# Chapter 73
Beyond the door of room 807 exists an elevator that can only be opened with a card key granted to the few who participate in the experiment. Through that elevator, one can access rooms A, B, C, and D. Of course, card key verification was also required when boarding the elevator and pressing the button.
Junwoo raised his left hand and pretended to zip his lips, but since he didn’t truly intend to hide anything, he playfully blinked his eyes. As if curious about how Dohyuk would react.
“…Then could you grant me one favor?”
“Well, I don’t know. Stealing an access card for you seems too burdensome?”
Dohyuk’s request was much simpler than Junwoo’s question. To be alone in room 807-C at 9 o’clock sharp.
*
“Doctor?”
After just a few seconds, Junwoo had been observing Dohyuk, who stood before him as if he’d always been there, when he was awakened from his thoughts largely due to the sturdy voice he’d already grown accustomed to. Junwoo gestured to Dohyuk with his usual bright smile.
“Ah, I’m a bit surprised. I couldn’t imagine anyone could secretly infiltrate here. Aren’t even the ventilation ducts monitored? We should pay more attention to security.”
“A-class and below who aren’t well-versed in the research building structure would find it difficult to approach this way. Still, it is possible, so I agree with your statement about paying attention to security.”
When Junwoo moved, Dohyuk followed. Glancing back at Dohyuk walking behind him, Junwoo asked:
“By ‘A-class and below,’ you mean that includes A-class?”
“…Yes.”
Junwoo shrugged his shoulders as he recalled Dohyuk entering through the ventilation duct with a composed face as if he’d ridden an elevator. He didn’t look tired at all. It was amazing how that youthful face that still had baby fat had grown up so much.
“Anyway, what you’re most curious about is the sample’s condition, right?”
Walking quickly past experimental equipment whose purpose could not even be guessed, Junwoo approached a medium-sized iron cage covered with a blackout curtain. Dohyuk, unknowingly hardening his expression, followed Junwoo close to the cage. The height of the cage was lower than Dohyuk’s waist.
He had the illusion of a thick, bloody smell hitting him. Dohyuk listened carefully, but no sound was heard from inside. Suddenly, as he looked at Junwoo with eyes rippling with anxiety, Junwoo just shook his head.
“It’s not dead.”
That’s what Junwoo said. That it wasn’t dead. It was an incredibly unkind statement, but Dohyuk knew better than anyone what condition that meant.
Without asking for permission, he pulled back the blackout curtain. Something pitch black was curled up in the corner of the cage. Dohyuk stared blankly at it as if looking at an unfamiliar being.
It wasn’t the cat from his memory. It looked more like a bundle of rags rolling around in a garbage heap. The lifeless body had lost weight. If not for the faint rising and falling of the chest, it might have been mistaken for a pile of leather. The fur, which had been glossy inside the dungeon, was now tangled with something and in disarray. There were no wounds left on the cat’s body, but Dohyuk noticed what had made the fur a mess. Monsters don’t bleed red blood; instead, they secrete a dark green fluid. If that fluid congealed after getting tangled in the black fur, it would surely take on such a form.
Dohyuk gripped the bars of the cage.
“Today, the first experiment with my participation is scheduled. Remember how I came as a consultant for the research? I wonder how much of our conversation you remember from yesterday, given your condition.”
His palm slipped, and the back of his hand hit the cage. It made quite a loud noise, but the cat only raised its head slightly, showing no reaction. He wasn’t sure what he was superimposing onto that resigned body. Dohyuk only realized after a while that he was gritting his teeth. His eyes, which had been wide open for a long time, became dry from the arid air.
“It’s a project studying how radiation affects monsters. They’ll inject plutonium-239 via injection. They’ll extract teeth and collect bone samples to check for radioactive residue. Depending on the monster’s response, new technology might be added to by-product weapons development.”
Junwoo’s voice continued uninterrupted after that. Among the various technical terms being spouted at will, all Dohyuk could understand was that the pain level of this experiment was E. Dohyuk knew what that meant.
Pain level E: Experiments involving extreme pain, suppression, or unavoidable stress.
