Chapter 503: The Ugly Truth (2)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 503: The Ugly Truth (2)
I returned to my room, lay on the bed, and lost myself in thought.
I knew all too well what emotion I had felt just a moment ago while watching Ju-yeon and Morgan Paul.
“Jealousy…”
It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling.
Ever since I was Son Si-woo, I’d always been the jealous type.
I hate seeing my woman talking and laughing with another man.
To be precise, I hate seeing her with guys who are so obviously drooling over her, but anyway.
I don’t think jealousy is a bad emotion.
If anything, can’t it be used as a metric to gauge how much a man and a woman love each other?
But this time, I couldn’t possibly see this jealousy in a positive light.
“…It’s filthy and ugly.”
This was different from any other jealousy I’d felt.
It was so dank, so gloomy, so ugly that I never wanted to reveal it to anyone.
I wanted to swallow it down and make it disappear, but even that wasn’t easy.
Like the bottom of a burnt frying pan, it was stuck fast, and no matter how hard I tried, it wouldn’t budge.
What should I do?
How can I erase this feeling?
The answer was already set.
Before I could erase it, I had to face it.
Why did the jealousy I felt only for Ju-yeon take this form?
What was its source?
And to find that, I had to bring out a truth I had painstakingly hidden away.
The nature of the relationship between her and me, as I saw it.
“…I thought we’d crossed that line long ago.”
The day our heated bodies intertwined.
I had believed that we had finally crossed the line and put our stale, old relationship behind us.
But I was wrong.
We hadn’t crossed the line; we were merely standing on it, right on the boundary.
In my daily life, I still perceived her as my sister-in-law, only forgetting that fact when our bodies grew hot for each other.
This relationship, which I considered improper, was now affecting even my jealousy.
“Hoo.”
By looking into an abyss I never wanted to face, I had found the cause.
And naturally, I found the solution as well.
I just had to end this relationship, even if it was now.
Since we had slept together, going back to the way things were was impossible.
That meant the only answer was to move forward, but…
“That’s easier said than done.”
Too many memories were stored in my head to simply forget and erase.
From the moment she was the only one to greet me with warmth amidst the cold neglect.
The days we spent together, when I considered her true family.
They had piled up, layer by layer, and had now become more than simple memories; they were a component that made up the person I am.
And so, I ask myself.
Can I cleanly erase the memories of that time and be faithful to our current relationship?
It was then, as I was wrestling with a frustration so intense it felt like my chest would burst…
Knock, knock, knock!
Someone knocked on the door.
* * *
“Hm, hmm~♬”
Humming a cheerful tune, she took one light, graceful step after another.
It was a path someone had already walked.
With slumped shoulders.
Harboring an ugly emotion that could not be shown to anyone.
She followed with a jaunty gait down the same path he must have seethed along.
Soon, she arrived in front of his room.
She slowly reached out and knocked on the door.
Knock, knock, knock!
“……”
No response.
He was clearly in the room, so not answering must mean he didn’t want to see anyone.
But she did not back down.
Knock, knock, knock!
“Do-jin, I know you’re in there.”
In a gentle voice, she called the name of the man who was holed up in his room, refusing to move.
Still, there was no response.
It seemed he really didn’t want to see her.
“Well, I have no choice.”
Han Ju-yeon pulled a thin pin from her hair, which was tied up in a bun, and held it in her hand.
The buildings in the Vatican were, without exception, ancient.
The lodgings where they were staying were no different.
As it was a place where only those permitted to stay as guests of the Orthodox Church resided, the internal security was surprisingly lax.
So lax that a single hairpin could easily undo the lock on the door.
“Hup.”
Click!
The door swung open in an instant, and what she saw was the sight of Kim Do-jin, utterly flustered, half-sitting up with his eyes wide in shock.
“You were in here, so why did you pretend you weren’t?”
It was an incredibly awkward situation.
“Well, I just dozed off for a…”
“Liar.”
“……”
His excuse was cut off before it could even finish.
At this, Kim Do-jin, feeling tired of it all, simply flopped back onto the bed and pulled the covers over his head.
“…I don’t know what this is about, but I’m not in the mood to talk today, so let’s do it later.”
With his head in a jumble, he didn’t think he could have a smooth conversation with her.
So he had firmly ordered her to leave, but…
She, on the contrary, walked deeper into the room and perched on the edge of the bed where he lay.
“Why aren’t you in the mood to talk?”
“…I’m just not feeling well.”
