Chapter 131: Endless Night (7)

Kwon Oh-Jin stared at Song Ha-Eun’s back as she walked further away from him. No... He pressed his trembling arms against the ground. Biting his lip, he summoned every ounce of strength he had left, but his arms still gave out below him. Thud! “Kugh!” His face slammed into the ground, leaving him with a nosebleed. “Don’t go...” He desperately reached out toward her silhouette. He tried getting up again using his legs, but they refused to move as if his Achilles tendons had been severed. “You... can’t go.” A memory from six years ago resurfaced. Lying on a hospital bed, she was trembling and crying as she drowned in an unfamiliar darkness. He couldn’t let her return to that terrible abyss again. She turned her head slightly, biting her lip as she looked down at him. “Oh-Jin...” Holding the Dragon Pearl dangerously close to her left eye, she turned back toward Cheon Do-Yoon. “I’ll call the association and have them take Oh-Jin away first. I’ll give you the eyes then.” “Hmm. And how am I supposed to trust the association will only retrieve the Thunder Wolf?” “We’ll call the association after we leave this place. If you still don’t trust me, you can just give up on my eyes altogether.” She waved the Dragon Pearl awfully close to her eye, enough that a mere slip would burn the Draconic Eye to nothing. Cheon Do-Yoon could tell that she wasn’t bluffing. “Hahaha. You're quite the spirited child. I like that.” He then nodded with a smirk. “Alright. We shall leave together and call the association afterward.” “Okay—” A deafening crash cut off Song Ha-Eun. Boom! “Fuck... that...” Kwon Oh-Jin uttered. “Oh-Jin...?” she mumbled. He planted his trembling legs on the ground. But not long after, he quickly fell helplessly back onto the ground. Blood seeped out from his numerous wounds and soaked into the dry dirt beneath him. “O-Oh-Jin!” She panickedly rushed toward him. His clothes were so blood-soaked that their original colors were unrecognizable. She bit her lip and glared fiercely at Cheon Do-Yoon. However, she couldn’t let her rage drive her to recklessly attack him. “You son of a bitch...!” “Ha... Eun...” Kwon Oh-Jin groaned. She closed her eyes tightly shut and stood up. “Hahaha! What a truly pitiful sight!" Cheon Do-Yoon exclaimed before looking down at Kwon Oh-Jin. "What on earth does she mean to you for you to go so far?” Kwon Oh-Jin let the taunts seep into his mind as he struggled to hold onto his fading consciousness. What does she mean to me? “A-Augh.” He dragged himself forward, crawling inch by inch toward Cheon Do-Yoon. He didn't care how pathetic, pitiful, and miserable he looked. “Haa! Haa! Haa!” Even as people sneered at the orphan he was, even as he was beaten without reason, he could endure it and keep moving forward—as long as she was there with him. Becauseto me, she's the first thing that... “Agh... ah...” Dragging his motionless legs across the ground, he crawled toward Song Ha-Eun. Memories so old he couldn’t even date suddenly resurfaced, perhaps from having lost too much blood. A girl with reddish-brown hair, a leader-like figure among the children at the orphanage, smiled brightly as she reached out her hand. “You're the new kid, right?” With her poor Hanja skills, she read the name on his nametag.[1] “Your name's... Oh-Jin? What does it mean?” The name he had despised with all his being. “Oh-Jin...? Doesn’t that mean... dirty dust?” That was right. His name, given to him by parents he'd never even seen, meant “dirty dust.” It was a miserable, wretched name that told him exactly what those so-called parents of his must have thought of him. Looking back on it now, a stupid name shouldn’t have mattered, but he'd been overly sensitive at the time and snapped back at her. “So what?” “No, like... that’s not what I meant. You just never talk, so I was curious.” “You don’t have to bother pretending to care.” He turned his head away, cold and dismissive. She scratched her head awkwardly before continuing. “Uh... Hmm. Oh-Jin... No, you don’t seem to like that name very much, so...” After briefly pondering it, her eyes suddenly lit up as she clapped. “Oh-Jinnie! Yeah, I’ll call you Oh-Jinnie!” It was such a ridiculous nickname that he couldn't even scoff at it. And yet, for some reason, his heart thumped. “Anyway, why are you up here?" she asked. "Are you running away from that pissy director, too?” “That’s...” She ran away since she always defied the director, but Kwon Oh-Jin had been the quiet type. He occasionally got smacked on the back of the head when the director was in a bad mood, but that was all. Even so, despite knowing he could get in trouble, he still came up to the rooftop. “It's because... this is my... s-secret base.” The door to the rooftop of the four-story orphanage should have been locked, but was left open for months due to the director’s carelessness. Ever since Kwon Oh-Jin discovered that, he slowly started turning it into his own secret hideout with nothing but a pile of boxes and wooden planks. Even so, to him, who had nothing—no parents, no relatives, and not even a single friend—this place was the first thing he could call his own. “Pfft! Hahaha!" Song Ha-Eun burst into laughter, clutching her stomach. "What kind of secret base is this?” He could only lower his head, trying to hide his reddening face. She was right. Even though he called it his secret base, deep down, he knew that the rooftop was never really his. There was nothing in this world that truly belonged to him. He understood that much even if he couldn't recite