Chapter 90

"Cha Seo-un?"

Cha Haya grabbed Seo-un's arm, which was covering his ears.

The idea of Earth's destruction—was I really hearing this correctly? But the premise was that the last survivors of each planet would gather on Earth.

Could it be that this time, the Messenger wasn't just spouting nonsense? After all, the Messenger had failed to predict the appearance of human mutants.

However, it was hard to completely ignore the Messenger, given the mysterious predictions the Messenger had shown before.

"Let's talk."

Seo-un removed Haya's hand and pointed to the terrace. Haya glanced down at his empty hand and followed Seo-un.

Seo-un, still looking at the child who was buried in the soup, began to speak.

"Don't believe everything I'm about to say."

"Should I believe half of it?"

Even that would be fine. Seo-un nodded.

"You know, my intuition... says..."

Seo-un took a deep breath and then let out the words instead of a sigh.

"Earth is going to be destroyed."

Seo-un looked around as if he had just leaked a major secret. When he looked at Haya, Haya's expression was indifferent, not surprised at all.

"Aren't you surprised?"

"Earth will eventually be destroyed, right?"

His tone suggested that this was a given.

"No, I mean..."

How do I explain this?

Having experienced traveling to other dimensions through tunnels, including Narakga, it wasn't difficult to mention other planets. However, the problem was what came next.

It wasn't easy to say that when the last survivors of other planets gather on Earth, Earth will be destroyed. The Messenger didn't specify how many would gather or how Earth would be destroyed.

"So, what you're saying is... I don't know if it's real..."

His mouth closed again.

"Cha Seo-un, no matter what you say, I won't believe it, so just say it."

Haya's statement that he wouldn't believe it was a relief. The announcement of Earth's destruction was that shocking.

Seo-un began to calmly relay the Messenger's words to Haya. Haya listened quietly, but his composure wavered when Seo-un mentioned the last survivors of each planet.

"The last survivors of each planet will gather, and then Earth will be destroyed?"

"Probably," Seo-un replied softly. Haya looked at the child.

"What about that one?"

"He's likely the last survivor of another planet."

This meant that the child's planet had been destroyed. The child had said that he was sent here.

While I shouldn't fully trust the human mutant, a memory of Crefas Planet flashed through my mind. It was definitely another planet, not Earth, where I and Haya were. We were only there for a few minutes, but when we returned, several days had passed...

I had dismissed it as a hallucination caused by being trapped in the gate, but if interplanetary travel was possible, could we also travel to different time periods?

The 'Zhou' in 'Cha Seo-un's Zhou' refers to time, as the Messenger said?

However, I couldn't mention the uncertain parts to Haya. Seo-un calmly relayed the information he had obtained.

"Two last survivors from other planets have already gathered on Earth. One is that child, and I don't know who the other one is."

Thanks to this bombshell, I could focus less on his injured lips.

"Hey, where are you going?"

Seo-un shouted at Haya, who suddenly left the terrace. I wondered what he was up to, but he grabbed the child, who was still engrossed in the soup.

I thought he was trying to extract information from the child, but his method was too rough.

"If you handle him like that, what will happen!"

Seo-un shouted, but Haya, faster than him, pierced the child's heart with his hand. Seo-un was speechless at Haya's unexpected action. He clung to the terrace railing, his face pale with shock. His mouth opened, but no scream came out. Was he standing and dreaming?

The mutant killed a human. Haya killed a human. Or was he a mutant? He looked like a human, so he must be one. What should I do now...

Cough, a cough erupted from the child's mouth. A hole was left where Haya had removed his hand, but there was no sign of a heart. Not even a drop of red blood. Instead, a purple aura swirled and began to repair the damaged flesh and blood vessels.

Poke! Haya, still holding the child's neck, this time pierced his stomach.

"Cha Haya!"

Seo-un shouted, but surprisingly, the child didn't die. It seemed that the heart and abdomen were not vital points. Haya finally summoned his white cosmos, and the child clenched his teeth. He grabbed Haya's wrist and began to absorb his cosmos.

"Wow, this is really not working?"

Haya muttered as he watched his cosmos being drained. The white aura surrounding him grew so intense that it seemed to tear the child's body apart. The child's body swelled as it couldn't withstand the immense cosmos.

"Stop it!"

Seo-un, finally freeing his legs, rushed to the terrace and pushed Haya away, freeing the child from his grip. As soon as the child's swollen body returned to normal, he stood up and glared at Haya.

"Really, cosmos. But, I don't like it."

Thud, the child, who had repaired all the holes in his body, collapsed onto the carpet.

"...Ah, I don't like it, I don't like it..."

The child repeated the same words like a broken robot and then closed his eyes as if he were sleeping. Seo-un, relieved to see the child breathing steadily, slumped to the floor.

His heart, which had been racing wildly, was now throbbing painfully. At least the child was alive. It was fortunate that Haya didn't become a murderer.

When Haya tried to grab the child again, Seo-un blocked his path.

"I told you not to believe me! You said you wouldn't believe it...! But you just..."

"You saw it yourself. He's a mutant."

Haya cut him off coldly, as if there was no problem.

The child's insides looked different from a human's, but he had human-like intelligence, thoughts, and speech. Yet, Haya tried to kill him without hesitation.

It was fortunate that the child survived. If he had bled and died like a human...

This was entirely my fault. I shouldn't have told Haya everything. But even I didn't expect him to attack the child so abruptly. The exposed flesh made me shiver.

"...Cha Haya."

Seo-un's eyes welled up.

"Even if he's a mutant... you said he's human."

After becoming a mutant, I've killed many, but they were just monsters. This time, the word 'human' was attached to the mutant. Moreover, the child didn't act like a monster and harm anyone.

If I kill a human mutant, I'll end up killing a human. Seo-un didn't want that. It felt like Haya would cross a point of no return.

"I might be wrong. Maybe it's not about destruction. If I'm wrong... you would have become a murderer."

Seo-un's voice trembled. Haya, still harboring murderous intent, was immobilized by Seo-un's gaze.

"Maybe I was deceived by his appearance... or maybe you're right, and I stopped you... What if I cause the destruction?"

Is it right to eliminate him? He didn't have a human body. Earth's destruction? What do you want me to do with that?

Seo-un's breathing became irregular under the weight of the situation.

Haya retracted his murderous intent and squatted in front of Seo-un. He snapped his fingers in front of Seo-un's face, as if to snap him out of it.

"Cha Seo-un, Earth won't be destroyed because of you."

Ugh! At that moment, the child, who seemed unconscious, suddenly clutched his face and began to roll on the floor.

I didn't want to eat! I didn't want to eat!

The child writhed on the carpet, screaming. Seo-un could only watch helplessly. The child's body was enveloped in a mix of purple and white auras.

The intertwined auras fluctuated, as if fighting for dominance. The white aura expanded and swallowed the purple, but the purple aura, finding a gap, surged and tried to suppress the white. Eventually, the purple and white auras intertwined in a whirlwind. The aura that had enveloped the child's body seeped into him as the two colors merged.

The child, curled up with his arms and legs, was drenched. He regulated his breathing calmly, like a creature that had just emerged from water after having its gills removed.

As soon as the child's convulsions stopped, Seo-un stiffened, and Haya frowned.

One of the child's eyes was purple, the other close to green. The child no longer looked like either Seo-un or Haya.

The child's face contained elements of both.

<F*cked.>

Seo-un couldn't react to the Messenger's sigh.