Chapter 45
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 45
With a hardened expression, Dokyun posed a question to her.
“Does Eun-ah know about the existence of the other personalities?”
“Of course not. I’m the one who controls the others. The original probably dismisses them as her own delusions.”
His head throbbed.
The two words, ‘we’ and ‘brought,’ implied far too much.
That there were more than just three personalities.
That, just as he had first suspected, she had been involved in his kidnapping.
And.
‘She tested me.’
Dokyun’s eyes grew cold.
‘Giving me a chance to leave was a test.’
A look of amusement flickered across the face before him.
“You were testing me.”
The statement came without context, but once again, she understood him instantly.
“I didn’t lie.”
A faint smile played on her lips as she answered, filling her glass halfway.
“Even if you left, that wench wouldn’t be able to find you right away. She hasn’t completely devoured Eun-ah yet.”
“But you’re saying she would find me eventually.”
“It would take a few years, at least.”
After saying that much, she took a sip of her drink to wet her throat before continuing.
“‘We’ were the ones who found you, who prepared everything to bring you here, and who set up this house. All Eun-ah and that crazy wench did was execute a plan that was already complete.”
Tap, tap. The movement of her fingertips tapping the rim of the glass seemed awfully cheerful.
“For that wench to learn our methods, she’d have to suppress all of us and digest our memories. The time it would take to do that is measured in years.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“There was a precedent.”
As she said this, Dokyun felt as if a shadow fell over her face.
“…Are you saying there are personalities that have already been devoured?”
“That’s right.”
A chilling aura settled over her faintly shadowed features.
“She’s a cunning wench. She started by slowly eating the ones she could, one by one. She’s already devoured four of them.”
Four.
Even after consuming four personalities, there were still more remaining.
As a dizzying sensation washed over him, a sudden question surfaced, and Dokyun opened his mouth to ask it.
“May I ask something?”
“Be my guest.”
“You said she started with the weak ones. Then why is she after Eun-ah now?”
At Dokyun’s question, her head, which had been tilted back to sip her drink, turned toward him.
Dokyun watched her stare at him in silence, and a surge of frustration made him elaborate.
“No matter how bad her condition is, she’s the original owner of the body. How is that possible?”
“It’s a special case.”
“Pardon?”
Thud. The glass made a dull sound as she placed it on the table.
“Go Eun-chae is a personality that acts as Eun-ah’s proxy. Her case is different from mine or the others.”
“…I think you’ll need to explain that in more detail.”
“What Eun-ah wants is to be a ‘good child,’ and to be a ‘good child,’ she has to do good deeds.”
She paused, letting out a breath before continuing in a calm tone.
“And to do that, she needs proof that she has done those good deeds.”
Only then did Dokyun understand what she was saying.
“…Do they share memories?”
“As much as is necessary.”
This was dangerous.
Even to his untrained eye, her condition was far too dangerous.
To summarize.
“So, is it safe to say that Eun-ah perceives Eun-chae as herself?”
“Correct. That’s the only way the results of Eun-chae’s actions can become her own.”
She dismisses all other personalities as delusions. She treats her ‘sister’ as a completely separate entity.
But she perceives Eun-chae as herself, which makes her easy prey.
A brief silence fell between them before she spoke again.
“The progression is quite steep. You must have noticed it yourself, haven’t you?”
A few things came to mind.
There were moments, even when Eun-chae wasn’t visibly present, that her actions had become excessively violent.
‘The first day.’
The first day he was kidnapped. The mood swings she had displayed then were, without a doubt, the worst he had witnessed throughout his entire time here.
“I told you, she’s already halfway devoured. Eun-ah is being stained by Eun-chae’s color. Eun-ah is a blank slate. Even the slightest drop of ink stains her completely.”
He remembered her clawing at her own cheek, punching her solar plexus, digging into her own wrist.
It had definitely been Eun-ah moving the body back then. And yet, the behavior had been Eun-chae’s.
He squeezed his eyes shut. A throbbing pain pulsed in his temples.
The sheer volume of information was overwhelming, and he needed time to process it. But if she left, there was no telling when he’d get another chance to ask questions. He had to find out as much as he could.
“I think I understand, more or less.”
“It’d be idiotic not to, after I’ve broken it down this simply for you.”
A flash of anger sent blood rushing to his head at her taunt, but Dokyun decided it wasn’t important and looked at her to continue his questioning.
“But what does any of that have to do with kidnapping me?”
This was the part he couldn’t grasp.
The situation was clearly dangerous for Eun-ah and the other personalities.
But he couldn’t understand how that connected to his abduction.
As Dokyun watched her with a look of doubt, she nodded and began to speak.
“Good. Now we’re at the question I was waiting for.”
Her expression was one of deep satisfaction.
She drained her glass and began her explanation.
“After that wench began to seriously devour Eun-ah, the other personalities were dormant for a very long time.”
It was a continuation of her previous story.
“I was in a similar situation. I wasn’t asleep, but I couldn’t get out, either.”
Her story continued in a low tone.
“Eun-ah and Eun-chae aren’t completely separate personalities. On top of that, Eun-chae is a very large presence, so once she started taking over Eun-ah’s consciousness, there was no room left for any other personality to intervene. To be honest, we were on the verge of being completely devoured.”
As she was speaking, she turned her head toward Dokyun and opened her mouth.
“And that’s when you appeared.”