If there’s a pain level E, then there must be levels A, B, C, and D as well. But Dohyuk had never seen other levels in his life. The experiments Dohyuk had been part of were always level E. The highest level.
Ah, once again, something overlapped with that damnably docile body. The dead eyes of a crouched boy. Helplessness poured down like a headache, and nausea rose. Pressing his lips with his palm, Dohyuk shrank his body as if someone had kicked him in the stomach.
He only lifted his gaze to look at Junwoo as if grabbing a lifeline. Between trembling lips, a broken voice leaked out.
“Is it… really… confirmed to be a mon-monster…? Did it… show aggression?”
Dohyuk secretly hoped that Junwoo would give him absolution like Dr. Jeong. But Junwoo, like a cold-hearted god, only asked in return.
“Is that the most important question? Then do you think this experiment is justified?”
Dohyuk shook his head. It wasn’t an answer to Junwoo’s question. It was closer to an act of shaking off the question. Dohyuk didn’t want to know about right and wrong. He had never once thought he wanted to know. Since nothing would change, realizing and drawing conclusions would only bring pain. Dohyuk repeated the words he had heard countless times.
“If it helps humanity… isn’t it inevitable? Monsters and humans can’t even be compared.”
Even after turning his gaze away, the red eyes remained like a scar. Dohyuk pulled back his heart that was trying to reach beyond the cage and spat out each word, chewing on them.
“Then why did you come all the way here?”
“I…”
Dohyuk couldn’t continue. His confused gaze became tangled.
“The radiation response experiment is just the first study. There are many experiments left. The research team is quite excited because it’s been years since they’ve captured a live monster.”
“…What do you mean by remaining experiments?”
“Observing recovery. Looking at the experiment log here, it seems they’ve already confirmed that wounds heal quickly through self-healing. In a week, they’ll probably perform amputation. They’ll observe the results of reconstruction through nuclear energy after amputation. Even if it fails, what difference does it make whether a monster has three legs left or four?”
At Junwoo’s indifferent voice, Dohyuk finally looked back inside the cage. The cat’s small head dropped to the floor with a thud.
A faint voice is heard from the memories of the past. A voice begging to be killed, with eyes desperate for life.
“Rather…”
“Rather?”
“It would be… more comfortable to die, wouldn’t it?”
Dohyuk wanted to kill that thing, just like that day. Because he was confident he could bear the responsibility for that act.
Looking from outside the cage to inside the cage. Who is the real monster, anyway?
***
Having halfheartedly left the laboratory and let the entire day slip away, his mind was still complicated.
In his imagination, Dohyuk killed the cat. After releasing his killing intent to draw attention appropriately, he stabbed the cat’s vital point with a dagger as it rubbed against him. It was a death without any unnecessary pain. No blood flows. Because the cat is not a living being but a monster. Sticky body fluid only pours out like mucus. Just like the countless hunts he had repeated.
He holds it in his arms until it breathes its last breath. He doesn’t care even if covered in bodily fluid, silently counting the life he has taken. Only when the light body grows cold does he put away the fragile corpse. He presses hard on his eyelids, soaked in fatigue, and bears that weight.
The honk of a car horn pulled Dohyuk out of his thoughts.
When he came to his senses, nothing had changed. It was all just an empty imagination. The cat that had died in his arms disappeared beyond the broken imagination and was given a cursed life again, trapped in a cage.
Dohyuk, left alone in the revealed reality, looked up. The cold air of the winter night was quite fierce, and the tip of his nose quickly froze. A familiar figure in the car waved and urged him. As if telling him to leave the freezing outside and come into the warmth.
Dohyuk strode over and got into the car. The feeling of something that had been buried at the bottom warming up was always unfamiliar. Suddenly he felt like crying. Hiding his tears, Dohyuk opened his mouth.
“Why did you come to pick me up when it’s so close? Aren’t you tired?”
“The night road is dark. And you haven’t been feeling well lately, hyung.”
“I think you’re the only one who worries about me walking at night. My body’s fine now. Today I just sat at a desk all day, so I’m just a bit stiff.”
“Then why do you look so unwell?”
Dohyuk pretended not to know and wiped his cold nose bridge with the back of his hand.
“It’s because I’m cold.”
