FLIA 78

“No, we can’t. Absolutely not!”

“Seungryong.”

“Even now, just thinking about the first time I fell into the Flood makes my skin crawl!”

Yohan had no idea what Yoon Seungryong was talking about. But everyone else seemed to understand exactly what was going on between Lee Hyunmook and Seungryong. Ju Hoyoung, eyes still locked on his game console, responded casually.

“I’m in favor.”

“Hey, Ju Hoyoung!”

“Let’s be honest. If he did it because he went insane from the corruption, we should forgive him. And come on, it’s you saying this, Seungryong-hyung. That’s not right.”

At Ju Hoyoung’s words, Seungryong’s shoulders sank a little. Even so, the scowl on his face didn’t go away. Sensing the rising tension, Lee Hyunmook placed a hand on Yohan’s back. The warmth gave Yohan a sense of comfort.

“If there’s even a chance that the exit might open by targeting that core, then even if it’s just a corpse – or something worse – we have to bring him out.”

“It wasn’t okay without Yohan-ah, but it’s even more unacceptable now that he’s here!”

“But because he’s here, maybe it’ll be okay. And honestly, shouldn’t we at least confirm it first, for the sake of our humanity?”

When Seo Yakrin added her voice, Yoon Seungryong finally seemed deflated. He clamped his mouth shut and slumped against the wall of the cave. With a thud, he knocked his head once against the wall, then said nothing more. Yohan couldn’t stay silent any longer and asked anxiously,

“What exactly is everyone talking about?”

“Sorry, Yohan-ah. We didn’t mean to leave you out.”

Lee Hyunmook apologized first, then explained the situation to ease Yohan’s confusion.

“We were talking about bringing back Lee Chanha.”

Lee Chanha? The deputy leader of the Sunrise Team? Yohan was already feeling the absence of a tank during the previous battle, so the mention of his name came as a shock.

“But you said he was definitely dead.”

“Mm… I guess we should explain what happened first.”

Lee Hyunmook seemed ready to tell the full story, while Yoon Seungryong sighed and fished around in the air, pulling out a piece of dried jerky. He popped it into his mouth to shake off his bad mood. When Seo Yakrin jabbed him in the side, he glared at her once, then handed out pieces of jerky to the rest of the group.

“Chanha… was the first one swept away by the Flood. After me, he was the most affected.”

“To be honest, he wasn’t swept away. He jumped in on his own.”

Seungryong added gruffly. Lee Hyunmook didn’t deny that Chanha had entered willingly, so Yohan shook his head. To willingly dive into something so repulsive and horrifying, just by getting near it? He couldn’t believe it.

“Why would he do something like that?”

Hyunmook’s answer was simple.

“He went insane.”

“Yeah, completely out of his mind. He basically fell in love with the Flood.”

Seungryong added more detail. He went mad and was swept away by the Flood, then fell in love with it? Yohan couldn’t make sense of any of it. But that only made him realize how horrifying this must have been for everyone else.

“As you know, once you’re corrupted, your mind breaks. No matter what kind of negative enhancement you’ve got, to be blunt, you basically become a lunatic. And with Chanha-hyung, it was especially bad.”

Yohan recalled each of the team’s negative enhancement. Lee Hyunmook, who never gave up. Seungryong, who struggled with gluttony and lethargy. Seo Yakrin, who had anger management issues. And Ju Hoyoung, who was obsessed with games and had a strong tendency to avoid confrontation. Maybe because Ju Hoyoung had never actually fallen into the Flood, his negative enhancement didn’t feel quite as severe. Seungryong gave a bitter laugh.

“His was obsessive cleanliness.”

“Ah…”

Yohan let out a sigh. Of all things, obsessive cleanliness? In the Abyss? A place that was filthy, sticky, and oozing with rot? That condition would’ve driven Lee Chanha mad far faster than the others.

“He kept deceiving and turning the team against each other, stirring up conflict constantly. Then one day, he ran straight into the Flood… Even though the Team Leader went through hell trying to save him, he shook off his hand and let himself get swept away… We thought he’d died right then. But after a long while, he started showing up again.”

Seungryong spoke with a tone like he was remembering something from a distant, foggy past.

“And every time, he screwed with us. He tried again and again to drag us into the Flood with him, and he usually succeeded. I was hit the hardest… Eventually, he messed things up so badly we couldn’t be a team anymore. The Team Leader tried to do something, but by then it was already too late. …So what exactly did you do to Chanha-hyung?”

As Seungryong asked this, Lee Hyunmook quietly took the jerky Yohan was holding but hadn’t eaten and placed it in his mouth, then calmly responded.

“I made him as small as I could without killing him and buried him deep. Then, whenever he started to recover, I went back and shrank him again.”

It was a very sanitized way of saying it, but Yohan understood immediately. The jerky fell from his mouth. Only the rest of the group chewed away, unbothered.

