Let's Do It. With Me.
Two, maybe three months had passed.
It was winter now, and the cold had settled in hard.
Bundled tight in a parka, I stepped out of the car and arrived at none other than the police station.
"...Ugh."
A bitter taste filled my mouth.
We hadn't even started yet.
Quietly suppressing the turmoil in my chest, I walked inside.
"Excuse me. I'm here as the guardian for Nari... that is, Oh Nari..."
"Ah, yes. Please follow me this way."
Guided by the officer, I headed to where Nari was being held.
A space that felt cold through and through. Deeper in. Deeper still.
The temperature kept dropping. Even with the heating running, my chest only grew colder.
[Snap out of it.]
"....Pwahhh."
Right on cue, my mana road flooded with light.
It didn't hurt much. Just shock therapy, nothing more.
I rubbed my chest with one hand and slowly let out a breath.
If I'm already like this, how am I supposed to handle the rest?
Besides, ending up at a holding cell wasn't exactly a once-in-a-lifetime event.
Back in my Academy days, I'd dropped by the lockup more than a few times myself.
Property damage, destruction of nature — that sort of thing. So there was no real reason to worry too much.
Nari had probably ended up at the station for something similar...
Clinging to that dreamlike delusion, I opened the door to the office where she was waiting and stepped inside.
And then—
"...Nari."
"!,....."
My pathetic little fantasy evaporated the moment I saw her face.
Where was I even supposed to start reacting?
Should I be shocked that she was dressed like that in the dead of winter?
That her makeup, once just a bit of dressing up, had gotten so heavy it practically screamed mental breakdown?
The tattoos, the look in her eyes, the overall atmosphere — all of it piled together.
"Later. Let's talk about it later."
".........."
Was the woman in front of me really Nari?
That was where the doubt started creeping in.
Nothing matched up anymore.
"Ah, are you Ms. Nari's guardian?"
"...For the time being, yes."
So... for now, I just needed to deal with what was right in front of me.
There's a saying: near ink, one is stained black.
Keep something dark close, and you end up stained dark yourself.
And that was exactly Nari's condition right now.
"So basically..."
Here's the summary.
Nari's boyfriend had been a drug supplier.
Through him, she'd gotten hooked.
And the problem was that I'd been the one who turned that boyfriend into a legless ordinary — meaning non-Awakener — and tossed him in a cell.
With her supply cut off, Nari had gone looking for other routes...
"...Ha. Fuck."
I didn't know anymore.
I wasn't even sure I'd properly heard the things that came after that.
Part of me wanted to grab her and tell her to stop lying.
But looking at Nari now, all I could think was that she really was "that kind of woman."
"If you needed money, you should've just told me."
"........."
"No — okay, fine. Asking me to lend you money for drugs is a stretch no matter how you look at it. But even if you needed cash that badly... you're an Awakener. You could've just gone into a dungeon..."
There are Awakeners who do drugs.
Korea's regulations are ridiculously strict, sure, but hop across the water to America and weed is basically standard issue.
So if she'd gone into a dungeon and raised the funds that way, I might have understood. But why on earth...
"....I'm sorry."
"..........."
No.
Don't.
The one having the hardest time right now was Nari.
I stopped talking and quietly swallowed the rest down inside.
What's done is done. Nothing changes that.
She'd needed the drugs.
She'd needed the money.
And so she'd sold her body, apparently.
The problem was that the police had caught her doing it.
And the even bigger problem was that it wasn't just simple prostitution — the drugs tangled up in all of it had gotten her busted right along with everything else.
In a way, it was a textbook case. But when it happened to someone who'd been my friend and comrade, it felt like my own insides were rotting along with hers.
"If I'd just handled things a little better..."
At the very least, when I'd sent that guy to prison.
If I'd checked on Nari even once back then, maybe none of this would have happened.
But that, too, was a regret that had already come too late — an assumption that didn't hold water.
We weren't a party anymore. We weren't comrades either.
Just old friends with a bit of history between us.
So what more could I even do?
Even if there was something I could do, I had no obligation to do it.
And from that perspective, this regret I was feeling now...
...Tsk.
It was exactly the kind of feeling you get between friends.
The kind where going any further than that feels a little uncomfortable.
The feeling of watching a friend who's gone a bit off the rails.
My head was still a mess.
I quietly turned to look at Nari.
"............."
She sat with her head bowed, saying nothing.
Bitter winter weather. Top and bottom, barely a single layer each — the kind of outfit that would freeze you to death.
I took off the parka I was wearing and draped it over her shoulders.
"Huh...?"
"Let's go grab a drink."
Weather like this called for something hot and brothy.
Yeah. An izakaya sounded good. Order some soju, some oden stew, this and that — it'd be fine.
I stood up and looked down at her.
"This doesn't seem like the place to talk about it."
"....Yeah."
Nari followed me out without resistance.
No officers tried to stop us. Her guardian had come to collect her personally, and besides, Nari was closer to being a victim than anything else right now.
Good thing I had that footage.
I'd spoken with the officer in charge separately and gotten things wrapped up cleanly.