“…?”
Seeing Dokyun’s blank, uncomprehending face, she added a single phrase to her explanation.
“The Girl Who Catches Bugs.”
“Ah.”
The web novel written by Go Eun-ah, under the pen name ‘Goni.’ The reason she had kidnapped him.
Seeing his reaction, she continued without further explanation.
“One day, I suddenly popped out. As always, the body was bleeding, and the novel Eun-ah had written was on the monitor.”
“It’s funny, isn’t it? I laughed out loud. After trying so desperately to get out to no avail, I suddenly succeeded.”
“I couldn’t grasp the full situation from the inside, so I first needed to assess what had happened.”
“Why? Why was control suddenly restored? While searching for a clue, I discovered that Eun-ah wanted you.”
“That’s when it hit me. The biggest reason Eun-ah was being devoured by Eun-chae was because she needed Eun-chae to become a ‘good child.’”
“To put it another way, if she could become a ‘good child’ without Eun-chae, she wouldn’t need that wench. In the end, all Eun-ah wants is the result.”
“If she doesn’t need a proxy to reap the fruit, there’s no reason to give up control of the body, no need to identify that wench as herself.”
“Just as she was about to be devoured, Eun-ah and Eun-chae began to separate.”
“Eun-chae must have been shitting herself. She was so close, just a little more and it would have been over, but something completely unexpected blocked her path.”
“Eun-chae’s chosen method was probably one step back. By sympathizing with Eun-ah’s emotions, she could delay the separation as much as possible. She must be confident she can devour her somehow once the situation is under control.”
“That’s likely why that wench is so obsessed with you. The more she acts against Eun-ah’s wishes, the more easily they’ll separate.”
As she spoke, she was smiling as if she was truly delighted.
From her long explanation, Dokyun finally understood what she wanted from him.
“Stay by Eun-ah’s side.”
As he said this and looked at her, he saw her eyes, which were watching him silently, curve into a smile.
“Is that what you want from me?”
“As I thought, you’re quick on the uptake.”
It was an affirmation laced with satisfaction.
And then, he realized something. He hadn’t avoided a trigger.
‘The separation was already in progress.’
The more he praised Eun-ah, the more affection he showed her…
The less necessary Eun-chae became.
As he mulled this over, another question popped into his head.
“A little while ago, at the front door… what were you going to do if I left?”
A short silence hung in the air. She stared at him as if to pierce right through him, then rested her chin on her knee and answered in a cryptic tone.
“Who knows?”
Her face was full of mirth. Her tone was playful. But from her answer, he knew one thing for certain.
‘She is not an ally.’
What this woman wanted from him was the deletion of Eun-chae. To her, he was nothing more than a pawn.
If he had tried to step out that door, this woman would have used any means necessary to stop him and make him dance to her tune.
His reason, which had grown slightly lax, sounded a warning alarm once more.
‘This won’t be easy.’
Throughout this entire conversation, this woman had never once directly revealed her own desires.
She had steered the conversation to evoke sympathy for Eun-ah, indirectly weaving in her own agenda.
She was cunning.
She called Eun-chae a cunning wench, but in Dokyun’s eyes, this woman was ten times more cunning.
‘What this woman wants…’
Is the deletion of Eun-chae all there is to it?
He couldn’t know. This woman wasn’t telling him much.
She was giving him just enough information—only what was necessary to achieve her goals.
As tension mounted, Dokyun stared at her silently. She let out a smirk and spoke.
“It’s good to think, but if you overdo it, it becomes a delusion.”
Her words seemed to see right through him.
“I have no intention of being greedy like that wench. If I did, this body would have been mine long ago.”
He flinched.
His body trembled.
It felt like she was stripping him bare. From his brief silence, his expression, his aura, she was reading his every thought.
“…I’m sorry.”
“No need to be sorry.”
He couldn’t find an opening.
Dokyun quickly replayed their conversation, trying to deduce what she truly wanted.
‘At the very least…’
What she wanted was probably not Eun-ah’s complete recovery.
Continuing this topic was dangerous. The deeper he dug, the more he would lose.
Having made his judgment, Dokyun opened his mouth again and continued in a low voice.
“…Excluding Eun-chae, you must be the most powerful personality, then.”
A change of subject.
She probably wouldn’t deny this part. She had given him the clue herself.
“That’s right.”
As expected, she gave a straightforward answer.
“Even just by order of appearance, I was second. And considering the reason I was created, I’m effectively the strongest.”
To control Eun-chae. That’s what she had said.
“As long as Eun-ah gets her head on straight, I can take care of Eun-chae. So.”
She fixed her gaze on Dokyun and continued playfully.
“You’re going to have to seduce Eun-ah for me.”
She tossed him another clue.
‘I can take care of it.’
She said she could take care of it once the separation was complete.
‘I can orchestrate the deletion of a personality.’
That’s what she was saying.
“Your choice of words… is rather cheap.”
“Don’t mention it.”
The face that answered with a shrug was filled with conviction.
She had made her proposal, certain that he would not refuse.
And her next words gave him an excuse to hide his true feelings.
“I’m not asking you to do it for free.”
So you can tell yourself you’re not just doing this out of pity, but for a legitimate transaction.
“Five billion won.”
Facing him, she raised one corner of her mouth and drove the final nail in.
“Get rid of Eun-chae, and I’ll give you five billion won.”
It was checkmate.