The Artifact Wasn’t an Object

He lifted me up again with ease and spoke.

“Why this balloon?”

“It’s weird for a balloon to just be sitting in a forest like this. It could be a key to getting out of here.”

“I see.”

I replied lightly, then asked what had suddenly occurred to me.

“By the way. Since when were you watching me earlier?”

“Earlier?”

“Yeah…From between the trees…Ack!”

As I was asking, recalling how Hyeon Jaeyul had appeared without a sound, the hand holding me suddenly vanished.

Clutching the balloon string, I dropped a short distance and snapped my head up, fuming.

“Hey, you’re supposed to hold on properly!”

…?

I looked up, ready to chew him out.

In front of me was only the silent, black forest.

“…Hyeon Jaeyul?”

The man was gone.

As if he had never existed in the first place, without leaving behind a single trace.

“What the hell?”

I quickly scanned my surroundings.

Nothing.

“…Where did he go?”

[TIP! Please check the ‘Situation Terminal’.]

As I stood there stupidly rolling my eyes, the system sent a message, sounding irritated.

Only then did I let out a small “Ah,” and rummaged through my pocket with one hand.

The Situation Terminal was displaying new information over the map.

[[TIP! In a ‘Hidden Field,’ the ‘Owner’ periodically moves to the location of their memory artifacts.
If you follow the ‘Owner,’ you can acquire memory artifacts more easily.]]

Ah. So that’s why I hadn’t heard his footsteps earlier.

If he had appeared out of thin air, there was no way there’d be any sound.

[TIP! Once you have encountered a person, you can track their location on the ‘Map’ via the Situation Terminal.]

After checking the follow-up message, I looked at the map.

Me, marked in white, and Hyeon Jaeyul were…

“I don’t see him?”

I narrowed my eyes and examined the map, but there was no dot that looked like Hyeon Jaeyul anywhere on the blackened display.

The entire map was swallowed up by pitch-black scorch marks.

Honestly, calling this a map was questionable to begin with.

It was completely covered in black, with only the pond’s location faintly marked in gray.

How was this supposed to be a map?

As I stared down the system in disbelief, it popped up again with a little ping.

[[TIP! Due to the scorch marks covering the map, locating the ‘Owner’ may be difficult.
The scorch marks on the map will be removed along with the scorch marks of the ‘memories’.]]

So basically, all I can see right now is a pitch-black map.

“Fine.
I got one memory already, so let’s deal with this first.”

Holding the balloon that floated along with my movements, I headed toward the nearby black pond.

The pond so dark it looked like it might pull me in.

Up close, it really was black as tar.

Tall, densely packed trees reflected on the surface, and the color was so vile I didn’t even want to dip a finger into it.

“Ugh….”

So I just need to erase the scorch marks here, right?

I wrapped the soot-stained balloon string tightly around my wrist.

It was a precaution to keep it from flying away while I cleaned it.

If it flew off mid-cleaning, I’d never get it back.

“Do I just… wipe it like this…?”

With the balloon secured to my wrist, I cautiously reached my hand toward the pond.

It felt like something might suddenly grab me and drag me in, which made my skin crawl.

Water you couldn’t see through really did look this deep and dark.

Swallowing a tense breath, I cupped my hands and scooped up a handful of water.

“……”

After splashing the water on the balloon, I hastily jumped back.

And then.

Nothing happened.

“…Better safe than sorry, that’s all.”

Even though no one was watching, I muttered defensively and approached the pond again.

[Scorch Marks 100/100]

A system display showing the current progress of the field’s scorch marks was fixed in the upper right of my vision.

I wasn’t particularly reliant on visual information, but having system windows scattered all over my field of view was getting uncomfortable.

In reality, it never obstructed my vision this much.

But inside the ‘field,’ it was like the system had gotten excited and was shoving all kinds of information into my face at once.

I glanced at the system window that felt closer than usual, then fixed my gaze back on the pond.

The pond was still and gave off no sense of hostility.

If so, I could just erase the scorch marks like this.

I slowly began washing the soot off the balloon with the cold black water.

The unpleasant squeaking friction between my hands and the balloon stabbed at my ears.

That kind of sound really set people on edge.

Still, the more I wiped, the more color emerged from beneath the grime, pulling me deeper into the task.

Squeak. Squeak. Screech.

Only after scooping water again and again did I finally see the balloon’s original color.

“So it was yellow.”

At last, the balloon’s true color began to show.

A bright, vivid yellow.

