World Chapter 3.2

Hyungjo didn’t answer, just looked at me with a distant gaze.

Where in the world was all of this happening?

Just one step outside the house, and the world was peace itself. No one was pushed from a library and killed for acting against the government. There were no longer people who set themselves on fire to express their anger and despair. There were no more military powers controlling the media to cover up such incidents. The world outside was an open one, so full of spaces to communicate freely and voice one’s opinion that it was hard to choose. It was a world where indifference and apathy were the problem, a world where voices encouraging people to pay attention were loud. The words that someone had self-immolated sent shivers down my spine.

Hyungjo tightly grasped my trembling hand.

“I really don’t get it. What on earth is happening?”

“If you had lived in this era, you might have done the same.”

“……What?”

“You would have been more proactive than Taewan, more than Gilhwa.”

Hyungjo spoke in a soft tone, as if caressing me.

“You would have.”

“I don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Hyunwoo, the place where we live… it wasn’t like that. I was a coward. Seeing as how I met you like this.”

“What are you talking about?”

I had no idea what he was saying, but my emotions surged, and my words came out choked with tears. Hyungjo gently stroked my head and patted my back, holding me in his arms as if soothing a baby.

“Hyunwoo, don’t forget me, and don’t forget us.”

“I won’t. We’re going to keep being together, right? Right?”

“……Uncover it. Uncover the truth, Hyunwoo.”

“What do you mean, huh? Don’t say things like that. Stay with me, okay?”

“Uncover it. I’m begging you.”

“I don’t want to……. I don’t know about things like that….”

Hyungjo wrapped his arms tightly around my waist. With wet eyes, he said,

“I won’t forget. I won’t forget. Forever.”

“……”

Hyungjo pulled me into a fierce embrace. A hot emotion surged up. He leaned in and kissed me. It was a long, comforting kiss. The sensation stirred my brain, and my mind was torn to shreds.

It was a different kiss from usual. Hyungjo moved inside me cautiously, as if committing this feeling to memory for a long time. That sentiment was transmitted straight to my heart where our chests met, and tears welled up. My ears felt clogged, as if all the air had been sucked into a fourth-dimensional hole, creating a vacuum.

I want you.

I want you desperately.

The pain of wanting Hyungjo was no different from the agony of my heart being gouged out.

Why is it so painful even when we’re together?

Kissing him, I wrapped my arms around his shoulders. Hyungjo, too, wrapped his arms around my waist so tightly it felt like I would break. It was at the moment when I felt the illusion that our bodies were completely pressed together, becoming one.

A tumultuous noise of shouts, screams, and the sound of dress shoes burst in, shattering the quiet of the silent house. To us, the sound felt like an auditory hallucination from another world.

Even as we heard Sungjoon’s scream and Taewan’s cry, which was close to a shriek, Hyungjo and I did not pull apart. I clung to him frantically, sticking to him as if he would disappear if even the slightest gap formed between us.

I called Hyungjo’s name dazedly.

The sounds of harsh shouts, screams, crying, a pandemonium, grew even more fiendish. Furniture toppled, and something ripped loudly. The piercing screams sounded so far away, yet so clear.

The louder the noise and vibration became, the more we focused on each other. My kisses with Hyungjo turned rough, like an animal’s. When silence and stillness once again pressed down on the house’s atmosphere, we didn’t even register that the chaos had vanished, only pulling away from each other when we could no longer breathe.

Had I been crying the whole time? My face was soaked with tears. Hyungjo’s form was blurry.

“……I won’t forget.”

Why do you keep saying such unsettling things? I looked up at Hyungjo resentfully. He wiped my tear-streaked cheeks with his sleeve.

“Don’t cry. Stop crying now.”

I went outside, supported by Hyungjo.

I collapsed right there on the spot. Hyungjo, too, slid down the wall he was leaning against.

The door to Sungjoon’s room was wide open. As if a bomb had gone off inside, all the objects had been swept out, and not a single thing was intact. The brutal traces of things being trampled, broken, and crushed. Such miscellaneous things did not enter my eyes.

