Episode 89: Partner (6)
“…”
She looks like she is in a very good mood, thought Yu Gyeoul.
“…”
It happened about half a day ago – Yu Yeorum crawled out of the water with a crushed body.
Lifting her up, Yu Jitae walked into the tent and closed the door, before telling her, ‘Play by yourself for a bit’. Before long, an aura that Gyeoul found unpleasant – the aura of the red race – started to flow out of the tent.
This was odd, because Yeorum’s aura had never been this big. So what kind of aura was this…?
In any case, playing by herself was something she was good at. Sitting near the soothing waters, she closed her eyes while humming a song. Looking back, the memories of the very distant past vividly filled her mind. The rustling voices around her the moment she broke out of her egg; the hands that tossed her around like a product; and the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes… those eyes…
Emotions of that time vibrantly resurfaced along with the memories. Constantly ruminating on those memories allowed Gyeoul to fully enjoy herself to her heart’s content.
Sometimes, she wanted to forever remain in that world of illusion.
A lot of time went by. The tent reopened and Yeorum walked out looking like a severe patient with countless unclosed wounds all across her body.
Why was she so injured this time?
Since last time she said she bumped into something, she must have crashed into something this time.
Yeorum walked to a corner of a large piece of rock and started to meditate.
.
.
.
That night, after her meditation, she became extremely loud.
‘Dude, I’m super strong now.’
‘About to smack Yu Jitae very soon.’
‘What? Smack Yu Jitae? Oh my! Yu Yeorum, even the sky is not her limit…’
Gyeoul gave a frown. It definitely was a crash. She must have crashed into something head-first.
‘Yu Gyeoul. What should I do?’
‘Tell me, huh? What should your unni do?’
‘I don’t think I can lose anymore so what should I do! Hahahahaha!’
Gyeoul ran away but Yeorum followed.
Persistently she followed her and grabbed her in the end, to simply explain how much stronger she had become. Unable to deal with it any longer, Gyeoul blocked her ears but her thunderous voice roared through her palms.
‘Stop the nonsense. You’ll be going deeper tomorrow so prepare yourself beforehand. There’s not much time.’
‘Yes sirr ’
Yeorum finally became quiet.
After that, Yu Jitae and Yu Yeorum shared a lot of conversations till night. It went like this.
‘We have to go together.’
‘I’m fine though? I can do it by myself!’
‘It’s dangerous. Yeorum. This time, I’m serious.’
‘I’ve always been serious though.’
‘Aren’t you afraid? You should have felt yourself what lies deeper down.’
‘Yes, but if I go by myself, are you going to let me die?’
‘No.’
‘Then I won’t die. I’ll be back in one piece.’
She’s so full of confidence as always…
Gyeoul always found that to be bizarre. Yeorum was never in a good shape whenever she returned from the dive. She was severely injured every time. Gyeoul could remember the pain Yeorum went through – how she vomited blood after constant short breaths; her pale expression as if in fear and how she crawled while pulling her legs with her arms.
And yet Yeorum would smile after a little as if nothing was wrong.
Gyeoul found that astounding.
How could she be full of confidence after going through all that?
How was it that she could still smile?
Wasn’t she scared?
…Maybe it’s because she injured her brain?
If it was me, I would be scared for a month at least…
That seemed to be the end of that day.
But in the middle of the night, Gyeoul opened her eyes after hearing a strange sound. A strange gulping sound was heard from outside the tent, along with a teary noise.
Lifting her body, she found that the door of the tent was half-open. With her eyes in the shape of (o.O), Gyeoul looked outside and found Yeorum facing the ocean.
She was crying.
…Eh?
…Why is she crying?
‘??’
Curious, Gyeoul was about to walk outside but someone pulled her body in. Caught in someone’s embrace, Gyeoul turned her head and saw Yu Jitae who shook his head facing the child as if telling her to not go outside. She didn’t know why he was stopping her but she obediently gave a nod.
She felt strange.
