Chapter 73
Chapter 73
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 73
Chapter Title: That Childish Lie
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73.
Black!
“Juingni!”
It was a raspy voice.
No, more like babbling?
Tap-tap-!
The moment Soi spotted me, she jumped up from her seat and started running toward me.
With all her might on those short legs.
So desperate were her footsteps.
She didn’t even notice that her kimono had grown too big for her shrunken body.
Soi….
Trip-!
‘Ah….’
She stepped on the hem of her own garment without realizing it and….
Thud-!
Tumbled down hard.
“Soi!”
I rushed over late and grabbed her waist, helping her back up.
Fortunately, she didn’t seem too badly hurt from what I could see.
The instant she felt my touch,
Squeeze-!
!
She burrowed into my arms and hugged me tight. I was startled by her sudden behavior.
I tried to gently pry Soi out of my embrace.
But….
Squeeze-!
The moment her slender hands gripped my clothes,
!!
Soi began to shed tears.
She burst into pitiful sobs, her delicate whimpers spreading through her entire body.
“Juingni! Juingni! Juingni….”
The clumsy sniffles from that tiny throat reached me.
They lingered endlessly around my ears.
Sadness filled the space.
Soi’s sobs were more heartbreaking than ever, slicing right into my chest.
Soi just wept endlessly in my arms, without a word.
Continuously.
She kept on sobbing.
Her reddened eyes grew even more swollen, tremors leaking out with her breaths.
The man who could only stare blankly at her wailing as if the world had ended
In this moment, could do nothing but
Wait….
Until Soi’s sadness stopped.
Until she gathered her emotions.
Silently.
Park Yeon-jeong said nothing, just waited.
*****
…Hic.
The hiccuping sounds gradually faded.
When the waterfall of tears streaming down her pale cheeks finally paused,
Stroke-
I looked at Soi, still in my arms, and gently stroked her hair.
And then,
I carefully opened my mouth.
Slowly guiding the conversation.
The most urgent thing to ask right now, above all else…
Was Soi’s current physical condition.
“Are you feeling okay?”
“…….”
Soi made no sound.
She just
…Nod.
Slowly moved her head up and down a little.
‘No problems with her body?’
But honestly,
Wasn’t the shrinking itself the problem?
Her current state was far too small.
Including how she fit entirely into my arms.
And with Soi’s body shrunk, this house seemed to have been affected quite a bit too.
At least it turned out she hadn’t abandoned me…
‘Now what?’
What the hell do I do?
I had no clue where to even start.
For now…
The most reliable victim here,
The key witness, Soi—that was my only option.
Without hearing the full story, finding clues to the situation seemed impossible.
I asked softly, careful not to stir her tears again.
“What happened?”
“…That, he lied to me.”
???
…Ah.
‘So that’s what happened.’
Only after hearing Soi’s additional statement could I quickly reach a conclusion.
This incident was hereby
Temporarily classified as an ‘unsolved case.’
…Why?
‘I couldn’t understand a single word!’
In her babbling just now, not one thing I heard made sense.
Hand on heart, zero.
Anyone who’s raised kids might get it, maybe.
Unless I suddenly got a ‘degree in child linguistics’ right here, decoding those words was damn near impossible.
A completely unforeseen obstacle.
While I struggled with this unexpected hurdle in the case, Soi stared at my face with jewel-like eyes.
Hop!
She suddenly jumped up and hurried off somewhere.
“S-Soi!”
I called after her urgently.
What came back was
Thud!
…….
Soi tripping over her kimono again.
It was just like watching our Bear Doll Trio, and as I took in the sight,
‘…She’s adorable.’
With a full-on dad smile on my face, Soi returned before I knew it.
Clutching something unidentified in both hands.
What she’d struggled to carry with her slender arms was none other than
White paper.
And a black marker.
Scribble-scribble-
Soi plopped right down and started eagerly writing on the paper.
Once she finished writing furiously and held it out to me—Park Yeon-jeong—
A slightly crooked phrase entered my view.
『He lied to me!!』
He?
Lied?
There was only one person Soi would call ‘he.’
Noise.
The scribbled words seemed to complain that Noise had lied to her.
Even crooked, they carried real emotion.
The first reason I thought that:
‘Our Soi’s got that pout.’
Just seeing her duck-bill lips told me exactly how pissed she was at Noise right now.
But
More than Noise lying to her,
I had one burning question.
Her current physical state.
“Why did your body shrink?”
