Moonlight had, before they knew it, settled evenly over the entire valley.
It was an hour when the boundary between day and night had vanished.
Miryeong and Bido kept their eyes fixed on the man,
quietly steadying their breath.
It was Hajin’s words that broke the silence.
“Uh… who are you…”
The man did not answer and remained where he was.
Beneath the moonlight, his figure did not change in the slightest.
He still did not look at Bido or Miryeong.
From beginning to end, his gaze was directed only at Hajin.
As if everything else had already been excluded from his calculations.
Seeing that gaze, Miryeong understood the situation.
This being had not come to judge.
Nor had he come to persuade,
or to threaten.
He had simply come to confirm his target.
Bido felt a chill run down his spine.
It was different from the danger he had felt before.
It was not approaching violence,
nor was it tension on the verge of exploding.
Rather, it was closer to a silence in which it seemed nothing would happen at all.
And yet that silence felt strangely heavy.
It was at that moment.
The man moved.
Bido thought he had not missed the movement.
He had not looked away,
nor had he blinked.
And yet, in the next instant,
the man was already standing before his eyes.
He had not approached,
nor had he leapt in.
It was as though what they had been seeing until now had merely been a reflection from far away,
and this was the distance at which he should have been all along.
It felt as though the air had folded.
There was no sound.
No wind, no presence.
Distance had simply lost its meaning.
Another layer of moonlight settled down.
The outline before his eyes grew clearer,
but that clarity did not anchor reality.
It was as though objects remained in their proper places,
yet only the “sound” that should have proven those places had disappeared.
Bido unconsciously drew in a breath, then stopped.
His mouth was going dry.
When the tip of his tongue brushed his upper lip, it tasted not of iron, but of cold water.
Miryeong’s ears lifted ever so slightly, then flattened.
Even the faint friction that she would normally have heard
could not reach the walls now, vanishing in midair instead.
Within the radius where he stood, it felt as though not presence, but the very “rules,” had changed.
Moonlight touched his shoulders, and yet the shadow beneath them did not fall properly.
Suddenly, Hajin’s hands began to tremble.
And though the heel of his foot, retreating a step, stepped on gravel,
the sound of the gravel rolling came late.
Bido felt his own hand seeking the hilt of his sword.
But even in the moment he grasped it,
the thought followed: What meaning does this have?
For some reason, he had no certainty that his sword would reach.
And the fact that he lacked that certainty
was the first thing to weaken his knees.
Miryeong’s breath broke once, then resumed.
In that gap in her breathing,
Bido felt the very concept of “distance to flee” being erased.
Here, the moonlight was not a path, but a boundary.
Miryeong’s breath stopped short.
“Uh… what…”
Without realizing it, Hajin took another step back.
He could not explain why,
but he felt that he must not look at that man for too long.
The man looked down at Hajin from very close by.
There was nothing contained in his eyes.
It was not the gaze one gave a living person,
nor the gaze one gave someone who was dying.
It was only confirmation.
The man slowly raised his hand.
And without a word, he spread his hand toward Hajin.
That was all.
The man said nothing.
And yet his silence was far clearer than words.
Miryeong felt her breathing grow a little more labored just from standing there.
It was an inexplicable pressure.
There was certainly no sign that he was threatening them.
And yet her body was rejecting this situation before her mind could.
As though the air were tightening around her, the inside of her chest grew constricted.
Miryeong gritted her teeth.
Until now, in countless situations, she had always been the first to speak to her opponent.
Whether the other party was strong,
dangerous,
or impossible to understand.
But now, she instinctively knew
that no words could touch this situation.
Even so, she had to speak.
This was not because of her personality,
but because of the way she had lived until now.
Miryeong drew in a breath.
And barely managed to open her mouth.
“Y… you are…”
Her words cut off midway.
Her voice was far lower and more trembling than she knew it to be.
Even Miryeong herself was momentarily shaken by that tone.
Until now, she had spoken bluntly to anyone.
No matter who they were,
or what position they held.
But now, she could not.
“You are…”
“What in the world…”
In the end, she could not form a sentence.
The question carried the meaning of asking his identity,
and the meaning of asking his reason,
all jumbled together without being sorted out.
Even then, the man did not look at Miryeong.
