By Zephyria 
“Make sure to go to the hospital tomorrow.”
“……Yes, sir.”
Yoo Jiha felt, for a moment, that he had lost his mind. To think that he actually wanted the other man to accompany him to the hospital.
Overcome with embarrassment, he quickly climbed into bed and lay down. Still unable to decide how to address him, he opened his mouth awkwardly.
“Aren’t you going to sleep?”
“You sleep first. I have a few things to organize in my head.”
“You’re not contemplating how to eat me, are you?”
He had summoned his courage to crack a joke, but the reaction he got back was strange. Jeil Heon didn’t answer; he simply gave a thin smile. Feeling his heart thumping, Jiha cautiously asked again.
“……A-ah, you’re not, right?”
“Haha.”
“……?!”
“The sun will be up at this rate. Hurry up and close your eyes.”
Why—why wasn’t he denying it?!
Although Jeil Heon carefully tucked him in with the blanket, Jiha’s heart continued to thrum in his ears until he finally fell asleep.
It was a bizarre dream. In the dream, he was a young child, walking down a white corridor with a strange man whose face was obscured. Just as he was about to look closer at the man, wondering who he was, the world where only the two of them existed twisted. People with severed limbs began to crawl out, writhing, and a man with a flushed face pounded on the elevator door, demanding alcohol. Thump, thump, thump, thump. The moment that man tore a piece of flesh from his neck and drank his blood, Yoo Jiha woke up.
“…….”
Even with his eyes open, the darkness remained, making him momentarily suspect that he was still wandering through the Eight Phases Mental Hospital. Wasn’t the very situation—meeting a man who helps without any cost in a horrific place where monsters hunt and devour people—too strange? It was a daydream far too beneficial to himself.
Perhaps he was witnessing a hallucination while being bled to death by an alcoholic. Like the Little Match Girl burning her last match.
However, he could hear a low sound of breathing. Beyond the darkness, the presence of another person remained still.
Yoo Jiha slowly shifted his gaze. He saw the profile of Jeil Heon sitting on the floor with his back against the bed. He looked exactly as he had when Jiha fell asleep. Unchanged.
Ah.
He finally realized. From the beginning, he probably didn’t need anyone else. He had stayed by his side, even lying to him, because he knew Jiha would have nightmares. A person who had lived a normal life without knowing about the Otherworld could not possibly sleep peacefully while retaining those memories intact.
Yoo Jiha recognized that this was his reality. The broad back that protected him was not a phantom dream, but the truth.
The violent pounding of his heart, a lingering effect of the nightmare, calmed down, and the scream caught in his throat faded away. His tense muscles relaxed gently, and he learned what true tranquility felt like. The left eye that held light within the darkness, just like the Aberrant Realm, was no longer scary.
He closed his eyes again and sought sleep. It was a deep sleep, free of nightmares.
* * *
Returning to the official residence, Kang Suk-young recalled Jeil Heon’s appearance—which looked ‘too human.’ In the past, he had been the Head of the Annihilation Execution Department, as well as her Sunbae and mentor. She had been willing to entrust her very life to him.
When Jeil Heon, the greatest Agent in the long history of the Management Bureau, disappeared, the Bureau had been thrown into chaos. They searched for years, but not a single strand of hair was found, and they eventually gave up, believing he was dead. The grief of that day remained as vivid to Kang Suk-young as if it were yesterday.
Yet, even though this man had returned after 22 years, she could not feel joy.
Because Jeil Heon, who had been trapped in an Aberrant Realm for 22 years, was far too human.
‘How can he be exactly the same as before?’
Not just his appearance, but his personality and manner of speaking were identical to 22 years ago. For a human who had been trapped in an Aberrant Realm for 22 years.
As she spoke with him, Kang Suk-young had to grit her teeth to hide the chills running down her spine. Unless one possessed a protective talisman to shield the mind from anomalies, an untrained ordinary person could not maintain their sanity in an Aberrant Realm for a few days, let alone 22 years. If he had been isolated alone for over 20 years, no matter if it was Jeil Heon, he should have gone mad long ago.
