CH 4

{ 4 – Master}

Her head hurt a lot; the world was spinning.

She felt like she was about to collapse and lose consciousness.

“Ah?”

Absolute Order, Kang Maru sat quietly in her seat and repeated such thoughts.

By the time she came to reality, 10 more minutes had passed since the incident.

“…Oh my gosh.”

As soon as she came to her senses, she hurriedly got up from her seat and looked around, but her expression slowly began to rot.

What caught her eye was a literally devastated execution ground; The guards and soldiers scattered here and there, still unconscious, clearly showed the seriousness of the situation.

“Who died?”

“The report hasn’t come out yet… but there are quite a few injured.”

Absolute Order looked at the tragedy with a bewildered expression.

Then she turned her head to the voice she heard of people talking next to her.

-“All those who didn't heed the orders are a collaborated group of Lumia's followers. Is it just a coincidence?”

-“It’s unlikely. Let’s start the investigation.”

-“By the way, it’s a shame as a hero to reach here only after all the ‘Dominating Hands’ withdrew.”

-“Yeah... In the beginning, there weren’t that many people on our side. We should just feel lucky that there were no casualties…”

The heroes who succeeded in entering the building late were already investigating the scene of the incident with the investigation team.

She looked at them like that and then began to move.

-“Oh, Absolute. Are you okay?”

A few heroes recognized her face and spoke to her in a friendly tone, but her eyes were searching for only one person.

“Lumia!!”

It was none other than Lumia, standing there in the distance where the wall had collapsed.

“Are you okay? No injuries…”

Maru, who had approached him with a worried expression on her face, stopped walking with a slightly frightened feeling.

“My favorite. My favorite...”

Lumia was muttering to himself with a dark expression that she had never seen on his face before.

“...He’s gone.”

“Lumi-”

“...Why? Why? Everything was perfect, why the hell?”

Thinking that he must have been quite shocked by this incident, Maru started to approach him cautiously.

“...Why the hell did the development differ from the original story? No, if this happens, seonbae is in danger. I have to do something…”

“Oh my God, Lumia!”

Finding Lumia’s fingernails bleeding from the repeated biting, Maru opened her eyes wide and stretched out her hand to stop him.

“Lumia, what is all this—”

“…to save him!”

Then, something completely unimaginable for Maru happened.

-Slap!

“—Don't touch me!”

“…uh?”

Lumia, who slapped her outstretched hand with all his might, was looking at her with a look of horror.

“…”

"..."

They both looked at each other with puzzled faces for a while.

“…that, Maru-san.”

In that instantaneous moment, Lumia, who returned to his usual innocent expression, began to mumble with a look on his face that he did not know what to do.

“Sorry, I’m sorry. This is my first time doing something like this, so I don’t know… my feelings are… so intense…”

“……..”

“Hey, I didn’t know this was going to happen. It’s all because of me. What should I do…? I’m afraid, Maru-san…”

The current innocent figure of Lumia was no different from usual.

“…don’t worry.”

Then, feeling a little reassured, Maru opened her arms and gently embraced him.

“…Not everything is lost. I’ll try something.”

Lumia, in her arms, began to tremble again.

How could such an innocent and kind child be okay while seeing such violence and gore?

Seeing that he was still trembling without being able to control his emotions, she understood why he showed such unusual behavior before.

After letting Lumia be in her arms and patting his back to calm him down for a while, Maru started walking with purpose.

“Ira Kim, where are you now?”

"..."

“You’re here, I know.”

Now, her purpose was to find one of the masterminds behind the unprecedented incident that severely undermined Lumia’s flawless reputation.

“Where did you hide!! I already know your ability!!”

-“…Ira Kim? I’ve heard that name somewhere.”

-“Isn’t that the girl who was handing out posters at the office the other day?”

-“Ah, that strange poster that says Kang Ha-neul isn’t the real culprit? But why is Absolute suddenly looking for her?”

The heroes started scratching their heads and whispering at the sudden action of the Absolute Commander.

Meanwhile, Maru began to speak with strange shining eyes while putting the fallen guards in her sight.

“I command that ‘Kim Ira’ is feeling a burning pain all over her body right now…”

Just when she was about to activate her ‘concept’ as she always did, to find Ira, who must be hiding somewhere right now—

“…Ugh!?”

—A sudden, tingling sensation, along with a terrible pain began to creep in.

-“What, what’s going on?”

-“Absolute, are you okay?”

-“Are you hurt?”

Thanks to this, she couldn’t even finish her words, and as she sighed and rolled on the floor, the heroes around her hurriedly approached her.

“Hey, here! Get a doctor…!”

‘What happened…?’

After rolling around on the floor for a while, Maru managed to get up with the support of other heroes.

‘Are there any injuries that I didn’t know about?’

She was groping her body with a bewildered expression, but there were no visible wounds.

‘…I’ll have to be careful from now on.’

