## Chapter 135 – Attraction (11)
The moment the elevator doors slide open with a soft chime, I dash out.
Towards where Chanwoo is, towards the place where ‘he’ is felt, I run down the long hallway.
I can’t feel him now, but he was definitely here. Where, where could he be?
I pass through the endlessly stretching hallway, turn to the side, and head to the right.
This time to the left, I run straight down another hallway that seems to have no end.
“…Ah.”
“…Noona? I told you not to come here…”
Turning towards the path on the right for the last time, I see a familiar back.
The eyes of the man who turns to look at me are definitely Chanwoo’s, but something is different from usual.
As he stammers in confusion, having made eye contact with me, who shouldn’t be here,
I run as fast as I can and hug him tightly.
“Why are you suddenly like this?”
“…No, it’s okay now.”
I actually knew. It wasn’t him after all. It was the power of the ‘Root King’ inside Chanwoo.
It seemed like the power inside Chanwoo was amplified by some influence and was being unleashed.
It’s disappointing that I couldn’t meet him again, but it’s okay…
I hug the man who resembles him, enjoying the familiar comfort, and bury my face in his chest.
Even after being reborn in this era, I’m still only receiving his help. Thank you for protecting this child.
“…Uh, are you really okay?”
“…”
Chanwoo, with his hands raised, unsure of where to put them, asks me in confusion.
Instead of answering with my voice, I quietly nod my head in his arms,
and I feel his still frozen arms gently wrap around me, and his large hand patting my back.
“Hey, I think I found the device you were talking about… Oof…”
Seohee’s voice suddenly comes from the door on the left side of the hallway.
While I was feeling a happiness as if I were in another world inside him,
hearing someone else’s voice quickly makes me realize that this is reality.
The emotion I feel now that I’m out of my happy delusion and back in reality is… embarrassment.
Seohee seemed like she was trying to give us space after seeing the atmosphere,
but I quickly push Chanwoo away. My face is too hot, and I can’t properly meet his eyes.
How much did Seohee see? From when I ran to Chanwoo? Or from when I was acting spoiled in his arms? Aaaah!! Embarrassing! I’m too ashamed to make eye contact with Seohee or Chanwoo!
“…Did I misread the atmosphere?”
“No, it’s okay. It seems like Noona was worried again.”
I can’t see it because I’m hiding my flushed face with both hands,
but I can tell that Chanwoo and Seohee are facing each other and talking.
Seohee is worried that she interrupted at a bad time, and Chanwoo notices that I’m embarrassed and is covering for me.
I’m grateful for their consideration, but it only makes me feel smaller…
“…Anyway, you found it? Where is it?”
“This lab is a bit wider than the other labs, so I looked around,
and there was a staircase leading down. There’s a huge device inside.”
“Great, Noona.”
“U, uh?!”
While the two were talking, I was looking elsewhere, fanning my face to cool down,
when Chanwoo suddenly called me, and I turned around in surprise to answer.
Chanwoo, who is looking back at me with a bright smile, said in a voice that sounds like he’s plotting something.
“Would you like to help too, Noona?”
——————————————-
“…Ugh… Ugh…”
My head is throbbing. My vision is dark, so I shake my head and look around.
Have I not opened my eyes yet? It’s too dark around me. What the heck happened?
I was definitely grabbing Im Chanwoo and trying to take him to the lab when light came from Im Chanwoo…
I piece together the shattered fragments of my memory, like shards of glass from a broken vase.
The memory that emerges from the string of memories is the light that emanated from Im Chanwoo,
and the moment I saw that light, I felt an intense pain all over my body and collapsed to the floor.
Next, that man was definitely in my head…
“Hic?! I, I…!”
I, I remember! That old man… that man took over my body without permission…!
I… I’m ‘me’ right now, right? My name is Lee Yuri… my dream was to be a singer… I’m 20 years old…
The memories are coming back properly, even old memories, so unlike what I was worried about, I seem to still be ‘me’.
I take a deep breath, relieved that I’m still here.
Old man, what are you thinking? It’s different from what we agreed!
…
…Old man?
The man’s voice, which always apologized in a gentle voice when I shouted, isn’t heard.
No matter how much I call out to the old man in my mind, there’s no answer, and only my voice echoes.
Something’s wrong. I can’t feel the old man. But the power is still felt inside my body…?
“Ha, ha…! It’s better this way, since that monster whose identity I don’t even know is gone!”
I’ve been thinking about it ever since I heard that voice. That something was off.
The worries and suspicions I always had have become a reality with the worst possible form and have come to me.
That man, he’s been trying to steal my body all along…
But it’s okay now, I can’t hear that noisy voice anymore, and I still have the power.
I can just start over from the beginning. First, Jung Ah-woon, I need to contact NO. 2, who I had attached to that old man…
I endured the pain that was enveloping my whole body and barely managed to stand up.
But my knees wouldn’t straighten. What? Why is this happening? This time, I tried to stretch out my arm.
But my arm was in the same state as my legs, as if something was grabbing my arm and wouldn’t let go, like being stuck in a swamp.
…It’s dark, so I don’t even know what’s grabbing me… but I can take care of this with this power…!
My arm is swallowed by something, and I gather strength in the fingers that are barely wiggling at the end.
I was going to use telekinesis to cut this off completely, but the power isn’t gathering.
“…Wh, why…”
“You wouldn’t know, but the Seoul branch had a device to suppress the power of the Fruit.
I attached that to the device, so don’t waste your energy and just stay still.”
A man’s voice is heard from far away in the deep darkness.
“…Im Chanwoo?! Is that you?”
I raised my voice and shouted in the direction where I heard his voice.