“At some point, he just stopped recovering altogether. Maybe he didn’t have the strength.”

“Or maybe he was pretending not to.”

Seungryong said as he picked up the jerky Yohan had dropped. That could be true, Hyunmook admitted calmly, then added,

“The real problem is that I’ve been pretty out of it myself lately, so I wasn’t able to check properly.”

Right after he said that, the temperature around them seemed to drop sharply. No, it wasn’t just a feeling. Ju Hoyoung had released a wave of cold air. His face had gone completely pale. Yohan hurried to bathe him in light. Seo Yakrin let out a deep sigh and asked,

“So where exactly did you bury the deputy leader?”

“Near the cliff in the Hong Kong sector.”

“That’s pretty far. Then if he’s trying to find us right now, it’s going to take some time. We were all scattered not long ago.”

At Seo Yakrin’s words, Yoon Seungryong let out another long sigh and stood up. Then he started grumbling as he urged them on.

“Let’s get out of here first. This place is way too cramped for five people.”

At that, everyone began packing up their things. Yohan glanced back one more time, then followed the others. He felt uneasy, like he was walking away without resolving something important.

“So, are we heading to the Hong Kong sector next?”

“For now, yes.”

Yohan nodded quietly, looking rather downcast, and Lee Hyunmook offered an apology.

“Sorry for lying, Yohan-ah.”

“It’s okay. I think I understand why you said he was dead.”

From the perspective of Hyunmook and the others, it must have been easier to consider him dead. That’s why Yohan didn’t feel especially betrayed. Even from the short version of the story he’d just heard, his heart ached. A comrade turning into an enemy in an already unbearable Abyss, how painful must that have been?

“Honestly, it’s more likely Chanha was killed by another monster after getting too weak.”

“But… you still hope he’s alive, don’t you?”

Yohan looked at Hyunmook as he asked, and in silence, Hyunmook nodded. A heavy emotion was layered deep in his black eyes. Even if they somehow managed to escape the Abyss, it was the kind of accumulated despair and suffering that would never leave them, not even in their final moments. Yohan couldn’t begin to imagine the depth of that pain.

“I hope he’s alive too.”

When he spoke from the heart, Hyunmook gave him a faint smile. It looked like the long journey of searching for Lee Chanha would continue for a while. The Hong Kong sector… What kind of place would that be?

As each of them sank into their own thoughts, silence fell over the group. Yohan lifted his head. When he saw the mouth of the cave, a sense of relief washed over him. Maybe it was because the memories of being buried alive in the Black Mountain were starting to resurface.

Quickening his pace, Yohan stepped outside the cave, and his smile disappeared. He blinked, confused, and looked around.

“Hyunmook-hyung, the fog… it’s gone.”

Hyunmook immediately stepped closer and pulled Yohan into his arms. The thick fog, so dense you couldn’t see an inch ahead, had completely vanished, opening up a wide view. But in exchange, the reeking stench of rot grew so overwhelming that Yohan struggled to breathe and quickly scattered light around them.

“What the hell is going on?”

Sudden changes in the Abyss always led to the worst. Seo Yakrin cursed under her breath, her eyes sharpening. Yohan shrank back, slowly surveying their surroundings.

Now that the fog had lifted, they could finally see the Salt Lake sector in the distance. But it looked nothing like the kind of lake one might imagine. The lake was the color of sewage, and along its edge, thick, black, hair-like seaweed twisted and spread in all directions. Huge bubbles rose constantly from beneath the surface, hinting at something alive lurking below. The water itself was endlessly dark.

“This place gives me the creeps.”

Seungryong scowled and stood close beside Yohan, ready to react to any sudden attack. Then it happened. The group sensed something and turned their eyes toward the salt lake.

The bubbling surface swelled until something began to rise. No–it wasn’t just the water, it was something massive emerging from beneath. Yohan tensed. A whale? A giant squid? What kind of grotesque monster would it be this time?

In the thick tension, what broke through the surface was…..a human face.

“…Huh?”

Yohan let out a dazed sound, completely caught off guard. What first appeared was wet black hair. At first he thought it was more seaweed, but then a smooth white forehead and a straight nose followed. Dark red droplets slid down the strands of hair. It was a beautiful, clean face. In a place where everything was twisted and filthy, a face this intact was so out of place it felt unnatural.

But above all, the face was as massive as the surface of the lake itself.

“Wh… what?”

How could a human face that huge emerge from the lake? The salt lake, enormous as it was, looked like nothing more than a puddle in comparison. Yohan was completely overwhelmed. The pale white face slowly opened its previously closed eyes, and that’s when Yohan finally realized why it felt familiar.

“Lee Chanha…?”

He murmured in disbelief, and at that moment, those pitch-black, bottomless eyes twisted into a long arc as they stared straight at the group.

“Holy shit.”

The last words Yoon Seungryong and Seo Yakrin muttered in unison were the final thing Yohan heard before his consciousness was abruptly cut off.