Chapter 88

**Episode 88: Means of Love**

[Baek Harin SIDE]

My senses return.

Once again, I awoke from a sweet dream.

In today’s dream, I met him after a long time and we embraced.

It was truly, truly a happy time.

I didn’t want to return to this miserable reality.

I had been trapped here for quite a long time, making it hard to keep my sanity.

‘How much longer must I endure…’

I hated this feeling as if my very self was about to collapse.

It felt as if I was doing something that brought no pleasure and only pain.

– Squeak…

In a moment when I thought I was losing my mind, the door opened very cautiously, unlike usual.

“Hello… I came to bring breakfast… I knocked, but there was no answer, so I opened the door and saw you were already awake… Um, may I come in?”

An annoying way of speaking.

A voice different from usual.

But I felt no malice.

It was a voice of a very youthful girl.

“… Why didn’t Mero come today?”

“Ah… Um, my sister… she, she quit her job and went back to her hometown… So I’m here instead of my sister… The steward said that it’s not a difficult job for a newcomer, so… Ah! My name is Lina… I don’t have a last name…”

Lina, the child who introduced herself, had a trembling voice that continued to irritate me.

“… Mero quit her job?”

“Yes… At first, I thought she was just on vacation… but that wasn’t the case…”

Wasn’t she supposed to be the maid in charge of me?

Why did she quit?

Just like Shiwoo, who doesn’t come to save me…

Mero, have you also come to dislike me?

During the short yet long time we spent together, I thought we became friends.

… I have nothing left.

In the end, perhaps it is too luxurious for someone like me to create bonds.

“I have many questions, but… it doesn’t matter anymore, does it?”

“Eh? What do you mean it doesn’t matter—”

I raised my hand for Lina to see, gesturing as if it was okay for her to leave now.

“Ah… Is there anything else you need—”

“I don’t need anything, so just leave quickly.”

“Y-yes, I’m sorry!”

– Thud.

I heard her fumbling in a hurry to leave, but the door was gently closed.

As soon as I recognized Lina was gone, I tightly gripped the knife given to me to slice meat in my right hand.

No more.

“I can’t bear to hold back this feeling any longer…”

I said, trembling, as if making a firm resolution.

I pressed the knife against my left wrist with my right hand.

In fact, I had done this act of bringing a knife to my wrist more than once.

I didn’t harm myself back then.

I wanted to punish myself, but lacked the courage.

However… since Mero left, it feels like my mindset has slightly changed.

Every time I press the knife to my wrist, I can feel the drug being released in my brain.

What I need most right now is being released.

I feel completely immersed in this action.

My senses tell me.

This act of scaring myself.

That it releases more adrenaline than jabbing a syringe filled with drugs into my own vein.

‘I can’t stand it… I feel like I’m going to go completely insane…’

A maddening yet exciting situation.

My heart races with breath I cannot hide.

It feels similar to being in love.

If… I were to cut my wrist with this knife, then…

‘At that time… how much deeper love would I feel?’

I can do it, I must.

—

The moment the taste was discovered, it felt like my breath could be taken away.

I want to enjoy this fantastic sensation even more.

Expelling the emotions built up deep within me makes me feel a little better.

This sensation.

‘I feel like I’m going to fall into a hallucination…’

Though I cannot see in front of me.

—

The smell of my blood hit my nose.

It seems blood splattered all around.

‘Ah… I’ve really caused an accident.’

I didn’t heal the wounds I inflicted on myself.

Did I forget how to heal?

Of course not, it’s because I wanted to hold onto this pain for a long time.

If I healed it right away, there would be no reason to have mustered the courage to cut my wrist.

If I keep feeling this pain, it feels like my brain will melt away, which I enjoy.

And this is… to quell the thought of being abandoned by him, while also punishing myself for doubting Shiwoo.

– Squeak…

“Ah, hello… I came for lunch… I knocked again, but you didn’t answer… Huh!”

“Ah… Lina? Can you come here for a moment?”

I called Lina, who had come looking for me as mealtime approached.

“Are you hurt, guest?! I can give you emergency treatment…!”

“I’m not hurt… it’s just a form of love.”

“L-love?”

“Yes, love… it’s love.”

