Free Web NovelIt was small and black like a black pearl. But it did not shine or gleam; it looked like a hole. As if something chilling were swirling inside it. It could have been a bead that held the foul, ditchwater-like flood of Bumram.
Only belatedly did the rat startle and flee. The will of something that had crawled out of the Abyss shrank back, rolling along the ground like a loathsome, tightly curled grub.
By chance, a group of mercenaries had entered nearby to clear the rift. The eerie thing, which had been rolling about haphazardly like a tumbleweed whipped by the wind, slowly came to a stop.
“Quite a few purifiers are going to appear soon, right?”
“Lucky them. People will throw money at them even if they sit still.”
“Who knew a brand-new ability line would pop up like this? Still, it’s good news. One less thing to worry about with contamination.”
Near a shabby building, Awakeners were resting together and chatting. Among them, a mid-tier Awakener pricked up, as if he had sensed something, and scanned the surroundings. He stared toward where the black, unsettling lump had been and tilted his head.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. I just suddenly felt bad. Must have been nothing.”
“Shit. We came in here to make money, but this place is seriously cursed. It’ll drive you insane.”
“Not already contaminated, are you?”
One Awakener snickered and spat. In the shade, the black thing took stock. Two strong, four weak. It gave up on the strong ones and chose the weak instead. A short while later, a low-tier Awakener stepped a little way off to relieve himself.
They had just done a quick sweep of the area, so he was careless as he pulled down his pants. While he relieved himself with a sigh, the black thing crawled up over his shoe. Then slowly up his pants, up his jacket, and on to his shoulder. One end thinned like a stretched rubber band and, with a tiny pop, bored into his ear canal.
“Huh?”
By the time the mercenary, pulling up his pants, reacted, it was far too late. His eyes, which had been staring vacantly into space, rolled in different directions. Thick, murky, black drool bubbled from his mouth. Crack, crackle—his arms and legs bent at wrong angles. His knee flexed backward with boneless ease and then barely returned to place.
Now occupying a human body, it recalled what had worked best so far. Among the things it had swallowed—those with an especially delicious taste—one had a hallucination ability. It decided that using it here would be good. Then it walked back to the camp.
“What took you so long? Constipated?”
Even though the mercenary’s body had warped beyond anything human—and even though that warping was still ongoing—his companions noticed nothing. To their eyes, he looked perfectly normal. The mercenary, no longer human-shaped, split his mouth in a long grin and spoke.
“Juuust, had a, lit-tle, busi-nessss.”
Even his warped voice slotted neatly into what they perceived inside their hallucinations. It happened to be mealtime. The “mercenary” bent his long body over the stew they were cooking. Black liquid pattered down from him in clots. In an instant, the untouched food rotted and stank. But inside their hallucinations, the others saw and smelled it as they always did.
“Nice, it’s cooked well. Let’s eat.”
They ladled the food into their bowls. They gobbled down what no one should ever eat, savoring it. Only the mid-tier Awakener, a little unsure, cocked his head.
“Tastes a bit off?”
“That much is fine. Stuff spoils fast out here anyway.”
“True enough. Let’s clear the next sector and get out fast.”
With that, the rest cheerfully devoured what looked revolting to the naked eye. A mercenary, patting his full belly, sipped his coffee—and suddenly sprang to his feet. Then, in a burst of excitement, he began to shout.
“H-hey, weird. I feel... stronger. Like that—feeling. Yeah!”
Arms flung wide, he shivered as if high on some shabby, dirty euphoria.
“I think I re-Awakened!”
The other mercenaries started shouting too. Though their bodies showed no outward signs of contamination, black foam bubbled at their lips as they whooped.
“Grrr-hahaha! Me too! Me too!”
“Me too me too me too! Re-Awakened!”
“Kee-oooo! Kyah-oooo! I re-Awakened! Lucky! I re-Awakened like Lee Hyunmook!”
They hopped like children, forgetting they were in a dangerous rift zone. The black froth bubbling from their noses, mouths, and ears didn’t bother them at all. Everyone was so overstimulated that no one sensed a thing wrong.
While the contaminated humans slowly burned up their life force in glee, the warped mercenary picked up a phone someone had dropped. The video they had been watching over the meal was showing Park Seungmin’s ability.
“Li-ight at-tri-bute.”
This offshoot—this avatar of the “black-abyssal-twisted-repugnant-thing” that had felt threatened and crawled from its cozy nest—had no sight, no touch, no smell, nothing but the sense called hunger. It always perceived everything through hunger. Big and tasty. Small and tasty. Unusually big and tasty.
