# Chapter 65
“Hyung is busy. What’s wrong with me handling the annoying and dirty work?”
“You’ve already done it… I’m scared for you, watching you do things like this.”
Ignoring Sangjun’s reaction, Junseo lowered his eyelids slightly as he became lost in thought. His long eyelashes cast faint shadows on the skin beneath his eyes.
“The more I looked into it, there were so many questions. How can someone’s records be so clean, as if they didn’t even exist before entering the facility?”
“……”
“I don’t think that’s the case.”
There wasn’t even the slightest trace of a past. As if it had been deliberately erased.
Sangjun, who had been furrowing his brow in thought at Junseo’s words, let out a sigh. When Junseo handed the paper he had finished reading to Sangjun, the pieces, shredded so finely they were unrecognizable as paper, automatically ended up in the trash can.
“I don’t know anything more than that. Stop trying to probe me.”
“I’m not probing. I just have one question. The cat, what you were going to say back then.”
“What?”
“Did you tell hyung separately?”
“With your overprotectiveness, I couldn’t even contact him after that, let alone meet him separately to talk,” Sangjun said in an incredulous voice.
At that moment, sunlight from outside the window poured like a waterfall over Junseo’s hair.
“This is strange too. Then why isn’t hyung looking for the cat? It’s not like him to carelessly abandon and forget something he once cared about. That’s not his boring personality.”
His irises, so dark they barely differed from his pitch-black pupils, only escaped their cool tone when dappled with sunlight.
“My Esper speaks as if he already knows where the cat is.”
The sunlight that fell from his eyes like tears thoroughly soaked his ambiguous voice. The beginning of the cold winter had arrived before they knew it.
# Chapter 65
Dr. Jeong arrived at the laboratory about an hour and a half later.
Upon discovering Dohyuk, who had already arrived at the laboratory, Dr. Jeong checked his wristwatch and briefly said to Dohyuk in a dignified, weighty voice:
“You’re early.”
Dohyuk, who had simply arrived according to the pre-announced schedule, nodded stoically. Dr. Jeong, scanning Dohyuk’s steadfast dark brown eyes that still refused to conspicuously display his emotions, cast a brief glance at the research assistant. Yet his questions poured out to Dohyuk.
“I heard you suddenly collapsed during this mission?”
“It was nothing serious.”
“To prevent danger, you need to closely monitor and be cautious about even small variables—don’t you know that better than anyone?”
While Dr. Jeong and Dohyuk exchanged brief words, the research assistant rolled up Dohyuk’s sleeve and drew his blood. As Dohyuk alternated between clenching and unclenching his fist for faster blood collection, he impassively watched the blood pack filling rapidly. Unlike non-ability users who only had enough blood drawn to fill a syringe even during large collections, Dohyuk always had his blood drawn to fill that large blood pack completely. He had no memory of receiving any additional explanation for this from Dr. Jeong. Nor did he have any questions about it. Dohyuk always simply followed instructions.
He had always endured silently, with his mouth firmly shut.
But today, his eyes, which usually stared absently elsewhere, were fixed on Dr. Jeong. It was a gaze demanding an answer, something he had never shown before.
“…What is the current status of the specimen discovered in Hochang Forest?”
Dr. Jeong’s gaze turned to Dohyuk, but his expression remained unchanged. The corners of his lips neither rose nor fell. His moderately full lips spat out the question and then firmly closed as before. A third party might consider his face unbearably stiff, but Dr. Jeong, having observed Dohyuk for a long time and thus familiar with him, showed a slightly interested expression. This was because to his eyes, the small rebellion Dohyuk was trying to hide was ridiculously prominent. Indeed, even Dohyuk initiating contact with Dr. Jeong was an unusual event.
Dohyuk, who had been reportedly unconscious, suddenly contacted Dr. Jeong one day and said something regretful that he had never said before. Hadn’t he said something about it being a young specimen despite likely being a monster? Whatever had happened in the dungeon, Dohyuk seemed to feel considerable affection for that specimen.
Recalling his voice from that day, Dr. Jeong responded casually.
“Ah. The experimental specimen is, of course, proving to be a good sample.”
Experimental specimen.
The term ripped away the hand with which Dohyuk had been trying to cover his eyes, even as he referred to it as a “specimen.”
“What, what kind of experiments are being conducted? And… what happens after the experiments are finished?”
