The world had ended, but the hospital cafeteria still served lukewarm porridge.
Kim Dae-Hyun stared into the bland, beige mush, his reflection staring back from the surface. It was a gaunt face, all sharp angles and shadows, with eyes that held a weariness far beyond his twenty-two years. The doctors called it 'cancer-induced cachexia.' He called it the slow, invisible monster that was eating him from the inside out.
Outside, the other monsters were louder.
A distant, guttural roar echoed through the reinforced windows, followed by the staccato thunder of what had to be Hunter artillery. The lights flickered—a common occurrence since The Ascension. No one in the cafeteria even looked up. This was normal now.
"You need to eat, Dae-Hyun-ssi," a firm, gentle voice said.
Choi Yuna slid into the seat opposite him, her nurse's uniform crisp and clean, a stark contrast to the general decay. She was pretty, with kind eyes that held a core of unshakable steel. She'd been his primary nurse for the last three months. She'd seen him at his worst.
"The porridge tastes like defeat," Dae-Hyun muttered, pushing the bowl away. His arm trembled with the effort.
"It tastes like nutrients," she corrected, nudging the bowl back. "And you need those to keep your strength up."
For what? he wanted to ask. For a few more weeks of this? But he didn't. He saw the genuine concern in her eyes and, for a moment, felt a flicker of guilt. He picked up the spoon.
That's when it happened.
A chime, high and clear, resonated directly inside his skull. It was the same chime everyone had heard on The Day, the one that heralded the System. But this was different. It was… personal.
A translucent blue screen, identical to the ones he'd seen others interact with, materialized before his eyes.
[New Quest Available: 'A Hunter's Heart']
[Objective: Consume your meal to regain 5 Stamina.]
[Reward: 10 System Credits.]
Dae-Hyun froze, the spoon halfway to his mouth. He looked at Yuna. She was watching him with a clinical expression, seeing only a patient's pause.
So, it's my turn now, he thought, a bitter taste in his mouth that had nothing to do with the porridge. The great System finally got around to the dying guy.
He felt a strange, detached curiosity. What would his Card be? Something useless, probably. [Enhanced Napping] or [Pill-Swallowing Proficiency]. He mentally reached out, a silent, sarcastic 'sure' directed at the universe, and accepted the quest.
The moment he did, the world… glitched.
The blue screen shattered like glass. The comforting, generic blue light was violently washed away in a flood of searing, vengeful crimson.
A new interface burned itself into his vision, the text sharp and jagged, like claw marks on reality.
[ANOMALY DETECTED.]
[SOUL INTEGRITY: CRITICAL. DIAGNOSIS: TERMINAL.]
[SOUL DESIGNATION: FORFEIT.]
[...]
[...RE-CALIBRATING...]
[WELCOME, USER KIM DAE-HYUN.]
[YOU HAVE BEEN SELECTED FOR THE REAPER TRIALS.]
Dae-Hyun's breath hitched. Reaper? Trials? This wasn't the standard Awakening message.
[INITIALIZING SOUL SENSOR... COMPLETE.]
A wave of nausea washed over him, and his perception shifted. The world gained a new layer. Around Choi Yuna, he saw a soft, silver luminescence, a gentle aura that pulsed with a rhythm of compassion and quiet strength. It was beautiful.
But then he looked down the cafeteria line. Around the tired-looking cook, he saw a murky, sluggish yellow—the color of exhaustion and resentment. And around a man in a suit talking loudly on a satellite phone, he saw a flickering, acidic green—anxiety and greed.
He could see their souls. Not their power, but their state.
[QUEST UPDATED.]
[REAPER'S TRIAL I: 'THE APPETITE FOR LIFE']
[OBJECTIVE: CONSUME YOUR MEAL. CONVERT SUSTENANCE INTO TEMPORARY VITALITY.]
[REWARD: THE RIGHT TO BREATHE FOR ANOTHER DAY.]
[FAILURE: ACCELERATED SOUL RECLAMATION.]
The message was clear. Eat, or die. Faster.
His hands, which had been trembling for months, were now perfectly steady. A cold, sharp clarity cut through the chemo-brain fog for the first time in a year. This wasn't a game. This was a threat. A direct, personal threat from the very system that was supposed to save humanity.
And he was not in the mood.
He looked at the porridge, then at the crimson screen. He looked at Choi Yuna, her silver soul glowing with concern.
"Dae-Hyun-ssi? Are you alright? You're pale," she said, leaning forward.
He gave her a faint, hollow smile. "Just tired."
He picked up the spoon. He wasn't doing this for Credits. He wasn't doing it for Stamina. He was doing it because somewhere, in the cold, logical machinery of this System, something had marked him for deletion.
And Kim Dae-Hyun, who had been fighting a losing battle against one terminal diagnosis, had just been handed a new enemy.
He ate the porridge. It still tasted like defeat. But now, it also tasted like fuel.
As he swallowed the last bland mouthful, a new crimson notification flashed.
[REAPER'S TRIAL I: COMPLETE.]
[REWARD: 24-HOUR 'STABILITY' BUFF APPLIED. TERMINAL DEBUFF PROGRESSION HALTED.]
A warmth, faint but undeniable, spread through his chest. It wasn't a cure. It was a stay of execution.
For the first time since his diagnosis, Kim Dae-Hyun felt a flicker of something other than despair.
It was rage.
And it was the most alive he'd felt in a very, very long time.
To be continued...