Kapitel 24: Turning Point
Byung would head to the shower, he was not only with a high fever but the shivering was quite intense. Running a hot bath, he would sit beneath the steaming hot water that escaped from the shower faucet, and pummel his ice-cold skin.
"Man, that feels good." He said as he laid on the shower floor, he appreciated the warmth that came with his pounding drop.
"Wait, isn't this weird?" Byung would think to himself, lying with his back on the ground with his face up beneath a shower.
"Man, who gives a sh*t!" He muttered, closing his eyes as he drifted into a dream-like state and with it, came a very strange and grotesque figure.
This dream was the same as the others but with each overlapping just a little over the previous one, revealing more and more information like a book slowly unfolding.
A mass of body tore through the sky, falling from as high as 600 meters with a huge water mass beneath. It was Byung, how did he get here. He could hear a faint voice but upon trying to make out what it said, it was established to be mere gibberish. Bracing for impact, he could swear he heard Jin's voice but falling at such pace, hearing the exact words proved a tantamount task. Bracing himself, he crashed into the water below him, going a couple of meters below the water surface but the weirdest thing occurred, the water turned to blood. Trying to swim back up, but it felt like weights were placed on his body. The more he struggled, the faster he drowned. As if he was being pulled, just before passing out, he saw a being he couldn't make out stand on the water surface, squinting his hardest to make out its appearance but all he could see was a toothless broad smile.
"Huh? Homeless guy?" He tried to scream but the water in his lungs would not allow a sound escape the water.
Suddenly, the landscape and scenario completely changed, Byung found himself in a desolate land, littered with skeletons, withered trees, and a shining red sun.
"What the hell..?" Byung muttered, looking around. This scenery would make him shiver in fear, the air was barely breathable, and the ground was with crows leading up a slope.
Crows fell in multitudes. No, it could be more accurate to say it was raining dead crows.
The numbers gradually increased wave after wave, till the ground turned red. It had soaked up the blood from the countless crows
"This has to be a dream! Yes, a dream!" Byung said, trying to make sense of what was happening.
"You, who carries my mark. Beware, your destiny is one painted in death,." A voice echoed, the malevolent tone was enough to make even the bravest warrior lose their resolve to resist.
"Who said that!?" Byung would ask, looking around and saw nothing but dead crows.
A hand grabbed his top left shoulder from behind and Byung could not move, it was like paralysis was induced, and just then, he woke up.
"WHAAAT THE ACTUAL F*CK WAS THAT!?" Byung would shout, jolting back to reality. It did not take long for him to switch off the shower. A knock was heard at the door
"Hey, you good?" Kwan's voice would echo within the toilet walls.
"Yeah, man. It's nothing." Byung would respond, sounding somewhat fazed.
"I guess your reflection must have scared you, that is how we feel every day." Kwan said, clearly mocking Byung, expecting to draw an over the top reaction from Byung but was met with silence.
Putting his ear to the door to try and hear what was going inside but all he heard was the door unlocking from within and an enraged Byung emerging with a plumbing stick.
"H-hey! Take it easy. I was just kidding!" Kwan shouted while laughing. Luckily he had gained distance once the door was being unlocked. Byung was no match for his natural speed, and it only took a few seconds for Byung to be out of breath, futilely chasing him around.
"You calmed down yet? You do know you are sick..... and naked, right?" Kwan said, pointing at his genitals. But his lingering eyes would spot something strange on Byung.
"Byung, what is that?" He said, now pointing at his top left shoulder, looking troubled. Byung initially thought this was an attempt to divert his attention so he could slip away but Kwan's face said otherwise. Sparing his shoulder a glance and behold, a print that looked like a hand with abnormally long slender fingers was embedded into his flesh in the form of a red mark.
"Huh? How is this possible?" Byung would ask, rhetorically. Moving back in fear before stumbling to the ground with Kwan standing there, confused and trying to think of a logical explanation but none came to mind.
"Relax, you probably stayed under the shower for too long." Kwan said. This was the only logical explanation as he had been in the hot shower for quite some time.
"T-That has to be it, that is right." Byung would reply, laughing nervously.
"You will never get a girlfriend at this rate, man." Kwan said, sounding disappointed.
"SHUT THE F*CK UP! HOW DOES THAT EVEN RELATE TO WHAT IS HAPPENING!" Byung screamed in response, tossing the plumbing stick at Kwan but the throw was far from accurate.
Jinwoo awoke, but he was bound to a bloodied surgical table. He tried to speak but all that came out was muffled unintelligible noises, he had been gagged. His eyes soon darted chaotically to try and make out where he was but in doing so, he would see things he wished he had never seen. Body parts were preserved in big jars and tubes, ranging from genitals to internal organs, this was something you'd see in Victor Frankenstein's lab. He saw something or someone that looked familiar and upon discerning its identity, his pupils would dilate in absolute horror.
