I panicked and rushed toward the door.
I pounded on the steel door with my fists and shouted.
“Please let out!”
“If you two just talk it out~.”
What kind of nonsense is that.
I slamd my fists against the door again and again. And then I realized it. This door wasn’t just thick—it was absurdly thick. Not sothing that would open with ordinary punches.
The density felt insane too.
I should’ve realized why Ricardo had bothered to bring here in the first place.
Shit!
I gave up on politely persuading him.
Instead, I started pounding on the door in a completely different way—desperate.
I poured urgency into my voice.
“The bathroom!”
Bang bang bang—KWAANG bang bang!
“I really need to use the bathroom! Ricardo! The bathroom!!”
“Just use the drawer there~.”
Is he out of his damn mind?
“Please respect human rights!”
I shouted while hamring the door with both hands.
“The human rights of your junior! Dignity!”
“If you talk it out, I’ll guarantee it right away~.”
Ricardo’s voice ca back, laced with amusent.
I gave up on persuading this infuriating man. It’s not easy to convince soone who’s enjoying themselves.
So I decided to persuade soone else.
“Aide!”
I knocked on the door and called for Ska Owen.
“I really need to use the bathroom!”
“Yeah?”
I’m screwed.
The mont I heard Ska’s casual reply, I knew it.
This guy would be even harder to persuade than Ricardo.
“Then you’d better talk quickly. Once you talk it out, the door’ll open.”
I stared blankly at the closed door.
How could they do this to .
I swore to myself that I would never again trust Ricardo when he told to co along. I really thought he was just going to show the training grounds.
I thought we’d look around the training area, smoke a cigarette, then go eat dinner.
I thought he called because he genuinely wanted to hang out.
It was all my misunderstanding.
“This is betrayal, sunbae.”
When I muttered at the closed door, I heard Ricardo chuckle quietly on the other side.
Is this funny to you?
“Don’t you feel even a little sorry for ?”
“Nope~. Not at all~. Anyway, we’re heading out now, so you two have a nice talk~.”
“Where are you going!”
“The control room~.... If you make up with each other, we’ll let you out right away, so don’t worry~.”
So there’s CCTV.
I whipped my head around and spotted a cara mounted on the wall of the eight-pyeong room. There were two of them, tucked into the corners. Probably installed to monitor rookies during training.
The sound of seniors’ footsteps growing distant.
I heard them walk down the corridor and descend the stairs.
Once the footsteps faded completely, I twisted my body and glared at the CCTV.
As I stared sullenly into the pitch-black lens, Jonathan moved.
He pulled the sword at his waist out with the scabbard still on, then gripped it upside down.
Jonathan raised both hands holding the scabbard.
And then he smashed down like a madman near the doorknob.
BANG BANG BANG—KWAANG KWAANG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG!
Ah.
KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG KUNG! KUNG! KUNG! KUUUNG!
This is scary.
I watched the senior slam the door while feeling utterly intimidated by his montum.
At this rate, the scabbard was going to wear down.
Jonathan didn’t care and kept smashing the door violently.
Does he really hate being in the sa room with that much.
For a mont, I felt a little sad—then imdiately realized I wasn’t in any position to feel sad. Last ti, hadn’t I bolted without even trying to hide it?
Anyway. The door didn’t open.
Jonathan slid the scabbard back onto his waist and stared intently at the back door.
Then he bent at the waist and gripped the sword hilt.
Srrrng.
The mont he drew the real blade, a voice echoed through the training room.
[Jonathan. As you know, this door was built to help first-day enhanced-body rookies adapt, so it won’t be cut even with a real blade. It’s as thick as the portal zone doors.]
Ska Owen’s voice.
[You’ll just damage the edge of your sword.]
Jonathan paused, then slowly sheathed the blade.
That thick, huh.
Unlike Jonathan’s delicate swordsmanship, mine emphasized brute force.
So if I swung hard enough, wouldn’t it cut?
As I turned my body toward the front door, the aide’s voice ca through the speaker again.
[That’s why it’s expensive too. If you don’t want to pay for damages out of pocket, don’t play around with swords in there.]
I let go of the sword, my hand dropping limply.
Then I turned and looked up at the CCTV cara with a pitiful expression, pouring every ounce of “how could you do this to ” into my face.
Jonathan stared at the cara with eyes full of irritation and rage.
No response ca back.
We stared at the cara for a long ti.
Then I surrendered first. Giving up, I trudged to the corner of the room and squatted down. I rested my forearms on my knees and waited for ti to pass.
Jonathan soon went and sat in his own corner as well.
We sat at opposite diagonal ends, avoiding each other’s eyes, wrapped in silence.
We stayed like that for a long while.
Suffocating silence....
As I sat in the stillness, my thoughts drifted elsewhere. This kind of situation wasn’t unfamiliar. When I’d been captured by the village of madn, or when I’d been taken prisoner back when I was just a foot soldier, I’d endured being trapped in narrow, dark spaces for stretches of ti I couldn’t even asure.
