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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 5
Chapter Title: SSS-grade Passive (1)
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Su-ho calmly mulled over the doctor's words.
Jin Seong-hyeok was dead. They'd found him with his breathing already stopped.
Naturally, they assumed Su-ho was dead too, but his heart had still been beating. The rescue team brought him straight to the hospital.
Su-ho's heart was beating, but the rhythm wasn't normal.
Helpers and hunters usually averaged 60 to 70 beats per minute. But Su-ho's was around 30. It held steady at about 30 bpm until right before he woke up, when it jumped to 50.
The doctor had called it abnormal. Anyone else would have been dead already.
But that wasn't the end of it. The monitoring equipment attached to him for examination started malfunctioning. Even machines working fine elsewhere would inexplicably shut down near him, as if repelled by a magnetic field.
Su-ho's gaze drifted to his hand. He stared blankly at his palm for a moment, then slowly clenched his fist and released it.
Oddly, his palm tingled, like faint currents of electricity prickling the skin.
"My ability seems to have transferred to you."
At the unfamiliar sensation, Su-ho stared at his palm—then whipped his head up at the voice, scanning the room. He'd definitely heard it.
Jin Seong-hyeok's voice.
"J-Jin... Mr. Jin Seong-hyeok?"
Had resurrection come with ghost hearing too?
Come to think of it, he remembered conversing with Jin Seong-hyeok before opening his eyes.
It had to be a ghost...
"Not a ghost."
He'd only thought it, but the voice echoed clearly in his mind.
Was it the shock? Some mental issue...
"No mental issues either."
At Jin Seong-hyeok's words, Su-ho shot up in bed. He clutched his head, face etched with considerable alarm. Who wouldn't be confused with a dead man's voice looping in their skull?
"I don't know what happened either."
Jin Seong-hyeok sighed, sounding as troubled as Su-ho felt.
"When I came to, I was inside your body."
Inside my body? Su-ho lowered his hands from his head and slowly lifted his gaze.
"So... you're saying you're inside my body, Mr. Jin Seong-hyeok?"
"Yeah. Inside your body. In your psyche. More precisely, your subconscious."
Jin Seong-hyeok was just as bewildered. He'd watched his own flesh die with his own eyes. He'd thought his endless cycle of lives was finally over.
As he released his fading consciousness, some force yanked him somewhere.
The world spun dizzily. He shut his eyes against the vertigo, then opened them to a flood of fragmented memories.
These weren't his memories. Snippets pieced together, mostly unhappy ones.
[F-grade.]
F-grade? Jin Seong-hyeok knew only one: Cha Su-ho. The helper who'd charged in to save him, oblivious to his suicidal intent.
No telling if he'd survived, but 99.9% chance he hadn't.
Why these memories?
Before he could question it, more poured in. Forced to witness them all, Jin Seong-hyeok realized.
This was Su-ho's mental world.
"Felt someone pulling me in hard. Came to, and here I was."
He was curious about the source of that intense pull, but it wasn't the priority now.
"Can't even get a proper rest in death."
"So... you're inside my body right now? Specifically, in my mind, my thoughts..."
"Yeah."
"Then how do I get you out? I'll call the doctor right—"
"No."
The tone was firm.
"Didn't they say three days passed? My body's frozen solid in the morgue by now, beyond saving. And I don't want to go back."
Su-ho recalled their pre-waking conversation.
"What's important is why I'm still kicking now. Tried to end this monotonous slog of a life."
"All I want is for this tiresome existence to end. I'm done dancing to everyone else's tune."
Realizing once more that he'd let the monster gore him on purpose—for suicide—Su-ho spoke slowly.
"Mr. Jin Seong-hyeok, you really meant to die."
A beat late, Jin Seong-hyeok replied.
"Yeah."
A momentary silence passed.
The SSS-grade who had it all, attempting suicide. F-grade Su-ho couldn't fathom it, but everyone had their burdens. Living solely by others' expectations must have worn him down, just as he'd said.
Besides, Su-ho knew all too well the agony of others presuming to judge your life.
For now, though, the why of Jin's suicide mattered less than what to do about the man lodged in his mind.
Su-ho ventured cautiously.
"Then... what are your plans? Staying in my body... forever?"
"In your body."
"Pardon?!"
Su-ho's voice rose in shock.
"Keep it down. What's with the hysterics?"
"No way! You're inside me—of course I'm freaking out! And you can read my thoughts too, right?"
"Just thoughts?"
Jin Seong-hyeok tsked.
"Bingeing porn nonstop is pushing it, don't you think?"
Su-ho's face drained of color in an instant.
"Wh-what kind of nonsense is that?!"
