Nabin was the first to reach out to Ryu Soh-an. Like a butterfly alighting softly on a petal, Soh-an smiled at him as though praising his courage.
Knowing just how much bravery it had taken, Soh-an felt a surge of determination, blazing like wildfire. He wanted to ease Nabin’s pain as quickly as possible, to reward that effort.
“I’ll begin the treatment now.”
With that, Soh-an clasped Nabin’s hand and closed his eyes. Mana flowed steadily into Nabin through their point of contact.
The unfamiliar sensation made Nabin bite down harder on his lips. His canines broke the tender flesh until blood welled up, yet he barely felt the pain, too focused on suppressing the desperate urge to pull away.
While Nabin fought his silent battle, Hayan kept watch beside them, worry etched across his face. He longed to wipe the blood from Nabin’s lips, but even the slightest outside disturbance during a mental treatment could be dangerous. He couldn’t risk it.
Instead, he clenched his trembling hand into a fist and waited, forcing himself to stay still until it was over. Time seemed to crawl unbearably slow, each second stretching long. He let out a heavy breath.
“Hhhh…”
With each tick of the clock, Nabin’s eyes lost their focus. Though open, his pupils dulled, as though he were drifting into sleep.
Soh-an, by contrast, looked as though he were in torment. His face was twisted with pain, drenched in cold sweat, tears streaming down in unending rivers.
Alarm bells rang in Hayan’s mind. He’d seen Soh-an treat others before.
Never had he looked like this. Back then, Soh-an had remained calm, eyes closed in steady concentration.
But now? Hayan couldn’t guess what was happening. The helplessness pressed on his chest like a heavy stone.
All he could do was sharpen his senses like a blade, ready to act at the first sign of danger.
Half an hour passed. Soh-an’s ragged gasp broke the silence, his eyes snapping open as he regained consciousness before Nabin.
“Hhhk—hah… What the hell…?”
Shock flooded his expression. Nabin, still glassy-eyed and limp, had collapsed into Hayan’s arms.
Though pale himself, Soh-an looked worse. His sky-blue eyes, locked on Nabin, shook violently as if quaking with aftershocks. The hand that had touched Nabin trembled uncontrollably.
Soh-an was shaken to the core. Since awakening as an S-rank Healing Esper, he had treated countless patients.
Healing Espers were rare, and he had never lacked for people to treat.
The process was simple: maintain contact, channel mana into the patient, and in return, fragments of their scarred memories and emotions would filter through.
But they were never truly his. Like watching a film, he observed and felt faint echoes of emotions—nothing more. That had always been the case.
Never had he been consumed by horror. Over time, he’d learned to distance himself emotionally, a safeguard for his own mind.
But with Nabin, none of it mattered. Perhaps because he’d felt drawn to him from the very first meeting. Or perhaps it was simply that the suffering Nabin had endured was far too monstrous.
What Soh-an had just felt wasn’t even a fraction of it. And yet—that sliver alone had driven him to the edge of despair, filling him with the urge to end his life over and over again.
If he’d held a blade, he might have plunged it into his own throat without hesitation. That was how corrosive it was.
When he finally severed the mana link, Nabin’s emotions and memories receded, but the lingering echo left Soh-an shuddering with dread.
“This… this can’t be real…”
The fragmented memories that flickered past defied reason. Most faces were strangers—but some he recognized.
Not just acquaintances. Blood relatives. People he had grown up with like family.
They were the ones who had driven Nabin into hell.
Even the gentle-looking man had taken part in crushing Nabin’s mind, but it was them who had pushed him toward death.
It made no sense. Memories weren’t glimpses of the future—they were traces of what had already happened, fragments left to drift in Nabin’s subconscious.
Nor could this be dismissed as imagination. What Soh-an had seen and felt were Nabin’s genuine experiences, carved into him. Soh-an had only peered into a fraction.
The people in those memories looked subtly older than they were now. If they knew Nabin so closely, Soh-an should have too. But he had only just met Nabin days ago.
How could such a thing be possible? He wanted to seize someone, anyone, and demand an answer. Illogical as it was, it had already happened to Nabin.
The past had carved brutal scars into his mind, leaving his psyche ravaged. There was no word but “horrific.”
Could they even be called human? To them, Nabin hadn’t seemed like a person at all.
The thought that people could wear human faces and still commit such acts turned his stomach. He pressed a trembling hand to his mouth, but it couldn’t stop the wave of nausea and despair crashing over him.
And this was only a fraction. Just tasting the pain, sorrow, and despair Nabin had endured was enough to leave Soh-an’s mind shredded, like it had been cut to ribbons by a thousand blades.
“I’m sorry…”
The words broke from him, ragged and trembling. He knew one apology could never erase what Nabin had suffered, but there were no other words.
It felt as though an invisible hand were crushing his throat. His body shook as if trapped in a blizzard, drenched in ice water.
He wanted to hide—to curl up unseen, block his ears, shut his eyes, flee from the world. The fear was that overwhelming.
Indescribable emotions coiled around him like a massive serpent. Tears poured down like a waterfall, soaking his pale face in moments.
Now he understood why Nabin’s eyes were so lifeless as he leaned against Hayan’s shoulder. Anyone who had endured such things would look the same.
The fact that Nabin continued to live with those memories proved his strength—strength hidden beneath his fragile exterior.
Even Soh-an, who had only brushed against those memories, found it the most harrowing experience of his life.
It wasn’t just dehumanizing—it was worse than being treated like trash. They had done to Nabin what one wouldn’t even do to garbage, and they had done it without hesitation.
The confusion in his heart ignited into fury. A rage without end, aimed squarely at those who had scarred Nabin.
His nails dug into his palms until they bled, fists trembling with the force of it.
If they had been in front of him, he might have attacked them without a second thought. It felt as though his blood had turned into pure rage, boiling in his veins.
His vision burned red, and the urge to destroy everything surged inside him.
“Esper Ryu Soh-an.”
Hayan’s voice rang out, calling him back as his reason slipped away.
Soh-an might have been a Healing Esper, but he was still S-rank. His physical strength alone rivaled, even surpassed, that of many A-rank Physical Espers.
He looked shattered, broken by what he had drawn from Nabin. Hayan had expected the treatment to be difficult—but this was far worse than he’d imagined.
Whatever realization Soh-an had reached, it was enough to send raw, unrestrained mana lashing out around him. Normally, he would never unleash such power with Nabin so close.
It showed just how deeply shaken he was.
Hayan swiftly raised a protective barrier around himself and Nabin, but not before the sofa crumpled into an unrecognizable wreck.
When even the floor began to crack, Hayan knew he couldn’t simply wait for Soh-an to calm down.
Downstairs, Nabin’s mother and her caretaker were present.
Hayan had already installed protective Artifacts around her room as a safeguard—but if Soh-an’s mana surged further, even those barriers might not hold.
