The impulse was greater than usual and bitterness rolled beneath his tongue. His chin clenched as he repeated opening and closing his hand to control the power behind his grip. If he were to move based on his mood, he might end up killing Myu.
His attitude towards her had been that way from the start and there were too many reasons why this peculiar relationship might go south. He had learned how to control his emotions to achieve his goal but in the face of uncontrollable impulse, he was no different from a beast who had to suppress its instinct.
“What about all this! Huh? So what if these pathetic insects die! How dare you try to make me submit just because of something so insignificant—!!”
Myu yelled as if she had gone insane. A kick made the table fly off as the watchers slowly began to wake up from their shock.
“T, that woman!”
“Oi! Are you not sane!? Stop it right now!”
“What do you think you’re doing!”
She reached her arm out but could not use any magic so instead, she raised a broken piece of a vase to threaten the surrounding astonished people. She was driven mad already. Even though her body refused to move according to her will, she still tried to attack them.
“Do you not hear me telling you to go away? You damn bugs!!”
He was still overly stimulated.
This was the first time in the 7th iteration that he had been so annoyed. The impulse didn’t subside with ease and he wasn’t confident in not killing her.
“Please stop!”
“Is she on drugs?!”
“This young lady has gone completely insane…!”
When the senseless ones threatened Myu by raising their voices, she held the vase piece tightly with her two hands. Her eyes sunk and without any omen, she suddenly began rushing towards them.
The vase knife closed in.
Is she going to stab me?
Is she?
“Uhhh?”
“Hukk…!”
That was when Yu Jitae stood in front of Myu firmly like a wall of steel. With the vase piece still in her hands, Myu fell back and rolled on the ground.
Myu was like a sugar cane to him – a sugar cane shaking violently. He wasn’t confident in not crushing it with a touch.
“You accursed human–!”
Collapsed on the ground, Myu shouted.
“How are you any different from our race, and how are you different from me? Aren’t you also harassing me to obtain what you wish? The one to blame for everything I’m doing is you. And yet you dare judge me? How do you ever have the right to do so – by what right, do you dare judge me—!!”
His eyes twitched, but his mouth remained closed.
“I do not care about my race or anything anymore. I cannot continue living like this and will instead die. By my hands!”
She had no mana and could not stop her own heart. Myu thus lifted the vase piece and pointed it at her own throat and Yu Jitad had no choice at this point but to move.
In order to not kill her, he relaxed his hand as much as possible.
[Knifehand Strike (D)]
Bamm! Myu’s body came to a stop. At the same time, she started falling back; towards his body, about to be embraced.
That was when mana began to gather in a dot in mid-air. Myu’s [Dragon Fear] had reached and resonated way too far and Bom’s presence that had been nearby rapidly closed in.
Immediately, Bom appeared in front of them.
It was [Teleport (S)].
Yu Jitae was supporting a black-haired woman with his arm in front of Bom’s eyes.
Her gaze shifted from Yu Jitae to Myu;
And back to Yu Jitae.
***
He brought Myu and Bom and returned to the hotel. There were three mouths but none of them said a single word and the room was therefore silent.
Myu asked him,
How do you ever have the right to do so?
He did not answer her last question. In fact, there was nothing he could say in response because there was nothing wrong with Myu’s words.
Those who condemn must be sinless. Those who strike others for being a sinner must be clean themselves – at least that’s how it must appear to those seeing it.
And in that regard, the Regressor had no right to condemn someone. His life was no different from Myu or the black dragons – he obtained what he wanted to obtain, and unhesitatingly carried out actions that might seem sinful in that process.
Myu killed people,
But the Regressor killed even more people.
Black dragons destroyed worlds,
But the Regressor destroyed even more words.
And yet here he was condemning Myu and had not been feeling repulsed by such a paradoxical deed. He simply thought to himself upon realising it, that he was yet again doing something contradictory.
