By Zephyria 
Gwak Yun-sang, who had been flustered by the sudden request to meet a hunter named Kim Si-baek, soon complied.
“Since you are observing the dragonfish raid, you will meet him sooner or later anyway.”
As they moved toward the room, Cloud looked down at his phone. The photo of the hunter, searched using the name he had heard from Hyo-ju Agnes, appeared on the screen.
“…….”
He wasn’t sure. He hadn’t met him in person, and a few blurry photos taken from a distance weren’t enough to be certain. To begin with, he was a brother whose face he couldn’t even remember.
Cloud grew anxious. The taste of blood lingered on his lower lip, which he was chewing. Could it be that it wasn’t him? What if it was merely Hyo-ju Agnes’s mistake? No, even if it was definitely his brother…
Isn’t it far more likely that he wouldn’t recognize me?
Nearly forty years had passed since he had been separated from his brother. The siblings had not left a single photograph for one another. Just as he had forgotten his brother’s appearance, his brother likely didn’t remember him.
To him, his brother was everything of his childhood.
But what was he to his brother? Like their mother, who had abandoned her children and fled, perhaps his brother had also wanted to disappear far away. If he had lost even the chance to escape because of a young brother who was nothing more than a burden, then he would be nothing more than a remnant of a painful past that his brother wouldn’t even want to recall.
Cloud vaguely recalled an old memory of taking a long bus ride to a distant place with only his brother. He couldn’t remember the exact details, but he remembered being caught by their father. If it hadn’t been for him, clinging to his brother’s back, his brother would have escaped safely—certainly.
Soon, Gwak Yun-sang knocked on a room door. An answer came from inside immediately. It was a clear and neat voice.
Then, the door opened.
Cloud saw him. Not the face captured in the crude photo on his phone, but the living, existing, actual man.
〈Si-woon.〉
The appearance of his brother, which he thought he had forgotten, overflowed like a flood from the deepest folds of his brain. The face of the brother, who had leaped across time from a mere boy to a young man, formed the man before his eyes.
Cloud recognized his brother at first glance.
And his brother recognized him too.
Since Kim Si-baek had been under the misunderstanding that his brother had died due to an organ trafficking ring, the mental landscape he perceived was utterly horrific. That was why the image of his brother, dismantled and bloodied, had appeared in the vision Edokus showed him. Even after dreaming that his brother was alive, that perception had not changed.
Thus, at the sight of his brother appearing before him again, Kim Si-baek felt a shock as if his brain were being crushed, while simultaneously, a terrible distrust surged within him. Is it Edokus? It must be Edokus. The only one who would toy with him using his brother’s image.
Even as he desperately composed himself, thinking it was another illusion, an uncontrollable passion surged. Intense pain. Fear. Sorrow. Terror. Guilt. The things that always dominated him whenever he thought of his brother.
He raised trembling hands to cover his face. Perhaps if he couldn’t see, he wouldn’t be deceived. But once recognized, the presence clung stubbornly to his mind. What must he do, and how, to shake off this illusion…
It was then. A touch from another person reached his convulsing hands. Firm yet soft skin, a warmth that was somewhat cool but infinitely hot only to him, a familiar touch. That familiarity caught the wick of his heart, which had been running wild.
“It’s not an illusion.”
The low whisper echoing through the rigid room was as silent as death. However, that quiet whisper reached Kim Si-baek as a resonance more truthful than anything else.
Eyes that had struggled to focus finally met the man, the brother, before him. His brother, who had been biting his lower lip tightly, finally took a slow step forward.
“……Brother.”
It was only a single word, but the voice trembled miserably. As if it carried the longing he had harbored for decades.
It was his brother. My brother. The brother I couldn’t protect.
Passion surged, nearly overflowing, in eyes that had been distorted by pain and confusion.
“You, is it really you? Si-woon, is it you?”
“……Yes.”
“Si, Si-woon…… I’m your brother. Your big brother……”
“……I know.”
The face of the brother, whose voice wavered slightly, became blurred. He rubbed his eyes repeatedly, but his vision would not clear.
Instead of seeing, Kim Si-baek reached out with arms that trembled like aspen leaves. A pulse slightly quickened by excitement and irregular, rapid breaths poured over him, mixing with human body heat. It was proof of a living person. His brother had not died. He was alive, and he was here. Right in front of him. In this place.
Kim Si-woon. Date of purchase. Price paid to the biological father. What must be extracted beyond this.
