The Jelly Alien Will Save You! Chapter 45

A sharp gaze shot at Haeeon.

 

Black tentacles rose from behind Do Kyeol. The numerous bright yellow eyes on the tentacles snapped open simultaneously.

 

“Even with my eyes, I cannot see through you.”

 

After becoming a Calamity, Kyeol had become able to see many ‘truths’ that were invisible on the surface.

 

However, a thick darkness hung over the boy before him—to the point that he couldn’t even gauge if this was truly Cha Haeeon.

 

If this were due to contamination, Haeeon should have lost his mind. He ought to have become a ‘Calamity’ like himself or Kwon Bora.

 

“I’m not even sure if you are a living human.”

 

This was the reason Kyeol had tried to keep his sister away from Haeeon.

 

Because he couldn’t tell what that thing truly was.

 

“Can it really compare to you, Guild Master Do, who goes back and forth between an octopus and a human?” 

 

Do Kyeol snorted.

 

However, there was nothing wrong with his words either. If someone were to ask him, ‘Are you truly a human?’ he wouldn’t have anything to answer either. 

 

Do Kyeol suddenly recalled the Cha Haeeon he had met for the first time during joint training.

 

Back then, he had been surprised by a face that was even younger than expected.

 

Because the boy was around the same age as his younger sister, it had weighed more on his mind. 

 

Though he looked much more grown now than he did then, to Kyeol, he still looked incredibly young.

 

As he remembered this, the strength left the hand gripping Haeeon’s collar.

 

Since he himself had nothing certain he could say, how could this kid be any different?

 

“…”

 

After a moment of silence, Haeeon blinked slowly.

 

“You told me to ask if I had questions.”

 

“What is it?”

 

“Why did you suddenly pull me to the rear back then?”

 

At the time, according to the operation, Cha Haeeon was the one who should have stood at the very front. It was something the team members and even Quasar had all agreed upon.

 

However, once the actual battle began, Quasar pushed Cha Haeeon to the back.

 

At his question, Do Kyeol laughed.

 

To throw out a question like this now? This guy hasn’t changed.

 

He muttered as he replied.

 

“Because you were a minor.”

 

Leaving those final words, Do Kyeol became an octopus.

 

The octopus opened all its eyes. Numerous bright yellow eyes turned toward him.

 

Haeeon stared back at him intently, as if Do Kyeol’s gaze had no effect on him at all.

 

At that, the Dumbo octopus turned around as if it weren’t fun anymore.

 

“Phew…”

 

Haeeon leaned his head against the wall for a moment and let out a sigh, then followed the octopus outside.

 

The pink alien scooped up her brother, who lunged into her arms.

 

Tears poured from the jelly.

 

Holding the octopus, the jelly squeaked and popped right into the spaceship.

 

He couldn’t understand why she insisted on that spaceship even when offered a room.

 

Approaching the jelly, Haeeon used his fingertip to wipe away the tears falling from her round eyes.

 

“Sniff!”

 

For a mere jelly, why was she so full of tears? In many ways, she was a jelly that required a lot of care. 

 

Haeeon thoroughly wiped away the brimming tears.

 

As if he didn’t like him wiping his sister’s tears, the octopus kept poking him with a tentacle, but Haeeon didn’t pay it any mind.

 

Only after a long while did the jelly stop crying, her eyes swollen red.

 

Watching her, Haeeon finally brought out the question that had been hovering on the tip of his tongue.

 

“Are you Do Dam?”

 

Do Dam nodded.

 

“That’s right.”

 

Then, she sniffled and said,

 

“Sniff! Call me Noona. I’m a year older than you.”

 

Haeeon let out a hollow laugh. It was as if he only now realized how nonsensical the situation was.

 

Eventually, he buried his face deep in his hands.

 

‘I thought the way she acted was familiar.’

 

The moment he first caught the carrot thief suddenly came to mind.

 

Hollow laughter kept leaking out as if his lungs were full of air.

 

Haeeon stared at the jelly again, as if glaring.

 

He still couldn’t quite believe it.

 

It was only natural. 

 

What were the odds that the first love he thought he’d never see again would appear as an alien?

 

Since nonsensical things kept happening in succession, it was hard to even be suspicious like usual.

 

Haeeon crouched down next to Dam and lifted her long ear.

 

“…You’re really Do Dam?”

 

“Mhm, mhm.”

 

Dam’s eyes sparkled.

 

Seeing Haeeon letting out another hollow laugh, Dam asked cautiously.

 

“We met once a long time ago and said hello briefly, do you remember?”