There was no answer.
He still stood there, pointing only at Hajin.
Only then did Miryeong realize.
Questions held no meaning for this being.
Explanations were unnecessary,
and understanding was not presumed.
Miryeong’s hand trembled ever so slightly.
She closed her mouth.
Miryeong’s lips quivered a little.
“Bi…”
The word stopped at that single syllable.
Even without the name following, its meaning was enough.
Bido felt that tremor.
He knew that Miryeong’s gaze was on him,
and he knew what choice this situation was demanding.
They could not hand Hajin over.
He could not explain the reason,
but it was a situation in which anyone here would have had no choice but to reach the same conclusion.
Bido stepped forward.
Then he shifted his center of gravity slightly.
Steadying his breath, he searched within himself.
Just as he had earlier.
Earlier, he had definitely stopped Hajin.
That memory was still vivid.
The sensation of drawing up Mirkin.
And Idrin.
The sensation of that power flowing together with the sword.
Bido recalled that moment exactly as it had been.
Surely he could do it again this time.
No, he felt he had to.
Something inside his chest pulled tight once more.
Bido did not open his eyes wide.
He did not grit his teeth.
He simply drew up his power in silence.
Mirkin.
And,
Idrin.
He could clearly feel the sensation of the two powers recognizing each other and overlapping.
Bido did not hesitate.
And this time, he was not cautious.
He discarded both the intent to stop him as he had done with Hajin,
and the judgment that he should leave no wound.
Bido swung his sword as it was.
It was precise.
The distance, the angle,
and the flow of power.
Everything was exactly as his body remembered it.
And yet—
There was no sensation of having cut through anything in the space it passed.
There was no resistance transmitted to his wrist,
only the brief sound of the blade slicing through air.
As though he had cut through a place where nothing existed.
Bido stopped at once.
The tip of his sword trembled faintly as it pointed into empty air.
The man was still standing there.
He had not retreated a single step,
nor had his center of gravity wavered.
As though the sword just swung had never reached him.
Cold sweat formed on Bido’s forehead.
Something was wrong.
That thought came first.
It was not the feeling of failure,
nor the sensation of being blocked.
Just—
the feeling that he had been exerting his strength toward an entirely different place.
In the end, Bido instinctively took a step back.
Even so, the man still showed no reaction whatsoever.
He did not even shift his gaze toward Bido.
His eyes remained on Hajin from beginning to end.
Only then did Bido realize.
He was not facing this being.
He simply could not reach the place where this being existed.
The man let out a very short breath.
The sound was smaller even than the whisper of passing wind.
At that moment,
Bido felt Hajin’s presence vanish from behind him.
Bido turned his head.
Hajin, who had clearly been standing behind him just a moment ago,
was nowhere to be seen.
Bido’s eyes returned to the front.
The man was standing there.
And in his hand was Hajin.
To say that he had been dragged over would not be right.
There was no trace of him having struggled.
He was simply caught in that hand.
It was an unreal sight.
Impossible to understand.
Bido tried to move his body, but could not.
Miryeong was the same.
No one was holding them down,
and yet no action came.
The man looked down at Hajin, who was caught in his hand.
Hajin moved reflexively.
“Let… let me go.”
The words were closer to a plea.
“Why…”
Then the man spoke, very softly.
“…I am sorry.”
Those words were not directed at Bido or Miryeong.
They were neither an explanation nor a request for understanding.
They were words directed unilaterally at Hajin.
An inexplicable dark light began to rise quietly from Hajin’s body.
The light neither flashed nor spread.
It merely remained there.
It felt as though time had stretched.
In reality, it must have been an exceedingly brief instant.
But to Bido, it felt close to eternity.
A time of stillness in which he seemed to have forgotten even how to breathe.
At last, the man slowly set Hajin down.
It was then.
For the first time, Bido saw the man’s face clearly.
On that face, which until now had held no expression at all,
tears were flowing down.
There was no sound,
no sobbing.
Only quietly,
a single streak.
That scene was the end.
In the space of a blink,
the man had already vanished.
Nothing remained in the place where he had been.
As though no one had been there from the beginning.
As though, when the sun rises, the moon can no longer be seen.
And so, everything was over.