Chapter 244

It was a notification window that was intimately familiar to Sa-yoon. The damned system window that declared, You have been designated as the Evil of Humanity. The moment he saw that blue screen, which would have been unwelcome even in hell, Sa-yoon realized something. In the first fragment, and all through the second one, not once had a system window appeared.

This was its first appearance.

Contrary to what he had remembered, the System had not come to him when the world began to end.

Just as the revealed truth was stunning Sa-yoon, the boy in the scene was also staring up at the empty air, unable to hide his bewilderment.

「Evil of Humanity?」the boy, still in his innocent youth, murmured in confusion. The cry of a monster sounded in the distance. He flinched, startled, and reached for the man whose eyes had closed. A faint strength still pulsed in his breath. A sign that he was still alive.

The boy, frantic and unsure of what to do, looked around before hooking the man’s arm over his shoulder and lifting with all his might. His face turned red from the effort, but the difference in their size was not something that could be overcome with strength alone. The boy was frail, to begin with. He had no choice but to let the man’s legs drag on the ground, repeating “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” as he walked on without stopping. He was heading for an old, dilapidated warehouse where they could hide.

It was a crumbling structure in the middle of a ruined street, but it was serviceable enough for a wounded man to lie down. He painstakingly dragged the man inside, laid him on the warehouse floor, and closed the door. The moon rose, and the cries of the monsters grew louder. The sounds stimulated his survival instincts and gnawed at his fear. The boy gripped the man’s hand tightly.

He scanned his surroundings, needing a distraction. And then he was faced with the blue system window again.

「Ominous.」

The boy knew instinctively that the status window was a bad omen. And yet, because he was scared of the monster cries, because he was terrified the warmth in the hand he was holding would fade, he stared at it. Time passed. The man finally awoke after the boy had watched the sun rise and the moon set three times.

Hearing his name called out with a groan, the boy, who had been staring into space like a madman, snapped to his senses and looked at him. Their eyes met. The boy looked into his hazy eyes, which seemed to be hovering between life and death, and squeezed his hand, calling his name. “Mister.” The man’s eyes widened at the clear sound, so out of place in this situation. As if waking from a terrible dream, the man’s eyes shot open, and his pupils darted from side to side, taking in the warehouse.

「Sa-yoon…」

His voice, which had always been so gentle and dependable, was now weaker than ever before. It was like a breath that had barely managed to escape through a tiny hole. A reedy whisper of a voice.

「This.」

With a trembling hand, the man lifted his jacket, showing Sa-yoon the gun at his waist.

「Take this… and go to the shelter. The place… we were supposed to go. You know where, right?」

The halting words sounded like they would cut off at any moment. The boy nodded. He just nodded, his face showing no understanding of what was being said, no grasp of the man’s meaning. He was so relieved the man was alive and so focused on his grave condition that he had no capacity to think of anything else.

The man gritted his teeth, and his hand rose. He bit his lip, but a small cry of pain still slipped out. Seeing him in pain, the boy’s expression filled with anxiety. As if to reassure him, the man’s large hand stroked his head.

Just as he always had.

「You did so well.」

When those words fell like a final testament, the boy’s eyes widened. The hand stroking his head fell away limply. The boy, frozen as if time had stopped, belatedly checked the man’s condition. His breathing was much fainter than before. He reached out and felt his body. Even through his clothes, he could feel his temperature dropping.

「Mister…?」

There was no answer to his call. The boy called his name one more time, then looked at the gun on the man’s hip before slapping his own cheeks with both hands. A flush of red spread across his deathly pale skin. He fumbled with the gun, pulling it from the belt, and turned his head.

「A pharmacy.」

There was a pharmacy nearby. He remembered the man telling him that even if it was ruined, there should still be a few usable medical supplies left. He had to go there. The man was hurt. He had to go and get medicine for him.

「Don’t trust anyone but me, you understand?」

The man’s voice, from a time he couldn’t remember, echoed in the space. It was a hallucination. “Yes,” the boy answered, not knowing to whom, and looked at the man. He took off his own jacket and draped it over him to keep him warm, then opened the warehouse door.

「I’ll be back.」

There was no time to waste. He had to find the pharmacy as quickly as possible. Fear made his hands and feet tremble, but that fear was nothing compared to the terror of losing this man. The boy ran into the night streets. It was winter. Each time he gasped for breath, a white cloud of vapor bloomed like fog, obscuring his vision.

The pharmacy seemed close, yet far. On his journey, he encountered monsters twice, and also a group of survivors. He saw them when he was attacked by what looked like a juvenile monster and was sent tumbling into the bushes.

