Chapter 32

3rd person Pov:

"You mean Wan-ho senior? Didn't you hear, he jumped off the mountain last night. He committed suicide." When the young man heard the disciple say that he froze on the spot. For a moment he could not digest what he had heard. He asked again after a few moments, but the reply came the same.

Death was a new concept for the young man. He was used to struggling from a young age. He himself had been trampled on, stepped on, pissed on but he had never once thought of dying. He had not seen anyone die either. So, the moment he heard about the death of someone he knew, even if not much, he felt his stomach churning. He felt like he would throw up any moment the contents of his stomach but nothing came out. He felt nauseous. He felt like the world was spinning. He struggled to stay on his feet.

After what felt like an eternity he snapped back. He threw up. He looked around. The same disciples were standing a little farther from him with frowns on their faces. He went up to them, grabbed one of them by the shoulder, and asked, spit flying from his mouth, "Where is his dead body?" The disciple albeit disgusted by what was happening still answered him as the young man was a disciple under an elder while he was just a disciple, "They took him to the morgue about half an hour ago. Since he killed himself, his sin was judged to be very grave so he won't be buried. They will keep him in there until his body rots and then throw him to the Vulcans to feed."

That was a cruel fate even after death. It was the judgment sect. they didn't even spare the dead bodies of the sinners no matter what their crime. But it was never to this extent.

A new theory was forming inside the young man's head. 'They must have killed him. They must have been the ones to push him off the mountain. Now they are trying to disfigure his corpse to erase the evidence. I have to get his body back. Justice must be done for him.' With that in mind, the young man ran to the morgue where the dead were left to rot away.

When he reached the building, there was an old man guarding the morgue, but the old man did not stop him for some reason. He just let him pass. The young man entered the building and instantly a smell far worse than anything he had ever imagined assaulted him. He emptied his stomach this time. He threw up so much that there was nothing left in his stomach.

After some time of throwing up, he finally stood up. He looked around. There were many corpses in there. He didn't know which one was Wan-ho's so he checked every corpse one by one. It was not a pleasant experience for the young man. Even though he was part of the sect that punished sinners, he had never seen a dead body before.

Right now, he was holding himself out of sheer will. He was on the verge of breaking down. He didn't know what would happen to him if he broke down and he didn't want to find out. So he held on desperately for any reason. The days when he was weak, the moments when everyone called him an orphan, the day when someone extended a helping hand towards him. He remembered every moment of his life that evoked any kind of emotion. Fear, rage, happiness, sorrow. Anything. He was clinging to anything right now. And he finally found him.

But something happened when he found his corpse. He saw something that finally broke him. His legs were mangled but that was not what he was looking at. At that moment he forgot about everything. Pain, suffering, happiness, and rage. He forgot about the smell assaulting him. Only one thing was in his gaze now. The expression. The corpse had the expression of someone who was broken. At that moment the young man figured out that he had jumped himself. He had killed himself. He was broken. Too broken to feel pain from dying. His expression remained the same. Without any pain, without any suffering.

He could tell because the same was happening to him right now. He was slowly breaking away. He knew that if he broke now, there will be no going back. But he could not shift his gaze and kept looking at the expression of a broken man.

And when he was on the verge of ending, he felt someone's hand on his shoulder. He turned around with the same expressionless face and looked at who it was. It was the keeper of the morgue. The old man was also looking at the corpse in front of them and asked, "Had you known, would you have tried to save him?" It felt to the young man that the old man knew what had happened to him. He looked at the corpse again.

This time it felt different when looking at him. This time he could feel one emotion. Regret. He regretted not helping him when he could have. He regretted not saving him when he was on the verge of breaking like he just was. Had he done what the old man had done to him, he could have saved that person. He could have also ask just a simple question and not let him break down. Regret was filling him up.

"Yes. had I known. I would have saved him." The young man replied. But the old man instead looked at him with doubt and said, "Would you have? The disciple who is responsible for this is directly related to an elder of the sect. Knowing of the consequences, Would you still have helped him?"

What the old man was asking was something the young man didn't have an answer to. No, it was not that. He did have an answer but he didn't want to admit it. Because he hadn't saved him exactly because of the consequences. Since the day he entered this sect, he was taught to uphold justice even in the sect yet he didn't help him. He didn't adhere to what he was taught every day because he was afraid that the sect elder would punish him instead. He was afraid so he let the man die. He didn't want to admit but he had to.

"And now that you know an answer to your question, what will you do?" He had to uphold justice. He had to obtain justice for Wan-ho. He had to do what he was taught from the first day of his new life. "I will uphold justice in the name of the judgment sect."

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Also, today's chapter was written in a little hurry so there might be mistakes in it. If you find any, let me know and I will correct them.