My gaze stopped on the dark red blood splattered on Sungjoon’s bed and around the room, on the small puddle of blood that had formed from dripping drops. A single white finger—unidentifiable as an index, middle, or ring finger—was rolling about carelessly.

“Gasp!”

My breath caught as if a strong grip was choking my neck. My legs had no strength, and I crawled on the floor, trembling. Warm blood stuck to the hands I used to support myself and the knees I used to crawl down the hallway.

With my hands now covered in bright red blood, I picked up the white finger. It seemed to still have some warmth. Yellow paint was stuck under the nail.

“Sungjoon…!”

I looked back at Hyungjo. Hyungjo was just looking at me painfully. The tears welling in his eyes shimmered like the headlights of a car shining in the middle of the night.

Clutching the finger, I looked around the room.

No one was there. Only Sungjoon’s and Taewan’s clothes lay on the bed like a snake’s shed skin.

How tremblingly must Taewan have undressed Sungjoon?

And with how much trembling must they have held each other?

My ears went deaf. A dull pain arose in my chest, as if a stone had been placed there. What was I doing when Sungjoon’s finger was being cut off? I was craving Hyungjo’s body.

I stood up, holding the white finger. The guilt pressing down on my chest made it hard to even breathe.

I looked at Hyungjo. I knew they were wanted men and were being chased by the police, but right now, I had no choice but to borrow the police’s power.

Even if it meant Hyungjo would get caught, I had to report this. I had to show them the finger. I had to tell them that someone had dragged Taewan and Sungjoon away, that they had dragged them away after cutting off a finger.

The tears that had been welling in Hyungjo’s eyes flowed down, tracing a long path across his cheek.

Suddenly, Hyungjo didn’t seem like a person of this world. He was blurry.

“Hyungjo, run. Hurry up and run! I’m going to report this to the police. I’m reporting it to the police!”

“……Hyunwoo, I love you.”

“Is this the time for that?! Hurry up and run away!”

“I liked you from the moment I first saw you.”

“……”

“Go.”

As soon as Hyungjo’s word fell, I ran down the blood-stained stairs.

“……Because this is the end of what we can show you.”

Hyungjo’s low voice came to me, scattering like the sound of the wind.

I ran out of the house like a madman. I ran and ran down the street. The flowing tears streaked past the corners of my eyes and disappeared. The darkening street was even harder to make out because of the tears.

My breath came up to my chin.

Gasping for air, how long had I run? Finally, a police substation came into view far in the distance. I felt like if I arrived even a little late, it would disappear. It felt like it would vanish like a mirage. I spurred myself on, running faster. The door is locked! I could see people sitting beyond the glass door.

“Hello! Help me! Please open the door!”

I pounded on the glass door with my palms and shouted. I struggled and cried. The glass door, with the slogan “Friendly Police, By the Citizens’ Side” written on it, rattled and shook.

Startled by the commotion, people came running out. As soon as the door clicked open, I pushed past the people and went inside.

“What’s going on?”

“Gasp, gasp! Taewan, no, Sungjoon, Sungjoon’s finger, someone, his finger, gasp, haa, haa……!”

I couldn’t breathe. My lungs were hot, as if they were on fire. My legs wobbled. A police officer barely caught me as I was about to collapse to the floor.

“What about a finger? What happened?”

“Someone, someone, dragged Sungjoon and Taewan away! While dragging them away, the finger, the finger, the finger!”

I searched my pocket. It was completely empty. I couldn’t feel anything. I frantically patted myself down.

The police officer took a step back from me, frowning strangely and just watching. I didn’t even notice, searching my body as if looking for lice.

It’s not here…? It’s not here!

I definitely put his finger in my pocket…!

“……This can’t be.”

I stared blankly down at my hands. On my hands, which should have been soaked in blood, there was nothing. My palms and fingers were not just white, but pale. My pants, which had crawled on the blood-splattered floor, were also clean.