“Hmm… I see.”
Han Ju-yeon licked her lips as she looked down at the lump that was Kim Do-jin under the covers.
“Were you jealous?”
“……”
She continued speaking to the silent man.
“It wasn’t just ordinary jealousy, was it? Didn’t it feel like an incredibly unpleasant sensation, like sweat on a humid summer day, clinging stickily to your whole body?”
Under the covers, Kim Do-jin’s eyes widened as if they would tear.
He was that shocked.
How on earth did she see through his heart so accurately?
Her words didn’t stop there.
“You didn’t want to show it to anyone. That’s why you stormed out of the banquet hall and hid under these covers.”
“……”
“You must have wondered how you could erase that feeling, too.”
“……!”
“And after thinking it over, you came up with a solution, but you were frustrated because it was one you couldn’t act on.”
That was it.
Fwump!
Unable to ignore her words that seemed to see right through him, Kim Do-jin threw off the covers and sat up.
He immediately reached out and pulled Han Ju-yeon by the shoulder.
Thump!
Pulled with little resistance, Han Ju-yeon fell back onto the bed.
Kim Do-jin climbed on top of her and asked in a rougher tone than usual.
“You seem to know a lot, don’t you?”
A dizzying thought flashed through his mind.
How did she see through him so perfectly?
Perhaps.
“As if you’ve experienced it yourself.”
Could it be that she had experienced this emotional vortex before he had?
Unfazed by the heavy atmosphere, she smiled and nodded.
“Yes, that’s right.”
“……”
“That’s why I wanted to tell you. Not just any jealousy, but an ugly jealousy… and just how heavy it makes a person’s heart.”
“Ugly jealousy…”
The ominous thought that had suddenly appeared was gradually turning into certainty.
But he couldn’t bring himself to speak rashly.
‘Disclosure Prohibition,’ one of the restrictions placed on them when their bodies were swapped.
That restriction, which had little time left, still had his lips sealed.
So, as he was searching for another way to ask…
She spoke first.
“Do you know why I wanted to become a Hunter?”
“…No.”
“It was because of my sister and you, brother-in-law.”
“……”
“You were more popular than most celebrities, you made a lot of money, and you were respected by people. To my young self, it was hard to find a cooler job than that.”
So, when the whole family was gathered, she had declared with a rather solemn attitude.
That she wanted to follow in her sister and brother-in-law’s footsteps and become a Hunter.
Thanks to that, the house was thrown into an uproar.
“My parents were vehemently opposed. Both of their precious daughters were putting their lives on the line for work, so you can imagine how worried they were.”
Her sister had also voiced her opposition.
“Not as much as my parents, but my sister was against it too. She knew how hard a Hunter’s life was, so she probably didn’t want her beloved younger sister to walk that path.”
Five people were seated around the lavishly set dinner table.
Three of them were already against it.
Only one person remained.
“But my brother-in-law didn’t object. Of course, he didn’t approve either.”
They say that sometimes, a single action is more important than a hundred words.
So, her brother-in-law put his young sister-in-law in the rear of his party and set out to conquer a dungeon.
And he showed her.
The life-and-death struggle against monsters.
He showed her, in graphic detail, what it was like to be struck by a palm that covered the sky, sent flying into a wall, to have flesh torn by sharp claws, and to bleed profusely.
The battle ended only after one of his arms was broken and half his face was covered in a sheet of blood.
Having barely clinched victory, her brother-in-law limped over with his battered body and asked his frozen young sister-in-law.
—“Is your desire to become a Hunter still the same?”
She couldn’t answer rashly.
Her mind had changed.
The life of a Hunter, seen with her own eyes, was so vastly different from what she had imagined.
Faced with a brutal reality, not a brilliant fantasy, she answered in a trembling voice.
“Yes, I have to become a Hunter.”
Despite it all, she had to become a Hunter.
The desire for fame and money she had once sought was gone without a trace.
In its place, a powerful longing bloomed.
To become a Hunter.
“I want to protect you, brother-in-law.”
Forever.
By your side.
Always.
She wanted to protect him, who was so busy fighting to protect others that he couldn’t take care of his own body.
Reaching out, she gently caressed Kim Do-jin’s cheek and confessed in a trembling voice.
The words she had kept locked in her heart until now, words she never dared to utter.
She mustered her courage and spoke.
“I’ve loved you ever since then, brother-in-law.”
At her shy confession, Kim Do-jin’s face twisted in agony.