"Sorry, but I can see all your memories."
All his memories? Su-ho stood there, dazed.
"You can see... all my memories? Mine?"
"I'm in your head, so yeah. They pop up even if I try ignoring them."
"Shouldn't you not look? Those are someone else's private memories!"
"Trust me, I don't want to. Not something you should gripe about to the guy stuck here, unable to die because of you."
Su-ho let out a disbelieving huff.
"No, I was trying to help because you were in danger...!"
"So we both ended up with holes in our chests?"
Jin Seong-hyeok's voice grew subdued.
"Whatever the reason, you were supposed to die. You're only alive thanks to my regeneration ability."
Regeneration ability. No wonder a power he'd never had suddenly appeared. It stemmed from Jin Seong-hyeok's strength.
"Anyway, no body means my mind'll fade out eventually. Just bear with it till then."
Su-ho had nothing to say. In the end, Jin Seong-hyeok had chosen suicide, and Su-ho had thwarted it.
Body gone, soul trapped in another's mind. No wonder Jin Seong-hyeok felt stifled.
Su-ho wasn't unsympathetic, but he felt hard done by.
"I really was trying to save you. If I'd known it was suicide..."
"Known?"
The cynical voice sliced sharp toward him.
"You'd have let me go through with it?"
Su-ho couldn't deny it. Nor affirm.
Even rewound, he'd have tried saving him.
"Whatever. Water under the bridge. I'll take a long overdue break, so don't sweat it. I'll play dead quiet."
Then, as if struck by a thought, Jin Seong-hyeok added,
"Oh, how about ditching the videos for the real deal? I'm pretty versed in that department..."
"Mr. Jin Seong-hyeok!"
That was when the door flew open. The nurse stared wide-eyed in alarm.
"...Mr. Cha Su-ho, helper, this must be a tremendous shock... but Mr. Jin Seong-hyeok..."
In Su-ho's flustered mind, Jin Seong-hyeok's laughter rang out.
"One more thing: even your inner monologue reaches me. So don't do anything dumb. I'm the one who'd die of embarrassment."
Su-ho tilted his head back to stare at the ceiling in sheer absurdity.
Hoping desperately that Jin Seong-hyeok hadn't caught the curse he'd muttered inwardly.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Su-ho extended his arm with the sleeve rolled up.
"It'll sting a little."
The needle pierced his vein. Eyeing the syringe filled with blue solution, Su-ho spoke up.
"Retaking the helper test?"
"Yes, exactly."
It was an old memory, but Su-ho remembered it well. Getting the blue injection for the helper test.
Back then, thrilled at becoming a helper, oblivious to the F-grade result.
"Kid back then, huh."
Su-ho reacted to Jin Seong-hyeok's abrupt voice.
"Suddenly...!"
"...Pardon?"
The nurse blinked at him, startled.
"N-no, nothing."
"Let me know if it hurts."
"Got it."
The air turned awkward. Su-ho let out a short sigh. No careless reminiscing—he'd see it all.
"Don't just butt in out of nowhere."
He thought it like an inward mutter, and the reply came.
"Can't even talk to myself?"
"It's not talking to yourself."
"I'll pretend I didn't hear."
"How? I hear everything."
Jin Seong-hyeok went silent. He always clammed up when cornered.
"Ignoring me on purpose, aren't you?"
No response. Su-ho dropped it.
The syringe eased out of his vein. The nurse pressed firmly on the beading blood.
"Follow me now."
"To the testing room?"
"Yes."
They left the room into a long hallway lined with doors marked by room numbers and names. Seemed like a patient-rooms-only floor. They rode the elevator up one level.
Unlike below, this floor had open offices and glass-walled rooms revealing the interiors. Examiners and doctors in white coats bustled about.
"In this room."
The nurse guided him to the innermost door and departed. Alone, Su-ho raised a cautious hand to knock.
"Here for the helper test."
A deep voice answered from within.
"Yes, come in."
He opened the door slowly. A sharp disinfectant scent assaulted his nose.
"Cha Su-ho, helper?"
Su-ho nodded to the examiner peering over his glasses.
"Yes, that's me."
The man flipped through papers in hand. His white coat bore the name Trevor. No Korean name, and his features looked foreign accordingly.
"Mixed race?"
The thought crossed Su-ho's mind—followed by the voice.
"Spot on."
Su-ho's lips twitched. He'd nearly blurted it aloud.
"I said no sudden comments."
"Just answering what you wondered."
"I was just thinking to myself."
"Oldest examiner around, highest rank. Handles only top-tier helpers and hunters."
Ignoring Su-ho, Jin Seong-hyeok pressed on.
"Looks like Trevor's doing the test personally."