Chapter 55
Chapter 55
“Kang Ihyun. It is mealtime.”
Black hair, blue eyes. Young Kang Ihyun opened his eyes at the dining table. On the table sat a dish covered with a silver cloche. His grandfather was seated right in front of him.
Servants bustled back and forth around him without end. A tiny cup was filled with milk with a soft pour. The silver tray clicked open, and side dishes were set in place one after another.
Spare ribs smothered in cheese, a milk-based soup beside it, and all kinds of dairy products were laid out in a row.
The smell alone made him feel like throwing up. Kang Ihyun clenched the hem of his shorts with both hands. He must have bitten his lower lip without thinking.
“Kang Ihyun, mind your expression!”
Tap. At the crack of his grandfather’s cane on the floor, he jerked his head up. He reflexively pasted on a grin. Only then did his satisfied grandfather permit him to eat.
He laid the napkin neatly across his lap. He traced a brief sign of the cross and murmured a prayer of thanks, then picked up his knife and fork from the outside in.
He had to cut the meat into bite-sized pieces, cleanly enough not to look crude. He sliced the spare ribs, which still reeked strongly enough to make him gag, into small pieces and speared one with his fork.
Watching Kang Ihyun stare at the meat with a smile, his grandfather spoke in a hard voice.
“Kang Ihyun, eat. All of it. Everyone else eats it all. You get used to it if you keep eating it.”
“…”
“Are you not answering? You are ignoring your grandfather again. Take after your father and mother at least halfway.”
“No, Grandfather. I was just… for a moment, admiring the chef’s craft. I will eat.”
If he ate, his stomach would hurt again. He would spend the whole day in the bathroom throwing up. Even so, he had to eat. He had to get through this somehow.
As he forced a smile, opened his mouth, and slowly brought the cheese-laden meat to his lips, someone grabbed his arm.
He looked to the side. A man, entirely black. Hair, eyes, clothes. The man’s face was tightened in a deep frown as he pushed Ihyun’s arm down. Then he spoke, slowly.
“Do not eat. Ihyun.”
* * *
“Gasp…! Ahk, kuh…!”
Kang Ihyun snapped his eyes open and tried to sit up, then collapsed again under a wave of agony. The steady beep, beep of a vital monitor sounded nearby. A faint smell of antiseptic lingered.
A glance around told him it was a single-patient room. A humidifier puffed steam, and sunlight slipped in in thin slices through blinds drawn to block the view inside.
No wonder it felt hard to move. He looked down to see bandages and splints wrapped tight around his arms and legs. Once he had roughly grasped the situation, he let out a sigh.
“…I was going to wrangle a short leave and heal up on my own.”
[Your constellation, the Staff of Purification, says Lude caught you red-handed and is worried about you.]
“…Damn it.”
He swore under his breath and bit his lip. He had been found out. He had not thought it would come to this. He exhaled a long breath and looked back up at the ceiling.
“Then Nari brought me to the hospital?”
Hearing his constellation’s affirmative message, he sighed again, this time with a chill that ran down his spine.
At the very least, this was where he had not wanted to be exposed, and now what should he do. How was he supposed to clean this up? The thought circled and circled in his head.
‘So this is how Nari felt when her secret got discovered.’
He was groping for an excuse when the door to the room rattled open.
“Kang Ihyun?!”
“Ah. Lude…”
Lude, wearing glasses, came in with a stack of papers that looked like test results, his face grave. Even so, Ihyun kept staring at Lude’s face and smiled.
“You put on glasses. They are pretty, they suit you. Lee Jisung made them for you, right?”
“Is that what matters right now?”
Lude’s voice cut sharp, but Ihyun only smiled. Lude sat by the bed, looked him over, and ground his teeth.
“Why did you not say anything? Why did you hide being in this much pain? Do you have any idea what your test results say? They say it is a miracle you are still moving.”
Pelvic and rib fractures, a crack in his skull, the wrist bones not only broken but shattered.
Several vital organs ruptured, intraocular pressure raised to the brink of blindness due to severe head trauma, and a nosebleed by the bowlful accompanied by a cerebral hemorrhage. Lude rattled it all off like a machine gun.
“I am fine.”
“How could you be fine?! How many weeks of total disability is this? You said you were fine, so I let you draw the aggro alone, and now this. I should never have planned an operation like that.”
To handle the Minotaur, the plan had been for him to draw attention, while Nari apologized to Jeong Suho to lift his status ailment and clear the Gate together.
He had said he was fine even without his usual white armor and holy sword, so Lude had believed him, and this was the result. With a face that looked on the verge of tears, Lude stared at the floor and swallowed the lump in his throat.
It felt like the time had finally come for him to speak. Kang Ihyun slowly turned his eyes to the window and smiled.
“Once my holy power comes back, I heal fast. I am fine.”
“What are you talking about? I heard only excommunicated priests convert holy power into demonic energy. You were expelled from orders, did your holy power not disappear?”
“It comes back.”
He shifted his eyes to Lude. Lude blinked. Ihyun gave a wry smile.
“With me, it comes back. I am… the ‘Master of Good and Evil.’ after all”
“So you… your holy power and demonic energy…”
“Yes, I can use them at the same time.”
He could wield both holy power and demonic energy. There had never been a precedent for that.
