I knew the other person was saying something irrational. But since the other person was Choi Jeokhyeon, and given the situation, it didn’t feel like an empty bluff.
‘That’s not a lie.’
His wide, red eyes were focused solely on me, yet his gaze kept slipping, making it immediately clear that Choi Jeokhyeon was in a state of complete agitation.
The storm of words hit me so hard I felt my mind turn paralyzed, and I grasped my face with both hands.
“This isn’t a threat, it’s a request.”
I never imagined the words I said back then would be returned to me in this form.
My body, which had become too drained to even blink, began to tense up as if screaming in response to the sudden return of danger.
The thought that I should stop him did cross my mind.
But I couldn’t think of a way to do it.
I want to stop, but you’re telling me I have to keep living until the end?
Because I knew my actions had hurt him, and that I was the least deserving of any moral high ground in this situation, I couldn’t easily find the words to stop him.
As my mind spun in confusion, a sudden question crossed my mind.
‘In the first place, will Choi Jeokhyeon even hear anything I say?’
Choi Jeokhyeon had already been through situations like this countless times.
And each time, he resisted desperately, only to fail in the end.
“I shouldn’t have left you and gone abroad back then. Right? I’m sorry. I think I misjudged the situation at the time. I won’t make the same mistake this time.”
As such, he reflected on the regrets he’d felt in the cold mortuary over and over again. He realized that he wouldn’t be able to stop me unless he used the greatest weapon he possessed. This was the result. And, in reality, it was very effective. The fact that I was now reacting to Choi Jeokhyeon’s threats proved it.
Could I really stop Choi Jeokhyeon?
No, that would be far too selfish. This whole mess happened because I couldn’t overcome Seo Yuseong’s death and weakly surrendered to my guilt. Because I dared to abandon my loved ones and give up on my own life, Choi Jeokhyeon was forced to put his own life on the line.
“So, you too … please hold on until the end, so I can live a long life.”
How could I possibly say anything to justify myself when I knew this was my fault?
In the end, I was left with no choice but to yield to his threat.
My head, moving like a rusty machine, gave a slow, reluctant nod. A gleam flickered through his eyes, and a smile spread across his face, as if he were genuinely happy.
“Thank you…….”
Then, as he carefully wrapped his arms around me, he began whispering things like, “I know how much Seo Yuseong meant to you. I know how much pain losing him caused you. But people say time heals all wounds. So, you’ll be okay too.”. He repeated those words over and over.
I didn’t push Choi Jeokhyeon away. Instead, I blankly gazed up at the sky and thought.
Isn’t the saying that time heals all wounds nothing more than words spoken by those who survived? Those for whom the saying didn’t work are unable to say anything because they have already left this world. Isn’t that why you threatened me like this? Because you’re no different from them?
But I couldn’t bring myself to crush the last hope that Choi Jeokhyeon was desperately holding onto, so I simply closed my eyes quietly.
We are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past.
The only difference from last time was that, instead of one person clinging to the other, we were both holding each other’s lives in our hands. All because of Choi Jeokhyeon’s will.
“…I’m sorry.”
I made him like this.
It was all my fault.
.
.
.
“If you stay here like this, you’ll catch a cold. You’re already weak, you know. That body.”
“…….”
“There’s a place we can stay nearby, so let’s get there quickly. I know you don’t like unfamiliar places, but … please just bear with it this once.”
“…Okay.”
Even after that, his agitation didn’t seem to subside, and he was rambling on in an even more heated tone than usual, quickly deciding what to do next. No matter what answer I gave, he probably wasn’t planning on listening to it anyway. He’s always had this tendency, but it was especially noticeable today.
Still, it didn’t matter.
I was planning on doing whatever this guy wanted anyway.
But Choi Jeokhyeon, seemingly in a great hurry, didn’t even wait for my answer before dragging me out of the water. My clothes, heavy with seawater, sagged around my belly and dripped. By the time that gradually stopped, the water absorbed by my clothes had cooled down and began to steal my body heat.
‘…It’s cold.’
The biting wind of the winter sea felt like it was ripping me to shreds.
When I was in the water, my brain was foggy and I felt numb, so I had no sense of time. It seemed I had been submerged in the seawater for a longer time than I had expected.
Looking down at my body, which was shivering uncontrollably, I realized that if I had stayed in the water just a little longer, I might have died of hypothermia before the water had a chance to reach my nose and mouth.
My body was heavy and limp, making it increasingly difficult to keep up with Choi Jeokhyeon’s long strides toward the car. As I lagged further and further behind, Choi Jeokhyeon, who had not responded no matter how much I called, finally turned around and frowned.
“Your lips have already turned blue.”
Before I could even shake my head at his words, Choi Jeokhyeon started the car, practically threw me in, and turned the heater to the highest setting. He then proceeded to strip off my clinging, wet clothes and piled a bunch of dry clothes from a shopping bag in the back seat on top of me.
They were all items with prices beyond imagination. He probably bought them on a whim and then lost interest, leaving them unopened and forgotten. Normally, the people he hired would have already moved and organized everything, but today, luckily they were still there.
I gave Choi Jeokhyeon a quick glance as he caught his breath after finishing the urgent tasks. Somehow, he understood what I meant and grabbed something to change into as well. Even that Choi Jeokhyeon didn’t have the presence of mind to put on one of his usual button-up shirts in this situation; instead, he chose a casual turtleneck sweater.
“We’ll be there soon, so just hold on a little longer.”
