Above, Not Below
Above, Not Below
The body that had received all sorts of grim diagnoses—permanent impairment, death during treatment, forced retirement, and the like—was defying predictions and recovering splendidly.
Shattered and crushed bones were mending, and organs that had been reduced to pulp were functioning again.
My muscles were gradually recovering too. I was past walking now; I could even run.
My body would be fully healed before long.
And soon enough, my energy might recover to the point where I could even attempt regenerating my arm. I was still mulling that matter over.
My mind—the thing that moved my body—had also recovered a great deal.
Because now I could think coherently even while awake.
There was a side effect.
As reason slowly regained its strength, the things I'd done when emotion had seized control of my body in reason's absence began surfacing one by one...
My face flushed hotly. Even without using the Calamity Flame, it felt like my body was heating up. Humiliating. I wanted to crawl into a mouse hole right then...
Pointlessly, I wanted to eliminate any chance of being observed by outside eyes. I pulled the blanket over myself and covered my body.
'Just how long was I holed up in this recovery room...'
A few days had passed since Hong Yeon-hwa and Baek A-rin came to visit. After that day, my condition seemed to have improved a bit more.
Probably because I'd received the warmth of the Calamity Flame from Hong Yeon-hwa.
The Calamity Flame... Actually, using it alongside the Azure Sea had caused some kind of issue with my body temperature.
Because my temperature, which had been fluctuating wildly—spiking hot and then plunging cold—had returned to something close to normal after that day.
The transfer of warmth through the Calamity Flame. The moment that method surfaced in my mind, heat rushed to my face all over again.
The inside of the blanket grew stifling. As if I'd been thrown into a sauna, I irritably kicked the blanket off.
- Whooosh
'Gack...'
The recovery room's temperature was climate-controlled. Even so, the air—cold compared to my body heat—rushed in and washed over me.
My body shivered. With trembling arms, I pulled the blanket back and covered myself moderately.
What had happened a few days ago was a shameful memory I didn't want to recall.
Being held in Hong Yeon-hwa's arms... I hated that it had become familiar now, but it wasn't enough to make me furiously kick my blanket.
But having my stomach touched was a completely different matter. And the fact that bare skin had been touched, not through clothes, was even more embarrassing.
Even before that, there were far too many embarrassing memories. The childish whining I'd directed at Professor Atra had been over the top.
Embarrassing and shameful. Not just the actions themselves, but the version of me who hadn't rejected it at the time—who had actually thought it felt nice—was mortifying.
I wanted to reject it all. I wanted to forget those memories, to deny that the me back then had been in his right mind...
'But I shouldn't do that...'
In the past I would have denied it, but I can't do that anymore.
I let out a deep sigh and turned over. The soft sensation of the bed pressed against my back.
My face turned upward.
I couldn't see the sky. With a ceiling there, that was only natural. And if I used the Observation Authority? If I did it well, I could probably see it.
I moved my remaining right hand. I stroked the place where my left arm should have been.
The area around my left arm was unbearably empty.
'Fuck...'
Back when I was grappling with Aerus, I'd naturally assumed I would die there.
Survival was out of the question, so I figured I'd take that bastard with me. Since I was going to die anyway, I'd decided I could afford to sacrifice one arm in the process.
But I lived. Minus one arm.
Whenever phantom pains hit me—the sensation of my arm being bitten off—I felt like I was truly going insane.
'No, if I'd known I was going to live, I would've been a little more careful...'
It was a futile regret.
If I hadn't offered up one arm as bait, if I hadn't closed the distance by extending my arm, the Azure Sea might have missed.
Using the Azure Sea twice had been impossible. The moment I missed once, I had zero other means of restraining him.
Naturally, the White Night I'd unleashed after that wouldn't have landed either, and I would have died there alone...
Regret ran rampant. Lying here comfortably, thinking it over, several ways things could have gone better surfaced in my mind.
I should've just run... Even now, having survived, I regretted it.
But...
'If I'd run away there, I would have regretted it too.'
The regret would have been the same. No—would it have ended at regret? Having become the very thing I despised, a person no different from my parents, would I have even wanted to live?
