Mother's Funeral (2)
Ha Ohu, dressed in black mourning clothes with an armband, stared at a single chrysanthemum flower placed beneath the portrait. The process of recovering his mother Han Sara's body had been gruesome. Her abilities had run rampant for twenty years, melting most of her flesh and organs into black sludge, leaving only bones behind. The police had to pump out that revolting liquid and painstakingly scrape up the bone fragments stuck to the floor. Those horrific remnants had been reduced to a handful of white ashes in the crematorium's blazing flames, now carefully enshrined in the small white porcelain urn before Ohu's eyes.
But the problem lay elsewhere.
"So, what do you plan to do about Mr. Ha Deok-gu's body?"
Detective Park, having finished his investigation, approached a corner of the funeral hall and asked cautiously. Ohu's face as the chief mourner was frozen cold. As much as the hypnosis made him love and grieve for his mother Han Sara like a true son, the hatred and disgust toward his father Deok-gu lurking beneath transcended anything a normal human could imagine.
A gambling addict. A domestic abuser. The bastard who had brainwashed his own wife for twenty years with an app, turning her into a sex slave, and even sold her once to debt collectors. Ohu couldn't bear to spend even a single won on funeral costs for that monstrous trash. Of course, he didn't even have the money to properly hold his mother's funeral—no beef soup in sight, just barely securing a spot in the funeral hall.
"Detective."
Ohu turned his unfocused eyes toward Park and spat out in a frigid voice.
"I can't even spare cremation costs for that fucker. Just grab a couple of 100-liter municipal waste bags from the nearby convenience store, stuff his meat in there like crumpled trash, and dump him at the recycling station. Wait, should it go in food waste?"
Smack! Before he could finish, Detective Park's palm smartly struck the back of Ohu's head.
"Ow."
It hurt. But that was it. Thanks to the pre-set hypnosis, he wasn't angry. Unaware of this, Park launched into a lecture.
"You little shit! No matter how much of a scumbag your dad was, what kind of lunatic demands corpse abandonment right in front of a cop?! Say something that makes sense, you idiot!"
Park clicked his tongue, rubbing the back of his neck.
"I get it a hundred—no, a thousand times over—that you don't want to spend a dime. But the law's the law. If you really hate it, sign a waiver relinquishing the body. They'll treat it as an unclaimed corpse, cremate it on the cheap through municipal authority, and handle it with the bare minimum. No funeral or anything."
In the end, thanks to Park's intervention and sensible suggestion, Ohu's plan to bag Deok-gu's corpse like trash was scrapped. It was decided that Deok-gu's existence would be erased from the world via the cheapest, traceless method for unclaimed bodies. A fitting end for garbage.
With Deok-gu's disposal settled, Han Sara's—Shooting Star's—three-day funeral truly began.
But the funeral hall's mourning room was silent. Not even footsteps echoed in the corridors. It was the expected outcome. Shooting Star had been just a promising star that flickered briefly in the past. Forgotten from the world's memory after twenty long years. Moreover, under Deok-gu's vicious control, she had been completely isolated—no acquaintances left to exchange contacts with.
An empty altar without a single flower arrangement. A dining area devoid of even the smell of beef soup.
Oh right, no beef soup. No money.
The desolate scene crushed Ohu's chest, perfectly mirroring his mother's wretched life—rotting away in isolation and darkness for twenty years without a soul's help.
"Haa..."
With no visitors and the room looking too depressing, Park, who had been watching from the side, dragged Ohu outside under the pretext of cheering him up.
In the smoking area, Park pulled out a crumpled cigarette pack from his pocket, lit one, and silently offered another to Ohu. Ohu quietly accepted and lit up. Wisps of smoke scattered into the night sky.
Park exhaled a long plume into the air and spoke.
"Your mother... Han Sara."
Ohu turned to look at him.
"I remember her active days crystal clear, twenty-two years ago. We were the same age. So I paid extra attention whenever she was on the news."
Park gave a bitter smile, eyes narrowing as if lost in reminiscence.
"Before I put on this police uniform—back when I was a kid younger than you. I thought I was hot shit, strutting around as an unawakened normie full of youthful bravado. Got cocky with some punk villain thugs shaking down my neighborhood alley, took a knife to the gut, and nearly bled out."
A bit of ash fell from between his fingers.
"Lying in the alley corner, gasping my last... then a yellow flash dropped from above like a comet, smashing those thugs' jaws. It was your mom. Shooting Star."
Ohu's pupils dilated slightly.
"That tiny frame of hers pressed hard on my wound to staunch the bleeding, told me to stay back so I wouldn't get hurt, all with a bright smile... Man, I swear I thought an angel came down from heaven. She saved my life—my lifesaver."
Park stubbed out his remaining cigarette on the ground and clapped Ohu's shoulder heavily.
"The world's gossiping now, but your mom was amazing... a real hero who staked her life for others. So... you, her son, can't fall apart. Toughen up, kid."
Park's gruff comfort didn't fill the void of Ohu's grim reality—surviving with the hypnosis app. But it was the first genuine kindness from another soul he'd encountered since plummeting into this twisted eroge world. Amid days of clearing stinking corpses, enduring mockery, and propping up his own brain with self-hypnosis in that hellish time, the warmth made even his hypnotized heart sting. Ohu nodded silently.
"...Thank you, Detective."
Leaving Park's consolation behind, Ohu shook off the unlit ash and turned to head back to the silent mourning room.
