Honbul: Flame of the Soul

The entire past could not be made undone.

But the events of this one night might be erased.

“In the name of the Naja, I confiscate the night.”

The moment he finished speaking, something rustled and slipped from the inner pocket of Yoon Taehee’s clothes. A black paper crane, about the size of a finger joint. It was a black bird. The black bird emerged from his clothes, seemed to float lightly in the air, then shot toward Jaegyeom like an arrow.

Using a black bird could erase the memories of a single night. By the time he had brought Jaegyeom back after Jaegyeom ran out of the pavilion, darkness had already fallen over the mountain. If he could carve out only this night with the black bird, the truths of the past seen in the form of a dream could all be covered up as if they had never happened.

This was the only way to save the boy who had faced a painful truth.

“Paehyeon, I need to ask you for something.”

Before entering this place to see the memories of the past, Yoon Taehee had given Paehyeon an order.

“Yes. Please speak.”

“Could you bring me one thing?”

What Yoon Taehee had asked him to bring was none other than a black bird.

As soon as Yoon Taehee told him where the black bird was, Paehyeon disappeared, then reappeared a short while later with a metal case containing a memo pad. It was a case filled with black memo paper.

If, by a one-in-a-million chance, he really was connected to Jaegyeom’s master.

An unknown sense of foreboding clung to him like a shadow. Though he thought it was absurd, Yoon Taehee, seized by a faint anxiety that was slowly growing, opened the case and peeled off one sticky note.

The moment he placed the memo paper on his palm and blew on it, a paper bird was completed in the blink of an eye. The black bird landed on the back of his hand, fluttering its paper wings as it looked up at Yoon Taehee. Even as he tucked the completed black bird into his clothes, he had not truly thought he would end up using it. He had only prepared it just in case, assuming the worst.

But in the current situation, he could not think of any other option. A truth like this was better not known. Pain that could not be endured ought to be erased.

However, it was uncertain whether the black bird would work on Jaegyeom. As the situation reached its extreme, Yoon Taehee, too, lost his composure. Yoon Taehee decided to stake everything on one gamble.

And that was the moment the black bird flew at him.

The red mist scattered all at once, and the rampage stopped.

Whether the black bird had worked or not, Jaegyeom lost consciousness and collapsed. At that, Yoon Taehee closed his eyes, holding Jaegyeom’s limp body in his arms. He tried to calm himself by taking a deep breath, but his hands were trembling uncontrollably.

The face of the boy who had begged him to kill him, with tears in his eyes, was now peaceful.

“......”

Yoon Taehee cupped the back of Jaegyeom’s head with one hand and slowly closed his eyes. Although it had been used for a different purpose than originally planned, the result was the same. In that he had taken back an unwanted truth.

Yoon Taehee. No matter what, don’t you dare lie to me.

No, you can lie. You can lie, just don’t get caught.

Yoon Taehee half-lifted Jaegyeom’s limp body and leaned him against himself. In a posture that, at a glance, looked as if they were sitting face-to-face, Yoon Taehee hugged Jaegyeom tightly. He bowed his head deeply and buried his forehead against the nape of Jaegyeom’s neck. Like that, Yoon Taehee held Jaegyeom for a very long time.

As if they had taken poison together and fallen asleep.

He did not know how much time had passed.

Black Emperor, who had been standing guard nearby, spoke cautiously.

“Are you all right?”

What did he mean by all right? That he had learned about his parents? That his father was Myojeong, Jaegyeom’s master and enemy? That he was the last Bangsangsi of the cursed former Office of Narye? That he had been intertwined with Jaegyeom from birth? That he was actually a human who had eaten a mermaid pill and lived for two hundred years...?

Whichever it was, it would be a lie to say he was unaffected.

“There was a pool of blue blood when I returned.”

At the time, he had thought Shin Jihye must have been mistaken, or that there had been some kind of error along the way. That judgment had been based on the premise that the blood belonged to Jaegyeom. But he had never once considered that it might have been his own blood. Back then, Yoon Taehee’s mind had been entirely occupied with having to find, from the very beginning, a way to cure his immortality. So after realizing that Jaegyeom had nothing to do with mermaids, he had dismissed it as a discarded answer and thought nothing more of it.

And the one who had consumed the mermaid pill was not Jaegyeom, but Yoon Taehee himself.

It was said that one who consumed a mermaid pill did not age, and that wounds healed on their own. The effect of the pill depended on the mermaid’s lifespan. According to the mermaid he had met on Geoyeo Island, a mermaid’s lifespan was around two hundred years, so the timing roughly fit. Now, everything made sense.

What he had thought were the ravings of a madman, Yoon Wonjoong’s words, had been true.

A hollow laugh threatened to escape him. Of course, if asked whether he felt no mental shock after learning the truth about his past and his parents, that was not the case. Yoon Taehee was also in a very confused and precarious mental state. But even if Myojeong and Hwirim were his parents, Yoon Taehee believed that did not make him any different from who he had been before. They were they, and he was he. Yoon Taehee was already too cold a person to feel familial affection solely because of a blood tie.