'...I mustn't deny it.'
I had realized my unique abilities.
Mana Affinity and All-Rounder.
The unique abilities I'd assumed the system—or something connected to 〈Savior〉—had fabricated and shoved into me.
I was wrong. I'd been grasping at the wrong thing entirely. The Authority of Space and Observation, which I'd thought of as Spatial Perception—those had been granted to me. But the other two were nothing of the sort.
They were abilities I'd possessed from the very beginning.
Not something anyone had interfered to give me. Not authorities bestowed from outside. Even if something had guided them to bloom, to unfurl a little further, they were elements uniquely mine that I'd inherently carried.
The reason I only realized this now? Brushing against death's doorstep had certainly played a part.
To be precise, it was because, while brushing against death's doorstep, I'd awakened to the individual "innate talents" that made up the person called me.
There were innate talents distinct from others but faint and pitifully small, and then there were innate talents as massive as All-Rounder and Mana Affinity—the kind that could define me.
And so, going forward, I must not deny my innate talents, nor the elements that constitute me.
'Lee Ha-yul.'
My name.
Regardless of who gave it, the designation that fundamentally represents me.
The Lee Ha-yul who, unable to abandon his conscience, foolishly runs around trying to save people—that was me.
The Lee Ha-yul who wanted to sob and run away that instant, but in the end didn't flee and hurled himself at a monster—that was me too.
The Lee Ha-yul who, even while brushing against death's doorstep, and even now having survived and somehow come out okay, still regrets the choice he made back then—that was me too.
And.
The Lee Ha-yul who clung to Professor Atra and whimpered—that's also me.
The Lee Ha-yul who, while claiming he couldn't even taste bitterness, refused to take his medicine—that was me too. And the Lee Ha-yul who complained of the cold and nestled into a warm embrace—that was me too.
The Lee Ha-yul who, once back in his right mind, finds those actions embarrassing and shameful—that's me too.
All of it is me. I mustn't deny it. I mustn't deny the innate talents that constitute me.
The reason I'd realized my unique abilities so late was because I'd been denying them so intensely all this time.
The most fundamental method of training a unique ability is to look back upon oneself.
I'd learned it at Siyoram, and I knew it from the original work's knowledge.
I just didn't apply it to myself. I'd jumped to the conclusion that I was an ambiguous, special case and it wouldn't have much effect.
I'd made a mistake. That part couldn't be helped. I wasn't omniscient, nor was I a flawless, perfect superhuman.
But if I've made a mistake, I need to pay close attention so it doesn't repeat.
So I have to accept it. The Lee Ha-yul who seems embarrassing and unsightly is ultimately me.
I have to acknowledge that the Lee Ha-yul who saves people and then regrets it, with such a filthy heart, is me too.
'I don't want to regret.'
As long as one lives, there are inevitably moments when you must choose one among many options.
Those moments of choice won't end in a single instance—they'll come countless times over the course of a life.
A half-hearted guy like me will regret every single one.
But I want to regret a little less.
I regret not running away from Sipnaha, but if I had run away, I would have regretted it enough to want to end my own life.
It was an incident that had entered my perception.
It was a level of crisis I was fully capable of helping with.
And it was a crisis that only I could help with.
That's why I hurled myself at it.
If that's the case, then what should I do going forward?
I rummaged through my knowledge of the original work.
Tower of the Dead.
Tower of Bitter Cold.
Tower of Purgatory.
The catastrophes I'd arbitrarily considered the final objectives.
I knew that those towers would begin making their moves very soon.
And I knew that the resulting damage would go beyond the level of a few nations being destroyed.
I'd perceived the events. I knew I could help, even if only a little.
So then—am I the only one who can resolve them? There are plenty of people far more capable than me. Do I really have to be the one to do it?
My thoughts drifted idly on.
'Ah.'
After fumbling through my thoughts for a while, I suddenly reached out my right arm as a thought struck me.
My hand closed around the box I'd left on the floor beside the bed. I carefully drew it into my arms.
