Chapter 155 – Chapter 155 – Merlin
A middle-aged man hums.
“Whip~ Whiik~ Poof~.”
Earphones were plugged into the ears of a middle-aged man humming thin, thin notes as if following a quiet tone.
Instead of wireless earphones, earphones connected with a pure white line were plugged into a square mp3 player.
The man nodded his head quietly while listening to the music flowing from the mp3.
He acted like everyone walking down the street would look back on him at least once, but oddly enough, he matched so well with the sad face of a man.
Passers-by who saw him naturally passed by without paying attention to him.
The man continued his hum, not caring about the glances pouring down on him.
Even though he was one of the ten famous members of the council, he had no one to recognize here anyway.
Merlin.
Because knowing this name and knowing one’s face had different meanings.
“Whip-whee-whee-whee.”
Merlin muttered the calming classical music flowing in his ears and stepped into his alley.
Light did not penetrate well, and the floor smelled of damp water.
Merlin had nothing to do with it.
Rather, the old memories came to mind, and Merlin only drew a small smile.
A gentle hum echoes through the back alley.
As if familiar, a party appeared in front of Merlin, stepping on a puddle and advancing.
Poo-! Poo-!
A boy who is being beaten one-sidedly.
And several muscular men surrounding it.
Seeing the boy’s blood dripping from his lips, Merlin reached out to stroke his beard as was his custom.
“This.”
There was no tactile feeling in his hand.
He used to do this sometimes.
It was a young body, but the habit of the old old body was still the same.
“Clack cluck.”
Merlin gave a strange laugh.
A damp alleyway, a boy bleeding in front of him, and himself who couldn’t abandon his old habits.
The coincidence of these three things was so beautiful that she seemed to reflect her own past.
Accident.
It happened without any causal relationship, but in the end, the tunes of this beautiful world are derived one by one.
“What is this old man…”
The muscular man who was kicking at the boy glared at Merlin.
Seeing Merlin, who was smiling strangely for a moment, stopped her body as she stood tall.
Seeing that Merlin in front of me was a skinny, middle-aged man, the man spat menacingly.
“Go on your way, I’m busy.”
An entertainment district established after the introduction of the succubus inn.
Unlike the succubus inn, which only accepts a limited number of guests per day and always has to pay the appropriate price.
It was dark in the back alleys of this entertainment district where various illegal prices and threats were exchanged.
And Merlin, who was well aware of this fact, became more immersed in the music in her ears and hummed.
“Wheek~.”
Memories of her past flashed through Merlin’s mind as he hummed her music.
* *
There was no name.
The word you call yourself 13.
Whenever a cold two-digit number was called out of someone’s mouth, he had to open his eyes and move.
A cold, damp solitary cell.
The light of the city streaming in not from the window, but from the grate above, was always beautifully shattered.
Sometimes it shimmers in a puddle on the floor, and sometimes the light scattered by a car is torn.
Unlike the solitary cell wrapped in darkness, looking at the light up there would make me dazed for a moment.
“13, come out.”
Chunk.
But there was no time to appreciate the light.
This is because as soon as she opened her eyes to the voice calling her, the door to the solitary cell opened, and a male hand approached.
“Yes, Merlin.”
13 said his father’s name and joined his hand.
His eyes wandered for a moment at the light shimmering on the bars, but 13 shook his head and followed his father’s hand to a certain room.
To push away the darkness, I lit a candle.
A decently sized room with still shallow darkness.
However, compared to the appropriately sized room, 13, who looked at dozens of desks placed close to each other, put her butt on one of them.
13 looked at the blackboard in front of him.
On one side of the wall made of blackboards, letters the size of ants were written.
13 wiped his hand and began to take the writing into his head.
It was a letter that would disappear after an hour.
If you can’t memorize that before the letters that will be filled up again, like the empty desks scattered around you.
Like the children who originally sat close to each other, 13, who knew it would disappear, slowly moved its frozen fingertips.
Square, square.
Scratching the desk with her fingernails, she began to memorize.
It was only after the blackboard was changed 12 times that 13 finished her memorization and returned to her own room.
“Come here.”
What welcomed 13 back to her room was a syringe.
Thirteen could feel her heart pounding when an injection of the blue solution was placed in her forearm.
“Heo-eok, heo-eok.”
Fluff.
Her eyesight was relaxed, and 13, who was sitting on the floor, shook her eyes.
In order to look even a little more at the only light shedding through the bars in the dark room.
13, who kept her light in her eyes until the end, she tossed and turned her body at the sound of calling herself again.
“13, come out.”
It was painful, but Thirteen slowly opened her eyes at the voice that allowed her to see the light again.
Time passed.
Dozens, hundreds, thousands of times let the light more.
The child who was sitting at the desk before he knew it was himself.
Merlin must have been quite grieved by it, and at some point she began to write her handwriting on her blackboard and she began to explain herself to herself.
“Damn them, even though you have magic, you’re just trying to bury it. Thirteen, you have to show them. The magic of origin that you used in ancient times. Only if you succeed, I can be recognized.”
As time passed, there were more and more explanations like Merlin’s complaints.
Merlin’s explanation, sometimes with a suppressed voice like a beast and sometimes crying like a child, made her 13 reflect on her own situation.
If you don’t succeed, you die.
Like the children who disappeared before her, Thirteen, who noticed that only her memories would turn into the remaining injections, simply memorized her handwriting.
