The Road to Busan
"I love you, my son!"
I was loved.
"Son. You stay right next to Grandma until Daddy gets back, okay?"
I had always been loved.
"I love you, Mom and Dad!"
So I loved them back.
"Both of them passed away in a traffic accident…"
"…What?"
What came back to me was the death of the ones I loved.
…
..
.
"Sunwoo. Grandma loves you more than anyone in the whole wide world! So don't you listen to those mean kids!"
"Grandma…"
I was loved.
"How can you call yourselves human after doing that?! How can you?! Stealing a snot-nosed kid's money—you rotten bastards!"
"Grandma…!"
I had always been loved.
"Grandma… I love you!"
"Aigoo, my little puppy. Grandma loves Sunwoo too~!"
So I loved her back.
"Due to overwork…"
"…Grandma…"
And once again, I lost her.
…
..
.
"Sunwoo. It must be so hard without Grandma, right? Want to live with Auntie?"
"……………"
I was loved.
"Auntie loves our Sunwoo sooooo much, you know!"
"…Auntie…!"
I had always been loved.
"Sunwoo. Auntie will always stay by your side."
"Auntie…!"
I thought I was loved.
"Your mom dumped you! Don't you even know what an orphanage is for?"
"……………"
Maybe it was only natural.
So of course—
"I'm sorry. I… just want to stay friends with everyone…!"
—my first love failed.
[Sunwoo… haah…♥, sorry… I'm… too busy…]
"…Yeah?"
Of course my childhood friend left me behind to do something strange.
"You're joining the Hero's party?"
"Stay out of my business."
Of course my reliable comrades left.
"You can handle things fine without me now, right?"
"…Of course."
Of course the senior I relied on walked away.
"That's how it is."
It was only natural.
Because I was that kind of guy.
Born that way. Living that way.
And the only way a guy like me could keep living was—
"Yeah…? Sorry, Ayoung! I must've been too hasty!"
—not to love.
"But you have to come out tomorrow for sure, okay? Got it, Nari?"
—not to truly live.
"Congratulations! I knew you could do it, Sea!"
—not to hold anyone in my heart.
"Don't worry, Jiyeon unnie. I'm the party leader of this party, after all?"
—not to leave any lingering attachments.
But then why—
"I want to have sex with Oppa."
—why do you keep coming closer?
"I'm not some heartless bitch who'd hate Oppa over one or two little mistakes."
I'm only going to hurt you again.
"I'm sorry. I took everything Oppa did for granted."
And you'll only hurt me again too.
"Hee… it feels good. I want to keep feeling like this…"
But why…
Why…
Just why…
"…This is driving me crazy."
I ended up loving them.
I dared to fall in love.
And that wasn't even the end of it.
"You… what happened between you and the Nature girls?"
"N-ngh?"
It wasn't just Hyewon.
Yeonhwa too.
Harin too.
Even Sujin.
Every single one of them came toward me.
I was loved by all of them.
"You've received so much."
Because I had received far too much love—
"You've received so much."
—I could finally decide.
Without wandering. Simply, calmly, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"…Ah."
I dozed off for a second.
I wiped the drool from the corner of my mouth and looked around.
"Oh."
The bus terminal across the way.
I woke up right on time.
I pulled my bag down from the overhead rack and stepped off the bus.
"Nnngh…!"
My whole body felt stiff.
The fatigue wouldn't leave.
Maybe because I'd slept in such an awkward position?
"…Haaaah."
No. That couldn't be it.
An Awakener's body wasn't something that fell apart so easily.
I let out a small sigh and looked down.
"Nox. Time to get down, yeah?"
"I refuse."
"You should listen to Papa."
"I don't want to listen to bad Papa."
"…Tch."
Nox had turned into a complete cicada and refused to let go.
She was squeezing my body full of mana so tightly that if I had some kind of meridian blockage, this was probably exactly how it would feel.
The reason I'd slept so poorly was probably Nox poking at my mana hole in real time the whole ride.
"Hecate. You're Nox's big sister. Can't you manage your little sister properly?"
"Don't talk crap, im. Why would I scold a kid who's doing just fine, eum?"
"What?"
"I don't want to listen to bad Sunwoo either, eum."
"Hey…"
When I called Hecate over, she simply climbed onto my back instead.
Thanks to that I was stuck in an unexpected double-cicada state. Being completely wrapped in little girls from head to toe was, to put it nicely, not comfortable.
Sure, people always say kids are light as feathers, but nobody wearing a down parka claims it's light, do they?
Those people should try wearing a waterlogged down parka. Then they'd understand what I meant.
Anyway… were they seriously planning to stay like this the whole time?
"There's no human worse than one who breaks a promise, im."
"If you go to Incheon right now, I'll acknowledge you as good Papa!"
"……Tch."
What choice did I have?
I carried the two cicadas on my body and started walking toward the beach.
"……Ugh."
Both spirits clicked their tongues at the same time.
Apparently deciding this wasn't working, they shifted positions and wrapped their arms around both of my legs like they were claiming them.
I was dying a social death in real time, so I'd really appreciate it if they stopped.
"Nox likes good Papa."
"If you make a promise, keep it, im. Is that so hard, eum?"
"……………"
If this was reaping what I'd sown, then fine, I was reaping it.
People always say the weight of a lie is heavy, but I never expected it to get heavy in this particular way.
If I'd known it would turn out like this, I would've gone to the gym more often—
[Master!]
"…Seiren?"