the times tables properly. “Hehe. I’m just messing with you. So this is your secret base, huh?” “N-No, it’s not.” “But didn’t you just say it was?” She teased him with a playful smile as she stepped closer, her reddish-brown hair swaying like fire. He gulped unconsciously, mesmerized by her beauty. “Let’s see... If this is a secret base, you don’t just let anyone in, right?” she asked. “Y-Yeah.” Avoiding her gaze, he clenched his fists. “Even if Mom and Dad show up... I won’t let them in either. Ever.” In a childish act of revenge, he swore that even if by some miracle the parents he'd never seen came looking for him one day, he would never let them into his secret base. The girl looked at him and his clenched fist with a bittersweet, empathetic expression. “I see.” Before they could learn their times tables, the two had realized that their so-called parents would never come back for them. “Then what about me, your big sis?” “Huh?” “Will you let your big sis in?” she asked with a glowing smile. “Big sis?” “I’m two years older than you, so I’m your big sister! Even if your mom and dad can’t come in, I can, right?” “Uhh... Y-Yeah?” As soon as she heard him agree in the heat of the moment, she stepped inside his shabby little hideout—and into his worthless, empty life. “Hehe. Now that I’m in, you have to think of me as your big sis from now on, okay?” She grinned brightly. She probably never even meant anything special with those words and even forgot all about it. However, that short and childish joke became the biggest salvation to him. “S-Stop it, Oh-Jin!” “Haa... haa... haa...” He exhaled ragged breaths mixed with blood and pressed against the ground with trembling hands. “Ah... Agh.” Having long surpassed its limits, his body screamed in agony, begging him to stop moving. Ring! [Warning! Kwon Oh-Jin is too injured to sustain mana use.] [The Stigma of Lyra’s mana is going out of control.] [Kwon Oh-Jin is entering a state of overload.] [Kwon Oh-Jin is entering an incapacitated state!] “Shut... up.” It doesn't matter if I break or if I'm shattered beyond repair. As long as I can stand up this one time... it's fine if I can never get up again. “Please...” He pounded on his trembling legs with his fists. “Please... just move.” Unlike his child self, he had something he wanted to protect. In his dark life, Song Ha-Eun was the only star who truly shone. “Oh-Jin...?” As he watched her eyes tremble, he forced himself up with a roar. “Aaaaaah!” Boom! With his feet planted firmly on the ground, he straightened his back. “Haa... Haa...!” He took a step toward her. He staggered and swayed, but didn’t fall. “Oh-Jin... why? Why are you going this far?” “Why am I going this far...?” Is she really asking me that after trying to save my life by offering up her own eyes? “You barged into my secret base without my consent..." he grumbled. "You can’t just leave now.” “What? W-What are you talking about?” It seemed she really had forgotten, but that was fine. He would always remember. “Hahaha! So you actually managed to stand in that state!” Cheon Do-Yoon mocked. “But tell me, what changes now that you’ve gotten up?” Nothing in the world ever got solved simply by enduring and persevering. No matter how hard Kwon Oh-Jin gritted his teeth, no matter how many times he stood back up, the vast gap between him and Cheon Do-Yoon remained. However, Kwon Oh-Jin had a plan. That fucker said the Draconic Eye is used to control the mana stored in the dragon’s heart. If so... then the Draconic Eye could also control the mana of the Dragon Vein. “Ha-Eun, whatever happens from now on, don’t move,” he instructed. “W-What are you trying to do?” “There’s no time to explain.” He carefully reached toward her left eye. Black clouds flowed out of his fingertips, gently covering her eye. “Kyaaah! W-What is this?!” “Stay still.” He carefully controlled the Black Heaven, making sure not to hurt her as he extracted a small portion of the Draconic Eye’s power. The Dragon Vein’s mana that deeply coiled itself in the black clouds began to stir. Woong! Ring! [The conditions for Open Heaven have been partially met!] [Αυτοί που με προσπερνούν στον κήπο των An unknown phrase in an unfamiliar language appeared with the same writing as the indecipherable description of the Open Heaven trait. He stared at the words that hovered in the air. For some reason, he could suddenly understand the phrase that had once been incomprehensible. His lips parted as he began reciting the incantation that seeped into his mind. “Those who pass by me into the Garden of Lamentation...” As the ominous chant echoed, the sky split open. “Ah.” Crackle! Crackle! The blue lightning crackling around Kwon Oh-Jin gradually turned black, the spilled blood on the ground transformed into black clouds flowing back into him, and the wounds all over him rapidly began to heal as if he'd drunk an elixir. Cheon Do-Yoon flinched, staring at the raging black lightning around Kwon Oh-Jin. “W-What...?” An ominous feeling pressed down on him, causing his teeth to chatter uncontrollably. He hadn't felt such terrifying fear even when facing the Celestial of the North Star. He looked at Kwon Oh-Jin, his face drained of all color. What the hell...? Crackle! Crackle! Shrouded in black lightning, Kwon Oh-Jin gazed up at the sky with a distant, unfocused look. Despite the scorching sunlight beating down, he saw a different shade altogether. “The sky’s too dark,” he said in an oddly exhilarated voice. “Don’t you think so?” 1. Hanja refers to Chinese characters used in the Korean language ☜