The Monster Garden
It wasn't that he hated having fun, but the energy allotted to Ji-oh was rather limited.
“…….”
“…….”
“…Honey, if Daddy's flopped out, you're supposed to nag me at least.”
“…Kkung kkung kkung kkung….”
“If both of us are flopped out, there's no hope at all.”
The busy, busy modern society he had reunited with drained Ji-oh's stamina dry.
Even getting my blood sucked by a vampire wouldn't leave me this exhausted.
He'd never thought of it as an especially peaceful or gentle country to begin with. Yet after thirty-one years, the Republic of Korea had become Hell-Korea. Frail Ji-oh was thoroughly intimidated.
Sprawled across the bed like a twenty-nine-year-old rag, Ji-oh kneaded Honey, who had flopped out like a liquid monster.
“As far as I know… I should still be synchronizing with Giovanni.”
“Kkureuk?”
“The feeling's much weaker when I'm inside than when I'm outside.”
“Kkurrr?”
“The synchronization speed has slowed down too.”
“When I dipped my feet in Cheonggyecheon I filled almost six percent, right?”
“Kkuk.”
“And when we rode the waterway to the restaurant it was nearly four percent….”
The common thread was that both had been water-related actions.
“Maybe because he has so many ties to water.”
It was Giovanni's story.
In any case, the synchronization progressed far faster when he was out in reality than when he simply stayed still inside the painting.
“Must be a trait of the world inside the portrait.”
“Kkurrrrr….”
While synchronizing, he felt the old living patterns return. Hunger arrived at reasonable hours, sleep became necessary after hard work, and a body that had once been strangely light grew heavy again….
Yet after returning from the Seoul tour, those sensations dulled a little inside the portrait.
“Even while synchronizing, maybe inside the portrait I'm treated as a painting rather than a human. Being here means even the emotions I feel get treated as ‘painting.'”
When Ji-oh was the subject, whatever intangible thing he targeted seemed to be judged as a ‘painting' first. Just as when he had once felt gratitude toward Yu Seong-un and arbitrarily gifted him fruit preserve, the one-to-one system hadn't complained.
“…….”
Once the synchronization finished, would he simply return to being a ‘portrait'?
“What would a human who can only ever be a portrait unless he synchronizes with someone else even be like?”
“…….”
“Truly badass.”
“Kkurr….”
“There's no other portrait like me anywhere in the world. I'll take confidence from that.”
Today, too, Ji-oh's self-esteem soared without knowing the sky had a limit.
“As expected, I'm amazing.”
Ji-oh's humanity refused to bow to the mere identity of a haunted portrait. His sense of self was far too assertive for something so trivial to throw it into confusion.
“Let's just eat.”
“Kkurrreuk.”
In the end their conversation turned to food. They were a pair of little pigs.
“Up we go.”
Only after exactly twenty-nine hours and thirty-six more minutes had passed did Ji-oh finally haul himself off the bed.
Honey showed no such intention and remained flopped out. The precious young master already knew full well that Ji-oh would simply carry him.
“Do you have any idea how annoying and adorable you are when you act like that?”
“Kkung.”
“You think being cute is everything? Yeah, actually, the world really is that simple.”
“Kkurrrrrrrrr.”
“You're already fulfilling your entire purpose just by being cute.”
As far as Ji-oh was concerned, no emotion brought more peace to humanity than cuteness.
“Today's meal is under my direction.”
It always was.
“Shall we head to the vegetable patch for the first time in a while and check how much everything's grown?”
“Kkung kkung kkung….”
“Even flying that far is too much trouble? Your laziness has reached the heavens. I'll put you in the basket, so just stay still.”
“Kkuuuuung kkurrr!”
“Trying to send me alone? Oh no you don't. Nope. We're going together. Daddy will get lonely.”
Ji-oh scooped the limp liquid monster into a basket. Honey grumbled with dissatisfied kkung-kkung sounds yet poured in smoothly, and Ji-oh stepped out of the cabin looking thoroughly satisfied with the basket in hand.
And then he beheld nature itself.
“What is this?”
Where had his humble little vegetable patch gone, and when had the Amazon moved in?
“Where on earth did my small, precious garden go?”
“Kku, kkuru….”
“My garden was never like this.”
He had expected, at best, a few sprouts. Instead of adorable little sprouts, the cherry tomatoes alone had grown roughly three meters tall.
