were a total stranger.
No hello, no reaction.
"Huh."
That deepened my suspicions.
I decided to up the ante. I snuck into her house while no one else was around—no family members in sight, perfect timing. In the bedroom, I pulled on an old set of her father's clothes. They reeked of age and poverty, a musty smell that had settled in for years.
I waited on the living room floor, a bottle of cheap makgeolli in my hands, until she returned. She didn't have a modeling job that week, so she'd be home early.
Bi-bi-bi-beep.
I heard a keypad chime at the door. Her grandmother, who suffered from dementia, couldn't remember a more complicated code, so they kept it at 5555. Sometimes even that was too much. Her grandmother occasionally asked me, the neighbor, to open the door for her.
Ji-won stepped in, slipped off her shoes, and sniffed the air lightly. She looked at me on the living room floor.
"Huh? Father, you didn't go to church today...? Then who's picking Grandma up? Where did she go?"
I stayed silent, feigning drunkenness, then staggered out the front door. Though she cocked her head, Ji-won didn't bother stopping me.
Only when I made it back to the alley could I finally let out a sigh. "I did not see that coming..."
The distant city skyline looked strangely crisp under today's sky.
And so, I finally learned something new about my would-be adjutant.
My long-standing right-hand companion, Yu Ji-won... can't recognize human faces.
Prosopagnosia: the disorder of being unable to recognize or properly perceive faces.
We all get a touch of "face blindness" now and then when we suddenly bump into an old classmate on the street. However, Yu Ji-won's symptoms were on a completely different level.
"Oh, yes, your guess was correct, Mr. Matiz. You figured it out."
If she'd been an adult, she wouldn't have revealed such a potentially exploitable weakness to someone who wasn't even a close acquaintance, but the fourteen-year-old version told me without hesitation.
"I was born having difficulty perceiving or remembering people's faces."
"How severe is it?"
"To be blunt, if you replaced someone's head with a full-body mannequin, I doubt I could tell the difference by looking just at the face."
I had no idea. It was so unexpected that I nearly retorted, "But in the future, you recognized people fine!" but of course that future hadn't happened yet.
Instead, I asked a question that fit the current timeline.
"Then how do you tell people apart? I mean, you manage to recognize the director at your photo shoots, right?"
"I rely on location and context," she answered matter-of-factly. "If there's a figure of a certain build and a certain outfit hovering near a camera, I deduce that's the director. I can also try identifying people by their voices. But I'm a poor listener, and a lot of voices sound the same to me."
It's quite troublesome, she added.
"That's why, whenever possible, I try to distinguish people by smell."
"Smell?"
"Yes, their body scent. Most people tend to have consistent preferences about perfume or cologne."
She stepped closer.
"If you don't mind..."
Then she leaned in, nose near my chest. She circled slowly around my torso, sniffing quietly.
"I thought so."
She wasn't Awakened yet, so her eyes were still dark instead of their future hue. She looked up at me.
"This is quite fascinating... If my nose is correct, you, Mr. Matiz, have no body scent at all. Apart from a mild fabric softener, your body is entirely odorless."
Indeed, that was my constitution. As Ji-won said, I literally had no distinct scent. Whether my body had always been like that or changed after I became an Awakener, I never figured out.
"Oh..."
And that was when I realized how adult Yu Ji-won managed to separate people so easily. It was by smell.
When people Awaken, a lot changes. Everyone always focuses on "they stop aging," but in truth, their entire physiology can shift. Take hair color, for instance. Once this timeline's apocalypse began, black-haired Yu Ji-won would Awaken, turning her hair silver and her dark eyes into a blend of purple and blue.
Body scent changes too.
"The Saintess exudes the smell of fresh running water."
"Noh Do-hwa smells sharply of lemon."
"Cheon Yo-hwa is orange-scented."
"Lee Ha-yul strangely smells like freshly baked bread."
"Sim Ah-ryeon has a faint mozzarella cheese aroma..."
