School of Evil - School of Evil Chapter 1

The wind blew.

Feeling the wind enveloping his body, Kim Hyunsung looked up with a gaze wavering in confusion.

“…Why on earth.”

On the rooftop.

He saw the faces of his friends who stuck to the walls, the so-called bullies in this school, tormenting him for years. From the first year of high school until he reached his final year, Kim Hyunsung was haunted by their persecution. Every day was a living hell, but he persisted in his studies relentlessly.

Soon.

He was about to graduation.

But why on earth?

Was he falling from the rooftop?

He couldn’t understand the reason.

Kim Hyunsung wasn’t particularly odd, he maintained his academics and friendships faithfully. He was good at sports, not inferior in fights to other friends. That’s why this made no sense. Why did someone who had worked so hard in life end up in such a dire situation, falling from the rooftop?

One thing was certain.

Thud.

Crack.

He was dead.

* * *

He didn’t exactly die.

When Kim Hyunsung barely regained consciousness, the voice in his ears spoke of a desperate reality.

“Grandmother. It’s already been three months. It’s a bit odd for someone in the caretaker’s position to say this, but I’ve never seen a patient who has been diagnosed as a vegetative wake up. So please, come to terms with it. I think you should be prepared-“

“What are you talking about!? Are you saying I should give up because my grandson will never wake up?!”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying.”

It was loud.

Amidst the altercation between the grandmother and a presumed caregiver on the bedside, Kim Hyunsung realized he was in a vegetative state. For a moment, his mind went blank. He remembered falling from the rooftop, but he hadn’t been bedridden until now.

At first, he denied reality.

Wasn’t he conscious?

He believed he could gain control of his body and open his eyes soon, but no matter how much time passed, he couldn’t escape the pitch-dark world. Clearly, he wasn’t brain-dead. He could feel the touch on his body, hear voices, and even think in his mind, but nothing else was allowed.

It was desolate.

It was despairing.

It took a long time to accept the reality, and during that time, he heard various stories through his ears.

“…My handosme Hyunsung. You should wake up now. How did things turn out this way?”

“Sob, sob, Hyunsung. Those freaking bastards want me to give up on you. How can I do that? When I’ve spent such a long time raising you after you lost your parents.”

“At least once, please give me a signal that you’re alive.”

It was his grandmother’s voice.

For Kim Hyunsung, who lost his parents in an accident, his grandmother was the only one he could lean on. But his grandmother came to the hospital every day and spent her time crying. She was usually a strong person who rarely cried, but with her sobbing, Kim Hyunsung felt like he was going crazy.

That wasn’t all.

When his grandmother wasn’t there, he heard the voice of an obstinate boy.

“Hyung. I can’t stand this any longer. The guys who bullied you are even bullying me now and grandma even worked at the restaurant to earn your hospital fee and hurt her waist. What do you really want me to do? If you were going to be like this, you should rather die. If only you died, we wouldn’t be having such a hard time.”

“Please! Wake up! Stop laying down like that and wake up, please!”

His only brother.

Kim Hyun-jin’s words were shocking.

Yet, to protect his brother from those who tormented him, he never acknowledged Hyun-jin even though they attended the same school. But now, to see his younger brother suffering too. It was a feeling of complete mental collapse. It was emotionally unbearable to hear the suffering of his family every day, as he couldn’t accept even the fact of being a vegetable.

However.

He couldn’t die.

That was what being a vegetable meant.

He was a vegetable because he couldn’t do anything himself, and Kim Hyunsung mind descended into that abyss.

Time passed.

One day, two days.

A week, two weeks.

And… a year.

Unlike the lengthy days, time sluggishly continued to move forward.

***

Denying.

Angry.

Compromising.

As time passed, now the time to accept reality had come, but Kim Hyunsung mind, which had reached the stage of compromise, reverted back to anger. He couldn’t accept it. With each passing hour, it felt like his mind was deteriorating.

What did he do wrong?

In his first year of high school, Kim Hyunsung who thought he did better in school life than anyone else, found himself marked by a powerful group with a single dispute. It wasn’t really anything significant. On that day, the powerful group relentlessly tormented Kim Hyunsung to an incomprehensible extent, and it continued until his third year of high school.

Transferring schools wasn’t an option.

There weren’t many choices for Kim Hyunsung area, and above all, it was a significant burden to move while living with his grandmother. So, he endured the painful reality. With the thought that he only needed to endure three years of high school, he returned home every day, hiding the numbness of his body under his clothes.

The outcome was this predicament.

Approaching the final gates of high school, after being called by the powerful group, Kim Hyunsung ended up falling from the rooftop.

He was angry.

Furious.

The target of his rage was evident.

Everyone who tormented him.

The adults who turned a blind eye.

They made him this way.

His mind deteriorated.

