Chapter 258
Chapter 258
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 258
Chapter Title: 105. Residence (3)
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Just because you've known someone for a long time doesn't mean you're necessarily close to them.
Na Hyein and I are a perfect example.
We've been aware of each other for ages, but we'd never even exchanged private words, let alone met up or swapped phone numbers.
So, inevitably, my understanding of Na Hyein had always relied on imagination.
In my mind, she was someone of few words, cautious, with a will of iron that never buckled no matter the situation, even if she didn't flaunt her courage.
That was all I knew.
For so long, I'd only trained myself to evaluate others based on their suitability for combat, and I'd stuck to that in practice.
As a result, my personal assessment of Na Hyein as an individual was practically a blank slate.
But the internet had revealed a new side of her to me.
Unicorn18.
A longtime fixture on the boards, a bit of an oddball.
Imagining that the girl I'd watched back in school was the real identity behind Unicorn? Impossible for me.
Now, here she stood before me: Unicorn, my classmate, savior of humanity—Na Hyein.
"I mulled it over and figured it was best to talk face-to-face."
Her outfit had changed.
She'd been in a training suit emblazoned with the National Crisis Committee logo before, but now she wore a crisp, neatly pressed uniform.
Her nearly expressionless face stared at me, showing the clear passage of time compared to the past, yet still radiating an overwhelming aura that dominated the space around her.
She held out a paper bag toward me.
Inside were four takeout coffees, neatly packaged.
As I stared blankly at them, Na Hyein caught my gaze and explained first.
"I didn't know what you'd like."
A small gesture, but it stirred old memories all the same.
Yeah, Na Hyein was always the type to prepare excessively.
Nearly a decade had pulled us apart, but a person's nature doesn't change that easily.
"I'll take the iced Americano."
As I picked a menu at random, a faint smile tugged at the corner of Na Hyein's impassive lips.
I watched her steadily, and she handed me the coffee.
"I had a feeling you'd say that."
We sat across from each other in some nameless café, sipping our drinks for a moment.
Sorry to say it, Na Hyein, but Jeju's coffee didn't quite measure up to what Dragonseed left behind.
Bitterer than the coffee was the prickly silence hanging between us.
So much to say, yet nothing came to mind.
The awkwardness from our school days had hardened into this uncomfortable quiet.
Talking online or in group chats is worlds apart from facing someone in person.
After a few glances, it was I, Park Gyu, who broke the ice first.
"I know I'm repeating myself, but thank you."
In moments like this, my speech naturally echoed the Park Gyu from my battlefield days more than the Skeleton of the internet.
My gaze on her probably wasn't much different from back then either.
"You saved my life."
Na Hyein tilted her coffee cup, a faint smile on her lips.
"No."
Her eyes met mine.
"If anything, I'm the one who should be grateful."
She shifted her gaze out the window.
Beyond the glass loomed a towering wall, with gentle mountains rising above it, shrouded in hazy mist and filling most of the view.
"Hold on. There's somewhere we need to go together."
Na Hyein stood up.
She looked at me.
"Will you come with me?"
*
The place Na Hyein took me was a cemetery.
More precisely, a well-maintained burial ground.
A quick glance at the gravestones scattered around made it obvious these were for people who'd fought monsters.
Na Hyein walked calmly among them, bouquet in hand, placing a single flower on each stone with a familiar name.
After five flowers had been laid, she spoke softly.
"Do you know what's missing from this cemetery?"
The sudden question gave me pause as I gathered my thoughts.
Before I could answer, Na Hyein gave a wistful smile and provided it herself.
"Remains."
No bodies.
Which meant...
"Inside the rifts?"
Na Hyein nodded, staring blankly at one gravestone.
"They all vanished in the rifts."
I surveyed the grounds.
By my rough count, over five hundred stones.
Awakened strong enough to enter rifts—over level 5.
So many awakened lost inside them?
I'd heard the stories, but I hadn't imagined the scale of the sacrifice.
"Why did so many die?"
"Not all of them died."
"......"
I think I get what she means.
The face of that boy from individuality who'd followed me so devotedly flashed before my eyes.
"They just... vanished."
Na Hyein knelt and placed a flower before one stone.
I read the name engraved there.
<Ryu Da-seul>
A stranger to me.
But the birth and death years carved into the stone told of a young soul who hadn't even reached her twenties.
Na Hyein stroked the gravestone.
She must have cherished this one deeply.
Watching her expression, I spoke quietly.
"A treasured teammate?"
Na Hyein nodded.
"Smart, kind kid. Strong-willed, too. I thought she'd never vanish."
"Fate's unpredictable."
"Above all, she was the one who introduced me to Red Archive."
Na Hyein let out a shallow sigh, caressing the stone.
After a brief moment of mourning, she turned to me.
"......You remember that time on the boards when I talked about my worries?"
"I do."
I answered, gazing into her mysterious eyes that seemed to glow faintly even under the sun.
Na Hyein turned from the stone.
"That's a big worry, but just as terrifying is the fear of vanishing like her, without warning."
She turned her head northwest.
That direction must lead to the rift.
"......Inside there, you hear all sorts of voices. Or... are they even voices? No matter how hard you try to understand, they don't fit our way of thinking—wills that invade your mind unbidden, fragments that somehow assemble in ways we can't grasp and whisper to us."
Staring toward the rift, Na Hyein quietly clenched her fists.
"......Come over to our side."
If this were before the war, her words would shatter our very definition of rifts.
A mere "phenomenon" possessing will, communicating something like intent to humans? Beyond our experience and knowledge.
