Amusement Park
I turned my gaze to where everyone else was looking, and I could feel my face crumpling, distorting beyond recognition.
"What the hell do you want, calling me out here like this!... What? Lee Cheon-seong, why are you even here?"
The one who'd raised his voice at me seemed to recognize me, and spoke directly to me.
"Don't tell me you quit your job!! How dare you cause a scene like this, do you have any idea where you are?!"
He spoke as if he were my parent, but beneath the words I could hear the disgust and revulsion he felt for me.
"I don't have anything to say to you, you piece of shit."
"What!? Is that what you say to your father, you little—"
My parents. More accurately, my adoptive parents on paper — Lee Jin-han.
That bastard was standing right in front of me.
"I've never once thought of you as my father. You only adopted me to get my grandmother's money, then abandoned me. What are you, a father? Don't make me laugh."
To me, the only person who had ever been a parent was my grandmother, who raised me with love. Not some piece of trash like this guy, who only wanted money, adopted me and then left me to rot while throwing punches.
"So you took my grandmother's money and what did you do with it? Work at a cheap hotel like this? Or did you gamble it all away, like I bet you did?"
My grandmother had lived modestly, but she'd owned several properties and buildings — at least several billion won. And yet not a single won had come to me. Every last cent had been taken by this guy, and now here he was working at a hotel like this. Given that he was a compulsive gambler, it was obvious what he'd done with the money.
"How dare you—!!"
His face flushed red and purple at my words. He forgot about the people watching around us and lunged toward me, raising his hand.
He wasn't even Lower rank — barely even the lowest tier, practically an ordinary person. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't touch a single hair on my body. But I had no intention of dodging.
If I just took the hit, this bastard would be the one to suffer.
From the reactions and the stares around us, it was clear this guy held some kind of position of authority here. It made me sick, but it was better to just take a slap and walk away than to make a bigger scene.
"L...Lee!"
Someone shouted. I'd wondered how this idiot was even allowed in a place like this, but the fact that he'd come to his senses before actually hitting me meant he wasn't completely without a brain.
"What? Now you finally notice people are watching? You're an idiot, but at least you're smarter than a goblin."
But what was he going to do if he didn't hit me? The damage I'd take was zero. The damage he'd take was at least half. Even if he hit me hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of times, I wouldn't feel a thing.
So I kept provoking him.
"I thought you were so useless you couldn't even compare to a goblin — every time you earned money you'd blow it all at a casino and lose it all. But now I see you're at least a kobold. Go ahead, go find a kobold and bark at it. Woof woof. See if it wants to be your friend."
I didn't care if others heard. I was the kind of person who wouldn't bother with that kind of consideration anyway.
"You little—!!"
Finally, unable to resist my provocation, he swung his arm — but someone stepped in between us and stopped him again.
If it had been another employee, or some useless citizen pretending to be brave, I would have been annoyed at the interference. But the one who stepped in wasn't a useless meddler — it was the protection of someone I loved.
"Yuna, wait—!"
"What are you doing! Get out of the way!"
He was already furious, played right into my provocation, and his anger was boiling over. I was startled for only a moment before I tried to stop Yuna, but—
Smack!
Yuna staggered with the sound of the slap.
He hit her?
He hit Yuna?
Right in front of me?
He dared to hit Yuna's cheek with that filthy hand?
Crunch!
"Kuh! Kuf..kuf..kuk! Kuk!Kuh!"
Lee Jin-han's body lifted into the air, his flailing legs showing his current state.
"You dare... hit Yuna? Right in front of me?"
I slowly tightened my grip, and the telekinetic force constricted around Lee Jin-han's throat in sync.
"KYAAAAAA!!!"
"H-help! Someone!"
"Manager!!"
Many people screamed, ran, and fell over, but Cheon Seong's attention never shifted to them.
