The Secret I've Never Told Anyone
"So, I have a secret I've never told anyone."
With that, Seoya began spilling every story she'd kept hidden until now. She told of coming from another world, what her homeworld Toda was like, the catastrophe that had gotten her exiled, the truths she'd uncovered on Earth, how Ibin had created the System for her sake, and what she needed to do to return to Toda. All of it.
She'd agonized over whether she should even say it at first, but once the words started flowing, they came out smooth and easy. Ibin had raised her from childhood never to lie, and that guilt had gnawed at Seoya the whole time on Earth. But now, everything felt refreshingly light.
"And that's how it all went down…."
Finally, when Seoya finished, Jeong Sira sat there utterly dumbfounded. Seoya had braced for the other woman to grab her by the collar after hearing that Earth's disasters were all because of her—but Jeong Sira seemed too stunned to even muster the energy.
Jeong Sira shook herself, trying to process, and summed it up in one sentence.
"Hold on, so… all these disasters were made for you…?"
"Probably."
Silence stretched out. It had felt so relieving to say it, but now, with Jeong Sira saying nothing, Seoya grew anxious, wondering what words would come next. She fidgeted with her fingers, eyes downcast.
The quiet lingered a moment longer, then Jeong Sira spoke.
"…Let me sort this out. About your planet, Toda, from what you've told me."
"You're not mad at me?"
"…I don't know. I'm too confused to waste emotions on blame right now. Yelling at you wouldn't change anything—it'd just be me venting one-sidedly."
Jeong Sira's voice was far calmer than Seoya expected.
"Uh… what actually surprises me is that you told me all this. Not the other Neverending guild members."
"We saw that dungeon together, so I figured you might think the story it showed was weird. Plus, I needed someone to bounce advice off about what I saw there."
Seoya glanced at her, gauging her reaction, then added,
"And… you seem smart, sis."
"…If you think so, then I'll earn it."
With that, Jeong Sira stood, vanished into some corner of the room, and returned dragging something with a rattling sound. A massive whiteboard on wheels.
"Why do you even have one of these at home?"
"Back when I was prepping my doctoral thesis, I had this habit of jotting notes everywhere…."
Her eyes grew distant, as if reminiscing about grad school, then she shook her head and popped the cap off a dry-erase marker.
"Toda. Pioneers versus Mutants. Pioneers wield mana, Mutants wield some unknown black energy."
Muttering to herself, she wrote Pioneers vs. Mutants on the board, then Mana under Pioneers and Black Energy under Mutants.
"Mutants keep coming no matter how many you kill. Then one day, no new Pioneers are born, and the Pioneers fall behind…."
Pioneers vs. Mutants became Pioneers < Mutants.
"In that situation, the Pioneers decide to hunt down and eradicate the Mutants' source… right?"
"Yeah, exactly."
Jeong Sira hummed thoughtfully at the board, then turned to Seoya.
"You think what we saw in that dungeon that day was a message from this 'Ibin' person to you?"
"Yeah."
"Let's pull out the key info from there and piece it together first."
Jeong Sira wrote Contaminant on the board.
"Before the Pioneer hologram appeared in the dungeon, it mentioned 'mana.' Before the Mutant hologram, 'contaminant material.' So, that 'black energy' you've been calling it? Probably 'contaminant material.'"
"Contaminant? We never used that term on Toda…."
"Maybe they coined it after you came here. Anyway, from now on, let's call Pioneer power 'mana' and Mutant power 'contaminant energy.'"
She scratched out Black Energy with firm lines and wrote Contaminant Energy above it.
"Clearer terminology is better. Word choice always matters."
Seoya stared at the board, recalling the dungeon.
"That day, there was this stone that produced Magic Stones. It looked compressed, and other Magic Stones burst out from it…."
"Then we'll call that stone the 'Prime Magic Stone' from now on."
Prime Magic Stone = Magic Stone + Magic Stone + Magic Stone + … appeared on the board.
Jeong Sira scanned what she'd written.
"The Pioneer holograms stopped appearing right after that Prime Magic Stone glowed once. No more Magic Stones were produced after that."
"Since Magic Stones produce mana, maybe it's a metaphor for no new Pioneer mana being generated?"
Seoya smiled faintly, pleased she'd used "metaphorical" right. Coming to Earth really had sharpened her thinking. Park Haejun would probably pat himself on the back if he knew, crediting his math-and-essay combo lessons.
Jeong Sira shook her head, countering.
"I see it differently. No new Pioneers means something went wrong with whatever supplies them mana—this Prime Magic Stone."
"What kind of problem?"
"Can't say. We've just pinpointed why no new Pioneers appear."
She marked an X over Prime Magic Stone and scrawled BROKEN! above it.
"Everything has causes and effects."
"Okay, but what about this? When I flew up high to seal the Mutant hole, I saw… unknown, weird things inside. But Toda doesn't even have holes like that for Mutants."
"What exactly did you see in there?"
"It was… really bizarre."
Seoya's voice trailed off, the grotesque red eyes flashing in her mind.
"I don't know. Can't explain it with anything from my world…."
"Got it for now."
Jeong Sira tapped the board twice, hard.
"Anyway, what you learned from this dungeon: One, that black energy from Mutants is 'contaminant material.' Two, no new Pioneers because the system making them—what we're calling the Prime Magic Stone—is broken."
"Ah…."
Seoya nodded slowly. Seeing her tangled thoughts laid out so clearly, she knew confiding in Jeong Sira had been the right call.
"But there's something else I'm mulling over… I'll tell you once I sort it out. Need to think it through alone."
"Sure."
Conversation done, Seoya stood to leave. As she flailed for her coat sleeve, Jeong Sira quickly helped her into it and whispered,
"But… I have a question."
"What?"
"About that Ibin person…."
"Yeah?"
"Was she always kinda cruel? Violent tendencies?"
"Huh?"
Seoya pictured Ibin: jet-black hair and eyes contrasting snow-white skin, icy expression and voice. People called her cold and rigid, but she wasn't. Just more rational, calm, and patient than most. Never cruel or violent.
"No? Absolutely not."
"Really? That's weird…."
"What's weird?"
Jeong Sira hemmed and hawed, then steeled herself.
"Everything has a flow. Results have causes, even if tangled in complex events. It's explainable."
"Yeah."
"I've always wanted to study Earth's sudden disasters, figure out the principles. Might write a paper on it alone later. Ah, sorry—you were leaving."
"Uh, yeah…."
Seoya blinked blankly, and Jeong Sira grinned sheepishly before continuing.
"Sorry. Back to it: The System's methods make sense individually. Give people skills, make them Hunters, so they accept your weird powers as normal and don't shun you. Convey messages via dungeons, deliver needs as rewards. Like that."
"Yeah, though it seems kinda inefficient…."
"Exactly!"
"Huh?"
Jeong Sira eyed Seoya's puzzled face.
"Why do you think it's inefficient?"
"Well… she could just pop System windows for me alone. And the monsters and dungeons kill innocent people for no reason. Ibin always said never harm people without cause."
"Right. To just bring you back to Toda, Ibin didn't need to kill masses of Earthlings."
Sunlight streamed behind Jeong Sira, turning her brown hair golden.
"But she chose to. Violently. Cruelly."
"What do you think that means?"
"This System's goal isn't just retrieving you from Toda. Maybe not even primarily."
In the quiet house, only Jeong Sira's voice echoed.
"It feels like… a warning to someone."