His voice was uncharacteristically urgent. Dr. Jeong’s leisurely gaze glided over Dohyuk.
“It will be handled according to the laboratory’s protocol. Why is Esper Choi Dohyuk concerned about such things? It’s just a monster, no different from the dozens you’ve hunted so far.”
After repeated tests and experiments, that experimental specimen had already been concluded to have monster characteristics. The bodily fluids containing components not found in ordinary animals, and its abnormal recovery ability, strongly supported the opinion that this specimen was a type of monster that had not yet been discovered. Although countless abuses had already been repeated in the process of drawing this conclusion, that wasn’t Dr. Jeong’s concern.
Monster. It was a specimen that couldn’t even be protected by animal protection laws, which were merely for show. Rather, Dr. Jeong found it more interesting that Dohyuk was showing such interest in that monster. Surely Dohyuk would naturally feel instinctive hostility toward monsters.
In an instant, his observing gaze clung to Dohyuk. To Dr. Jeong, the person before him was the most special. Special enough that even the slightest change captured all his attention.
Hadn’t he been born against very small odds and now remained unique? That specialness was enough to make one covetous.
“When you say ‘handled according to the laboratory’s protocol,’ do you mean it will be killed?”
The question, obviously difficult for him to ask, was easily crushed by Dr. Jeong’s reply. Dr. Jeong observed each of his reactions and formed various hypotheses while easily donning a different mask.
“Well. We have a lot to examine today. Let’s not dawdle.”
At Dr. Jeong’s reply, who had been staring directly at him, Dohyuk firmly closed his mouth again. The countless repeated feelings of helplessness once again layered over old scars. Learned helplessness pressed down on Dohyuk’s crown today as well.
Starting with Dr. Jeong’s words, a series of examinations, so familiar to Dohyuk that they were even boring, followed in sequence. The whining mechanical sounds mercilessly scraped his sensitive hearing, but it was strange how particularly distant everything felt today. His energy was drained as if someone had shaken him thoroughly. Once again, blood was drawn, he entered a noisy cylindrical machine with numerous strange pads attached to his body, and by the time only the ability limit test remained, he was beginning to think that today felt like it consisted of 48 hours. He endured the tedious time to the point where he secretly wished to just faint.
The most exhausting ability limit test finally ended.
Dohyuk, blinking his eyes slowly, roughly ruffled his hair as if wanting to shake something off. Unfortunately, the intense fatigue clung even more thickly to his skin, not falling off despite his movement. Sleep washed over him. Hope feebly raised its head that if he closed his eyes now, he might escape this insufferable situation.
Just as Dohyuk was about to close his eyes, a chilling ringing sound bared its sharp teeth. An intense headache, as if someone was mercilessly piercing his temple with a long awl. Dohyuk frowned and opened his eyes, which he had closed.
His wavering vision stabilized again. It felt like trying to balance on a distorted ground. His stomach churned as if he were motion sick. What crawled from far away wrapped around Dohyuk’s skin like a collar and sagged downward. The endless feeling of depression embraced Dohyuk and whispered to count a long time together.
It was familiar.
Tinnitus and hallucinations, fatigue, depression symptoms. The everyday experiences that choked all Espers.
Dohyuk stared at the other person with eyes as hazy as someone who had just woken from sleep. Dr. Jeong casually touched his neck, as if knowing Dohyuk wasn’t in his right mind. The nape of his neck, where the control device had been temporarily removed for the ability limit test, was smooth. Dr. Jeong’s touch was persistent, checking the empty neck of a wild beast whose collar had disappeared, without feeling even a hint of threat.
Eventually, his hand moved up a bit more and lightly slapped Dohyuk’s cheek. It was an impassive attitude, as if dealing with an animal trapped in a laboratory, for the purpose of awakening his mind.
“Esper Choi Dohyuk. We’ll stop here for today.”
Dohyuk, whose eyelids trembled at the light impact, still tried to discern what was real with his confused mind. He, who had been pouring out his abilities according to instructions until just before, finally had an empty gaze like a completely depleted doll.
[Three times.]
[No. Five times.]
[Six times doesn’t work. That’s strange.]
[The response is slower than the previous experiment.]
With a slapping sound, this time Dohyuk’s head turned sharply. The unpleasant buzzing sounds in his ears instantly stopped. With a briefly clear gaze that flashed for a short moment, Dohyuk blinked twice rapidly.