That night, she had trouble falling back asleep.
.
.
.
The next morning.
Yeorum was surprisingly back to normal during breakfast. She still had wounds and her stamina had yet to fully recover. Because of that, she took a rest at the corner of the tent while Yu Jitae and Gyeoul were playing outside.
It was by night that she finally started to prepare for the dive.
‘Fishy Yeorum ready for the dive! Skipping the exercise before dive!’
‘About to become a blue dragon at this rate!’
‘Shat! That’s a bit iffy!’
‘Yeorum is a fishy!’
‘Anyways, off she goes!’
With a loud announcement, she entered her third dive.
.
.
.
And a few hours later at dusk.
The dimensions cracked open as a red hatchling revealed itself.
The might of a baby dragon, reaching 8 metres in height fluttering its wings, shook the whole atmosphere of this wide dimension. In a normal ocean, schools of fish would have suffocated to death from that pressure; the aura that alerted the world of its arrival and presence.
However, the red hatchling couldn’t fly for long.
It staggered in all directions, unbelievably feeble for its large size. Like a fly that had breathed in pesticide, it wobbled before dropping to the ground but even after that, it fluttered its wings and wriggled, seemingly in pain.
Startled, Gyeoul turned towards Yu Jitae.
‘Can you stay inside the tent for a bit?’
***
The sea was tranquil, just like its name.
Yeorum was silent and so was Yu Jitae.
She sat facing the ocean with her face away from him.
For a long time, they remained silent as Yeorum gazed down at the water with her head lowered. Everything was so silent to the point that the small sound of her lips parting reached the ocean as well as his ears.
As if she found herself pathetic, Yeorum said.
“I failed.”
Yu Jitae didn’t return any words. Gyeoul and him were the only ones that saw what happened just then because he made sure that no-one else could see her.
“…Well, were you surprised? Since I suddenly popped out?”
“I wasn’t really, no.”
“Really? I guess that’s just how you are. It’s the first time I showed you my dragon form. How was I, pretty?”
“No.”
“Can’t you just say I was pretty even if it’s just empty words?”
“No.”
“…”
She picked up a pebble and threw it in the water.
Pong–
A ripple travelled across the silent ocean.
“Why did you come out.”
“What do you mean why. It’s nothing crazy. I just found it hard on the way down. Tried to endure it but it wasn’t easy.”
“How far did you go down.”
“Just deep enough. Ah, of course it was more than 500 metres.”
“Let’s go down again after healing your wounds.”
“It’s fine.”
“What?”
“I’m gonna stop now.”
Yu JItae gave a frown.
Yeorum picked a different pebble and began throwing it up and down. She looked extremely fidgety.
“Yeorum.”
“Ah, c’mon to be honest, this should be more than enough already.”
“You can’t give up here.”
“Why? I at least went down 500 metres didn’t I? And I’ve built a lot more mana. It’s 1.8 times more than what I started with so that’s enough.”
“It is not enough. Far from it. I didn’t prepare this training to only build such an insignificant amount in your body.”
…
The rock that had been jumping up and down her hands came to a stop.
“What did you prepare?”
“What?”
“Putting that stupid invisible flag underwater?”
“No. It hasn’t yet…”
“Like I said, I just don’t want to do it okay?”
Her voice became a little louder. He couldn’t see her face so he couldn’t see the expression that was on her face.
“This much is enough isn’t it? Isn’t the training for me to get stronger? I’ve become strong enough already.”
“Yeorum.”
“Why, I tried as hard as I could, you know? Same for 200 metres but for 500 metres, I put in more effort than I had ever done in my life.”
“…”
“I’ve done enough. This is fine already. How much harder can I do from here? Isn’t it fine to stop what I don’t want to do after this much?”
“Yeorum. Calm down first.”
“I am calm. I’m just stating the facts.”
“Yu Yeorum.”
Yu Jitae’s voice serenely echoed across. As if startled, her voice came to a stop, but before long, her hands started fidgeting again as the pebble bounced up and down.
