Chapter 34: Absolute Proposition (15)

Was it six years ago, or five. She could barely remember. It must have been sometime in between.

There was a time before she even had the name “Lude,” a time when Nari hadn’t yet realized how badly her skills affected other people’s minds.

Unable to control the power she had gained out of the blue, she followed the Lord of Chaos’s suggestion, created a secondary avatar, put it on like a mask, and slipped into empty gates to practice her skills.

A gate had burst open inside a school. It was late at night, so no one could make a report, which meant Nari could be there alone.

Because it was a school at night, there would be no survivors. The Lord of Chaos had sensed it and tipped her off, telling her to go try controlling her strength, just this once. That was how she was able to enter this particular gate.

Inside a burrow shaped gate, Lude, who at this point was just “Nari’s alt,” was slicing through monsters however he pleased to test his power, but then he found a boy lying quietly on the ground.

He wore a neat black vest and a blue tie. The name on his badge was hidden under the jacket draped over him, so he could not see it.

“What’s this, a corpse? I walk into a gate and the first thing I see is a dead kid?”

When the black clad man, Lude, crept closer, thinking it was a corpse, the boy’s eyes flew open.

“Gah! Ah, hell, my heart. You scared me!”

The boy clutched his chest and leaned against the wall. He stared blankly at the man.

Blue eyes shone under a fall of pitch black hair, yet there was something gloomy and shadowed about him.

“What are you, Snow White? Why are you lying there like that?”

Lude dragged a hand down his face, as if to settle his pounding heart, and spoke with a sigh. The boy still only stared.

“If you found a gate, report it and run. What are you doing here? Are you a senior with a sleep deficit? If you want to sleep, go home. I’ll send you.”

“I don’t really care if I die here.”

He let the words out, then shut his eyes tight again. His flat voice was calm.

“I don’t know why I should keep forcing myself to live when it’s this hard, and I don’t know why I was born. That’s why. Don’t worry about me.”

Lude’s eyes went half lidded. He clicked his tongue, knit his brows, and scratched the side of his head.

“You think anyone knows that kind of thing? Just live.”

“No, I think I was born wrong.”

“Why?”

“Every adult tells me so. They say I need to be fixed. But they don’t know how to fix me. Which means I must be wrong at the root.”

His voice was clearly young, yet it echoed hollowly around the tunnel. At the same time, the shadow of a giant soldier ant loomed up behind Lude.

A swarm of soldier ants gathered, raising sharp mandibles as they stared the two down. The boy sensed death on him and squeezed his eyes shut.

“So disposal is the answer. Everyone will be happier. If I die in a gate, there won’t even be a body…”

That was what he said, but when it came to actually dying he was scared. Nari could see the strength tighten in the boy’s hands, folded over his belly. His voice shook on the last words.

He was horrified at the thought of being torn apart by a soldier ant swarm.

He imagined the moment his torso was severed from his legs with a sickening snap, and his fingers went white with strain.

‘Huh?’

He cracked one eye to check what was happening, then shot to his feet. The soldier ants had been sliced to pieces when the black Hunter he had never seen before released a surge of spirit energy.

The boy stared, dazed, at the man. The man wiped ant ichor from a black half pair of scissors with a cloth, then looked at him.

“You’re a very good kid I see.”

“Eh… Huh? Yes? Huh?”

Judging from the man’s build and skill, the boy had assumed he was a support type Hunter who could not help him. For the first time, his expression wavered. The man’s indifferent eyes pierced him.

“I haven’t lived long, but I’ve learned a thing or two in nineteen years. Well, I’ll be twenty soon.”

“You’re nineteen?”

The man looked like he was at least in his early to mid twenties if you just went by face value. The boy blinked, unable to believe it.

He had thought the man was an adult, yet he was a high schooler like himself. The man scowled, annoyed.

“Did you commit a crime?”

“No.”

“Do you curse people out or hit them?”

“No… I’ve never done that.”

“Then ignore what they say and live your life. If that is your record, your character is fine. You are more than fine, so what flaw do you have?”

The clean, clipped words made the boy blink several times. He hurried to protest.

“No, even if it’s not that. It’s just… everyone says it! How am I supposed to ignore them?! They’re adults!”

“So what will you do? You said you can’t change them. You're going to kill every jerk who talks like that? You don’t look up to it.”

“…Kill them? No, I don’t…”

“Then just ignore it and live. There are seven billion people. Some of them will like you. If you live straight, keep your head up, hold on to what’s right…”

“Those words are draining. It’s just mental gymnastics.”

The man trailed off, thinking, then sighed and took the boy by the arm, pulling him to his feet. Hauled up without warning, the boy looked down at him.

“If you watch people who say others have flaws, you’ll notice they all have them too. They say they’re just ‘different,’ while I’m a ‘flaw.’ Does that make sense? People aren’t factory goods, and they don’t get to call others defective or genuine at their whim.”

His eyes focused on empty air. Brow creasing as if recalling something, he muttered without thinking.

“From what you’ve said, it sounds like you’re being used as a dump for other people’s irritation over trivial reasons. There are more people who don’t know you than people who do. Don’t let your life be defined by what a few dozen out of seven billion say. Yes, just a few dozen…”

His teeth ground. Anger boiled in his eyes, then he caught himself and smoothed it away.

“…Thanks for saying that. But that doesn’t mean I’ve found a reason to live.”

“That’s none of my business.”