The mind of Kim Hyunsung, who often heard about respecting adults and being kind, gradually became filled with negative thoughts. If, If he really had a chance to turn back time, how would he live? If he knew he would end up like this, he would have run away. If he couldn’t escape, he would rather kill them first.

One year.

Two years.

Three years.

Time passed like a flash.

His younger brother cut ties, and amidst his grandmother’s collapse, laughter and loud chatter from the caregiver could be heard.

In the midst of this, the blaring TV sound, turned up as if to ignore the patients, pierced through his ears.

[TOP STAR A Caught in a Scandal…]

[Member of the National Assembly Kim Pan-ho…]

[Shocking news. The identity of the group leading school violence has been revealed. They are…]

It was the sole pleasure in life.

Listening to the news of the world.

When hearing one of the stories, Kim Hyunsung thought.

“If a miracle happens to me, I will surely annihilate all those who made me like this.”

He was consumed by hatred.

The amiable boy was nowhere to be found.

But the miracle didn’t come true.

It wasn’t expected to.

Kim Hyunsung replayed the past countless times in his mind.

Regretting the events of that day so deeply, he had meticulously planned how he should act if he could go back to that day. It was mere fantasy. A futile dream that could never come true. Despite knowing that, as someone who had to live as a vegetable, he felt he might go crazy if he didn’t even try.

His grandmother was an amazing person.

Until ten years after she passed away, she never gave up on Kim Hyunsung, who was in a vegetative state.

And when he heard of his grandmother’s passing.

Kim Hyunsung’s mind completely collapsed.

More precisely, he let go of the barely-held sanity.

Now.

He couldn’t survive without going mad.

* * *

How much time has passed?

Now, even the concept of time has been forgotten.

From the moment consciousness returned until sinking back into darkness, Kim Hyunsung, in his mind, violently confronted those who made him this way. Blood splattering on his face, voices pleading for mercy, none of it mattered. No matter how much pain they expressed, it was nothing compared to turning into a vegetable. Compared to his grandmother, who suffered for ten years before passing away, they were probably living a truly happy life.

He lived in madness.

At this point, he even wished for someone to end his life, stopping him from prolonging this existence any further.

Then, one day.

Kim Hyunsung had a strange dream.

He met someone there and had a conversation.

It was satisfying.

Though it was nothing but a dream, the fact that he could have such a conversation brought a smile to Kim Hyunsung’s face.

And when he awoke once again.

Kim Hyunsung was faced with a reality that he simply couldn’t accept.

* * *

I heard chirping.

Raising my head to look out the window, there was a single tree, and as I turned back to face the front, I saw a blackboard with chalk being used. It was all too familiar. If you’ve received basic education in South Korea, you’d have come across this scene countless times.

“What’s this?”

“Hahaha.”

“Stop there, crazy bastard!”

It was noisy around me.

Looking over, two male high school students in uniforms were loudly chasing each other, causing chaos in the classroom. Chairs were overturned, desks were topsy-turvy, and the girls sitting in their places pleaded for them to stop, but the boys paid no attention.

That’s when it happened.

Thump-thud-thump-thud-thump-thud.

My heart raced as if it was about to go crazy. As if his ears could hear his own heartbeat, Kim Hyunsung couldn’t believe the information his senses were providing.

“…Did I really go back to the past?”

Yesterday.

Kim Hyunsung had a dream.

He thought it was nothing but a delusion.

The words shouted in his dream couldn’t be achieved, and he’d dreamt countless delusional dreams. Kim Hyunsung pinched his cheek almost unknowingly. It stung a bit, but since he couldn’t accept reality to this extent, he stabbed his thigh with the visible sharp point of a pencil.

Ouch.

It hurt.

As he raised the pencil, his eyes were drawn to the blood trickling down from the end.

“I really came back.”

Regression.

It was certain.

The pain in his thigh.

The scenery around.

There was no other way to explain it.

At the moment when he thought his fervent wish had come true, a sound broke the tranquil reality.

Crash!

“Dammit, you son of a b*tch!”

It was an intense voice.

Something rolled on the floor.

Cursing at it.

The classroom suddenly fell silent.

Even the male students who had not stopped their chase despite the girls screaming, now peeked into the hallway when glancing back into the classroom, and they retreated in a somewhat hidden way. They didn’t completely distance themselves. Like the students gathering around the disturbance, they showed a curious glance at the interesting incident occurring in the hallway.

“What did you say? you want me to take care of it myself now?”

Thud, thud, thud.

The sounds of violence.

It was familiar.

The sounds of pain, the obscenities that seemed to fill the classroom.

Thump, thump, thump.

Kim Hyunsung’s heart raced as if it were about to explode.

This situation.

It couldn’t help but be familiar.

High school, first year.

It was the starting point of being tormented by violence.

It was that way.

At the moment he earnestly wished for, he existed as Kim Hyunsung, a first-year high school student.