The Late Game Healer Is Way Too Strong – Chapter 130

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏𝟑𝟎: 𝐗𝐢𝐚𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠 𝟑

20 years ago, South Korea.

Lo-an dug through the trash cans.

His short stature and small body forced him to half-submerge himself into them.

At least it wasn’t too hot to make the smell unbearable, as it was winter.

The day before, he had found a half-eaten hamburger that had filled his empty stomach, and in the morning, he had picked up a loaf of bread that someone had discarded.

The trash cans near the supermarket were the best.

If there was mold on the food, he could just cut off the bad part, wash it with water, and eat it.

If the meat had gone bad, he could boil it in hot water and add ramen soup powder to make it somewhat edible.

Today, he had also found a half-empty bottle of cola and a rotten banana, in addition to the bread.

If he was lucky, he could even find food that looked fine but had already passed its expiration date.

As he dug through the trash cans, he was suddenly struck by a sharp pain in his side.

BAM!

“Keugh!”

Lo-an fell to the ground, clutching his side.

Vomit rose up from his stomach and sprayed across his face.

He looked up to see a man in his 50s holding a bottle of soju glaring at him.

“You little brat, stealing again! Hey! How many times do I have to tell you that this is my territory!?”

“F*ck you(In chinese), there’s no such thing as yours or mine among beggars!”

“You little punk! Did you just curse at me? Get lost!”

“Son of a b*tch! Your mother is a dog thief(In chinese)!”

“What did you say. . . Get lost!”

He yelled at Lo-an, brandishing his soju bottle menacingly.

Bastards, all of them, good-for-nothing dogs.

“Tch, asshole!(In chinese).”

Lo-an spat on the ground and limped away.

Then, he carefully opened his palm.

He must have grabbed something from the trash can when he was kicked.

In his hand was a small, cheap hair clip.

“Damn. . . This isn’t even food.”

Lo-an was about to throw the hair clip away, but he hesitated for a moment and then closed his hand around it again.

That evening.

“Wow~ Oppa, what is this?”

“Can’t you tell just by looking at it?”

“Did you get this for me? Really?”

“Be quiet.”

A dingy, semi-basement room with no heating.

Black mold all over the wallpaper, the electricity cut off, and newspaper stuffed into the gaps around the door.

This was what poverty looked like in its physical form.

His sister tried to put the hair clip in her hair, which was as thin as a sparrow’s tail.

However, her hair was too short, so the clip only held on loosely.

Her hair had been cut short with scissors she had found, because it was too difficult to wash it in cold water.

“Oppa! I’m pretty, right?”

Lo-an nodded slightly at his sister’s innocent smile.

His sister’s cold hands, which were like twigs, were lit up by the headlights of a car passing by the crack in the window.

“Where’s mom?”

“She went to find dad.”

“. . . .”

Lo-an couldn’t bring himself to curse in front of his sister, so he swallowed his words.

At the end of last year, the bar where his mother worked had closed down. She had been desperate to borrow money, so she had been searching for his father, gambling day and night.

But how could she find a gambler who traveled all over the country?

Their lives had become increasingly precarious, as if the very word “family” was crumbling around them.

From freshly cooked rice to cold rice.

From cold rice to stale rice and ramen noodles.

And finally, to trash cans.

Poverty and misfortune had grown like mold.

“Oppa, I want to watch TV.”

“I don’t want to watch it.”

“Do they have the movie we watched when we were living in China?”

“They probably do.”

“I want to watch that movie. Oppa, you look just like the main character in that movie.”

His sister played with the hair clip, twirling it around her finger as she repeated her usual words.

‘What main character, my ass.’

“Go to sleep first.”

“Are you going out again, Oppa?”

“Go to sleep.”

“You have to come back soon. . . I’m scared.”

“Just go to sleep! Don’t go outside, it’s dangerous! Stay home no matter what! Don’t go out even if someone calls for you!”

“Okay. . .”

He tried to keep his sister at home as much as possible, because of the debt collectors who came looking for them.

With his sister wrapped up tightly in blankets and clothes, Lo-an left the house.

It was cold.

He headed towards the meeting place of the neighborhood delinquents.

