On Sunday, Seungho showed up early at Entre.
No car this time. I signed the contract. Perks are over.
He humphed on the bus, disappointed. Then shook it off.
Doesn't matter, I guess.
"Take all your clothes off," the technician said, pushing his glasses up his nose. Long white coat, longer than standard lab regulations. Black hair in a ponytail.
Seungho obeyed and undressed slowly. He had no option.
"Those too." A gesture at his underwear.
"Is it really necessary?"
"Yes. You need to be completely naked to enter the Dode."
"You mean that?" Seungho pointed at the machine—a dodecahedron partly buried in the ground.
"Uh-huh." The technician tapped his tablet.
"What does it do?"
"State-of-the-art mana analyzer. This baby will tell you how strong your mana is and how your powers can be employed."
In other words, Seungho had to go in.
"Chop-chop. I have more hunters to measure after I am done with you."
Being called hunter felt good. His life was getting brighter.
"Will I see the results afterward? I'd like to learn—"
Thud.
The technician dropped a stack of files on the table. Didn't look up. "Please hurry."
Seungho stepped into the dodecahedron. It was cold inside. He didn't like it—he didn't feel cold like he used to, but it was also different.
This thing is sterile. Like it wants to poke me around.
He stood in the center. Radius maybe four meters.
The hatch closed without warning. And darkness.
He waited.
Dark again.
He felt tense. Perhaps memories from the tests.
He shook himself. Unlike the test rooms, this space felt tighter than before. He could barely move.
He waited in silence. He couldn't hear any sound, probably it was soundproof, like those floating tanks Julie had taken him to, for his insomnia.
What's she doing now?
The machine whirred as lights from its walls came on. It spun, faster and faster. A glow intensified. Mana of a different kind.
Seungho was amused until his body reacted.
He couldn't breathe.
Plop.
Chunks of his flesh began to rip from his body. He screamed, but his voice was gone.
Can the technician not hear me? Why won't he stop the machine? Is it like the tests—they have no idea what's inside? What about the ana—
A sharp pain in his chest overwhelmed him. Then it stopped.
And something else came.
Pleasure. From each cell in his body. Like the mana in the chamber recognized his own. They started reverberating off each other, intensifying the sensation.
They danced together. A rhythm beyond anything he'd known.
He stopped thinking.
He wasn't in the machine anymore. He was in a place far away, deep inside himself, where clusters of colors clashed and mixed.
A familiar feeling he couldn't pinpoint where he recognized it from.
Warmth swelled up in his heart. A healing energy started flowing all over his body, nurturing it.
The clusters covering his body were moving coordinated this time, with geometric precision, solidifying in a smooth shell protecting him.
In his mouth the taste of the noodles from the Han-river, the marinated egg now tasted what he meant it to be all along.
Yes! My taste is back!
Then the machine halted. Lights off. Back to the darkness. The chamber was warm and pleasant.
The whole experience had been exhilarating and calming, as he'd later describe it.
Soon, the healing effects began wearing off, he felt the surface of his shell fracturing in myriad clusters like it had done before with the Apelox.
He didn't move. Afraid his body would fall apart.
The hatch opened.
"You can get out now." The technician's voice, indifferent.
Seungho stepped out. In one piece. Breathing hard.
The technician glanced up. "You're smiling."
Seungho touched his face. He was.
"I'd go through that again."
Being a hunter wasn't so bad after all.
"No chance. It would certainly destroy your mana."
Still, his body was fine. He stepped into the light, checked himself. All healed. Slapped his arm. Nothing missing.
This is amazing!
"Sorry. Should've warned you. Some people get difficult if you tell them beforehand about the pain."
Seungho blinked.
Is that normal? Treating hunters like that?
He remembered the contract clause. A quiver of regret, just briefly enough to forget it soon after. But I'm not the only one who signed that. It must be okay.
He dressed in silence. He realized the pain was already gone from his memory, like it never happened. But that kind of pain could scar a person.
Lab rat.
The thought just flashed. He wanted to ignore it.
Surprisingly, though, once again a worrying thought slipped away quickly with no guilt. It seemed his new powers made him focus on the right things, on the positive, on the changes he wanted to make, the goals he could achieve.
What has started as a desire for hyperfocus, had turned into a desire to be accepted into Entre. That desire had brought him there.
It was my choice. I shouldn't forget my decision process, I knew what I am putting myself into when I signed the contract. It is for a better life.
He couldn't complain about that.
Plus in Entre he had met Sangmin, that was a big bonus. A new friend in his new life.
"Hello???"
"Yes?"
"I have been calling you for a while, did you not hear me?" Asked the technician.
"Not really, sorry I was thinking about something..."
"I see." The technician lifted his tablet to add a note. "Could you please show me your skin?"
"Where?"
"Your back."
Seungho stood up to pull his shirt up.
"My skin…?"
It had changed, it looked almost like soft rubber. Thicker and more resistant, as if it could promptly get hardened.
"You will get used to it." After a moment of silence added, "and it will go back to normal."
Seungho sighed happily.
The technician put the tablet down on a chair. He wore gloves and put on special goggles that did something Seungho didn't understand. He trotted around Seungho's body to observe his back. He stuck his nose close, almost touching Seungho's skin. Seungho suppressed a giggle.
He touched lightly the skin on his back in search for something.
Seungho couldn't see, but an image played in his mind, clear as if he were watching. He could sense his touch and smell as if they were his own.
Is that even possible?
His senses had sharpened. Because of hyperfocus, he was sure of that.
That reminded him to add reward points to whatever stat increased hyperfocus next he got them.
Would that be under "intuition"? Or was there a specific skill for increasing his senses?
That didn't sound right, it must be a category. He would have to check again.
"You can take your shirt down."
As he tucked it in, Seungho stared at the wall. Replaying what the goggles saw. Nothing. He turned.
The technician looked disappointed. "Need something?"
Seungho laughed nervously. "What now?"
"Go out this door, turn right, down the corridor to the gym. They'll tell you there."
The technician left through the opposite door without a goodbye.
Ready to go, Seungho patted his pockets. His wallet was missing.
I probably left it in the exam room.
He promptly turned on his heels and knocked at the door.
No answer. He pushed in, it would only take one second. He slipped swiftly in, saw the wallet on a chair, picked it up happy to have found it.
Across the room, the chamber hatch was still open. A glow caught his eye.
He tiptoed closer.
The inner walls glowed. Imprinted with patterns both complex and regular. He recognized his own blood in it.
His cells mapped thoroughly, with precision.
He fled the room forgetting to close the door.
He ran to the end of the corridor. His neck pulsed like a warning alarm. He burst through a door, his heart hammering.
Another set of doors to cross into the gym.
What was that?!
He stood there, catching his breath. Forcing himself to calm down.
I can't change my mind now. I have to move forward.
He opened the other door.
They handed him a training uniform. and shown where to pick a new one if he needed, apparently there was an unlimited supply available. It seemed ripping clothing was almost part of the protocol.
He focused on the instructions to forget what he had seen. Took note of all the details in the schedule. It calmed him, although couldn't remember any of it.
In the back of his mind, a thought circled.
Why are the exams planned like this? First the tests, driving you crazy. Then the chamber. More pain. What's in those rooms? What generates those experiences?
Are pain and fear necessary?
He longed for a friendly face. And thought of Sangmin, wondering where he was.
A deep seated doubt settled in his chest. He pushed it down like he had learned to do.
Focus. Hyperfocus. He hung on that thought. And on his tasting again.
Training starts now. A new life. The change I wanted, don't lose it.
But the doubt stayed.