episode_0236

It felt stuffy, as if the room was packed tightly with rocks. The warm breeze that had been blowing through the room had disappeared and turned cold.

“By any chance… that person… ”

Seo-yeon, clutching her chest in excruciating pain, asked in a hoarse voice.

“Min-ha… Hey… ?”

“… ”

A lonely smile still appeared on Hyun Lee’s lips as he looked at her. After a brief silence, he slowly nodded.

“Yeah.”

“Sigh… ”

Seoyeon groaned as if in pain. She felt the past mistakes choking her throat again. She lowered her head and muttered in a voice filled with self-loathing and despair.

“That, that’s right… As expected… I made you… like that… Of course you don’t want to even look at it… ”

“That’s not it.”

However, Lee Hyeon shook his head and immediately denied her words.

He stood up, staring at Seo-yeon with eyes filled with complicated emotions. Then he slowly walked over to the window and stared blankly beyond it.

The scars of the capital city from the rebellion were being repaired. Lee Hyeon’s hazy gaze was directed beyond him towards the horizon to the west.

The cradle. And the direction where the beech tree dormitory where he had been kept all along.

Maybe someone is waiting right now.

“I won’t say that it didn’t hurt.”

Lee Hyeon, who had been staring blankly outside the wide open window, opened his mouth.

“When I thought I had lost you after my family… It was really painful. Really… I wanted to rip my heart out… ”

“Ugh… ”

“Still… It’s okay now.”

Lee Hyeon approached Seo Yeon, who had slumped down again, and bent down to be at her eye level.

“How could I hate you when I knew it was all a misunderstanding?”

And he placed his palm over the slender back of her hand that was supporting the ground, with a very slight tremor that was almost imperceptible.

“And you too… have endured the pain alone.”

“Ha, but… ”

“Everyone makes mistakes. You too. And me too. And we’re still young. Really… I don’t hate you.”

“Ugh… ”

It was a voice filled with warmth that comforted her. That was why it was even more painful.

“… If I had met you a little earlier, maybe things would have turned out as you said. But… now… ”

Seoyeon carefully raised her head. Then, she opened her mouth weakly, her voice full of disappointment.

“Why…?”

Then, after thinking for a moment, Lee Hyeon looked at her and said.

“Senior Min-ha… is someone I can’t live without.”

“Ah… ”

Seoyeon let out a desperate sigh. That one word was more terrifying than any torture in the world.

“He’s too dangerous to be left alone. I feel so sorry for him… I can’t just leave him alone… That kind of… ”

Lee Hyun turned his blurry gray eyes toward the window again.

“Just like…you used to be.”

“… ”

“You can do it. Just like you always have. You are more than capable of it.”

Seo-yeon could no longer hear her voice. Lee Hyeon, who was watching her, tried to comfort her, but it didn’t provide much comfort.

Hyun Lee checked his watch and carefully got up. He could no longer feel even the small amount of warmth that had been wrapping around the back of Seoyeon’s hand.

“… I have to go now. I can’t leave her alone for too long. ”

And Lee Hyun’s trudging steps grew distant. The doorknob that his hand had touched was about to make a rattling sound.

“Me, me too… !!”

He suddenly stopped walking at the shout that came out of nowhere.

Seo-yeon, who had been lying down, suddenly raised her head and looked at his back. Her hair was disheveled and the blood vessels in her round eyes were all red.

“I, you know… I… can’t do it without you… ”

“… ”

Even though it was such a desperate cry, Lee Hyeon still couldn’t look at her. Nevertheless, Seo Yeon desperately continued to appeal to him.

“Are you still going to go…? Really… Really…?”

Seoyeon fervently pleaded to all the gods of the world.

Just once, I wish he would look back at me. And let his heart waver when he sees my miserable state.

“Like this… leaving me… alone… ?”

“… ”

His hand that held the doorknob was trembling. Seo-yeon could tell that he was in terrible agony.

Seeing him in so much pain, I hesitated for a moment, wondering if letting him go might not be the right choice.

The Fall of Heaven and the Fall of Jukhwa. Two families that can never stand under the same sky.

In the meantime, forcing a man who is entangled like a wisteria tree to make a choice could be seen as too cruel.

Still, Seo-yeon couldn’t let go of Lee Hyeon.

The pain of losing him forever is only once enough.

In the midst of such a horrible feeling that her soul was torn apart, Seo-yeon desperately begged and begged.

Please, I hope Hyun-i chooses herself and not Yeon-min-ha.

But his choice did not change.

“… I’m sorry.”

A short phrase filled with many emotions rang out softly. What followed was the sound of footsteps moving away from Seo-yeon’s hospital room.

In the hospital room where the warmth of early summer had been lingering, only a chilling chill was felt. Seo-yeon was just stretching out her arms weakly into the empty space.

So Lee Hyeon left her hospital room forever.

