Ch.197IF Side Story – And the Two Lived Happily (51)

……I dream.

A lucid dream, is that what they call it?

In this dream, I seem to be an ordinary person.

Last time I was a butterfly, and before that, a dragon soaring through the sky.

I wonder if there’s some pattern to it.

I walked forward slowly.

I just felt like doing so.

Even though it’s called a lucid dream, there’s not much I can actually control.

The things people typically associate with lucid dreams—flying through the sky or manipulating the dream at will—are impossible.

I’m merely aware that I’m dreaming, but otherwise, it’s no different from reality.

It was like that last time, and it’s the same now.

So… there’s not much to do.

Except walk across this vast plain.

I moved my feet slowly.

It wasn’t completely flat terrain.

Small hills rose from the ground, and tiny branches protruded from the earth.

With each step, rustling and crackling sounds echoed.

Without a destination, I just walked.

I always wake up eventually when doing this, so I believed this time would be no different.

As I was walking.

“…Ouch.”

A sting.

An irritating sensation on my arm.

My arm had been tingling for a while now. What could it be?

I turned my head to look at my arm.

Something was moving.

I looked closely.

Something very tiny was crawling up my arm.

It was so small that I could barely see it even when looking carefully.

Just a tiny dot.

That’s all I could make out of these small… insects.

Sting.

“……”

It doesn’t hurt, but it’s annoying.

Should I move my arm to remove them?

Or should I just shake my arm to get rid of them?

The insects kept moving.

Up, down.

Sideways too.

I was curious to see how far they would climb if I left them alone, but I felt I should remove them.

I moved my body to move my hand to remove the insects.

‘…They’re smaller than I thought…’

But the insects were too small.

Too small to remove… I might accidentally crush them if I’m not careful.

What should I do?

Even though they’re tiny insects, I don’t want to kill them thoughtlessly.

I waved my arm around, but the insects remained firmly attached.

If anything, they seemed stimulated by my movement and began moving faster.

Can these insects not fly?

If they could fly, they would have flown away by now, but they’re still clinging to my body, so maybe they can’t fly…

…Anyway, that’s not important right now…

Sorry to the insects, but I might have no choice but to kill them.

As I thought that and was about to bring my hand down.

“…Huh?”

The insects disappeared.

No, not just the insects…

The ground, clouds, sky, and sun.

The feeling of floating in an empty space.

That feeling of being left alone in a dark space.

The sudden loneliness makes it hard to breathe, and my head feels numb.

Realizing I’m alone in the darkness, I flail my body, but nothing can be grasped or felt.

I hate this.

I hate being alone.

So, I.

Reached out my hand toward the faint light before my eyes────

***

“…Mmm.”

I opened my eyes.

Why is it that sometimes there are days like this?

Days when you wake up in the middle of the night, wide awake, without having done anything.

Today seemed to be one of those days.

I suddenly woke up at 3 AM.

Turning my head to check beside me, I saw Eila sleeping soundly in bed.

I checked my phone, but there were no messages while I was asleep.

That was to be expected.

If there had been any, I would have woken up then.

I lay back down, but sleep wouldn’t come.

I was lying with my head on the pillow, but my mind was clear.

Even if I tossed and turned, I didn’t feel like I would fall asleep, so I carefully got up from the bed and moved to the sofa.

Sitting on the sofa, I turned on my phone to check the situation.

Given that there were no messages, the situation probably wasn’t too serious, but it wouldn’t hurt to know what was going on.

And as expected, I should say.

The situation was peaceful.

Unnaturally so.

The media was buzzing with news.

I found one at random to check, and when I finished, I looked for another article or news to check.

After repeating this a few times, I had a pretty detailed understanding of the situation in Seoul.

The dungeon had been successfully conquered, and the raid team was now exiting.

It was the best possible outcome.

Except for the one thing that all articles and news were talking about.

“…What are they plotting?”

Why aren’t any monsters crawling out of the dungeon?

I don’t know the reason, but it’s probably not a good one.

After all, the door had been tightly locked until now, and suddenly it’s open.