In the past, he didn’t want to live like this but he had been living this way for far too long already. Regrets do not bring anything back and he wasn’t the type to linger on things that cannot be retrieved.
However, such emotions tended to arise at times after starting to live a daily life. These things called ‘emotions’ were exceedingly outside his control. Whenever it rose up, he had to close his eyes and muddle his thoughts;
Like what he had always been doing.
“…”
He reopened his eyes and saw Bom.
Bom was sitting on the sofa of the hotel room without leaning on the backrest or twisting her legs, and merely had both of her hands resting on her lap with her eyes fixed on the ground. She was wearing an outstretched t-shirt, shorts, slippers – everything she usually wore at home.
He had just asked Clone 1 for an explanation.
– There was a flower blooming in Yu Bom’s room.
– It was a flower that had existed from the first time I had stepped into Unit 301 and had an abundant amount of Yu Bom’s aura. She seems to have saved a lot of her aura inside it over the past 5 years.
– Although it was remarkably crafted, it has now withered.
A highly precise manipulation of mana so brilliant it even deceived the Shadow of an Archduke for a split second. Even though she had been preparing for 5 years for this one moment, it was nonetheless a masterful feat.
That was why the Regressor had to face a situation he had not been expecting.
“What’s with that flower.”
Bom slowly opened her mouth in response as her voice echoed resembling a breeze flowing past the grass.
“It’s something I started growing from the first day I was kidnapped… to run away.”
“You got me. Even though I knew you were a genius at using mana, I wasn’t expecting you to be able to deceive me.”
Power had an endogenous origin and it was hard to clearly see through it before being released
Honestly, he was quite impressed. He had always considered Bom a genius at magic but he had to edit his opinion a little today – Bom’s talent had exceeded the normal threshold.
He wasn’t trying to blame her however.
Bom stayed silent so he continued.
“So why did you come here.”
“I came because I was worried.”
“Because of the onion core?”
“Yes.”
“I told you there’s nothing to worry about.”
Bom slowly shook her head in silence.
“And how did you come here.”
“I saw Providence.”
Soon, her gaze slowly travelled up from the ground to Myu who was lying down on the bed. He remembered the things that had happened with Carrot Girl in the past. There was nothing he was guilty of but he still felt the need to explain the situation.
“That is the black dragon you know. And as you said, it’s a female.”
“Yes.”
“Usually it’s kept isolated at the Association’s underground isolation room and is used as an experiment subject. It gets a short vacation after every experiment because the black race has trouble staying in one place. And this holiday will go on for four days including today.”
“Yes.”
“It’s an adult. Around 500 years old and the name is ‘Myu’ with a dirty temperament like every other black dragon. However, it’s crucial for an experiment so it has to be kept alive. And that is why it gets treated humanely, although limited.”
“Yes.”
“I am here as a supervisor. It is such a dangerous entity that I’m the only one that can do it. So there is nothing to misunderstand here. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
“Yes.”
She turned her eyes towards him. Her head slightly tilted to the side as her grass-coloured hair flowed down from her shoulders.
Yu Jitae observed the muscles around her eyes – there was no quivering and it meant that she wasn’t anxious.
“Did you really understand everything I told you?”
“Yes.”
He looked at her opened mouth – she didn’t lick her lips, meaning that she wasn’t nervous.
“Are you less worried now about what happened with the onion core?”
However, she did not reply to this question.
Bom simply stared back and as always, she appeared as if she was trying to gaze deeper into him. It was the same eyes he saw when he first met her that was quite different from an average young dragon’s gaze.
It would now be a question time from Bom.
The Regressor realised that the 7th iteration was about to twist out of his intention once again in front of his eyes.
And he would have no choice but to lie.
Experiment.
She might ask what the experiment on the black dragon was. However, no-one in the world knew what this experiment was and he naturally had no plans of telling Bom about it either. He had already come up with a decent excuse.
Why didn’t you tell me? She might ask and he already prepared an excuse which Bom would certainly be convinced by.
