# Chapter 95
It was rare to see his parents’ faces so stern. Jeongyeon, becoming frightened, stammered as he explained. Facing his parents who seemed to be angry, his mind went blank, and he couldn’t even remember his uncle’s instruction not to mention the research.
The details of his recent days tumbled out incoherently. How his uncle took him to the collection room every few days and connected machines to his arms, how he felt a little weak after the collections increased at his uncle’s request, how he had been sleeping more as a result…
Both his father and mother listened to Jeongyeon’s words silently. But Jeongyeon quickly noticed that his parents’ expressions had visibly darkened. Did I do something wrong? What more should I have done? Do they dislike me now? Not understanding the situation, he whimpered in a shrinking voice.
“I’m sorry…”
“No, no. You didn’t do anything wrong, Jeongyeon. I just didn’t know anything…”
His mother, speaking like that, wore an expression of considerable shock. Her hands, which had been rubbing her cheeks and neck for a while, soon embraced Jeongyeon tightly. It seemed Jeongyeon hadn’t done anything wrong after all. What a relief… Jeongyeon buried his face in his mother’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry. I had no… no idea at all.”
His father stroked his back from beside them. We didn’t hear the details from your uncle. So we were a bit surprised. You didn’t do anything wrong. Kind words poured out gently. Jeongyeon nodded with his face still buried. Though he hadn’t fully grasped what was happening, he felt somewhat relieved to hear that he wasn’t at fault.
After his parents comforted him, turned off the lights, and left the room, silence fell.
After thinking for a long time in the dark room with the blanket pulled up to his neck, Jeongyeon slowly rose. No matter how he thought about it, he was concerned about Sano. He couldn’t just wait idly until it was time to leave.
Moving stealthily through the research center corridors had become familiar to Jeongyeon by now. He looked around cautiously as he carefully walked. After turning several corners, his uncle’s office came into view.
Bright light from the office leaked through the crack in the door.
“You said it was just demonstrating superpowers a few times!”
Through the small gap in the thick door, a booming voice flowed out, greatly diminished.
“You dare to exploit my son’s gi-ryeok?”
“My son?”
At first, Jeongyeon thought there was another person he didn’t know. But soon, he realized it was his uncle’s voice.
“He’s just an adopted child, isn’t he?”
It was a kind of voice Jeongyeon had never heard before.
“Isn’t it just like playing with a doll?”
“Watch your mouth!”
“Haha, brother. Are you serious?”
The sharp tone, which seemed like both laughter and mockery, was so unfamiliar that Jeongyeon couldn’t breathe. His uncle’s words pierced deep into his heart.
“He’s a massive lump of gi-ryeok. He’ll probably receive Mugunghwa Tier 5 immediately when he turns twenty.”
The uncle who said Jeongyeon had been a great help. The uncle who played with him happily and stroked his head. The kind and friendly uncle.
“When such a thing has rolled in, isn’t it natural to make good use of it? It’s not like I’m trying to kill him. I’ve been taking it slow out of consideration for you.”
“Lee Taejin!”
A roar resonated through the door. Jeongyeon stepped back from the door. He didn’t want to hear any more. The boy, who had been fingering his cold fingertips, soon staggered away from the corridor where the office was located.
It was a summer night, but strangely, the air felt cool. Jeongyeon walked with his body hunched.
His uncle hadn’t really liked him. Jeongyeon knew what gi-ryeok was too. The superpower inside him. Though he didn’t know much, Jeongyeon had a lot of it, and his uncle had wanted that.
He hadn’t invited Jeongyeon to the research center because he enjoyed spending time with him.
The boy mulled over the conversation he had just heard several times. At first, his heart chilled every time he thought about it, but gradually it numbed. Adopted child. Playing with a doll.
After fully accepting his uncle’s words, his mind seemed to clear a bit. Jeongyeon quietly blinked. Uncle doesn’t like me. He just used me.
“But I liked him…”
The small voice dissipated quickly.
Walking aimlessly, Jeongyeon stopped when he discovered a familiar door. The collection room. It was his first time since the day before his parents arrived.
The collection room door required a researcher’s fingerprint recognition, so his uncle always approached first to open it.
“…”
White sand gathered beside Jeongyeon. Soon, a person much taller than Jeongyeon and wearing a white gown was created. A man resembling his uncle pressed his hand on the pad, and the door opened. As soon as the door opened, the man turned back into sand and disappeared.
