What is a kiss?
It is a show of affection. When a person gives a kiss or pecks with their lips to someone they like, it means that they are giving them a show of affection. When two people’s lips collide, it is also a kiss however the meaning is more intimate as it means they are reciprocating their expression of love to each other.
Then what about a French kiss? It is not called French because the doer of the verb is French. I don’t know about its cultural inclinations or origins, but it is simply kissing where two persons’ tongues intertwine. It is a show of lust which most often tickles people’s knockers just because it feels great.
I don’t know about Great, but I am scared.
Yoenha’s grip on my wrists is strong. Sometimes I wonder. When people kiss, do their noses collide? Apparently, no… Their noses do not collide. They just get to smell each other. How about the smooches? Does it taste like saliva? No, it tastes like the last meal a person eats.
I reciprocate Yoenha’s actions in a sense. I smooch her back as she smooch me. I let her tongue violate mine until she is all inside me. "You want to get freaky? Fine, let's get freaky!"
Do you want to play rough? Fine. Let’s play rough. "I am sorry Yoenha." I bite her tongue that dares violate my mouth. Following that is one crunchy headbutt. It makes her flinch backwards giving me enough space for a second more powerful headbut.
~Crack
I don’t know if it comes from me, her, or both of us but it sure hurts.
[Slight skull fracture detected.]
Well, thank you. I ignore the AI notification and power through the pain. “Quit dilly-dallying idiots, I need help!” I shout to the spectators. Nayun immediately acts on it as she tackles Yoenha and pins her on the walls. At least, Nayun is quick on the uptake when sensing that something wrong is going on.
Suho draws his sword and stands between me and Yoenha.
Meanwhile, Hajin drags me by my shoulders. “What is happening!?” He asks with a frown.
I spit Yoenha’s tongue from my lips and throw a series of instructions to Cube. “Restrain her! Restrain Yoenha and give me a freaking potion!”
Mechanical appendages sprout from the walls and the solid vice grips take hold of Yoenha’s limbs. Seeing this, Nayun retreat from her. I receive my healing potion and immediately down it. I feel my hurt forehead become ticklish until it is mended completely.
[Slight skull fracture is healed.]
“What happened?” Hajin asks me more calmly, holding my shoulder down. I meet Hajin's gaze, and then Nayun's and Suho's who are all equally curious.
I throw the potion bottle aside to give them a lazy summary. “A lot happened. That is what happened.”
Suho picks up Yoenha’s bloody tongue and examines its peculiarity. “What is this? It… looks familiar…” He did not see me spit it, so I cannot blame him for being clueless. But man, it does sure look familiar. I don't want to remind him through the early mornings he brushes his teeth, cuz I reckon that is where the familiarity comes from.
"What do you think?" I sarcastically ask. "Say, maybe it is my weenie I got lost..."
Hajin scrutinizes the ‘object’ through his [Observation and Reading], but even without that, he seems to understand what it is. “Suho… That is a tongue.”
Kim Suho expressionlessly look at the tongue and then to Hajin unsure of what he heard. “It is a tongue? Huh? Really?” He drops it in surprise. I sense something odd with Suho as if he is aware there is something wrong too the tongue. To be more specific, he seems to be aware something is wrong with Yoenha.
I trace Suho's eyes connecting to Yoenha.
“Dumbass,” Nayun cusses at Suho, lacking the awareness I have. Instead of contempt, I see the joy in her eyes that she gets to address another person as an idiot. She is very petty... and pitiful. “So, Hyon Hyung…” She intones. I look at Yoenha who is now unconscious maybe thanks to the headbutt.
“Can you tell us what is happening?” Nayun plainly interrogates me of the truth, while she pries Yoenha’s jaws open. “Wow, her tongue has already regenerated… This looks familiar… and bad…” She sees the entire affair after all.
Me biting Yoenha and causing blood to splatter everywhere, and there is Yoenha's risque behavior too.
“I hope it is just a false alarm,” I confess. “But I saw Yoenha attacking Rachel while looking moderately close to a Djinn in appearance.”
My eyes land on Hajin, and he easily realizes my intention.
Hajin places the goggles hanging by his neck to his eyes for a moment. “She is not a Djinn…” He has already told me what it can do, but the others don’t know of it yet. “This is the Djinn Detection Goggles. This is a prototype, so we only have one, but this can detect Djinns easily…”
Suho and Nayun nod at his explanation with approval, aware that they can trust Hajin’s words. Kim Hajin returns the goggles hanging on his neck. It is good equipment, but it has the penalty of being unable to use his Thousand Miles Eyes from his [Master Sharpshooter] Gift.
