Chapter 5: Quest (5)♥
Chapter 5: Quest (5)♥
I earned a million won.
I should have been happy about it, but I couldn't purely enjoy the feeling.
It was because of my Noona, who was currently staring into the air with an expression that bordered on grim determination.
Just what kind of quest had popped up?
What kind of quest could it be for her to react to my explanation with an attitude of, ‘So this really is what I wanted’?
I didn't know, and frankly, I didn't want to know.
Yet, a part of me was curious. It’s human nature to want to peek into the darkness you shouldn't touch, to open the sealed box, or to lift the closed toilet lid.
I forced myself to swallow hard and cleared the area, pretending not to notice.
“Anyway.”
Noona’s body stiffened. Just hearing my voice seemed to startle her; her eyes snapped wide open as if she’d been caught off guard.
“Noona?”
“Oh, uh, yeah. What is it, Jin-ah?”
“Uh… you were just, you know, acting weird all of a sudden.”
Her reaction was practically a jump. Even if I tried not to pay attention, it was impossible to ignore.
Noona tried her best to act nonchalant.
“I was just… lost in thought for a second. Yeah!”
She even forced a bright, cheerful laugh, so I couldn't bring myself to press her further.
I had a vague idea, anyway. It probably had something to do with the quest.
Though I didn't know exactly what that quest entailed.
I had a feeling that even if I tried to find out, she wouldn't tell me. So, I didn't ask. I stretched my body and turned my head away.
Fortunately, nothing had happened during the night. I had been secretly worried that this might suddenly turn into a horror game, but those fears were unfounded.
The vent I had blocked was still sealed, and the other spots I’d reinforced showed no signs of anything entering or even approaching.
Was there really no one else here? Perhaps, like in The Martian, the only goal was survival.
“Should we keep moving for now? Did you get any other quests, Noona?”
It was a blatant act of playing dumb. If she told me what quest she’d received here, all my worries would likely turn out to be groundless.
“Huh? Oh, um, no! Nothing. Do they usually only give one at a time?”
Seeing her act so coy made me feel uneasy. Just what kind of quest was it that she couldn't even tell me?
Maybe telling her that the quests were a manifestation of her subconscious had been a bad move.
“I haven't had any new ones pop up either, but usually, if you complete one and keep playing, they give you more. Let’s just keep going for now.”
“Shall we? Just give the word, Sergeant!”
Seeing her give a clumsy salute with a giggle made me feel like everything was fine, regardless. I left the cafeteria with her and continued our trek.
I didn't particularly like the long, stretching corridors or the lingering traces of past inhabitants that gave off a somewhat eerie vibe, but…
“Hmm, hmm! It looks like the goal is to reclaim the base while restoring the power.”
Even that felt less daunting because I had Noona with me.
In fact, every time we restored power to a section as we passed through, seeing the base slowly hum back to life felt good.
How should I put it? It felt like the path I was walking with her was gradually becoming brighter and returning to normal.
It almost felt like we were healing this base.
In that sense, Noona wasn't just providing emotional support.
“It’s a bit high…”
She was genuinely helpful. There were paths that would have been much more difficult if I had been alone.
“Noona. Here.”
“Okay, hold on… Got it!”
With her, I could overcome obstacles quickly.
I felt it even when we were simply heading to a higher level.
I gave her a piggyback ride to lift her up high, and Noona, utilizing her flexibility and incredible core strength, climbed up lightly and lowered a rope that was naturally placed there so I could follow.
“Here, take my hand!”
“What, am I a dog?”
How long had it been since the two of us spent time like this?
This experience, which had been rare even before I joined the military, suddenly brought back memories of the past.
From the time when our father was still alive to the chaotic period after he passed away.
And I wasn't the only one thinking about it.
“This reminds me of the old days.”
“You too, Noona?”
“Yeah. Do you remember back then? When you stayed by my side while I was crying, Jin-i.”
As she made a whimpering sound and rubbed her eyes as if pretending to cry, I smiled faintly, remembering the time she actually had been in tears.
She hadn't been crying in such a lighthearted way back then.
Rather, it had been a shock that felt like the world was collapsing around me.
It wasn't that long ago, but it had been quite a while.
Back when Noona was still in high school and I was just a clueless middle schooler.
Noona was still doing ballet then.
She swept up awards every time she entered a competition, drawing attention as a promising ballerina.
Back then, I, Kang Yu-min, and Yu-ri all believed without a doubt that she would become a professional ballerina.
One day, I came home and froze at the sound of someone sobbing.
‘Noona…?’
My sister, who had always been the reliable one at home, was crying. She was visibly flustered that I’d caught her, but she couldn't stop the tears.
I wondered what had happened, if there was some kind of problem.
I didn't know then, and I still don't know exactly why she was crying that day.
But at the very least, I could take a guess now.
Our father had no intention of filling the void left by our mother, who died giving birth to Yu-ri. The only person who could fill that parental void was our eldest sister, who was still young and in need of protection herself.