After that, Choi Jeokhyeon drove straight to a nearby hotel. The moment we arrived, he went up to a room without even checking in, which made me briefly wonder if this was really okay. But after noticing the hotel’s name displayed throughout the building, I realized it was owned by his family, and that put me at ease.
As soon as we entered the room, Choi Jeokhyeon immediately took me to a bathtub filled with hot water. I told him I could manage on my own, but all I got in response was a long silence followed by a short, “I know.“
The thought did cross my mind, If he knows, he should just leave me to do it alone. But after recalling what I had done in the water, I had no choice but to let him be.
A little while later, I came down with a fever and was bedridden.
“If your fever gets any higher, we need to go to the emergency room.”
“I’m fine. We might get photographed for no reason …What about the members?”
Now that my mind was clearer than before, I thought of the members. At the time, my head wasn’t working properly, so I hadn’t considered it, but they must have been worried sick when I disappeared.
As if he guessed what I was thinking, Choi Jeokhyeon replied in his usual gentle tone.
“Don’t worry. They’re probably resting comfortably in the studio. I explained everything properly before I left.”
As I slowly closed my eyes in relief, a voice echoed through my disoriented mind.
“Why are you still alive?”
It was Seo Yuseong’s voice.
‘…There’s no way Seo Yuseong would say something like this to me.’
This was just my imagination.
Even though I knew that fact clearly, I would still be shaken, and if I let my mind wander for even a moment, I would act impulsively. Just as I did earlier.
‘Ah, that’s right, it was the same back then too.’
Around the time I reunited with Choi Jeokhyeon, hadn’t I dreamed of unleashing my anger at my father by this very sea? That day, the reason I was in the water was the same as today. I had been consumed by impulse and tried to follow after Seo Yuseong.
“Yuseong’s inheritance … can’t you give it to me?”
My father had followed me because he wanted something.
When I yelled at him, asking how he could already be looking for the inheritance when the child hadn’t been gone for long, my father finally confessed the truth he had been hiding.
“What do you mean by that? Father, I already paid off all your debt last time.”
“…After that, I borrowed a little from the lenders connected to Director Kang. I couldn’t get a loan from the bank…….”
I didn’t want to give up on my father.
I considered it my duty to my mother, who loved my father.
“If I don’t pay back the money, they said they’d kill Seo Yutae’s father and anyone connected to him. But I’m still your father, aren’t I? Yuseong’s inheritance is more than enough to pay it off, so you’re not planning to just pretend you don’t know, right? You won’t be able to use the money Yuseong left behind anyway.”
But that day, seeing my father—who had always referred to Seo Yuseong as ‘that bastard‘ and never even acknowledged him as his son—suddenly calling him “Yuseong”, I felt like I was about to lose it completely.
“Father … at this point, wouldn’t it be better to just die?”
I burst into laughter like a madman and then hurled curses, saying that someone like him would be better off dead. So, it was only natural that people misunderstood and thought I had killed my father.
But the truth was, in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to cross the line.
When I looked up at his face, I saw a resemblance to Seo Yuseong, and I found myself unable to do anything.
‘How pathetic……’
As I recalled those memories, a chilling sensation crept over me, and I started to feel that something was off. With that, I unsteadily pushed myself upright, grabbed my messy hair, and muttered under my breath.
“I had already let go of any attachment to my father back then, and Lim Seunghoon must have known that too…….”
“…Yutae-ya?”
“The person they killed wasn’t my father.”
“Kang Hyukwoo killed him. Kang Hyukwoo … it wasn’t me who killed him!”
If the person Kang Hyukwoo and Lim Seunghoon killed had been my father, he wouldn’t have panicked so much when my name was mentioned. Besides, I jumped off that roof myself, unable to cope with Seo Yuseong’s death. That meant I couldn’t have been their victim.
“Seo Yuseong made a promise with me when we were kids. He promised he would never go near the water.”
“…Well, wasn’t he the kind of kid who didn’t really take promises seriously? That’s how Seo Yuseong always was in my memory.”
“No, that’s not true. Seo Yuseong always did his best to keep the promises he made with me. Besides, he himself had been afraid of deep water ever since he had a serious accident.”
“…….”
“Then why did he go to the sea? Unless someone took him there by force…….”
The moment that question crossed my mind, I remembered that on the day Prism went to the sea, Lim Seunghoon was among the managers who accompanied them.
And also the words Kang Hyukwoo once said to me.
“Keep a close eye on your little brother. If he keeps poking around where he shouldn’t, who knows what might happen. Seriously, he’s too clever for his own good…….”
How did I come to know about the business Kang Hyukwoo was so desperate to keep hidden?
“Hyung, I think Father is involved in Kang Hyukwoo’s business. You need to be careful.”
The moment I found the answer to that question, my hands trembled even more violently than when my body temperature had dropped, and my breath grew ragged, tinged with a metallic rasp. Forcing my feverish body upright, I clung to Choi Jeokhyeon and screamed.
“The hell … who did they kill?”
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Translator’s Corner:
ngl I got scared of Choi Jeokhyeon in this chapter lol insanity level max. That sea better be deserted af in winter ….. or else he’ll end any unlucky passerby …..
But MC is really … that a cut piece of bamboo personality. Wdym his father abandoned them since young age that he was forced to work as minor and couldn’t go to school, then when he was succesful, he uselessly ruined his career because he was greedy … yet he didn’t hate him AT ALL. the only reason he came to hate him was because how he treated Yuseong until the end ….. even Baek Kiryang or Han Seungbeom weren’t that pushover …..
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