Chapter 219: Fragment of Emptiness (2)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 219: Fragment of Emptiness (2)
“Of course.”
Kang A-rin answered without a second thought.
Not even a single second of hesitation.
Before we began, I turned my head.
The cameras filming the inner lab were all shut or angled away.
Each displayed a red message: SYSTEM OFFLINE.
“……”
I closed my eyes and once again extended my senses, sweeping through the space.
I even checked for any magical eyes, just in case.
But there was nothing.
A sealed room with no one watching.
It seemed that from the USA’s perspective, finding a clue was more important than whatever we might do to the Fragment.
I could feel their desperation.
I approached the massive meteorite.
Cheon Yeo-wool’s Fragment of Desire.
Yu Hana’s Fragment of Order.
My Fragment of Harmony.
And finally, Kang A-rin’s Fragment of Emptiness.
The Fragment of Harmony from Baekdusan… and the Fragment of Order from Hunan Province could be considered ‘Protruding Types.’
The Fragments themselves were exposed, and as long as you could reach or arrive at their location… they were relatively easy to distinguish.
But the Fragment of Desire was different.
It dwelled within a medium. This is what’s called a ‘Medium Type.’
Kang A-rin’s Fragment of Emptiness was the same.
A Medium Type.
It dwelled within the meteorite.
With a Protruding Type, you can awaken the Fragment by getting close and either touching it directly or simply being near it.
For a Medium Type, there is only one way.
The qualified individual must make direct contact.
I held out my hand to Kang A-rin.
She stared blankly at it for a moment…
Then the corners of her mouth lifted into a smile.
And then.
Squeeze.
She gripped my hand tightly.
Like that, Kang A-rin and I slowly approached the meteorite.
Our hands clasped firmly together.
“Are the bride and groom making their entrance?”
Kang A-rin said playfully.
“I wouldn’t mind that.”
I replied with a smile of my own.
Finally, when the meteorite—no… the Fragment of Emptiness was right before our eyes.
I took her hand in mine, and together, we slowly reached for the Fragment.
Tap.
Our fingertips touched the meteorite.
And in that instant.
A black wave began to flow from the surface, traveling up Kang A-rin’s hand and into her.
Her hair fluttered in the wake of the pulse.
Kang A-rin closed her eyes gently, feeling it…
Thump.
Her body suddenly collapsed.
I caught her.
Her red lips moved faintly.
“…Hae-in…”
I held her tight and whispered.
“You can do it.”
She would be able to handle it without a problem.
Because she was Kang A-rin.
*
Cheon Yeo-wool must have had a life she regretted.
Yu Hana, too, must have had a life she regretted.
And Ha Sion, without a doubt, must have had parts of her life she regretted.
But Kang A-rin…
Among them all, the weight of her regret was the heaviest.
At least, by her own judgment.
Kang A-rin’s older brother—no, a piece of trash she hated to even call her brother.
The Kang A-rin of back then didn’t know his true nature.
Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say she didn’t want to know.
To her, her brother was her whole world.
She believed he would never betray her.
Kang A-rin opened her eyes.
A place that was familiar, yet still unknown.
It was Jung Hae-in’s office.
This sensation, this feeling.
She thought she knew.
She knew what moment this was.
Kang A-rin barely managed to turn her head, a motion she desperately wanted to avoid, and looked at the desk.
Jung Hae-in was sitting there.
Yes.
It was the same that day.
“Kang Yu-sung sponsored Seong Si-woo with more funds.”
On the tablet Cheon Yeo-wool held out, the final destination of the complex flow of funds was clearly marked.
“…To Si-woo.”
“Yeah. Blatantly. Not even trying to be subtle.”
Jung Hae-in sighed and closed his eyes.
He, too, had much on his mind.
Kang Yu-sung.
According to the original story’s setting, he was unequivocally a traitor in league with the Evil God.
That was why, in the beginning, Hae-in had tried like mad to weed him out.
But every time, with a devastated expression, Kang A-rin had begged him to trust her brother.
‘My brother would never do something like that…’
Of course, part of it was that they’d never found concrete proof of his complete corruption.
At some point, it had become too difficult for him to kill the brother she so admired with his own hands.
Worse, Kang Yu-sung was continuously seen supporting Seong Si-woo, a hero Jung Hae-in had trusted and nurtured.
