Chapter 331
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 331
Chapter Title: 133. Fair Trade (5)
Let's take a fresh look at the person known as IAmJesus.
He comes from a single-parent family, raised solely by his father.
He has no connections to grandparents or other relatives.
IAmJesus's temperament is on the timid side, lacking the courage or will to actively stand up against external pressures.
He simply lives with what's given to him, mustering just enough bravery to voice minor complaints within those bounds.
He possesses the virtue of patience, but patience can be a double-edged sword.
In environments or situations where one absolutely should not endure, patience becomes nothing more than a self-inflicted curse.
IAmJesus's father is a highly controversial figure.
He's known as a cult leader who toys with numerous female followers and is infamous for all sorts of scandals.
Fortunately, he never skimped on financial support, but he didn't seem to love his son all that much either.
Like any fearful parent, he did only the bare minimum as a father and made no real effort to engage in meaningful conversations with his child or encourage change.
Personally speaking, IAmJesus isn't all that appealing.
His looks, personality, and sociability all fall short, and he never tried to hide his flaws or highlight his strengths to broaden his social circle.
He always shut himself away in his own little world, completely immersed in it.
In the darkness brought by the war, the boy spent nearly three years in confinement.
Anyone who's spent that same time on the message board with him knows well what his mental world looks like.
A shattered, broken soul.
I met him.
I pulled him out of that bunker and reached out to him.
But in the end, IAmJesus discovered his true potential and chose to stay in the city of death with his father.
He turned away without a hint of hesitation.
That said, I didn't entirely dismiss Jeon Sang-hee's concerns either.
As I left the city of death, I did worry whether this immature soul named IAmJesus could truly grow up properly.
After that, I sent him a few messages.
One-sided messages don't last long, though.
After being ignored a few times, I forgot about IAmJesus just like anyone else and stopped paying him much mind.
The most I did was check in on him during that brutal winter.
And now, that friend has appeared before me again.
In the form I vaguely foresaw but desperately hoped never to see.
"SKELTON. My stuff. Did you bring it?"
His voice had thickened, but his speech had grown even more halting.
The habit of speaking in fragmented bursts, combined with the human-skin mask flipped over his face, made this message board buddy look even less human.
"......"
Where do I even start? How do I fix this?
The face of the King looms in my mind.
For now, talk.
Let's try talking.
"There are few things in this world that words alone can resolve. But refusing to speak means you won't even make the attempt. Talk a lot. Don't assume it won't work and give up—seize any chance to talk. If it fails, you can always swing your fists later; it won't be too late."
These are the teachings of my mentor, Jang Gi-young.
He spouted plenty of nonsense, but he got a lot right too.
Right now, I'll follow Jang Gi-young's example and give talking a shot.
IAmJesus led me to his room.
A pitch-black darkroom.
A jet-black space where not a single ray of light could seep in, meticulously sealed with blackout curtains covering every inch of the window frames.
The only illumination came from an analog TV in the center, crackling with grayish static noise, and the faint glow of eyes from the zombies lined up like statues on either side of the room.
"......"
Among the zombies standing there with arms crossed like statues, there were a few familiar faces.
For some reason, Chairman Je Phong-ho—complete with a Santa hat—had been appointed as one of the spectators watching IAmJesus's gameplay.
"Haha! It's been forever!"
IAmJesus deftly connected the game console I'd brought and slotted in the game software cartridge.
"Dad was the first one to bring me one of these."
As the game booted up, unfamiliar Japanese text appeared on the screen.
I watched IAmJesus play for a while.
Staring silently at him, I wasn't much different from the zombies gawking at us from the sides.
The first words came when he defeated what looked like a boss.
"How've you been holding up?"
"Good."
IAmJesus stuck out his tongue in response.
"Good?"
"Yeah. Lots of stuff around the city. Found it with friends."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"What about winter?"
"Winter? Cold."
IAmJesus shuddered dramatically.
That was it.
He didn't say how he'd survived the winter or what he'd felt.
He wasn't sharing what he was thinking now or what he planned to do.
He was just enjoying this moment without a thought in the world.
I studied IAmJesus's expression.
I couldn't see his eyes, hidden behind the grotesque mask, but his exposed lower face had his mouth clamped shut, just like the zombies surrounding us.
"......"
Is he bored?
Nothing's more frustrating than dealing with someone who won't talk when you're trying to connect and get something out of them.
But he's not the type to force a conversation with, nor would yelling work on him.
I quietly scanned the room.
"Hm?"
Something interesting.
A laptop.
"Mind if I hop on the internet for a sec?"
"Internet?"
"Yeah."
"Just wanna check something quick."
"What?"
"Whether that Dongtanmom bitch is still alive."
"Uh. Yeah. Go. Ahead."
His hands busied themselves with the controller.
Probably tackling a tough section.
With IAmJesus behind me, I powered up the laptop and checked the screen.
Dozens of photos cluttered the desktop.
Back in the day, they said a person's clothes and behavior were a mirror to their soul, but in the 21st century, one more item was added: the computer desktop as another mirror reflecting the person.
