[355 years have passed.]
[356 years have passed.]
[357 years have passed.]
[358 years have passed.]
[359 years have passed.]
[360 years have passed.]
The surroundings had turned into an ocean—an endless, vast sea. The only difference was that instead of blue, it was entirely dyed red.
To be precise, it was the colour of blood.
In other words, it was a sea made of thick blood. It was as if the planet Earth itself had been turned into a bathtub filled with blood.
Oh Haeyoung was floating in the middle of that sea of blood.
“…Right… That’s right…”
Yes.
The reason I joined Tree. To track down the entity that did this to my family.
The one who killed my family was my own older brother.
My mother was Japanese.
I was mixed-race.
So were my siblings.
I had developed spiritual abilities from a young age.
I am Korean.
I am an Administrator.
I am Oh Haeyoung.
I manage entities.
I joined Tree to kill my brother.
I like animals.
I like spicy food.
There was a time when I resented being mixed-race.
There were times when my friends made fun of me because of my bloodline.
The truth is, I am easily scared.
Even now, I am afraid of my life as an Administrator.
I never wanted to join Tree.
I wanted to live a normal life.
I have never been in a relationship.
I…
I…
I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I.
What…?
Why am I doing this here? Where is this place? Why am I…? What am I…? What? I? No.
No. That’s right. I am an Administrator. I am Oh Haeyoung.
My parents are both dead. My youngest sibling is dead too.
Maybe it’s because I haven’t eaten. I’m hungry. For lunch, rather than omurice, maybe doing deadlifts would be better. Since working out makes my mood plummet anyway. I get lonely easily.
That’s why I hate killing people. Have you ever seen a dead body? Do you know how painful it is when the flesh is first torn? Seeing it in your mind and seeing it in reality—dying from inhaling coal gas—it’s not the same thing.
[370 years have passed.]
At seafood restaurants, they use sashimi knives to fillet fish. When you hear the slicing sound—scrape, scrape—humans feel a primal fear through their sense of hearing. They’re sensitive like that. That’s why sounds are scary. But pain—it’s unbearably painful, too.
How long has it been since I arrived at the Voice of the Heart? But this place… the entity… What was its name again? I suddenly can’t remember. Is it because I can’t breathe? Maybe it’s because my chest feels tight? What is it, what’s the problem? I have a chronic illness. I don’t know.
[380 years have passed.]
No.
Where is this place again? You don’t even know that? Idiot! Please, stop that sound! Why! Why! Why! I don’t want to fight anymore. Why do you keep fighting?
I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. Mom, Dad, please don’t fight. Okay? It’s all my fault.
Do you know how much suffering I’ve been through because of you! Do you know why I’ve been suffering like this in a foreign land! It’s all because of you! It’s all because of you! If you hadn’t met that Japanese man, I wouldn’t have had to come to this wretched country… I would have lived a much happier life!
[390 years have passed.]
You btch! Did I hold a knife to your throat and threaten you? You followed me eagerly when things were going well, but now that the business has failed, you think your husband is just a worthless piece of trash? Huh? Btch. Let’s settle this today, then. Animals like you only listen when they’re beaten, don’t they? Something’s been fishy about you lately. You wh*re. Who’s the guy? Youngchul? Chulho? Pilsu? Who is it?!
[400 years have passed.]
Shut up. I can’t focus.
Okay, let’s start again. Now, where were we?
Ah, here.
My name is Oh Haeyoung.
I am an Administrator.
I…
Why am I here?
Ah, right.
My brother.
My brother killed our family. He took a kitchen knife and killed our parents. He killed my younger sibling. He even killed our pet dog. And I… for revenge…
Where? Where did I go? What am I doing right now? What was I thinking? Why am I even questioning this?
I haven’t been able to breathe properly for a while now.
Huh?
How long have I been thinking like this?
Why couldn’t I remember anything all this time?
I? I I? I am I I am I am? I I am I I am I I I am I I am I am I am I am I am I I I I I am I? I am I? What? What is this? What? What what what? What? What what? What?
…Splash!
Oh Haeyoung’s body slowly sank into the blood-red depths.
She did not struggle, nor did she move her hands.
Like someone who had given up on everything.
Like someone who had accepted death.
She simply let herself be enveloped by the crimson liquid. She did not even question why she was doing this.
Downward.
Just downward.
Sinking deep.
The inside of the bloodstained sea was empty.
“……”
How far down would she go?
Oh Haeyoung’s empty eyes stared into the bottomless abyss.
