Regression

"Haah...!"

He jolted upright, dragging air into his lungs. His whole body was drenched in cold sweat.

Was that a dream?

Kim Yihyeon slowly raised his hand. It was whole. Unbroken.

He ran his palm over his neck, his chest, his waist, one after the other. Nothing was broken; nothing hurt. The last thing he remembered was the impact of his entire body being crushed all at once — so why did he feel this fine now?

...Didn't I die?

The grip had vanished at the very end. He'd gone straight into the wall.

Puzzled, he lifted his head and looked around the room.

It was a cramped space — a bed, a desk, and a wardrobe filled it to bursting. The low ceiling slanted at an angle, and a familiar stain spread across one corner. Beyond the window, rooftops stood under a thin blanket of snow.

"...What is this?"

He knew this room. There was no way he couldn't.

Oscar's house...

The attic he'd been staying in since the day he first arrived in Europe — the room that had held most of his life there, through his Formula 4 days and his FRECA days. And in one corner stood a row of trophies.

At the sight of those trophies, his heart began pounding all over again — for an entirely different reason than before.

Kim Yihyeon picked up his smartphone with trembling hands and checked the date.

"..."

The moment he read the date on the screen, his breath stopped.

February... of 2024?

A dream? He could have sworn he died — and yet he'd opened his eyes in February 2024?

That would be... right when I was moving up to F2.

Seventeen years old, freshly crowned FRECA champion, his F2 debut right in front of him. February 2024 — three and a half years before the moment of his death.

Kim Yihyeon staggered over and stood in front of the mirror hanging on the wall.

A distinctly younger face stared back at him. His jawline, his neck, his shoulders — all far thinner than he remembered. Kim Yihyeon, a driver who hadn't even made his F2 debut yet, stood there in the glass.

"...Have I really come back?"

His voice cracked.

Honestly, it was impossible. This wasn't a novel or a comic — how could anyone return to the past? He kept telling himself it made no sense, and yet the person standing there before his eyes was his seventeen-year-old self.

Just as he was drowning in the confusion—

The door burst open.

"Yihyeon, you still asleep? Dad says hurry down and eat..."

A red-haired young woman stepped into the room.

"...Yihyeon?"

"..."

"Why are you crying?"

It was Louise.

The daughter of Oscar — the man who had stood in for his parents throughout his life in Europe. His one and only friend, and the pillar that had kept him upright.

She was as beautiful as ever.

"Yihyeon? I asked why you're crying. Did something happen?"

Kim Yihyeon hastily rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand.

"It's nothing."

"People who are fine don't cry like that."

"...I guess I just had a dream."

"What kind of dream makes you cry like that?"

He shut his mouth for a moment. He couldn't exactly say, I was pretty sure I died, but when I opened my eyes I'd apparently gone back to the past...

"I don't know. I can't remember it."

"You're crying over a dream you can't even remember?"

Somehow, Louise's worried gaze felt like something he hadn't seen in years.

"Are you sure nothing hurts?"

"I'm fine. I'm not sick."

"Liar. You're pale as a ghost."

Louise reached out and cupped his face in her hands.

At the sudden contact, Kim Yihyeon flinched back without meaning to.

The last face he had thought of before dying was right in front of him. The person who'd sent that message he never got to answer.

"...Why are you pulling away?"

"No reason. It's just."

"You're really weird today."

Louise tilted her head, then grabbed the door handle.

"Anyway — you're positive nothing's wrong?"

"...Yeah. I'm fine. I'll get changed and come down to eat. You go on ahead and eat with Oscar, noona."

At that, Louise said she would, closed the door, and left — never quite taking her worried eyes off him until the very end.

He drifted in a daze for a while after that. By the time he came back to himself and made his way down to the living room, the table was already set for breakfast.

"You're up."

The middle-aged man seated at the table — Uncle Oscar — spoke without lifting his eyes from his smartphone.

"Louise tells me you were crying."

"I wasn't crying. Some tears just... happened to come out."

"That's called crying. I always say this — if something hurts, don't hide it, tell me. At the end of the day, your body is all you've got. And a driver moving up to F2 needs to be even more careful."

With Oscar's grumbling concern playing in the background, Yihyeon lifted his chopsticks. That taciturn German of a man was always like this.

And so he sat there, still half in a daze, shoveling food into his mouth without any idea whether it was going in through his mouth or his nose.

Then Oscar set his smartphone down with a tap.

"Yihyeon. Did you see the news this morning?"

"...What news?"

"The seven-time champion. He's off to Ferrari."

Yihyeon froze.

The seven-time champion...

That meant Lewis Hamilton — one of the defining faces of F1's current era.

Sure enough, Oscar pushed the phone screen right up under his nose.

"All of Europe's been in an uproar since this morning. It's the only thing anyone's talking about. Hamilton's move is for '25 — ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and it's only '24 right now."

Oscar set the phone back down as if it were nothing and took a sip of his coffee.

"Well, either way, that means one Mercedes seat opens up for 2025."

"Who's going to sit in it?"

Louise, who had been quietly listening, asked in the middle of her meal.

