It Was Her
It was her…
In the basement of the temporary headquarters, before the morning sun had risen.
There, she sat playing the piano — slowly, drawing out a familiar melody.
A beautiful piece filled with joy and exultation.
And at its center sat someone whose appearance made it almost impossible to believe she could produce music like this.
Hair dyed gold. Tanned skin with a warm brown undertone. A rough, delinquent look that clashed utterly with the beauty of her playing — and on her face, an emotion far denser and darker than anything she usually showed: anguish, thick and unrelenting.
A sound overflowing with joy. A face that looked on the world with cold cynicism. And an expression heavy with something deeper still.
All those tangled, contradictory currents finally came to rest as the last notes faded. She turned slowly toward him, a flicker of surprise crossing her features.
"…Lee Jinhyun… Adjutant?"
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt."
She stared at him, already starting to look flustered — Yu Gwon-sun, A-class hunter of Dreamouth.
He approached her without hurry. She looked away, then asked in a quiet voice:
"…How long… have you been standing there?"
"A little while. If I had to put a number on it — from the moment you started playing, I suppose."
"…Tch. So you saw the whole damn thing from the start. For an adjutant who's supposed to be buried in ops planning, you've got a hell of a lot of free time, don't you?"
She muttered it with a half-hearted grumble. Beneath the attitude, though, he could read exactly what she was feeling. His voice turned serious.
"Operations matter, of course. But right now, I think this matters just as much."
"…Ha. That hunter mental-care talk from before? Sorry, but my mood isn't exactly at the 'needs counseling' level—"
"Jogus."
"…"
"Talk to me. What's going on with you. What is it that's tearing you up like this."
He spoke clearly, with a quiet firmness. Her mouth was denying it. Her heart was not. Even setting everything else aside, he could see her face — and in that moment, a single tear was already sliding down her cheek.
She was so lost she hadn't even realized she was crying. And he, who had a fair idea of why, could not simply leave her like this.
At his words, Jogus's face began to crack, slowly, as if something inside her were fracturing. The smile she had been forcing shattered completely. Thick tears spilled from both eyes.
"…It was her… That Abyss… The face it was wearing… That was… definitely… her."
"Her… You mean—?"
Something flashed through his mind the instant she said it — the past she had once confessed to him. His brow tightened on its own. Watching him, Gwon-sun nodded slowly.
"Choi Sonbin… The one who fought beside me… The one whose body we couldn't even recover in that goddamn Pyongyang reclamation battle…"
"!…"
The suspicion he had barely dared to form snapped into certainty. For a moment he could say nothing. Looking at him, Gwon-sun's expression twisted with an even deeper pain.
Gwon-sun wiped the dust from the rifle in her hands.
It was flashy, painted up and illegally modified to match its owner's usual image, and as she worked over it her face held a resolve more serious than anything she usually showed. The anguish was still rooted deep in her. But in that moment, something else stood beside it — a hard, clear determination to see the thing in front of her through to the end.
He really is capable, isn't he. Our adjutant. However you look at it, he got me to pick up a gun and walk back onto a battlefield.
She had been drowning in the thought that she might have to kill, with her own hands, an old comrade who had died so unfairly. That feeling still haunted her like a ghost — but she could choose to take up her weapon anyway.
Because of what Adjutant Lee Jinhyun had told her after she poured out her pain.
If that thing truly was her comrade, then she was to end it with her own hands and set her free. Set the complicated thoughts aside until after she had liberated that pitiful being from the Abysses that were using her.
He had not explained what "salvation" and "freedom" meant in concrete terms. Whether it would be a mercy named death — or the threadbare hope of a miracle that should never happen. Either way, Gwon-sun could settle one thing in her heart with absolute clarity.
Whether that's really Choi Sonbin or just a monster wearing her face doesn't matter right now. What matters is bringing her down with my own hands. Figuring out what she actually is comes after.
Whatever that thing was, leaving it alone put her life — and the lives of her precious comrades, and of everyone here — in danger. Thoughts of an old friend could wait until the threat in front of her was gone.
She sorted through the tangle of personal feeling, and her resolve hardened again.
Either way… I'll be the one to settle this at the end.
After nine days of grinding intelligence work, the hunters who had collapsed from sheer overwork were sent to the infirmary once the mission was complete. I turned at once to the adjutants and guild masters who had been waiting only for me to speak.
Nine days of exhaustion had left my own body in rough shape, but I had no room to care about that. Ten thousand lives hung on what I did next — the people I held dear among them — and beyond them, every soldier still fighting somewhere out there. This operation had to succeed.
I gathered what was left of my frayed focus and spoke with seriousness and resolve.
"Then, as previously announced, we will proceed with the operation."
It was the plan we had set to begin one day before the Abysses reached the defensive line. Everyone present listened carefully as I laid out, in detail, the best strategies I could build from the intelligence we had gathered.
The briefing ran for more than three hours. Complicated emotions began to settle over the faces in the room. I addressed them with a careful edge of concern.
"If anyone has questions about any of the above, or believes something needs revision, please speak now."
"…"
I had braced myself for pushback. Instead, no one raised an immediate objection.
…Unexpected. I thought there'd be at least a little disagreement. If someone like Lee Sena were here, she'd have started picking holes right away — but it looks like we don't have that kind of person in this room.
In the old days, no matter the plan, the former guild master would have found something to rant about. If it was dangerous: why are you throwing us into a meat grinder. If it was safe: why aren't you giving us a chance to rack up glory. I had half expected the same performance here.
Thankfully, no one raised a real problem. Relieved, I spoke in a calm voice.
"Very well. If there are no objections, I ask that you proceed according to the plan immediately."
"You all heard that? Then we move now! Operation commence!"
The moment the guild master overseeing the site gave the word, they snapped into motion as one. Watching that clean, coordinated response, I felt a strange exhilaration I had never known before — and hurried toward the place I needed to be.