Chapter 184
Chapter 184: Trauma (5)
When the Sylph forcefully pushed Yoo Ji-han’s consciousness into Kim Si-hu’s dream.
“Why do I keep getting kicked out?”
More than 30 hours had passed since entering the dream, but Yoo Ji-han couldn’t even set foot properly in the School.
It was because the hero academy created by Kim Si-hu’s subconscious kept bouncing him back outside.
— I have to act like a student as much as possible!
“Ugh….”
The Sylph, remaining in reality, continually offered advice to Yoo Ji-han.
Thank goodness he knew that the flow of time in dreams was vastly different from reality.
If he hadn’t, he would have felt an insane urgency.
In the midst of this, seeing the Sylph casually chatting with him as if ignoring the flow of time, Yoo Ji-han was astonished.
— Until I meet the owner of this dream, Si-hu, I have to play the role of a character.
“So you want me to be a character… a student, huh?”
Since he couldn’t enter the school using every method while listening to the Sylph’s advice,
Yoo Ji-han eventually waited at the school gate until a late student arrived and then kidnapped them to steal their uniform.
“Got it!”
Interestingly, after putting on the uniform, there was no problem entering the school.
However, as he ran to find Kim Si-hu afterward, he got bounced back outside again.
— You should be attending class during class time!
‘Wandering the hallway instead of attending class’ wasn’t suitable for a character in a dream.
To enter the school, he had to meet the proper conditions as a student.
With his clothes reverting to their original state, Yoo Ji-han had no choice but to loiter at the school gate, waiting for new students.
In Kim Si-hu’s dream, where class time perpetually repeated, there was no scene of finishing class and going home.
He had to wait patiently for a long time to acquire a uniform.
Going through the entry and exit 31 times, Yoo Ji-han, who had devised his 32nd method for playing a dream character, finally made contact with Kim Si-hu.
“Wow, this is no joke.”
“Thank goodness it ended up like this. I almost got trapped here too.”
Kim Si-hu, after hearing everything, clicked his tongue.
It took a long time to find Kim Si-hu’s classroom, which happened to be in the corner of the top floor.
“So how do we get out?”
“Get back at those guys.”
Yoo Ji-han pointed to the students who were still badmouthing Kim Si-hu.
“Back in the day, you just put up with it, right?”
“… Well, it wasn’t this bad.”
A dark memory remained in Kim Si-hu’s mind.
An event he thought he had overcome and had forgotten for a while turned out to be trauma.
What he saw now seemed far more exaggerated than his memories.
He felt the recurrence of past trauma in this dream.
“Don’t hold back, fight back.”
“Got it.”
“Really hard.”
Hearing Yoo Ji-han’s advice, Kim Si-hu approached a female student with a determined expression.
“Don’t go around saying you’re an elf. You’re really ugly!”
The student belittled Kim Si-hu’s appearance and height while emphasizing the elf.
In response, Kim Si-hu pointed at her face and said,
“Go look in the mirror at the bathroom.”
“What?”
“Who are you to criticize someone else’s face? Know your place.”
“T-this is…!”
Slicing—
At Kim Si-hu’s attack, the girl flared up but soon her body disappeared from the classroom.
‘Oh, so this is how it works!’
Having grasped the concept to some extent, Kim Si-hu initiated his counterattack.
“All those of different species should just be wiped out.”
“How about you die instead?”
“Elves give off a really foul smell from their pointy ears.”
“Not as bad as your poop smell.”
“She looks like someone who wasn’t raised properly.”
“Did your mom teach you that?”
….
….
With each strong rebuttal, the classmate students disappeared one after another.
Yoo Ji-han watched this scene with great satisfaction.
And finally, when even the boy whose body and head had separated vanished,
“Ha!”
Kim Si-hu made a relieved expression.
Just as Yoo Ji-han was about to clap his hands beside him.
Both of them awakened in reality at the same time.
“Success.”
“Whoa! The guy next to me just now was you, right?”
“That’s right.”
Sitting up from where he was lying, Yoo Ji-han spoke to Kim Si-hu.
“I’ll wake up the others, so you and the Sylph protect us.”
“Yep!”
The second person to enter the dream after Kim Si-hu was Lee Dong-gil, a healer who was also his classmate at the Hero Academy.
Fortunately, he didn’t seem to have many twists in life.
He was dreaming of a time in his childhood before realizing his magic, getting caught up in a brawl.
It was somewhat lacking to call it a nightmare.
Thud! Thud!
“Quack!”
“Ugh!”
The brawl in Lee Dong-gil’s camp ended when Yoo Ji-han threw stones from a distance.
In an instant, Yoo Ji-han brought Lee Dong-gil to reality and immediately jumped into Chilla’s dream.
“Chirp! Chirp!”
“I’m sorry.”
“Chirp—!”
The dream Chilla was having was relatively simple.
It was a nightmare about being given away by its previous owner.
Too much shedding, unable to control its bowel movements.
For various reasons, a memory of being given away by its former owner during its young days.
Chilla kept experiencing that over and over.
“Chirp….”
Late in the evening, in front of the entrance of a large animal hospital.
A message taped to the top of the cage stated it wanted a good owner to take it.
After causing mayhem for a while, Chilla was left weakened, laying helplessly on the floor.
