By Zephyria 
It started with chatting. The child used to excitedly show him conversation logs whenever an interesting story came up with a friend, teaching him trendy words or memes he didn’t know. Yet, the child not only kept texts from an unfamiliar man hidden but could even be heard laughing happily alone in the room.
…Had he ever been able to provide such joy? A strange anxiety hammered against his chest. In proportion to the increasing amount of time the child spent staring at those texts, the nervousness grew rapidly in volume, like a snowball rolling down a hillside.
Jeil Heon, ruminating only on the name Han Geun-woo he had glimpsed on a chatting app profile, braved the embarrassment and ended up calling his younger brother.
Sounds like a dating app? You remember the third son of the Japanese-cuisine Hyung’s family, right? He once got blackmailed after sending nude photos to someone on a dating app. If you’re worried, do you want me to look into the guy?
“I’m sorry, I know you’re busy.”
It’s not like I’m searching for him myself. My subordinates will look into it, so it’s nothing.
Je Seong-jae hung up with a genial laugh, but the anxiety would not easily subside. Before that night ended, Je Seong-jae provided Han Geun-woo’s personal information. No criminal record, no suspicions. From his appearance to his career, he was respectable enough that one wouldn’t feel ashamed to show him off to others.
Since he now knew that the person the child was getting close to was a clean-cut individual, he should have felt relieved as the guardian acting in place of the parents; nevertheless, the turmoil in his heart would not settle. Rather, whenever he imagined the child standing side-by-side and laughing with Han Geun-woo, it felt as if a fire ignited in his gut.
Jeil Heon struggled to acknowledge the identity of this sensation, which he was feeling for the first time in his life. Jealousy was more petty than he had imagined, and as base as his own selfishness.
Before he could manage that emotion, an unexpected encounter occurred. Han Geun-woo was among the victims in an Aberrant Realm they had entered.
The child recognized him immediately as well. The Investigation and Exploration Division trains its agents not to over-empathize with victims. This is so that rescue operations can be carried out fairly, and so that the mental pain is lessened even if a victim is killed. The child had always been diligent in following the training, but it was different with Han Geun-woo.
The child already possessed a kind nature. It was only natural to want to be attentive and to be drawn to someone they liked. He kept telling himself this, but he wasn’t convinced at all. Watching the child sit side-by-side with another person and exchange conversation was more agonizing than he had imagined. His insides twisted. In the end, he used petty threats to snatch the child away from him.
“…You’re really a bad person, Mister.”
Though he had tried to hide it, the child’s sulky voice—having noticed his gloomy inner thoughts—stimulated his sense of shame, yet he still could not control his emotions.
Because the True Eye was not originally his, the child could not use it proficiently and bore a certain burden when doing so. Using the characteristics of an Aberrant Realm to train the True Eye was a method he had considered for a long time. But could he guarantee that Han Geun-woo’s presence hadn’t influenced the reason he delayed, even while guessing the strategy? Could he guarantee that he had been as indifferent as he was to other victims while watching Han Geun-woo gradually become contaminated?
Jeil Heon shuddered at his own baseness. Unlike himself, who treated the rescue of victims as a byproduct of hunting Aberrations, Song Hilda and Kim Min-seop were exemplary Exploration Division agents. The child, being taught by them, had not lost a shred of his innate goodness.
If the child knew of this toxicity, he would despise him. Despite lacking the confidence to endure that contempt, he delayed until the very last moment. Because of that, he couldn’t even meet the child’s eyes while exiting through the Hongsal Gate. It felt almost fortunate that Kang Suk-young had come to meet him and that they had stepped away alone.
However, relief soon turned to despair.
A Bearer who had dedicated his life to hunting Aberrations, mixing them into himself until the day he died. His last disciple and Hubae.
He had received news that the final Bearer, Choi Beom-seok, was alive. Not as a human, but as an Aberration.
Rushing to the Containment Sector, Jeil Heon met the contained Choi Beom-seok. The Aberration Choi Beom-seok had merged with was an entity born from the fear that a killer might be following from behind on a dark night. The containment room was already occupied by darkness. Only the faintly emerging silhouette of Choi Beom-seok was the sole proof that a tiny fraction of him remained human.