If she had been irresponsible, it might have been different, but Noona wasn't the type of person who could turn a blind eye and ignore her responsibilities.
And that wasn't all. Noona had an obsession.
It was the pressure to follow in the footsteps of our mother, who had been a world-class ballerina, and fulfill her mother’s dream.
I realized that must have been what was pushing her to the brink. Following a vague instinct, I had sat down beside her.
I didn't know what to say at the time.
I think I just sat quietly next to her and held her hand.
A thought that had vaguely crossed my mind escaped my lips on its own.
‘Noona, is ballet really that hard?’
Hearing those words, Noona, who had been silently weeping, lifted her head.
Our eyes met, and she tried to squeeze out some words, but nothing really came out.
She just quietly shook her head. But I immediately noticed that her non-verbal answer was a lie.
I agonized over what to say for a long time, but nothing came to mind.
Seeing her cry like that was a total shock. It was an unknown terror I had never even imagined.
So, I remember speaking almost like a spinal reflex.
‘You don’t have to try to be exactly like Mom.’
The only other ballerina I knew in the world. Noona flinched violently at my words and froze.
Her tears even stopped, and I remember her speaking in a voice still thick with the urge to cry.
‘Then… won’t everything I’ve done until now go to waste?’
Her words, spoken as her hands trembled with fear and she gripped my hand tightly, contained her most vivid sincerity amidst all the fragmented things she said afterward.
Noona was afraid. She was afraid that the time she had spent would vanish into nothingness, and that all of her mother’s efforts and traces would be forgotten and disappear.
But I believed there was something more important than that.
‘It’s okay. If you want to quit, you can quit.’
Her face from back then—mature yet youthful and shell-shocked—overlapped with the smiling, beaming face she had now.
‘Noona, you’ll be good at whatever you do.’
‘I….’
‘I just want you to be happy.’
It was my honest heart. Instead of cliches like saying Dad would want that too, or that Mom would want her to be happy.
I just conveyed my sincerity. I felt that’s how it should be with family.
‘Let’s do what you want to do. What do you want to do, Noona?’
And so, the ninth-grader and the eleventh-grader siblings had a long conversation.
A talk about trivial, completely unrealistic dreams and the future.
Was it from then? That Noona, who was already kind, began to show me an even gentler and sweeter side.
When I became a high schooler and started attending the same school as Kang Yu-min, Noona suddenly left her arts high school and transferred to the school Yu-min and I attended.
‘Jin-ah! Noona’s here! How do I look? Does the uniform suit me?’
After quitting ballet, Noona started smiling again. And very brightly, at that.
There were still problems, like how difficult it was to start studying again so late, or the struggle to get into the university she wanted because of it.
But the important thing was that Noona was smiling again. So, our family didn't mind. In fact, it seemed better for our father.
Because after quitting ballet, Noona started working hard to inherit our father’s business.
And surprisingly, she had a talent for business.
She adapted quickly and did well. Thanks to that, when Father passed away, she was able to wrap up his business and start a new one instead of just taking it over.
As I smiled at the end of my recollection, Noona chattered away as she led the way.
“I can’t tell you how grateful I was back then.”
She spoke with a bashful, beaming smile.
I waved it off, saying it was no big deal, but Noona’s soft, lamb-like eyes were fixed solely on me.
“Really. If it weren't for our Jin-i, Noona… heehee.”
She trailed off. That was her own way of being considerate. It was a somewhat heavy kind of consideration, but since we were in a low-gravity environment, I figured it was fine.
I continued the game with her while thinking such nonsensical thoughts.
We restored power to the base and tinkered with things like potato cultivation devices and life support systems.
Eventually, as we were walking down a corridor, Noona called out to me.
“Jin-ah, Jin-ah.”
“Yeah, what is it?”
“Look over there.”
“Over there? Oh… wow.”
We found a window looking out.
As expected, it seemed we were somewhere like Mars. I’m not an expert on space, so I wasn't sure.
But we could see Earth outside.
The Earth, embedded largely within the space scattered with brilliant starlight, was truly beautiful.
It was a landscape that would inspire poetry even in someone who wasn't a poet. As I stared blankly at the Earth, Noona’s hand softly took mine.
“You know, Jin-ah.”
Even though I couldn't take my eyes off the Earth, Noona waited patiently.
In fact, she spoke hurriedly as if she liked it that way.
“Noona just got a quest.”
A quest. Noona was lying. Since it was her, I knew for sure.
But I didn't even have time to stop her.
“Close your eyes?”
Only then did I turn my head, and Noona was close.
So close that I found myself catching my breath.
The breath I drew in was filled with a sweet scent.
Noona’s signature sweet and soft fragrance. The dangerous scent that had almost made my body react instinctively when we slept together yesterday.
As I tried to hold my breath, Noona’s eyes looked up at me from below.
“I told you to close your eyes.”
“Noona….”
“You have to listen to your Noona, right?”
I reflexively closed my eyes and felt Noona’s sweet breath getting closer.
“So… it says I have to kiss my younger brother, Kang Yu-jin.”