Whatever question she interrogated him with will all be met with lies.
However, Bom’s following question was way beyond what he had predicted.
“What’s…”
Bom asked very slowly, with an extremely prudent voice.
“…Your relationship with her?”
Yu Jitae turned silent for a bit.
There must be a lot of questions weighing in her mind including the ones he had thought of but her first question was nonetheless about their relationship.
This question was extremely important for Bom, so he had to give a definite answer.
“Nothing.”
Her hazy eyes regained its focus and her half-dead expression relaxed a little.
“When you say nothing, do you mean you are not close to her at all?”
“Yes.”
“Does that mean you are far from her outside of work?”
“Very far.”
“Then what’s your personal opinion aside from your position as a supervisor and a test subject?”
“I hate it.”
“Why?”
“Let’s see. There are a lot of reasons but first and foremost, it’s a black dragon.”
There was slightly more vitality in her eyes.
“What if, you are starving to death and that dragon gives you bread? Will you not eat it?”
“I’d rather die.”
“What if that dragon was actually your younger sister. Will you still hate her that much?”
“The name must stay removed from the family register then.”
“What if the ones that are very precious to you, like… umm, if Yeorum, Kaeul and Gyeoul all love that dragon and want to live together, will you still not bring her in?”
“Never.”
“What if I ask?”
“What?”
“Please. Let’s take her into our house and live together.”
“Why.”
“Actually, I wanted to become friends with a black dragon ever since I was young. I had a big injury when I was young and a black dragon acquaintance helped me…”
“No. Stop. It’s a ‘no’ whatever your reason may be.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean ‘why’. Because I don’t want to.”
“But didn’t you kidnap us even though we didn’t want to come…?”
“She’s not the same as you guys.”
Bom still had an indifferent look on her face but there was a slight difference. Unlike before, her eyebrows appeared a little more composed.
“Lastly, let’s say you’re a normal person ahjussi, and the world is coming to an end with you and that dragon being the only survivors. Will you still not get close to her?”
“Why would I ever get close to her.”
“You know, it’s dangerous and lonely to stay by yourself. You will need someone to talk to, and someone to keep the fire going. And, if there are no humans, then umm, have a relationship… for descendents…”
“Bom. Stop saying something so disgusting.”
He gave an irritated remark but Bom showed an expression that didn’t suit the current situation. She had a rather moved look on her face for some reason.
“Sorry…”
And she didn’t look sorry in the slightest. He didn’t know why, but she appeared to be feeling more comfortable now.
“Just then I saw that woman lose her temper and damage the surrounding people. So will you end the vacation here?”
That was a different topic altogether.
“I’ll have to talk to her after she wakes up, but I will try to guarantee the holiday as much as possible.”
“Why?”
Reward and punishment was a system and an unwavering system had the power to act as a cage around an existence.
Yu Jitae had promised for a four-day vacation with Myu. Only when she gets this reward properly will Myu have the power to endure the remaining experiments – no matter how painful they are, she will gain the strength by looking forward to the next holiday.
That was the cage Yu Jitae made and Myu will slowly adapt to it regardless of whether she was aware of that or not, like a prisoner feeling better from just the breeze and the sunlight coming through the tiny window of the prison.
“Do you understand?”
Bom nodded in response.
The faint tension in the air finally dissolved. It seemed that she had been misunderstanding him regarding something until just then. Since Bom was the most unstable factor in the 7th iteration, it felt like a small storm had just passed by.
He thought it was all over but that was when Myu turned in her sleep while murmuring, “Nnnn…”. In that instant, Bom flicked her head.
With her eyes out of focus, Bom blankly stared at Myu – for a long time with the eyes of a seemingly dead person.
Before long, the muscles around her left eye began to tremble a little.
“You said there were still three days left for the vacation.”
He had misunderstood something.
Nothing was over yet.
“Let me go with you.”