# 161
Jeongyeon’s face contorted at the afterimage that rose like an ambush. His throat filled with something hot. It was instantaneous—a faint sob escaping, his reddened eyes becoming completely wet. No matter how hard he clenched his fists with his head bowed, it wouldn’t stop.
The lawyer nervously watched the small back that crumpled and curled up at once, then very carefully turned his head away to pretend not to notice.
The house his father had bought in Chohosi was similar in size to their previous home, but the layout was completely different, making it unfamiliar. The empty space, without any furniture purchased yet, welcomed Jeongyeon, its first resident. Beep. After the door lock engaged, silence settled.
Now he was truly alone.
Leaving his belongings at the entrance, Jeongyeon trudged along and sat down on the spacious, empty living room floor. As he crouched quietly, the familiar longing rushed in like a wave. His heart ached as if it were shriveling, and below his throat felt hot. It was the emotion he had felt throughout his rehabilitation at the hospital after waking up.
Jeongyeon hugged his knees to his chest. Even curling up as much as possible didn’t ease the emptiness. Until the bright outside gradually darkened and only the faint red light of the Red Void entered through the window, he continued sitting there, and his heart showed no signs of lightening.
Though he had changed his name and severed his ties with his parents, naturally, the human being known as Jeongyeon remained unchanged. The sense of loss grew day by day, expanding the hole in Jeongyeon’s heart. It seemed like it would never be filled. The fact that he had to live like this for the rest of his life was horrifying.
He missed them.
Jeongyeon, who had been burying his face in his knees the whole time, suddenly lifted his head to look ahead.
‘Ah, please.’
Don’t do that. Iyeon spoke to Jeongyeon, but it didn’t reach him.
White sand gathered before him. The beautifully shining particles grew larger. A gentle breeze blew, making Jeongyeon’s bangs flutter slightly.
What was eventually created were the figures of two people.
“…”
Jeongyeon quietly reached out his hand. The fakes, which had somehow taken on delicate forms, smiled and bent at the waist. Jeongyeon stared blankly at the parents embracing him. It was a face he hadn’t seen in such a long time. A face he missed so dearly that he had wished to meet even in nightmares.
It was the same for Iyeon too.
The touch of a hand stroking his head felt as warm as if it were real.
If they were his real parents, there’s no way he could be treated like this. If they saw the murderer who killed them acting this way, they would be disgusted. Guilt stabbed his heart relentlessly, but he couldn’t bring himself to dispel his parents by his own hand. Despite knowing it was false, the warmth was so welcome that, even as his hands trembled, he fell into their embrace.
The moment soft forces firmly pulled him in, something inside his heart seemed to snap.
From then on, he simply didn’t think about anything.
The greatest misfortune was that Jeongyeon’s ability was too strong. If it had been moderate, his gi-ryeok would have been drained or disappeared frequently enough that he’d have to create them anew and come to his senses. But the fake parents Jeongyeon created wouldn’t disappear over ordinary matters.
After moving in, Jeongyeon hardly went outside. Literally, he could do everything inside the house. There was no need to go out. Since he could create anything, there was no need to bring people to his home either. The white sand easily created furniture, tableware, and necessities for a family of three.
It was truly a calamitous ability.
Jeongyeon didn’t even graduate from middle school, let alone pursue high school. The lawyer left by his parents visited several times to persuade him, but there was nothing to be done about Jeongyeon constantly shaking his head.
Jeongyeon’s time remained at fourteen, not advancing. The time when dad, mom, and Jeongyeon lived together.
That time when they were happy like a fairy tale.
“Mom, Dad. Good morning.”
Jeongyeon, who had just woken up with his hair sticking out like a magpie’s nest, bowed his head. Without fail, a warm hand rested on top of his head. When Jeongyeon hugged his mother, she took his hand and led him to the kitchen.
