Guru sat by the train window, resting her chin on the sill.
Thump-thump train twip!
The quiet scenery of the village slipped past outside the window.
Wut if Gwuu ca wit Guildmastuh too.
Jurim’s face drifted gently through her mind.
Gwuu wanna go ho fast.
The squirrel farm was fun, and spending ti with Mister and Oppaw Serhi had been nice too... but still, she’d missed him the whole ti.
Gwuu was gonna buy candies too.
She had [Dungeon is an Open Door], and even an item that could let her escape. She’d planned to slip away after briefly distracting Ham Honggi, but thanks to the dungeon’s unique properties, things had taken longer than expected.
Was Guildmastuh super mad now? Was he so, so mad that he’d scold her really loud, but still hug her at the end?
Even if she found her real mommy and daddy?
“...”
Guru pulled her backpack into her arms and sank into thought.
Siwon, sitting next to her, had opened his notebook and was jotting sothing down, while Serhi, across from them, quietly stared out the window.
It was Serhi who broke the silence.
“You ca to Korea chasing Gnosis, right?”
“Pardon? Ah, yes. Is it obvious?”
“Why chase them so hard? ‘Cause Gnosis wrecked Kyrus?”
Siwon shut his mouth tight and blinked a couple tis with a blank expression.
“...”
“It’s fine. You don’t have to say anything.”
“...My sister...”
He closed his mouth again, as if choosing his words.
“My sister is Gnosis. What happened to Kyrus... was her doing.”
After dropping that bombshell, he smiled gently. Serhi froze in place.
Guru, eavesdropping from nearby, opened her mouth in a soft gasp. That sounded like... a really big story?
“My sister beca Gnosis, but I didn’t even know. I didn’t know a thing. I couldn’t do anything... That’s why I want to handle Gnosis with my own hands.”
“You an kill all the Gnosis?”
Siwon glanced at Guru, then simply gave a soft smile. He didn’t say it aloud, since a child was present, but that smile said it all.
Guru read the answer in his smile. Could it be—that strange feeling she had when they first t... had that been the blood of Gnosis?
A wittwe bit shivver-shivver.
He was always gentle, kind, and a little clueless around her. But that subtle, murky aura—maybe it ca from this truth.
Dying was scary. And killing soone was terrifying, too.
But if the person you had to kill... was family?
Dat’s jus’ too-too sad.
Guru let her ears droop and gently hugged Siwon’s arm in comfort.
Siwon, as if reading her heart, wrapped an arm around her shoulders and patted her gently.
Leaning against his shoulder, Guru peeked at the notebook in his hands.
Clipped inside was a photo of a strange symbol.
“Sabu Ajusshi, wut dis?”
“Ah, this... If you ever see sothing like this, be careful. Don’t go near it. Got it?”
“Wut is it?”
“It’s the mark Gnosis uses.”
“Gwuno-sis...”
The bad villains. The ones Sabu Ajusshi was trying to kill. The Gnosis...
Guru stared long and hard at the Gnosis symbol.
****
Clang. Clang.
Darkness had fallen, but the train continued racing down the tracks.
[Updating......]
Guru pulled phisto from her bag and tucked him inside her inner pocket. His warm little body made her chest feel toasty.
After she gathered a few more things from her bag, Guru squatted quietly in front of Serhi’s sleeping compartnt door.
It wasn’t long before a tall shadow fell across her head.
“Yellow squirrel, what are you doing?”
“Gwuu thinkin’. Wots and wots of finking, up to here like dis.”
“A little thing like you? Thinking? Get inside and sleep, stop with the nonsense.”
Tch. Guru puffed out her cheeks and curled herself into a tight little ball.
“...Gwuu is wonwy.”
“Cold?”
“...?”
Why was he asking if she was cold all of a sudden? No way...
“Chilly?”
“Yeah, that. Chilly.”
Guru curled up her lip.
“Wonwy and chiwwy not da sa fing.”
“You’re really pissing off... Hey, it’s your native language. You and I probably wouldn’t score that differently on [N O V E L I G H T] a dictation test.”
“Gwuu is fouw!”
...Shit. I lost.