I picked up the knife that was already stained with my blood once again.

“Oh… now that I think about it, Lina, you asked me earlier if I needed anything else… So… take this.”

“This… this?”

And I firmly placed it in Lina’s hand.

Then I exposed my left wrist, where my skin was previously torn open, revealing a wound.

“Listen, Lina.”

“Yes?”

Lina replied in a trembling voice.

“Cut it for me.”

“I-I think I misheard you…”

“Don’t be afraid… It’ll be as easy as drawing a line when you’re painting…”

“But I’ve never done anything like this before…”

She really seems like a child raised in an environment without love.

“Don’t want to?”

“No… It’s not that I don’t want to… it’s just… that…”

“You… are you trying to leave me too, Lina? Just like Mero…”

And like Shiwoo.

“I-I’m not leaving…!”

“Then do it.”

It’s not that hard.

“I-I don’t know how…”

“Quickly.”

Don’t be frustrating.

“Eh!”

—

– Slash!

—

“Um… Does it hurt…? Sniff. I’m sorry…”

Lina worried about me with a quavering voice.

“It’s okay. I told you to do it… Well, it might look painful, but… this kind of wound is nothing.”

Because.

“The pain isn’t in my wrist.”

—

It’s that I can’t meet him again, the thought of being abandoned hurts my heart even more.

—

Lina ran out of the room, and shortly after.

It was still early for dinner, but the door of the room I was imprisoned in opened.

These footsteps don’t belong to Lina.

“Who are you?”

“Lady, I am the steward.”

A voice of a woman in her mid-forties.

“Did you come to let me out of here?”

The steward let out a deep sigh.

“No matter how much of a guest you are, there are limits. How badly must you have tormented her for a newcomer to quit and run away in just one day?”

Locking a guest up doesn’t seem reasonable.

“… If you’re talking about Lina, I haven’t particularly tormented her…”

The steward approached me.

“I heard that you forced that newcomer into making the wound on your wrist… is that not true?”

Did Lina spill everything?

I didn’t think she would.

I thought she was a decent child.

What a shame.

“I’m not sure.”

“Hmm… I see.”

As if you know anything.

Anyone else would have done the same in my place.

I lost the person I loved overnight.

And it was right next to me.

Thinking back to that time makes me feel melancholic.

Right now, a sense of helplessness and loneliness approaches me.

My heart feels empty, and it seems as dark as my vision.

‘What do I do… Shiwoo.’

Even if I feel like I’ve been abandoned by you.

I still like you so much.

I always love how you play along with my nonsense, no matter how trivial.

Even if it was just in a dream, thinking about our embrace makes me smile.

‘Really… my heart races to the point that I feel like it’s going to burst…’

I can feel my heartbeat stirring.

It feels so divine that my soul might fly away.

Doki Doki, the cute sound of my heart feels like it’s wrapping around my entire body with a thrill.

I want to live like other ordinary couples.

Holding hands, sometimes hugging.

Kissing, getting intimate.

Touching his sexy collarbone.

Getting married.

Becoming his wife, when I become a mother, I don’t want my child to walk the same path as I did.

—

Delusions.

It’s the happiest when I’m having them, but the most empty once it’s over… just like when a couple has sex.

When the happy imagination ends, I end up seeking drugs again.

However, there’s no way to take or administer any sort of drug here.

All I can do is release adrenaline.

No matter how exhausted I am, I can’t sleep due to the extreme stress.

To fall into a deep sleep, I need to use the knife again.

As soon as the steward left, I immediately held the knife in my hand once more.

It was different from yesterday when all I did was scare myself.

I’ve already had experience.

I brought the knife to my wrist.

Repetitively inflicting wounds on my left wrist to the extent of boredom.

The sensation of skin breaking.

The sensation of nerves tearing.

This action feels like it’s vanishing negative energy.

The scars and pain derived from this, though short-lived, provide me a profound sense of happiness.

It offers more pleasure than stripping off all my clothes and seeking solace.

This pleasure, even if I were allowed to step outside the gate… I feel like I could never forget it.

Self-harm, which offers me this deep sensation, I know I could never forget.

It is, after all, the only atonement I can offer to Shiwoo.

And it’s my means of love for you.