“No, wait—can you even call a three-meter cherry tomato a ‘cherry' tomato?”
No.
“Are these even tomatoes to begin with?”
The tomatoes he knew weren't the size of small watermelons.
Having tried nearly every kind of farming at least once, Ji-oh fell into confusion at a result he had never experienced in his life. He hadn't left the patch unattended that long, and the seeds and seedlings had been perfectly ordinary when he planted them. So how had a monster field been born instead of a vegetable patch?
“The lettuce is….”
“…….”
“It's the incarnation of Cthulhu.”
“Kkurrreuk?”
“There's a thing like that.”
An octopus monster-god that could drive even a perfectly normal person who could buy hotteok with five thousand won completely insane.
“It looks exactly like that.”
And Ji-oh knew that was the spot where he had planted lettuce.
“I must have planted octopus instead of lettuce.”
“Kkureuk.”
“Don't agree, Honey. Daddy bruises easily.”
The lettuce leaves, thicker than autumn napa cabbage, soared toward the sky without knowing a limit. Their presence was so imposing that Ji-oh felt as if he had been rejected without even confessing.
“A reality beyond imagination.”
And then the corn.
“…….”
“…….”
“I'm scared.”
Ji-oh was intimidated.
“Is that a tree?”
The stalks were far too thick, and the kernels even thicker. It was extremely terrifying.
The potatoes and sweet potatoes still hiding underground were even more frightening. Even though they had yet to reveal their true forms, the stems crawling above the soil looked as if he were watching a horror movie.
“This powerful life force… it's alive.”
“Kkureuk.”
“Don't ruin the mood by saying of course it's alive, Honey. Daddy already knows that much.”
“Kkuk?”
“I meant it looks like it'll start crawling around on its own any second. It's not supposed to do that.”
If this wasn't a horror movie, what was it?
“The peas are….”
“…….”
“…Even a zombie crawling up from hell wouldn't be this clingy.”
The pea vines that had half-parasitized the nearby plants were long and thin, doubling their grotesqueness. They looked ready to start catching bugs any moment. Like spiders.
“So what on earth is this?”
What have I done?
“As expected, I'm incredible.”
No, that wasn't it.
“At this point it's just funny.”
“…Kkuk?”
“Yeah, that's what I wanted to say.”
When a situation this unexpected hit him, it simply became entertaining.
“There's no way the taste has changed.”
Then it was fine.
“Even though the garden has become so robust it looks like it could start talking to me any second….”
“…….”
“We're still going to call this place a vegetable patch. It's a little embarrassing to say out loud, but those of us who know its humble beginnings have a duty to protect that identity.”
“Kkurr…?”
“Honey, think carefully. Those guys look like they're about to start moving any second. We need to stay on their good side before that happens so we don't get eaten.”
Half joke, half serious.
In a world that can evolve even humans into portraits, a plant with a sense of self is basically average, isn't it?
Grandmother had said it: a mere human never knows when disaster will strike, so one must always live humbly and wisely.
Today, too, Ji-oh was a good grandson who faithfully followed the wisdom of his elders.
“…….”
But the urge to shove the blame onto someone else when an accident happened was human nature.
“…Do you think Yu Seong-un might have given me monster seeds from the start?”
“Kkung.”
“Right, the seeds themselves looked ordinary even to me. This world's the problem after all.”
Which made him extremely curious whether they would taste good.
“Shall we try a little taste….”
“…….”
“…….”
“……?”
Stepping into the monster field, Ji-oh doubted his own eyes.
Have I gotten farsighted?
Or was it a hallucination?
“If this is reality, our safety might be in danger, Honey.”
“…Kkurrrreuk….”
“Why is there a dead deer here?”
Ji-oh was thoroughly intimidated.
“Oh gods of heaven and earth.”
Please watch over this pitiful portrait.
“So why is it really here?”
“Kkurrreuk, kkureuk, kkureuk.”
“You can do it too? No, don't compete. So who the hell dragged this thing here and left it? Where did this deer even come from? Daddy is too confused right now, so Honey, please stop climbing out of the basket to do self-PR….”
The monster field had grown so dense that he hadn't noticed at first, but once he pushed deeper inside, a deer that was clearly dead lay there in perfectly fresh condition.
Judging by the deer's robust and sturdy build, it was not one of the creatures from the forest around Ji-oh's cabin. The animals here were all cute and dainty to match his tastes.