Hundreds of more lights flowed like that.
Unlike before, Merlin did not call Thirteen by name.
If 13 wakes up and blankly looks at the light outside the bars.
He just slowly approached and opened the door to the solitary cell.
And from then on, Merlin ordered not to write, but to write in the air.
Whip, Whip.
When Merlin asked him to list the letters he had learned so far, 13 just waved his hand in a daze.
No matter how much I imitated the writing on the desk with my fingernails, nothing changed.
Hundreds of more lights flowed like that.
Just as Merlin gradually turned to beating 13, spitting out her profanities.
One change occurred in 13.
At one point while lying down after receiving the syringe, 13 could hear a small sound outside her grate.
“Ah.”
It was the first exclamation uttered by 13, who had not uttered anything in the room.
The soft and beautiful pitched sound made 13 mesmerized.
Even more than when his eyes were taken by the flashing light for the first time, that simple little sound shook 13’s mind.
Even as the blue liquid in the syringe gradually closed her vision, Thirteen opened her eyes to hear the sound as much as possible.
However, the sound always cut off, and 13 woke up to the daily life that came again.
Hundreds of more lights flashed.
Unlike 13, who always had to hear the same voice, Merlin’s appearance has changed considerably.
Poo-! Poo-!
Merlin, who mercilessly hooded the 13, proclaimed it to the 13 one day.
“Tomorrow… Tomorrow… Will be the last.”
Whiik.
Merlin placed the syringe on Thirteen and disappeared.
Thirteen blinked at Merlin’s meaningful words.
She had never been able to fulfill Merlin’s order to embroider letters in her air.
She knew for sure that she would die tomorrow.
So that.
13 tried to escape little by little.
He tore off the gnawed bars through which the light streamed.
If it was like before, it would have been unimaginable, but the sound coming from outside made 13 move.
Click.
My feet touched the puddle for the first time.
It was fishy and dirty water to others, but to 13 it was quite a satisfactory sensation.
Different – different, different -.
A small singing voice came from far away.
Thirteen felt the syringe blurring her mind, but slowly moved her foot towards it.
Clap, Clap.
As he moved his feet, at some point he stepped into an empty alleyway.
The sound of singing came from right next to the alley.
It was on a different level from what I was hearing in solitary confinement.
It was a loud sound that made my heart tremble.
The perfect sound created by the harmony of soft and powerful melodies.
Thirteen pressed against the wall as if possessed, and tried to approach it.
Poo-!
The impact on the back of her own head knocked her head to the floor.
Swoop.
Panting on the floor, listening to the sound.
Someone grabbed his ink and lifted it up.
“An ungrateful bastard.”
Merlin’s face was visible in the reddened field of vision.
He was holding his hands up towards himself with a very angry face.
Ugh-.
Pure white light on the fingertips.
He soon knew he would die if he stayed, but Thirteen just listened quietly.
Ddantddddddddddanda- Baaaaam!
The singing voice slowly grew.
All the notes they had played so far were thrown away, and the growing tone naturally made 13th’s heart thump.
Chaeeng-!
Zenith.
As if they sang just for this, along with a song that explodes.
Thirteen slowly raised her hand.
Swoop.
And she unknowingly waved her hand.
Poo-!
Merlin’s head exploded.
At the same time, all the notes of the song exploded in an instant.
“Ah.”
Thirteen muttered blankly.
In the alleyway drenched in blood, 13 was overcome with joy asheheard the dying song again.
“Ah.”
I was able to find the meaning of life.
Feeling the moist lower part of his body, 13 let out a big laugh for the first time.
* *
“Wheek~.”
Feeling the feelings of her past after a long time, Merlin listened to her slowly rising music.
It was just around here.
The area where she first found the meaning of her life.
“……”
The muscular man who was watching her Merlin flinched.
She instinctively sensed something, and he slowly withdrew her feet, but she was already approaching the climax of her song.
Merlin coincided with this coincidence, and she decided to play.
Swoop.
The white light extending from her fingertips wrapped around the man’s arm.
Poo-!
The man’s arm was crushed.
“Aagh!”
Unfortunately, she had no intention of killing her.
No matter how trash it was, there was too much risk to kill.
So Merlin, in time with her music, burst the arms of the men who surrounded the boy one by one.
Bam bam bam bam-!
The men’s arms bursting out with the music made Merlin smile.
“Ughhhhh…”
Seeing the men lying on the ground like worms, Merlin felt a thrill of pleasure and approached the boy lying face down.
“Sa… Save…”
She begged Merlin for her mercy as the boy who had been beaten up by a man bled from her mouth.
Merlin smiled benevolently, and she simply put the mp3 player in the boy’s hand and earphones over her ears.
Differently different-.
The music of that time that was still playing near the climax.
Putting it in the boy’s ear, Merlin raised her body.
The boy trembled and listened quietly to the music.
“I hope you feel the same way I do.”
Merlin whispered.
Turning her back to her boy, Merlin hummed as she walked out of her alleyway.
She didn’t hear any songs in her ears.
It didn’t matter now.
No matter how much time passed, her music was always flowing in my mind.
Humming her song, which she still hears in the corner of her head, Merlin greeted her own guest who approached her just in time.
“How are you?”
Kang Joon.
“Hello, Merlin.”
At Kang Joon’s voice calling her name, Merlin grinned.
