Not A Regressor-Chapter 244: Interlude - Left Path

His breathing grew ragged and heavy. “Haa, haa!”

Blood from his wounds soaked through his clothes.

“Agh.”

Kwon Oh-Jin poured the potion supplied by the False Star Cult onto his injuries.

“Damn it! Even Madecassol[1] would be more effective than this crap.”

He hadn’t expected much from the supplies given to someone like him, a grunt with no title or rank.

Crawling across the ground, Kwon Oh-Jin rifled through the pockets of a fellow cultist whose head had been split open by a Valhalla Guild member’s hammer.

“Well, at least this guy has some decent stuff.”

After pouring another potion on his wounds, he leaned against the cave wall with a heavy sigh.

“It’s already... been half a year.”

It had been six months since he left Song Ha-Eun’s side and became a False Star Cult member. The crushing loneliness of being unable to see her face or hear her voice had been unbearable.

Just a little longer and...

He touched the left side of his chest. Thanks to the Owl Nebula’s blessing, he had mostly healed enough to move again. However, no sign of a Stigma appeared on his chest to signify that he was an Awakener.

Even the fake Stigma of Aquarius I carved in before disappeared during the healing process.

All he could feel now was smooth, unblemished skin.

Kwon Oh-Jin whispered a vow he knew no one could hear, “I’ll definitely come back to you when I become an Awakener, Ha-Eun.”

For now, he was nothing more than a nobody. Worthless without a Stigma, but if he managed to gain one and build up some merit, he would eventually be allowed access to the Moon Palace where the False Star Cult stored its most treasured Astral Relics.

I’ll hit the jackpot there and then make a run for it.

It was nearly impossible for someone like him to even approach the Moon Palace as of right now, but he had a plan.

If I can just deceive Cheon Do-Yoon, or rather, the Serpent that’s manipulating him...

He had spent his whole life pulling scams, so he was confident in his ability to deceive others.

“Though, I’m not sure if Ha-Eun will take me in even if I shamelessly crawl back.”

Kwon Oh-Jin bitterly smiled and clenched his fist.

Even now, six months later, he still remembered the day he left her side. He only left behind a pitiful note saying, “Please take care of Ha-Eun.”

His chest ached like a blade was digging into it, but he didn’t regret his choice. Even if he went back to that moment, he would make the same decision again.

At the very least, I didn’t want to get in her way.

Song Ha-Eun had become a Valhalla Guild member and one of the Guardian Stars. Her life had just started to shine brilliantly. The last thing he wanted to be was a speck of dirty dust tarnishing that light, so he left behind nothing but a short note asking Lee Shin-Hyuk to take care of her.

He didn’t even say a proper goodbye and simply disappeared from her life.

“Time to get going now.”

Seeing that the bleeding had mostly stopped, Kwon Oh-Jin slowly pushed himself up.

By now, they should’ve all escaped through the exit.

During the battle against the Valhalla Guild, he had deliberately leaked information that a False Star Cult executor was in the cavern. Knowing full well how terrifyingly strong those executors under the Serpent were, the others would have retreated immediately to the external route.

There are some forces stationed there, but...

Lee Shin-Hyuk, Lee Woo-Hyuk, and Song Ha-Eun would be able to break through.

Staggering on his feet, Kwon Oh-Jin walked toward the cavern.

By now, the False Star Cult executors stationed there had likely secured the Dragon’s Heart and exited the dungeon.

Let’s see if there’s anything left worth scavenging before I leave.

Even just a scrap of the Dragon’s Heart would be a blessing for someone like him, who didn’t even have a Stigma yet. Kwon Oh-Jin stepped over collapsed rocks and debris until he finally arrived at the inner cavern.

“Whoa.”

A vast space made of blue crystals lay before him. He couldn’t sense the mana in it clearly, but his instincts told him that something powerful lingered here.

“There really might be something worth taking.” 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

Kwon Oh-Jin scanned the space with sparkling eyes. Just then, something caught his eye.

“Did this get melted?”

The floor and walls were scorched black as if they had been seared by intense flames. Following the trail, Kwon Oh-Jin moved deeper into the collapsed rubble and spotted something reddish and tangled like thread.

“This is...”

It wasn’t thread. It was hair.

“Huh?” A chill crawled down his spine. “N-No, Ha-Eun should’ve gone toward the exit...”

Shaking off the ominous thought, he began clearing the crystal debris. His breathing grew heavier and quicker. With each piece he moved, something trapped beneath the rubble began to take shape. Clothes, soaked in blood, and then—a woman with hair redder than blood.

“W-Wait...?”

There lay a gruesome corpse with her left eye gouged out. Half of her face had disappeared, but Kwon Oh-Jin instantly recognized her.

“Ha-Eun...?”

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why, why?

“Why... are you here, Ha-Eun?”

Kwon Oh-Jin’s breathing grew erratic. He ran his trembling hands over the body buried under the debris again and again.

“No...”

This couldn’t be Song Ha-Eun. It couldn’t be Song Ha-Eun.

“I told you... The executors were in the inner cavern.”