A box sized to fill my embrace. When I rummaged inside, the sensation of countless sheets of paper met my touch.
The Sipnaha Incident had made me quite famous. The perception-obstruction magic that my Observation Authority magic tool had been maintaining had been dispelled, and my appearance had been captured quite extensively.
They said it had been edited just enough to spare me from undue trouble and then broadcast.
Because of that, things like my recognition and reputation had risen considerably, and letters had flooded in—enough to fill a box to the brim.
This box wasn't the only one.
There were many letters, I was told, from the very people I'd directly saved, and from those who'd merely heard the news and sent them from around the world.
I let my hand drift over the letters, dazed.
They were a little crumpled. A cold surface met my touch.
But at the same time, they felt warm.
'...I.'
I didn't want to die. I valued myself more than others. I wanted to break my curses and live peacefully. I wanted to eat delicious things, to just mess around and live.
'I want to be happy.'
That was the kind of person Lee Ha-yul was.
I want to be happy.
And if possible, I want other people to be happy too.
Happy laughter was much nicer to hear than miserable weeping.
Whenever I heard that handwritten letters brimming with gratitude had arrived in this modern era where the internet had been restored through the Tower of Harmonization, a feeling of quiet pride rose from somewhere in my chest.
If possible, I want others to be happy too.
If such a paltry person as me could dare to have it—I want to be happy, and I want other people to be happy too.
Was it possible? The letters answered that for me.
Professor Atra had told me. The people who'd come to visit had told me too.
That while there were those I hadn't been able to save, there were certainly those I had. That there were people who wouldn't be alive now if I hadn't stepped forward. That because I'd stepped forward, many who would originally have died had survived.
'I've decided.'
I set my goal anew.
One way or another, in order to survive myself, I had to prevent catastrophes on the scale of annihilation.
I had no intention of dying unhappily. I had no intention of living happily but briefly and then dying.
Let's make the effort, as much as possible.
Even if it's just to regret a little less.
So that later on, I can at least make the excuse that I did my best at the time.
The sky was still invisible. With the ceiling blocking it, that was only natural.
And with my head hanging low, not being able to see it was only natural.
Thinking the sky would be visible while I kept my gaze pointed downward—that was a stupid thought.
Going forward... I would try to lift my head.
Facing death, I'd felt a great many things.
Being forever trapped in the shadow of dead parents was a ridiculous way to live. Wasn't it about time I shook that off?
I steadied my heart and reconstructed my growth plan.
Since my plan to acquire the Confession Necklace had gone to complete shit, I drew up a new plan.
Assuming that the Confession Necklace and other easy-to-acquire Hidden Pieces had already been looted, I called to mind elements that I could make use of.
'Ah, but still, the necklace is such a waste...'
If nothing else, I could've sold it off for a lot of money...
I was deeply disappointed. If only I'd gotten the Confession Necklace, I could've kept ignoring the Curse of Silence from now on.
But what could I do? Reality was what it was. I could only swallow my regret.
- Scroll
"Nothing happened while I was gone?"
A few hours later, Professor Atra, who'd been away on personal business, came rushing in.
She strode right up to me, then pulled me—sitting on the bed—into an embrace.
A soft and gentle warmth wrapped completely around my body.
'...I'm happy.'
I'd accepted myself.
So I couldn't deny this feeling...
* * *
It was the day after I'd finally been discharged and returned to Siyoram.
"Our house isn't such a grand family, so this is the only kind of thing I can give you, hehe... Still, I'm sure it'll be helpful to you, Ha-yul!"
Ellia's outstretched hand... on her palm rested a neatly arranged necklace.
Through the information gathered by the Observation Authority, I could sense the necklace's appearance.
A silver necklace better described as rustic than ornate.
My still-unpolished Observation Authority also partially grasped the providence contained within the necklace.
A providence that reads the wearer's psyche and projects it externally through voice...
'This is...'
Identical appearance. And a familiar ability that stirred déjà vu...
'It's the Confession Necklace...'
How in the world had this, of all things, ended up with a friend I'd just sorted out my feelings about...
I stared blankly, mouth agape.