Seoul Object Story

The spirit barrier had collapsed.

That trustworthy shield guarding the city? Gone. Crumbling away in flames like some cheap paper fortress.

And where was I in all this chaos? Wandering around, of course. Just strolling through the burning streets like it was my personal playground.

The city—once a familiar maze—now felt like it was trying to choke me out. Every breath I took felt like fire, burning my lungs as if they were on the verge of exploding. Yeah, real fun.

The red glow from the barrier—it looked like a sunset, if sunsets were harbingers of doom—cast eerie shadows over the ruins. The collapsed outer walls looked like the city’s skeleton, while smoke and fire shot into the sky without a care. The streets, which used to be as familiar to me as the back of my hand, now felt alien, twisted by destruction.

“Hurry up. We’ve got to get out, and fast.”

That was my friend, always the cautious one, leading the way.

“Wait. Stop.”

Suddenly, he pressed his back against a half-shattered wall, voice low. I glanced over in the direction he was staring at, and there they were—those long-limbed freaks. Monsters. Not human, of course. More like Objects, with limbs that stretched out like water striders.

Unlike the flaming pigs—yeah, you heard me right, giant flaming pigs—they skulked around every corner, hunting down survivors. If it weren’t for those creeps, we’d probably have been out of this burning city ages ago.

One of them, hunched and grotesque, was prowling on the other side of us, inspecting the area like it had all the time in the world. From the looks of it, this thing was gonna be here for a while.

I glanced at my friend. “So… what now?”

He didn’t even flinch. “We wait. Once it moves, we cut through that alley and we’re good. We’ll hit the forest.”

“Yeah, sure.” I muttered under my breath, taking in a deep breath to steady myself. Even though the air reeked of smoke and burning debris, I stifled a cough and focused on catching my breath.

After a few minutes, the monster finally wandered off, disappearing down an alley.

“Thirty seconds,” my friend said calmly. “Wait thirty more seconds, then we bolt.”

“Got it.”

I could finally breathe again, lungs starting to stabilize.

Twenty-five seconds. Twenty-six…

Then, I heard it—a low, raspy snicker.

What’s so funny? I turned to my friend, half-expecting some clever remark, but he was looking up. And when I followed his gaze, well, wouldn’t you know it—a monster with an absurdly long neck was hanging over the wall, smiling down at us.

“Run!”

At his word, I bolted. Asphalt cracked behind me as the monster’s hand sliced through the ground like it was slicing cake.

Great. Just great.

We were almost there, dammit!

I cursed inwardly as we ran toward the forest, but then, of course, we had to stop. Why? Because there it was—a massive, heat-radiating pig, standing right in our path. Its body gave off so much heat it felt like my skin was about to catch fire just from being near it.

A pig in front. A monster closing in from behind. Perfect.

“This is it,” my friend said, surprisingly calm. “We’re done for.”

Really? Is this how it ends? For a second, I thought, Screw it. Letting go of everything suddenly made the stinking hell we were in feel… cooler.

Wait, cooler? And humid?

That didn’t make sense. Not in this burning wasteland.

Then, out of nowhere, glowing characters appeared in the sky. Water droplets surrounded us like some kind of divine shield.