Words were censored as if such words had never even existed in his mind.
He finally realised the situation he was in.
Something similar had occurred in the past.
In the 2nd iteration, the precious woman whom he had promised the future with was killed by a demon in his stead. Back then, he ended his life from shock and dejection by committing suicide.
And at the start of his next life, the word ‘Ha Saetbyul’ had turned into a long blank for Yu Jitae. He had completely forgotten the very existence of Ha Saetbyul.
In the 3rd iteration, on a certain day as he vomited on top of a monster’s dead body, crumbled on the spot with fingers cut off in his battle against a demon, he sat down on the field all by himself gazing up at the sky.
He asked himself. What am I doing here? The name floating up in my head, – who is that person?
The same thing was happening again.
Born a human,
Who started to go beyond the boundary of a human through the 3rd iteration.
Yu Jitae noticed that the state of a mental illness stemmed from daily life.
Going further beyond a superhuman and by becoming a true superhuman in the true sense of the word, and after covering his glass-like mental state with a barrier of metal, he became distant from all sorts of mental diseases.
That should have been the case but… He could not have guessed that it would remanifest inside his mind after retrieving the lost daily life.
He decided to conduct an experiment.
Yu Jitae called Gyeoul and made her sit in front of him.
“Gyeoul.”
“…Yes?”
“I hope you live a happy life.”
“…?”
Gyeoul nodded with a smile on her face.
His words were properly delivered without fail up to here, because those were his sincere thoughts.
“And I wish you and I would .”
“…!”
After that, he let out words that were completely against his actual thoughts. Both during and after the speech, he couldn’t clearly guess what it was that he was saying.
But Gyeoul was surprised in return and looked back at him with circular eyes. She then gave a bright smile as she approached him and wrapped her arms around his belly.
While repeatedly bumping her head into his belly, she replied.
“…Me too.”
As expected, it did convey the meaning.
He wasn’t talking gibberish and that was why Gyeoul was showing him gestures of affection.
It was an intentional lie and those would have been the best words for Gyeoul. He was intentionally trying to say such words and that meant that the meaning had gone across, but not knowing what he was actually saying might become a big problem later on.
Lowering his body, he met his eyes with the child and asked.
“What did I say just then?”
“…Nn?”
“Please repeat what I just said to you.”
“…Ah. …That you wish, you, and I would … , .”
The simple method did not work and each of the syllables she was saying sounded squashed. Even though it was through the mouth of someone else, his brain filtered the information the moment it realised it was his own words.
“Can you try writing it down.”
“…Sorry? Why?”
Gyeoul looked at him as if he was strange.
“I to …”
Trying to give a false excuse immediately made it impossible for him to check his own words. He stopped his mouth and pondered a little before saying a sentence that did not contain any falsehood.
“Please. I want to see it in your handwriting.”
This one worked just fine.
Gyeoul displayed the watch’s hologram in the air and started writing letters with her finger.
[You and I …]
The words were dim and hazy.
This much was within his expectations.
But his intention was in seeing the trajectory of her fingers which might allow him to understand what was being written. That was the objective of this experiment.
However, this too did not work. Even the pathing of her fingers was wavering. Her fingers should be moving in a certain pattern if she was writing letters but the flow was very unnatural as if everything was going in a different order. It appeared like a computer screen with low frames per second.
There was no way Gyeoul’s fingers would be moving like that so it must be the process of his brain deceiving him.
It was telling him to stay unaware.
“…Is dat okay?”
“…”
He didn’t reply and instead he simply caressed her head.
Gyeoul then used her watch to look up the prices of houses on the internet. Her startled face was the result of the search.
Why was she looking up houses?
He was put in a tough spot. No matter how hard he thought about it, he couldn’t tell the reason…
His head turned heavy. Like wetted cotton it weighed down.
All the relationships were forged on falsehood.
The moment those lies crumble would be the moment everything he had strenuously built up in the 7th iteration would come crashing down. That was why he faced away from it. He denied it and ignored the truth.