He was consumed only by the fact that Lee Jin-han had hit Yuna — that he'd done it with that filthy, disgusting hand, right in front of his eyes. He kept tightening the telekinetic force, tighter and tighter.
But then a voice reached Cheon Seong's ears, one that made him stop.
"A...Dad."
"H...Hana...?"
It was the reason he'd come to the amusement park today — his adopted daughter, his beloved Hana. Her voice was trembling with fear.
"Dad... I'm scared."
Thud.
The telekinetic force released, and Lee Jin-han's body, which had been suspended in the air, dropped with a thud.
Thud!
Someone else fell — another thud.
"The dad that Hana knows... isn't you. I'm scared."
Hana's big, round eyes clouded over as tears welled up.
Thud!
Someone else fell nearby — this time the sound was louder.
'No... this isn't... this isn't what I meant.'
Thud!
Thud!
Thud!
The sounds came faster and faster. But they weren't the sounds of people falling and collapsing.
Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!!
They were coming from inside me. From my heart.
'What... what am I doing...?'
This was my true nature, but I had never wanted Hana to see it. I'd tried my hardest to hide it from Yuna too. And today, both of them had found out.
I'd shown the two people I least wanted to see it that I was trash — that I was crazy and violent.
Why? Why had I acted so emotionally?
If I had been the me before regression, I would have never provoked Lee Jin-han. I would have killed him quietly, without a sound.
But I hadn't. Why?
Why had I acted emotionally? Why couldn't I hold back? Why? Why? Why on earth?
Why had I provoked him like that, so unlike myself? I could have just held back — so why? Or was it... was it because I'd grown soft?
'I've... grown soft...?'
If I had been the me before regression, I would have been sharpened to a razor's edge — unable to sleep properly, every day a fight for survival. But what about now? Was I still sharp?
No. No, I wasn't.
I wasn't sharp. I was dull.
My edge had grown so dull it couldn't cut anything anymore.
What had made me dull? Was it peace? Was it being able to sleep comfortably, no longer threatened in my life? No.
Love.
I had grown dull because I had been loved.
The blade I had sharpened to protect those I cherished had grown dull from love — love I hadn't even received for half the time.
'Ah... I see.'
Only now did I realize.
'I... shouldn't have been loved...'
Smack!
Another slap echoed through the chaotic hotel lobby.
The slap had landed on my left cheek. And the one who had struck it was—
"Cheon-seong, snap out of it."
"Y...Yuna?"
It was Yuna.
Yuna, who had staggered after being slapped by Lee Jin-han, was the one who had hit my cheek.
My cheek hurt from Yuna's slap.
My heart hurt. My stomach churned.
I felt sick that a piece of trash like me had even considered rejecting Yuna's love.
I felt like I was going crazy that a filthy thing like me had dared to reject Beatrice's love.
I was furious that I'd even considered whether someone like me deserved the genuine family love Hana gave me.
What kind of person was Yuna to me? How much pain did it cause me when she was hurt? And yet she was telling me to calm down.
That was... far too difficult for me.
Thanks to Yuna and Hana — though it felt strange to say it that way — I was eventually arrested by the people who came to quell the disturbance and underwent questioning.
It didn't take long.
I had evidence that I'd also shown to the staff, but the staff had no evidence at all. Based on the testimony of other guests who had witnessed Lee Jin-han ignoring us, I took responsibility for assaulting him as a substitute for the staff's mistake, and was released sooner than expected.
The problem was... the fact that Hana was afraid of me.
Hana, hiding behind Yuna, looking at me with fear in her eyes.
My mouth tasted bitter.
"Yuna, I'll watch from here. Go play with Hana."
"But Cheon-seong, if you do that..."
"Please. It's Hana's first time at an amusement park. I'll just watch from far away. And Hana."
"U...uh-huh."
I spoke to her with the gentlest smile and voice I could muster, despite the fearful look in her eyes.
"Dad is really sorry."
After apologizing to Hana, I stepped away so she wouldn't be afraid anymore.
