There was the sound of waves crashing against the sand.
In front of the gloomy sea that looked ready to unleash a torrent of rain at any moment, two men stood on its shore.
“How on earth did it end up like this….”
The jet-black long hair was blown away by the sea breeze, scattering into the air.
One of the two men was me.
“You knew what Kang Hyukwoo had done to us.”
I was talking to someone, letting out my anger.
An overwhelming sadness filled my heart, so deep that it chilled me to the bone.
I was miserable. It felt like a cold, sharp blade was mercilessly tearing into the most vulnerable parts of my soul.
“I really wanted to believe you. Despite what everyone else said, I was determined to never give up on you until the very end!”
While I was letting out a scream filled with agony, the man in front of me showed no reaction. Overwhelmed by an unbearable sense of sorrow, I trembled.
And then, covering my face, I burst into laughter like someone who had lost their mind. When my hunched back began to tremble, struggling to support me with each ragged breath, I lifted my head.
Tears were streaming down a face shrouded in dark shadows.
“Father … at this point, wouldn’t it be better to just die?”
Ah, it was such a dreadful memory. So much so that I never want to remember it again.
Against my will, I was pulled back to the beginning memory, and the same scene was about to play out again.
I couldn’t avoid it by closing my eyes or covering my ears.
“Please, snap out of it!”
This was a dream, and a punishment I could never escape.
“….tae-ya.”
As I repeatedly watched the same scene nearly a hundred times, feeling a sense of helplessness, I faintly heard someone’s voice.
“…Seo Yutae!”
My eyes snapped open at the touch of a hand forcefully shaking my shoulder. Feeling as if I had been suddenly pulled to the surface of the water, I gasped for air.
“Heuk, ugh, heuuh……”
The first thing I saw was a familiar ceiling.
With a belated sense of reality returning, I jerked my upper body upright and looked down at my body. Like an illusion, my original body and Han Seungbeom’s body alternated in my view, but soon only Han Seungbeom’s body remained, and my vision stabilized.
My entire body was covered in a cold sweat. I pushed the tangled hair out of my face with my palm, and frantically turned my gaze to find Choi Jeokhyeon’ face in front of me.
“….Choi Jeokhyeon.”
It was Choi Jeokhyeon who was shaking my shoulder. His usual carefree expression was gone, and he was watching me with a frown on his face.
“I heard you groaning and couldn’t get up, so I called you. Are you okay?”
“…Yeah.”
I had only just woken up, and my mind was still foggy. As I sat dazed on the bed, Choi Jeokhyeon silently watched me before asking.
“Did you have a nightmare?”
His question rendered me speechless.
The emotions and sensations I felt in my dream remained so vividly, it was almost eerie. Yet, the memory of the dream had vanished completely, as if it had evaporated into thin air.
I grabbed a handful of hair with my fingers and mumbled, “I don’t know. I don’t remember.”
“Dreams are usually forgotten quickly. Don’t worry too much about it. If it was a dream that was that painful, maybe it’s better to forget it.”
Then, as if trying to ease my worries, Choi Jeokhyeon hurriedly began to comfort me.
Just as I was trying to forget about it, I felt a headache again. And even the faintest traces of those emotions began to fade away, as if they were being washed away.
After a bit of time passed, I looked up.
“Why are you here?”
“…Just. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you.”
Ah, the goosebumps.
I waved my hand, feeling disgusted by Choi Jeokhyeon’s smiling eyes.
“Is the weather getting hot already? I’m sweating like crazy. Get out, I need to change my clothes.”
Despite my cold response, Choi Jeokhyeon smiled without a word and got up from his seat. Then, with his hand on the doorknob, he said, “We’re going to have breakfast, so get dressed and come out. The housekeeper made pancakes.”
“I hate pancakes.”
“Don’t be a picky eater. You keep eating junk food like hamburgers every day, that’s why you’re getting more and more sensitive.”
“You’re one to talk. You should cut down on your drinking, you alcoholic bastard.”