At the cool, matter of fact reply, the boy let out a small, dissatisfied noise. He decided it had been empty comfort and a useless conversation, slung his bag over his shoulder, and pouted.

“Right. You don’t really care, do you? I’ll just go home. Now I’m just in a worse mood.”

“I don’t know why I’m alive either. I decided not to think about it.”

The boy, who had started to leave, looked down at the man. The man pushed back his coat sleeve to check his wrist.

“...If I thought through every one of those questions, the only option left would have been to die.”

But when it came down to it, it was terrifying. He gave a hollow laugh, dropped his hand, and turned around. A dimensional gate opened before the boy’s eyes. He could see the empty subway station in front of the school.

“Go home. Live without thinking. It’s a lot better that way.”

* * *

“The vibe was too different.”

Lude folded his arms, dredging up the memory. After politely seeing Hunter Min Jaewon out and thinking it over, he realized he had not remembered because the impression had been so different.

[His face is the same, so how did you not remember, asks the Lord of Chaos, staring at you.]

“Who would think a low self esteem yin type would turn into a kind, gentle yang type overnight. You didn’t know either, did you?”

[No, I knew, says the Lord of Chaos, sticking out their tongue.]

“If you knew, you should have told me! You really enjoy this stuff, don’t you!?”

Lude shot to his feet and grumbled. The Lord of Chaos cackled that this was more fun, so he flicked his fingers to dismiss the indirect message.

While he was in mid grumble, the office door banged open again.

“Lude!”

“Agh, you scared me! Did you swallow a train whistle?! Why are you so late?!”

Face bright with excitement, Kang Ihyun burst in holding two tumblers.

When his partner came in, Lude hurried to make it look like he had been working hard the whole time and not slacking. Ihyun ignored that and let out a joyous yell.

“We passed! The guildmaster called a moment ago to say it’s enough, so that’s why I’m late!”

“What!”

Lude shot to his feet. At the news that the maddeningly strict report for the government agency had passed, the domestic rank one and rank two hugged and cheered.

“Let’s go home, Lude. We’re on the afternoon shift tomorrow. Let’s go home and sleep!”

“Right, let’s go home. Let’s go…!”

Like true early career workers, they savored the supreme bliss of knowing they could clock out on time starting tomorrow, and immediately began packing up.

They punched their time cards, saved their logs, shut down the computers and the power strips, then turned off the office lights.

“Lude, I’ll get going. See you tomorrow!”

“Yeah, tomorrow afternoon.”

Lude opened a dimensional rift, and Kang Ihyun headed down to the parking lot. In the dark office, his smile froze as he stood before the rift.

It made no sense, yet a memory that had definitely happened flashed through Nari’s mind. Lude turned on his heel and stared down the corridor where Kang Ihyun had vanished.

[Nari, you finally caught on, says the Lord of Chaos with a sly grin.]

“…What.”

Any ordinary person who saw his skill would suffer mental shock. Except Kang Ihyun, who had “complete immunity to evil alignment mental attacks” thanks to “Constellation influence.”

The black haired Kang Ihyun had witnessed Lude’s skill with his naked eyes back then, without any effect.

He had said he turned blonde when he contracted with the Constellation Raphael.

If so, how had Kang Ihyun, before contracting with Raphael, watched Nari’s skill head on and remained unscathed?

* * *

‘What is this guy…?’

Dimensional travel is not something just anyone can do. In fact, as far as Ihyun knew, no Hunter could open a warp gate that easily.

Seventeen year old Kang Ihyun, black haired, looked at the black clad man.

If he was this strong, Ihyun should’ve known him. Ihyun had the widest network among Hunters in the country.

Puzzled, he asked the man in black,

“Um, what’s your name?”

“I don’t have one yet. I’m thinking. I’m terrible at naming.”

‘So he hasn't registered yet.’

That he could accept. He would not know someone unregistered. Some Hunters did register under aliases now and then.

In the information age, you could dig up someone’s real name with a little effort, but people did it for impact. Ihyun assumed this man was one of those and said,

“People usually tie it to their traits. What’s your trait?”

“Lucid Dreamer.”

“Then how about Lude, straight and simple, right?”

“Lude?”

The man rested his chin and thought something over. He muttered and snapped now and then as if bickering with someone. It seemed he had a Constellation.

Given that level of skill, of course he would have one. Ihyun kept watching him.

His alignment seemed to be on the evil side. If word got out that a new evil alignment Hunter had reached S class, his grandfather would raise hell again. While he was thinking that, the man spoke brightly.

“Nice. Lude it is.”

The man, no, “Lude,” snapped his head toward Ihyun and grinned. Ihyun blinked.

It was ten minutes. Out of his seventeen years, exactly ten minutes of conversation.

Out of all the smiles he had seen, only that smile, only those ten minutes, changed Kang Ihyun’s life. Staring at him, Ihyun spoke as if bewitched.

“Can I see you again?”

“Nope. Next time I won’t save you.”

“Okay, then I’ll make sure there won’t be a next time.”

Watching Lude mutter that he was a strange one, Ihyun flashed a bright smile and stepped into the rift.

A few months later, “Lude,” apparently registered as an Awakener, became the undisputed domestic rank one, and beyond that, world rank one.

And Kang Ihyun, right behind him, became domestic rank two.

From that day on, Lude was number one, and Kang Ihyun was number two. Always, and forever.

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