The same color as my eyes, which made me like it even more.

[Some scorch marks have been removed. The field’s scorch mark value has decreased.]

[Scorch Marks 80/100]

As the notification appeared, the darkness of the forest receded slightly.

The Situation Terminal also turned gray, making it possible to identify Hyeon Jaeyul’s location, now marked as a black circle.

“This way?”

Machines really were a pain to deal with.

After rotating the terminal up and down a few times, I decided to just move based on instinct and check my status as I went.

With the yellow balloon still tied to my wrist, I walked along, letting it flutter.

As if my direction was correct, the circles representing me and Hyeon Jaeyul gradually drew closer.

Before I knew it, they overlapped.

That was when I spotted Hyeon Jaeyul standing there blankly, holding something.

“Hyeon Jaeyul, what are you doing just standing there like that!”

Calling out to him loudly now that he felt familiar after meeting once, I saw him blink and turn toward me.

In his hand was a black cloth.

A limp, black piece of fabric.

A handkerchief?

I hurried over to him.

As I ran, the balloon tied to my wrist bobbed up and down with me.

His gaze drifted to the bright yellow balloon.

“That balloon…Is that the one from earlier? So it was yellow.”

Hyeon Jaeyul, the ‘Owner’ of the Hidden Field, and the term ‘memory artifact.’

Even though he couldn’t remember his past, all of these objects were tied to it.

Because of that, he looked faintly confused as he stood there with the items.

This was an opportunity.

I had only taken the balloon because I liked the color, but I smiled meaningfully and untied the string from my wrist.

As the balloon floated upward as if it might fly away, Hyeon Jaeyul hurriedly reached out and overlapped his hand with mine.

A large, warm hand completely enveloped mine.

In his grip, my hand felt as small as a child’s.

“…It looked like it was going to fly away.”

He murmured, brows knit.

I gently freed my hand and tied the balloon securely around his wrist instead, the same way I had done to myself.

Hyeon Jaeyul pressed his lips together, watching my every move.

The balloon looked awkward hanging from the arm of a large man, like clothes that didn’t quite fit.

Tracing the string around his wrist with my finger, I spoke.

“Do you remember this balloon?”

“It’s just the one from earlier, but with a different color.”

“Not that.
I mean, don’t you remember seeing it even earlier than that?”

“…I don’t know. I can’t remember.”

It was the same answer as when I’d asked if he remembered me the first time we met.

But his tone was lower now.

His expression suggested something vague was trying to surface.

Even he didn’t seem to understand what it was.

I grew curious about how he had lost his memories, but it felt like a line I shouldn’t cross.

So I smiled softly, stopped thinking, and whispered.

“I hope you remember. The balloon. And me too.”

We need to be friends.

At least until I get out of the bunker safely.

Finishing that thought, I took the handkerchief from his hand.

It was also heavily stained with scorch marks.

[You have acquired a new ‘Memory Artifact’!]

After losing the handkerchief, Hyeon Jaeyul stared at the balloon and asked,

“But this balloon was black earlier. How did it turn yellow?”

“I washed it in the pond. It cleaned right up.”

“…Why were you washing it?”

I thought he was the type to take things at face value.

Turns out he could ask sharp questions too.

I just shrugged.

“I wanted to see its original color.”

“I see….”

He nodded, as if satisfied.

Now that I had the handkerchief, would he disappear again to wherever the next memory artifact was?

I stared at him, but he showed no sign of vanishing.

There were still 80 scorch marks left.

Why wasn’t he moving to the next artifact?

He needed to go near it for me to erase the scorch marks easily.

Tilting my head in thought, I decided to deal with the handkerchief’s scorch marks first.

‘You never know. Maybe clearing this will erase everything.’

…I really shouldn’t have moved so carelessly.

I had underestimated the genre of an R-rated romance simulation.

Up until this very moment.

I should have realized something was off when Hyeon Jaeyul didn’t disappear toward another memory artifact.

And it never even crossed my mind that I might be the artifact.

“Go Doya.”

“Call me Doya. Don’t add my surname. Why?”

“Fine, Doya. There’s something black on your body too.”

“What?”

He had followed me all the way to the pond and was watching as I cleaned the handkerchief.

That’s when he spoke.

[Scorch Marks 60/100]

I was checking how smoothly the scorch mark value was dropping when I sharply frowned.

What was that supposed to mean, there was scorch mark residue on my body…?

“Huh…?”

There really was.

And a lot of it.