Tap. The sound of small footsteps echoed inside the collection room. The dark interior brightened immediately when he pressed the switch beside the door.
If there was a room Jeongyeon had frequented most in the research center, it was undoubtedly this collection room. The scene, not much changed, only seemed a bit empty without people. Jeongyeon, who was staring blankly at the bed and machines in the center of the room, leaned against the wall without approaching.
So that was the process of exploiting gi-ryeok.
A puzzle he hadn’t intended to solve was completed. To be honest, Jeongyeon didn’t know why extracting gi-ryeok was wrong. The term ‘exploitation’ made it sound a bit bad, but as his uncle said, it wasn’t like he was dying… The more he thought about it, a feeling gradually emerged that, if it was his own and not someone else’s, what was the harm in giving some gi-ryeok.
I’m fine with it. If I had said I was okay with it, would the situation have improved? Making such meaningless hypotheticals didn’t improve his mood. Jeongyeon glumly slid down the wall.
In the process, his limp hand accidentally pressed somewhere on the wall.
Thud.
“…Huh?”
The wall he was leaning against shifted. Jeongyeon turned around with surprised eyes.
Where there had been a wall just moments ago, a large door had appeared.
“What’s this?”
Jeongyeon, unwittingly muttering to himself, ran his hand over the newly appeared door. How do I get in? After peering around, he soon discovered a pad identical to the one in front of the collection room door. After summoning the materialized uncle again, the door opened quickly.
The secret space resembled his uncle’s office. A large desk and blackboard, files neatly arranged on bookshelves, computers, cabinets, and drawers.
The writing on the blackboard was filled with complex equations that Jeongyeon couldn’t understand. As he approached the desk, a thick report bound together lay conspicuously. Jeongyeon stuck his head out and peeked at the document. At the very top of the document, it read:
“Butterfly Project”
The simple English words were easy to interpret. Jeongyeon immediately knew this was a project related to Sano.
Like the writing on the blackboard, there weren’t many parts of the document that Jeongyeon could read. The string of boring and difficult words quickly bored him. He needed to understand something first before reading further.
Amid words with unknown meanings, there was one sentence that miraculously caught his eye.
“…Among them, in the case of Subject No. 3, gradual gi-ryeok release…”
Subject No. 3. It was Sano. Jeongyeon’s eyes sharpened again. Focusing on that section, he could find more about Sano. Just because one familiar name appeared didn’t mean the incomprehensible content suddenly became clear, but it helped him read persistently.
Jeongyeon carefully remembered the sentences he could understand. Very small and slowly, information accumulated one by one. No. 3’s treatment process, observations, results. Rough content connected loosely.
Unsurprisingly, the children’s speculation was correct. The research center was experimenting to develop the non-superhuman Sano into a superhuman. They periodically injected a superhuman’s gi-ryeok into Sano to observe the repulsion effect of internal gi-ryeok. There were various other supplements explaining the experimental process, but they were too difficult for Jeongyeon to understand.
“No progress regarding superhuman manifestation.”
“Increasingly strong complaints of severe headaches, muscle pain, and pain from non-existent symptoms.”
Whenever such phrases caught his eye, Jeongyeon frowned. If it hurts, they should stop. What’s the big deal about superpowers? His fist clenched instinctively in a strange sense of rebellion.
After that, the journal detailed exactly how much pain Sano had endured. Jeongyeon’s face became increasingly distorted. His gaze, scanning the papers, stopped somewhere.
“Enhancement of Subject No. 3’s experiment intensity with large-scale gi-ryeok acquisition.”
…Large-scale acquisition?
“Side effects incomparable to those experienced so far. Full-body restraint after violent self-harm attempt before proceeding.”
Jeongyeon’s pupils trembled.
‘I think it would be okay if Jeongyeon helped a little more. But then Jeongyeon might be a little tired.’
It was probably no coincidence that a past conversation crossed his mind.
Thump. Thump. His heart began to beat harder and harder. His gaze couldn’t detach from the black letters as if they were nailed in place.
“Violent self-harm attempt”
He was the one who had hurt Sano the most.
Because Jeongyeon unknowingly gave too much gi-ryeok, his uncle had used it all on Sano.
Sano never showed any signs of pain to him. He was always quietly and obediently in that place. When Jeongyeon asked to play, he played without complaint, and though he would make snarky remarks, he never left first.
Because of me.