***
After the debut was confirmed, the members took some time off with their families before being informed by the agency that a dormitory had been arranged. I was also notified to pack my belongings and move into the dormitory by tomorrow, so I needed to start preparing.
So, I was currently cleaning Han Seungbeom’s room after leaving Choi Jeokhyeon’s house.
‘I can’t let them use the excuse of bringing my things to try to make contact. I should move everything myself in advance.’
This was partly to prevent Han Jaewoon’s family from leeching off of Han Seungbeom, but mostly because of the intense emotions I had felt on the day of the final broadcast.
‘If by chance those feelings came from Han Seungbeom … it would be best to get rid of them completely.’
To put it simply, I didn’t want Han Seungbeom’s belongings near them. The thought of them touching and messing with Han Seungbeom’s belongings without permission filled me with disgust. After all, Han Seungbeom was a child who was sick and dying in this house.
I was planning to prepare a place for Han Seungbeom to live when he returned, so I no longer saw this prison as a home he could return to.
And since this house belonged to Han Jaewoon’s parents, it had to be completely emptied and returned to them.
“…There’s almost nothing to pack.”
I muttered to myself as I glanced around the room, which was now somewhat cleaned up.
Although I called it
cleaning up
, it was really just erasing the traces of my stay before I signed the contract with SU Entertainment.
The only trace of Han Seungbeom I found while cleaning the room was a set of CSAT preparation books. Everything else seemed to be merely placed there like interior decorations in a model house, and I felt they didn’t really belong to Han Seungbeom.
‘A few basic clothes, basic school supplies, and family photos.’
They said that it’s sad to sort through someone’s belongings because it tells you a lot about the kind of person they were and the kind of life they had lived. But I felt nothing like that.
I couldn’t find any traces of life in Han Seungbeom’s room, and it struck me with grief.
He should have lived a little more selfishly. I wondered why he had lived so foolishly.
“…….”
When I opened the study book, neat handwriting was written densely on the pages. Of course, I couldn’t understand a word of it, but I could tell that Han Seungbeom was a hard working student.
‘It would have been better if a smart guy had taken this body instead. Why did it have to be someone like me, who didn’t even finish high school?’
Since I was going to live as an idol from now on, my life would be far removed from studying, but I couldn’t bring myself to throw away the thing that still held Han Seungbeom’s traces.
I silently stuffed the empty suitcase with study books and textbooks.
Finally, I began to remove the furniture.
“…Are you really going to leave?”
As I was moving the items out, I heard Han Jaewoon’s father’s voice at the door I had left open. I coldly responded while carrying the dismantled bookshelf.
“Yes. I already told you.”
“…….”
Then Han Jaewoon’s father went back out into the living room with a nervous look on his face and started pacing around. He had been like that since I announced that I would not be temporarily living at the dorm but would be completely independent, and asked them to let me know if there was any furniture they wanted me to leave behind.
I couldn’t tell if it was because I didn’t seem like the son he knew, or if he was feeling a shred of responsibility now, or if it was because of Han Jaewoon’s mother glaring at him from the living room. To be honest, I didn’t need to know the exact reason.
“Phew…..”
Wiping the sweat from my forehead, I looked at the last things I needed to clean up.
‘There’s only the bed left.’
Since I hadn’t specifically asked to leave any particular furniture behind, I had to dismantle the bed as well. When I lifted the mattress, I saw something rectangular placed on the lower mattress, which had been covered the whole time.
‘What is it?’
I put the mattress down on the floor and picked it up. It was a laptop.
“…….”
I was shocked to find that Han Seungbeom had hidden something. I had thought that in this perfectly staged, artificial space, the only things that truly reflected Han Seungbeom’s personality were a few books. Bu now, I felt like I had finally found something that belonged to him.
I put the laptop on the desk, hesitated a moment, then pressed the power button.
“Hmm.”
