Realization
"You're... adopting me?"
"Yes. From today on, you're our child."
".........."
It had happened right around the time Maru realized she was different from other children. A young couple had arrived at the orphanage and begun filing adoption paperwork for her.
"Her eyes are sky-blue, just like mine~"
Watching the gentle, innocent-looking woman clasp her hands together with a fond murmur, young Kang Maru had thought only one thing.
You'll just throw me away soon enough anyway.
In truth, she had already been disowned and returned three times before. The reason had always been the same: the eerie, inexplicable power she harbored. No adult ever looked kindly upon a child who constantly whispered and conversed with her own shadow.
Maru knew that talking to her shadow caused problems. But when not a single soul would dare come near her, that shadow was her only friend in the world. Speaking with it brought peace to her frightened heart. Whenever danger loomed, it would step forward in her place and protect her.
"I don't need this."
She did not need new parents at this late stage. She knew with absolute certainty that they would only carve a fourth hole into her heart—one that wouldn't even hurt anymore.
"We're here again~"
"Hello, Maru."
Yet the young couple, whom she had assumed would lose interest and stop visiting after a few days, returned almost every single day.
"It's terribly hot today, isn't it? Would you like some ice cream?"
"We ought to trim your hair a little."
Summer passed.
"Are you reading a biography of the First Hero?"
"So Maru dreams of becoming a hero too."
Autumn passed.
"The weather's gotten quite chilly lately, hasn't it?"
"Here, a scarf I knitted myself~"
Winter passed as well.
"...Why do you keep coming back?"
On the day marking the full year since their visits began, Maru finally gave voice to the question she had buried for so long.
"We already chose you as our daughter. We can't simply give up on you."
"Besides, your eyes are the exact same color as mine~"
Only then did the truth break through her defenses. There really were kind people in this world. Where there were shadows, light existed too.
"...M-Maru? Why are you crying?"
"Oh dear."
That day, Maru became Kang Maru.
"Noona!"
"What is it now?"
A few years later, Kang Maru gained another family member.
"I'm hungry!"
"Hmm. Is that so?"
A little brother named Kang Haneul.
"Mom's coming home late today, though."
"Aww..."
After receiving a diagnosis of infertility, her mother and father had endured a grueling, exhausting struggle before finally being blessed with this precious miracle. In comics or films, such an arrival was almost invariably the beginning of tragedy, but against all odds, the stepsiblings—unbound by a single drop of shared blood—adored each other. Kang Maru's parents were exceptionally warm-hearted, and Kang Haneul was a gentle, obedient boy who followed his big sister everywhere.
"Want Noona to cook for you instead?"
"Yeah! Yeah, yeah!"
He loved the food Kang Maru prepared for him.
"What should I make?"
"Kimchi stew!"
His absolute favorite was always kimchi stew.
"How is it? Good?"
"I love Noona!"
"No, silly, I'm asking if the stew tastes right."
"I love Noona!"
"Pfft."
For Kang Maru, those days were nothing short of a dream.
"Wanna go to the playground after we finish?"
"Yeah, yeah!"
She had a precious family who smiled at her every waking hour. And ever since that family had come into being, the shadow had never manifested once, fading into a hazy memory of a childhood imaginary friend. If only the world they lived in hadn't been plagued by magical beasts, Maru's family would undoubtedly have lived out an ordinary, peaceful life.
—Skreeeech...!
".......!"
The tragedy struck on an otherwise peaceful afternoon, just as the siblings arrived at the playground after lunch. A small magical beast lunged out from the dark.
"H-Haneul!"
In a single heartbeat, their world tilted on its axis.
"Leave Haneul alone!!"
Throwing her entire body forward to shield her little brother from the beast trying to drag him away, Maru screamed at the top of her lungs—and in that desperate moment, her dormant ability burst wide open.
"Maru, you're genuinely incredible."
"Look at this, you're all over the news! A prodigy who halted Justia herself for ten whole seconds. Heheh..."
"...P-prodigy, my foot. Justia is the real monster for breaking through my command with raw physical strength."
From the moment it was discovered that the Concept of Command had taken root in Maru's body, her life transformed at a dizzying pace.
"By the way, how is your hero track application going?"
"Ah, right! I submitted the paperwork for the middle school division, but..."
"You'll become the greatest hero in history, Maru. I know it."