Maybe it was just a phenomenon that happened by overexerting the body.

Having made such a guess and being supported by the heroes, Maru began to give orders as slowly as possible this time.

“It’s a Command. Whoever is called Kim…”

She never finished saying it.

– Pijjijik…

It was because the same terrible pain that had rushed in had again engulfed her body.

“Absolute!”

“Why is this happening all of a sudden?”

It was then that the Maru began to realize little by little what had happened to her.

“I, to me… what did you do to me…”

Yes.

The culprit of this phenomenon was Kang Ha-neul.

As a result of overexerting her body to the point where she had lost consciousness earlier, Kang Ha-neul was able to make one permanent change in her body.

“What have you done…”

It was none other than ‘the price of ability’.

Now, when she gave orders affecting others, she had no choice but to do the same for herself unconsciously.

“Kang Ha-neul!!!”

A very simple yet severe penalty.

It was an unacceptable risk to her, who took it for granted to give orders to others.

“What did you… what did you…”

Maru, who understood it but still could not accept such a fact, stood there for a long time as if she was dead.

“……!”

Then, belatedly noticing that there was something in her pocket, she put her hand into it.

[There is only one blood relative in the world, so I couldn’t do more than this.]

Then, a dusty note came along with her hand.

[Then, make a good side dish and eat it.]

As Maru read the note written in fairly familiar handwriting, her whole body started to tremble.

[Goodbye forever.]

For some reason, the remorseful face and voice of her younger brother seemed to linger around her.

“Command…”

So, how much time had passed?

“…Reveal your true identity to everyone, Kim Ira.”

With the note completely crumpled and her head bowed, Maru gave a new order in a hushed voice.

– Tap Tap

And after a while, with her back straight, she walked towards the heroes who had worried expressions on their faces.

“Ah, hello. I’m the 3rd ranked hero in Korea and 11th in the world…”

-“That, Miss Absolute?”

“...Kang Maru, a loyal henchman who serves Lumia-san as her master.”

She suddenly declared that in front of bewildered heroes.

-“…W-what...”

But even after going through such a shameful act, it was only she who suddenly came out in front of everyone. Kim Ira, who was the target, was nowhere to be found.

-“Hey, are you really okay?”

-“Come on, let's go to the hospital…”

‘For the rest of my life… to live like this?’

Because of shame, Maru trembled with a bowed head.

‘I don’t want to see Lumia…’

Then with crawling eyes, she moved her gaze to the place where Lumia-san was with her.

“……?”

Lumia, who was previously there, had already disappeared.

“Where is Lu-Lumia?"

"..."

“Did he just go somewhere by himself?"

-“Right, he said blonde hair and blah blah.”

-“That’s right, he said he doesn’t think he’ll be able to see you for a while, so he asked for your regards.”

The heroes who scratched their heads and answered the puzzled Maru's question began to focus on the investigation again.

Only she was left alone in that place.

“…What’s going on?”

The back of her hand, which had just been hit by Lumia, was still tingling.

.

.

.

.

.

A few days later, at the secret hideout of the Dominating Hands:

“How’s Ha-neul?”

“Not bad. He’ll probably wake up today.”

“Yeah? Then I should be there in advance. Thank you as always.”

Paradise, whose expression brightened at the hopeful report of a woman wearing a doctor's uniform, began to head to Kang Ha-neul’s private room with a happy smile.

“Don’t worry, Ha-neul.”

Then, she whispered in a low voice.

“The self-proclaimed protagonist can’t touch you anymore.”

The purple eyes of Paradise were shining quietly in the morning sunlight coming through the window.

“Now I’m going to protect you.”

The moment she made that determination, she put a smile on her lips again and opened the door to Kang Ha-neul private room.

“What did you do to Dice? Tell me before I kill you.” Spade threatened Ha-neul with a yoyo in her hands.

“I didn’t do anything.”

“Hey, Ha-neul ssi, do you believe in the existence of God?” Heart, wearing a nun's dress, began to preach to him.

[ TN: In Korea, ssi is added after someone's name for polite speech; it is equivalent to Mr./Ms. ]

“No.”

“Are you willing to tell me your weight and height? Oh, it’s nothing…” Diamond, a bald uncle, tried to rope Ha-neul in for his infamous exercises.

“………”

Paradise saw a scene where Kang Ha-neul, who just woke up, was surrounded by 'executives' and was receiving death threats, propagation, and gym training at the same time.

[Ahjussi, do you like anime?]

[Do you know how to program?]

[What about games?]

[ TN: In Korea, older men are called Ahjussi. ]

Pandora, whose eyes were shining with anticipation, was hacking his smartphone in real-time while texting him.

But suddenly, their sense tingled and all of their hair stood up in alarm.

“What are you guys doing?”

From the arms of Paradise, whose smile looked crooked, countless piles of cards jumped out and started flying toward them.