After confirming his brother’s name in the ledger, the endless nightmare that had piled up like layers of grime exploded into a scream. Kim Si-baek rushed toward his brother, letting out a wail steeped in the pain of his intestines being torn apart.
He didn’t even know if the voice he was screaming was actually his brother’s name. He didn’t know how his arms were moving as he clung to him. He simply clung to him as desperately as the hours of agonizing pain he had suppressed his entire life. As if doing so would prevent the brother he had finally found from disappearing.
“In the ledger, your, your name…… I, that’s why…… I didn’t know. I’m sorry, Si-woon. Brother is, sorry……”
Unrefined words simply tumbled out recklessly. Cloud, who had been stiff with tension and anxiety, dropped his head low.
“……Did you find me? Didn’t you hate me for being a burden, Brother?”
“You are my brother!”
Though his voice was a mess, drenched in tears, the words ‘my brother’ were conveyed clearly. To Cloud, who had been unconsciously anxious, and to Tae-un, who was forcibly suppressing the violent, ferocious impulses that were surging despite his expectations.
“……Brother.”
It was the same word as before, but the emotion embedded within it was markedly different. Cloud leaned into Kim Si-baek and wrapped his arms around his back. The shoulder of Kim Si-baek, upon which he leaned, soon began to grow damp.
At the weight of the arms holding him tightly, Kim Si-baek sobbed even harder, frantically embracing his brother. That small child had grown this much. He hadn’t even known he had survived until he grew this large. He had become such a commendable adult in a place he didn’t know. Heart-wrenching sorrow and breathtaking joy swept over him in succession.
A world where his brother didn’t die. A world where his brother survived safely.
A world that would have been void if not for Tae-un was newly defined. The scales of judgment, weighing both worlds, shook violently. Just as Tae-un had hoped.
✽ ✽ ✽
Gwak Yun-sang could not recover his composure until Tae-un, who had grabbed the nape of the stunned Biyendwe—whose beak was wide open—and stuffed him into a jacket pocket, dragged him out by the scruff of his neck. Only after hearing the sound of the room door closing behind them did he suddenly snap his head up.
“W-what was that just now? He, he called him ‘brother,’ right? I think that’s what I heard? Brother? Brother? Brotheeeer? What does ‘brother’ mean in English?”
“Be quiet.”
Tae-un placed his index finger over his lips. Gwak Yun-sang, who had been rambling incoherently out of shock, reflexively shut his mouth. From beyond the firmly closed door, the sound of labored, broken wailing could be heard. It was a cold, painful cry, as if raw flesh were being sliced by a blade.
This was a moment he should not peek at or overhear.
Standing there blankly, Gwak Yun-sang shook his head and hurriedly caught up with Tae-un, who was striding down the hallway.
“Guild Master Tae. About the ‘brother’ thing, I mean…… is Dr. Carter really his, his younger brother?”
Even though Tae-un remained silent, Gwak Yun-sang, who had pieced the situation together in an instant, became even more bewildered. A person who had been in another world, not even Korea, for 21 years had reunited without warning with a brother who had died—or rather, whom he was certain had died—about 40 years ago? Kim Si-baek’s brother, who had no old acquaintances in Korea, suddenly popped out from America?
Does this even make sense? How on earth? It wasn’t his place to say, given that he had manipulated his own background as a former NIS agent, but the lack of plausibility was too…
“No, no. That’s not it.”
Gwak Yun-sang barely managed to pull back his mind, which had been spiraling toward strange places in his confusion. This was no time for that. Any matter regarding Kim Si-baek, no matter how trivial, was to be reported to Director Noh.
As he took out his phone to make a call, a hand wearing a black glove covered it.
“Are you planning to spread rumors?”
“I have to tell the Director!”
“I don’t mind you reporting it, but you’d better watch your mouth.”
“Ye-yes?”
“Cloud Carter is American.”
The sudden remark caught Gwak Yun-sang, who had been flustered and wandering. Only then could Gwak Yun-sang properly hear Tae-un’s voice, which had remained emotionless throughout.
Not only Kim Si-baek and Cloud who were at the scene, but even Gwak Yun-sang, a third party, felt his head spinning, yet only Tae-un remained calmly settled. As if he had foreseen such an event.
The question, ‘Are you the one who created this plausibility, Guild Master?’ hung precariously in his throat, but he forced it down. He must not ask. He must absolutely not dig deep. The darkness of the three-hundred eyes, sunken in a black, void-like state, gave a cold warning.
Gulping down dry saliva, Gwak Yun-sang asked a different question instead.
“……Um, why is it a problem that Dr. Carter is American?”
152 – MDF