Professional hero: the number one dream job for children, and the number one dream abandoned by adults. That exalted profession, once merely a distant object of yearning, seemed poised to fall effortlessly into her grasp under the weight of her overwhelming talent.
"...Of course I will," Maru had replied back then, overflowing with brilliant confidence. "Whose daughter do you think I am?"
No one faulted her for that pride. She was more than strong enough to justify it, and to the public eye, seeing a young girl hailed as Justia's future rival radiate bright, cheerful assurance rather than arrogance was nothing short of charming.
—ROOOAAAR!
"...Huh?"
So on that fateful day, when an unfamiliar magical beast shattered the window and burst violently into the house:
"Get down."
She issued the command without a shred of hesitation.
"Stay still. Play dead. Be silent. Relinquish your will. Obey. Yield. Submit."
—Grrrk, grk...
The command took hold.
"...It worked!"
Her ultimate technique, hammering a relentless barrage of keywords in a single breath to enforce an absolute command—a method she had poured endless hours into researching—had achieved an unprecedented miracle: a single human subjugating a magical beast.
Admittedly, the intruder belonged to the lowest threat bracket, weak enough that an ordinary adult woman might have scraped together a victory against it. Yet even the weakest magical beasts were known to choose death over submission to humankind. They were creatures fueled by an instinctual, almost artificially manufactured malice toward humanity.
"E-even Justia couldn't do this..."
She had actually done it. A human had conquered that ancient, intrinsic malice for the first time in documented history.
—Rrrrrumble......
And right in that triumphant second:
"Wait... what?"
Her shadow suddenly surged out of control, thrashing across the walls and floor in every direction. The beast she had dominated began sinking into the darkness, pulled under by an irresistible gravitational pull.
"Maru? What are you..."
"A-a beast?"
Before Kang Maru could even comprehend what was happening, the amalgamation of shadow and monster completed its genesis.
—Grrrrr.....
The seed of all impending tragedy, registered as the world's very first Non-Standard Rank magical beast, was born.
".........."
A few days after the catastrophe.
"I'm sorry... Mom..."
Inside the darkened bedroom, Kang Maru stepped onto a wooden chair, all light drained from her hollow eyes.
"Dad....."
Both of her parents had fallen into deep comas during the incident. Though she had poured every last cent saved for her academy tuition into their medical treatments, the doctors had delivered a devastating verdict: there was no realistic hope of them waking up. In all likelihood, they would remain asleep until the day their hearts gave out.
"I'm so sorry..."
She could not bear the crushing guilt. The price for daring to covet the sweet dream of a loving family and an ordinary life was far too brutal. The monster that had emerged against her will at the orphanage, maiming the children who approached whenever danger arose—it hadn't been a distorted childhood delusion. She truly was a monster, just as she had always feared.
A wretched creature that needed to be wiped from this world alongside those horrific eyes lurking beneath her bed even now. It was time to finish what she would have done years ago had the couple arrived just one day later.
—Rustle...
Kang Maru slipped the coarse noose around her neck and squeezed her eyes shut. Even as a monster, the memories of living as a cherished human bubbled up with piercing clarity. Her parents hoisting her onto their shoulders to show her the endless blue sky; her adorable little brother running alongside them, tripping over his own feet and fighting back tears.
"...Who do you think you are, indulging in memories like that?"
The uninvited parasite who had shattered those beautiful moments forever was none other than herself. If only she had stubbornly refused the adoption to the bitter end. If only she had never dared to imagine she was human instead of a monster. They would all be living in warm, blissful happiness right now.
"...Ghk, urgh!"
Having steeled her resolve, Kang Maru kicked the chair away. Her body convulsed, thrashing against the strangling rope.
—Drip...
Fresh blood began to seep from the jagged wounds on her arms left by her first two failed attempts.
"Ugh... ngh..."
Why wasn't she dying quickly? Why was she still clinging to life? Why had every single attempt ended in failure?
"NOONAAAAAA!!!"
As Maru's vision blurred and her strength began to fade, her body was violently lifted upward, accompanied by a frantic, familiar shriek.
"No! Nooooo...!"
Kang Haneul had smashed through the door, his hands bathed in blood, wrapping his small arms around her waist with frantic desperation.
"...Ha... neul."
On the low dining table behind him sat a clumsy, poorly seasoned pot of kimchi stew, long since turned ice-cold. He had stayed up late into the night waiting for her to come out of her room, only to sense that something was horribly wrong.
