ReLife Player - Chapter 116
[Loser]
Year 6 of the Lunar Calendar and Eunha is eleven years old.
One week after the winter vacation, he welcomed the closing ceremony.
«We’re all in the same class again this year.»
When Eunha was assigned to a new class, he was unimpressed.
It was expected.
He wouldn’t find out who his teacher would be until the first semester, but it was obvious who it would be anyway.
The other kids seemed to have gotten over it.
«Captain, will you be on the field today too?»
«I have work today, so I might not be able to go. You’ll have to train alone today.»
«Okay, I’ll do that.»
Eunha had been teaching Eunhyuk combat skills for over a year now.
Eunhyeok would collapse from exhaustion during training, but he had never said he wanted to quit until now.
He was so strong. He didn’t seem to know the word «quit» as he kept trying to get up even when he was exhausted.
All the more so, Eunha taught him seriously and strictly. He wanted to teach him one more thing.
«Where are you going?»
«I told you, it’s an assembly day at Eunae’s kindergarten.»
«Why would you go there?»
«Why else? I’m going to see my sister.»
Eunha grumbled as he grabbed his bag and got up.
The girls were growing up fast.
Minji had grown so much over the winter break that she was almost as tall as Eunhyuk.
Eunha had grown up, but he still had a long way to go to catch up with the girls.
What’s more, he was shocked when Ha-yang, who had been the smallest of the girls until last year, grew to be about the same height as him.
I can’t wait to grow up.
I just have to wait for a few years.
Secretly making up his mind, Eunha waved dryly and left the school.
He had a destination in mind.
Doan Kindergarten for the first time in three years.
Even though it had been a long time, the kindergarten didn’t seem to have changed. It was just as I remembered it.
Today was the day of Eunae’s kindergarten convocation.
My mother told me that I didn’t have to come, but since Euna couldn’t come because she was living in a Player secondary academy, I wanted to go just for myself.
Besides, once school started, I wouldn’t be able to see her in kindergarten at all.
It was so small.
It was strange to visit after a long time. Everything felt small and unfamiliar.
It was an assembly day, so the inside of the kindergarten was relatively quiet.
Eunha put on his adult-sized slippers and struggled down the hallway.
«Eunha, over here, over here.»
«Oh, mom. Where’s Eunae?»
«Eunae is up front. Do you see her?»
«…Ah, I found her.»
He found his mother among the parents.
Standing by his mother’s side, Eunha looked at the young children listening to the kindergarten teachers’ explanations.
Eunae was at the front.
The children didn’t seem to be paying attention, but Eunae was listening as the kindergarten teachers explained what was so exciting.
«Eunae’s teacher is Mr. Tayo. You know him, right?»
«Mr. Tayo? Noona does, and I do too. We must be related to Mr. Tayo.»
«Haha yes, Mr. Tayo was very curious.»
She pointed to Mr. Tayo, who was operating a laptop on one side of the podium.
Three years later, Mr. Tayo hadn’t changed much.
He must have been in his mid-thirties, but surprisingly, he still looked the same.
He hasn’t aged at all.
Even in the photos from when noona was in kindergarten, he looked the same. Is he really human?
I even thought that.
But Eunha knew people who never really got old and stayed the same.
Mr. Tayo was just a normal person, except he was very old.
<Index>, Yoon Sung-jin, who still had the appearance of a boy even when Eunha was called the Undead, and Precis Memory, the <Witch of Time>, whose age could not be confirmed, even though she was rumored to have lived for hundreds of years.
Ah, it’s over.
Oh, it looks like the presentation is over.
The children who couldn’t sit still for a moment and those whose attention had wandered all rushed to their parents.
Some well-behaved kids like Eunae waited in their seats until their parents came.
Like Eunae, for example.
«Oh, Oppa!»
«You’re a good girl. You’re not crying like the other kids.»
«Hehe, my mom said if I don’t cry today, she’ll buy me squid peanuts, flavored peanuts, and Popeye!»
«Can you eat all of those?»
«Mmm~ Then Eunae will eat the flavored dongs!»
Dad had turned Eunae’s taste buds into an old man’s.
Eunha stroked her hair for not making a fuss.
Lately, Eunae had developed a taste for the snacks that Dad had stocked up on.
It hadn’t been that long ago that she’d been a fan of potatoes and honey butter chips.
Still, his sister’s giggling and clinging to him eased his worries.
«There you are, Eunha. You’ve grown up a lot since I last saw you.»
«Hello, Teacher.»
Mr. Tayo, who had spotted Eunha as he was cleaning up, approached him with a gentle smile.
Eunha remembered getting into arguments with Minji and Eunhyuk and getting in trouble.
He was nostalgic for those days.
There wasn’t a day that went by that they weren’t loud, but it was oddly nostalgic.
The thought lasted less than a minute.
«Tayo-Tayo! Tayo-Tayo! Teacher!»
«Huh?»
«Eunae, your teacher’s name is Mr. Tayo, not Mr. Tayo-tayo.»
«Mr. Tayo!»
Eunae, who was clinging to Eunha, ran over and tugged on Mr. Tayo’s apron.
Mr. Tayo bent down to be eye level with her.
Then her eyes lit up,
«I’m going to kill a goblin, too!»
