The Way of Life for a Terminal S-Class Hunter - C99
If he wasn’t a patient, I would have grabbed his collar and slapped him, but no matter how much I hated him, I didn’t have the heart to hit someone wearing a hospital gown. Instead, unable to control this emotional turmoil, I smashed the glass window. Frustratingly, my tough body didn’t even get scratched.
“Woo-hyun.”
Seo-heon hurriedly pulled out his IV needle and approached me. Blood dripped from Seo-heon’s arm where the specially made needle had torn his flesh. I ignored even that and infused magic into a glass shard. The shard glowed sharply, taking on a sword-like form.
“If you come any closer, I’ll really stab. Whether I stab you or myself. Let’s die together like you said.”
With everything I’d been holding back exploding at once, I couldn’t control myself. Though I was aware I was doing something crazy, I couldn’t resolve to stop. I even thought it wouldn’t be so bad if it ended like this.
At that moment, Seo-heon, who had looked somewhat surprised, stopped in his tracks as if realizing something. I moved my hand to hold the glass shard to my neck. Instead of trying to stop me, he suddenly knelt down.
My hand trembled at this action I never thought I’d see in my lifetime. Wondering what on earth he was trying to do, I watched as he bowed and suddenly kissed my ankle. The emotions that had been bursting out froze for a moment. I barely managed to pull my foot back as his lips tried to move lower.
Just as I was about to tell him not to try to smooth things over like this, Seo-heon spoke first.
“I acted on my own out of fear.”
I was dumbfounded. I never imagined I’d hear the words “I was scared” from the mouth of someone who seemed to fear nothing in this world. Perhaps surprised by those words, or because he was being honest for the first time, the strength gradually left my hand.
“I was afraid you’d leave me if you knew the truth, and when I heard you were facing death, I was afraid you’d disappear from this world. So I became obsessed with the idea that I had to save you at all costs.”
He gave a bitter smile.
“I’d never been afraid of anything before, so at first I didn’t even know it was fear. Honestly, even now I’m just guessing it’s close to that emotion.”
Silence fell.
“What’s certain is that this time, I felt there was no need to live in a world without you. I had no intention of self-harming to control your actions.”
“So what are you trying to say?”
My voice came out hoarse, my throat choked up.
“Live with me.”
A gentle request came from Seo-heon’s lips.
“I don’t care if my life is halved or whatever. I’ll die without you anyway.”
For the first time, he was asking me for something.
“I’m begging you for life. If you die, I’ll follow anyway, so think of it as saving me.”
I just looked down at Seo-heon, unable to answer. There was no trace of his characteristic calm smile when deceiving others. He was just calmly confessing the truth, his weakness.
“I won’t try to control your life. Instead, you control mine. If you just live, I can endure even if you think of using and discarding me.”
He handed me the choice. It was a declaration of defeat from someone who had only played games he could win. As unreal as it felt, doubt’s hand choked my throat, wondering if I could really trust him. I couldn’t even refuse, suffocated.
When I was at a loss for words, he spoke up as if he had been waiting.
“Do as you wish, Woo-hyun. If you want, you can think of me as a parasite.”
He even brought up words I had once said. As if such things were no problem for him at all. Seo-heon just stared at my mouth. His appearance, having let go of everything, was unwavering. Kang Seo-heon had completely let go of himself, yet hadn’t lost his essence.
“You’re too extreme.”
Is that something I should say, after just shouting about dying or living?
My voice leaked out like air from a balloon. It might not suit the situation, but I felt deflated. The strong heat-like things that had tightly filled me flowed away like draining water.
Was it because I heard what I wanted to hear from him, or because I had exploded once? I didn’t feel like bursting into anger again. It wasn’t a feeling of futility.
“It’s only like that with things related to you.”
Seo-heon reached out his hand to me, though he could stand up on his own. I just stared at Seo-heon’s hand reaching up from below.
“I’m not taking that hand.”
Belying my own words, the glass shard in my hand rolled onto the floor.
“We can’t go back to how things were all at once. I can’t fully understand your way of thinking either.”
Seo-heon said that and watched me without urging as I just moved my lips. His attitude was as docile as a prisoner awaiting execution, having accepted death.