I looked back at the police officer with a bewildered expression.

“Officer Lee, what’s going on?”

“I don’t know, sir. This person seems to be saying someone abducted someone.”

“There was definitely a finger! Someone cut off Sungjoon’s finger. They cut it off and threw it away! I, I…!”

I had clearly been holding that cold lump of flesh, that leaden mass, in my hand, and the sensation was still vivid on my skin.

I shot out of the station like a bolt of lightning. A police officer followed me out. I frantically searched the ground as I walked.

“I dropped it, I must have dropped it. Sungjoon, hyung….”

Calling Sungjoon’s name, I retraced my steps. On the street, there wasn’t so much as a cigarette butt, let alone a finger.

“Did you drop a finger? Here?”

“……I think I dropped it. I dropped it. I definitely put it in my pocket.”

“Where is your house?”

The officer asked me. A thought struck me. I had to go back to the house. I started running again. The police officer had no choice but to run after me.

What on earth is happening?

I thought I finally understood what it meant to feel like you were going crazy.

The house was gone. I wandered the streets aimlessly, searching for the house I could find even with my eyes closed.

“Pant, pant! Hey! Where is your house! How many laps is this now?!”

“……This can’t be. This can’t be. It’s gone. The house… the house is gone.”

I spun around in circles right where I stood. The alley itself had vanished. I was certain that if I went this way, there was a pleasant alley where the air itself seemed to change. Just ten steps from there was a high-end, English-style house.

The house where I lived… the house I had drawn in my dreams.

“Hey! I asked where your house is!”

“Here… here, the alley here….”

“Is this guy crazy? He doesn’t smell of alcohol. Officer Lee, come here and help this man.”

I was not helped, but detained. I twisted my whole body. I resisted, writhing. The hands gripping me grew rougher.

“Let go of me! It’s over there! Hyungjo! Hyungjo!”

“You’ll wake up the whole neighborhood. Let’s be quiet. I’m busy as hell and some crazy guy is causing a scene in the middle of the night.”

“Hyungjo! Let go of me! Hyungjo is still there! I have to… I have to get to Hyungjo!”

“So where is this house?! A perfectly normal-looking young man, did he eat something bad? Why is he being like this?”

“Hyungjo… to Hyungjo….”

As if by a lie, all strength drained from my body. I collapsed into the officer’s arms and lost consciousness.

The touch of a hand on my body made me flinch, and I opened my eyes.

Wincing at the blinding fluorescent light, I sat up from my lying position. With a hazy gaze, I looked toward the source of the touch.

It was an older woman. Her eyes were sharply slanted, giving her a fierce and ominous appearance. Even the direction of her wrinkles seemed to stand on end, making her impression not just fierce, but chillingly frightening.

When I flinched and recoiled, the woman’s expression crumpled even more menacingly.

“Filthy things are attached to you.”

“……Pardon?”

“Filthy things are circling around you.”

A gloomy voice, as if drawn up from a deep, dark well, muttered before she suddenly threw something at me. It looked like a small pebble.

“What are you doing! Aah!”

It felt like I had been shot. It was so stinging and painful that it was as if a nail had pierced my skin. I screamed and curled my limbs. The surroundings became noisy as people stepped in to stop the woman.

“This lady’s at it again. Stop it!”

A police officer dragged her away and forced her into a chair on the opposite side, then turned back to me.

Terrified, I trembled, stealing glances at her as she glared at me.

“Hey, are you okay? That lady is possessed by a spirit. She does that to everyone, so don’t be too scared. There’s no need to be scared.”

The officer glared at the woman and snapped at her to be quiet, but she paid him no mind. Instead, she just widened her eyes and glared at me even more intensely.

My body trembled like a sheep, stripped naked and waiting to be eaten by a wolf that hadn’t eaten in three days. Her features were fierce and scary, but that was all.

I couldn’t understand why my body was trembling so violently, why I felt such a chill and fear.