The only thing important to Yoon Taehee was Jaegyeom.

“Black Emperor.”

“Yes.”

Yoon Taehee, who had been burying his forehead against the nape of Jaegyeom’s neck, slowly lifted his head. A considerable amount of time must have passed, because the darkness outside had faded greatly. Blue dawn was spreading, and the sun was rising in the distance.

Yoon Taehee stared far away with sharp eyes.

“Let him see only good things, and hear only good things.”

Yoon Taehee gently laid Jaegyeom, whom he had been holding, properly on the bed. At that, Black Emperor bowed his head. “I understand.” He had received the same order once before, but the situation was completely different from then.

Approaching silently, Black Emperor reached a hand over Jaegyeom’s face and closed his eyes.

“Leader.”

But at some point, Black Emperor stopped and looked back at Yoon Taehee.

“I cannot... enter his consciousness.”

The moment he opened his eyes, Jaegyeom knew he had fallen into the god of calamity’s domain again.

“Hey, are you okay?”

It was because a boy with the exact same appearance as him had poked his head into the edge of his vision and was looking down at him. Startled, Jaegyeom’s eyes widened as he shot upright.

Their heads collided with a thud.

“Ugh!”

The boy cursed, clutching his forehead as he fell backward.

Jaegyeom looked around with a bewildered expression. Above him stretched a clear sky without a single cloud. The sensations from just moments ago remained vivid. The dark night air. The bright moonlight. The lukewarmness of tears falling on his cheek, the bloodshot eyes that had seemed full of rage, the force choking his neck, and...

In the name of the Naja, I confiscate the night.

The black bird.

“H-How...”

Yoon Taehee had used a black bird on him. And yet, with a delay, a jumble of memories began surging in like a wave. Myojeong. Bangsangsi. Office of Narye. Hwirim. And Taehee. As if Yoon Taehee had never used the black bird at all, he remembered everything. He had no idea what on earth had happened, and his breath came in ragged gasps.

“You should be grateful. It’s all thanks to me.”

Just then, the boy spoke as if he had read Jaegyeom’s thoughts completely.

“What, thanks to you?”

“That damn black bird thing.”

The black bird had not worked while he was in a state of rampage. The boy took all the credit, boasting that Jaegyeom should be grateful he had protected him with his own power. Judging by the fact that he did not ask anything, it seemed he already knew everything Jaegyeom had been through. Jaegyeom touched his own neck with a dazed expression.

“Why...”

“Huh?”

Why did you do it. Why.

Just as the boy made a puzzled face, dark clouds suddenly began to gather in the clear blue sky. The sunny weather swiftly turned dark, and a fierce downpour began to fall.

“What the...”

As rain suddenly poured down, the boy frowned.

“Hey, what are you doing?”

Jaegyeom was not doing anything.

He was not doing anything. He was simply grieving.

“The sky’s a mess because of you.”

Annoyed by the sudden downpour, the boy nagged him to change it back. Without a word, Jaegyeom sank to the ground, then collapsed forward and prostrated himself against the earth. And then he began to wail with his whole heart. As if screaming. As if bitterly resenting someone. Or perhaps as if longing for them. He had never cried like this, not even as a child.

The boy, who was not human, did not know what the sensation of sadness was. But as the emotions Jaegyeom held gradually transferred to him, the boy began to feel sad along with him without even knowing what that emotion was.

The expression of the boy watching Jaegyeom cry slowly sank.

“Hey...”

The boy, who had been pacing around Jaegyeom with a gloomy face, spoke in a dejected voice.

“Is it... because you feel sorry for Myojeong?”

“......”

“Or do you think it’s all your fault?”

“......”

But no answer came from Jaegyeom.

“Heeey.”

“......”

“Huh? Say something.”

“......”

The boy scratched his head with an indifferent look.

“If you’re not feeling good, then I don’t feel good either...”

In the end, the boy came over to Jaegyeom, who was kneeling and sobbing. In front of the curled-up Jaegyeom, the boy hugged his knees and sat down on the ground. An umbrella had appeared in the boy’s once-empty hands. Just as he had created an ant before, this time he had created an umbrella.

The boy stretched out his arm and held the umbrella over Jaegyeom.

“Can I stay here?”

“Do as you please.”

The boy nodded and added another question.

“How long are you going to stay here?”

“Forever.”

At the unexpected words, the boy’s eyes went wide.

“You’re going to stay here forever and never go outside?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Pitter-patter, pitter-patter...

“I can’t forgive it, this life...”

Listening to the sound of the rain hitting the umbrella, Jaegyeom cried for a very, very long time.

As if crying was the only thing he knew how to do, Jaegyeom just kept weeping endlessly. Time did not flow here. Everything stood still here. Because nothing ever happened. He was not tired, or sleepy, or hungry.

A long, unending rainy season had begun.