A prisoner.
Leeho was a good man. He probably wasn’t dead, but I had no idea how he was being treated.
His wounds would heal imdiately, so even if he were tortured, it wouldn’t leave visible marks.
And they probably hadn’t been trained to deal with soone like him. Until now, Black Badgers fought Creatures—not intelligent, humanoid enemies.
Once, Lee Seunghyun said that the reason he was paid as a special forces soldier was because he was nothing more than a tool. But that was an attitude only soone that rigid could have.
People who’d never imagined being captured on a mission.... People who’d never been taught how to endure captivity....
This wasn’t the ti to be running around like this.
I turned my head and looked at Jonathan.
The man, sensing my gaze, slowly rolled his eyes toward .
Pitch-black, vivid eyes.
I gathered courage from deep in my core.
“Sunbae.”
Jonathan didn’t look away.
“Um.”
“.......”
“I, uh....”
...What do I say?
I’d worked up the nerve to speak to him, but I had nothing to say.
What am I supposed to say here?
Apologize again?
Wouldn’t that just make him angrier? Besides, hadn’t Sophia told not to belittle my own efforts?
I should’ve thought before opening my mouth.
Unable to avoid the gaze boring into , I desperately turned my thoughts over.
Then, stamring, I spoke.
“You still can’t forgive ... can you?”
I could feel Jonathan’s piercing stare.
He looked at with a catlike gaze and said,
“Is that all you wanted to ask?”
Bang!
A loud noise ca from beyond the speaker.
That sound startled more than Jonathan’s reaction.
I looked up at the speaker as the senior continued.
“Why do you care about my reaction?”
[Ah, this bastard, seriously.... Can’t you speak properly~?]
Ricardo’s voice spilled out of the speaker, thick with irritation.
[You punched him in the face, that’s why he cares, you asshole.... ‘Why do you care’ my ass~.]
[Truly astounding social skills, my friend.]
Ska’s voice followed, mixed with a hollow laugh.
[Sotis I think your social skills are worse than my boss’s family’s.]
How can he say sothing that harsh.
Worse social skills than Lee Seunghyun—how could anyone say that. I stared up at the speaker in shock, then thought about it for a mont and fell into confusion. I honestly couldn’t tell which of the two had better social skills.
But Jonathan wasn’t listening to them.
He didn’t know Lee Seunghyun, so he couldn’t have understood anyway.
He kept his gaze locked on and said,
“Don’t you think, from your perspective, that it was a justified choice?”
I blinked.
“No.”
I had no intention of lying.
“I’m not sure which choice you’re referring to, but even if I went back to the past, I wouldn’t make a different one.”
Jonathan closed his mouth and scrutinized .
A brief silence settled between us.
The relationship was already broken—so why did the seniors keep clinging to hope?
As I thought that, Jonathan broke the silence.
It was a murmur, closer to talking to himself.
“I still can’t forgive your kind.”
Of course. He’d been through sothing that justified that.
“And as for the choice you made back then.... I resent the very fact that you set foot on Earth.”
I know.
That was why I let him hit without resisting. At least when it ca to that part, I didn’t regret it even a fraction. Victims of the war had every right to be angry at soone like . Resentnt and rage were never strange reactions.
But even if they were angry, I wasn’t going to want to overturn my past decisions.
Fear had been the biggest factor, but there was also the simple fact that I would never regret that choice. That was why I hadn’t tried to reconcile.
So....
“But I can’t let deaths like that happen again.”
Jonathan murmured while staring at the floor.
It took a mont to understand his low, sunken voice.
He didn’t want to create more victims like his wife.
“And in Ashen Mantle, I saw fragnts of your mories.”
I nodded to show that I’d heard his quiet murmur, but Jonathan’s voice grew clearer.
“mories of you trying to stop the war from breaking out. mories of you kneeling and begging in front of your own kin.”
My body stiffened.
“mories of you handing over your sword.”
My sword.
The sword I’d kept by my side my entire life, the sword I’d let go of for the first ti in order to kill my closest friend.
I t Jaeyeon in an opera house that maintained its elegant form even amid the chaos of war.
The glitter that sparkled at the corners of her upturned eyes and on her eyelids.
She listened to what I said, nodded, and then reached her hand out to . In that mont, I knew I had crossed a line. The instant I placed my sword in her hand, I realized I would never be able to return to who I’d been before.
The despair I felt then.
The sorrow so crushing it felt like my body would break apart.
Jaeyeon passed my sword on to the one who could wield it best.
“I felt what you felt when you handed over that sword,” Jonathan said.
“I understood what kind of resolve it took to make a choice you could never take back.”
That creature makes you feel the emotions the owner of the mory felt at the ti.
I hadn’t been certain, but it seed Jonathan really had seen part of my mories back then.