In an apocalypse with plummeting standards of hygiene, Awakeners exuding these unique, often pleasant scents stand out like "chosen ones." Hair color, eye color, and body scent are so vivid and straightforward that they can't help but seem divine.
And in the future, Yu Ji-won was adept at Aura. Partly thanks to my teaching, sure, but to be honest, she already had a knack for it before we ever met. That implied she had extremely sharp senses compared to others.
"For her, all the important people in her life are Awakened, each with distinct body scents. It'd be easy to memorize them by smell alone," I mused.
Then there was me, the Undertaker?
"In a world where everyone is covered in unique scents... I, who have no smell at all, would actually stand out the most."
In a sense, I'd be the easiest one to distinguish. Plus, I was always wearing that barista outfit, wielding a cane sword. She could identify me at a glance just from my getup.
"Same goes for Dang Seo-rin, Cheon Yo-hwa, and Noh Do-hwa. They basically never change their clothes. They're easy to recognize."
That realization triggered a chain reaction, like toppling a row of dominoes.
"Mini-Map..."
That was the power Yu Ji-won would one day Awaken.
"In her Mini-Map ability, everything about a person's appearance, their face and features, is 'bleached' away."
An Awakened ability is practically a mirror reflecting how its user experiences the world. From that perspective, Yu Ji-won's Mini-Map is telling.
A black-and-white chessboard world. People only distinguished by name labels stuck to each piece. No one's actual form recognized as unique.
Ji-won habitually assigned Noh Do-hwa to the queen (♕), but that didn't necessarily mean the queen was Noh Do-hwa. If she relabeled the bishop, the bishop would become Noh Do-hwa. If she labeled a pawn, the pawn was Noh Do-hwa.
"Seems like even now in her middle school years, the seed of that ability is already there."
And maybe that was also why Go Yuri's mental control never worked on her.
"Mr. Matiz?"
"Hmm?"
"Is there something on my face?"
"No, nothing... Anyway, hurry up and get in. We've gotta go all the way to Suwon today, right?"
"Oh, right. Thanks in advance."
Du-du-du-du.
I merged into traffic, something I'd grown more accustomed to. Still, I found myself lost in thought.
'Even if I meddle in this timeline's past, she might not remember me in the future.'
She didn't yet have the heightened senses the Awakened version would one day use, so her method of memorizing scents wasn't that refined. A normal person's senses can only go so far, after all.
'I can't even make her remember my name.'
Not long ago, I tried introducing myself to her as "Undertaker." Yet for some strange reason, she'd completely forgotten by the next day and just went back to calling me "Mr. Matiz."
I suspect I know why.
'At this point in time, an Awakener called "the Undertaker" doesn't exist. So that "nonsensical data" must get auto-deleted or forcibly smoothed out. Likely by Cheon Yo-hwa.'
Which meant I probably shouldn't risk using Aura openly either. At least if Yu Ji-won failed to notice, it might slide by.
'For all I know, Cheon Yo-hwa is constantly patching or editing our words and actions in real time. It's possible that the me I believe I am and the me she sees are completely different.'
It put a lot of constraints on the actions I could take.
'So.'
I couldn't call myself by my real name, ■■■, nor by my alias, the Undertaker.
Meanwhile, Yu Ji-won, who couldn't recognize faces, might never form a strong impression of me at all.
But I had an idea—a way to carve "my presence" deep into her mind despite those hurdles.
-x-X-x-
The Skeptic XV
It was an undeniable truth that Yu Ji-won had very few friends.
I confirmed it by slipping into her school to observe her day-to-day campus life.
"Hey! Ji-won, hi!"
"Pardon me, but who are you?"
"Huh? Uh... I-I'm Eun-seo. Hwang Eun-seo. Remember? I asked if you wanted to be friends. Don't you remember?"
"Ah, my apologies. You used to use a completely different lotion than the one you're wearing now, so I was mistaken."
"Hey, oh my god! Ji-won, I heard the student council president confessed to you yesterday!"