Three servings of meals were laid out in the kitchen. Rice bowls, side plates, spoons—all in sets of three. The white sand had become perfectly accustomed to creating everything in portions of three. As long as the materialization ability maintained until the food was fully digested, there was no issue with nutrient intake even if the food was created. Jeongyeon chatted happily throughout the meal. No matter what he said, his parents always listened attentively with the same smiling faces, nodding lightly.
How dazzling the fantasy created according to his taste was.
He knew all of this was false. He knew everything would disappear if he deactivated his ability. He was old enough to know that this, which amounted to nothing more than playing house, had no meaning.
Nevertheless, the blind fool forcibly crammed his growing body into an increasingly narrow world. He didn’t realize how suffocating the mismatched size was. He simply curled up as much as possible and ceaselessly caressed the fading happiness as if it were eternal.
It was a very slow and massive self-destruction.
The sensation of crumbling was very peaceful. That’s why he thought it was okay.
But the guilt he continuously ignored swelled larger and larger under the name of reality. It was only a matter of time before the balloon, inflated to its limit, would burst.
Watching TV with dessert after dinner was one of the family routines. It was rather perfunctory, as Jeongyeon, the main subject, had no interest in TV programs and would turn it off after watching for just a few minutes, but it was still a daily routine he followed faithfully. Old memories were being stubbornly prolonged in this way.
[Next news. A new hero has appeared in Chohosi.]
The timing of that news flowing out was perhaps a miracle-like coincidence. Jeongyeon, who had been munching on an apple handed to him by his father, unconsciously turned his gaze to the TV.
[Je Sano is a superhuman with the ability to transform, operate, and synchronize minerals, and he has come of age this year. Je Sano immediately received Mugunghwa Tier 5 in the superhuman grade assessment that can be taken from age twenty, and has instantly claimed first place in the unofficial ranking tallied on the online page. Considering that even those who receive Mugunghwa Tier 5 assessments typically climb the ranks gradually from the bottom of the same tier, this is an extremely unusual phenomenon…]
“…Je Sano?”
Jeongyeon muttered blankly. Je Sano. It was many years ago, but he couldn’t forget that name. The boy from the research center.
But Sano didn’t have superpowers. Is it someone with the same name? Or…
“Dad, did you hear? Je San, o…”
His voice, which had grown louder in surprise, quickly shrank. His parents knew nothing about Sano. He couldn’t talk about it because of Taejin’s gag order, and he hadn’t met him since then. Even if Jeongyeon excitedly talked about it alone, it was a story no one knew.
But his father nodded.
His face showed that he naturally knew about it.
“…”
Seeing this, Jeongyeon froze like a stone. A chilling sensation flew to the back of his head, as if someone had splashed cold water on his mind.
It was inevitable. The parents beside Jeongyeon now were avatars he had created. They looked exactly the same as when they were alive and smiled with the same faces, but they weren’t real. They were fakes recreated based on Jeongyeon’s memories.
It was a cruelly destructive realization.
‘You need to find Je Sano.’
Suddenly, such a thought flowed into his mind. Jeongyeon somehow caught this very faint and blurry afterimage of a thought. He naturally accepted as his own idea a cry from an unknown source.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t heard any news since they parted at the research center. His brain had been so full of news about his parents that he hadn’t thought about it at all. A dreamlike memory gently rose. Chatting while eating snacks together in the pristine white research center…
What were they talking about then?
‘You need to get out of here.’
A strong tone echoed inside his head. Jeongyeon unknowingly frowned and pressed his temple. Only then did he feel a subtle sense of discomfort. What is this? Who on earth, why such words… His confused mind swayed back and forth. Though it was clearly his body, it felt like a stranger was occupying it. Through the dizzy sensation, someone shouted strongly again. End the fantasy here. Look at reality.
This is not where I’m supposed to be.
“You get into trouble the moment I leave you alone.”
It was then that the familiar voice was heard.
As a strong force grabbed the nape of his neck, Iyeon’s body was swiftly pulled somewhere.