The computer that accompanied someone through puberty was like Pandora’s box. I wondered if it would be too cruel to pry into something he’d hidden so thoroughly, but I couldn’t just let go of the clues about Han Seungbeom that I’d finally found.
‘If I find something too personal, I’ll turn it off.’
With that vow, I placed my hand on the laptop’s fingerprint recognition button. It unlocked the laptop and the homescreen appeared.
There were basic icons on the homescreen, such as the Internet and Recycle Bin, and a folder. I clicked on the folder and opened it.
Then, a file named ‘
To Seungbeom
‘ caught my eye.
When I clicked to open it, a loading screen appeared showing a photo of Han Seungbeom as a child, smiling and hugging a woman who looked so much like him.
After a few more moments, a text appeared above the loading screen.
[Unread Message]
[The CSAT month is approaching soon. Studying isn’t everything in life, but since I know Seungbeom is studying hard, Mom can’t help but worry. Fighting!]
[Did you finish your high school graduation ceremony well? Congratulations on becoming an adult. I hope only kind and good things come your way, my dear son.]
It seemed like the messages were set to be delivered on specific dates, like events. Since they were all written with the future in mind, I immediately realized they must have been written by Han Seungbeom’s mother when he was very young.
Suppressing my bittersweet feelings, I immediately read another part next to the message.
★ User name: Han Seungbeom ★
[Quest]
Reading a book: 1P
Eating well : 1P
.
.
.
Come say hello to mom:3P
‘…..I guess this means she wanted him to visit the charnel house.’
After checking the family registry, it was confirmed that Han Seungbeom’s mother had already passed away and was no longer in this world.
Since there was no ID, bank password, or digital certificate, it took quite a bit of time and effort to verify, but anyway, based on what I checked, that was the case.
‘…Except for the last one, it’s pretty much the kind of thing mothers would ask their kids to do.’
This game seemed to have been created by Han Seungbeom’s mother, who was worried about his future, to act as a guide. It was made to help Han Seungbeom live well in a world without her.
‘Did Han Seungbeom’s mother have a job like a game developer?’
Although it looked like an ordinary educational game at first glance, every aspect of it was filled with love for Han Seungbeom. It also seemed to have fun aspects, like being able to do something as a reward for completing a quest.
[GIFT]
I Can Hear Your Voice: COST 1
Eraser in My Head : COST 10
Freedom Cat : COST 100
.
.
.
You are Me, I am You : COST 10,000
I smiled as my eyes scanned over the lovely design of the game, then placed my hand on the mouse pad.
Then suddenly, something went wrong with the screen.
[You are not an authorized user.]
[User access will be blocked.]
A strange notification kept popping up on the screen.
I quickly moved the mouse cursor to close the notification window that was covering the screen. Then, a creepy beep sounded.
Beeeeeeeeeeep.
And the warning sound kept repeating, with bright red text quickly filling the entire screen, as if it were threatening to engulf it entirely.
[error!]
[error!]
[error!]
[error!]
It piled up layer by layer, as if the game was trying to push me away, and it grew so large that I could no longer close the window, making it impossible to fix. I was startled by this sudden anomaly and took a step back, hesitating.
“…What is this?”
After the sound, which had been repeating wildly as if there was a malfunction, suddenly stopped, I leaned forward to examine the monitor. As soon as I read the text on the screen, my heart plummeted.
The notification that appeared at the top of the screen read as follows.
[Where did you go, my son?]
You can support this translation through Buy Me a Coffee!
Translator’s Corner:
: D I lied, there’s system tag here
Anyway … today I just sent my first ever professional job application (I mean, I worked part-time a lot before in college, but this is the first time I applied for a job that aligned with my study). Please send me a prayer so it will go well ….. I only have time left until the end of the month to go find a job before I’m forced to go back into my hometown jdfkhkjf (as I said before, my hometown is a rural village) (so there’s no wifi and the internet connection somewhat poor) (so you won’t see me this often because opening internet on laptop consumes too much mobile data) (can we just stop time please).
Thank you 茹儿 for the Coffees!