Daddy...
"Daddy......" …………… “Wheeeeeeck――!!”
Han Sol's body bent over the toilet in an L-shape.
“Guhhh……”
Gastric acid refluxed up her esophagus, scorching her throat. She hadn't eaten dinner, so her empty stomach had nothing to give, but her body wouldn't stop. It convulsed violently, squeezing out even what wasn't there, spewing only yellow bile.
But no matter how much she heaved, the revulsion surging from her gut refused to subside.
“Ugh, urk, ugh……”
Without even thinking to flush, Han Sol slammed her forehead against the cold tile floor. That scene wouldn't leave her mind. The hot-pink neon sign, the flashing marquee, the words Love Hotel. Her father's back. And clinging to his arm, the one with flame-orange hair――that thug bitch.
“Ugh, urk……”
She thought she'd calmed a bit, but another wave of nausea hit. She didn't want to imagine it, but the images came anyway. Her father's strong arm wrapped around that bitch's waist, their sweat-slicked flesh writhing stickily together. Just like he'd done to her over the weekend――no, maybe even more passionately――devouring that thug bitch's body.
Every time that delusion flashed in her mind, her insides twisted. She wanted to vomit out everything in her gut, and if she could, rip out her brain and scrub it raw. Dirty. Dirty, dirty, dirty. Whether it was disgust, jealousy, or rage, that black, sticky emotion clutched her heart and wouldn't let go.
Staggering to her feet, Han Sol stared into the bathroom mirror. Inside it stood a woman with bruised, unfocused eyes, half-mad.
Why, why, why.
Why had she just stood there back then? Why had she watched that bitch hang off her father's arm? Why had she turned away in front of the love hotel? Why hadn't she burst in and dragged her father out?
Blue Falcon――Han Sol could have done it. She could've smashed a window with a drone and pried them apart. She could've grabbed that bitch by the hair and slammed her to the ground.
But she hadn't. Her legs had frozen solid, not moving a millimeter as she watched the motel door close from afar.
Deep down, Han Sol knew exactly why. She'd just consciously avoided thinking about it, but the answer had been there all along.
‘I'm his daughter.’
She had no justification. No right to stop her father from seeing a woman. The only card Han Sol held was [daughter]. Abandonment anxiety, self-harm scars, the non-biological father-daughter bond her father had ignored. She'd weaponized those to cross the taboo line with him.
But that prized ace, the [daughter] card she'd been so proud of, had turned to poison in this moment.
If she were his girlfriend, she could do it. Slap him for seeing another woman, scream if he wanted to break up, sob until he apologized.
A daughter couldn't. A daughter without a mom had no right to block a dad without a wife from dating. A daughter couldn't tell her dad not to date. Couldn't throw a tantrum against remarriage. Crying about hating a stepmom would just get her dismissed as a spoiled brat.
Yes. Han Sol was terrified.
One wrong word, and it was over. The fragile bond she'd stitched together with flesh and blood could shatter with a single mistake.
She'd wrung a promise from her father that he'd never abandon her, demanded proof until their bodies intertwined. Crossing that taboo had been her hard-won victory.
But crossing the line with his daughter didn't mean he couldn't date or marry.
[Sol, are you jealous? You're my daughter, after all.]
What would she do if he said that?
[Who Dad dates is none of your business.]
How could she go on living?
“Ha, ugh……”
Finally wiping away the filth, Han Sol roughly scrubbed her wet mouth with the back of her hand and left the bathroom.
A father who felt guilt for seeing her as a daughter and accepted her. The moment she revealed her jealousy as a woman to him, that relationship――that precarious tightrope――could snap again.
‘What if Dad……hates me.’
That's why she hadn't stormed the love hotel. She'd held back to avoid being abandoned.
But the cost was brutal. Even now, her father was probably rolling around with that bitch. Whispering sweet nothings, giving her the same look he'd given Han Sol.
Han Sol collapsed face-first onto the bed. A faint trace of her father's scent from the weekend lingered in the sheets. She buried her face and inhaled deeply, but what filled her lungs wasn't comfort――it was deeper despair.
She was furious enough to go mad, yet so heartbroken tears flowed.
“……Daddy.”
The word slipped out. Resentment, plea, resignation――impossible to classify.
“Daddy……”
No answer came. Her father wouldn't hear his daughter's silent scream. He'd be buried in that thug bitch's flesh.
Han Sol's hand clenched the pillow. Her nails dug into the fabric, knuckles white.