Or turned completely into an Aberration.
‘I verified it with things only Sunbae and I knew from the past, Ji-hwan stripped himself of his gear, and he even entered the barrier without wearing any… but…’
Despite passing the implicit tests without issue, her suspicion did not vanish. It was only natural. Doubting everything that touched the five senses was an essential quality of a Management Bureau Agent, and she was their leader.
‘I’ll have to use that person’s power to verify if Sunbae is truly human. I feel bad for waking someone who just fell asleep last month, but…’
Until then, she would have to keep Jeil Heon confined in the main building. Since he likely guessed he was being suspected, he would follow along obediently, so there would be no unnecessary impulses.
The only thing that had changed from 22 years ago was his attitude toward the student named Yoo Jiha, whom he treated with an uncharacteristic warmth. In the past, he would have severed his concern the moment a victim was rescued from an Aberrant Realm.
‘Wait… come to think of it, wasn’t Yeo-jin’s child’s name also Jiha? Nam Jiha.’
Kang Suk-young briefly wondered, but soon scoffed at herself. If he were alive, Lee Yeo-jin’s child would not be the right age, and more importantly, that child was a daughter. The daughter Lee Yeo-jin used to joke about, saying she didn’t resemble her parents at all.
Suddenly feeling an eternal wave of fatigue, Kang Suk-young covered her forehead. Lee Yeo-jin, Sunbae has returned, so where are you? If you’re dead, at least appear as a corpse.
[Hidden World Record]
Name: Eight Phases Mental Hospital
Classification: Aberrant Realm-O-B.Ho-057
First Sighting: December 31, 200X
Survival Rate: 71%
Exploration Rate: 99.7%
Unexplored Area: Room 404, where the door does not open, and the basement entrance.
Remarks: Even if one fully understands that the ‘Eight’ in the hospital’s name implies making a lot of money and the ‘Elephant’ implies luck, entry is impossible without a person from the Sinosphere. The reason is unclear, but it may be the influence of the Hospital Director entity having been an Overseas Chinese in life. Or perhaps it reflects the reality of the increasing number of Chinese people escaping from China. Urgent measures are needed for the anomalies crossing over with them. You all know what problems occurred during the Japanese colonial period, right? Please give us some budget.
I’ve rambled, but anyway, more research is needed before it naturally vanishes. How can we guarantee that Aberrant Realms requiring people from cultures other than Korean won’t occur in the future?
└ It hasn’t been updated yet, but it was closed early this morning.
└└ Fuck! Who did that!
* * *
Talismans occupied the surroundings. The countless talismans formed a bizarre sight, appearing as if they were preventing something inside from leaving, or perhaps preventing something outside from entering.
At the fingertips of the only ‘thing’ existing within, a thin black flame shaping the words ‘Jeil Heon’ flickered before suddenly snapping out. The moment the flame vanished was identical to the moment the Aberration identified by the Management Bureau as the Blind Eater completely vanished upon Yoo Jiha’s call in reality.
Pale lips, like a corpse, curled up diagonally.
「Oh my, he’s dead.」
It rested its chin on its hand, letting out a strange clicking sound with its tongue. It had a form that closely resembled a human, but no one who witnessed it would ever mistake it for an ordinary person.
「I thought he had already been merged after being eaten by the Aberration I contaminated, so I didn’t even pay attention, but he had been holding on with his sanity all this time? He was human until now? Surprising. How did he kill that Aberration? And why, of all times, now? Anyway, fine. I’ll take the fact that he came out as a sign that he’s willing to pay the remaining price.」
As it muttered to itself in a near-soliloquy, its eyes rolled to the side.
「If you kidnap someone else’s child, it’s only human decency to pay a fitting price. Why do you think I didn’t kill him 17 years ago and just left him? Sunbae mustn’t die easily.」
The slanted corner of its mouth shot up into a massive grin. The smile, which closely resembled the wide-open mouth of the Blind Eater that had tried to swallow Jeil Heon, lingered on its face for a very long time.