I Became the Drug-Addicted Childhood Friend-Chapter 83

The phone rang.

Someone was looking for Han Shihu.

It was a failure.

He had missed the doctor, and the drugs were no closer to being a cure.

Perhaps it was a mistake to repeatedly inject dozens of doses into himself, raising his drug resistance to absurd levels.

Even with Shihu’s formidable mental fortitude, he had overdone it.

The once-urgent voice pressuring him had gone silent.

It didn’t matter anymore.

It was all a failure.

There was no cure—nothing.

The call was from Lena.

Shihu had no intention of answering.

She would just ask where he was.

Better to destroy the phone.

Though Shihu searched for it, it was nowhere to be found.

Because the phone had long since been smashed and was lying in pieces on the floor.

"...Ah."

Hallucinations and auditory delusions.

Probably from lack of proper sleep.

Even though he used a skill to force himself to sleep, it was unstable at best.

"Damn it..."

Still, he used more drugs.

[Drug Resistance IX]

One more level, and there might be something.

That was why he kept pumping more drugs into his body.

If this didn’t work, there was no other answer.

—Restart? Restart? Restart?

"Shut up."

Shihu knew.

The skill descriptions never lied.

If a skill required him to give up everything, there had to be a problem with it.

The tempting escape always came with risks.

—Restart? Restart? Restart?

Since it was a failure, one more round?

It was almost mocking him.

Could life really be treated like a game?

Shihu knew this world was no more than a grand stage.

After all, everyone else was just an extra.

He was the protagonist.

So, it didn’t matter what he did.

But just because he could do anything didn’t mean he could achieve everything.

He couldn’t save Seo Ah.

He might have been able to save her—if it was the Seo Ah from the past.

If he hadn’t used the drugs to such an extent that he was now a wreck.

If he hadn’t gone this far, maybe he could have saved her.

—Restart? Restart? Restart?

The time to use more drugs had come.

Was this what Seo Ah had felt?

Shihu glanced around.

He checked where he had left the drugs.

Today’s doses were stored in a drawer.

"Drugs..."

Had he run out?

No, that couldn’t be.

"...They’re gone."

He knew the truth.

Why the drugs weren’t in the drawer.

He had seen Seo Ah opening and closing the drawer.

It had to be her.

Rising to his feet, Shihu decided to confront her.

He could always get more drugs, even if some were missing.

But he wanted to ask Seo Ah why she had taken them.

"Seo Ah?"

Maybe she had done it out of concern.

Even Shihu knew he was taking far too many.

He could understand that.

He would just have to convince her not to do it again.

He had no intention of blaming her.

"Seo Ah? Are you in your room?"

What was she doing in there?

"I’m coming in, okay?"

The door creaked open.

Syringes came into view.

It was true—Seo Ah had taken the drugs.

"Ah, Shihu, I—uh..."

Used syringes rolled across the floor.

Shihu hadn’t considered the possibility that Seo Ah might use them herself.

He had been giving her pills, believing they were enough to suppress her urges.

"I accidentally... used it."

Her palm bore marks from needle pricks.

It seemed she had jabbed herself by mistake while moving the syringes.

"Ha... haha. Why did you... use this stuff alone...?"

A single syringe might have been an accident, but all five syringes were empty.

Seo Ah was already drenched in euphoria.

—You can’t stop her. Just give up.

—Might as well let her indulge until the end.

He couldn’t blame Seo Ah.

Shihu knew all too well what it was like.

Once addiction set in, there was no escape.

"Give me more of that drug."

—She’s not the Seo Ah you knew.

No, this was the Seo Ah he knew.

Shihu muttered to himself.

"...Why did you take them?"

"Because... you were using so much. Ahaha. But... I guess it wasn’t that much, huh? Hehe."

"...Using any more would probably kill you."

It was strange.

Seo Ah hadn’t died.

Her resistance might even be stronger than Shihu’s, who had a Drug Resistance skill.

It was as if she were born to use these substances.

Perhaps that was true.

After all, Yu Seo Ah’s original role had been nothing more than that—to use drugs.

"I don’t know. Let’s use more!"

He had no grounds to tell her not to.

Shihu was doing the same, after all.

He no longer knew what the right course of action was.

Shihu handed her two or three syringes he had on hand.

Seo Ah took them with a beaming smile.

"Are there more?"

Of course. There were plenty.

There was no reason to withhold them now.

"Wow..."

Shihu emptied his inventory of drugs onto the table.