“You’re here, punk.”

The leader of the group, 18-year-old Young-ho, greeted him.

“You haven’t been here in a while.”

“I need money.”

The last time he had come to this meeting was three or four months ago.

That was when he still had some uncooked rice and stale rice left at home.

He was only 14 years old, so there was no place that would hire him for a part-time job.

Occasionally, he would earn some money by distributing flyers.

That’s how he ended up hanging out with the neighborhood delinquents and naturally learned how to pickpocket and mug people.

“We haven’t had many jobs lately.”

“It doesn’t matter. . . I’ll do anything, as long as it pays.”

Three or four months ago, he had stolen money from an internet cafe and Lo-an had taken the blame.

Fortunately, he had been released that day, but he had been told that if he made another mistake, he would be sent to a foreign prison. That’s why he hadn’t come to the meetings again.

If something happened to him. . . What would happen to his sister?

“Oh, Yoon-gu said something like that earlier. Apparently, there was this kid who came into the store, and he was really young. But Yoon-gu said his wallet was full of cash.”

“Is he alone?”

“That’s why we should go after him, punk.”

“Okay.”

And so, the group of five set out into the night to find the ‘kid’.

Thanks to Young-ho, who had many friends and underlings in every corner of the neighborhood, finding their target wasn’t difficult.

“Why is that kid sitting alone in the park behind the mountain? He’s just staring at the ground.”

Yoon-gu asked Young-ho.

“Who knows? Maybe he’s crazy. He’s alone, so let’s do it now, guys.”

They pulled their ski masks over their faces and approached the kid.

“Hey, you got any money?”

Young-ho asked in his typical neighborhood bully tone.

The kid looked at them with an expressionless face.

Under the streetlight, his sharp, cold features were revealed.

“We’re a little short on money for the arcade, so can you lend us some?”

“Scram.”

“What?”

“I’m busy, so get lost, you worthless pieces of trash.”

“Huh?”

Young-ho and the others began to pull out small knives from their pockets.

“Who are you calling trash, kid? You want to get stabbed?”

“Young-ho’s been to juvie, you f*cking idiot!”

They surrounded their target and threatened him with menacing voices.

However, Lo-an stood a little distance away from them, not knowing what to do.

It was an animalistic instinct.

Something about this felt dangerous.

“That punk is scared. You’re not getting a cut, trash!”

Young-ho brandished a small butterfly knife.

Slash! BAM! BAM!

It happened in an instant.

The boy, who looked to be about the same age as Lo-an, lunged at Young-ho and turned his face into a bloody mess.

He was like a small mountain beast.

The other guys tried to attack him, but they met the same fate.

The boy looked at Lo-an with cold, dry eyes.

Lo-an collapsed to the ground.

The boy approached Lo-an, crouched down, and pulled off his ski mask.

“You’re just a kid.”

“. . .You’re a kid too.”

“Who are you talking to like that?”

“You talked to me like that too.”

“I’m the victor, and you’re the loser. The victor gets to talk down to the loser.”

“I. . . I didn’t lose to you.”

“Do you want to try?”

As the boy raised his fist, Lo-an covered his face with both arms.

“Pathetic.”

He flicked Lo-an’s cheek and stood up.

“Aren’t you going to hit me?”

“You messed things up for me.”

“What do you. . .?”

“I was luring them in, but you made them run away.”

“What?”

“What do you think, monster? If other people die, it’s all your fault. I don’t care.”

The boy walked away with heavy steps.

Monster?

Lo-an got up unsteadily and watched his back as he walked away.

At that moment,

BOOM!

A huge explosion occurred in the downtown area.

Lo-an fell to the ground, his eyes wide as he watched the flames and smoke billowing into the sky.

It was the neighborhood he lived in.

Lo-an ran towards his house.

His breath was ragged and his lungs felt like they were being ripped apart by the cold winter air.

Hairpin.

Strangely, that damn hairpin kept coming to mind.

He shouted his sister’s name through his blurry eyes.

The houses around him had collapsed from the monster’s attack.

Lo-an found the house where he lived, now reduced to rubble, and began frantically clearing away the bricks like a madman.

His nails broke and his fingers were crushed, but he never stopped.