“Daddy……”
In the darkness, Han Sol repeated her father's name. Hating him, despising him, yet loving him to madness.
Over and over, endlessly.
……………
The next morning.
I dragged myself to work like a zombie. My body moved, but my mind was somewhere far away. I had no memory of the subway ride or arriving at the office and sitting at my desk.
I turned on the computer and stared blankly at the monitor. The boot screen passed, the desktop loaded, the login prompt appeared――but my hands stayed frozen over the keyboard.
‘Feels like I've become human bone marrow.’
Like my very marrow had been sucked dry through a straw.
And Yeom Hana, who'd drained it, showed no signs of tiring as she personally demonstrated the effects of stamina food on me.
“Ha……”
I cradled my face in my hands and sighed.
What the hell am I even doing right now?
Looking back on my life as Han Kang in the 'fifth world'――
Lee Jin-ah. Coworker and junior.
Han Sol. Daughter on paper.
Yeom Hana. Acquaintance young enough to be a daughter.
Bottom line: I'd slept with all three. In an absurdly short time, all at once.
Last week: Yeom Hana and Lee Jin-ah midweek, Han Sol over the weekend. This week: Yeom Hana again.
A murderous schedule.
But.
‘I've never defined any of them as [lover].’
In this world, I'd just gone with the flow. Was it because my name was Han Kang? Like a river, I'd let the current carry me, drifting along.
The water was too fierce to fight, and I had no will to resist.
As Han Kang, I'd fallen for Lee Jin-ah's seduction, yielded to Han Sol's blackmail, accepted Yeom Hana's offer.
Looking back now, what a spineless life.
What was the condition to pass the trial from the three goddesses?
Normal love. Finding it and becoming happy.
‘Normal……love.’
I leaned back in my chair, staring at the ceiling.
Was this situation normal?
‘……Hmm.’
If I stretched the definition of normal pretty wide, a harem might squeak by.
The three goddesses who'd given me this trial were all from Olympus. And by Olympian standards, harems weren't weird at all.
Look at the king of Olympus, god of sky, thunder, lightning. List all the women he'd touched, and it'd fill a book. Incest was everyday stuff there too. The goddess of family and the thunder god were siblings and married, right?
From the gods' view――especially the Love Goddess――my thing with Han Sol might just be, 'Kinda hot, huh?'
‘What kind of sophistry is this……’
Fine, say harems are okay. Incest is normal by god standards.
The real problem: I had zero confidence I'd be happy dating all three at once.
Let's think about the three women surrounding me.
First, Lee Jin-ah. I'd thought she was just a sweet junior colleague. But after really dealing with her……well.
For starters, her eyes when I mentioned Yeom Hana on the rooftop were terrifying. Too clear, too certain――you get it.
And the suspicion she'd secretly unlocked my phone. No matter how I thought about it, the preview notification excuse for seeing all my chats didn't add up.
Second, Han Sol. I'd seen her as a good kid, if a bit distant. Totally wrong.
Barcode-like self-harm scars on her wrists, and she'd blackmail with her own body to possess her father. A very, very scary daughter.
Third, Yeom Hana. The coolest, no hard feelings, fun and quirky girl. But coldly speaking?
A bright young woman in her early twenties, full of potential and pretty, volunteering as a sex partner to an old guy like me? Sorry, Hana, but maybe behind that sunny smile hides some deficiency or twist.
‘……Am I the biggest trash for thinking that?’
On the positive side: As Han Kang in this world, I'm pretty damn strong. So no sudden deaths, probably.
Not like the first world, murdered by a lover. Or the second, caught in gang crossfire. Or the third, whatever.
No such deaths here, at least. Unless some uncontrollable disaster like a reptilian invasion.
Anything short of that, I can survive. Probably. Maybe.
But survival isn't everything.
‘The real issue is……how to untangle this knotted mess.’
Lee Jin-ah, Han Sol, Yeom Hana. Relationships with all three, tangled like a horrific knot.
Lee Jin-ah knows about both Han Sol and Yeom Hana.
Han Sol……probably suspects I'm seeing others. It triggered her self-harm blackmail, after all.
Yeom Hana vaguely senses Lee Jin-ah, but not Han Sol.
Not even a triangle――a quadrangle.
How to unravel it?
‘Group meeting first, make them all aware?’
The thought triggered a red warning light in my brain.
‘No way.’
That their face-off ends well? Hell no. It'd be a death match, not a four-way talk.
So……what?
I racked my brain, but time passed with no answers.