Chapter 103.1: Heat flower (3) Part 1
Heat flower (3)
What is Heat flower? [T/N: Heat flower (열꽃이란) ]
It's the red dots that bloom on your skin when you're severely ill.
A pain that lingers as a mark.
These flowers of record bloom when the illness is at its worst, or in other words, right before the body begins to recover.
That's why it symbolizes both the most desperate moment and the most hopeful.
-Choose.
It may sound paradoxical.
But this was a law befitting the truth.
The darkest dawn is also the closest to the arrival of light.
The harshest winter is also the closest season to welcoming gentle warmth.
Life was no different.
-Choose, Raiden.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts so much.
Even if the tears that stream down your cheeks become a sea that laps at your feet.
Eventually, the moment the Heat flower blooms will come.
Because there's a limit to the misfortune that life bestows.
If you walk through a thorny path with your wretched breath, you're bound to step on a soft snowfield someday.
We live a beautiful paradox.
We each draw our own dance lines, following the serenade that life plays.
-What do you want to do?
Life is a Heat flower.
Although it is impossible to decide what kind of pain you will receive.
The choice of how to overcome that pain lies in everyone's hands.
Some will move forward, breaking the Heat flower.
Some will collapse, intoxicated by the dizzying scent of flowers.
-Nothing will bind you. So, make a decision comfortably.
The world always asks questions.
Turning your back and running away, or stubbornly taking a step forward.
Peace that can tie up all the pain, or the foolishness of pushing yourself back into hell.
If you have to choose one of the two...
-Which will you choose?
About what choice you will make.
***
"Cough...! Hack...!!"
When I opened my eyes with a dry cough, I was rolling on the bed.
Blurry focus.
In my flickering vision was the scenery of the room where dawn had settled.
I collected my ragged breaths and let out a groan.
"Haa... Ugh, uh..."
As I pressed my forehead with a throbbing headache, the contents of the dream that had just swallowed my consciousness flashed through my mind.
The voices lingering in my ears chased away my hazy drowsiness.
-Yes, you're right.
-...You were reincarnated, Raiden.
The dissonance, the sense of deja vu, and the melancholy that swept through my body.
Lost in a whirlwind of complex emotions, I pinched my thigh to bring myself back to reality.
I tried to focus my wandering gaze.
A lukewarm heat lingered on my fingertips.
It felt like the warmth of the two boys was still vivid.
A dizzying sense of reality washed over me, making my hands tremble faintly.
"..."
I could feel it.
Very clearly.
Something inside me had changed.
I clenched my trembling fingers into a fist and sat up from my sprawled position on the bed.
Stagger...
My feet, having left the bed, gently touched the ground.
I stumbled forward, forcing my shaky legs to support my weight.
My unsteady steps led me to the full-length mirror.
Standing in front of the transparent surface, I took in my own reflection.
"..."
Depressing black hair.
Black eyes, so deep they seemed to swallow the light.
An awkward smile stitched haphazardly across my lips.
Not dead.
But not quite alive either.
Gazing at the boy in the mirror, I muttered a single word, my voice hollow.
"...Raiden."
The boy's name, a name I had avoided all this time, pretending not to know... I finally spoke it.
.
.
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