 

Resting his chin on his hand, Haeeon covered his mouth and spoke softly.

 

“It was twice.”

 

“Huh?”

 

When Dam asked back, Haeeon looked down.

 

“I said we greeted each other twice.”

 

“Huh, did we?” 

 

In truth, he had looked at Do Dami much more from his side alone. It wasn’t that he did it on purpose, but that was just how the situations were. 

 

While Dam racked her brain trying to figure out when she had met Haeeon, Haeeon recalled his first meeting with Dam.

 

During the first meeting, they hadn’t even been able to exchange greetings.

 

Well, because…

 

At the time, Dam, seen through the hospital window, was standing on her bed holding an IV pole like a guitar.

 

“Give me a beat!”

 

Then, from the side, Kyeol played a song on his phone and clapped.

 

…Because Do Dam was singing her heart out to Benson Boone’s ‘Beautiful Things’ while playing air guitar with her brother.

 

Haeeon, who had chased Guild Master Do Kyeol all the way to the hospital for skipping joint training, had no idea how many question marks popped up in his head at that moment.

 

“These beautiful! things that I’ve got!”

 

The two of them were singing with their whole souls as if they were in a karaoke room, and Haeeon was forced to stand there stupidly, unable to even knock.

 

‘I thought he said she was a frail, sickly, beautiful girl?’

 

He recalled Do Kyeol, who had appealed every day about how frail and slender his younger sister was.

 

In Haeeon’s mind, a frail, sickly, beautiful girl was—though he didn’t know much—definitely not someone playing air guitar with an IV pole in a hospital room.

 

Lacking the nerve to barge in while the siblings were playing, Haeeon waited blankly until the song ended.

 

That was their first, one-sided meeting. 

 

Haeeon even vividly remembered Dam getting scolded by the nurse back then.

 

“Damie, I told you your arm will break again if you do this?!”

 

Haeeon often thought of her after that day.

 

Well, mostly—

 

‘Just how wildly did she play for her arm to break?’ 

 

It was this kind of thought. 

 

And three days later.

 

When he went to the hospital to find Do Kyeol for the second time, Dam, seen through the hospital window, had a cast on her arm.

 

‘She finally went and overdid it.’

 

The thought came naturally.

 

“Damie, is there no improvement in your condition? Why do you have a cast on again?”

 

“Aunt, why do you say it like that again?”

 

“It’s okay, Brother… Cough! I’m sorry, Aunt. My immunity has been weak lately, so, cough! cough!”

 

Only on that day, when relatives came to check on her, was she truly a frail, sickly, beautiful girl.

 

The woman called Aunt stood up in a fright as soon as Dam coughed.

 

“Are you leaving? Cough, cough! Please get home safely~”

 

Dam raised her good arm to see the relatives off. Then, as soon as they turned their backs, she stuck out her middle finger.

 

‘Yep~ don’t ever come back~’ 

 

Dam didn’t forget to mouth those words either.

 

“…”

 

Haeeon, standing by the window, stepped quickly behind the door in case Dam saw him.

 

Even on that day, he couldn’t bring himself to knock.

 

While he was worrying about what to do, Dam nagged her brother, who kept coming to the hospital to play, and sent him away.

 

Only after Kyeol left the hospital room did Dam cough for a long time.

 

“Cough! Cough! Cough!”

 

Kyeol waited in front of the closed hospital door until his sister’s coughing stopped, and Haeeon also stood still without rushing him.

 

“Sorry, let’s go now.”

 

“…”

 

That was the first time Haeeon understood why Kyeol went back and forth to the hospital like that.

 

Since then, as he became Kyeol’s dedicated chaser, Haeeon often saw Dam. Whenever Kyeol disappeared, he was always at the hospital where Dam was admitted.

 

Dam was strikingly different from the image Kyeol sang about every day (the frail, sickly, beautiful girl).

 

She would sing at the top of her lungs, call other patients over to start a gambling den, or play hide-and-seek by herself.

 

Even Haeeon, who used to find Kyeol’s constant fleeing from training annoying, began to wait for Kyeol to run away at some point. As if he were waiting for a meeting with Dam.

 

Because Dam was a person who made Haeeon wonder what she was doing at any given moment.

 

Nevertheless, Haeeon never once managed to knock on the hospital room door.

 

He felt that the moment he knocked and met her eyes, she would realize that he had been thinking about her a lot.

 

So, despite going in and out of the hospital like that, he had only exchanged greetings with Dam twice.

 

And one of those was only remembered by him.