What's the difference from this planet having a will of its own?
"......"
But now, even I could vaguely sense it.
The nature of our enemy, the calamity bent on humanity's extinction.
Monsters—and rifts themselves—harbor purpose, faint though it may be, to destroy our world. Humans. Everything.
"That's probably what it means. As far as I can tell."
I watched her profile as she smiled sadly at the cemetery, wondering how much despair and loss she'd endured.
The count of those losses was no less than the number of stones in this barren graveyard.
That's all there was to it.
I had nothing to say to her here.
Not even light consolation.
I knew better than anyone that I, who'd fled my fate, had no right to speak to her, who'd stood on the front lines.
"But."
Na Hyein turned back to me.
Her eyes, gleaming with unmistakable radiance even in the sunlight, fixed straight on mine.
"Thanks to you, I've changed my mind."
I met her gaze directly.
She looked away first.
Awkwardly clutching her wrist, she continued in a slow but firm tone.
"That day, I saw you fighting."
It was inevitable.
She came to save me because she saw it.
"Dongtanmom's video was boring, so I skimmed it and started late—didn't know who it was. No face shown, not a word spoken. But when the fight began, I knew."
She turned back to face me fully.
"It was you. It had to be. No one else in this world could fight monsters that well with a plain human body, no powers."
She added with a soft sigh.
"Professor."
"......"
"Watching you fight so perilously, wordlessly, fiercely—it stirred something inside me. I lack the words, but it felt like a long-forgotten emotion awakening. One thing came through crystal clear."
She fell silent, staring intently, waiting for my reaction.
Surprised by this fresh side of her, I asked.
"What was it?"
She answered instantly.
"I need to get out of the house."
Na Hyein smiled brightly.
I learned something new that day.
The ever-stoic, enigmatic woman could smile like that.
That was the rough outline of our talk in the barren cemetery.
We exchanged a few more words, but nothing crucial.
Of course, no talk of Viva! Apocalypse! or Red Archive boards.
Internet business stays online—that's basic netiquette. We're veterans.
Before parting, Na Hyein asked.
"You planning to stay here?"
Just a week ago, I'd have answered without hesitation.
Absolutely leaving.
But the human heart is a fickle thing.
Honestly, I had no complaints now.
Comfortable living, zero risk of getting shot in my sleep—my worst nightmare banished.
No gruesome morning exercises or roll calls, and credits for a bountiful life.
Hell, I could do almost anything from pre-war days.
Best of all, internet access. Even Red Archive boards as a deluxe two-for-one option.
Why leave paradise?
"......"
I flashed a grin at Na Hyein watching me.
"I'll think about it."
*
The intranet news boards blared headlines about another savior's return: Na Hyein.
Emerging from long seclusion to aid Savior Kang Han-min in the near-final rift closure operation.
"......"
Closing the rifts.
News from before I came to Jeju, but I'd doubted it then.
Now? Different story.
I believed they could close them.
End humanity's doom with human hands.
Even if Jeju's rift was the weakest, success here versus failure was night and day.
If they sealed Jeju's, maybe—just maybe—humanity survives.
Even shelving that Chinese scientist's species preservation issue.
As I stood with arms crossed, watching Na Hyein mobbed by cheering crowds, my phone buzzed.
"Mr. Park Gyu? Yes. Na Hyein mentioned you're weighing whether to leave Jeju. Whenever you decide, feel free to contact us anytime."
Na Hyein might've waffled briefly, but her efficiency was legendary.
Anticipating a change of heart in her absence, she'd used her authority to give the National Crisis Committee the option to let this Park Gyu return anytime.
That call was confirmation.
"Hmm."
Two days since my face-to-face with Na Hyein.
Still no decision on my residence.
Main reason? It's just too damn nice here.
Prime Zone indeed.
Worthiest of old Korea's elite, all gathered.
Rumors of an even posher Special Zone above, but that's not for me.
Reserved for top National Crisis Committee brass, Kang Han-min, Na Hyein—over level 10 awakened only.
Word is Pilkrum lives there too; might bump into him at the supermarket.
Bottom line: this Prime Zone matches my pre-escape dreams of Jeju most closely.
With this life guaranteed, no need to leave.
But my position here remains shaky.
Still, the big shots above National Crisis Committee are lucky low-level awakened like Park Seung-su.
Na Hyein's favor lets me stay for now, but trouble for her spells doom for me.
Can't last forever.
Still, a short break won't hurt.
Lately, Viva! Apocalypse! treated me unjustly.
Lame excuses won't fix a soured heart overnight.
I have my pride.
If they can't embrace a "big user" like me, I'll walk to greener pastures.
Jeju has Red Archive boards.
Objectively smaller scale than our world-class one, mismatched age group.
But younger, with a future.
Jeju won't fall anytime soon—outlast our boards, easy.
Decent spot for a "big user" like me to jump ship.
"......"
I read the note on my phone memo.
- Verify by rolling gacha and posting game proof
- Block skldqe82
- Block Melongman, postmomentum, DKFUDDL
- Accept quantum bomb buddy request
Right, time for gacha.
That was my next content here.
Logging into the game, I checked recruitment.
<Fes Recruitment Ongoing!>
-Yakumo (Limited), Yoris (Limited), Huai Ba (Limited) Pickup!
-3-star rate 5%!
Lively stuff.
Fes recruitment? Some event.
Those marked limited? Jeju exclusives, probably.
"......"
Shall I pull once?
This Park Gyu? Pretty lucky, personally.