"Ah. So he's the student council president?"
"Ugh... Obviously! He's the best-looking senior in our school!"
"Hmm. I had no idea. There are at least six students here who use the same sunscreen, as far as I know."
It was an utterly devastating case of prosopagnosia.
If that were her only difficulty, her relationships might still have been manageable, but Ji-won paired it with an expression more frigid than ice 24/7.
And that wasn't the only issue. Her brain had very little space for words like "empathy," "sadness," or "understanding." Even if she heard someone's family member had died, her first reaction would be, "Oh, the funeral costs and procedures must be quite a burden."
How is that a recipe for making friends?
At first, classmates were drawn to her stunning beauty, almost like they were enchanted, but they all gave up within a month. Rumors filled the gap they left behind.
"Her mom's in that weird cult..."
"Seriously? That place is really dangerous."
"We live in the same neighborhood, and her dad is always shouting in that back alley. I checked one time, he was cussing out her grandma. He was swearing at his own mother!"
"Wait, you mean Ji-won cussed out her mom?"
"Huh? No, no, her dad was cussing out his mom, Ji-won's grandmother."
So Ji-won quickly became an outcast. She wasn't exactly bullied—she was simply isolated. After all, she was already working as a professional model, her athletic abilities were top-notch, and she never dropped below first place in academics. To the other kids, she was anything but normal. Sometimes there were hushed whispers about her, but they were like small waves between islands that never actually made landfall on "the uninhabited island" called Yu Ji-won.
And so we arrive at the conclusion.
In front of Shinseo Middle School's gate, Yu Ji-won stood waiting alone for someone, the school's desert-like dirt field stretching into the distance behind her. She was waiting for her driver—the one who'd take her to her job. In other words, me.
'One of two things has to happen. Either the world adapts to her ways, or she adapts to the world's ways.'
In the original future, it was the latter. Ji-won learned how to camouflage herself in society when the apocalypse and the emergence of Awakeners actually provided an opportunity for her. Once her sense of smell sharpened to an extreme degree, she could finally rely on scent alone to distinguish people.
'...What would the younger version of me, my "past self," have thought about her?'
He wouldn't have been clueless.
A few years from now, I'd be scouted as a dedicated tutor for Cheon Yo-hwa's household in Sejong City, which meant I was a clever, quick-witted young adult. Surely I would have noticed Yu Ji-won's true nature.
An adolescent exposed to domestic violence. A girl who basically earned all the household's income in place of her neglectful parents, caring for her grandmother with dementia...
And yet, once I actually got involved, I'd realize she wasn't the tired, one-note depiction of some "pitiful" victim.
In a sense, Yu Ji-won was ungrateful. No matter how kindly someone tried to help her, it wasn't in her nature to "feel gratitude." She simply "calculated" the amount of the help she received, then she decided whether to repay it in kind or wash her hands of it, whichever presented a smaller risk.
'Would the younger me have kept helping her after discovering her true nature, or given up in disappointment?'
I don't know, but right now, within this illusion that Cheon Yo-hwa had woven to lock in the past, it was my choice that dictates the answer, not my past self's.
"Hey."
Ji-won was reading a book near the school gate. She peered at me over the cover.
We were five meters apart. That distance was too far for a normal Ji-won to catch a person's body scent.
"I'm sorry, but do I know you?"
"C'mon, it's Mr. Matiz! Heeey."
"Ah."
She snapped her book shut. The title was Henle Latin First Year, printed on a lavender cover.
Reading an introductory Latin text, in English no less, at the school gate... And she wondered why she had no friends? Ji-won!
"My apologies, I didn't recognize you," she said. "But that boring tone of voice is definitely familiar."
"Enough. Come a little closer, will you?"
"All right...?"
She approached me without complaint.
In her mind, Mr. Matiz drove her wherever she needed to go, so it was only natural to comply if I asked her to walk a few meters. That was probably all there was to it.