Song Ha-Eun shouldn’t have come here. No matter what happened, she shouldn’t have been here.

“I gave you information! I told you that they were in there! So then, why, why...”

Someone should have stopped her if she tried to come here alone. Kwon Oh-Jin had even prepared someone to take that role in his place.

“You said... you’d protect her... You said you would protect her!”

Kwon Oh-Jin pulled Song Ha-Eun’s body into his trembling arms. Her body still held a fading warmth, and he desperately embraced the remaining heat that slowly drained away.

“Ha-Eun, Ha-Eun, Ha-Eun.”

It was strange. His chest felt like it was being ripped apart from sadness, and yet he couldn’t shed any tears.

“You’re not really dead, right, Ha-Eun?”

The world felt like one giant theater, and everything turned black and white like an old film. The world he once knew and lived in suddenly felt so unfamiliar.

“Ha, haha. Right? Ha-Eun...?”

Maybe his entire life had just been a performance. The orphanage director who tormented him and Lee Shin-Hyuk, who had taken away his hope... They were all just actors hired for this play. At the end, someone would pop out with a smile and say, “Ta-da! Thanks for watching until the end!”

“Please... please tell me this is all a lie. Please?”

If that were true, why didn’t the curtains fall on this goddamn play?

Just then, a searing pain exploded from the left side of his chest.

Rumble.

“Agh!”

Along with the pain, a clear chime rang in his ears.

Ring!

[The Black Heaven is undergoing its first enlightenment!]

[The Black Heaven is absorbing the Stigma of Draco.]

Kwon Oh-Jin frowned at the unfamiliar word.

“Black Heaven?”

Rumble!

Soon afterward, black clouds flowed out uncontrollably from his palm, engulfing Song Ha-Eun’s chest. From those clouds, he felt a force he had never felt before. The Stigma of Draco’s mana, which belonged to Song Ha-Eun, entered him.

“No...”

Kwon Oh-Jin reached toward the black clouds greedily devouring the Stigma. The mana he had desperately longed for was finally filling him up.

“Don’t eat it...!”

This belonged to Song Ha-Eun. It had to be Song Ha-Eun’s.

“I said, don’t fucking eat it!”

He tried to brush away the black clouds clinging to her chest. It scattered like smoke, only to recondense and continue devouring Song Ha-Eun’s mana.

“Please... stop! Please!” He screamed and howled, but the Black Heaven’s clouds didn’t hear his desperate cries as it gluttonously devoured her mana. “Stop, stop, stop. I said fucking stop, you bastard!”

The Stigma’s mana flooded into him. With it, the last remnants of mana within her corpse began to vanish. Her body, drained of mana, rapidly grew cold.

The lingering warmth, the warmth he had yearned for so desperately, cooled to a chilling temperature and hardened lifelessly.

Ring!

[Kwon Oh-Jin has successfully absorbed the Stigma of Draco!]

[The Stigma of Draco has been set as the primary Stigma.]

A searing pain, like being branded with a hot iron, scorched the left side of his chest.

Sizzle.

“Ah...”

Kwon Oh-Jin touched his chest with trembling hands and felt the Stigma of Draco that once belonged to Song Ha-Eun.

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhh!”

His world collapsed. It had been completely crushed, trampled, and shattered. Flames roared up and wrapped around him.

Whoosh!

He knew these flames all too well. Beyond the blazing inferno, Song Ha-Eun’s face overlapped with the fire.

“Ha-Eun...?”

With a trembling hand, Kwon Oh-Jin reached toward the flames. Song Ha-Eun’s face faded away like smoke in the fire.

Kwon Oh-Jin’s eyes became drained of life and void of light. With empty eyes, he looked down at her now-cold corpse.

Just then, he could hear someone’s voice.

“Huh? Someone’s still alive?”

“Looks like that guy came here hoping to pick up scraps like us.”

“Hey, isn’t he that one dude? You know, the little brother of that woman from the Guardian Stars?”

“Oh yeah, that’s him.”

The voices sounded strange in his ears like they were amateur actors reading from a script.

A dry, bitter laugh slipped from his mouth. “Ha, haha.”

Right, of course, the voices sounded fake.

“Because all of this... is a lie.”

This world was nothing more than an elaborately crafted play.

Kwon Oh-Jin slowly rose to his feet. Flames, hot as a dragon’s breath, surged up and wrapped around him.

Fwoosh!

“What the? Didn’t that bastard not have a Stigma?”

“Did he find an Astral Relic or something?”

“Hehe. That’s good for us.”

The False Star Cult cultists approached with twisted grins.

Kwon Oh-Jin turned to face them and also made a twisted smile that matched theirs.

“That’s right.”

This was all a well-made play.

“Then it’s time to bring down the curtain and end it all.”

His eyes flickered with a ghostly blue flame.

Horrific screams, smoke, and the stench of burning flesh filled the cavern moments later.

This was a story never recorded in the great epics of the hero who defeated the Heavenly Demon after countless trials and tribulations.

The tale of the path that was not chosen—the left path.

1. A popular wound healing ointment used in South Korea to prevent scarring. ☜