Once the mutation began, Choi Beom-seok, who had offered himself as a test subject to the Management Bureau laboratory, was on the verge of fully mutating into an Aberration as his time limit expired.
「Head of department. I heard you came back. I asked them to keep it a secret. Because it would be hard for you.」
It drew a shape resembling a smile, shimmering within the darkness.
「I didn’t want to show you this side of me, but I wanted to entrust my end to you, Head of department. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.」
“Beom-seok…”
The taste of blood filled his mouth through his tightly clenched teeth. This was his duty as his instructing officer and the Head of the Enforcement Division. Yet, it was a pain he could never grow accustomed to, no matter how many times he experienced it. Despite knowing this agony, he had to step forward. So that a cherished colleague could meet his end as a human, not an anomaly.
He received the hwan-do from a silent Kang Suk-young and slashed his own wrist. As the containment room door opened and the entity spread out like mist regardless of Choi Beom-seok’s will, the blade soaked in the blood of the sole surviving Bearer fell. It was the death of Agent Choi Beom-seok, 98th class of the Water Abnormality Worship Management Bureau’s Annihilation Execution Department.
Since the containment had begun and dummy corpses and news of death had already been delivered to the families, the funeral was held secretly for two days. A tombstone was erected while only a few agents and high-ranking officials who had been close to him in life paid their respects. Because special measures were taken so that not even the ash of the cremated remains of an Aberration would remain, what was buried in the grave were the personal effects the deceased had entrusted separately during his life.
Wearing the Enforcement Division’s formal uniform for the first time in 22 years, Jeil Heon could not leave the deceased’s grave for a long time even after the quiet funeral ended. If he were to die, that grave would be empty. Since there was nothing he wanted to leave behind in the world and nothing he wanted to be remembered for, he had not entrusted any personal effects.
He had viewed his life dryly, believing that an empty tombstone without even three letters of a name and an empty grave would be his end. For the hatred and revenge, the only values he cherished, would vanish with death.
…That was how it was. It certainly had been.
He felt with a piercing clarity that the root of his life, which had not wavered once since the age of 14, had already changed.
Jeil Heon groaned softly and pressed his brow. Since learning of Choi Beom-seok’s survival, a disgusting hunger had been gradually eroding him. Now, a heat that burned his entire body slowly began to boil. His vision was already distorted. Throughout the funeral, what Jeil Heon had seen were not agents of the Management Bureau, but mere meat-clumps that were nothing more than prey.
Even while leading this body, which was no different from a monster, he was still, always, human. He wanted to be human. He wanted to leave a single value in the world as a human. He wanted to bury shining pride, not vanishing hatred, in his grave.
He did not know if the name of this was love.
Nevertheless, he wanted to live as a human.
Finding the child was not difficult. Amidst the unnatural artificial structures and the countless meat-clumps passing by, there was a pure radiance. A purity that would never be contaminated. A brilliance that would not fade.
His heart fluttered and his limbs grew hot as if caught in a fire upon confirming that the artificial structure where the child stayed was a hospital linked to the Management Bureau. Victims were hospitalized there for the treatment of contaminated minds. Had he come to see Han Geun-woo? It didn’t matter. It still didn’t matter. He didn’t mind clinging piteously and begging. He would not let him be taken. By anyone.
“Get out of the way, you bastard!”
Is it Han Geun-woo? How dare something that is nothing more than prey. How dare. A delicious sound of crushing bone rings out from the gripped joint. Something, whether hunger or murderous intent, heads toward the prey. Should he crunch it down in one bite? Should he tear it apart until it screams? Should he rip out the liver and swallow it? Its mouth opens before the prey.
“Mister?”
However, the sweet hunger that had cast a haze like a thick fog and made him delirious vanished as if washed away by that one word. The contamination that had surged to his marrow stabilized quickly, and his mind cleared. His distorted vision was corrected, and the Ji-hwan that had been heating up as if to burst cooled down.
“…Jiha.”
The child’s transparent gaze held him. What was reflected in those eyes was, unmistakably, a human.