"Hm?" She stopped short when she reached me, tilting her head. "Mr. Matiz."
"What?"
"Did you put on perfume today?"
I smiled. "No, this is actually my natural scent."
That was a lie.
Over the past few days, I'd gone around different shops to buy seven perfumes that might fit a budget-conscious young professional in his twenties. The cheapest one cost me 30,000 won and the most expensive one 300,000 won.[1] I then disassembled them and blended them in various ratios.
"It was tricky, but—"
I happened to have some fragrance knowledge and skills.
When you live thousands of years, you pick up all sorts of random expertise. Perfumery was one of them. Ironically enough, perfumers boomed in post-apocalyptic Busan.
Why people in a ruined world were so passionate about perfumes is a story for another time.
"Is that so?"
For now, I had to focus on convincing this middle-school psycho kid in front of me.
"I don't recall ever smelling this on you. Must be because you usually use weird body wash. So you switched to a gentler product, right? And that's your actual body odor?"
"Mhm."
She took hold of my right arm. The bit of physical contact was abrupt but nothing worth reading too deeply into. This kid simply wasn't socialized. She was only verifying whether my claim was true or false by sniffing me more directly.
"Please bend down a bit."
She brought her nose to the back of my hand. It was less "sniff" and more "hnff." A short, quiet sound. Then from my hand to my wrist, forearm, elbow, up my sleeve. She kept sniffing for about thirty seconds.
"Indeed..." She wrinkled her brow slightly. "It's somehow familiar, yet unfamiliar. I'm certain there's a woody note, but it's too faint for a typical perfume. I think the top note might be pepper... I'm not sure."
"I told you, it's my body scent."
"Let's just say I believe you," she said, letting let go of my arm. "But it's unique. I like it."
"Yeah?"
"Yes. It's faint enough to be hard to detect, but if I'm close by, I'll definitely know it's you."
"Oh."
"It's personally my style. If only it had more of an alcohol kick, I'd like it even more. But I suppose normal body odor can't have that."
Though her face was expressionless, a subtle air of satisfaction drifted around her.
A faint smile tugged at my lips.
'All right. That worked.'
While she would adapt herself to society in the real future, right now, I was adapting to her, adopting a specialized "communication method" for Yu Ji-won.
'If my younger self noticed what kind of person she was and still decided to help her... he might have gone as far as creating a one-of-a-kind perfume for her sake.'
Of course, he wouldn't have had the same budget or skill. He'd have messed with cheap brands and probably messed up plenty of times. But for me, with advanced knowledge in perfumery, it was simple to find an optimal formula.
'Anyway, it's enough.'
I kept getting closer to Yu Ji-won.
Prosopagnosia was no barrier, she quickly got used to my "artificial body scent" and stopped confusing me for others. Her psychopathic personality likewise posed no obstacle between us.
"Now then. Gas money is 100,000 won for this month."
"That's acceptable."
"Your tab for rides so far is about 270,000 won. Like I said, I'll charge interest at standard rates."
"Understood. I plan to pay it all back in one go this year, anyway."
From her parents to her classmates, everyone struggled when dealing with Yu Ji-won because they just didn't know how to talk to her. However, once you figure it out, she's not quiet at all. In fact, she can be downright talkative. Just think back to how much adult Yu Ji-won would gush whenever she needed to flatter me in the future.
"So you might study abroad in the U.S. eventually?"
"Yes. I plan to start preparing in earnest next year."
I didn't bother with: "But you're poor, how can you afford that?"
"Are you aiming for a STEM major?" I asked instead. "Non-STEM degrees might be challenging overseas."
"I do prefer liberal arts, but I haven't made a firm decision."
Nor did I push: "You should definitely do STEM."
"Then maybe keep going deeper into Latin and Ancient Greek. People who major in that get treated as rather unique in foreign universities."
"Really?"
"Sure. And I doubt you'll face racism, but if you tell them you read the Bible in Latin or especially Euripidesin the original Greek, no one's gonna dismiss you out of hand at least."