“Then if she has not become a Djinn, then what is it?” Nayun already knows the answer to it, but she cannot help but feel the need to utter this. “What is our plan?”
She looks at every one of us. This is a decision that is far weightier than an individual can decide alone. Maybe if the host is an unknown cadet, we’ll be able to easily make the hard choice for the sake of all of humanity. "How can we be so sure?" I ask.
According to them, Suho and Nayun have already dealt with the Devil's Seed's host. Yes, having two more hosts is unprecedented but entirely not impossible. I... I am scared... This is my honest feeling about the situation at hand.
"No, she's a host too..." Suho tells us in confirmation. "Having been able to cut it once, I now am able to detect them albeit imperfectly. I can say with confidence that there is a Devil's Seed inside Yoenha. It is very faint, but it is there."
This is going to be fucking dramatic.
“How about this? Let’s vote…” Suho suggests with a stoic gaze, firm on his words, yet has a tinge of unwillingness to it.
We need to move forward. We need to make a decision. I appreciate Suho being democratic though.
Just to be clear, I need to express the fact just so that there are no misunderstandings, and that this remains a formal procedure for our dear little club. “The assumption is Yoo Yoenha has become a host of the Devil… Is it? And the subject of our votes will be either to deal with her now or deal with her later. So what is it?”
“Those who are in favor of getting rid of her now, please raise your hands.” Kim Hajin suddenly blurts out. And to my surprise, the people who raised their hands are… Kim Suho… and Chae Nayun.
***
Kim Suho supplements. “We need to kill her.” He powerfully declares. “We must kill her…” He intones with a sad cry. He doesn’t want to, but he needs to, because it will be too late if they hesitate now.
He has already made that mistake once, and he will never repeat it again. Once he has the chance to kill the source, then he must do it regardless of his own feelings. If it is for protecting this world, then he must learn how to make sacrifices.
Hajin replies with an ounce of doubt still trying to overturn their thoughts. “Suho… You can cut concepts, right? Maybe you can cut them more accurately… For example, cut the Devil’s Seed from the host!”
“Hmmm…” Suho gives it time to think about it, but still shakes his head in the end. “That is… wishful thinking. My ideal hero is to become someone who wins through injustice despite the odds being all against him, but that is too… unpractical… I see that now.”
Kim Suho realizes how weak he currently is... And no amount of strength can overturn things around.
Who are you? Hajin feels a sense of betrayal. Something has changed in Suho. Hajin just knows it, but he cannot pinpoint when and where. “But…”
Interrupting his words are Nayun’s somber and chilly voice. “Does it mean that you are against this, Hajin? How about you Hyon Hyung?”
I choose to remain silent, unsure of what to say. Unlike Hajin who is insistent on delaying this, I am between deciding what is right and what I want. I want Yoenha to live! But I know the right decision is to end the Devil's Seed now! That is how Hajin did it in the novel, so why can it not be done now? Is it because Yoo Yoenha is worth it? Or am I just being a simp?
How about Nayun's elder brother who Hajin offs from the original novel?
Suho and Nayun are already decided on doing this.
My mind wanders to the recesses of the novel. Is there a way out of this?
I regret not telling Hajin his entire story. If only he knows what he did in the original novel.
***
Nayun does not have any expectations from Hajin anymore, but she feels betrayed, yet it is not exactly that either. It is more like… she feels that Hajin is being hypocritical. “What about then my brother? Why did Hajin choose to kill him then? Why is it that he is hesitant to do it on Yoenha? If it is out of necessity, then it should be the same for Yoenha.”
"Tell me, Hajin." Nayun coldly addresses Hajin. "You should already know that my brother has the Devil's Seed on him too. I told Suho and Hyon too. Do you know? In the future, you will choose to kill him..."
The dispute only gets more out of control. As usual, Suho doesn't understand the in-the-future reference as he is unaware of Nayun's regression origins. Thus, he simply looks at Hyon as if asking whether it is he, the clairvoyant who told Nayun about this.
Hyon Hyung ignores Suho.