Gunshots rang out, one after another, followed by the monster’s death shriek. Sa-yoon, having just barely managed to shake off the forearm-sized creature, pressed a hand to his bleeding wound, stifling a groan. People emerged from the direction of the gunshots. Four men, who looked to be in their thirties.

「Fucking hell. They said this place had almost no monsters. What a load of bullshit. There are fucking tons of them. Are you sure there’s an Awakened here?」

「It’s sending a signal. It’s definitely here. The problem is whether it can actually kill monsters. I heard there are a lot of fakes.」

「Can’t we just ask it to show us? You know, how Awakened have that system window thing? ‘You have been selected as the Savior of Humanity?’ Something like that.」

「I heard only other Awakened can see it.」

The boy held his breath and listened to the men’s conversation, their voices sharp and irritated as they chain-smoked. ‘Awakened’ and ‘system window’ were unfamiliar terms to him. But there was one thing that wasn’t.

The boy’s eyes unconsciously drifted to the empty air. The blue notification window he had seen in the warehouse had disappeared at some point.

Remembering the man’s warning to be wary of both monsters and people, the boy stayed hidden until the group of survivors had left. Only after their voices had faded and he could no longer hear their footsteps did he get up.

「Awakened…」

His gaze fell to his own small hands. He spread his fingers, then clenched them into fists. As if thinking of the man waiting for him alone in the warehouse, he shook his head sharply.

「First, the pharmacy…」

He set his priorities, as if reminding himself, and ran for the pharmacy again. Perhaps it was because he had already faced two trials on the way, or because the survivors had killed all the juvenile monsters while coming from the opposite direction, but he made it to the pharmacy without any further attacks.

He arrived, panting for breath. The shattered glass door showed that others had already been here. He carefully squeezed his body inside and began to indiscriminately sweep the few remaining medicines into his bag. There was no time to check them one by one, so he decided to take everything that was left, stuffing it all into a small backpack.

Dust was thick on everything, and every movement of his arm made him sneeze and cough. And yet, he kept his eyes wide open, searching for medicine until the backpack was bulging and could hold no more. He finally closed it, clutched it to his chest like a treasure, and headed back to the warehouse.

The return journey was no easier. He ran into another group of survivors and was chased by a monster he hadn’t seen before, running and tumbling for his life. He fell, was even kicked by the monster, but that only sent him flying further away, which was a good thing. Through it all, his clothes were torn, and he was a mess of scrapes and bruises. But the bag was unharmed. He had protected it with his entire body, clutched in an embrace so tight he would have rather broken his own arm than let it be damaged.

Just as the man had done for him.

The boy wiped the blood trickling from his head on his shoulder and caught his breath in front of the warehouse. He brushed off his clothes, wanting to look as presentable as possible for the man. Then he hurried to open the warehouse door, ran inside, and set the bag down.

「Mister. I brought medicine. It’s medicine.」

The boy opened the backpack wide, words tumbling out. It would be okay now. There was enough medicine to heal him. But the man didn’t answer. The hands that had been rummaging busily through the bag stopped.

「Mister?」

The boy called his name softly and crawled across the floor toward him. No answer. Silence. His eyes darted around frantically. His hand moved. He pressed it to the man’s mouth and nose. He felt no breath. The chest, which had been rising and falling faintly, was still.

「Mister.」

The boy called his name. He shook his shoulder. He hadn’t noticed before, but there was a large wound on the man’s back. Blood had poured from it. He pressed his hands against it, trying to wake the man up, but he wouldn’t stir, as if in a deep sleep. When his hands were stained red and the dusty warehouse began to fill with the smell of blood, the boy understood.

The man was dead.

「…Because of me.」

He died protecting me.

His parents, and this man. They all died protecting me. If I hadn’t been so weak, if I wasn’t someone who needed protecting, if I could have killed the monsters, none of this would have happened. The boy hugged the unmoving man tightly. As he held the blood-soaked body, leaving no space between them, and whispered, “I’m sorry,” a blue window appeared in his vision, shining brightly as if for him to see.

<You have been selected as the Evil of Humanity! Oppose the Saviors and lead Planet #9180 ‘Earth’ to ruin. (b ᵔ▽ᵔ)b>

Awakened.

The moment he saw the window, the conversation he had overheard on the street echoed in his ears. His gaze was fixed on the screen as if nailed there. A moment later, another window appeared.

<Upon clearing all missions, a ‘Wish Ticket’ will be granted. Will you accept your awakening?>

On the selection screen, divided into ‘Yes’ and ‘No,’ the boy, still clutching the man, asked.

「With the wish ticket… can I save the mister?」

<The Wish Ticket will grant the user’s wish, ‘whatever’ it may be. (b ᵔ▽ᵔ)b>

A notification that served as an answer appeared. The boy—Sa-yoon—reached his hand toward the system window.