"I see. That's a perspective I hadn't considered. It's a practical plan, since I've already begun studying Latin."
This was how our conversations went.
"But you want to go into politics anyway, don't you? Wouldn't going to Seoul National be simpler?"
"I'm still weighing my options. It's just..."
She stared out the window from where she sat in my Matiz. The hand axe I'd given her earlier still lay across her lap.
"Sometimes, this country feels cramped."
It was a murmured confession she'd never voice as an adult.
"I don't know how to describe it exactly, but sometimes, even breathing feels like it's choking me."
A light drizzle began tapping the car window.
"It's like there's already a 'right way' to live in this land. But that way is built more on words than on life itself. People measure their own and others' existence through collisions of words and phrases." She paused, then quietly added, "Life is death. Death is not words but something real, right before our eyes, like a mirror for each person. So I can't understand why people talk as though they'll never die, layering their 'life' on top of mere words."
Silence.
"Pardon me. I ended up sharing thoughts that are hard to put into language."
"No."
When we got a red light, I reached over and patted her shoulder.
I didn't try stroking her head. That would ruin her carefully prepped model look.
"You're not wrong... You haven't made a mistake. And that's exactly why it's so tough."
I wasn't sure if my words sank in.
She took my hand from her shoulder, lifted it to her nose, and sniffed again. Her quiet inhale merged with the patter of rain, dissolving softly. When the red light turned yellow, she let my hand go. The chilly trace of her touch lingered on the back of my hand.
That day's outdoor photo shoot got canceled due to torrential rain.
Even though the usual rainy season had passed, climate change hammered new "patch updates" onto Earth's "server," pelting it with sporadic downpours.
I was getting anxious.
'It's summer.'
This wasn't just a nostalgic nod to that meme "It was summer."
'Fourteen. Yu Ji-won's summer.'
Cheon Yo-hwa must have had a reason for showing me this era in her illusions.
'In this season, Yu Ji-won kills her parents.'
In the past... Or perhaps I should say "the far future," I'd talked with adult Yu Ji-won many times.
"Fuck, I know you murdered someone at fifteen, cut them to pieces, and dumped them in that minari swamp on Mt. Bukhansan. Just trust me, you psycho!"
"Oh. Understood. That statement just made your claim more credible."
"Because it's a secret no one else knew?"
"To be precise, you got it wrong. It wasn't at fifteen but fourteen, and it wasn't Bukhansan, it was Dobongsan."
At age fourteen, in the dead of summer, Yu Ji-won commits a double parricide, dismembers their bodies, and dumps them in the Dobongsan minari pond.
Upon entering this past illusion, I met the middle-schooler Yu Ji-won in early summer. Now it was August. Summer was flooring the accelerator on time.
I waited nervously for "that day," and then one night...
Even though it was muffled by the roar of heavy rain, it wasn't quite enough to escape my inhumanly keen senses: There came the scream of Yu Ji-won's father.
"Aaagh... Aaaaaaagh!"
However faintly, it pierced through the downpour.
One moment, and I knew.
"It's tonight."
Right now, at this very moment...
Yu Ji-won was in the middle of murdering her parents.
Footnotes:
[1] Around $21 USD and $210 USD, respectively.
[2] Around $70 USD and $190 USD, respectively.
-x-X-x-
The Skeptic XVI
The next scream, long and drawn-out, came from Yu Ji-won's mother.
"Aaack... Aaaaah...!"
Nine parts of the noise from outside the window were the pounding rain, the remaining one part was screams and moans—a murder scene unfolding behind the curtain of rain.
Although only sound reached my heightened senses, I knew Ji-won better than anyone. From the screams alone, I could piece together what was happening.
'She picked the moment her parents were asleep.'
Her father's screams had already ceased, likely because he'd been attacked while in a deep slumber. A man who spent his life shouting at his family and daughter ended up facing death with nothing but a deafened howl.
