Chapter 129
“I don’t know what you’re talking about all of a sudden.”
“It’s obvious that you came here because it’s your turn today, so don’t play dumb.”
Yu-hyun spoke first, sensing that everything was already figured out. Kwon Jia stuttered, flustered by his words.
“No, I mean…”
“Then, do you want to go back?”
“…”
Kwon Jia couldn’t say no to that.
Seeing her like that, Yu-hyun sighed and took her arm, leading her along.
She didn’t resist, even though she could have.
She just consoled herself with the fact that she didn’t say anything, for the sake of her pride, and followed Yu-hyun.
“Here, put on these glasses.”
Yu-hyun handed Kwon Jia a pair of glasses with an engraving on them.
It was the same thing he wore when he went out with Kang Hye-rim before. Kwon Jia also needed to wear them because she had attracted too much attention lately.
Kwon Jia obediently put on the glasses.
‘Hmm. Her image doesn’t change much, does it?’
Kang Hye-rim had a calm and literary vibe when she wore glasses, but Kwon Jia was the opposite.
Her image didn’t change at all with glasses.
She still had charisma overflowing from her.
It was because of her aura that couldn’t be hidden by any external changes.
‘But I guess pretty people are pretty no matter what they do.’
Kwon Jia’s appearance was still cheating, so she looked like a successful female CEO with glasses on. But her behavior was different from usual when she was dragged out by Yu-hyun.
“Is there anywhere you want to go?”
“Hmm? No, I mean…”
She hesitated to answer, mumbling and fumbling.
Kang Hye-rim and Baek Seoryeon had at least shown some will to do something they wanted, but Kwon Jia didn’t.
She definitely came out with Yu-hyun because it was her turn, but she didn’t think beyond that.
To be more precise, she couldn’t think of anything.
“I don’t know what to do.”
There was no confidence in Kwon Jia’s voice, unlike usual.
She had forgotten about this kind of thing for too long.
Even if he suddenly told her to take a break and go somewhere to have fun, she couldn’t set even a small goal for where to go and what to do.
Yu-hyun didn’t blame Kwon Jia for that.
It was cruel enough to give her such a choice after she had been moving like something possessed for so long.
“Then, I’ll take the lead for you.”
So he just had to show her the way.
“All you have to do is follow me.”
“Is that okay?”
“I appreciate your concern, but honestly, your situation is not something you can talk about either, right?”
She had lived longer than Yu-hyun.
He couldn’t read most of her books because they were locked, but he wasn’t ignorant of how hard her life had been.
A regressor whose emotions had been worn out as much as possible.
She had gotten better recently, but this was still Yu-hyun’s evaluation of Kwon Jia.
She wrapped herself in strength on the outside, but she was a glass castle that could collapse at any time and place.
That was Kwon Jia.
“Come on. Let’s go.”
So this time, it was Yu-hyun’s turn to do something good for Kwon Jia.
Kwon Jia, who would have been stubborn or annoyed otherwise, obediently listened to Yu-hyun’s words.
“Where are we going?”
“Well, first of all, we have to eat something, right?”
“Eat?”
That was when it happened.
Gurgle!
“…”
Kwon Jia quickly avoided Yu-hyun’s gaze at the sound coming from her stomach. But she couldn’t hide her ears that turned red.
Yu-hyun didn’t mention this part out of consideration.
“I know a good place.”
“…Okay.”
Kwon Jia didn’t refuse Yu-hyun’s kindness.
***
The place Yu-hyun took Kwon Jia this time was a rice soup restaurant.
It was a small place, but there was enough room for two people to sit since it wasn’t mealtime.
Kwon Jia looked at the scenery inside the rice soup restaurant that felt somewhat cozy and felt an indescribable emotion.
“Why are you looking like that?”
“…Do people usually go to a rice soup restaurant when they eat together?”
She thought this was ridiculous even for a regressor.
She didn’t know much about this stuff, but she had some basic knowledge.
Wouldn’t they normally go to a fancy restaurant and cut some steak or something?
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Yu-hyun didn’t understand at all.
“What’s wrong with rice soup? It’s filling and good to eat. And it’s cheap too.”
“…”
He was right, of course.
Rice soup wasn’t a bad food.
Rather, it was very cost-effective in terms of price.
But didn’t she have feelings?
Inside Kwon Jia’s head, a fierce battle raged between her cold reason as a regressor and her emotions as a woman.
Perhaps because of that, she was unable to make a rational judgment right now.
In the meantime, Yu-hyun quickly finished setting the table and ordered the food.
“Ah.”
Kwon Jia let out a belated sigh, but it was already too late.
She gave up and quietly sat down across from Yu-hyun.
“How strange.”
“What is?”
“I thought you were the same kind as me.”
She spoke in a small voice that wouldn’t be heard by others.
“But, you are… how should I say it, very different from what I expected.”
“For example, in what way?”
“Hmm. It’s hard to explain. Just, your usual behavior…”
“Is skillful?”
“…Is that what you call it? I guess you could see it that way.”
The Kang Yu-hyun she saw was a mysterious person.
He was definitely twisted.
He had seen and experienced such a world, and it would have been more strange if he wasn’t.
It was a sense that she could recognize as a fellow regressor who had gone through hundreds of regressions.
But, at the same time, Yu-hyun was very normal.
His actions, his attitude towards people, his perspective on the world.
All of that seemed very correct and ideal, like looking at a role model.
But, if she asked him if that was an act, she would hesitate again.
“Both your genuine joy over trivial things and your hidden side are real. What are you exactly?”
“Is that so surprising?”
“At least to me.”
“Hmm. I see.”
Yu-hyun had never really thought about his own behavior.
The question of what his true self was seemed quite vague and philosophical.
“I think all of them are me.”
