Chapter 10
Chapter 10
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 10
Chapter Title: The Way to Turn Back Time
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Every time I turned the page, I felt like I was suffocating.
My heart felt inexplicably stuffy and queasy.
The immersion and focus that once enhanced the pleasure of reading were now nothing but obstacles.
I lacked the confidence to keep reading. I lacked the strength to endure it.
I wanted to reminisce, yet I feared crumbling under those memories.
I was terrified of feeling that despair from back then once more.
"No. That's not it."
This was a lie. I knew it myself.
What I'd been avoiding all this time wasn't that.
I just hated facing the possibility that they resented me.
Since it took the form of a book, their final moments were written out like an ending.
Their ending was a sad one—a bad ending. It could never be happy.
I didn't want to read a story where they could never find eternal happiness.
Even if it felt a bit forced, a happy ending was better.
If even one line cursing me appeared in that final moment, I knew I wouldn't be able to bear it.
Only the regrettable things I'd done to them, the thorny words I'd spat, came to mind.
If only I'd been a little kinder to them.
Regret is always late, no matter how swiftly it arrives. It's regret precisely because it's late—and late because it's regret.
Back then, I wasn't in my right mind. Just taking care of myself was overwhelming enough.
It was a time when I was under immense mental strain.
In the early days, I flailed desperately just to survive. With nothing but survival on my mind, other worries were a luxury.
It was when life had finally become tolerable, and I prided myself on being somewhat strong.
Days of strutting around arrogant and full of myself.
In truth, it was nothing more than forcibly propping up my pride and self-esteem, terrified that my worthless core would be exposed.
Even though that self-esteem I crammed in could never be genuine.
Suddenly my gender changed, and in an instant, my entire world shifted.
My memories remained crystal clear, but the people tied to me no longer existed.
The rift between memory and reality—that disconnect drove me insane.
Am I even me? Thoughts straight out of puberty flooded my head.
I suffered from having no anchor to define myself except myself.
Shaking precariously, with no one to grab hold of me.
I felt like a solitary sailboat adrift on a vast ocean.
Even the rolling waves felt like tsunamis in a storm.
A life of just floating aimlessly, unable to define where I was headed or even who I was.
Not truly living, but merely being lived.
It seems the passage of time doesn't automatically make one an adult.
I was still just a coward who ran away, an endlessly selfish child.
"Hoo."
I let out a deep sigh, like a long breath.
Yeah, it's time to face it. Time to stop running.
About time I grew up.
And from the very first page I confronted, I crumbled.
There was no resentment or disappointment aimed at me.
Just one simple phrase.
[This book is dedicated to my dear mentor.]
This one line—just this one line I couldn't bear to see.
In the end, I never fully trusted those kids.
Why?
Why did this one phrase cut deeper than any curse?
A single tear I couldn't hold back traced down my cheek.
Once the sobs burst forth, they were impossible to contain. Tears swelled rapidly, like a dam bursting.
One drop, two drops of tears falling.
The book wept where my tears landed.
The crying spread, making the pages weep pitifully, warping unevenly and hideously.
Yet strangely, laughter bubbled up too.
Memories I'd thought sunk forever resurfaced bit by bit, drawing a smile across my face.
Each person's handwriting carried their personality.
Round and bubbly scripts, squarely angular ones—even chicken scratch barely legible as handwriting.
The dedications on the opening pages were in their individual styles.
The kids probably didn't write them themselves. It was just the Tower recreating their handwritings on its own.
The Tower can't invent facts that don't exist.
It pursues perfect fairness, which sometimes felt coldly mechanical.
But never had that fairness felt so warm as it did now.
Sniff! Sobbing, I read the book straight through.
It wasn't just the handwriting—their writing styles captured their unique traits perfectly.
That was pretty amusing.
I could find traces of them even in the less obvious parts.
It brought even the hidden memories bubbling up, drop by drop.
Those soap-bubble memories floated hazily, fragile as if they'd burst at a touch, teetering on the edge.
"Not all sad endings are bad endings."
"Sniff. What? Old Man, you're still here?"
"Did you want me to leave quickly?"
"No, that's not it. So what were you getting at?"
The Old Man raised one eyebrow.
"Because of you, I missed the perfect timing for a cool line."
"It's fine. I'm still in the mood, so go ahead. The afterglow lingers."
I said, sniffling my nose.