***

I deliberately walked instead of using regular public transportation. My head was hurting so much that I felt like it was going to burst, so I felt the need to collect my thoughts a little.

Yeon-i’s desperate, tearful voice rang in my ears hundreds of times. Of course, I was aware that I had done something cruel to her.

Knowing the pain of being abandoned by someone, yet forcing that same pain on others.

Am I really just a useless piece of trash?

And then the first thing that came to mind was the captain and his older sisters.

A captain who hasn’t forgotten someone for over a decade.

The older sisters, unable to let go of their love for such a leader, follow him around the battlefield like a ghost.

There is no way that the manager doesn’t know what his sisters are thinking. Maybe the reason he always treats them so harshly is because he feels those feelings.

What on earth was the captain thinking at that time?

I feel so frustrated that I want to go to the Eastern Ruins and get some advice. I wrote a letter to them for a hundred days, but it didn’t reach them.

The kid is already acting up, so I wonder if he’ll get hit on the head for worrying about something like that. His older sisters will see that and yell at the captain.

And then they start chatting about trivial things as if nothing had happened. I’ve always been the one listening to their stories, but this time I have quite a bit to talk about.

If I hear that I’ve never missed first place, my sisters will be so happy that they’ll jump for joy. Maybe they’ll even want to hug me tightly. This time, I’ll try not to show my dislike and feel that warmth. My sisters’ faces, who are secretly disappointed, are always on my mind.

The captain will also be grumbling on the outside but feeling happy on the inside. That person has always been like that.

Maybe your girlfriend will ask you with secret anticipation if you have a girlfriend. If she hears that you even have a fiancé, she will be shocked and turned inside out.

And then he’d drag me to the back of the barracks and ask me with his eyes wide open whether I was using enough force. That was what he’d been telling me over and over again, because he’d been worried about my health the whole time.

uh…

Then… what should I answer?

“… Ah.”

As I came out of that swamp of thoughts, I soon found myself standing in front of the cradle’s main gate.

The surroundings were already darkened by the ground spiders. Even the effort of walking around was useless, as it only increased my distracting thoughts.

“Sigh… ”

Standing before that now familiar scenery, I let out a deep sigh as if the ground was falling apart.

***

The mere fact that the principal had returned filled the air of the cradle with an inexplicable vitality. This was a passage where one could confirm Haewolhwa’s great presence.

The school break was lifted a while ago, and students are returning one after another. It seems that many students have already returned, and there are quite a few rooms in the dormitory with their lights on.

And next Monday, the academic calendar will begin again.

The existence of the witches will also be made public, and the students will also learn who is behind this attack.

I walked through the main gate and took the back road to the dormitory. I was a little anxious because I had been away from Yeonmin-ha for quite some time without even saying hello.

And the sight of the dormitory without a single light in sight only fueled my impatience.

The inside of the dormitory that I entered like that was pitch dark. Only after slightly strengthening my eyesight with general circulation magic could I discern a little of the inside.

“… ”

Everything was a mess. The dormitory, which was clean and spotless like Yeonminha’s personality, was now littered with all sorts of junk.

Since I didn’t feel any sign of life, I ran straight up to the second floor where my bedroom was.

I pushed open the slightly open bedroom door and went in, but Yeonmin-ha was still nowhere to be seen.

I thought you were definitely in the dorms. I wonder if something happened in the meantime.

And then, with a swish, as if the fog was clearing, a sudden movement was felt from the doorway of the bedroom where there had clearly been no one.

And when I turned around, I could finally see the familiar face of the female student.

“Senior?”

“… ”

For some reason, he was standing there blocking the door with a pale face and a pitiful expression. It seemed as if he was blocking the way so that I couldn’t escape.

First of all, it seems that nothing happened to him personally, which is fortunate.

I don’t know how to bring it up, but… I guess I should just say hello first.

“Senior, I’m here… ”

“Yeah. I thought about it.”

And then he cut off my words of pity and opened his mouth. In a voice that was so subdued that it felt ominous at first glance. Without greeting me warmly or expressing his sorrow.

“Thoughts… ?”

“Yeah.”

Yeonmin-ha nodded slightly.

“I wonder if I’m being greedy. Maybe you’d be happier if you were by Baek Seo-yeon’s side. So… I wonder if it wouldn’t be right to give you up.”

“What is that… ”

“I thought about it for a long time. While you weren’t here. In the dark. While I was chewing on it alone… ”

“… ”

“But, but… ”

It seemed as if he had no intention of listening to my pitiful words. Yeonmin-ha, who had been speaking to herself, suddenly closed her mouth.

Then she seemed to bow her head, and then she collapsed to the floor with a thud.

“I can’t… do it.”

Before I knew it, she was kneeling in front of me. It was extremely difficult to follow the situation due to her sudden actions.

“Don’t…go. Please… ”

And what I heard was a small voice. It was unusual for her, and it sounded very depressed and even wet.

“No, please don’t go… ”

Before I knew it, she was even using formal language.