At the ti, he must not have understood, only felt my emotions—but now, he likely understood everything.
“At the very least....”
I averted my gaze, suddenly embarrassed, but the senior continued.
“You shouldn’t scorn soone who carried feelings that heavy and still struggled forward.”
Jonathan spoke with clear enunciation.
“Because I felt vividly how much pain you were in when you made that irreversible choice.”
Even if it’s a mory I’d rather forget.
“Hildebert.”
When my na was called, I brought my gaze back down from where it had been drifting.
I couldn’t tell whether what I felt now was embarrassnt, sadness, guilt—or all three. Or maybe I was moved that soone who’d been desperately trying to return to an irretrievable past, even resorting to actors, had finally lifted their eyes from the past because of my mories and emotions.
I couldn’t say for sure. I myself was soaked in emotions I couldn’t clearly define.
“Now that I understand and feel all of that, I can no longer hate you.”
I felt like his gaze was going to pierce straight through .
“After seeing soone who keeps taking the next step even while being crushed under the weight of death.”
I had seen part of his past as well.
The flutter he’d felt toward the woman who sold tulips. The heavy longing and affection he’d felt when talking about his wife to his comrades.
That was probably why he’d been so afraid.
Because he’d felt, even in fragnts, the weight of his own emotions—and thought that ant there was no way to nd what lay between us.
I looked into Jonathan’s eyes and gave a bitter smile.
“Thank you.”
I was relieved that the things we’d both been shown unintentionally hadn’t beco the reason we drifted further apart.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you beforehand.”
I never would’ve dread it would turn out the opposite way.
Jonathan nodded.
Then he closed his mouth. I kept silent as well, trying to rein in the emotions that had surged up—feelings from the past I’d forgotten but that had resurfaced, and the emotions stirred by Jonathan’s words.
I’m exhausted....
Ricardo’s voice yanked back to reality.
[What about the apology?]
I flinched.
[Now you should say you’re sorry for hitting him, right?]
Across from , Jonathan squeezed his eyes shut.
[Jonathan, my student~?]
[Don’t be stubborn, my friend.]
Ska spoke.
[I’m embarrassed just watching this.]
Jonathan bit his lip hard.
And didn’t move. His face scread that he was dying of humiliation. Seeing that, I had to struggle not to burst out laughing.
His reaction is hilarious.
[Haa....]
Ricardo’s sigh wasn’t funny.
[Should I force you two to shake hands and make up~?]
[Jonathan Kudo. Apologize properly before I make you chant “I was wrong” three tis. Don’t embarrass and Rick any further.]
“...I want to apologize for that.”
I was thinking this was going a bit far when Jonathan spoke heavily.
“I was careless.”
“No.”
I pressed down the laughter threatening to spill out.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t explain it in my own words. Anyone would’ve blacked out in that situation.”
“Are your injuries fully healed?”
[It’s been months since then....]
Ricardo snorted.
[Did you beat him up and forget already? Smacking soone in the face and then asking that with a perfectly fine expression—what is that~.... Is he insane?]
[You did well, Hilde.]
Ska laughed quietly.
[I’m sorry this is all I could do. My friend’s capacity is a bit small. I’m really sorry, but please understand.]
Of course.
***
We were released from the room.
The two seniors opened the training room door themselves. Jonathan and I stood side by side, blankly watching the door creak open.
The n smirked at us as we stood there stiffly.
I glared at Ricardo, who was grinning broadly.
“I’m going ho now.”
“Are you sulking~?”
The senior chuckled.
I answered flatly.
“Yes.”
“Sorry~. I’ll buy you dinner, so cheer up~.”
“Make Lexic noodles for .”
This was my chance.
“I got the recipe.”
The senior didn’t like that.
He didn’t like it, but he did promise to make it for next ti. If I prepared all the ingredients, he said he’d follow the recipe and cook it.
The mont he answered indifferently, I bead.
“Thank you!”
Ska burst out laughing.
Jonathan shot a look asking if I still liked those noodles. I ignored the reaction.
Poor people who don’t know how good Lexic noodles are.
We left the training room in high spirits. Then the three seniors and I went to a nearby place for dinner. After a fierce argunt over the nu among the three n—each of them had drastically different tastes—a steakhouse was chosen.
It was more than satisfying for , though it was probably twenty percent lacking for Jonathan, Ska, and Ricardo. After dinner, we headed ho.
On the way back, I sent Ami a ssage.
[: So I made up with my sunbae after all that!]
I added the dancing sheep emoticon Ami had sent earlier.
She replied quickly.
Briefly.
[Ami: Kkuzzeok-i.]
What does that an?
[Ami: Anyway, good job. Your break’s almost over, so get so proper rest, Hilde. Yehyeon-oppa will ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) be calling you soon.]
So I did.
I slept, and the next day I cleared my head and rested properly.
And just like that, my long break finally ca to an end.
It was ti to go back out.
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