From the darkness, a writhing mass of flesh began to crawl upward, merging into a human-like form.
It was Oh Haesung, her youngest sibling.
The face was eerily similar to Oh Haesung’s, but with a gentle smile. A gaping hole was torn open in the right side of the torso, pink intestines spilling out in long strands.
“Sis… my body hurts so much. My side… my side… it hurts too much.”
Despite the entity’s call, Oh Haeyoung did not react. She merely watched.
It slithered toward her and wrapped itself around her body. Then, it opened its mouth wide. Inside, rows of saw-like teeth were tightly packed.
Crunch! Chomp!
It began devouring Oh Haeyoung’s flesh.
Even then, she did not react.
Another voice echoed from the side. This time, it took the form of her mother—but with two heads.
“I should never have given birth to you. I should never have come to this country. I should never have married that man. I should never have started any of this.
I loathe you.
I curse you.
I resent you.
I hate you.”
The mother-shaped entity also approached and began tearing into Oh Haeyoung’s flesh.
With two heads, it was even faster than the sibling.
[410 years have passed.]
The two tore into Oh Haeyoung’s entire body like piranhas driven mad by hunger. Her body was ripped apart, regenerated, ripped apart again, and regenerated once more in an endless cycle.
“It hurts.”
“I curse you.”
Their voices echoed from the torn remnants of her ears.
[Girl… Pull yourself together.]
The voice of the pendant’s owner, Ragnar Lodbrok, resonated through the air. For over a hundred years, he had been calling out to Oh Haeyoung, but she had closed herself off, trapped within the illusion she had created.
[Has she already broken…]
Even now, Oh Haeyoung’s consciousness was plummeting deeper into the abyss. Everything around her was a manifestation of her trauma, meaning that the only way to escape was for her to awaken on her own.
But her mind had long since collapsed. Thanks to Lee Taeseong’s help, she had barely managed to hold on, yet the relentless tide of darkness was too much to endure.
She wanted to forget but couldn’t.
She wanted to hide it, but it couldn’t be concealed.
It was memory.
Each time she recalled it, she felt like she was suffocating. But without recalling it, she lost all sense of direction.
Where there is the sun, there is the moon. Where there is light, there is darkness. Though she had always shown a bright demeanor, her shadow was far deeper than anyone realized.
And in the end, even Oh Haeyoung was consumed by her own pain, devoured by the abyss.
The deep ocean of darkness grinned wide.
Come.
Now, her endless fall into the eternal bottomless pit was, in the end, her own will.
She wanted this.
She wanted to be freed from this painful life.
She wanted to cast herself into the sea of oblivion and break free from the shackles of revenge that bound her.
She wanted to no longer witness the deaths of those she loved.
She desperately wished for it.
Oh Haeyoung had never had a choice in becoming a manager of the Tree.
The day her family was slaughtered, she decided to dedicate her life solely to revenge. Her very reason for existence had become the eradication of the “entity” that had murdered her family and dragged her into hell.
Was it truly her brother’s will?
Or had some “entity” made him do it?
If so, was her brother still alive?
There were too many truths about that day that she had yet to uncover.
But she was too weak to uncover them.
So, she fought with everything she had.
That was the summary of her life.
She had no regrets.
But she was still human. She couldn’t help but grow weary.
It was painful to witness the deaths of so many comrades. It was terrifying to see a colleague she had shared lunch with discovered as a cold corpse by evening.
The senior managers always emphasized that one had to grow accustomed to death to survive at the Tree, but she had never been able to accept it.
…She simply hated it.
…She no longer understood anything.
Why did she have to go through all this?
Why did she have to seek revenge?
Why did she have to stay alive?
Everything.
So.
“I’m done.”
With those words, Oh Haeyoung sank forever.
.
.
.
[421 years have passed.]
[422 years have passed.]
[423 years have passed.]
[424 years have passed.]
[425 years have passed.]
[430 years have passed.]
[435 years have passed.]
[440 years have passed.]
[450 years have passed.]
[460 years have pa—]
[Warning! Warning! An anomaly has been detected in this space.]
[Attempting to restore the space for normal operation…]
[Restoration deemed impossible. Proceeding with standard protocol.]
Crack!
A shattering sound, reminiscent of a bomb explosion, echoed as fractures formed in space itself.
Then, through the crack, a man stepped forward, wielding an black sword in one hand and a bloodstained sword in the other.
Step. Step.
Dressed in a black suit, the man muttered with an exhausted expression.
“…Finally found you.”
It had been 160 years since their last meeting.
“Oh Haeyoung.”
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