'But he probably struggled at the very end. Or maybe she stabbed the blade at a bad angle and his blood splashed on her mother.'
Whatever the case, it wasn't a perfect double-kill in one strike. Such were the slip-ups of a fourteen-year-old. However, just like in the future, this younger Yu Ji-won wasn't a compulsive gambler. She always stayed keenly aware that she could make mistakes.
'She deliberately chose a night of heavy rainfall.'
It was an environment optimized for murder. Even if the victim's screams managed to thread their way through the downpour and reach the neighbors, it hardly mattered.
'After all, her house was always loud with shouting and violence.'
It wasn't an accidental crime or a stroke of luck, but a stark decision made with absolute clarity:
Yu Ji-won was killing her parents.
'Intervening right now... is not allowed.'
If I stepped in, I might save at least one life. Even earlier—if I'd given her any hint that I knew she intended to kill her parents, perhaps I could have prevented the crime altogether.
But I didn't.
'Because that would create a gap between past and future.'
Yu Ji-won kills her mother and father. It was far too pivotal a moment in her life, something that can't be changed—or mustn't be changed. No matter how much preliminary work was needed to cement her as Leviathan's Miko, I wouldn't upend the course of her life.
'I won't intervene.'
Summer rain was whittling away the world's edges. Misty droplets scattered night into fragments, and I silently gulped them down.
'Let murder and death take their course.'
That was my decision.
"Aaaaaargh...!"
This wasn't a timeline where Cheon Yo-hwa's twin sister survived, nor where Dang Seo-rin's family wasn't killed by an Anomaly, nor where Yu Ji-won avoided staining her hands with her parents' blood.
"Ah... aah... aah..."
I chose this world, with all its crooked lines, perfectly continued from the footsteps those children and I had taken in so far.
"...ah..."
The rain buried the night. The night shadowed their lives.
When two lifespans had been consigned to a double grave, I finally rose from my seat at the window. I pulled on a raincoat, slipped on galoshes, and donned rubber gloves. All were already waiting by the door.
There wasn't a need for tools, I had them stored in my trunk.
Lastly, I checked my computer. I had it set to stream an online lecture at a specified time, good enough to prove my half-day alibi.
Then I stepped outside.
The rain fell.
I drew in a lungful of air, taking in a slow deep breath, and exhaled. The odor of water still carrying the warmth of higher air funneled through my windpipe like a drain. Then, I stepped onto the alley's walkway, which had embraced the sky's downpour a bit earlier than I did—splash, splash. Each time my weight landed, a puddle shattered.
What is life?
In that moment, life was right here, in the gap of an alley too narrow for even a single car to pass.
It was in the raindrops, carrying the sky's heat as they fell to the ground and scattered.
It was in the half-open front gate of the peeling blue villa.
It was in the third-floor door's passcode, fixed at 5555 for the sake of a grandmother with dementia, now rusted like moss.
Beep, bi-bi-beep.
The digital lock's faint chime, a meager sign it was made by civilization, trickled out between the sounds of rain.
Beep.
Rainwater dripped onto the keypad, and the door swung open. Darkness as deep as an abyss filled the entryway.
There was a sharp whistle, a sound cutting through the darkness. It was the hand axe I had given her.
I stepped back to dodge.
"Ji-won."
No reply. Instead, a second swing came my way.
But a predicted ambush has no meaning. Especially from a middle-schooler with a model's physique, someone who hadn't trained any martial art to a meaningful level.
"It's me."
A heartbeat of shock.
"Mr. Matiz."
The attack didn't stop. The silence didn't either.
So I forced it to stop. My grip on her arm sapped the power she had to swing that axe and likewise sapped her ability to remain silent.
"I'll help you."
She struggled. She couldn't land a hit.
"You must have prepared tools to wash away the blood. But if we do it together, we'll finish much faster."
She struggled again, weaker now. Still no success.
"Do you even know how to dispose of a body?"
A ragged breath.