“He. . . lp me. . .! Someo. . . ne, someo. . . ne. . .!”

The world continued to blur due to the tears that kept flowing.

His breath became ragged as he sobbed.

His head felt like it was going to split open.

Crack. Crack.

No matter how many times he removed the damn rocks, they wouldn’t go away.

It was an impossible task for a mere 14-year-old boy.

Oppa will earn money and buy you a TV.

I’ll let you wash your hands in warm water.

I’ll buy you real, delicious food, not just scraps.

“That’s why. . . sob, that’s why. . . sniff, Oppa is sorry. . .”

Her last appearance replayed in his mind hundreds, thousands of times, and each time, he collapsed like a house.

The Awakener and firefighters arrived late and began clearing the wreckage.

As soon as there was a small gap, Lo-an squeezed through.

He dug through the collapsed rocks, tearing his flesh and drawing blood, but he didn’t care.

A chill worse than the cold steel emanated from the basement.

It was a different kind of cold from the winter cold, a coldness that seemed to freeze the human soul.

He approached the spot where his sister always slept and removed the small stones.

After removing a lot of them, he still couldn’t see her, so Lo-an began to hope that she had gone outside.

Yes, she must have gone outside because of the loud noise. I can’t see her even after removing this much. So please, even if you didn’t listen to me before. . . don’t be here, please.

A very small space was cleared of rocks.

A tiny girl, wrapped tightly in a dirty blanket, came into view.

Lo-an felt the blood drain from his face.

“H-Helpㅡ!! Help!! There’s someone here!!”

He staggered to the basement window and shouted at the top of his lungs.

“O. . . ppa. . . .”

At that moment, he heard his sister’s faint voice.

Lo-an stopped shouting through the gap and approached his sister.

A very large rock was on her lower body.

“Later. . . .”

His sister spoke intermittently, her face pale.

“We’ll get rich. . . together. . .”

Lo-an grabbed his sister’s cold, rough hand.

It was colder and harder than ice.

“I’ll grow my hair long. . . and put in the hairpin Oppa gave me. . . .”

Lo-an couldn’t answer and just nodded his head.

He wanted to answer, but his throat was so tight that he couldn’t say anything.

Yes, Oppa will earn a lot of money.

I’ll buy you ten, a hundred more of those hairpins.

So. . . let’s be together, Oppa.

Lo-an felt a sharp pain in his chest and tasted blood in his throat.

“Oppa, I’m cold. . . .”

His sister’s words trailed off.

“. . . . . . .”

Lo-an stared at her with dull eyes.

He couldn’t feel anything, as if the world had stopped.

He stroked his sister’s cheek.

Rough. Cold.

Lo-an let out a beastly cry.

🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷🔷

On that day, it is said that the monster that had ravaged the moonlit neighborhood was defeated by a young Awakener who lived nearby.

Lo-an went to find that Awakener.

“Take me as your disciple.”

“Why me?”

The boy he had seen in the park frowned.

“I want to kill all the monsters.”

“Oh, really? Then go kill them yourself.”

“I’m a beggar and a foreigner, so I don’t have the money to learn.”

Lo-an fell to his knees with a thud.

“That’s none of my business. It’s up to you whether you give up or not.”

“Because of me. . . my sister died.”

The boy looked at Lo-an as he chewed on a piece of squid.

Suddenly, he was reminded of himself and his own sister.

‘𝙁*𝙘𝙠.’

“I see.”

“If you take me on, I’ll. . . I’ll call you master for the rest of my life.”

“That goes without saying, you f*cking idiot.”

“Then. . . I’ll be your dog. I’ll bark when you tell me to bark, and I’ll bite when you tell me to bite. Raise me as your disciple. No, please raise me as your disciple.”

The boy clicked his tongue.

This is such a pain in the ass.

He stared at the kneeling beggar for a moment before opening his mouth.

“What’s your name?”

“Lo. . . .”

Lo-an started to say his name, but then he closed his mouth again.

That name was buried with his sister’s grave.

It was a name that should have died with her.

Lo-an thought of the name of the movie actor his sister liked the most.

“My name is Xiaolong.

TL: Dang that’s sad.

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