"That is….!" He thought, as the head of the child that was playing in his room a few days back was seen in a jar like a trophy hung up on display, with her eyes and tongue ripped out.
"Mmmmffffppppphhh!" Jinwoo would attempt to scream but no avail. He was getting restless.
"Oh, you are awake, Young One. I apologize for the inconvenience, it will be over really soon." The old man, who had on a blue surgeon robe and white latex gloves, said in a surprisingly reassuring tone.
"It is ironic, is it not? I saved you only to kill you. It is almost poetic." The old man said, lining up his scalpels of varying size. Noticing Jinwoo's gaze was in the direction of the severed heads.
"Oh! That? They were just like you. People I saved, does that not give me the right to decide how they die?" The old man would ask but of course, this was rhetorical as he did not expect an answer from Jinwoo.
"You see. The day I saved you, is the day you died. Young One, this is not personal but once you reach my age, you need a hobby that keeps your heart racing." The old man continued to speak in a casual tone, it was clear he thought he was doing nothing wrong here.
He noticed Jinwoo stopped struggling, and he took this as a sign of surrender.
"Good, you have accepted your fate." the old man said, picking up a scalpel commonly used to dissect a person and began walked towards him, locking eye(s) with Jinwoo just before proceeding.
"Now then, let's begin." The old man said. Digging his scalpel into the abdomen of Jinwoo, it was like a piercing pain shot through his cerebrum, and his eye-rolling completely to the back of his head. The searing pain that rocked his body was unimaginable. Slowly, and intricately, he would split his abdomen right down the middle but made sure not to damage any internal organs. At this point, Jinwoo passed out due to the pain being too much for any human to handle.
The man would proceed to dig his hands into his guts, rummaging through the thick entrails before grabbing firmly unto it and yanking out his organs with one strong tug.
"Thank you for making this old man's heartbeat once again. You cannot blame me for wanting that much, can you?" The old man asked while laughing as the organs he had yanked out were put into a metal rusted bucket that was strategically placed on the floor beforehand.
"You are right, I cannot blame you." A voice said behind him, the old man would freeze in place as he looked back to see Jinwoo standing with his arms cross. He was not in any shackles and was very much alive.
With this revelation, he would shoot the very dead body before him a glance but it was nowhere to be seen, the blood on his gloves had vanished as well. It was like it never existed in the first place. He found himself bound to the table in the same manner as Jinwoo, their roles were now reversed.
"W-What is going on?" The old man asked confused, and Jinwoo would not utter a word but with an intensified glare, a scene played in the head of the helpless veteran and it all became clear.
The very moment the man established eye contact with Jinwoo, namely the empty socket. He was trapped in an illusion similarly to Chaewon. In this false reality, he carried out his cruelty but in reality, there he stood. But the question now is, was this very reality a false or true reality?
"W-What are you..!?" He asked Jinwoo but Jinwoo simply walked towards the table in which he was bound to.
"Humans… You are truly terrifying creatures brought forth from pure hatred. You scare me more than the monsters that lurk in the dark." Jinwoo said, with a cold stare.
"D-Don't kill me, I am just an old man." The old man would plead.
"Oh! I am not killing you, man" Jinwoo said, laughing with an innocent-looking exterior. This old man nervously laughed along with him.
"Death is too good for a piece of sh*t like you…." Jinwoo said, and this would make the old man's laughter cease at once.
The man's eyes would begin to swell, reaching an abnormal size before popping like a balloon, prompting blood to splatter. He screamed in agonizing pain but this was just beginning.
He could feel his ears suffer the same fate, swelling, and blowing up. But this paled in comparison on what was about to unfold, Jinwoo had shown a much more sadistic side, one that was unseen by most.
Taking the scalpel, he began mutilating the elderly man. Before peeling the entire skin off his arms to reveal his bare flesh before splitting his abdomen right down the middle, damaging his internal organs with that one vertical slice. This was the last straw, the old man would 'die' on the spot or so he thought.
A loop would begin, making him experience the torture over and over again. This was his hell. It might be in his mind but his brain could not discern what was real and what was not.
Each minute there is but a second in reality, the man would eventually die of a cardiac arrest.
The illusion had ended, and reality set in. The elderly man was standing and only fell to the ground after his heart stopped beating.
Jinwoo proceeded to break out of his shackles, getting to his feet. He would look at the lifeless man at his feet and not feel a tiny bit of remorse.
Bowing his head, he said a prayer to the deceased within this compartment. He wanted to leave but saw a 25 liter keg of gasoline. It was said in some tribes that fire frees the souls and that was exactly what these people needed.
Dousing the entire floor in gasoline, before tossing a match stick, consuming the entire floor as he made his way out of the building. The fire did not leave that room due to how it was constructed, allowing it to burn silently.
"I hope you all find peace." He muttered.
Geschenke
-- Geschenk
erhalten Wöchentlicher Energiestatus
-- Power-
Rangliste 
-- Power-
Stein