Using holy power was not the issue. The problem was that a child not even ten years old had been able to wield demonic energy.
No matter how strong the holy power, no matter that he could use both forces, none of that was any kind of advantage.
From the moment he awakened, the mere fact that he could use demonic energy marked him as “excommunicated at birth.” There was nowhere he could bear to say it out loud.
Being special was usually poison. “Incomprehensibly special” was worse.
Born to spotless, impeccable parents, a freak among freaks was judged more harshly still.
He had achieved “max level social skills” at a young age. He had to be max level. He had to stack up every trick in the book to hide a gaping flaw.
“I am sorry I hid it. I knew Lude’s secret, and I still hid mine...”
He could not forget his grandfather, who had tried to change his grandson’s constitution by forcing dairy down him until he puked and pushing mission school. That was how “family” had disappeared from his life.
He had told the truth to his closest friends, but once people started calling him a freak and a “special person,” he erased that face of himself completely. That was how “friends” disappeared from his life.
Even Min Jaewon and Kang Sujin, who had claimed to be his guardians, had either chosen not to speak of it or had tried, to some extent, to suppress it. Even if that was for his sake.
Only Min Jaeyoon knew and treated him as usual. Min Jaeyoon’s judgment of him was exactly right.
He had no interest in other people. In truth, family and friends did not matter much to him. The one thing that mattered was Shin Bitnari, that single existence.
The incarnation of malice who reaffirmed the obvious proposition that “if you did not harm others, you were a good person.” The King of Madness who told him not to be led around by others.
So of course he had not wanted his shame to be seen by the first person who had ever accepted him. He had wanted to show only his good side. But there was nothing to be done. He had already been found out.
Lude was the same. After Lude had been discovered, he must have felt like this too. Ihyun swallowed the urge to cry and offered his excuse.
“...If it creeps you out, I am sorry. But I was never excommunicated. I really have not done anything wicked. I try every day not even to let myself think that way. It was just like this when I awakened. I do not know why.”
Would he be treated like a freak now? If that was all, it would be a relief. He squeezed his eyes shut. He hoped he would not be denied.
He did not believe Nari was that kind of person, but the fear was always there. With his eyes still screwed tight, he listened to Lude’s answer.
“...Then.”
“Yes.”
It felt like a death sentence was about to fall, and his brow creased. Lude’s voice cut through the brief silence.
“You have an alt character? Like me.”
“Huh?”
He blinked. Lude looked down at him with a mischievous smile. His expression said he was relieved.
“I am glad your holy power comes back. I was really scared something would happen to you. How long does it take to return?”
“What? Wait, wait. Should you not be more shocked?! Ah, kgh…”
“Hey, don’t move yet!”
Startled, he tried to sit up, then clutched his belly and lay back as pain stabbed through him. Lude, just as startled, let out a deep sigh and slumped back against the chair.
“I knew you were hiding something. That is why I am not surprised.”
“What?! Since when?!”
“I replayed the day we first met. I thought something was off, and sure enough.”
“Oh.” Kang Ihyun let out a low sound. Lude laughed and brushed his bangs with his fingers. It looked like the compromise he had made because he could not ruffle his hair.
“Yet you still trusted me? Even though I was hiding something?”
“I am hiding plenty from you too. If we laid out every thought we were having, we would both drop dead from shock. A relationship with no secrets at all is creepier.”
“...True.”
He rolled his blue eyes in thought. Lude, thinking how, in moments like this, he really did seem twenty-three, let out a brief laugh.
“Even so, you never lie. You tell me the truth up to the line where you can still be true to yourself.”
“That is right.”
Lude cleared his throat, then glanced at him. He rubbed the back of his neck and murmured.
“Then… you meant it when you said you would protect me, no matter what.”
“...That is right.”
He sneaked a look at Lude. The glasses frames naturally drew the eye, and Lude’s ear had flushed a little red. Lude muttered again.
“Then that is enough. I trust you. Show me only as much as you want to show. I will not judge lightly or leap to decisions.”
“Nari.”
As he muttered, he felt something touch his hand and looked down. At some point, Kang Ihyun had laced their fingers together. A moment later, he smiled with a face that looked like a single tap would shake loose tears.
It was an expression he had never seen before. Without thinking, Lude gripped the hem of his coat with his free hand.
“I… Nari, I really, really—”
“Young master!!!”
A deep male voice shattered the taut mood. The door to the single room swung open. Min Jaewon stood there, dripping sweat and holding a bouquet.
“Young master, I heard the news. Is your body all…”
Then Min Jaewon looked at the two of them. Kang Ihyun’s face, clearly not in an ordinary state. Lude, clutching only his coat hem. Their hands, clasped together. Min Jaewon fell silent. A chill ran down Lude’s spine and he blurted a reflexive explanation.
“Wait.”
Creeeak. With the shy expression of a father catching his son’s first romance, Min Jaewon gently closed the door. A small voice slipped through the crack.
“Young master… you’re already at that stage.”
“Wait!! It’s not like that!!”
Face flaming to his neck, Lude shot to his feet. Min Jaewon’s gentle voice, full of open-minded good cheer, floated in from the hallway.
“I am sorry to interrupt. You two… please enjoy the rest of your time.”
“No!! I told you it’s not like that!!”