A Door to the Past
The moment Baek Cheonji stepped out of the bathroom, he instantly regretted it.
I made things hard for Teacher….
When he had woken from sleep with a sudden, desperate need to go, he had done everything in his power not to wake the teacher. He had shaken the friends dozing beside him, even tried tickling them, but regrettably, they showed no intention of stirring.
And yet, he simply hadn't had the courage to walk alone through that dark night to the bathroom and back…. Not one bit.
……So in the end, it was only when he felt he absolutely couldn't hold it any longer that he had called out to his teacher after all.
Watching his damp hands being wiped perfectly clean on a soft handkerchief, Baek Cheonji let out a small sigh.
"Ha…."
Had I actually done a good job fulfilling my role as 'mediator' today?
……He didn't know.
One way or another, I ended up being a bother to Teacher.
If he went back to sleep like this, the thought nagged at him, it would leave a terribly uneasy feeling….
Huh?
Suddenly, the handkerchief folded neatly in his hands dropped to the floor, and he saw the teacher spring up from his seat.
"……Teacher?"
What was going on? Had he done something wrong?
Should he have wiped his own hands after all?
Picking the handkerchief back up, Baek Cheonji rose onto his tiptoes to see the teacher's face.
It's too dark, I can't see anything!
He was still wondering how he was supposed to get back to the brightly lit bathroom when—
His right hand was suddenly seized, and the surroundings blazed into light.
Reflexively, his gaze shot straight ahead. What he saw was countless doors, packed side by side along both walls of the corridor.
What is this?
For a moment the strange new landscape frightened him, but the grown-up beside him was so utterly calm that an entirely different thought occurred to him instead.
Was the hallway always shaped like this?
Besides, his brain—still half-submerged in sleep—had blurred the border between dream and reality beyond all recognition.
A reality more dreamlike than any dream.
Even as the swarm of sleepiness came flooding back, Baek Cheonji clenched his one free hand into a firm little fist.
Th-this time, I have to show them how composed I can be!
It was only once the area brightened that he noticed the teacher's expression wasn't good.
It was still as warm and gentle as always, but something seemed to be weighing on him.
I know that face. My brother makes it all the time, too.
The downturned corners of the eyes, the lips ever so slightly pushed out—that exact expression!
And for reasons he couldn't explain, grown-ups were forever sighing through their noses instead of their mouths.
Teacher is in a difficult situation.
Having frequently accompanied his parents to crowded places, Baek Cheonji had long since become a seasoned expert at reading adults' true expressions.
I already troubled Teacher once, so I need to stay sharp.
"Shall we go?"
A soft voice asked. Baek Cheonji nodded crisply.
I have no idea where we're going, but….
"Hmm…. I think I read an escape method for this anomaly. Something about opening all the doors to get out, was it?"
He had no idea what that meant, but he nodded along earnestly anyway.
"Ah. No, wait. Was it 'find the glowing door'?"
Nod, nod.
"Ah…. right. No, that's not it. We're supposed to look for the door that leads back to reality."
Nod, nod, nod.
"……."
The teacher looked down at him and seemed to fall silent, but Baek Cheonji only nodded his head faster.
I'll follow along quietly and well!
I'll be helpful! I'll act composed!
And yet, the worry on the teacher's face only deepened. Looking down at him, he murmured under his breath.
"……I need to get him to sleep, fast."
No way!
"I'm not sleepy."
"You'll get sleepy."
True…. He was sleepy.
In fact, the teacher currently looked like two of him. But still, still…!
Baek Cheonji's eyes snapped wide open as he declared with conviction.
"No, I'm really not sleepy."
Not sleepy, my foot….
His eyes were practically half-shut already.
Cheonji, dressed in children's pajamas striped with red, was valiantly fighting to keep his drooping eyelids from closing.
Aigoo.
Watching him, I felt a pang of sympathy that tipped, just slightly, into impatience.
Right. Let's get this over with fast and put him to bed.
I turned the doorknob of the nearest door without a moment's hesitation.
It said it was safe, so there's no reason to hesitate.
One slight concern, though: I had skimmed that escape method far too quickly.
The details are fuzzy.
……But it would be fine. I clearly remembered that it guaranteed safety, and the escape method itself.
-Creeeeak.
A hinged door—not the sliding kind found in the kindergarten building—opened with an unpleasant groan.
I flicked off the lightsaber in my hand and passed it to Cheonji. The corridor sank back into darkness.
With the child tucked behind me, I positioned myself facing the open door squarely.
Can't be too careful when I don't know what's on the other side.
"……."
Through the open door, an unfamiliar scene came into view.
A stately Western-style residence.
Inside, a group of men in old-fashioned suits were enjoying drinks together.