But I really felt like I was going to die of fright. Fear rose from the very pit of my stomach, seeming to entangle my legs, constrict my torso, and choke my neck.

The woman again reached into her pocket, pulled out those stinging little pebbles, and threw them wildly. I had thought they were small pebbles, but they weren’t. They were red beans. But the weight with which they hit my body was equivalent to the pain of an arrowhead tearing my skin.

“Aah! Aaaah! It hurts! Aah!”

I screamed and thrashed. Unable to watch any longer, the police officer stood in front of me.

I quickly hid behind his back. I let out ragged breaths and looked at her fearfully. Cold sweat ran down my back. My hands were also soaked with sweat. A fever boiled throughout my body, and my head ached as if it were rotting.

The officer didn’t scold the woman, but me.

“Seriously, this guy! Student, get a hold of yourself!”

“……It hurts. Tell her to stop. Tell her not to do this.”

“Ma’am! The student says it hurts, could you please stop!”

“It’s gone now. You don’t have to do it anymore.”

I tightly grabbed the hem of the officer’s uniform as he turned away. He looked down at me with an expression that said he was fed up, but I didn’t care.

“Isn’t he an escapee from a mental hospital?”

“We ran his ID, it’s clean. He’s a college student, his family is out of town, but we contacted his aunt, she’ll be here soon.”

The officer roughly shook my hand off and, as if brushing off something dirty, dusted off his clothes and returned to his seat. The woman continued to glare at me with sharp eyes.

I curled up my limbs and hid myself. Hiding in a corner to avoid the woman’s gaze, I trembled.

“Don’t be scared. It’s gone now.”

“What is, what’s gone….”

My body was still trembling violently. My voice trembled too.

“A terrible possession. An evil spirit has possessed a pure, unknowing soul!”

“……What are you talking about. What….”

I searched my pockets. No finger. No finger and no bloodstains. Blood had definitely stuck and soaked into my hands and the knees I had crawled on the floor with, sticky and viscous. The slimy feeling and the nauseating, pungent smell from that time came back to me clearly.

What on earth is this?

Where in the world did the house I was living in disappear to?

The more I thought, the dizzier my head became.

And Hyungjo wasn’t there either.

Hyungjo….

A lump formed in my throat. I called Hyungjo’s name desperately in my heart. When his face came to mind, I couldn’t possibly stay still. I shot up from my seat.

I have to find him. I couldn’t find him because it was dark, I have to find Hyungjo.

An officer grabbed me as I tried to leave the station without a second thought.

“Where does he get this strength when he looks like he hasn’t had a single bite to eat! Hey! Is this student’s family here yet?”

“They’re on their way now. Let’s get a grip! Student!”

“Let go of me! To Hyungjo…, Hyungjo is still there! Hyungjo! Hyungjoooo!”

A scream, so raw it felt like my throat was splitting and blood was boiling, erupted from me. Every time I struggled, I thought of Hyungjo’s face. The face of Hyungjo that filled every fiber of my mind, and Hyungjo’s warm chest, and Hyungjo’s kiss, the hands that held me.

My first love….

Tears poured out uncontrollably. Something hot as sulfuric acid flowed endlessly down my dry cheeks.

“No, no! That can’t be! Hyungjo, you said you were alive!”

You said you were alive.

“Let me go. Sob, Hyungjooo……, sob……, let me go. He’s still there. Hyungjo……, Hyungjooo!”

As I thrashed about trying to get away, an officer grabbed me as if to detain me. The woman pushed him aside, approached me, and slapped my forehead repeatedly. Each time her palm struck my forehead hard, my stomach churned as if in turmoil. All strength drained from my body, and my vision blurred to white. I lost consciousness and collapsed to the floor.

I came to my senses at the sound of a murmuring conversation above my head. I managed to open my eyes.

A white ceiling, people in white coats bustling about….

It was a hospital.

By the bedside, my aunt and uncle stood with worried faces, exchanging words in low voices.