“No, I don’t…” Hajin replies with strength in his voice dwindling away to Nayun’s question. “I don't know, but there has to be a way…” He adds with a trace of reluctance in his shuddering voice.
There has to be a way. This is the line Kim Suho tends to use when he is in a pinch, but now, Hajin is using it. Hajin’s mind turns to his SP and his Stigma which according to its definition is the source of all creation.
Meanwhile, Nayun is just getting more and more disappointed. Hajin might not have killed her brother yet, but in the future, Hajin will… or simply put, in Nayun’s mind, Hajin has already killed her brother.
“Don’t give us false hope, Kim Hajin…” Nayun has decided, she must take matters into her own hands. If she has to kill Yoenha and her own brother then so be it.
Kim Hajin has changed just like the same way Suho does. If it is before, Hajin will have no reluctance on offing Nayun’s big brother who is supposedly under a Devil’s Seed. Hajin will also have no reluctance of sacrificing Yoenha if it will help him reach the epilogue and go home.
Of course, he still wants to go home, but there is something more… Something greedy in him that he wishes to fulfill especially after he has become a character of this world. After hearing Nayun’s story, and learning of his own story from Hyon Hyung, Kim Hajin has become closer to this world as a person.
Kim Hajin doesn’t want to achieve a happy ending alone. He also wants the others to be happy. For him, Nayun, Suho, Yoenha, Rachel, and Jonghak are like his children. “Hyung! Will you just leave it like this? Please! Help me!”
***
Ah~! I feel shitty. My favorite characters are arguing… I don’t know what choices I have to make. Since the beginning, I have gone with the flow with the thoughts that I should enjoy every second I can share with my favorite characters… and honestly, I am enjoying every second of it.
But now? I feel awful.
But then. Kim Hajin calls me. “Hyung! Will you just leave it like this? Please! Help me!”
I hear him loud and clear, which wakes me up from my stupor. For the first time, Hajin calls me by my given name. “I heard you, and since you called me ‘Hyung’, I will give you my full support.”
I cross my arms with conviction. “Let’s do this! Let’s kill Yoenha!”
“Wha—” Hajin is utterly confused.
“???” Nayun feels like she is hearing things wrong.
“…” Suho just keeps silent, maybe he has built some immunity already to my shenanigans.
What is a kiss?
It is a show of affection. When a person gives a kiss or pecks with their lips to someone they like, it means that they are giving them a show of affection. When two people’s lips collide, it is also a kiss however the meaning is more intimate as it means they are reciprocating their expression of love to each other.
Then what about a French kiss? It is not called French because the doer of the verb is French. I don’t know about its cultural inclinations or origins, but it is simply kissing where two persons’ tongues intertwine. It is a show of lust which most often tickles people’s knockers just because it feels great.
I don’t know about Great, but I am scared.
Yoenha’s grip on my wrists is strong. Sometimes I wonder. When people kiss, do their noses collide? Apparently, no… Their noses do not collide. They just get to smell each other. How about the smooches? Does it taste like saliva? No, it tastes like the last meal a person eats.
I reciprocate Yoenha’s actions in a sense. I smooch her back as she smooch me. I let her tongue violate mine until she is all inside me. "You want to get freaky? Fine, let's get freaky!"
Do you want to play rough? Fine. Let’s play rough. "I am sorry Yoenha." I bite her tongue that dares violate my mouth. Following that is one crunchy headbutt. It makes her flinch backwards giving me enough space for a second more powerful headbut.
~Crack
I don’t know if it comes from me, her, or both of us but it sure hurts.
[Slight skull fracture detected.]
Well, thank you. I ignore the AI notification and power through the pain. “Quit dilly-dallying idiots, I need help!” I shout to the spectators. Nayun immediately acts on it as she tackles Yoenha and pins her on the walls. At least, Nayun is quick on the uptake when sensing that something wrong is going on.
Suho draws his sword and stands between me and Yoenha.
Meanwhile, Hajin drags me by my shoulders. “What is happening!?” He asks with a frown.
I spit Yoenha’s tongue from my lips and throw a series of instructions to Cube. “Restrain her! Restrain Yoenha and give me a freaking potion!”
Mechanical appendages sprout from the walls and the solid vice grips take hold of Yoenha’s limbs. Seeing this, Nayun retreat from her. I receive my healing potion and immediately down it. I feel my hurt forehead become ticklish until it is mended completely.
[Slight skull fracture is healed.]