And, the thing it must never swallow. Across eons, its rare nemesis.
A danger so unacceptable that it had to crawl out of its snug den.
With the twisted eyesight of a human it was inhabiting for the first time, it barely recognized a familiar shape of light. But unable to distinguish people, the warped mercenary’s tongue scraped and clacked.
“Pu... ri... fi... er?”
In an instant, dozens, hundreds of repetitions refined the pronunciation.
“Pu-ri-fi-er! Pu-ri-fi-er! Purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier purifier....”
“Purifier! Purifier! Purifier!”
The obsessive chant went on and on until the mercenaries, hopping around him, were also entranced into chanting “Purifier.”
* * *
After a deep sleep, Yohan lazed in bed, happy simply that the sight before his open eyes was his familiar room.
“This is nice!”
He had purified the dust-caked room and was cheerfully admiring how clean it looked when he heard a small commotion from his brother’s room. Yosep had woken and was dashing into the living room.
“Mother! Father! What on earth happened?!” freeweɓnovel.cѳm
“Yosep, you’re up! How do you feel?”
The couple, who had been up long before their sons, hovering after preparing breakfast, lit up with joy at the sight of their firstborn. Knowing how severely contaminated he had been, Yang Yosep was overjoyed but deeply bewildered. He had been half-unconscious and cut off from the world outside; he knew nothing of the astonishing events of recent days.
“Did I have a nightmare? I was definitely contaminated, so how in the world—”
Feeling over his body, Yosep sensed Yohan’s presence and whipped around. The sharp expression on his face crumbled when he saw his younger brother coming through the door.
“...Yang Yohan?”
Looking as if he truly must be dreaming this time, Yosep came up to him and stood before him. When Yohan had reunited with their parents, he had embraced them at once and cried with joy—but in front of his brother, for some reason, he only felt glad yet unspeakably awkward, shuffling his feet. Yosep ran his fingertips over parts of Yohan’s body and then opened his eyes wide.
“You...!”
He had a lot to say, but swallowed it. Yosep yanked his brother into a sudden hug. At first it felt like he was controlling his strength; then, sensing something odd, he abruptly let go. As if testing something, he grabbed Yohan’s arm, shook it this way and that, and then punched.
“Ow! That hurts!”
Yohan forgot his gladness and moved to annoyance as Yosep thumped his back and forearm as if checking durability.
“I said it hurts!”
“...You’re sturdy. You Awakened, huh?”
Murmuring in a daze, astonished that his younger brother had Awakened, Yosep’s face then filled with rage.
“You reckless brat! How could you go to an Awakening Party without any guarantee you’d Awaken? Just because it’s called an Awakening Party doesn’t mean you won’t run into scamming thugs—how could you go off and pull dangerous stunts—!”
“Who greets someone by hitting them?”
As always, Yohan reflexively bolted. If Yosep hadn’t risked contamination to search for his missing little brother, Yohan would have talked back. So he endured. It was not because, just now, he had instinctively felt that Yosep’s strength—no, his offensive power—was greater than his.
“Hey, you...! Get over here!”
“Yosep, stop chasing Yohan. Thanks to Yohan, you recovered so safely.”
When Yang Hwapyeong shielded Yohan, Yosep hesitated. He had already been wondering, from the start, how his contamination had so cleanly disappeared.
“That idiot did what for me? How?”
He dropped the idea of “disciplining” his brother for now, sat on the sofa, and asked. Relieved, Yohan wedged himself behind his parents as a human shield and sat a good distance away.
That Yohan had fallen into the Abyss and returned—and had even become a high-tier Awakener as a purifier—was unbelievable to Yosep. It was miracle enough that his brother had come home alive; and now he was a high-tier Awakener? He had even survived the Abyss with Lee Hyunmook and others? But when Yohan showed his ability, he could not deny it.
“Him? A high-tier Awakener? That one?”
The “him,” the “that one,” rankled, but Yohan held it in. His brother’s fist was too close. Though Yohan was a high-tier Awakener, he was a healer-type, and it galled him that he could not beat his mid-tier dealer brother with brute strength. At the same time, slipping into his familiar daily life after a year, he felt moved and choked up. Yosep fixed his gaze on him and beckoned.
“Come here.”
“You’re just going to hit me.”
“Come here while I’m asking nicely.”
Reluctantly, Yohan shuffled toward him. Keeping a small gap, he said, Why, and instead of punching or scolding him, Yosep spoke slowly, as if the words were hard to say.
“Thank you.” freeweɓnovel.cѳm
“Huh?”
“You worked hard, and... thank you.”
