Chapter 8
If you went close enough, it felt as though you might hear the child's faint breathing.
Her slightly round stomach looked like it might rise and fall with shallow breaths.
It seemed as though she might shift in her sleep at any moment, bothered by the strands of hair stuck to her sweaty cheek.
She wore a familiar long-sleeved shirt and cropped pants.
There were marks from crushed grass and flowers on her knees and calves, while mud and tangled roots clung to the shoes visible beneath them.
Just looking at her made it easy to imagine how hard she'd been running around and playing.
And yet, in contrast, the flowers blooming around her were so fresh and vibrant that the child who had run through them seemed almost like another part of the green meadow.
Perhaps she'd been picking flowers.
One hand rested on her stomach, while the other lay over the flower field.
In that hand was a simple bouquet made from flowers and long blades of grass.
The flowers weren't limited to the bouquet.
Several blossoms had also been placed on top of the frog she was using as a pillow.
"..."
The frog resembled the child's comfort doll.
Its overall shape was closer to that of a real frog, but something about its expression and atmosphere still resembled that blank-looking stuffed toy.
It looked exactly like how that doll might appear if it had suddenly come to life.
"..."
The frog's thick belly and slightly raised spine formed a gentle curve.
It looked sturdy enough for a single child to comfortably lean against.
It was even larger than the girl, giving off a reassuring sense of security.
As though it would protect her.
"...How can this be..."
Sunlight from a spring day that couldn't possibly exist seemed to fall across the sleeping child.
Unlike his memories, she looked utterly calm.
Utterly at peace.
A strange sense of life radiated from the sculpture.
That imagined vitality became a spear and drove straight into his chest.
A spear made of warm spring sunlight.
Gentle toward his child.
Merciless toward him.
Afraid that even the slightest sound might wake the child from her deep sleep, Shin Ha-gyeon covered his mouth.
Dad said he has an uncle who never listens to anyone. Are you that uncle?
Before he could resist, memories rushed over him.
Whenever Shin Ha-gyeon thought of family, he remembered people who constantly told him he was impossible to understand.
Only much later did he realize that he truly had been born as someone who was difficult for others to understand.
Even so, he hadn't been hurt by it.
If he had been, he probably wouldn't have used his family's words as a shield, declaring, I've always been impossible to understand anyway, while continuing to do whatever he wanted.
After awakening, he became even more distant from his family.
His parents didn't visit him when they learned he'd gained fame and money.
They didn't come even when the news reported that he'd been injured inside a Gate.
His older brother, however, would occasionally show up in person and bother him.
Not that his brother ever asked for material things.
The problem was that he asked for everything else.
"Call Mom and Dad once in a while. They don't say it, but they miss you."
"Are you eating properly? My wife packed this lunch for you. ...Even if you've already eaten, shove it down your throat. How dare you reject something she made?"
"Hey, what kind of attitude is that in front of cameras? You're practically a public figure. Why do you have to act so obnoxious? ...Stop making so many enemies."
Shin Ha-gyeon couldn't remember ever listening to a single thing his brother said.
Whenever that happened, his brother would mutter to himself,
"You really never listen."
Then the next time he came, he would say something almost identical all over again.
Until one day, just after Shin Ha-gyeon had finished clearing an A-Class Gate.
That was when he learned that his parents, along with his brother and sister-in-law, had died in a Gate Break elsewhere.
"...What?"
"They'd dropped the child off at school and went to the supermarket together..."
Things like that were common back then.
It had been less than five years since Gates first appeared.
There weren't enough Hunters.
Assault-Type Gates broke open frequently.
Monsters poured out of Eruption-Type Gates and destroyed entire sections of cities.
The fact that countries somehow continued to function and ordinary life still existed at all was practically a miracle.
"Shin Ha-gyeon! At least get the funeral hall address before you leave! Hey!"
Within ten years of the first Gates appearing, Earth's population had been cut in half.
Expecting his own family to somehow escape that disaster untouched had been little more than wishful thinking.
Near dawn on the second day of the three-day funeral, Shin Ha-gyeon found a small child sitting alone and keeping watch over the memorial altar.
"Dad said he has a younger brother who never listens. Are you that uncle?"
What had he felt when he heard those words?
One thing was certain.
It was an emotion Shin Ha-gyeon had never experienced before.
"..."
"...Aren't you my uncle? You look like him..."
Looking at the child's face for the first time, he saw his parents.
He saw his brother and sister-in-law.
He even saw himself.
"...Yeah. I'm your uncle."
For the first time, he truly felt what blood relation meant.
He'd never even felt that way while looking at his own older brother.
And now, he realized that this child was his only remaining blood relative.
That strange realization made him speak to his niece, Yeonwoo, whom he'd only just met.
"If you don't have anywhere to go, come live with me."
"Why?"
"Because you're... the only blood relative I have left."
"...I don't like complicated words. You mean you and I are family, right?"
Looking back, he hadn't made the offer with any grand determination.
He assumed things would remain much like they had when he lived with his parents and brother.
Distant.
A little cold.
The reality was completely different.
The child constantly wanted him to do things with her.
Her demands were clear.
And whenever Shin Ha-gyeon acted unlike a proper adult, she would sigh and say,
"You really never listen!"
The difference between Yeonwoo and his brother's family was that whenever she sighed and spoke exactly like her father, Shin Ha-gyeon found himself missing something he couldn't quite name.
He gradually began paying more attention to the child's words and actions.
And as they were forced to spend more and more time together, Shin Ha-gyeon naturally stopped thinking of her merely as blood.
She became family.
It was around then that Shin Ha-gyeon began collecting frogs from all over the world in an attempt to win the child's affection.
And then he had to listen to an elementary school girl lecture him.
"Mom said you have to think very carefully before getting a pet."
"..."
"She said you can only raise a living thing if you're prepared to take responsibility for it until the very end."
"Who said that?"
"Mom and Dad. Uncle, you don't even know that? Didn't your mom and dad teach you?"
"My mom and dad are your grandma and grandpa."
"...Why?"
In the end, Shin Ha-gyeon promised the child that he would responsibly care for every frog he'd brought in from around the world.
Fortunately, despite everything she said, Yeonwoo enjoyed the frogs and all the frog-themed items Shin Ha-gyeon collected.
She would often point at frogs beyond the glass of their enclosures, or at frog dolls, and explain what species they were, where they lived, or what sounds they made.
The more she did that, the more frogs Shin Ha-gyeon collected.
And whenever the child drew frogs on his combat uniform or stuck frog stickers onto his greatsword, he would go outside wearing them exactly as they were.
"Uncle, the frog you drew is ugly."
"Still better than yours."
"No, it isn't?! No!"
"There's a saying that strong denial is strong affirmation."
"Do you really feel good about yourself for beating a kid in an argument when you're already an adult?"
"Are kids even allowed to say things like that?"
Looking back now, perhaps it was from that child that he finally learned what his brother had meant whenever he talked about family.
If they'd had more time together, perhaps Shin Ha-gyeon would have gradually become closer to the kind of adult his brother always wanted him to be.
The child occasionally asked about the day her grandparents and parents died.
"Was the Gate really difficult?"
"It was A-Class, so there were a lot of gimmicks. It was huge too, and there were a lot of monsters..."
"So it was hard, right? ...Hard enough that you had to stay inside for a long time?"
Her voice had seemed to tremble slightly whenever she asked about the Gate Shin Ha-gyeon had entered that day.
All he could do was answer her honestly.
And make a promise.
