Vol 3 Chapter 61

As he spoke, Kran slowly approached the front of the statue, lightly jumped up, and stood on the pedestal. The pedestal was quite large, leaving room even with Kran on it. Standing right in front of the maiden's statue, Kran slowly raised his hand holding the Luigina flower, like a knight making a vow to a princess at a window.

"They would place what should be in these empty hands like this."

Flutter.

Silently, a single Luigina flower fell into the clasped hands of the statue.

A moment later, a blinding light burst forth from those hands.

***

The capsule's cover opened with a zing. As Kapros tried to get up as if waking from sleep, he suddenly clutched his temples due to a sharp headache.

"Ugh..."

Ever since he had lost sleep because of Yu-wan last time, he had been having trouble sleeping, almost to the point of insomnia. That's why he had been spending even more time in the capsule lately, thinking it might be better to be in a state of light sleep, and it seemed to have been the right answer as it somewhat resolved the chronic fatigue from lack of sleep. Instead, he occasionally experienced severe migraines like now.

'Somehow it seems worse today, how annoying...'

As he got up unsteadily and looked at the clock, it was almost time to prepare for morning training.

"Computer. Prepare the bathroom."

[ Understood. ]

As soon as he finished speaking, the light turned on next to the living room with a click, and the sound of running water could be heard.

"Any missed messages?"

[ ...Mu-heon-nim, you have 1 voice message. ]

The answer came immediately when he asked, as he had set all messages received while he was gaming to be treated as missed messages. He widened his eyes a bit at the unexpected response, as he had thought there would be none as usual.

"Who sent it?"

[ The sender's number is not registered. ]

So it was sent by someone I don't know.

"Play it."

As he said this while going to the living room and sitting on the sofa, a voice said [ I will play it now. ], and a few seconds later, the voice message began to play.

[ ... '...zzzzzz...' ]

'...What's this?'

He could tell it was playing due to the low buzzing sound, but the voice of the person who left the message wasn't coming through. Just as he was about to say to stop it, thinking what this was and feeling annoyed, a low male voice that seemed to hesitate a bit began to speak.

[ ... 'I'm sorry for only sending a message now.' ]

'This voice.'

In that moment, Kapros turned his head in surprise towards where the voice was coming from.

The slightly cold voice, speaking in an awkward tone that wasn't commanding.

'Yu-wan...'

It was Yu-wan, who hadn't been in touch since he got the number before. As Kapros sat quietly, feeling a sudden, inexplicable mix of emotions, the voice that seemed to be speaking with some difficulty for him continued to be heard.

Yu-wan briefly asked about Kapros's well-being in a tone that showed he was trying his best, and then seemed to want to say something more, but ended up letting several moments of silence pass, just like before. Only after that did he say one thing in a low voice that, had he been standing in front of Kapros, would have been accompanied by downcast eyes that didn't suit his appearance.

[ ...'If I say I want to meet, it might sound ridiculous to you... but if it's okay, I'd like you to send a reply. But don't worry about it if you don't want to send one.' ]

Click.

[ ...Playback has ended. ]

"...What was that."

It took several minutes to start speaking, but it ended in 1 second.

However, Kapros couldn't say anything because he felt he could understand Yu-wan's behavior. After all, he was aware that the current relationship between Yu-wan and himself wasn't that of complete friends. Yu-wan had essentially made a sort of confession to Kapros, and Kapros hadn't given an answer yet, plus Yu-wan was away without a clear reason.

It's a relationship that could easily become awkward at this point, but does that guy still want to stay connected with him?

Kapros, who had been sitting facing the direction the sound had come from even after the playback ended, suddenly remembered that he had told the bathroom to fill with water and stood up abruptly. He had already clearly decided what answer to give to the message.

Un-o wasn't at the dojo when Kapros arrived a little later than usual. They had often met during early morning training since reuniting in MIST, but the last time they met, Un-o had said he found a morning part-time job, so it seemed it would be difficult to see him for a while.

As Kapros walked out wearing his uniform, trying not to limp, there was an unexpected person already sitting inside the training hall.

"...Master Instructor?"

"You're finally here. Sit down."

Although Kapros saw the Master Instructor every time he came for his part-time job, it was the first time seeing him at this early hour. As Kapros hesitated and sat in seiza position with some difficulty, he saw the Master Instructor frown.

"A guy with bad legs... You don't have to sit in seiza."

"It's fine."

As Kapros shook his head with lowered eyes, the Master Instructor clicked his tongue, seeming to know that further words would be futile.

"Well... It seems you've been coming diligently in the early mornings since last time."

"Yes."

"Last time" referred to when Kapros had thoroughly beaten up five thugs before.

"Have you seen any results?"

When Kapros blinked and couldn't answer the Master Instructor's suddenly direct and seemingly stiff tone, the Master Instructor asked again.

"Mu-heon. Have there been any results?"

Kapros slowly reflected on his recent training and opened his mouth.

"There hasn't been any big change from before. However, the ringing in my ears when I hold a sword has decreased a lot, so I think if I continue, results will show."

As he said, these days there weren't any dramatically improved areas compared to before, but there weren't any worse areas either. After picking up the sword again, Kapros had mainly been training to get used to the sword and to concentrate his mind.

Thanks to this, the hallucination-like voice of Seung-jo, the chilling memories of pain, and symptoms like difficulty breathing had mostly disappeared, but the buzzing tinnitus, mild headaches, and the problem of having to consciously choose his breaths remained. Because he couldn't get past this point, he had been in a stagnant situation with no progress and no regression for several months. The Master Instructor nodded.