‘Could he… really have had a change of heart?’
He had even started to entertain a thought he never should have.
The thought that the knowledge from the original story was wrong, or that the causality of this world had been twisted.
“Well… it should be fine.”
He couldn’t think about it any further.
Jung Hae-in always had too much to think about.
“…That was funding meant for you.”
Cheon Yeo-wool’s voice was less of a reprimand…
And closer to, ‘Why are you giving what’s yours to someone else?’
Jung Hae-in gave a bitter smile and turned off the panel.
“There’s no need to draw a line between us, is there?”
After all, they were all working together…
to eliminate the Mines.
And so, Jung Hae-in deliberately chose not to consider that possibility.
Time passed.
And with Kang Yu-sung’s questionable support.
Seong Si-woo grew at a terrifying rate, befitting his title as an S-Class Hero.
And Jung Hae-in grew even stronger, beyond all standards.
He had no one’s support.
He did it with his own strength alone.
However.
Time flowed on.
And before long, the mistake he had willfully ignored demanded a price in truth.
It was during the war.
The war between the Mines and humanity.
It was just another mission, like always.
Before Kang A-rin’s eyes, the familiar city of Busan was gone, replaced by a vision of hell.
The Gwangan suspension bridge was half-destroyed, its wreckage plunging into the sea, while skyscrapers burned, spewing black smoke.
Busan was on the verge of falling. Kang A-rin, Jung Hae-in, and Seong Si-woo had been dispatched there.
“Ah, fuck.”
A curse erupted from Seong Si-woo’s lips.
CRASH!
As if to vent his frustration, he slammed his fist into the wall of a nearby crumbling building.
The head of a giant monster that had been charging him exploded.
The reason for his anger was that he’d been splattered with its blood.
“……”
Jung Hae-in paid him no mind and continued to analyze their surroundings.
The situation was incredibly bleak.
A surprise attack by the Mines had begun without warning in Haeundae.
Most of those on the outskirts had managed to evacuate, but the problem was the civilians in the central district.
They were likely trapped in a massive underground bunker, trembling in fear.
The enemy hadn't breached the bunker itself yet, so there was still some distance.
The problem, however…
“There are too many of them.”
The numbers… were endless.
They did all this just to take a single city?
At this rate, it was only a matter of time before they found the bunker and broke through.
“Hey, what about this?”
Just then, Seong Si-woo, wiping blood from his face, pointed to a completely unexpected spot and proposed a new plan.
“We know the central location, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then the three of us—A-rin, me, and you—split up and attack from three different directions at the same time.”
“……”
He said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“Makes sense, right?”
He wasn’t wrong.
Trying to break through from one point like this was a bit inefficient.
They could even be surrounded by enemies attacking from the rear.
If three S-Class Heroes each took a zone and struck the flanks simultaneously…
It seemed plausible that they could break the enemy’s formation and reach the bunker quickly.
Logically, it was perfect.
“The problem is…”
What if a powerful enemy appeared?
What if this was all a trap, and a strong enemy was waiting for them to split up?
If an Apostle were to appear…
It would be tough even with all three of them; alone, it would be suicide.
While Jung Hae-in was deliberating.
“Ha, fuck. Hey. If we waste time now, everyone’s gonna die anyway. You know that.”
That was also true.
The situation itself… was awkward, forcing their hand.
Jung Hae-in fell silent.
Seong Si-woo’s proposal was rational, and Jung Hae-in had no grounds to refuse it.
And now, the present Kang A-rin was watching this entire scene as a transparent observer.
She felt like she wanted to tear her hair out.
She was watching her past self.
She was watching ‘the her from back then’—the one who stood there, indecisive and unsure of what to do amidst Seong Si-woo’s plausible suggestion and Jung Hae-in’s silence.
Weak.
Disgusting.
Kang A-rin felt like running over right now, grabbing that foolish past version of herself by the collar, and shaking her violently.
But.
There was no way.
Because this was the punishment for her atonement, shown to her by the Fragment of Emptiness.
She had to watch.
The moment of choice she most wanted to look away from.
“Let’s do it.”
Jung Hae-in finally nodded.
“Alright.”
Seong Si-woo grinned from ear to ear.
“Just trust me.”
This was the past Kang A-rin regretted.
One of them.
The atonement.
It hadn’t even begun.
