I Remembered My Past Life
Rome, Italy — it was no exaggeration to say the entire city was one colossal museum, one sprawling ruin. No wonder it showed up so often in movies, variety shows, and textbooks.
Maybe that was why even I, on my first trip abroad, felt a strange sense of déjà vu the moment I set foot in this city — as if I'd been here once before.
But I couldn't fully enjoy the moment. A grim future was already waiting for me. Returning to Korea — going back to school the moment this summer vacation ended — that reality pressed down on my chest like a stone.
"I don't want to go back······."
I was muttering the words that kept circling my mouth when the guide's voice rang out.
"Behind me there, you can see the Colosseum, completed in the year 80 AD! Think of it as a building from roughly two thousand years ago. It stands forty-eight meters tall — about sixteen stories. A structure this magnificent was built by mobilizing sixty to a hundred thousand slaves in just eight years! You're getting a sense of how insane Rome was, right?"
I'd been lost in my own head for a while, and now I tilted my face up to gaze at the enormous Colosseum, just as the guide had described. I'd seen it so many times in Gladiator, my favorite movie of all time, that it felt familiar — yet the reality of it hit differently. So this is why people travel, I thought. Squinting against the thirty-eight-degree sun, far harsher than anything in Seoul, I followed the crowd forward.
Hoooooosh—.
Inside the corridor, where the air was relatively cool, the sound of wind echoed in my ears.
And as I passed the security checkpoint, the passage, drawing closer and closer to the stands — that echo only grew louder.
"What is this······."
I furrowed my brow. But Mom and Dad looked perfectly at ease. So did my sister, Hae-in. So did every other tourist around us.
Am I the only one who can hear it······?
My mom mentions ringing in her ears sometimes — was it something like that? Still, it was hard to write it off as—
"Here we are — the highlight of the tour! That maze-like structure down below······."
The sound I'd mistaken for wind took on more and more substance, until it swallowed even the guide's voice.
—RRRAAAAGGHHH!
It became a roar so vast it raised goosebumps across my entire body. Frozen in place as one wave crashed over me and faded into the distance, I heard myself murmur without thinking.
"The Hypogeum."
The guide looked at me.
So did everyone else.
"Oh! That's right! You've really done your homework. I'd give you an A+. Haha!"
The guide was laughing as he said it, but surrounded by all those admiring onlookers, I couldn't smile back.
Because I hadn't studied a thing. And yet a word I'd never known rose to my lips. In Latin, no less.
That wasn't all.
When I turned my head, the images came into sharp focus: the senators on the front row of the arena stands, the equestrian-class spectators packed into the second row, the women and slaves on the topmost tier — all of them, every last face, twisted with madness.
Goosebumps rose on my skin despite the sweltering heat. I looked down at my trembling hands. Fresh blood seemed to swim before my eyes. The smell of dirt and iron seeped into my nostrils. A terrible thirst closed in on me.
"Hey, what's wrong with you all of a sudden? You okay? You look pale."
My sister was staring at me, eyes wide. I'd stake my life on it — in that moment, we were seeing each other as complete strangers for the first time ever.
"Water."
At my request, Shin Hae-in, who'd frozen up for a second, handed me a bottle. The moment the lukewarm water touched my tongue, memories of this place came flooding back, faded but vivid.
Glug, glug, glug, glug······.
I could feel it as if it were happening now — warm water sliding down my throat before a match. My hands were always bound, so the water always spilled. I'd wipe my mouth roughly, then scoop up the dirt from the floor and rub it between my palms. A habit, to keep my hands from slipping.
And as I did that, the announcer's voice would drift over.
—Theron of Greece! Champion of pankration at the Olympian Games, victor of boxing at the Isthmian and Nemean Games, and the first since the great Theogenes to earn the title of 'Kratistos' — The Strongest!
Theron Kratistos. That was the name my past self had been called.
—Captured as a prisoner of war at the Battle of Corinth, he now stands before you in this Colosseum!
I had piled up the corpses of beasts and my own countrymen alike. To become champion — that was all. To become champion, and win my freedom.
But with my homeland and my family both gone, that freedom was never meant for my own comfort.
My family······.
"Mm."
Remembering the family I'd lost to war, something deep in my chest ached as though it were collapsing in on itself. A groan slipped out between my teeth before I could swallow it whole. The time I'd spent with my family in my past life had been the one thing in my existence that nothing else could ever replace.
Back then, I hadn't understood how precious it was. Only after my wife and children were gone did my life begin to exist for one purpose alone: revenge. The despair and agony they must have felt in their final moments became the single force that kept me standing. I became champion that way. I raised my hand against Rome. And I was executed as a traitor.
Even in death, I never got to see my family again. Perhaps I hadn't earned the right — or perhaps there was no afterlife to begin with. But there was one truth I had only now confirmed with my own two eyes: the underworld does exist.
And it was right at that thought—
"Whoa."
My sister turned and looked at me, standing there dumbfounded.
"Oppa... are you crying?"
I didn't answer. I just wiped away the tears streaming endlessly down my face. Drawing in a shaky breath, I dragged both palms across it like I was splashing water on it dry.
"I'm fine."
Yes. I'm fine. Carrying over the blood-soaked grief of a past life hurts like hell, but because of it, I won't repeat the same mistakes again. I ache to see my wife and children — I feel so guilty toward them, resting peacefully as they are — but there is a life here that I must see through too.
"Dad, Mom. Oppa's crying!"
"What's the matter?"
"What's going on?"
Because here, too, I have a family.