What came back was not an answer, but a mocking laugh that ‘poked’ at me at strange intervals.
A device that suppresses my power? There’s no way there’s something like that…
I put strength in my hand again, but the power still doesn’t gather and scatters in the air.
“Ugh?!”
Again, again, again, I try to gather strength, repeating it several times, but the result is the same.
Just as I was about to take a deep breath and gather strength again without giving up,
an intense light that seared my eyes began to illuminate this wide space.
My eyes, which had become accustomed to the darkness, couldn’t handle the sudden light and hid behind my eyelids.
And slowly, carefully, I slowly opened my eyes to adjust to the light.
It’s still blurry, but a wide room slowly begins to appear. Im Chanwoo is visible in the distance.
The familiar scenery around me came into view first, and then what came into view was…
“…Huh?”
Jung Ah-woon, a device that looks like the machine that old man made, but something is different.
Inside that device, I was suspended in the air in an ugly pose, with my limbs tied up like an animal that had been stuffed.
“How do you like it?”
“Hic!”
A nightmarish scene, no, a reality that I want to believe is a nightmare, makes me feel like the blood is draining from my head.
Due to an unknown fear, I feel the heat on my face cool down.
Because I instinctively know what Im Chanwoo, who is smiling slyly, is planning to do to me now.
He knows that I’ve noticed his thoughts, and he asks me for my ‘impressions’.
“Ah, th, there…”
The words don’t come out properly. Scary, scary, scary!
The loss of humanity that I felt while being possessed by that man.
The fear of losing my life as a human being is already deeply embedded in my head.
But this is worse than being possessed, I’m losing everything as a human being.
All of me becomes that man’s, my body, my mind, my life, everything.
I hate it, I absolutely hate it, I, I have to live! I want to live!
I bit my trembling lips tightly to calm myself down, and barely raised my frozen lips.
It’s the smile I’ve been wearing every day, the smile I’ve been wanting so much… but I can’t smile.
“…Pl, please save me…? If, if you want me, I’ll lend you my strength as much as you want…
If you want my body, I’ll offer you the agency friends I know… So, so…”
“…So, everything about you is decided by this button right now?
Do you know how funny this is? Everything you’ve built up with your life on the line.
That precious thing is taken away by someone else with just one press of this button.”
“…Huh? What are you…”
“There’s no reason for me not to press this button.
The things you said as conditions for saving you right now will all be achieved with just one press of this button.
Isn’t that right? The power you have will only be used for me,
and if I order you, you’ll sell out your friends from your trainee days without a second thought,
or you’ll offer me the people you cherished the most. Am I wrong?
If I’m wrong, tell me. If you can convince me, I’ll save you.”
Im Chanwoo, leaning against the table as if he were leaning on it, supporting his face with his hand, is looking at me.
I have to convince him, I have to live. I have to prove my usefulness to him… but, how…?
“…Th, there… So, so…!”
[Confirmed the injection of the subject. Starting partial mechanization and android modification.]
“…Eh? Why… Not yet…”
The glass door of the device slowly begins to close in front of my eyes. Beyond that is Im Chanwoo.
While I was bowing my head and thinking about a story to convince him,
he was already looking at me and smiling with the button pressed.
‘Did you really think you could convince me?’
His voice can’t be heard beyond the already closed glass door,
his voice, speaking into the microphone, is heard through the speakers inside the device.
‘You never understood me in the first place. I’m the same, no matter what you say, I can’t understand you.
The next time you open your eyes, you and I will be friends who can understand each other.
So don’t worry too much, sleep well and let’s see each other again.
Oh, and I’ve tweaked what you guys made a little more, so please explain the changes to me later.’
“Wa, wait a minute! Pl, please! Just listen to me once!! Pl…! Eget!♡”
I want to live, I don’t want to disappear like this, a life worse than death. I hate that!
I desperately move my hands to try to take out my arms, but my tightly bound arms don’t come off.
The moment I raised my voice and shouted at Im Chanwoo, who was turning his head,
I felt something sharp pierce the back of my head and the back of my neck.
The feeling of electricity flowing through my spine and into my head, the feeling of my head being paralyzed.
I let out a strange sound without realizing it, a sensation I had never felt before.
[To prevent shock to the subject during the procedure, we will begin ‘neural domination’.]
“Ah, ah! Wait…! Waityook?!♡ Kek…♡ Wait! Sumi…! I can’t breathe…!!♡ Kahak♡”
Countless needles pierce my skull and penetrate my brain from the helmet-shaped device that covers only the back of my head.
An unpleasant sensation of my head being massaged against my will. What is this…!♡
Thin needles are rummaging through my head, my head, my vision is popping!!♡
‘I’ve also set up an announcement inside the device so you can know what state you’re in,
how is it? Can you hear it well? It’s broadcasting you becoming not you.’
“I hate it…!♡ That kind of thing?!♡ Ook!♡ I hate it!!♡”
I start jumping up and down with my arms and legs restrained, sweat is forming all over my body.
Tears are flowing down my cheeks against my will.
Am I crying? Or is it because my nerves are being poked? I don’t know, I don’t know..!!♡
[Neural domination 80% complete, would you like to test it?]
‘Uh, show me once.’
[Testing the subject’s neural domination, starting urination.]
“Ohek….!♡ Ah, ah…♡”
A device that went out of my head and stabbed other needles into my brain.
I feel the muscles in my lower abdomen loosening on their own.
I feel my pants slowly getting wet from the warm liquid.
What…? What is this… pee? Who…?
My head hurts, it feels like it’s spinning.
“Ah, hic…♡ Ah ah…♡”
[Neural domination state is good. Continuing the modification.]