[Seiren… hates bad Master! Seiren likes good Master!]
"What the… wait, ngh?"
This time Seiren appeared—or rather, she summoned herself on her own.
She wasn't a Supreme Spirit like Hecate, and she hadn't forced her way through with the combined power of multiple spirits like Nox.
Had she suddenly evolved from Upper to Supreme out of nowhere?
"…Nox?"
"Nox doesn't know anything about that!"
No. That couldn't be it.
I could feel Nox's power coming from Seiren, who was now blocking my path.
Come to think of it, "Darkness" mixed with other forces really well, didn't it?
[Kiiing…]
[Piyopiyopiyopiyo!!!]
"Aigoo, you little brats… you're going to kill me!"
Even Ran and Shinpung came out and planted themselves in front of me.
One pecked my head with her beak. The other bit the hem of my pants and started pulling.
Seiren was thrashing her whole body to block me as well.
"Hey… why are you all suddenly doing this?"
"You're asking that like you don't already know, im?"
"………"
Hecate scolded me.
Every other spirit's eyes were locked on me alone.
[Master…]
[Kiiing… woof!]
[Piyoyoyot!]
"…Haaaah."
Spirits are beings close to their Spirit Contractor.
The contract is with the soul itself. That's why they share emotions too.
"It's fine. It's not 'that' thing you're all thinking."
"If it really were 'that,' we wouldn't have gone this far, im."
"……"
As the representative of the spirits, Hecate took one step closer and spoke to me.
"A human going off to die is already a problem, but a human with 'no thoughts at all' is even worse, im."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"It's not a weird statement, eum."
A human going off to die is at least thrashing around because they want to live—
—but a human with no thoughts at all can't be stopped at all.
"There's no idiot here who doesn't understand what it means to walk into a death trap with zero thoughts, im."
"…………"
What was she trying to say?
I quietly stared at Hecate.
"…Sunwoo."
At the end of it all, Hecate spoke.
"I love you."
"!……"
"Me. Nox. And Seiren, Ran, and Shinpung too."
"…Hecate."
Hecate took another step toward me.
"I. We. We never left you."
"…Hecate."
"We aren't leaving you now, and we won't leave you later either."
So—
"If Sunwoo dies, we're dying with you."
"…How does a spirit even die?"
"It won't just be Sunwoo. We're all dying together."
"……………"
Before I knew it she was right in front of my nose, wearing the same expression she had once shown me.
The kind that looked like it would shatter at any moment. The kind that had crammed so much emotion inside that it could no longer make any expression at all.
"Haaaaah…"
A sigh escaped me.
Deep. Long. I dropped to one knee and pulled Hecate into my arms.
"I'm not dying. Why the hell would I die?"
"…That's not enough, im."
"I won't die until I get hit by a car."
"Still not enough, eum."
"It'd take a lifetime to hit me with a car, right?"
"Look at the face on that one behind you, im."
Hecate pointed at Nox.
"You think she won't pounce, eum?"
"…Unnie?"
"Even if she doesn't, I will, im."
"Hecate unnie!"
"Wha—"
The sudden barrage of confessions left me a little lightheaded. Right then Hecate grabbed both of my cheeks—
"Mmph…?!"
"—Pwah…!"
—and kissed me.
A short, brief peck. A bird kiss.
Nothing more than a little smooch, really.
"So wait until I become king, got it?"
"…Huh."
It was more than enough reason to keep living.
At the very least I couldn't die if I didn't want to watch these kids die with me.
As a side note—
"Nox too! Nox is gonna be king too! I'm gonna be the Spirit King!"
"Aigoo, my goodness!"
The moment Hecate kissed me, Nox came charging in like she couldn't stand it anymore.
I shoved Nox aside and then got showered in random kisses. It was cute. It even felt a little like having a daughter.
"Okay, okay. I get it. Papa's not dying. You think Papa would die and leave you behind?"
"…..?"
"Hm?"
When I patted her head and set her down, Nox's eyes went round.
"This isn't right…?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Your reaction is different from when it was Hecate unnie!"
"Seems the same to me?"
"No! It's different!"
Like this, like that—
Just, just, that, uuugh…!
"…Anyway it's different!"
"I have no idea what you're saying."
"Eee… eeeek!"
Nox stamped her back feet against the ground in frustration.
Hecate had been acting weird, then Nox started acting weird, and now the ripple effect seemed to be spreading to the other spirits too.
[Master likes that kind of look, huh?]
"Seiren?"
[…Woof.]
"Ran?"
[Piyopiyoyot!]
"…And Shinpung is still just Shinpung."
In any case, the spirits accepted my will and started listening to me again.
After we reached the beach and I was waiting for a guest who might show up at any time—
"Oppa… where are you right now?"
"……………"
A call from Hyewon.
I smiled softly and answered the girl on the other end of the line.
"…I'll be there soon."
"…Really?"
"I'll be right there."
"—————"
"Hm? Hello?"
The call suddenly went dead.
I pulled the phone away from my ear and checked the screen, but nothing looked wrong—
"Ow ow ow…"
—until a sharp current suddenly shot through the phone like electricity.
What the hell? Was the phone defective? For a second I even wondered if my phone was somehow a bomb phone.
"Sunwoo oppa."
"Uh… hello?"
Hyewon spoke from the other end of the line.
"See you later."
"…Hyewon?"
The call cut off right there.
At the time, I had no way of knowing just how big a snowball that single phone call was about to set rolling.