Chapter 213

Chapter 213

What Gio did was simple.

“I brought them onto my palette.”

“I believe I asked you to explain in more detail, fairly, and specifically.”

“...”

“Don’t make a face like you don’t know how you could possibly explain it more properly than this.”

“I have never made such a face.”

“I can see it plain as day, so don’t deny it.”

“I feel wronged.”

Only after quite a long time did Gio manage to explain what he had done. At some point, he had become a platinum-blond priest.

“...To draw a picture, you need paint, don’t you?”

“It must be hard to explain, so you’ve become Giovanni. Yes, that’s true. But?”

“So, in other words, a painting is something drawn with paint.”

“Right?”

“The same goes for me now. The me inside the frame is made of paint, or can be defined as a concept equivalent to that. I think that’s only natural.”

It was the same context.

“The mermaids, and the ‘Breathing Sea’ where their roots were... or the ‘Nation of the Deep Sea,’ were in a linked state with my frame. In other words, you could say it was a single frame and a single painting.”

Gio said it calmly.

“Then weren’t our mermaid friends paint as well?”

“...Does it work like that? Why? That’s too sudden.”

“But it’s only natural that a painting is, in essence, a combination of paints.”

“...”

At last, Juhyeon was left speechless.

Juhyeon, dumbfounded, couldn’t even bring out the usual, “...I see!” reaction, but Yoo Seongun, already used to the novel incidents and accidents wrought by beings of the Origin, accepted it at once.

“I get the gist.”

In the end, Gio too was a ‘portrait.’

“But then, does that mean every existence drawn in your frame becomes, that... a resident on the palette? If so, I and Mr. Juhyeon have also stopped by, you know. Even Student Cha Isol.”

“You are not palette residents.”

“Sounds like there’s a separate criterion.”

“The roots must be connected.”

“Roots, huh...”

As a gardener, he knew. Roots played an extremely important role in composing an existence. If it was the root of the soul, the most essential concept, that said it all.

“So it’s not enough to just share the same flowerpot?”

“That is correct. Again, it must be ‘linked.’ If we use plants as an analogy, it’s a situation where you don’t just share the same pot—your roots and stems have actually fused together.”

“If we use people as an analogy, it means not just being lovers, but being conjoined twins?”

“I think it’s closer to the relationship between organs within a single person’s body. It’s also similar to how nutrients chewed and swallowed by the mouth are converted into fat that is stored permanently in the body.”

“So the ‘roots’ really have to become completely the same.”

It sounded like you had to become ‘one,’ beyond the level of merely ‘sharing.’

“Then what can you do with it? What changes?”

“You can call them.”

“Call what? They were already dead.”

“A palette resident is paint, isn’t it?”

“...Ah.”

Yoo Seongun nodded.

“True, that doesn’t involve the question of life and death.”

Even Gio himself was dead, yet preserved in the most perfect state.

With such a case sitting plainly before their eyes, there was no guarantee you couldn’t do the same for others. Though it would require Gio’s help a great deal.

“So right now, those mermaids... became paint?”

“More precisely, they became colors.”

“Colors?”

“Yes.”

In a mechanical tone, the portrait recited the truth.

“Aria became gray, and Iser became sky blue.”

“...”

“You will be able to find them within my shadow and my works.”

“...Well, damn...”

Yoo Seongun hesitated, then continued.

“...That’s cool.”

He meant it.

“That means it’s unrelated to death.”

“Like me, they are unrelated as well.”

“What is this ‘color’ you’re talking about?”

“It is simply, literally, a color.”

“Can they speak? Can you talk to them? Is interaction possible?”

“If I intend it, it can be so.”

“And their consciousness remains?”

“If that is what I want.”

“They are already dead beings, yes?”

“Yes. They have become beings far removed from life.”

“...Hah, that’s truly romantic...!”

Laughter burst out on its own.

“I really want to see it at least once—where can I appreciate it? If you aren’t displeased, I want to see it with my own eyes. If I’m not being rude, could you tell me the way?”

“You may go to the ‘Temple of the Deep Sea’ or the ‘City of the Void.’ You should also be able to find them without difficulty in the cabin where I am.”

“You have to go to the frames?”

“Either way is fine. In the end, the visible colors will be everywhere.”

“It’s incredible...”

At their conversation, Juhyeon wore an uncomfortable expression.

“...Am I the only one who doesn’t understand?”

“There are worlds Mr. Juhyeon can’t understand.”

“Since it’s a world that includes Mr. Gio, I feel like I need to understand it too, but I can’t help feeling a strange aversion. Am I narrow-minded...? Stuck in a mold...”

“Mr. Juhyeon is a diligent person.”

It was only natural to feel aversion.

“You can’t help it, because the direction you look from is different.”

“...I’ll try to adapt little by little.”

Juhyeon finally broke his social-life smile and let out a long sigh. Since the one he served was an enormous mystery evaluated as the Origin, he too had to improve in many ways.

‘But...’

He looked at Yoo Seongun, smiling brightly.

“...”

“Hm? Why?”

“No.”

Juhyeon smiled back.

“I just thought it must be a headache for you.”

“It always is.”

Even now, Yoo Seongun still couldn’t define Gio.

* * *

“...”

Yoo Seongun was in the ‘City of the Void.’

“...The water birds are here too.”

“Since it is one of the homes I made, that is only natural.”

“And there are quite a few more residents since I last came.”