"If the ground isn't dug deep enough, this heavy rain will turn the soil to mud in no time. No matter how carefully you seal it, the stench of a corpse is strong. If a sniffer dog comes while the smell lingers, you'll be exposed. And if you thought about dismembering them and dumping pieces in the sewer, forget it. In a rundown neighborhood like ours, no way you flush all those remains."
A slower, steadier breath.
"What about CCTV routes? Do you have a plan to manipulate the victims' alibis and confuse the police investigation? You just learned how to 'kill a person,' but do you know how to 'erase a person'?"
One-tenth of silence.
"I'll help you."
The rain pounded.
"Let me help."
Lightning flared from somewhere far off, briefly illuminating Ji-won. She wore a raincoat and rubber gloves, with boots just like mine.
There was a slash across her face. Not from a moment ago. Maybe from yesterday, or the day before. A scratch that could be fatal to a model.
A trace of violence well past the limit.
Yu Ji-won slowly lowered her head against my chest, pressing her nose near me. Black bangs fell and hid the cut.
She inhaled my scent in silence.
That was her permission.
From here on, it was a race against time.
"All chopped up?"
"Yes."
"I finished cleaning. Let's go."
We spoke only the bare minimum.
"Your grandma?"
"She's asleep in her room. When Mother screamed, she complained about the noise and then immediately drifted off again."
"Good."
We crossed the rain to the Matiz.
A thump, then the trunk slammed, then the car door. Ji-won sat in the passenger seat. We wore her father's and mother's clothes respectively, so that if someone spotted us, they might mistake us for her parents.
"Listen carefully while we drive." I started the engine and pulled away. "They racked up a gambling debt and fled into the night. They stole their daughter's bank account on the way out. Do you have your mom's usual gambling site ID?"
"Yes, she used a few."
"Transfer all your money from your account into hers. Then deposit it on one of those gambling sites."
"Understood."
Without hesitation, she operated her phone and her late mother's.
Her entire life savings were 34.6 million won distributed across three banks. Two of those accounts, totaling 19 million won, vanished in seconds from the passenger seat—part of her funds for studying abroad to the states.
"Leave the remaining 15 million alone, but try logging in and deliberately fail the password five times."[1]
"Yes... Done."
"Good. Now rest until we arrive. Driving up a mountain in this weather won't be easy."
Silence.
At a quick glance, Yu Ji-won was leaning her head against the window, eyes closed. Her axe was no longer across her lap, just lying on the floor.
Rattle-rattle-rattle.
Night rain hammered down relentlessly. Sometimes the sheets of water grew so thick I couldn't see outside at all.
Tonight, I was grateful for this downpour. In this weather, at this hour, the odds of a witness were slim.
Eventually we reached northern Seoul, Bukhansan.
"We're here. Let's get out."
"Okay."
Another used car was parked there.
"We're switching cars," I explained.
"Move everything over?"
"Naturally."
"I thought we'd dump them here on Bukhansan."
"We're staging a runaway, so we switch cars a few times. We're not forging our alibi, but your parents'."
"Then..."
"We're not sticking to Bukhansan. We'll go to Dobongsan."
A transfer. Off to the next stop.
Though Bukhansan and Dobongsan lay side by side, the route took a while for certain reasons.
After a long drive, we arrived. She was about to climb out, but I pressed a hand to her knee to stop her.
"Mr. Matiz...?"
"Pay attention, Ji-won." I locked eyes with her. "This is Dobongsan. Even if you spot some sign or label showing the real name of this area, do not read it. Understood? It's Dobongsan."
It was a lie, and she knew it. For the first time since the murders, doubt escaped her lips.
"Why?"
"Hopefully it won't come to that, but if the police catch a whiff, they might use a lie detector on you. Those tests are mostly junk, but it's still best to keep yourself shrouded in suspicion from the start. Make sure you 'genuinely' don't know where you are."
A flash of admiration passed in her eyes. "Understood. Makes sense."
"All right. Let's go."