"That's exactly ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠what everyone's screaming about right now. They'll buy someone out of another team, or promote the reserve, or bring in a rookie straight out of nowhere — every theory under the sun."

Oscar shrugged.

"Not that I blame them. It's a Mercedes seat, after all. The best seat on the grid — of course everyone's going to want it."

And then, in the tone of ordinary breakfast-table small talk, he asked:

"Who do you think ends up in it?"

In that instant, his memories began replaying on their own. It was almost like instinct.

March. Just two rounds into his F2 debut season, and the call had come in on Oscar's phone.

The caller was Mercedes' driver management. They had been keeping a close eye on the potential of a driver named Kim Yihyeon — the one Oscar managed as his guardian — and wanted to test whether he was worthy of a seat in '25.

Then, right on its heels, came April. The first private test was held at the Red Bull Ring in Austria.

That day, Kim Yihyeon took the downforce of a genuine F1 car through his entire body for the first time. Braking strong enough to wrench his head forward. Lateral g crushing him in the corners.

What the engineers had asked him afterward — honestly, he couldn't remember.

Testing moved straight on to Imola in Italy, and in May he ran Silverstone in England, the true heartland of F1. Then Barcelona, Spain in June. Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium in July.

After that, he'd gone out for practice sessions — FP1 — in Italy and Mexico, behind the wheel of the seven-time champion's race car.

With just those two sessions, the European media had begun memorizing a name: Kim Yihyeon, the driver from Korea in line for Mercedes' future seat. And that winter, Kim Yihyeon signed the Mercedes contract.

How had he felt back then? He couldn't quite remember — but he'd probably felt like he was flying.

His mother's sobbing. His father silently emptying glass after glass. His little sister, bursting with pride that her big brother was an F1 driver. Uncle Oscar and Louise, standing quietly at his side through all of it.

Everyone had congratulated him.

And amid all that celebration, the long-awaited 2025 season opener arrived.

...Melbourne.

Kim Yihyeon's hand, still moving his chopsticks, stopped.

Melbourne, Australia — his first Grand Prix as an F1 driver. It had been raining that day. Running in P7, he'd clipped a kerb wrong in an utterly unremarkable corner, lost grip, and put the car into the wall.

His vision spinning end over end. The sound of the car chewing through gravel.

He'd answered the race engineer that he was fine. He was not fine.

He wanted to die of embarrassment. To retire like an idiot — in the season opener, in his debut, no less.

The shame crushed down on him—

When he made it back to the team's garage, drowning in it, no one said a single word to him. That silence was, if anything, more terrifying.

That was where it began — the moment the dreamlike Mercedes seat turned into pressure, and everything started to come apart.

The year that followed wasn't even worth remembering. Spins. Contact. Crashes. Severed ties. The Mercedes seat, gone — and then, right before he opened his eyes here today, that rain-soaked Belgian circuit.

"Yihyeon?"

Louise's worried voice snapped him back to reality.

The hand gripping his chopsticks was trembling.

...It's real.

Only now did it begin to sink in. Not a dream. Not a delusion. He didn't know the cause, but right after that crash, his life had been rewound, whole. And now he was standing once more at the exact point where all of it began.

This time has to be different.

Making it back to that same seat — that much could stay the same. But what came after could not. There was no next time. If he fell apart again, there would truly be no second chance.

And this time, there were things he had to protect. His parents, hunched over a tapping calculator. His little sister, who had never once asked for anything she wanted. In his first life, those faces had only come back to him after he'd lost everything.

This time, he meant to reverse the order.

Kim Yihyeon slowly raised his head.

"Uncle Oscar."

"Hm?"

"I'm going to take that seat."

The table went quiet. Oscar stopped mid-sip and set his coffee cup down. Louise blinked, chopsticks still in her hand.

"...What?"

"That seat. I'm going to be the one sitting in it."

"...Yihyeon, are you sure you're not sick somewhere?"

Louise reached out to press her hand against his forehead.

This time, Kim Yihyeon didn't pull away. He simply said, calm ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and matter-of-fact:

"I just have to prove it in F2 this season. Then the call will come."

Oscar studied him for a long moment. Then he let out a short laugh.

"Well, nothing wrong with dreaming big. Still, you haven't even debuted in F2 yet — better make your debut something special first, no?"

"Exactly. Start by winning an F2 race, future World Champion."

Louise chimed in from beside him.

"...Right. I should."

Oscar and Louise let his words slide past like a joke. Anything more he said now would only sound absurd.

But Kim Yihyeon knew exactly how soon those words would become reality. His mind was already running at full speed.

March. That's when the call comes.

He had to produce results in F2 before that call arrived. Even if those results amounted to nothing more than two race wins — it had been exactly the same before his regression anyway.

The real problem was what came after. The countless private tests, and only two FP1 sessions.

In his first life, he'd treated those tests as nothing more than a 'glorious opportunity'. Simply being in an F1 car had been overwhelming enough, so he'd scrambled just to drive it — and his mistakes had piled up as a result. What the team was watching for, what they truly wanted — he had never figured it out, not until the very end.

I was already falling behind from that point on.

But this time was different.

This time...

He would do everything perfectly, and he would take everything.