They bickered for a bit—“Can you speak Russian?” “Then can you speak Squirrel?”—then called a truce.
“Oppaw Serhi, how many yeaws is you?”
“Sixteen.”
“Sa as Oppaw Dani!”
“Maybe.”
“Maybeee?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t really rember my early years.”
His first mory was lying on a cold hospital bed inside a lab.
The researchers had gasped, panting alongside him, saying he’d survived, that he’d done well—
That counts?
Maybe it would've been better to die back then.
After his heart stopped and started again, his na, his age—everything had vanished. His past was blurry, fragnted. But fear and resignation, engraved again and again, had taken root deep in his body.
They’d smiled as they explained everything again to a test subject who couldn’t even rember what was happening to him.
“This is for the sake of humanity.”
A sacrifice for the Awakening Project.
Their goal was to determine if it was possible to control the awakening chanism—and the skills granted by the system—through artificial ans.
They called Serhi “No. 156.”
“No. 156, co out.”
“No. 156, use your power.”
Ironically, the day Subject 156 succeeded in the experint... was the day the lab collapsed.
“We did it!”
“We can recreate it again!”
The researchers, celebrating in a frenzy, didn’t even notice as debris began falling over their heads.
“What—what the hell?! It’s collapsing!”
“Evacuate!”
“Get Subject 156 first! Hurry!”
As they grabbed his wrist roughly—those sa hands collapsed like puppets.
“...”
Serhi just sat there, staring blankly.
And then, crossing the ruined lab and walking toward him... ca a blonde woman.
“Wanna co with ?”
Behind her, the lab—once an inescapable prison—crumbled like a gingerbread house.
After Serhi took Irina’s hand and left the lab, he chose a new na and age.
He took the na from a nearby bakery owner. His age...
“What a pretty kid. How old is your friend?”
A clerk at a clothing shop had asked that.
“Irina. How old do I look?”
“Hm... about thirteen?”
In the mirror of the fitting room, a boy with mismatched eyes stared back at him.
“Thirteen...”
That’s how it was decided. He’d be thirteen.
“Doesn’t matter anyway. Age, na—none of it matters.”
Guru blinked once at his calm tone.
“Gwuu birfday is fake too.”
“Why is it fake?”
“Gwuu birfday is da day da orphanage pwincess lady bwood Gwuu in. Decembuh thirrd.”
They said she’d been abandoned outside the orphanage on a snowy day. Wrapped tightly in a cloth, with only a note reading “Hanguru” left behind...
“So Gwuu na is weal. Dat’s why Gwuu wike it.”
Guru said this with a genuinely happy tone.
Serhi let out a disgruntled sigh and ran a rough hand over her head.
“...Guess you’ve had your share of hardship too.”
Heehee. Guru giggled.
“Oppaw Serhi, pwease tuck Gwuu in.”
“No.”
“Whyyyyehhh—”
“You’ve been sleeping just fine on your own till now.”
Guru pouted and buried her face in his arm.
“Gwuu feews wonwy... Haaaah—miss Guildmastuh so bad...”
Staring blankly up at him, she sighed deeply again.
In the end, Serhi, looking like he’d given up, scooped Guru into his arms.
Uheehee.
Snuggled under the covers in Serhi’s bed with the blanket pulled up to her chin, Guru grinned ear to ear.
“What are you so happy about?”
“Cuz Oppaw is pat-pattin’.”
“I haven’t yet.”
“But you wiww.”
Tch. Clicking his tongue, Serhi gave her chest a clumsy little pat.
He might act like he didn’t care, and he might talk rough, but Serhi wasn’t a bad person.
When Gwuu fiwst t him, he saved Gwuu too.
Guru rembered Serhi blocking the door at the auction house, stopping anyone from opening it.
Everything that followed from then until now... had begun with Serhi’s kindness.
And besides—being registered as a [Caregiver] ant he had no disqualifying traits.
Soone not dangerous as a caregiver.
So maybe... there was just a big misunderstanding...
“Now go to sleep. Seriously.”
“Oppaw Serhi...”
“What.”
“...Is you a Gwuno-sis?”
Clatter. Clatter.
The train roared forward down the tracks.
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