“What happened?” Hajin asks me more calmly, holding my shoulder down. I meet Hajin's gaze, and then Nayun's and Suho's who are all equally curious.
I throw the potion bottle aside to give them a lazy summary. “A lot happened. That is what happened.”
Suho picks up Yoenha’s bloody tongue and examines its peculiarity. “What is this? It… looks familiar…” He did not see me spit it, so I cannot blame him for being clueless. But man, it does sure look familiar. I don't want to remind him through the early mornings he brushes his teeth, cuz I reckon that is where the familiarity comes from.
"What do you think?" I sarcastically ask. "Say, maybe it is my weenie I got lost..."
Hajin scrutinizes the ‘object’ through his [Observation and Reading], but even without that, he seems to understand what it is. “Suho… That is a tongue.”
Kim Suho expressionlessly look at the tongue and then to Hajin unsure of what he heard. “It is a tongue? Huh? Really?” He drops it in surprise. I sense something odd with Suho as if he is aware there is something wrong too the tongue. To be more specific, he seems to be aware something is wrong with Yoenha.
I trace Suho's eyes connecting to Yoenha.
“Dumbass,” Nayun cusses at Suho, lacking the awareness I have. Instead of contempt, I see the joy in her eyes that she gets to address another person as an idiot. She is very petty... and pitiful. “So, Hyon Hyung…” She intones. I look at Yoenha who is now unconscious maybe thanks to the headbutt.
“Can you tell us what is happening?” Nayun plainly interrogates me of the truth, while she pries Yoenha’s jaws open. “Wow, her tongue has already regenerated… This looks familiar… and bad…” She sees the entire affair after all.
Me biting Yoenha and causing blood to splatter everywhere, and there is Yoenha's risque behavior too.
“I hope it is just a false alarm,” I confess. “But I saw Yoenha attacking Rachel while looking moderately close to a Djinn in appearance.”
My eyes land on Hajin, and he easily realizes my intention.
Hajin places the goggles hanging by his neck to his eyes for a moment. “She is not a Djinn…” He has already told me what it can do, but the others don’t know of it yet. “This is the Djinn Detection Goggles. This is a prototype, so we only have one, but this can detect Djinns easily…”
Suho and Nayun nod at his explanation with approval, aware that they can trust Hajin’s words. Kim Hajin returns the goggles hanging on his neck. It is good equipment, but it has the penalty of being unable to use his Thousand Miles Eyes from his [Master Sharpshooter] Gift.
“Then if she has not become a Djinn, then what is it?” Nayun already knows the answer to it, but she cannot help but feel the need to utter this. “What is our plan?”
She looks at every one of us. This is a decision that is far weightier than an individual can decide alone. Maybe if the host is an unknown cadet, we’ll be able to easily make the hard choice for the sake of all of humanity. "How can we be so sure?" I ask.
According to them, Suho and Nayun have already dealt with the Devil's Seed's host. Yes, having two more hosts is unprecedented but entirely not impossible. I... I am scared... This is my honest feeling about the situation at hand.
"No, she's a host too..." Suho tells us in confirmation. "Having been able to cut it once, I now am able to detect them albeit imperfectly. I can say with confidence that there is a Devil's Seed inside Yoenha. It is very faint, but it is there."
This is going to be fucking dramatic.
“How about this? Let’s vote…” Suho suggests with a stoic gaze, firm on his words, yet has a tinge of unwillingness to it.
We need to move forward. We need to make a decision. I appreciate Suho being democratic though.
Just to be clear, I need to express the fact just so that there are no misunderstandings, and that this remains a formal procedure for our dear little club. “The assumption is Yoo Yoenha has become a host of the Devil… Is it? And the subject of our votes will be either to deal with her now or deal with her later. So what is it?”
“Those who are in favor of getting rid of her now, please raise your hands.” Kim Hajin suddenly blurts out. And to my surprise, the people who raised their hands are… Kim Suho… and Chae Nayun.
***
Kim Suho supplements. “We need to kill her.” He powerfully declares. “We must kill her…” He intones with a sad cry. He doesn’t want to, but he needs to, because it will be too late if they hesitate now.
He has already made that mistake once, and he will never repeat it again. Once he has the chance to kill the source, then he must do it regardless of his own feelings. If it is for protecting this world, then he must learn how to make sacrifices.
