Chapter 230: Wake Up

Joo Joowon seemed to have become completely unable to think. His thoughts were like rusted gears, struggling to turn even once more. Yet beneath those rust covered gears, something seemed to be hidden, something extremely important, something he could not bear to let go of.

What was it? What exactly was it?

The whispers beside his ears grew louder and louder, yet he was stubbornly determined to obtain an answer, as though he were a perilous boat in the middle of the ocean, repeatedly battered by enormous waves, his entire body soaked by seawater, with only that insignificant, insignificant...

The belief that he could return home? What home did he have?

He clearly only had, clearly only had...

Only...

Cats?!

Everything seemed to freeze in place. Joo Joowon had no time to think and instinctively sat up from the bed, subconsciously tightening his arms around the fluffy bundle in his embrace.

The whispers began to recede like the tide. That tangible trembling still cast a layer of shadow over his mind, while his heart continued beating violently.

His face was as pale as paper, and he gasped heavily for breath.

"Meow!" Byeol winced in pain, but his sharp claws were slow to strike. The pain was so intense that the tip of his tail trembled uncontrollably.

Joo Joowon’s body trembled, and his heart felt as though it were about to leap straight out of his throat.

Buzz, buzz, buzz.

The buzzing sound made Joo Joowon react like a startled bird, instinctively tightening his arms around the thing in his embrace.

"Meow!" Byeol could no longer endure it. His sharp claws suddenly lashed out, leaving three bloody scratches that ran all the way from Joo Joowon’s neck down to his collarbone. From the pain, Joo Joowon instinctively released his grip and sat there blankly.

The unknown whispers sounded once again, causing Joo Joowon’s already unstable mind to fall into an extremely unstable state once more.

An endless sense of heart palpitations overwhelmed him, as though an invisible hand had tightly seized his heart. The world began to twist and distort, while his soul began to sink into...

"Meow?" Byeol guiltily lowered his ears. His moist nose rubbed against Joo Joowon’s chin as he carefully licked away the beads of blood from the wounds.

"Mm?"

Purr, purr, purr...

The unique vibrating sound of a feline slowly calmed Joo Joowon’s racing heartbeat. Everything gradually fell silent. He gently stroked Byeol’s soft fur, then buried his entire face into Byeol’s belly and tremblingly responded to him.

"I’m fine, I’m fine..."

Although he said that, Joo Joowon’s body continued trembling the entire time. Byeol also had no time to worry about his body being squeezed to the point of nearly breaking his bones. He stuck out his tongue and desperately licked Joo Joowon’s hair, trying to comfort him.

After a long while, Joo Joowon finally recovered. He took a bottle of mineral water from his spatial waist pendant and drank the entire bottle in one go. Only then did the dryness in his throat ease somewhat.

Actually, even if he tried to clearly explain what had happened just now, he would not be able to. It was as though he had experienced a long and terrifying nightmare. Even after waking up, the feeling still remained, yet the dream itself quickly faded away, becoming obscure and indistinct within his memories.

However, no matter what, that feeling could not be completely driven away.

He stroked Byeol’s soft fur, and his thoughts gradually became clearer.

Don’t panic. Panicking won’t help.

Was this the special event [Voices of Eternal Night] that the system had mentioned?

When Joo Joowon was awake, he had not heard any sounds at all. Instead, it was only after he fell asleep that the unknown whispers had taken advantage of the opportunity to invade.

No. It was not because he had fallen asleep. It was because his Mental Power had lost the control of his consciousness and begun drifting freely around him, which had allowed the whispers to take advantage of the opportunity.

The Mental Power that drifted outside his body was still a part of him. However, compared with the resilient Mental Power within his body, which had his physical body serving as an anchor, this Mental Power that unconsciously drifted outside was like a newborn baby. Almost anything could hurt it or contaminate it.

No! There had to be something else he had overlooked!

With 23 points of Mental Power, Joo Joowon believed that there were absolutely very few players whose Mental Power was higher than his. If even he had struggled so much to resist it, wouldn’t almost all the other players be wiped out?

That made no sense! It was impossible!

He furrowed his brows tightly. His thoughts, which had originally become calm, grew somewhat chaotic again, but he still forced himself to think and sort out what he had overlooked.

He had a feeling that if he could not figure this out, the whispers would soon come looking for him again.

What else had he missed?

That’s right! He had already suffered an attack from the whispers once!

Although he had successfully passed the Will check in the end, that did not mean that he had not been left with some kind of "wound." Perhaps that was the beacon the other side had left behind. Therefore, compared with other players, he might actually be much easier for them to "locate."

It could even be said that he had been specifically marked as a priority target!

Still not right... There had to be more than this! He must have overlooked something...

Joo Joowon grabbed his hair forcefully, but there were still parts that did not make sense.

He had already experienced it once before. Logically speaking, he should have been able to resist it more easily this time than before. So why had it been even more difficult to resist, to the point that he had almost fallen into it?

What exactly was wrong?