She whispered the words right in front of my lips. Before I could even react, her lips overlapped with mine.
Zap. An electric current surged through my body.
They say electricity runs through the human body, and it certainly felt that way. I flinched at the current that surged from Noona’s lips, through mine, and straight to my brain.
I felt our bodies pressed together. Her voluptuous figure was conveyed with a weight that crushed my sanity, even in the low-gravity environment.
I was crumbling. I trembled, trying somehow to reduce the area of contact, but I couldn't.
“And, since this is a game… it’s okay, right?”
She murmured as she pulled her lips away slightly. I couldn't even answer and just kept my eyes closed.
My lips parted. Between my parted lips, Noona’s lips brushed against mine.
Our heated breaths flowed into her mouth, and from her mouth into mine.
My tongue, which had lost its strength without me realizing it, touched hers. Taking that as a signal, Noona pushed me onto the floor without hesitation.
I felt the inevitable rush of blood. If I were to make an excuse, this was entirely due to the influence of gravity.
Since I was lying down, the blood naturally rushed to my lower body. It was a purely natural phenomenon. I just hoped Noona would think so too.
I kissed her.
Even though it was a game, the sensation was no different from reality.
Noona’s sticky tongue became entangled with mine, and as our tongues intertwined, my member, which had swollen to its limit inside my stiff clothes, pressed firmly against her lower abdomen.
Noona’s hips twitched as she pressed herself against me, and we continued to kiss for a long time.
[!You have died!]
[Cause of Death: Starvation]
[>Game Over]
Until the game forced us to stop.
After exiting the game, Noona quietly returned to her room as if nothing had happened.
Right, this was a game. Nothing happened.
I desperately whispered that to myself.
After finishing something that had technology far too advanced to be called just a game, Kang Yu-dam returned to her room, breathing so hard her already large breasts seemed to heave.
Click!
The first thing she did upon entering her room was lock the door.
So that no one could enter, so that no one would know what she was about to do.
Every second counted. The excitement coursing through her body was slowly paralyzing her reason.
Kang Yu-dam let out a ragged breath and moved her hand to her lower body.
Squelch.
The wet sound was lewd. She knew she shouldn't be doing this—he was her brother, after all, the brother who trusted and followed her, the brother who loved her…
The eldest sister, who had played the role of a mother for a long time, could not hold back. She leaned against the wall, slid her hand inside her clothes, and pushed her fingers into her underwear.
“Ah, hngh….”
A moan escaped her lips involuntarily. She bit her lip hard to endure it, but Yu-dam could no longer hold back.
Her eyelids trembled as she moved the fingers she’d slid into her underwear, slowly stimulating the parted crevice.
The pussy hole was already leaking sticky pussy juice. A lewd entrance that made squelching sounds as she spread the fluids thick over her fingers.
‘I’m sorry.’
The sister apologized as she obsessively rubbed her fingers over her pussy hole.
‘I’m sorry, Jin-ah.’
Kang Yu-dam thought of her brother. His face when he’d grin widely and laugh whenever their eyes met, the way he’d mischievously laugh when he came out half-naked after a shower saying he’d forgotten his towel.
Those firm muscles. His thick forearms. The back of his hand where his veins showed, radiating masculinity.
And the long, strong, rugged fingers attached to that hand.
“Hngh, mmm, nngh….”
Imagining those fingers digging into her, Yu-dam parted her own pussy hole and pushed her fingers into the pussy meat.
She moved slowly, imagining her brother’s fingers, which would surely be longer than hers and scratch all the good spots.
Because if it was too hard or too fast, it would hurt.
Yu-dam panted as she tightly squeezed her own fingers.
The pussy juice that gushed out soaked her palm, but even that made her hopelessly aroused as she thought of her brother’s palm, imagining she was dirtying his fingers.
She reached her climax while remembering her brother’s penis, which had pressed firmly against her lower abdomen—right where her uterus was—inside the game.
As her vaginal pressure reflexively pushed her fingers out, she convulsed from the friction against the vaginal walls.
A pleasurable climax and its lingering afterglow. Kang Yu-dam panted and moaned, savoring the sensation despite the excuses she’d hurriedly made to herself.
Once the masturbation was over, what she had done came into view. It was shameful. Especially her fingers.
Yu-dam let out a sigh and looked at her fingers.
‘…If only these were Jin-i’s fingers.’
Imagining what it would have been like to be poked while soaking his fingers in her pussy juice, she let the sticky fluids drip onto the floor.
“…Ugh.”
It was hard to bear. Yu-dam eventually lay down on the bed and licked her fingers.
Thinking of them as her brother’s fingers, thinking she was licking them wet to make them easier to insert.
She licked them slowly, with care and affection.
Then, she pushed those fingers, stained with saliva and pussy juice, back into her pussy.
She felt lucky that the room was soundproof.
‘I should ask him to play together again next time.’
Yu-dam decided she had to play that family-friendly game with him again.
‘Because it’s a game. It’s just a game.’
Everything that happened inside was just a game.
She reached another climax, feeling grateful for that mysterious game.