3. Me? Busan? Why?

In my previous life, Busan had been the very definition of love and hate.

Sure, in the beginning I'd sworn loyalty to the place—my hometown, my life, my livelihood. But these days I was Seoul-born, thank you very much.

"No... just think about it. I come to the ballpark to win. I don't come to lose."

"Player Noh In-seong, we're in the middle of an official interview, so if you could just—"

Cutting off the chattering female announcer mid-sentence, In-seong shoved reality into the world's face.

"Seven consecutive years of last place, correct? With results like these, I don't exactly see a bright future, do you?"

"......No. We do not."

"Which I expect will still be true by the time I get drafted... wouldn't you agree?"

The announcer's breath caught in her throat. So did the broadcast commentator's and the field reporter's—both of whom had been standing by, ready to jump in at any moment.

"Wait—is this bastard not scared of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠his own future?!"

Absurd, right? This was a kid who should've been grateful just to get drafted, saying this.

That was how they saw him: 'an arrogant punk who torched his own future over a little bit of talent.'

If Noh In-seong hadn't had his past-life memories, that judgment would've been dead on.

But viewed through the eyes of Noh In-seong—the infield utility man who was the Busan Marines' inside man—what did this team's future look like?

...You bastards haven't changed one bit! If anything you've regressed. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠There is nothing—NOTHING—to gain by going there!

"...In all seriousness, I should probably look into the majors, or (BEEP---!!) college."

The broadcast itself never aired in full. But every clickbait clip channel in the country was already hauling around the censored soundbite.

Forty minutes after the tournament ended and the interview wrapped, the internet was flooded with countless cookie-cutter clip videos, spreading across the globe.

"Ooh, the view count's sweet as honey!"

A side effect of the information age.

Even before my skull cracked open and I was absorbed–merged (not hostilely) into the soul of a small child, the Busan Marines were famous.

But their fame back then rested entirely on how long they'd gone without a postseason.

"Good heavens—last place eight years running? How long has this team even existed?"

They were not yet the team playing such magnificent AAAAAAA-grade baseball that even a AAA-level opponent couldn't lay a glove on them. I swear on my life.

In the middle of it all, there was me—scraping together big-league experience one awkward game at a time, swallowing every curse in the book, absorbing every piece of filthy defense, and grinding it out on glove work alone all the way to my final season.

"Ugh, it was brutal. One day the hot corner blows up, the next day somewhere else. And why the hell did the first baseman keep tearing his hamstring?"

Rotating across the entire infield to hold the collapse at bay was one thing.

"There we go, another homer! Feels great. Let's go tear into some ribs!"

Great captain or not, the man's bat resembled some former player—once the greatest meat-killer in all of Busan.

Unlike the corner outfielders who—whatever their political leanings—joined forces defensively to generate the finest known carcinogen,

"Aargh, can you two play defense properly for ONCE?!"

"We're sorry!"

...there was also yours truly, the walking lead tank who spent every inning in center field shielding the world from that radiation.

The slap-hitting center fielder with the team's best batting average still ruled the middle of the diamond, too.

"Well now, let's give 'er a go!"

"...Ugh, sunbae. Don't talk big with an ice pack on your shoulder after six innings."

And with a bespectacled curveball artist of an ace (the third one), there'd even been a time when they attempted a postseason run.

"...There was, wasn't there."

Why is that past tense? Because it didn't work. That's why.

In the roughly seventeen years I'd spent conscious inside this kid—can't see anything as a baby, can't remember anything either—

Swing, strikeout!

"AARGH, who the hell brought that bastard here! Somebody skewer him on the foul pole at Sajik and put him on display!"

As the furious voices of the fans made abundantly clear—

the captain had been replaced by a human appendix of a first baseman: great glove, no bat.

The center fielder had transformed into an Incredible Hulk who hit the most homers on the team while spraying radiation from center.

And the bespectacled curveball ace honored tradition, ground his shoulder into dust, and retired.

"So again—what exactly changes if I get drafted by a team like this?"

What would joining a team like that even accomplish? I'd probably just end up humming a hymn of hope.

Meet this doomed franchise, get asked "what is your wish?"—my answer would be: let me leave this insane team as a free agent.

The announcer fell silent. Naturally—if she'd agreed with me, the broadcast station would've been set ablaze by her own listeners.

I pitied that announcer, silently enduring for the sake of her job—a bitter snapshot of society.

And since the segment was nearly over anyway, out of respect for the reporter frantically begging me to wrap it up, I simply delivered my philosophy on life, short and thick, and ended the interview.

That was the first day the high school baseball cable network's homepage physically collapsed under the traffic.

The reaction to my full bowl of facts disguised as reckless trash talk was, good or bad, enormous.

First, the geezer elders of Korean baseball—they of the hallowed seniority—announced they were 'concerned.'

"What a load of crap. Where exactly were you bastards when you were acting like dogs every bit as much as me? Fix your own rotten team first, then open your mouths."