Screeech! A harsh friction sound erupted from the funeral hall's underground parking entrance, followed by blinding headlights flooding in. Ohu shielded his eyes with his arm.
Black luxury sedans and heavy SUVs slid in one after another. At the sight of the gleaming convoy, Ohu instinctively tensed into a defensive stance.
Reporters? Sniffed us out all the way here?
But the doors opened.
Clunk! Click.
People stepped out.
"...!"
Ohu's eyes widened, hypnosis be damned.
From the lead sedan emerged a man nearing sixty—but straight-backed without a hunch, boasting a muscular build ready to burst. Beneath neatly combed white hair gleamed hawk-like eyes radiating sharp, overwhelming energy. It was none other than Rapid Star, one of Korea's Hero Association's living legends—an S-grade hero of physical enhancement and speed. Shooting Star's mentor, who had scouted and trained her twenty years ago.
SUV doors opened in sequence. A woman in her mid-thirties stepped out in a crisp black skirt suit, exuding cold, intellectual beauty. Rapid Star's own daughter, Park Ayoung—awakened with minor regeneration that slowed aging instead of combat prowess, now a high-ranking official in the Korean Hero Committee.
Following them were middle-aged A-grade and B-grade heroes who had once shared missions and life-or-death trials with Shooting Star, stepping heavily in black suits.
The empty corridor, thought to echo only silence, filled with the footsteps and overwhelming presence of heroes who had crossed twenty years in an instant.
"...Sara."
The heroes' gazes lingered on the portrait atop the altar upon entering. Rapid Star's shoulders visibly trembled. Confronted by his young, radiant disciple's smile from twenty years ago, he collapsed to his knees.
"Sara, you fool...! Why didn't you say anything... Why suffer that hell alone... Ugh... huuugh!"
The S-grade hero's wails shook the room. Before his prized protégé—pegged for A-grade—the old master forgot all dignity, pounding the floor in raw grief. The middle-aged heroes behind him reddened their eyes and bowed their heads; Park Ayoung silently wiped tears and offered flowers.
At the heroes' heartfelt mourning for the unfinished star who could have lit an era...
"...Now you can rest."
Detective Park sighed in relief, left a text saying to contact him if needed, and quietly slipped out.
Bzzz. Ohu's pocket vibrated with a message, drowned out by the heroes' sobs. Oblivious, Park lit another cigarette just five minutes after the last—for an excuse to gaze at a star in the night sky.
After prolonged condolences and wiping tears before the portrait, the heroes' gazes turned as one to the lone young man standing blankly in the corner, armband marking him as chief mourner.
To the sole blood relative, Ha Ohu.
The heroes approached the mourning table.
"You've been through a lot, kid... Now I see how much Sara cherished you. We should've found you sooner... Sorry."
"Must've been terrifying and tough. Hang in there."
The middle-aged heroes who once fought alongside Shooting Star gripped Ohu's hands, offering sincere comfort. Heroes driven by justice—their eyes brimmed with pity for their comrade's only child.
But one man differed.
Thud. Thud.
Rapid Star approached right up to Ohu's face. His towering height and crushing aura bore down. With cold eyes wiped of tears, he scanned Ohu from head to toe like inspecting vermin—blatant and frigid.
"... "
In the eyes of the thorough meritocrat, survivor of a might-makes-right world, his disciple's heir was horrific. Not a trace of his once-proud, beautiful, strong protégé's genes. A repulsive jiggling gut that quivered with every breath. Gloomy, vacant gaze. Clumsy movements. And bearing the loathsome features of that bastard Ha Deok-gu—who drove her to hell—despite inheriting not a shred of her gifts, just a powerless normie.
Rapid Star's brow furrowed deeply, disgust plain on his face.
"Tch. The bloodline Sara sacrificed her life to protect... reduced to this pathetic sight."
Perhaps from years lording as an S-grade, he tsked openly, laced with contempt.
"An unawakened deadweight, with that unmanaged pig of a body. They say blood's scary—looks like you photocopied that trash's mug exactly."
Insulting vitriol poured unfiltered. Glancing at his daughter Park Ayoung behind him, he added,
"Even my Ayoung's got trash combat skills that crawl the floor and give me grief, but at least she uses her head to snag a Hero Association exec seat and feeds herself. What the hell can you do? Inheriting Sara's glorious blood and still that mess..."
To the chief mourner who lost father and now mother, in a funeral hall no less—the cruelty far exceeded bounds, raping Ohu's ears.
Guilt by bloodline was bullshit enough. But this hero's naked scorn for looks and power made Ohu clench his fists, head bowed.
Ah... fuck, seriously. Now I get a hundred—no, a thousand times—why original Ohu hypnotized all these hero fucks and turned 'em into toilets...
He hadn't played the full game, but reviews always mentioned "toilet" without fail. If he had a normal mindset, he'd have snapped, lunged screaming, or burned with vengeful rot down a dark path. He deeply realized how much this arrogant S-grade contributed to forging the monster Ha Ohu.
But fortunately, Ohu's brainstem bore the strongest shield now.
Endure, fuck. Today is Mother's funeral. Don't waver from those fuckers' words. Erase the rage, you shit.
Thanks to that narcotic hypnosis, Rapid Star's bone-chilling barbs left Ohu's emotions calm as a leaf on still water.
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Park Ayoung (Mid-30s)