A week later, I was not in Europe but in Seoul, South Korea. To be precise, in the classroom of Class 3-3, Buksan Middle School.
And right on schedule, the catastrophe arrived.
"Have a good vacation? I called you like a million times, but you just went off to Europe, huh?"
First thing on the first morning back, Choi Woo-seok, seated right in front of me, turned around and started in. To think the target of my bone-deep fear and hatred could look this pathetic now.
If this situation had happened before, it would have been a disaster on the scale of a car crash. Now it felt like nothing worse than a few stray drops of drizzle caught on the way outside.
"Did you? Sorry."
"Didn't even call once."
"Things were hectic."
I kept going.
"Can I ask you something?"
My rare show of initiative seemed to please Choi Woo-seok.
"Sure. Ask away. What is it?"
"I still haven't heard why you hate me."
"Ah, the reason."
Choi Woo-seok nodded.
"Just because."
The rude little bastard added:
"······'Cause you've got a punch-me face?"
For the record, I'm actually on the pretty side.
"Then just ignore me. Why do you mess with me this much?"
"'Cause it's fun."
"······."
"You're laughing."
An involuntary smirk had slipped out of me. Choi Woo-seok grinned back at it.
"Something funny?"
Smack!
Out of nowhere, he flicked the back of his hand against my cheek.
"I asked if you thought that was funny, you little shit."
Smack!
Again.
Would this friend of mine ever realize that taking two hits without reacting was me suppressing my past-life self?
No — if he understood that, he'd never have made a mistake like this in the first place.
"You wanna die?"
Naturally, I had no confidence in talking my way out of it, so I just shook my head at his question.
"No."
And then I said, calmly:
"I'll give you exactly one chance to apologize."
"What?"
Choi Woo-seok went blank. The kids seated around us, though, burst out laughing.
"BWAAAAHAHAHA!"
"Did you lose your mind or what?"
Choi Woo-seok's face hardened.
"You crazy? Huh?"
The back of his hand came flying again.
Smack.
I caught it with one hand — and thrust the other straight out, fingers fully extended.
Shunk.
Right at eye level.
"······?"
A scream tore through the room a moment later.
"AAAAGH!"
Both eyes jabbed, Choi Woo-seok clutched his face and doubled over. Sitting there utterly defenseless within arm's reach — he had no one to blame but himself.
"You won't die."
My finger had gone in about one knuckle deep past his eyelid and come back out. It'd sting a bit, sure.
"Uuuurgh."
I stared at Choi Woo-seok moaning on his desk for a long moment, then turned away. And I asked Park Ho-jin and Woo Gi-beom, who'd just gotten to their feet:
"Someone should probably take him to the nurse's office. Right?"
"Are you insane?"
Park Ho-jin asked.
"You fucking psycho."
I didn't answer. I just watched Park Ho-jin with an idle, unhurried gaze.
"You little······."
The moment he lifted his right leg, I was already standing. So instead of hitting me, his kick slammed into my chair.
SCREEEECH—!
At the same instant, I swept my leg into his left.
Crack!
"Argh!"
His supporting leg buckled and Park Ho-jin dropped where he stood. At the same time, a fist came flying in from where Woo Gi-beom was standing.
Thud!
I turned my head, giving him my face on purpose — but in exchange, I got a grip on his wrist. No need to check where his weight was leaning; the punch itself told me. I pivoted with the motion and hurled him over my shoulder.
CRASH!
"Holy shit!"
"Eek!"
Guys and girls alike erupted in gasps. See, this is why landing a big throw feels so damn satisfying.
Still, I'd relaxed my grip at the last second and let him fall onto the desks, so even after tumbling to the floor, Woo Gi-beom could squirm around like a worm. If I'd slammed him into the bare concrete with my full weight behind it, he'd never have walked on his own two legs again.
"Hah."
I exhaled slowly, soothing my aching muscles.
And yet — how on earth had I moved that little, and I was already winded, my shoulders stiff and heavy? Even if my lack of raw strength didn't matter much when I was borrowing my opponents' force, I'd been throwing around brutal movements on pure instinct, so no wonder my body was in shock. The moment the tension drained, I wanted to collapse. This body really does take the cake.
The absurdity of this frail little frame almost endeared it to me, and a hollow laugh slipped out. Shaking my head, I walked out of the classroom. Not a single person had opened their mouth by then. In a silence so complete you could hear people swallowing, I alone made any sound — strolling out of the scene of the crime as if nothing at all had happened.
By the time I got back from the bathroom, things in the classroom had more or less settled down.
The moment I sat down at my desk, Kang Ji-won, beside me, leaned in close and whispered.
"Hey. You're insane."
She smelled of cherry. Green and unripe.
"Since when? What happened over break?"
"······."
When I pulled my head back and looked steadily down into her big, bright eyes, Kang Ji-won flinched, retreated, and busied herself looking anywhere but at me.
"Seriously, what's going on. You — you used to not even be able to make eye contact."
That was before I remembered my past life. To me now, Kang Ji-won was a baby. Like a predator looking down at a newborn rabbit, maybe.
Whether she felt that predator's aura or not, the moment our eyes met again, she scrambled to look away. Even her earlobes went red.
"······What are you staring at?"
I shook my head.
"Nothing."
Then I asked her out of nowhere:
"By the way — were you filming me when I was fighting earlier?"
※All names, characters, events, companies, organizations, place names, countries, products, and every other proper noun appearing in this work are entirely fictional and not real.※
Everything herein is created independently of any real-world elements, and any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.※