“But, I’m serious. I’ve done enough. I think, it really is time for me to take a rest…”
“…”
“At least, I didn’t cause trouble. I swam up to the 200 metre mark and teleported from there.”
She stood up from the ground.
“I’m going now. You two can play for a bit more. There won’t be any problems. That thing underneath… that shit probably doesn’t even know I was here in its slightest dreams.”
He opened his mouth with a sigh.
“Yes. You’ve done well. I know you were trying very hard until now. But you see Yeorum, you have to go again.”
“I don’t want to.”
“You must go.”
“I don’t want to.”
“You can’t say no just because you don’t want to. You have to do it.”
“I don’t want to. No. I’m saying I don’t want to do it. And I’m going to stop.”
“Who says.”
“I say it. Why? Am I not even allowed to decide that myself?”
Her voice became increasingly louder.
“I’m saying I don’t want to do it! Can I not even say that?! Can’t I find it painful to get hurt? Can I not hate how it feels to bleed? Can I not find it frustrating to not hear anything; get irritated to not see a single thing? Can I not say that? Me!?”
“Yu Yeorum.”
“Stop. I’m going!”
“You can’t. If you don’t do this now, you’ll never be able to. You need to know that there is inertia to failures as well. Didn’t I tell you? That you must do it in one go?”
“No? I just don’t want to.”
“You can do it. You’ve been doing it well so why wouldn’t you do something that you can,”
“Do you think I really don’t want to do it? I can’t–!!”
It was an anguished shout sounding like her throat was ripped apart.
“I can’t do it! I just can’t do it anymore…!”
As the silence came once again after her shout, her breaths turned audibly louder as her words began to tremble. A voice filled with tears soon crawled all the way up from beneath her throat. Uhk, uhk… but it stayed within her throat, unable to cross the syrinx.
“W, why are you doing this to me? You should know… D, don’t you know what I want to say already…? You said you’ve done it… you said you know how painful it is…”
“…”
“D, do you have to hear me say it in such a pathetic way? W, will that make you feel better…?”
Saying that, she lifted her hands and started wiping her eyes. Tears that had already flowed out were about to drop from her chin.
Yeorum started crying just like last night.
There was only one reason why she would cry.
“I’m, scared…”
Yeorum crouched on the spot. She seemed to have reached the limit in holding her tears in and she audibly sobbed.
“It’s too scary… I can’t do it anymore…”
Her sorrow turned into drops that endlessly flowed down as heavy marbles.
“My skin gets ripped the whole time; it’s painful…
“The feeling of my bones breaking and disjointing gives me goosebumps…
“I feel painfully powerless from all the bleeding… it feels like I’m about to die…
“And so what if I go down…? It’s dark. I can’t see anything a, and, everything becomes narrow. I feel like I’m locked in a small room… it suffocates my chest… It’s scary…
“W, when I go down it becomes quiet… I can’t hear anything; I can’t tell the direction… I feel like a fool… it’s scary…
“Deeper down even the time feels off… my senses feel weird. I don’t even know if I’m right or wrong… I thought I was dying there for a month… it was too scary…
“And those weird things attack me. They like, bite me, scratch and stab… why do I have to be attacked like that…?
“My heart feels suppressed, and plus my chest contracts like crazy. I try to endure it but it happens again in 10 minutes… I want to breathe… Why do I have to hold my breath like an idiot…?
“Why do I have to be the only one suffering…?”
The emotions that she had pressed deep inside her – those suppressed emotions came flooding out.
“What did I ever do wrong…?”
Over countless times, Yeorum had wanted to ask that very question but she held it in, because that might again make her look childish. However, she couldn’t hold it in anymore.
“Wasn’t I trying hard…?
“I tried my best…
“I really, really did my best…”
She couldn’t control the surge of emotions, and thus the child sorrowfully sobbed.
“So please, let me just stop now…”
“Please…”