Weak Class of Anti-Hero
Chapter 43: Rewriting the Code

Chapter 43: Rewriting the Code

After my father left, I went to my small kitchen. I needed something simple, something normal. I opened the fridge and grabbed a carton of banana milk.

As I was drinking straight from the carton, my personal terminal buzzed. The one I only used for "normal" contacts.

It was a call from Ji-Soo.

I was surprised. It was the first time she had ever called me. I answered, a small smile forming on my lips. I was happy to hear from her.

"Hey," I said.

"Hi, Ji-Hoon!" Her voice was cheerful, but there was a hint of nervousness in it. "Guess what? I’m in Itaewon!"

My heart sank. Itaewon. My neighborhood.

"Oh, really? That’s nice. For your art classes?"

"No, for vacation! My older sister brought me here for a few days. She said it would be a nice change of scenery. We’re in a hotel not far from the park."

Yoo-Na.

Yoo-Na was in Itaewon. With her sister. Who knew nothing.

I sighed. My life had just gotten even more complicated.

"That’s... great," I managed to say.

"Could we meet up?" she asked. "I’m a bit lonely, my sister is always busy on the phone."

Just then, I heard the door to my apartment open.

My body tensed, ready for a fight.

Then, a familiar voice echoed in my entryway.

"Ji-Hoon? I’m here! I brought lunch!"

It was Ha-Yoon.

She walked into the kitchen, holding two bags of food, a big smile on her face.

She saw I was on the phone.

I looked at Ha-Yoon. I thought of Ji-Soo, waiting for my answer. I thought of Yoo-Na, who was somewhere in the same neighborhood.

I closed my eyes for a moment.

My semblance of a normal life was about to implode.

"Yeah, of course," I said quickly to Ji-Soo. "I’m a little busy right now, but I’ll message you later, okay?"

"Great! Talk to you later!"

I hung up, my brain overheating.

I looked up at Ha-Yoon, who was watching me with a curious expression.

"A friend?" she asked.

Before I could answer, she put the food bags on the counter, walked over, and kissed me directly on the lips.

It was a soft, familiar kiss. For a moment, all the tension of the situation melted away.

"I missed you," she whispered against my mouth.

Later, we were sitting on my couch, eating the fried chicken she had brought and watching a forgettable movie.

"So, what did you do today?" she asked.

How could I answer that? Well, I did reconnaissance on a secret prison by flying around with my spiritual body, found out my boss is a traitor, declared war on the most powerful man in the country, and my dad stopped by to say hello before going off to hunt monsters.

"Not much," I lied, taking a piece of chicken. "Work. You?"

"I worked at the café this morning, and I spent the afternoon at the library for my classes. It was boring."

We kept talking. She told me about her professors, her friends, her brother in the rehabilitation center. I told her about my "job" at the burger joint, making up anecdotes about difficult customers.

I was lying. With every sentence. With every smile.

I was sitting there, next to a girl I really liked, living a complete lie. And another girl, the sister of my sworn enemy, was waiting for my message a few blocks away.

I felt like I was juggling live grenades. And I knew that sooner or later, they were all going to blow up in my face.

When the movie ended, Ha-Yoon checked the time on her phone.

"Oh, it’s late," she said, getting up. "I have to go home. I have an early shift tomorrow."

"Okay," I said. "I’ll walk you out."

We left. I walked with her to the bus stop in the silence of the Itaewon night. It was a calm night, for once.

Before getting on the bus, she gave me one last quick kiss. "See you soon?"

"Soon," I promised.

I watched her leave, then went back home.

The apartment was quiet again. Empty. The turmoil of the day had given way to a feeling of loneliness and emptiness.

I couldn’t call Ji-Soo. It was too late. And I didn’t even know what I would say to her.

I needed a distraction. Something to focus on that was real. Concrete.

I took out my terminal. I opened my father’s data chip. It had been a while since I had read it, too busy with my fake normal life. A sense of familiarity, almost comfort, washed over me as I saw the training program’s interface.

I scrolled through the Chapters. "Mastery of the Astral Body." "Theory of Higher Dimensions." "Anatomy of the Abyss Lords."

Then, a section caught my eye. A section I had skimmed over the first time, deeming it too complex.

"MRC - Cellular Manipulation and Reconstruction - Full Usage"

I opened the file. The first line was a warning, written in red.

"DANGER LEVEL: EXTREME. ATTEMPT ONLY AFTER COMPLETE MASTERY OF THE SPIRITUAL BODY. THE SLIGHTEST MISTAKE CAN LEAD TO IRREVERSIBLE BODILY DISSOLUTION."

It was exactly what I needed. A challenge. Something to occupy my mind and forget the chaos of my personal life.

I spent the rest of the night reading, absorbed in the manual.

MRC was not simple regeneration. It was far beyond that.

My father’s text explained that normal regeneration, even that of my spiritual body, was a process of "repair." The body followed a pre-existing blueprint, its own DNA, to rebuild itself identically.

MRC was "rewriting."

It was about using one’s Aura at the most fundamental level to directly manipulate one’s own cells. To force them to change, to transform.

The applications were staggering.

Physical Adaptation: Modifying one’s own bone structure for greater density. Changing muscle fibers for more speed or raw strength. Developing gills to breathe underwater without needing a power like Aquakinesis.

Mimicry: Changing the color of one’s skin, hair, the shape of one’s face. The perfect camouflage.

Biological Weapons: Hardening one’s skin into armor. Transforming fingernails into sharp claws. Creating toxins within one’s own body.

It was the power to reshape oneself at will. To become one’s own monster.

The manual detailed the exercises. It was an incredibly dangerous and painful process. One had to enter a state of total concentration, dissociate their spiritual body to "observe" their own cells, and then use their Aura like a microscopic scalpel to alter them.

The slightest mistake, the slightest loss of focus, and you could accidentally turn your own liver into a pile of formless sludge.

It was terrifying.

And it was the most powerful skill I had ever seen.

I looked at my hand. I imagined being able to turn it into a steel claw. Into a weapon.

This was the next step. The next evolution.

I was going to have to master this. It might be the only thing that could give me an edge against the Director and his legion of monsters.

The next morning, I woke up with only one thing on my mind. Training.

I cancelled my shift at the restaurant, faking a sudden illness. Mr. Kim grumbled on the phone, but he accepted.

I spent the entire day in my apartment, blinds closed. I didn’t need a training ground. My own body was the battlefield.

I sat cross-legged on my living room floor.

I followed the manual’s instructions.

I started with something simple. Changing the color of my hair.

I closed my eyes. I dissociated my spiritual body. I "looked" at my own body, not with my eyes, but with my consciousness. I could see the hair follicles at the base of my scalp.

Then, I tried to channel my Aura. Not a large amount. Just a thread of energy, as thin as a hair. I tried to send it into those follicles, with a single instruction: "change color."

The pain was immediate. An intense burning sensation on my scalp. It felt like thousands of white-hot needles were being driven into my skull.

I cried out and lost my concentration. I re-entered my body, panting, sweating.

I touched my hair. It was still black.

Failure.

I tried again.

And again.

And again.

Each attempt ended in unbearable pain and failure. My Aura was too raw, too destructive. It was like trying to perform microsurgery with an axe.

I spent hours like this, until I was on the verge of passing out.

Exhausted, I dragged myself to the bathroom to splash water on my face.

I looked up at the mirror.

And I saw a single lock of hair. Just one. Near my temple.

It was no longer black.

It was white. White as snow.

It wasn’t much. It was a tiny, almost invisible success.

But it was a start.