When he made plans to deal with his enemies, when he played pranks on his colleagues at the office, when he ruthlessly abandoned someone, when he saved someone in danger.
All of them were himself.
“People don’t have just one side to them.”𝖓օ𝘃𝑒ɭ𝖇𝓲𝖓.𝗻𝒆𝑡
A villain doesn’t always do evil deeds.
That was consistent with the fact that a good person doesn’t always do good deeds.
“Miss Jia seems to be living in some kind of delusion. It’s true that I’m someone who has experienced a terrible future like you, but that doesn’t mean I have to ‘be like this’ necessarily. That’s too one-sided and prejudiced.”
“…”
At Yu-hyun’s words, Kwon Jia unconsciously nodded inwardly.
“I see. I guess I unknowingly imposed my standards on you. I’m sorry.”
“No. You don’t have to apologize. Rather, I think that attitude is something you need in your own way.”
“For me?”
“You always try to be thorough and certain in your life. That must be partly for some forgotten purpose, but also largely influenced by your trait. You don’t have any leeway.”
“Leeway…”
“Don’t be ashamed of judging others arbitrarily, like an ordinary person would. The fact that you thought that way means that you still have some human aspects left in you.”
The steaming hot soup came out before long.
Yu-hyun picked up his spoon and continued his words.
“Don’t be confused or embarrassed by that.”
“But, I…”
“I understand that you’re confused right now. You must have felt it while spending time with me. This regression is definitely different from the previous ones.”
Yu-hyun’s point was sharp.
It felt like he was digging into her innermost feelings that she hadn’t looked into yet.
“You haven’t fully accepted the change yet, so you’re a bit disoriented. You can’t just stop feeling that way easily, so you have to hope that time will solve it naturally. But there’s one thing you should remember.”
“What is it?”
“Don’t forget your conviction.”
“…”
Conviction?
Kwon Jia always felt a strange emotion whenever she heard that word.
It felt like it didn’t suit her, along with the contradictory feeling that she had to stick to it somehow.
She didn’t have a clear goal of what she had to achieve yet.
She didn’t have any conviction for it either.
She must have had it in the past, but over the long years, it had faded away without leaving any trace.
“I don’t… know.”
Knowing that very well, Kwon Jia muttered in a deflated voice.
It was a rare moment when she pushed aside her regressor’s trait and let out her ‘true feelings’.
“What I want to do, what I have to do.”
“You can start looking for it now.”
“Can I really, do that?”
“Why not? If you don’t know, find out. If it doesn’t exist, create it. There are so many people in the world who sway this way and that without their own convictions. Compared to them, you’re an angel, Jia.”
Yu-hyun’s tone was light, but the impact it had on Kwon Jia was the opposite.
If there was weight and value in words, Yu-hyun’s words were dazzling gold to Kwon Jia.
She felt his voice deep into her withered and wounded heart like a sweet rain.
If you forgot, you can find it.
If you can’t find it, you can make it anew.
Surely, the process wouldn’t be smooth.
It could be so hard that she would want to give up many times.
But having someone cheer for her and guide her like this.
It wasn’t so bad.
“I see.”
Kwon Jia knew that too, so she picked up her spoon.
“Let’s eat first.”
“Sure.”
They finished two bowls of rice soup like that.
***
The next place they visited after the rice soup restaurant was the movie theater.
“Is there a movie you want to see?”
“I don’t know any.”
Kwon Jia’s knowledge was mostly focused on philosophy and collecting.
She had virtually no knowledge of what was happening in everyday life.
“I knew that, so I bought the tickets in advance.”
Kwon Jia sent him a look of protest, as if to say why did you decide on your own, but Yu-hyun ignored it lightly.
Anyway, even if she did that, she would end up watching the movie he chose.
The genre of the movie was action, Sci-fi.
It wasn’t intentional, but the protagonist of the movie was quite similar to Kwon Jia.
The earth invaded by aliens.
The protagonist, a soldier who tried to fight them, accidentally gained the ability to regress when he died.
At first, he was confused but also used this regression ability to die, die and die again while fighting the enemies.
He met a female lead who understood him along the way, and fought the final battle to save her.
In the last fight, he defeated the ultimate enemy with a synchronized attack with his partner.
The ending was a happy one.
In the end, he regressed to the past where the alien invasion failed, and met the woman he wanted to protect again and smiled.
“…”
Kwon Jia, who was reluctant at first, was immersed in the movie from the middle.
Was it because the protagonist’s situation was similar to hers?
She was still slightly lost in the aftermath as she came out of the theater.
“Hmm. The ending wasn’t bad. It felt like it ended at just the right time?”
“Is that so?”
“But don’t you feel a bit sorry? The female lead fought with him for a long time, but she doesn’t remember what happened then. It feels like everything they achieved so far disappeared… Ah.”
Yu-hyun belatedly realized that he was evaluating the movie with a regressor.
“Uh, um. I didn’t mean to pick this movie. It was just the only blockbuster that came out at this time…”
“I know. I’m not offended by it. I enjoyed the movie too.”
“How did you feel about it?”
“Just, I could relate to it… And the ending left a strong impression.”
As she muttered that, Kwon Jia suddenly asked him.
“Do you think I’ll have a day when I can smile like that too?”
“…”
His voice sounded faint and wistful, and Yu-hyun was momentarily captivated by her appearance.
He quickly regained his senses and nodded his head.
“Yes.”
He said it not as a lie to comfort her, but with all his sincerity.
“Surely, there will be such a day.”
“I see.”
That answer was enough for Kwon Jia.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
It was still a stiff expression of gratitude, but she couldn’t hide the emotion behind it.
Yu-hyun knew that too, so he didn’t say much else.
‘Huh?’
Then Yu-hyun discovered something amazing.
‘Jia’s book…?’