"You're the one spouting bullshit, you know. In-seong, I am begging you, stop ranting like it's forty years ago..."

I lightly ignored my battery mate's incessant squeaking and folded my hologram newspaper.

Concern, my ass. What good are these old fossils beyond sensing the vibe of their own playing days? Absolutely useless, the lot of them, no?

Guess they can't stand anyone scratching their precious mountain of 'legacy,' can they?

"Hello?"

"Yes, this is the Baseball Promotion Association—"

"Ah, I don't take calls from peddlers. Get lost!"

Click—!

They even called my phone. Naturally, I assumed it was spam, told them to hang up, and hung up first.

When they later publicized the anecdote in a column, I asked in the comments who the hell phones a minor like that—and they blocked me.

Next up: the players and franchises who'd been part of the Korean pro league reacted with masterful ambiguity.

Teams with decent records that were nonetheless at the age where a rebuild—or retool—was in order tended to cheer.

"Now THAT'S what I'm talkin' about! Kid's got sense! Damn right! Why should we fatten the bellies of teams that don't even wanna win?!"

Made sense—they were the ones clawing and scratching for wins, choking down losses one at a time, until they finally had to slam the reset button in tears.

Meanwhile, the bastards whose consciences doubled as their main erogenous zones—what exactly had they ever done to deserve a damn thing?

"Is losing a pension fund, you bastards?! Why are you burning good players on your picks year after year?!"

If you're gonna tank, then spend the money—or buy up other teams' future draft picks. You're supposed to do at least that much, no?

A bottom-feeder team that faithfully devours its top draft picks every single season under the banner of 'ranking consideration'?

From the perspective of teams actually trying to win, that's an existence you want dead.

The fans, too, leaned positive—plenty of them were sick to death of franchises brandishing the tanking shield while producing nothing but garbage records.

On the flip side, from the franchises that tank the standings into oblivion yet somehow can't develop a soul, and end up unable to cut their aging veterans—well.

"You goddamn bastard! If a huge prospect like you doesn't transfuse this team, the team DIES!"

But as you can tell from the blunt descriptions above, the Busan Marines fit this exact definition to a T.

Even a century and a half after this league's founding, this tradition remains sacred and must be preserved... a disgusted blegh! would honestly be a generous verdict.

Most fans were busy squinting through their own dark ages, desperately hunting for a superman to carry them back to the postseason.

Never mind a prince on a white horse—a bespectacled superman with a golden arm. A great Iron Man to conjure one more miracle.

"...That kid? His antics are lunatic, I'll give you that..."

"Think about it—our team's always been full of lunatics. He'll fit right in."

The core fans cackled with glee, convinced the moment he'd completed a perfect game at the Bonghwangdaegi as a sophomore starter that they'd found their man—and that with this draft position, they could seize one more miracle.

Even the casual fans chimed in: so what if the lenses are fake, slap some fashion glasses on the kid and let him pitch already!

The very people who fueled Busan's baseball frenzy all burned white-hot over this prospect's unspeakable atrocity.

They say even mountains and rivers change in ten years—but these were people whose own team's standings never changed, spewing all manner of abuse at Noh In-seong's social media.

"Well, what's that got to do with me? The one thing I refuse to let end in the gutter is my baseball career."

Noh In-seong casually plugged his ears, kindly leaving a polite "go eat shit" under every single post on his feed.

"...If the world were nothing but guys like you, Earth would already be a fallout paradise."

After incinerating the airwaves with that interview, he was banned from all ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠interviews for the remainder of his high school career.

Noh In-seong marched into the head coach's office and issued a formal declaration: 'I am unhappy at this school.'

Then, leaving the coach's smirking face behind him, he used training as a pretext to sprawl out on the bench.

Chatting beside him was his battery mate—no, sorry, Deok Jin-man.

Thanks to his unfortunate surname, he'd never once managed the act itself in real life, but like a true man he'd still somehow earned the nickname 'Seonghaengwi-Jinman'—Sex Act Jinman. The starting catcher.

The only friend of my brief middle-and-high-school existence was packing up his gear.

"So, you're really quitting baseball? Where the hell am I supposed to find somebody to catch for me?"

Not a gold spoon—a rice cake spoon. To take over his father's small food-processing business, he'd chosen a job over the draft.

Having refused our 'let's play one more year!' and decided this season would be his last on the baseball team, his face looked utterly at peace.

"Well... anyway, good luck out there. I'm officially a tteok-and-castella man now, but you've still got baseball ahead of you."

How beautiful his retreating figure was, tapping my shoulder as he went... is what I'd say if it were true.

"Aw, come on, one more year. Who's gonna catch my splitfinger in practice? You're the only catcher I've got who's actually human!"

"--The kid coming in next year can take the balls, and once he's used to your stuff, I might actually get to graduate!"

"Isn't that a you problem? I'm off to the rice cake factory! Finally liberated from the agony of having my hands smashed to bits!"

Damn you, you absolute RiceCake Jin-man bastard. So that was the real plan all along.