"……?"
Just in case, I poked my finger through the doorway—it passed through without the slightest resistance.
I inhaled sharply and immediately pulled my hand back.
Not this one.
As I reached to close the door on that first impression, my eyes met those of one of the men inside the house.
His eyes widened slightly, and he began striding quickly toward us.
"I say, who might you be? This place is known only to the friends of Choi Haewon—"
"Ah…. well, you see."
My body froze at the sudden turn of events as I scrambled to swallow back the words that had leapt out of me.
The atmosphere of early-1900s Joseon.
A man from the history books, a man I'd only ever seen in period dramas, was walking toward me.
The moment the man reached the very edge of the threshold and stretched out his hand—
A small figure suddenly popped out in front of me.
"……!"
Before I could even process the situation, a blinding torrent of light poured down onto the face of the man in the doorway.
Wobble.
"Ugh…!"
While the man staggered under the sudden brilliance, the door swung shut with remarkable speed.
-Click.
"……."
Cheonji, both hands pressed flat against the closed door, turned only his head to look at me, his face a portrait of helpless bewilderment.
"I-it was scary, and…. I wanted to protect you, Teacher…. but the button got pressed all of a sudden!"
"……."
I had been staring at him, utterly dumbfounded, when his freshly diagnosed condition suddenly came back to me, and I gave him a thumbs-up.
Seriously….
One wrong word here and I'd be in serious trouble.
I showered him with praise, no questions asked.
"Cheonji just saved his teacher's life!"
The only difference between us and burglars was that we weren't carrying knives.
-BANG.
"Not this one either…."
"Wh-who's there?! Who are you people! Opening someone's door like they own the— ACK!"
-Click.
While I opened a door and scoped out the situation, Cheonji stood by on standby. The moment anyone inside noticed us and came approaching, all he had to do was brandish the lightsaber and unleash it as an anti-eye-weapon. Situation resolved.
I considered stopping him for safety's sake, but….
Watching Cheonji shut the door and straighten up with perfect composure, I let out a deflated little laugh.
Just look at that face.
……I can't stop him. Not when he's this happy.
Not even if I dragged in Baek Cheonhyeong—that cold man with about a teaspoon's worth of warmth in his entire body—could he have pried this away from the kid.
No particularly dangerous side effects, so it should be fine.
* Reason for disposal: Haha, try pressing the button while holding your eyes calmly against the glowing panel at the top…. You get it now, right? That's why. (It was intended for use as a supply item during dungeon raids, but was judged unusable for extended periods / and, on the assessment that it carried a high risk of exposing one's position, was decided for disposal.)
* Precautions: Same as the reason for disposal.
* Manufactured with the assistance ofYeo Wonha, an S-class Crafting-class Awakener.
Then again…. how long is this going to take?
We weren't making much progress for all the doors we had. Then again, it made sense—the doors seemed to be undergoing nuclear fission like amoebas, endlessly sprouting new ones along the corridor.
And opening and closing them one by one turned out to be far more tedious than it sounded.
If it were up to me, I'd rather sweep them all open at once, then sweep them all shut again.
But doing that would leave us in no shape to respond if something unexpected happened.
In the end, I found a compromise.
Open the doors within arm's reach on both walls simultaneously, then close them simultaneously.
I quickly swung open a door on each wall at the same time and looked back and forth between the two rooms.
This one's…. a laboratory? I can see people in lab coats.
-Click.
And this is… a puppy café?
-Click.
As we passed through every manner of place and person, we came upon a space that looked quite familiar indeed.
-BANG.
"……This is."
My home.
To be precise, the apartment I'd lived in when my parents were still alive.
I stood frozen, staring into it without a word.
"……."
Through the door connected to my old bedroom, a scene from those days, perfectly unchanged, stretched out before me.
A brand-new school uniform hanging on the wall, a bed made with meticulous care.
The books I'd loved back then. My game console.
I gazed at that room in silence for a long moment, then reached out and picked up a single USB drive sitting on the desk.
"So I can take things out…."
If I went through this door, could I meet my late parents again? Bring them back here with me….
Stop.
That's enough sentimentality.
I shut the door with urgency. I felt my racing heart slowly settle back down.
With the thing that had disturbed my mind vanished from before my eyes, rational thought returned.
No.
Stepping through that door would be an incident in itself. I couldn't commit an act that proved nothing, all on the strength of one absurd, delusional hope.
If it were just me, maybe. But with Cheonji here, absolutely not.
To dilute the tangled thoughts, I moved quickly onward and flung open the doors on both walls.
"……!"
And through one of those open doors, I witnessed it.
The Director, taping rubber tape over a sprinkler.
"Oh?"