“But at least I won’t try to die. That’s as far as I can promise right now.”
Life gradually returned to his hazy eyes.
“You hold my lifeline, and I hold yours. Let’s stop hiding our cards and have an equal relationship.”
I was sick of things being tilted to one side.
“No more lies.”
“Okay.”
A handful of soil was sprinkled into the deep, deep chasm between him and me. Though it was a very small amount, it was a signal that we, who had only been running parallel lines, could eventually meet if we kept moving forward.
“Okay. Let’s do that, Woo-hyun.”
Through the broken window, the long, long darkness ended and the sun rose. Though it was still dark outside, it would only get brighter from now on.
“Don’t just stay like that, get up.”
Seo-heon seemed ready to stay on the floor if I didn’t take his hand. Only when I spoke reluctantly did he finally get up and press the nurse call button.
“Why are you calling?”
Seo-heon silently looked around the room. I looked around with him and closed my mouth. The IV had been pulled out of Seo-heon’s arm, the room’s window was broken, and blood that had flowed from my neck, scratched by glass shards, was dripping on the floor. Now that my head had cooled, I realized what a nuisance we’d been.
“What’s the matter?”
The nurse who came in response to the call looked around the room, was shocked, then shook her head.
“This is why hunters…”
It was a small whisper, but Seo-heon and I heard it clearly. It seemed that when hunters were hospitalized, this kind of mess happened occasionally.
“I’m sorry. We’ll compensate for the window when we’re discharged.”
I kept apologizing to the nurse with my head bowed, but she waved her hand, signaling me to stop immediately.
“How can you move when your neck is bleeding!”
“If there’s a resident healer in the hospital, please ask for treatment. His hand is injured too.”
When Seo-heon requested in a very gentle voice, the nurse stomped over and examined my neck and hand.
“Stay still.”
She must have been a healer herself, as yellow light came from the nurse’s hands. It didn’t seem to be a high rank, but since the wounds weren’t deep, they started healing quickly. I was about to say it was nothing serious, but it seemed impossible to convince this nurse who was frowning deeply and not hiding her anger.
“It’s all done. I’ll bill the treatment fee along with the window cost, so don’t think about doing anything reckless anymore. You too!”
After reinserting the needle into Seo-heon’s hand, the nurse clicked her tongue disapprovingly and left. Thanks to the nurse, my sense of reality gradually returned. I sat in the chair, taking a long breath.
“How did you know I was in the Himalayas?”
Now I had the energy to ask questions one by one. Seo-heon hesitated for a moment, as if it wasn’t a topic he particularly wanted to discuss.
“Shin Ihan told me.”
After a short wait, an unexpected answer came back.
Ihan?
“When I told him that only I could save you, he thought for a long time and then told me.”
But Ihan hadn’t heard where I was going. It was a place I had decided on spontaneously after moving with Antonio. Seeing that I still looked like I needed more explanation, Seo-heon added:
“That watch Shin Ihan gave you, he said it could track your location. He wouldn’t just send you off alone without thinking.”
It seemed Ihan had judged that sending Seo-heon was better than letting me find a way to live on my own. Thinking of Ihan made me feel incredibly complicated.
“You didn’t hurt Ihan, did you?”
Seo-heon twisted his lips. He seemed very displeased at the mention of Ihan, but because of what he had said to me, he continued to answer honestly.
“When I saw him with you, I thought about killing him. But…”
I calmly waited for his next words.
“I couldn’t move a finger because of what you said. Even when I tried to attack, your voice echoed in my head saying not to even touch your corpse, and my body wouldn’t move.”
If Seo-heon had just insisted it wasn’t true, I would have doubted him. But because he honestly mixed in his emotions as he spoke, I couldn’t help but trust him.
“I see. If Ihan wasn’t safe…”
I swallowed the words I was about to say – that I would have acted as if our conversation just now had never happened. Even without saying it, Seo-heon probably understood.
“When day breaks, let’s discharge and go back. There’s a lot we need to do.”
There were people I needed to meet when we returned to Korea. Now that I had decided to live, it was time to find out how to live.
“I’ll share my life force with you.”
This time, I quietly nodded. What he had previously called treatment now became a kind of ritual to live together.