A herbivorous animal that camouflages by blooming flowers or autumn leaves on its antlers according to the season. It normally avoids fights with other animals, but when its camouflage is discovered it falls into extreme excitement and goes on a rampage. Its metallic antlers, teeth, and hooves can easily crush animal bones. As part of its camouflage, it emits the scent of nuts or of flowers and fruit.
Alchemy Method: Processed meat made by filleting the flesh and sun-drying it grants strong satiety and heals light abrasions.
Habitat: Ruined Abilas Rainforest — Kingdom of Animals
Ji-oh shuddered.
“I've finally caused a real disaster.”
In this life where not even an inch of the future can be known, he had expected that living so thoughtlessly would someday bring the final day—but that end had arrived far sooner than expected.
“The day of ruin is coming soon.”
“Kkung?”
“An invasive species has gotten in.”
With nothing for self-defense except the ability to paint potatoes, Ji-oh was clearly not going to last.
“Kkurrreuk, kkurrrrrrrrr.”
“Honey?”
“Kkuk kkuk kkuk. Kkuru, kkuk.”
“…….”
Watching Honey, who seemed desperate to tell him something, Ji-oh carefully re-examined the scene and understood.
“…This….”
“Kkuk!”
“There's a hole in its forehead.”
And he confirmed that blood was smeared on a nearby sweet-potato vine.
“…….”
“Kkurrreuk?”
“Are you trying to say that the sweet-potato vine came alive, reached through the dimensional gate I made, and stabbed the invasive species right through the forehead, killing it instantly?”
“Kkuk.”
“I see.”
Ji-oh pondered.
Which one should I be more afraid of?
A violent invasive species that drifted in from some unknown dimension
VS
A sweet potato that moves on its own and can pierce a solid skull in one strike
“Gods of heaven and earth, have mercy.”
Both were terrifying. Ji-oh had already been intimidated three times today.
“Honey, can a fragile being like me even survive in this wilderness?”
“…….”
“Don't look so serious. Daddy is serious. I think I'm far too weak to survive this great nature.”
“Kkung.”
“Where would you ever find someone as pitiful and useless as Daddy, huh?”
After a long exchange, Ji-oh received the assurance that every living thing in the monster field would be well-disposed toward him. Just as every plant and animal in the forest treated him kindly, the crops he had raised would be much the same.
There was no solid evidence for it, but….
“Then that's fine.”
Ji-oh's ultimate positive mindset freed him from such petty fear.
Above all, he had been about to prepare a meal anyway.
“We've got meat.”
“Kkurrreuk.”
“Meat….”
Come to think of it, the alchemy method had said ‘processed meat.'
“…Nice.”
And so today's content was decided.
For reference, Ji-oh had learned how to butcher animals before.
Click, click….
“…….”
Tap.
“…Strange.”
In a quiet alley of the slums, a woman with deep-blue hair that swayed like the leisurely depths of the sea murmured to herself.
“For the trail to cut off here.”
She had been quite worried when the aura of her dear human collaborator vanished, yet what an absurd turn of events this was.
“There are no signs of combat.”
She had carefully chosen a suitable specimen and tossed him down beneath the sun.
He had not been bad at infiltration or combat, so the complete absence of not only battle traces but even escape traces was simply incomprehensible.
Still, she did not deny what had already happened.
“He got taken out.”
By whom, she did not know.
“That will require more investigation.”
The woman hummed as if singing.
“The temple seems troubled, nothing has reached the press, and even though it happened in the slums no one knows the circumstances—just how ridiculous a situation is this….”
She could understand the temple's position.
“People who love hiding things under lock and key won't change their cautious habits no matter where they go. How underhanded.”
With the festival about to begin, of course they would be in a tight spot.
“I was hoping to ruin the Festival of the Sun.”
“…….”
“But the person who was supposed to ruin it has disappeared.”
The woman spoke to the child.
“Iser, my only Eun-ha by my side.”
“Yes.”
“You'll have to handle the work.”
“I will not disappoint you.”
“Don't be so stiff.”
The woman smiled, revealing teeth like a shark's.
“We're doing this so everyone can have fun together.”
Her dress that resembled the sea fluttered.
“…….”
In the end, only a single child with blue-green hair remained in the place.
The child wore a benevolent smile.
(To be continued)