But the issue was that the sense of guilt he had been laboriously turning away from had come to the surface through Bom, Yeorum and Kaeul.
His world shook. His built-up history started to push him off the cliff.
His mind after feeling the crisis obstructed falsehood from him from the very foundation, like how it did with Ha Saetbyul of the distant past.
“Gyeoul.”
“…Yes?”
“Can you help me a little.”
After various other experiments, he had no choice but to admit it.
“Thanks for helping me.”
“…Is dat everything? …Is it enough?”
“.”
He could no longer control his lies.
*
Despite everything, he wasn’t in a bad mood.
In fact, it was making him feel quite comfortable.
The reason his mind was trying to deceive him like this was to settle his emotions. It was a struggle for survival from impending death.
If the reality is unchangeable, then deny it altogether – it was a decent self-defence mechanism.
‘Every issue is due to the sense of guilt which exists due to ‘lies’ so Yu Jitae that does not know of lies does not need to feel any sense of guilt.’
This ridiculous hoax of his unconsciousness was untangling the sense of guilt that had been binding him up. There was nothing more unproductive than being pained by one’s own hypocrisy so he left his unconsciousness to do what it wanted to do.
You will definitely become happy.
That was what the Vintage Clock had told him and that was the only thing he could trust in.
His mind was still chaotic but before long, guilt and whatever no longer became any important. An event that would shake Yu Jitae’s long life from its core happened after a few days.
It was at Myu’s underground isolation room.
***
It was on a certain summer day as the land had a gentle breeze with warm sunlight shining from above. The sky immediately after the rain contained a clear and beautiful rainbow.
Beautiful like the sign of a covenant from someone.
At the Association;
At a nearby park were children who had followed their parents playing among themselves in groups. Their pleasant chuckling voices echoed all across, as low grade agents exhausted from work watched the peaceful scenery with smiles.
One agent who suddenly felt emotional opened his mouth.
If a miracle would happen to someone one day, wouldn’t today be the day?
The agent was scolded by his superior who condemned him for having flowers in his head.
But in truth, the day was proving to be a miraculous day for someone.
At the underground isolation room of the Association, [Shapeless Sword] was rotating as a small electric chainsaw and cut through the tough ribs of the dragon. The ambient dragon heart shaped like a gem was placed within the complex array of organs in the same place as a human heart which it was mimicking.
Myu opened the eyes she had closed and faced the man. She could see a pale skin underneath his tidy hair as well as his focused and unblinking eyes.
Today’s experiment was unusual and different. His hands were delicate with deep consideration within.
In her eyes, he was quite strange these days. He was still as brusque as before on the outside but the experiments changed every time. Once he would hurriedly move his fingers as if he was in a bad mood and would sometimes move them joyously as if he was in a good mood.
And yet today it was different altogether.
Thinking that, Myu whispered.
“How bizarre, My Nemesis.”
“Why.”
“Have you found something? You have become very careful as if you are doing a surgery on your baby puppy.”
He moved his hands without replying back.
As expected, his hands were very cautious. He had always been as precise as a machine but the method was a lot different.
It was as if he was treating her as someone precious. It was such a big difference from before: so delicate and precious to a slightly shocking degree that it made her feel as if she was receiving affection. Would this be the hands of a devoted husband doing a surgery on his wife?
…Why am I thinking such things while my heart is being ripped apart? How disgusting.
Thinking that, Myu clicked her tongue.
“Tch… I am not in a very positive mood.”
“What now.”
“Since when were you so considerate of me? It is unpleasant that you are pretending to be delicate after all this time. And thinking of all the experiments you have done coarsely when you could have done it like this from the start irritates me even more.”
“…”
“Because of that, you are ruining my mood right now.”
“…”
“Anything to say to me?”
“…Yeah. My bad.”
Myu was slightly surprised and frowned, wondering what was seriously wrong with this lunatic.
“Is there something inside?”
“…”
“Have you found something from my heart?”
“…”
Yu Jitae remained silent.
“Say something. Am I not talking to you right now.”
It was the same even when Myu irritatedly grabbed a handful of his hair. His hair remained intact and he stayed still like a statue.