"D...Dad...?"
Hana's confused voice came from behind me, but I didn't stop walking.
Hana had been captured as a slave since she was young and had suffered at the hands of humans.
Was I really any different from them to her?
Of course not. No matter how much trash I cleaned up, no matter how many owls I killed, I was still a filthy piece of trash with blood and filth on my hands.
No matter how much I treated Hana like a daughter, in the end I was still just a piece of trash who had inflicted trauma on her.
So I didn't stop walking. I disappeared.
All that remained was Hana, staring blankly at the place where Cheon Seong had vanished with her hand outstretched, and Yuna and Beatrice watching her with sorrow in their eyes.
"Dad...."
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
"Should I... kill him... or not."
I'd been found out.
Everything had been exposed. All because of that bastard.
Lee Jin-han... a piece of trash who cared nothing for his sick grandmother's worries, only for her inheritance...
"I was planning to ignore him since he'd fall on his own face eventually... but should I just kill him?"
Hana looked depressed.
At the same time, the image of Hana's face — looking at me with fear — came vividly to mind.
What should I do?
Should I go to Hana, who was afraid of me but seemed disappointed that I wasn't there?
Or should I keep avoiding her until she was okay?
"U-um, excuse me... h-hey!"
From a distance, I struck a man who was approaching Yuna with obvious desire, using telekinetic force.
No matter what, I wouldn't let anyone bother Yuna while I wasn't there.
"How about you just go be with her?"
"How can I? Hana is afraid of me."
Beatrice, who had been watching from beside me, suggested I go to Hana. But how could I?
"Even though Hana seems lively, there's always a wound in her heart that hasn't healed — one that bleeds. Her liveliness is just a forced mask over it."
Hana was always lively and energetic, but that was just a survival instinct for her.
Always showing me a bright face, always seeming happy — out of fear of being abandoned by me, of being alone again.
And now Hana felt fear toward me. How could I possibly approach her?
"If I go to her, I'll only make things worse."
Beatrice embraced me as I used telekinetic force to push away the men approaching Yuna.
"That is not it. Hana wants to apologize to you."
"...I know that. I know that, but... I'm scared she'll be afraid of me again..."
I wasn't ignorant of the fact that Hana wanted to apologize to me.
But what could I do about being scared?
I was afraid she'd look at me with fear again. Afraid she'd dislike me.
I was afraid of being completely abandoned by Hana — the other light in my life, different from Yuna and Beatrice.
If Hana's lively smile was her survival instinct — a way to avoid being abandoned — then my presence with Hana, my time with Yuna, was my survival instinct.
The survival instinct of someone terrified of being completely abandoned, of being rejected.
And that had been shattered.
I had shown a part of myself I never wanted to show.
Even just the tip of the iceberg of my true nature had been enough to make Hana this terrified, this afraid of me.
I could also sense Yuna's confusion at my behavior.
They had seen only that tiny fragment of me, and they had reacted like that. What if they saw more? What if they saw even more of my true nature? The thought made me want to go insane.
"If I'd known it would come to this... I should have just stayed away. If I'd known I'd be shaken like this... I should have just handled it myself..."
The blade sharpened by the deaths of my comrades, of Yuna, of those I cherished — it had grown dull in an instant from the love of two people.
The deaths of those I cherished felt meaningless, and I felt like I was going mad right now.
And yet I was dull. I couldn't do it.
If I had been the me before regression, I would have acted without a moment's hesitation. But the me of now couldn't.
"Why... why am I being loved... I'd rather they both hated me. I'd rather they hated me."
If only Yuna and Hana had hated me, I wouldn't be like this. But I could still feel their trust and love for me.
"We, this woman, will never hate you. So go, quickly."
"Bea...trice."
I could feel Beatrice's love.
"Dad...."
Hana's voice reached my ears.
"Now, go quickly."
At Beatrice's affectionate words... my feet moved.