"Let go of me..."
"If... if even Noona dies... h-how am I supposed to live?!"
He pulled her limp, choking form down to the floor and collapsed over her, weeping uncontrollably as he buried his face in her chest.
"Please don't... Don't die... Don't leave me all alone...!"
"Haneul."
Maru's hand hovered over his trembling back before freezing mid-air. Her voice shook with profound despair.
"I'm... a monster."
"You're not! Noona is Noona!"
"Mom and Dad... it's practically the same as if I put them in that state myself... No, I *did* this to them."
Kang Maru shut her eyes tight against the agonizing truth.
"Someday, I might end up killing you too..."
Scalding tears carved trails down her pale cheeks.
"So please, just stay still. Okay?"
"............."
"This is... yes. This is an order..."
"Then I'll become the monster instead."
Kang Haneul's voice trembled, but the words carried a terrifying resolve.
"If I do this, you'll come back to normal, right?"
Dangling a makeshift pendulum made from a coat button strung onto a loose thread pulled from his shirt, Haneul began to swing it gently before her face. A thick, suffocating fog immediately seized Maru's mind.
"I saw it on TV. They said this is Hypnosis. If you get hypnotized, even people whose hearts are hurting can get all better."
"Haneul..."
Drifting in a daze, Maru choked back a sob at her little brother's heartbreaking earnestness, burying her face into his shoulder.
"The monster mister under the bed told me."
"...What?"
"He said if I swing this and do just what he taught me, Noona will go back to the way you were."
Pure, unadulterated horror painted Maru's face as she whipped her head up to look at him.
"I'll take Noona's place."
"N-no..."
"Noona, become the greatest hero instead of me."
"No!! Haneul, don't—!"
The horrifying realization of what he was attempting to do crashed over her, and she began frantically writhing to break free.
—Tremble...
Yet the hypnotic paralysis had already flooded every nerve in her body; she could not twitch a single muscle.
"Kang Haneul! Don't do something so stupid!!" Maru shrieked in desperation. "You're just a kid! You don't understand, you'll regret this for the rest of your life! Just kill me instead and get rid of the monster! Don't throw your life away for this!!"
"........"
"It's an order!! Kill me, Kang Haneul!!"
Kang Haneul merely looked down at her, tears spilling from his eyes as a gentle smile formed on his lips.
"Why... why won't you kill me?!"
"I knew you'd say that, so I made a contract with that strange old man who came by earlier."
"What...?"
"Even if I turn into a monster, I won't be able to kill a single person. Nyah."
The moment those words left his lips, Kang Maru's consciousness plunged toward a bottomless abyss.
"Noona."
The soft whisper drifting into her ear engraved itself irrevocably onto her soul even as darkness claimed her senses.
"You aren't a monster."
"........."
"Because you've always been my noona."
"So I..."
"Haneul..."
"I'll always be Noona's little brother..."
"Haneul-ah..."
The very last sight she witnessed before falling into total darkness was the nightmare lurking beneath the bed, its eyes curving into sickening crescents as it slithered out from her shadow and burrowed straight into Kang Haneul's back.
"...Haneul."
When Kang Maru opened her eyes again, she was lying flat on a hospital bed.
"Haneul."
"Excuse me, miss?"
"Haneeeuuul!!!"
She had been murmuring with a hollow expression, but suddenly she screamed his name at the top of her lungs, ripping off the sheets and bolting to her feet.
"What on earth have I been doing all this time? This can't be happening. No, this is all wrong...!"
"Wait, miss—!"
"I-I have to see him right now. Right this instant, I need to..."
Rushing toward the door in a frenzy of raw panic, she stumbled.
"...talk to him..."
Her frantic gaze snapped to the television mounted on the wall.
"..........."
She froze petrified in place.
The memories of the seminar crashed back into her fractured mind like a tidal wave. Kang Maru's knees buckled violently, shaking until her legs gave out entirely.
She crumpled onto the cold linoleum floor.
"Over here, someone help! The patient has gone into severe shock!"
Clutching her head between trembling hands, Maru's face slowly distorted into a mask of pure agony.
"For all these years, I hunted you down as a monster."
Sitting motionless on the floor, she whispered into the empty air, her voice cracking into splinters.
"When the monster was me all along."
Only a few minutes later, every last trace of light vanished from her sky-blue eyes.