“Your owner isn’t that person.”
“Chirp?!”
At that moment, Yoo Ji-han appeared in front of the animal hospital and freed Chilla trapped in the sturdy cage.
Though words didn’t get through, there was an understanding atmosphere.
Then, Yoo Ji-han made sure that Chilla could see its former owner as they got into a car.
“Chirp….”
While demanding to be freed when stuck in the cage, once released, Chilla was surprisingly calm.
It didn’t try to chase after its former owner or get angry.
“Chirp!”
Ignoring its departing former owner, Chilla gazed quietly at Yoo Ji-han.
Yoo Ji-han seemed to understand its heart.
‘It must know that it has a real owner.’
After bringing Chilla back to reality,
Only Min Yu-ri remained.
*
Tat-a-tat-tat—!
Min Yu-ri sprinted down the narrow pathway with all her might.
She was running much faster than the vehicles going in the same direction on the road.
If she collided with pedestrians coming from the opposite direction, it could lead to a serious accident.
“Huff, huff…!”
The expression on her face, gasping for breath, was more serious than ever.
Soon, she arrived at a familiar hospital.
Wiping the sweat trickling down her forehead with her hand, she shouted at the reception desk.
“Min So-yeon! Where is my sister So-yeon right now?!”
After being guided through the emergency patients, she frantically searched for her sister in a place where hospital beds were lined up.
“……!”
Finally, she found her sister lying unconscious on a White Bed.
She heard a monster had appeared, but aside from some scratches, she wasn’t seriously injured.
The nurse said to Min Yu-ri, claiming to be a guardian.
“She just fainted from the shock; she’ll wake up soon.”
It was a statement meant to reassure the guardian.
However, Min Yu-ri knew it was merely a wishful thinking.
In reality, Min So-yeon wouldn’t wake up even after hours or days had passed.
And when Min Yu-ri accidentally touched Min So-yeon’s body,
That part turned black like rotting flesh.
“Oh no!”
She already knew that touching her would cause discoloration.
That was because she had the memory of having made a mistake before.
So, despite being conscious of avoiding contact,
Min Yu-ri couldn’t alter the future of touching her sister’s body.
Even when she tried to distance herself from the hospital.
The moment she regained her senses, she found herself back in the situation of touching Min So-yeon’s body.
“Urgh…!”
Her sister, who had turned black after contact, slept peacefully, unaware.
After the precise examination, the diagnosis of Magic Discoloration Syndrome was declared.
From the doctor’s mouth flowed only a cold response.
“Currently, there is no specific treatment.”
The phrase that there was no method.
Min Yu-ri muttered internally, ignoring the unchanged answer that mirrored her memories.
‘If only I hadn’t asked her to run an errand back then…’
If she hadn’t said to buy a drink with the allowance, her sister So-yeon, who was comfortably resting at home, wouldn’t be lying here in the hospital.
Min Yu-ri even despised herself for making her sister run an errand.
‘… Calm down. This is something I’ve already gone through.’
She knew.
These memories were all from the past.
She also knew that in reality, it had already been over four years since Min So-yeon had fainted.
Thus, to regain her composure, she closed her eyes to escape this situation.
But when she opened her eyes again…
She had traveled back to the moment just after she asked her sister to run an errand.
To that moment she always regretted.
Even trying to force her eyes shut again,
She couldn’t take her gaze off the message log with her sister on her mobile phone.
‘I have to stop it.’
That moment always lingered with regret.
Even knowing everything was an illusion, she wanted to change this moment.
However, even when she called her sister on her mobile phone, she didn’t answer.
Knowing the location where her sister was found, she ran straight there.
“Ah….”
But there, an ambulance carrying her sister was already making a loud departure.
The moment Min Yu-ri sat down in that spot,
Her body was moved back to the hospital where her sister was admitted.
Thus, the horrifying experience of her sister suddenly collapsing continued to repeat for the 40th, 50th times without rest.
Even after several repetitions confronting her sleeping sister, she never grew numb or accustomed to it.
It only approached her with new pain each time.
‘How much time has passed…?’
In repeating only the most unpleasant moments of her life.
She couldn’t even guess how much time had passed in this illusory world.
Tears flowed continuously from her eyes without drying.
She even worried that all the moisture in her body was being drained.
“Ah.”
And again, face to face with her collapsed sister in the same hospital, Min Yu-ri tore her hair with her hands in front of her sister’s bed.
“Ah, ah, ah…!”
She slapped her cheeks with an overwhelming sense of frustration.
Slap! Slap! Slap! Slap!
One time, two times, three times, four times…
With each slap to her cheek, her hair swayed chaotically.
The people inside the hospital merely glanced at her self-harming actions, pointing fingers instead of stopping her.
Everyone was blaming her for not being able to protect her sister.
“It’s my fault… It’s all my fault….”
The repetition of self-deprecation.
Even after her cheeks turned red, she didn’t stop slapping her cheeks.
And how much time had passed again?
By the time she felt a tingling sensation in her palm that slapped her cheek,
Bam!
Someone forcefully grabbed her hand, trying to slap her cheek again.
Min Yu-ri looked at that person with blurry eyes.
“What are you doing?”
It was Yoo Ji-han with an angry face.