I waited for Soi’s answer.
After pondering with the marker in hand for a while at my question,
Scribble-
She started writing on the paper again. When she held it up to me with both hands once more,
The contents read:
『Before that, Master, I have something to ask you.』
“Me?”
Soi’s expression as she said she had something to ask me held a seriousness beyond her childish face.
Scribble-
Soon, she wrote her question on the next paper and showed it to me.
And I, for a moment,
Lost my words.
『Master…you almost died this time, didn’t you.』
!
Soi had asked something completely unexpected.
Had she heard about me from Noise?
The question itself implied she’d noticed something, and feeling like I couldn’t dodge it properly,
I opened my mouth in as lighthearted a tone as possible.
I didn’t want her worrying.
“Well, it was… a bit dangerous, yeah?”
“!!!”
‘I did nearly die and come back….’
After hearing my playful voice, Soi’s reaction
“…….”
Didn’t look good.
Squeeze-!
She gripped the marker tight and marched toward me,
Then started hitting my arm with all her might.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
It didn’t hurt.
But Soi was hitting me with everything she had.
Lips bitten tight.
With all her sincerity.
With all her strength.
Expressing her anger at me.
…No, more precisely, punches loaded with complex emotions.
Drip-
Tears she’d held back burst forth again, and her fists, still clenched, grabbed my arm and sobbed.
Face buried in my forearm.
Swallowing endless tears.
Seeing that,
I couldn’t speak.
Couldn’t even offer a word of comfort.
Somehow, right now…
It felt like I should just silently accept Soi’s emotions. My body was telling me that’s what I had to do.
After the storm of deep emotions passed.
Once Soi’s feelings had calmed somewhat and she picked up the pen again,
Scribble-
Scribble-
The writing was packed so densely it hurt my eyes.
『Master…please stay alive. No matter what happens, put yourself first. More than anyone else…even if it makes you selfish! Think of yourself first!』
“…….”
As I read the densely packed words on the white paper, my gaze never left Soi’s face.
Her body was smaller than before, every action childish, and the way her beaded tears trembled down her reddened eyes was purely a child’s.
But her eyes.
Those eyes of Soi’s stared straight at me—Park Yeon-jeong—with fierce intensity.
I answered softly.
“…Sorry.”
“…….”
Only after my short reply did Soi stop her tears again. Relief finally seeped into her eyes.
…Somehow.
Considering just the situation, it was a bizarre scene: a child scolding a full-grown adult, emotions settling like waves receding.
Then Soi continued with explanations she hadn’t given before.
Scribble-scribble-
The first topic was the core of the current situation.
Her shrunken body.
『When the only one who remembers me—Master—starts to fade, I seem to be affected too.』
This reminded me of Professor Noise’s special lecture from before, ‘Ghost Story Genesis Theory.’
-Ghost stories carve their existence into humans, feeding on that tiny bit of attention.
By that logic,
Park Yeon-jeong, the only human who remembers Soi—his life was tied to her very existence.
So the reason Soi had shrunk… was largely my fault.
‘One mind, one body… something like that?’
I felt even more sorry toward Soi.
“Then, will you stay this small forever?”
『No, I don’t think so. Once Master fully recovers, I should return to normal too.』
That was a relief.
Even so, sleeping in a house that looked ready to collapse any second would’ve been another headache.
She seemed to have explained her shrunken body well enough.
So,
The remaining question was
‘That bastard Noise’s lie.’
What the hell had he lied about to leave Soi this soaked in tears?
I was genuinely curious.
“What lie did he tell?”
I asked Soi.
But Soi, who’d explained everything smoothly until now, hesitated at this final question.
Was it something she couldn’t even put into words?
If so,
“You don’t have to force it.”
If it was something too awful to say, I didn’t really want to hear it.
No point getting cursed or tangled in something because of it.
Hesitate-
After hearing me, Soi seemed even more conflicted.
…Scribble.
She started writing on the paper.
It wasn’t that long, surprisingly. After finishing, she agonized over whether to show me, hesitating several times.
From my perspective, watching her,
‘I really don’t want to see it now.’
I just wished she wouldn’t show me.
Squeeze-
But Soi gripped the paper like she’d made a huge resolve.
Thrust-!
And showed it to me with both hands.
The contents were
……
『He said…you died, Master.』
“…….”
Noise, you…
‘You’ve got a pretty childish side, huh.’
I’d learned an unexpected new facet of Noise.