Is he ignoring me?
Or is he completely mental now?
But Myu soon realised that he was in an outrageous level of concentration right now. The procedure of the experiment was not much different from how it always was but the result seemed to have been different this time.
Therefore, Myu quietly released his hair.
What did this lunatic find inside the heart?
Even she was curious at this point.
.
.
.
But his concentration continued to a crazy extent. This experiment was unlike the usual experiments that ended at around 4 hours and 8 hours at max.
For almost 3 entire days, he continued staring at Myu’s heart with repetitive experiments. His eyes nor his expression changed in that span of time and from one point, even his breath came to a stop.
Myu was starting to feel frustrated.
What was so different this time that he was doing something like this?
“Hey, My Nemesis.
“How long are you going to continue doing this?
“It is time for me to feed my dog. How about you stop here?”
Her questions were met with silence.
“You should be fully aware that this will only prolong my vacation. Did you not shout at me from a mere 3-day vacation just because you did not like it?”
Silence yet again. It seemed that Yu Jitae could not even hear her voice. In fact, it even seemed at a glance that he did not even exist in this place.
Immersion.
A ridiculous level of immersion was controlling both his body and mind.
“I truly have gotten as unlucky as I could have been… This reminds me once again.”
Although the experiment was done kindly with the pain being less than a quarter compared to the usual ones, it was still the process of ripping through flesh, crushing bones and twisting the mana out of place. Her body resembling a human had its nerves sensitively rising up. The skin all across her body turned red as her body shivered. She was starting to feel cold due to the malfunctioning nerves.
Spending five days in that state was enough to gradually push even Myu to mental fatigue.
“I cannot withstand this anymore,
“I will have to go to sleep.”
One week after the start of the experiment, Myu could no longer withstand it and closed her eyes.
Closing her eyes she could see a sweet dream in front of her.
Because there will be a one-month vacation waiting for her to wake up.
.
.
.
But Myu was appalled when she woke up from her long slumber.
Yu Jitae was still continuing the experiment.
The dragon looked over its mental clock – it had been almost 2 weeks already. How was the experiment still taking place? At this point it was dumbfounding let alone frustrating.
“Hey.
“My Nemesis.
“Have you seriously gone insane?
“How long are you going to continue with this, hnn?
“Tell me, why is it that it is not coming to an end!
“Do you not hear me?”
Myu rolled a fist and struck Yu Jitae by his head.
Her fist was the one that hurt instead.
Seeing that Yu Jitae was still motionless, Myu could no longer endure it and lowered her hand to grab onto his hands. With her other hand, she covered her opened body in an attempt to interfere with the experiment.
Slowly, his eyes that were blankly immersed in the experiment regained its focus.
Yu Jitae looked at her hand with a hazy gaze, and looked at the wrist connecting on from that hand, before slowly carrying his gaze across the arm and the shoulder to at last reach her face.
Their eyes met. The movement of a non-human imitating a human – that inorganic movement of gaze gave her goosebumps.
“Get rid, of your hand.”
He replied with an inarticulate voice.
That short interaction damaged her pride. She had never felt such fear ever since she was born as a dragon.
However, upon closer inspection, she realised that his reaction was slightly strange. His gaze was shivering and so were the hands that were forced to stop the experiment after being grabbed by her own.
He was shuddering.
A shudder…
Similar to trepidation even.
Such was the nature of the shivering she could feel from his hands.
“Your hand.”
Something exceeding madness could be felt from his gaze and it made her think that there would be nothing odd even if she were to be killed right at this moment. Even though she still had an indifferent look on her face, this time she was truly frightened and had to remove her hands while glancing at his face.
Why in the world was he like this?
.
.
.
It was only after another day that Myu finally understood it.
“…”
After finishing the experiment and carefully healing the opened chest, he interlocked his fingers as if in a prayer with his eyes gazing down at her. Myu asked, ‘So what in the world is it? You damn lunatic,’ and Yu Jitae softly muttered with shivering lips.
‘I found it…’ was what he said.