Noh In-seong had been about to unleash every curse known to mankind, but held it all in when the bastard promised to make him the ad model for his company someday.

My junior-year high school life was a rollercoaster.

Countless backroom negotiation attempts between clubs, plus human sludge slithering up calling themselves 'agents.'

"Aargh, I don't take peddlers! Get lost!"

SLAM!

Locking the baseball club's door shut pretty much said everything that needed saying.

Then there was the small matter that neither the old backup catcher nor the newly arrived rookie catcher could do anything with my changeup—couldn't catch it, couldn't even block it—

"...I can't take it. Seriously, who on earth catches this ball?"

"Oh for god's sake, you corpse-like ball-takers...!!"

Left with no choice, I was forcibly converted to a position player.

Certain people got all high and mighty about my arm, asking on my socials whether I'd finally broken myself.

Their one and only weak spot—the line 'your team's record just cratered again'—and watch them writhe on cue.

"How transparent. Go check on your franchise's future instead. I'm not coming to your team."

Once the online WWE—trash talk answered with even bigger trash talk—had concluded, the games began.

"Now then, which pitcher shall I hand a loss to today~♪"

"...Ugh, it's this lunatic again..."

Nothing in this world was funnier than the face of the opposing catcher, staring up in despair as Noh In-seong strolled serenely to the plate.

Honestly, people who knew even a little about baseball didn't much care whether Noh In-seong pitched or not.

"Well, an arm only gets fresher the more rest it gets, doesn't it?"

"Better than getting ridden into the ground in high school—might be healthier to come up to the pros and rebuild his delivery properly..."

Above all, Noh In-seong focused on hitting was delicious in a whole different way.

First, the opposing pitcher would contort his entire body and painfully, painstakingly throw a pitch to Noh In-seong.

Crack!

Then Noh In-seong would launch the baseball clean out of the stadium with an exit velocity you rarely saw even at the professional level.

"AAAAGHHH!! Not again...!!"

The score would climb to 4–1 entirely at his whim, and the pitcher would do one of three things: choke up, wail, or blow his stack completely.

"Calm down! No—actually, just walk him! Why do you keep challenging him and getting tattooed?!"

The manager, having lost his own mind, would trudge back out to the mound.

The catcher being a brand-new rookie who couldn't handle the pitching was beside the point—Noh In-seong's alma mater was a powerhouse recognized nationwide.

"Just so you know, we were a powerhouse before you ever showed up. Seriously."

"Ah, I get it—you're a 'strong team' because you're near the river?"

"...Ugh, this bastard, for real."

A storied program located in the heart of Seoul, one of the nation's premier pipelines for legendary sluggers.

Turn Noh In-seong away? After watching his class sweep every flag-tournament there was?

"Oh my, so if we enroll here, you can develop our boy into a player just like him, can't you?"

"...Could I, though... oh, so that's the goal? Damn it."

Even after seeing the excellence of a squad hand-filtered from the teeming hordes of transfer students and freshmen?

There was a monster in the lineup warping every average into nonsense—but even judged on the averages alone, this was a team that could eat alive any flagged tournament you put in front of it.

The most infuriating part was that this monster wasn't just some pure slugging tub of lard of a slugger.

The record spoke for itself: after a single at-bat, he'd steal second, steal third, steal home outright, and get ejected for screaming in the catcher's face.

After getting tagged for a stinging homer in the first inning, the moment Noh In-seong strolled back up in the third and worked a walk—

"Safe! Safe!"

"Haha! Your pitcher throws so slow I just walked my way on! Heading for third now--!!"

That accursed bastard, openly taunting the pitcher from second base.

"We're not winning a damn thing before that kid graduates..."

Through countless games that multiplied the opposing manager's sighs and bleached the pitchers' faces white, the final Bonghwangdaegi of senior year at last drew to a close.

Of course, the usual argument always followed: so the Bonghwangdaegi's over, does that mean baseball's over too?

"Huh? Too much effort."

National Sports Festival? Never heard of her! Tournaments like that exist to develop the scrubs, so players of my caliber should politely step aside.

"Hey! I get a full year of you, don't I?! You should at least run a final inspection before going pro!"

The coach let his ambition get the better of him, and finally attempted his persuasion: 'now that our scrawny catcher has become a proper spirited backstop, the pitcher ought to show his arm too!'

"Pardon? Who, exactly? Me? The National Sports Festival? Why?"

I could not have mustered a shred of interest.

"Once I go pro I'll be run into the ground no matter what, so wouldn't it be smarter to just start building my body half a year early?"

Besides, unless you were coming up to the pros with me, we'd only be seeing each other again all smiles at alumni donation ceremonies anyway.

What tumbled out of Noh In-seong's mouth was, essentially, 'let's skip the drama and each do our own thing'—a long-winded, roundabout spelling of the word no.

"Sob... you damn brat. Win me at least this one trophy before you go..."

And so the head coach collapsed at the National Sports Festival, felled by his chronic lifelong condition: having no conscience.

That dimwit.