But if the situation is the same whether it’s open or closed, there would be no reason to open it.

Then, is there some significance in deliberately opening a dungeon large enough to be S-rank while excluding the monsters inside?

“…Should I have forced my way in despite the risks…”

It’s a pointless regret now.

“Sigh,”

Since it’s meaningless to keep thinking about it, I decided to stop.

There were too many other things to consider to keep dwelling on that problem.

Just then, my phone vibrated.

A text message.

At this hour?

Who could it be?

I checked.

Unknown number.

I thought it might be spam, but… it wasn’t.

The sender called themselves “Doctor.”

And there’s only one person crazy enough to send me such a message.

The message said… that the results of Eila’s examination were roughly in, and asked me to bring Eila to the research facility as soon as possible.

It said the content was too sensitive to transmit wirelessly, so if I wanted to know, I should come in person…

Should I head to Seoul now?

I looked at the bed.

Eila was lying there.

Moonlight coming through the window gap illuminated her figure lying on her side.

“……”

Going to Seoul right now would be difficult.

I could go alone, but taking Eila back would be challenging.

…I’ll wait.

The situation is progressing well, so I can wait until transportation normalizes and then return slowly with Eila.

…We should be able to return.

“…Sigh.”

I let out a long sigh.

The night was deep and the moon was setting, but sleep wouldn’t come.

***

“Ah, shit, what the hell is this?”

“I know, right?”

Two men sitting in front of dozens of monitors muttered.

Both were soldiers wearing military uniforms.

Normally, they would have taken off their outer garments and fallen asleep with their heads down by now, but they weren’t reckless enough to do that in the current situation.

Still, they couldn’t help wondering if they really needed to carry these heavy guns.

“Think it’ll happen during our shift?”

“I hope not… I don’t want to go report it.”

The screens on the monitors were all dark, so even with dozens of them together, it wasn’t very bright.

But the sun was rising in the corner over there, so in a few hours, the screens would become quite bright.

And by then, this damn CCTV monitoring duty would be over.

“When will this end…”

“We’ve been here less than 30 minutes.”

“Damn… Of all times, the situation breaks out right after I return from leave.”

“Better than having it happen on the day you’re leaving for vacation. I heard there’s a sergeant in the next platoon who’s being discharged today?”

“Did that guy sell out his country in his past life or something?”

Even as they joked, the two men didn’t take their eyes off the screens.

After all, the jokes were just to stay awake.

But no matter how much they talked and tried to stay alert, sitting in a chair staring blankly at screens with no changes inevitably created gaps in their attention.

Specifically, it meant they couldn’t help dozing off.

“…Huh?!”

“What?! What is it?”

The man sitting on the right snapped to attention as morning sunlight brightened the screen.

And hearing that sound, the man on the left followed suit.

“Damn… I dozed off…”

“How long were we out…? Are we screwed?”

The faces of the two men turned pale.

And for good reason—the current situation was a super-large dungeon opening in the middle of the capital… a quasi-wartime state.

It was only downgraded to quasi-wartime because monsters weren’t coming out and the conquest was complete; otherwise, it would have been equivalent to a full wartime situation.

And the punishment for negligence of duty during wartime…

“Hey, hey, calm down. If something had happened, we wouldn’t have woken up on our own.”

“True… an officer or senior would have woken us up.”

Though they were talking as if everything was fine, their voices were trembling terribly.

It was essentially self-hypnosis.

As the two were muttering and watching the screens, something strange caught their eye.

“Oh! Something came out!”

“What? The raid team? Or monsters?”

A figure bursting through the gap.

If it was the raid team, it meant the situation was over, and if it was monsters, it meant the situation was getting serious.

In this binary choice that would determine whether things improved or worsened…

“…Isn’t that a person?”

What came out of the massive crack was… a person.

“The raid team is out! Let’s report it!!”

It was the raid team that had emerged.

As the person closer to the communication device picked it up to report this fact.

“…Oh, shit. What is that────”

A massive, pillar-like thing…

BOOM─────!!!

As the world shook violently and consciousness faded.

“■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■——!!!”

I thought I heard some kind of cry.