I could feel the Old Man staring at me with an incredulous look. I slyly averted my gaze.
"Ahem. Not all sad endings are bad endings."
The Old Man cleared his throat and said.
Ah, starting from there?
I shot him an equally baffled look, and the Old Man slyly dodged my eyes.
"Human endings are sad endings by default."
"So 'happily ever after' from fairy tales is impossible?"
"Exactly. A human ending is literally the end. It can't go on."
All deaths are sad—for those left behind and those departing alike.
The world holds all sorts of funeral traditions.
Some dance, some laugh and celebrate in festival atmospheres to honor the departed.
Yet beneath every act of commemoration lies sorrow at its core.
Ultimately, it's sorrow. Every farewell hurts and saddens.
"The key is to part well. With anything."
"Is that so?"
Then, have I finally managed a proper farewell now?
"Still scared?"
"Of what?"
"Of being left alone."
A gaze like it pierced right through me turned my way.
Eyes worthy of the Sage title, brimming with depth, fixed on me.
"What're you talking about?"
"If not, never mind."
We tossed the words lightly, but we both knew they were lies.
Sometimes a well-packaged falsehood serves better than blunt truth.
But apparently not this time.
The Old Man peeled back the polished shell.
"You won't be alone. There's the Tower, and the Abyss too. Ber's in the mix as well."
"I have to rebuild those bonds. Can I even do it? What if I stack them wrong and they twist or collapse? What if I screw it up worse?"
"You're way too scared."
Can't help it. I don't want to suffer again from memories only I carry.
I swallowed the unspoken words deep inside.
"Then I'll remember too. Somehow, even if it means going back to the past."
"Ha, how on earth would you manage that, Old Man?"
"Somehow."
He uttered it ambiguously—serious or joking, hard to tell.
Still, those words brought comfort.
"Turning back time feels right. That has to be it. It is. It will be."
Staying like this would never lead to a happy ending.
At the very least, it should be an acceptable sad one.
"If I go back to the past, I'll take you on as my disciple, Old Man."
"Sounds good. Bring me when I'm young if you can. This rickety old body tires out too fast."
"Yeah, I will."
"But do you even know my name?"
The Old Man eyed me suspiciously.
"Of course I do?"
"Really? Then say it."
What does he take me for?
"Jang Chun-mong."
A name impossible to forget once heard. One that evokes a fleeting spring dream.
And
"How could I forget my friend's name?"
The Old Man widened his eyes at me, then burst into laughter.
"Haha. Hahahaha."
"What's so funny?"
"You kept calling me 'Old Man' this and 'Old Man' that, so I thought you'd forgotten my name."
"As if. You think I'm some fool?"
I tapped my head and continued.
"It's all here. Everything. The stuff I want to forget, the stuff I mustn't. All of it."
Just sunken for now. Ready to surface anytime.
"And your name's pretty unique, Old Man."
"It is."
"Never disliked it? Chun-mong—not exactly a great connotation."
"Talking like this without a drink feels awkward."
"Cut back on the booze."
"You drink more. Passing out after one shot? Come on."
I was speechless. But I snapped back quickly.
"How about getting drunk on the vibe today?"
"Using your tears as a chaser?"
"Eww, what kinda nasty talk is that?! So cringey."
"Anyway, I like my name."
The Old Man hurriedly steered the topic back.
"The meaning behind it too."
"Chun-mong means a vain dream, life's transience."
"But you can be happy in it, even if just for a moment."
Is that so? I tilted my head.
I didn't quite get it, but nitpicking someone else's name isn't polite.
"Even a fleeting dream brings happiness while you're dreaming it."
"And after you wake up?"
"Well, it shatters like glass shards. You might even get cut."
"What're you even saying?"
"That's humans for you. Creatures who thrive on moments."
"Thrive on moments?"
"Beauty works the same way, doesn't it? We get captivated by that split-second glimpse. Then we cherish the memory of that irreplaceable instant."
The Old Man continued, polishing his glasses.
"Fleeting instants in a long life. Humans label them memories, mull them over, yearn for them—that's how we live."
Squinting one eye, he peered at me through his lenses.
"In the end, what sticks vividly through a long life are those flashes of happiness."
You too. Me too.
His softly settling voice blended with the serene, glowing light.
In the darkened night, over the hush when all slept, his words quietly spread.
Like gentle ripples on a calm lake, they warmly soaked my heart.