Looking around, he saw several figures covered in blotchy black as if drenched in ink. They were probably ‘evil humans’ who’d been caught after acting cheeky in front of the ‘City of the Void.’

‘Still, not as many as I expected.’

Since it was an era overflowing with evil humans, he’d thought it might be packed by now. No—perhaps there might be other places beyond what Yoo Seongun was seeing right now.

‘Well, it’s a roadside with no end in sight.’

The ‘City of the Void’ takes the shape of a road set in the middle of the walls of gigantic buildings rising on both sides. You could go into the alleys between the buildings, and it also looked as if you could keep moving beyond the road, toward a place where you couldn’t tell where the end might be.

‘What you can see through a frame is, in the end, only a fragmentary shard...’

As Yoo Seongun looked around, water birds perched on his head and shoulders.

“Whoa, what is this. Why are you like this?”

“They seem to be water birds that met Mr. Yoo Seongun at the cabin last time.”

“Ah... ah, right, then.”

It had been quite a while, and he thought they had good memory.

‘Before I was first invited into the cabin, I saw water birds sitting in a tree.’

They seemed to be those same kids.

“...”

When he held out his hand, they hopped up onto it too.

“...They’re gray?”

“Since this space is gray, that is only natural.”

“That’s true.”

Since water is transparent, it was only natural that it absorbed the surrounding colors.

‘Because this place, these guys, everything here is a painting.’

On Yoo Seongun’s hand, the water birds pecked at him or tilted their heads. It was as if to say, ‘I don’t know why you’re here.’

‘Is it because most humans who come here are evil? I should be grateful they aren’t treating me like a bad guy...’

Around then, he saw a black silhouette being eaten by a water bird.

“Oh.”

So that’s how they handle it.

“Your kids are going to burst, aren’t they?”

“That is not necessarily so. It is an act focused more on play than on eating...”

“If you call this play, humans who hear it get a bit creeped out.”

“Your jokes are something.”

“You need to take people’s words a little more literally.”

“Are you enjoying the appreciation?”

“...It definitely feels less tense than before.”

That didn’t mean it was comfortable, though.

‘And I’m not even a target receiving hostility, yet I’m like this.’

Even though he’d stopped by before, it was still a chilling space.

Just inhaling and exhaling inside it felt like the existence called ‘me’ would be erased. It was suffocating, like plaster dust had filled his lungs.

‘Even this is only bearable because I’m receiving Gio’s goodwill.’

There was a reason even hunters couldn’t handle the ‘City of the Void.’ Once you were trapped by the Black Cloak’s work, you couldn’t get out unless they directly bestowed mercy.

“Hm...”

Yoo Seongun tilted his head.

“...Where are the mermaids?”

“It will be difficult to call them mermaids now.”

“Then can’t you even call them by name anymore?”

“No. A name does not disappear just because one dies.”

“Should I call it merciful, or horrifying...”

Soon, a deep gray entered Yoo Seongun’s eyes.

“...”

Ah.

“...Eyes.”

“Yes, eyes.”

“...Are they looking at me?”

“They are.”

They were eyes made of color.

‘They’re the mermaid’s eyes.’

A strange silvery sheen like water-scales reflecting. No—closer to the color of pearl.

Glittering pupils surrounded by irises like polar auroras. They were not two, not one, but dozens and hundreds.

Then hands sprang out. Buried in color, made of color, they wriggled in indistinct shapes within a fixed color. They too were not one or two, but numbered in the thousands.

He couldn’t grasp them precisely.

‘Are they alive?’

Or are they taxidermied?

‘It’s too vivid to call it taxidermy...’

And yet he felt no life at all.

It was like a thin oil film shimmering atop an oil painting. Even though no wind blew, it leisurely drifted according to the brush’s swish, and it almost resembled a mermaid’s tail from when it was alive.

‘Is it disgusting?’

It was beautiful.

‘Should I call it dreadful? Even if they were evildoers and monsters, isn’t it wrong to profane the dead?’

It was no different from a portrait.

Literally, it was ‘color.’

Gray.

Just as the sea by day differs from the sea by evening, the differences in light and shade seeped everywhere were clear. He wondered why a mermaid born from the sea would become gray, and then—

“...”

It was a gray sea.

‘...So the color didn’t matter.’

This was flowing softly, like a spring sea.

“...It doesn’t look like Iser is here. Am I right?”

“No, that is not so.”

“Then why aren’t they showing hostility toward me?”

“Because they are merely color. Paint cannot express intention, nor can it possess it.”

“I see.”

Yoo Seongun looked up.

“...I understand.”

A twilight unbefitting the name ‘void’ flowed across, covering the ‘sky.’

‘So this is the hell the mermaids chose.’

They decided to remain by Gio’s side as tools.

In the past, the mermaids had two paths.

Whether to become an evil god and stay together for a span close to eternity even if they would never be forgiven by Gio, or to remain in the form of such a tool and wait for the day they might be forgiven.

The mermaids had chosen the latter.

“I was going to ask if, now that you’ve made heaven, you’ll make hell too.”

“I make neither heaven nor hell.”

“I know. You only wanted to make a home where the things you like can stay.”

“I’m glad you seem to know well.”

“...Yeah...”

But if this isn’t hell, what is?

“...I keep saying it, but it’s cool.”

Yoo Seongun wanted to go to this hell when he died.

This eerie hell that resembled a fairy tale.

“...”

...Will a day come when I see you as a person?

(To be continued in the next episode)