We got out to step upon a deserted mountain trail. Eventually, we reached the marsh I'd scouted in advance, which was already thick with trash. From my memories of traveling all over the country, I knew it would never be developed.
For all I knew, multiple bodies were already sunk in this swamp.
"Everything tied up properly?"
"I've double-checked. No mistakes."
"Then let's dump them."
A soft splash. We finished a few more steps, and that "somewhere in Dobongsan" marsh swallowed any trace of her parents' remaining life, silently and without evidence. It'd take a bit more time for the swamp's "digestive system" to fully break down the remains.
"What about the bones? I cut them as much as I could, but I couldn't grind them to dust."
"A little farther up, there's a row of abandoned graves. We'll bury them there."
"I see."
We arrived at a half-collapsed graveyard. Some I'd dug ahead of time, some were already half-dug. We placed the bones deeper than a coffin's depth and covered them with gravel, stones, twigs, leaf litter, and earth in layers, packing down the soil.
That took the longest. If I'd used Aura, it would've been quick, but I didn't. Right now, I was no different from this era's Yu Ji-won, just an ordinary person.
Her shovel scraped the surface, cutting into the earth's soft underbelly.
"I've been curious about something."
"What?"
"My mother carried me when I was a helpless infant. So I wanted to ask her a question before I killed her."
Scrape.
"Why did she give birth to me?"
Scrape.
"I didn't need a real 'answer.' It's just... Like you said, there's nothing in this world that's inherently 'wrong,' so I assumed my mother had her own reasoning."
"Couldn't you just have asked her anytime?"
"She's not a reliable narrator in everyday life."
Scrape.
"Objectively, creating me was an excellent investment from their perspective."
Scrape.
"I'm diligent, intelligent, and quick to act. The reason I focus on modeling is so that if an interview opportunity arises, the 'middle-schooler who kept first place academically yet still worked professionally' angle leaves a strong impression on the public."
Scrape.
"My parents' gambling addiction, my mother's fanatic cult, my grandmother's dementia—none of this is a real disadvantage for me. Anyone who'd attack me over it, I can easily paint as shameless scum."
Scrape.
"Overcoming all these environmental obstacles to succeed in life, all while supporting my parents and grandmother—that story, by itself, would undeniably grant me a cloak of 'humanity.'"
Scrape.
"Then... why are my parents not happy?"
The earth gave way.
"Even if they do nothing, they'll profit from me. I never demanded they change. In fact, I told them it's okay if they remain as they are. If they changed, that would affect my personal narrative. If they didn't, that would affect it differently. Either way, they were just raw material for my story."
Each time the shovel dug in, rainwater rapidly pooled in the hole. The shovel blade carried half the weight of earth and half the weight of sky.
"They could change, or not. If they needed money for either path, I'd give it to them... And still, humans don't become happy?"
The shovel froze.
At some point, Yu Ji-won turned to look at me.
"What if that misery isn't wrong, either?"
At that moment, the raindrops that had been falling in straight, unwavering lines around her suddenly slowed. Water droplets quivered, elongated.
My eyes went wide.
Globs of water wriggled around Yu Ji-won, gathering, spreading, then coalescing again. For an instant, they formed 雨, the shape of the Chinese character for "rain," before melting back into the puddle. The same symbol faintly appeared on the puddle's surface, then sank away.
A bizarre phenomenon.
Seoul's endless summer, the midnight sun, the apocalypse, those were still far off. And yet...
Here, in front of this grave, where people died and then more death was layered atop it, something akin to the world's first Anomaly was stirring.
"Mr. Matiz."
But it seemed Yu Ji-won herself was oblivious.
Her breath, her warmth, the outline of her raincoat, the very texture of her presence all blended with the storm.
She was...
"Maybe humanity itself—the world that spawned such humans—was broken from the start?"
...only looking at me.
Footnotes:
[1] Around $24,000, $13,200, and $10,400, respectively. So Ji-won sends away over half of her life-savings, which originally put her just above South Korea's poverty line.