Soon enough she'd be pressing charges against her boyfriend — that drug dealer — and Nari herself would have to go through some social education program.
But for the moment, at least, there was nothing that would cause real trouble.
Just enough breathing room for a single drink.
...
..
.
""...........""
We tipped our glasses in silence.
More accurately, it was mostly Nari who kept draining hers without pause.
Like she was trying to die of acute alcohol poisoning — one mouthful of oden stew, one shot of soju, over and over.
Only after she'd polished off an entire bottle by herself did she finally open her mouth.
"Three years ago. Yeah. It would've been three years ago."
"....?"
Three years ago.
When we'd all turned twenty-five and hit that halfway-to-fifty mark.
And—when every member of our party had climbed to A-Class.
"I went to a club? By myself."
"By yourself? Why?"
Was there any real need to go alone?
I personally couldn't go near places like that without crashing and burning, but someone like Jiyeon unnie would've gone with her if she'd asked.
"Well... I was kind of embarrassed..."
"..........."
"...Looking back now, it was all bullshit."
Nari knocked back another shot of soju.
A light sigh. Then she kept going.
"If the party found out I was going to clubs, it'd be mortifying, you know? I'd look like some cheap girl. And I didn't want you to see me as the kind of woman who goes to clubs."
"Beats looking like a woman who does drugs."
"..............."
"Your glass is empty. Have another."
I poured her another one.
Better not interrupt from here on.
Nari downed the shot again, then flashed a thin little smile.
"Pff.... Yeah. That night I lost my virginity? Don't even remember his name. Just drank... hung out... did this and that... Yeah. Ended up doing this and that."
".....I see."
"Sucked dick... took it in the ass... Aah, you know what? Whiskey up the ass feels fucking amazing? Seriously, your vision goes all hazy and you feel like you're gonna die...♥"
".........."
Nari's confession.
Honestly, it wasn't something I could sit there and take in.
Just listening felt like it was contaminating my soul.
[Filthy.]
"....Tsk."
Apparently I really was getting contaminated, because Hecate stepped in herself and started scrubbing down my mana road.
It felt a lot like someone spitting on the floor of your bedroom and you cursing while you clean it up.
Thanks to that, against my own desire to just get drunk and check out, I had no choice but to sit through Nari's confession to the bitter end.
"So they all tried to jump me at once, and I figured they thought I was some easy bitch, so I was about to flip the tables on them... and that's when Dick showed up, you know?"
"Yeah. Right. I see."
A girl prowling the clubs.
Naturally they'd sized her up as cheap and piled on together.
And that drug dealer had stepped in and saved her. She'd taken an interest — someone rare to find in a place like that — and then...
"So.... a mutually enjoyable relationship? Partners? That kind of vibe.... Heuuuugh!"
Even she seemed to find it ridiculous as she said it, letting out a hollow laugh.
"...It was all bullshit. Why didn't I see that?"
They'd slept together.
She'd given her body, and her heart had followed.
Once her heart went, the money started pouring out.
Every last won she had, she kept throwing at that man.
Whether it was misfortune or luck, nothing major went wrong.
The income an A-Class party pulled in could easily cover a little luxury here and there.
"After living like that for about half a year.... I made up my mind, you know?"
That she'd live with this man.
That she'd take him as her husband.
"So I'm sorry. I've been sorry this whole time. To you. The person I really loved was you... but in the end I gave my body and my heart to that guy."
"?. Is that something you need to apologize for?"
"Huhn?"
"Neither of us ever confessed. We never dated."
"...Yeah. Right. Nothing to apologize for. God, I'm such an idiot."
Another hollow laugh.
But her eyes had gone a little more unfocused than before.
Nari lifted the bottle itself and drained it dry.
"Haaaaah.... You know what? That bastard. All he wanted was my body and my money."
Said an Awakener's pussy was nice and tight while he fucked her like a dog.
Kept borrowing money saying he was short, never paid it back once.
And still I went on about love and all that shit — just acting like a complete fucking idiot.
"But then I left the party and the money dried up, and from that point on..."
No — actually, even before that.
She'd felt him getting tired of her. So she'd tried her hardest to match what he wanted.
Got tattoos. Wore slutty clothes and heavy makeup.
Devoted every ounce of herself to the person she'd given her heart to.
And the result of all that was...
"............."
Nari didn't say anything more.
She just stared quietly down at her glass.
"Want me to order more?"
".......Yeah."
The drinks kept coming.
But unlike before, there was no more talk about her boyfriend.
"Back at the Academy—"
Stories from the past.
"Come to think of it, you cross-dressed again? You're seriously incorrigible!"
Nothing but light conversation.
"Hey. You always said your lifelong wish was to touch a pair of tits. Special offer — free of charge, just this once. How about it? These are the breasts that make every customer lose their minds, you know?"
Even talk that was halfway to her completely checking out.
Just thrashing around, trying to forget the present moment.
Sunwoo quietly went along with his friend's desperate flailing, and when she finally collapsed at the end of it, he scooped her into his arms and stood.
And then—
"Let's do it. With me."
"....Nari?"
At a motel. Nari jumped him.