That desktop—based on desktop personality theory—was utter chaos.
Grotesque corpse mutilations, unspeakable porn, cheerful anime characters and cool game avatars, news clippings about his father, various pet dog photos, and what seemed to be his own amateurish drawings of female anime characters (definitely not well-drawn), among others. It was a jumbled mess of images that defied categorization.
"Hey, IAmJesus."
"Yeah."
"You ever gonna clean up this desktop?"
"Desktop?"
"Yeah. A guy can skip cleaning his room, but the desktop? Gotta keep that tidy."
For reference, my desktop only has two icons: the SKELTON folder and Viva! Apocalypse!.
The background is an AI-generated image I made of a muscular warrior holding twin axes, standing back-to-back facing forward, with my signature as the AI artist SKELTON in the bottom left corner.
"R-Really? I should?"
IAmJesus turned to me with shining eyes.
For a moment, I felt a fresh jolt of surprise.
I'd said it without much thought, no big meaning behind it.
I figured nagging about desktop cleanup was something you could say to someone you're not even that close to.
Yet this offhand remark startled him.
It might seem trivial, but in that instant, I glimpsed a sliver of hope.
Maybe even this broken friend could be reached through words.
"Want me to do it?"
"N-No, I can do it myself."
Well, I'd found a point of connection.
One his father probably never would have.
"You like this stuff?"
Start small.
"Oh, that. Kinda. For show."
"What, so what? Guys can look at that stuff too. Clean it all at once?"
"......"
Cleaning a desktop is like housework.
An ordinary task that's easy to overlook but necessary.
Just tidying up your surroundings brings psychological comfort, peace, even a sense of refreshment.
I figure the desktop's the same.
Even fleeting bits of clutter accumulate and leave marks on the mind.
Like being crushed under a heavy rock.
"Hey, what's this? Why save crap like this?"
I expand the scope while cleaning.
"What're you gonna do, stare at dead bodies? Corpses everywhere. At least these don't rot, but normal ones decay and vanish without a trace."
"T-That. Just. Curiosity."
"Delete this?"
"Y-Yeah."
One thing hits me anew.
Our message board isn't exactly great educational material.
I vaguely knew it and understood it intellectually, but it hadn't sunk in because I had no kids of my own to teach, and the neighborhood children had grown up decently—factors that played a big part.
The board had a seriously bad influence on IAmJesus.
His photos included not just the nasty new users I've been banning lately, but also plenty from toxic users who've since vanished.
Women raped to death were, sadly, a common type he saved.
No need to point it out, though.
Twisted habits like that don't fix themselves through criticism.
I let it slide silently.
Instead, I found something decent.
"This one?"
A family photo.
In the faded picture, against the backdrop of a tiny church tucked in a commercial building corner—not even a standalone one—stood IAmJesus's father (younger and alive than I knew him), child-IAmJesus, and an unknown woman, all smiling happily.
"Dad and mom?"
"Y-Yeah."
"When was this taken?"
Only now did I stare at IAmJesus's mask.
Until then, I'd deliberately ignored and avoided mentioning it.
"Why make that out of your dad's face?"
I figured now was the time to ask.
Maybe it was a heavy question; IAmJesus fixed his gaze on the family photo and clamped his mouth shut.
A moment later, he spoke.
"Just."
A lukewarm answer.
I wasn't expecting much anyway.
Just bringing it up was success enough compared to the initial wall.
Click-click-
The photos cluttering the desktop were mostly sorted.
Saved what to save, filed what to file, deleted what to delete.
What remained were several irreplaceable family photos.
I looked at one.
Probably taken by his father: young boy IAmJesus playing with an old game console that was outdated even then.
Not just one shot, but several.
That number spoke of a father's love.
And the fact that it endured amid the desktop chaos showed the son loved his father too.
People's hearts are often compared to a magnet's poles—similar, but not quite accurate.
Hearts don't stick like S and N poles.
Not even between the closest family.
"I have something to say."
Time to wrap up the cleanup.
Night was falling.
Besides, I was certain staying longer wouldn't lead anywhere.
"The King sent me here."
IAmJesus stared at me blankly.
Soon, he bowed his head and muttered.
"......Figured as much."
There was something the King hadn't told me.
"......"
Click-
I'd logged in with IAmJesus's account.
Hundreds of messages sat unread.
And the sender of those messages was...
...
...
It's the King.
Man, even his love calls are sent in this clingy, desperate style.
The King seems just as lacking in communication skills as IAmJesus's flipped human-skin mask of a father.
In other words, both are still immature.
The King and IAmJesus alike.
"What is this? You send these?"
IAmJesus had replied to the King too.
Countering the King's offer of live women with dead ones.
A few mysteries cleared up.
Like the riddle of all those female zombies in various outfits, led by Jane.
But was that really necessary?
Time to show off this SKELTON's communication skills.
"SKELTON? What're you doing?"
I sent a message to the King.
"Watch closely."
I grinned and tapped the keyboard.
"......"
Tap-tap