He had never seen Seo Ah look so happy.

He returned to the dining table and sat down.

Why had his life turned out like this?

It had been wrong from the very beginning.

He had lost his parents in an accident.

If that accident hadn’t happened, Shihu and Seo Ah might have lived normal, happy lives.

If monsters hadn’t appeared, and if Awakened individuals hadn’t fought battles in this bizarre world.

His parents were gone. He had no other family.

His childhood friend was in the next room, laughing while using drugs.

Shihu himself wasn’t much better.

—Restart? Restart? Restart?

"...I want to die."

He finally let the thought cross his mind.

He wanted to make everything irrelevant, to erase it all.

Shihu had reached his limit.

Even limits could only be pushed so far. Now it felt like the entire world was crushing him.

In a way, it was remarkable.

That he was only now seriously contemplating death.

Some people use drugs before they die, hoping to go out in a final burst of pleasure.

Shihu had already indulged as much as he could.

Was it time to go?

He staggered to his feet.

What should he do?

—Restart? Restart? Restart?

The combination of drug effects and purification penalties was horrific.

It felt like his entire body was being eaten away by insects.

He wasn’t sure what was worse—his physical state or his lack of sleep.

Or maybe he was coming down with something.

Shihu slowly walked out the door.

Seo Ah wouldn’t notice.

Not anymore.

It didn’t matter who left the house.

***

"...Ugh."

The drugs were gone.

"Shihu, I need more..."

How much time had passed?

It was nighttime, a time to sleep.

"Ah..."

Shihu was nowhere to be seen.

He had been gone for quite a while.

I thought we were using the drugs together.

But now that I think about it, there had been no one else in the room but me.

"...Ah..."

It dawned on me too late that something was wrong.

Why would Shihu give me so many drugs?

Because he liked me?

"...Shihu?"

That must be it, right?

To make me happy.

Crash.

I couldn’t get up and collapsed onto the floor.

Something felt wrong.

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As the euphoria faded, pain began to seep in.

But that wasn’t what mattered.

I stumbled into the living room to check if Shihu was there.

His shoes were missing from the entrance.

"...He left?"

Even if I went outside into the dark, I doubted I’d find him.

He would come back if I waited.

I decided to stay inside and wait.

I sat in the chair Shihu usually occupied.

And then I started thinking about where he might have gone.

He wouldn’t have abandoned me, right?

Thinking like this felt like a sickness.

I should just wait calmly.

Shihu liked me.

He definitely did.

After all, he gave me so many drugs before he left.

Even if I’d used them all.

He must’ve gone to get more.

That had to be it.

Sitting here brought back memories of when I was young.

Really young.

Back when I still had parents.

Shihu thought I lost them in an accident.

In a monster attack.

That was partially true.

Only halfway.

—"Seo Ah, here."

He had said that, handing me a piece of candy.

It was at the playground.

I hadn’t been able to go outside for a while, but that day, I was finally out with my mom, and I was happy.

We ate snacks and the lunch my mom had packed.

Thinking about it now, she really was a good mom.

And that was the last memory I had of her.

I never saw her again.

I didn’t know what happened.

Was it a monster attack?

No, I know now.

She abandoned me.

Seo Ah must have been too much trouble, too bothersome.

It was a memory I had tried to forget, but now it had come back.

Why now, of all times?

"...No."

There was a common thread.

My mom gave me delicious food and spent the whole day playing with me at the playground. It made me happy.

Shihu gave me drugs, so many drugs, and that made me happy too.

The point is, they gave me things they didn’t usually give.

And then my mom abandoned me.

So would Shihu abandon me too?

Why did this feel so familiar?

This crushing despair—it felt horribly familiar.

"Ah... haha... hahaha. No way. No way."

That couldn’t be true.

Shihu said he wouldn’t abandon me.

He said everything he did was for me.

Maybe he just went out for a walk.

Yeah, I should go outside.

Every time I left the house, Shihu somehow knew and would come running.

Like he had installed a surveillance system or something.

The doorknob clicked as it turned, and the door opened.

"Shihu."

One step outside.

Then a few more.

Usually, by now, Shihu would be running toward me, telling me not to go outside.

"Shihu? Where are you?"

But there was nothing.

No one was there.

I thought about searching further, but I didn’t know the area well.

It was ridiculous, really.

This was my house, but I had no idea what was around it.

If I left and Shihu came back while I was gone, that would be a problem.

So I decided to stay near the house.

He’d come back soon, right?

He would.