Hajin replies with an ounce of doubt still trying to overturn their thoughts. “Suho… You can cut concepts, right? Maybe you can cut them more accurately… For example, cut the Devil’s Seed from the host!”
“Hmmm…” Suho gives it time to think about it, but still shakes his head in the end. “That is… wishful thinking. My ideal hero is to become someone who wins through injustice despite the odds being all against him, but that is too… unpractical… I see that now.”
Kim Suho realizes how weak he currently is... And no amount of strength can overturn things around.
Who are you? Hajin feels a sense of betrayal. Something has changed in Suho. Hajin just knows it, but he cannot pinpoint when and where. “But…”
Interrupting his words are Nayun’s somber and chilly voice. “Does it mean that you are against this, Hajin? How about you Hyon Hyung?”
I choose to remain silent, unsure of what to say. Unlike Hajin who is insistent on delaying this, I am between deciding what is right and what I want. I want Yoenha to live! But I know the right decision is to end the Devil's Seed now! That is how Hajin did it in the novel, so why can it not be done now? Is it because Yoo Yoenha is worth it? Or am I just being a simp?
How about Nayun's elder brother who Hajin offs from the original novel?
Suho and Nayun are already decided on doing this.
My mind wanders to the recesses of the novel. Is there a way out of this?
I regret not telling Hajin his entire story. If only he knows what he did in the original novel.
***
Nayun does not have any expectations from Hajin anymore, but she feels betrayed, yet it is not exactly that either. It is more like… she feels that Hajin is being hypocritical. “What about then my brother? Why did Hajin choose to kill him then? Why is it that he is hesitant to do it on Yoenha? If it is out of necessity, then it should be the same for Yoenha.”
"Tell me, Hajin." Nayun coldly addresses Hajin. "You should already know that my brother has the Devil's Seed on him too. I told Suho and Hyon too. Do you know? In the future, you will choose to kill him..."
The dispute only gets more out of control. As usual, Suho doesn't understand the in-the-future reference as he is unaware of Nayun's regression origins. Thus, he simply looks at Hyon as if asking whether it is he, the clairvoyant who told Nayun about this.
Hyon Hyung ignores Suho.
“No, I don’t…” Hajin replies with strength in his voice dwindling away to Nayun’s question. “I don't know, but there has to be a way…” He adds with a trace of reluctance in his shuddering voice.
There has to be a way. This is the line Kim Suho tends to use when he is in a pinch, but now, Hajin is using it. Hajin’s mind turns to his SP and his Stigma which according to its definition is the source of all creation.
Meanwhile, Nayun is just getting more and more disappointed. Hajin might not have killed her brother yet, but in the future, Hajin will… or simply put, in Nayun’s mind, Hajin has already killed her brother.
“Don’t give us false hope, Kim Hajin…” Nayun has decided, she must take matters into her own hands. If she has to kill Yoenha and her own brother then so be it.
Kim Hajin has changed just like the same way Suho does. If it is before, Hajin will have no reluctance on offing Nayun’s big brother who is supposedly under a Devil’s Seed. Hajin will also have no reluctance of sacrificing Yoenha if it will help him reach the epilogue and go home.
Of course, he still wants to go home, but there is something more… Something greedy in him that he wishes to fulfill especially after he has become a character of this world. After hearing Nayun’s story, and learning of his own story from Hyon Hyung, Kim Hajin has become closer to this world as a person.
Kim Hajin doesn’t want to achieve a happy ending alone. He also wants the others to be happy. For him, Nayun, Suho, Yoenha, Rachel, and Jonghak are like his children. “Hyung! Will you just leave it like this? Please! Help me!”
***
Ah~! I feel shitty. My favorite characters are arguing… I don’t know what choices I have to make. Since the beginning, I have gone with the flow with the thoughts that I should enjoy every second I can share with my favorite characters… and honestly, I am enjoying every second of it.
But now? I feel awful.
But then. Kim Hajin calls me. “Hyung! Will you just leave it like this? Please! Help me!”
I hear him loud and clear, which wakes me up from my stupor. For the first time, Hajin calls me by my given name. “I heard you, and since you called me ‘Hyung’, I will give you my full support.”
I cross my arms with conviction. “Let’s do this! Let’s kill Yoenha!”
“Wha—” Hajin is utterly confused.
“???” Nayun feels like she is hearing things wrong.
“…” Suho just keeps silent, maybe he has built some immunity already to my shenanigans.