«…Huh?»
No Eunae, age 5, raised her hand to express her opinion.
On the other hand, Mr. Tayo continued to smile and nodded.
Eunha knew.
That what he is smiling was not a smile.
He didn’t want to think about it.
His body already remembered.
That when he smiled and shook his head, he should run away.
…I should run.
Eunha took a quick step backward.
But he had forgotten.
Mr. Tayo wasn’t the only one to avoid.
«Eunha?»
Behind him, his mother stood with a cold smile.
«Eunha, did you tell her?»
Behind him, his mother, in front of him, Mr. Tayo.
Eunha couldn’t hide his confusion as he watched them close the distance between them.
«…Uh, noona probably did it.»
In fact, Eunha had told his story a few days ago to Eunae, who was curious about his kindergarten experience.
«I, uh, hit a goblin with a toy sword with a pot, and it died, you know?
«Wow! Oppa is the best! I want to do it too! I want to do the pot!
For now, I had to live.
As heartbreaking as it was to sell her, he had to live.
His lies fell flat in front of Eunae.
«Oppa did it! He killed a goblin with a sword! He killed a goblin! I want to kill a goblin too!»
«Haha, haha, ha….»
I can’t say anything in front of her.
Once again, he learned the lesson of being careful with his words in front of Eunae.
«Mom.»
«Yes.»
«I’m going to scold Eunha for a while.»
«Yes, you’re the first teacher to scold him in a long time.»
His mother replied cheerfully.
With the corners of his mouth pulled up, Mr. Tayo grabbed Eunha’s cheeks and stretched them.
For the first time in a long time, Eunha’s cheeks stretched like glutinous rice cakes.
«Eunae too, Mr. Tayo, please do it!»
Eunae jumped up and down with an innocent look on her face.
☆
«Oppa, Eunae’s friend.»
«Friend?»
Eunha, who had turned a cheeky red, looked at the child Eunae had brought with her.
A girl hugging a teddy bear.
The child was looking up at him, unfamiliar.
«Hello?»
«…Hello»
The child Eunae had brought with her was playing on the playground.
She came with her grandmother, and Eunha noticed the old woman watching her from behind.
The old woman made eye contact and gently waved.
Eunha bowed his head in greeting and asked the girl holding Eunae’s hand for her name.
«My name is Sunmiye…»
«Call her Mie!»
«No, Mi-ye, Mi-ye.»
«Mie?»
«Miye.»
«Mie!»
«Miye!»
«Mie.»
Shaking her head, the child repeatedly told Eunae her name.
But Eunae couldn’t pronounce Miye’s name correctly.
Eventually, she settled on,
«Then let’s go Sunmi!»
«Sunmi? What’s that?»
«It is Sunmiye, so Sunmi should be»
«Yeah, I’ll go with Sunmi.»
Eunha watched Eunae run to the playground, holding Mi-ye’s hand to make sure she wouldn’t get hurt.
Sunmiye, by the way.
The name sounded familiar.
It didn’t take long to remember.
‘This is our Mi-ye, Sunmi-ye.
Isn’t she beautiful? Our daughter, if she were alive, she’d be as pretty as a celebrity…, if only….’
A member of the Mist Flower Party, a Guardian who had led the Mist Flower Party to the deepest depths of the Abyssal Dungeon.
Sun Ki-joon, known as the <Loser>
He became a Guardian who could not protect anyone, and when he was drunk, he would look at the picture of his daughter, whom he killed with his own hands, and weep.
Eunha had once supported his drunkenness.
He’d heard it so many times that he even remembered her name: Sunmiye.
That man’s daughter, it must be her.
Eunha was lost in the past as he watched Eunae and Mi-ye climb the slide upside down.
Sun Ki-joon had strangled his own daughter to death.
Everyone consoles him, saying it was inevitable.
A being infected by a monster can never be normal again.
In the end, he had no choice but to lose his daughter, who was being transformed into a monster.
It was just a different process.
He strangled her with his own hands as she lunged to kill him.
‘I still think about it many times.
I wonder why I did what I did.
‘I’d rather have become a monster with Miye back then than kill her with my own hands…’
No matter how much people comforted him, Sun Ki-joon regretted what he had done that day.
A guardian fighting to protect others on the front lines, he had lost his reason to fight, unable to protect what he held dear.
There was no party looking for him.
In the player’s world, the Guardian was a position of trust.
They were there to protect the party, as their name implies.
Of course, Guardians don’t pick and choose their parties, as they protect them with their lives.
You could tell if a party was trustworthy or not by the presence or absence of a Guardian.
As such, once a Guardian was discredited, they could never be trusted again.
As much as players trust and rely on Guardians, they also demanded strict standards from the Guardians who would protect their lives.
For example, if a guardian who was supposed to protect the party ran away, claiming that they would live alone.
For example, if no one could protect themselves and they survived alone.
For example, if a guardian who was supposed to protect the party couldn’t even protect their own family, and worse, killed their own family.
In the player’s world, once a mistake is made, it’s hard to undo, and the mistake of a Guardian is especially irreversible.
‘How can I trust my life to a man who couldn’t even protect his own family?’
‘I feel sorry for him, but there’s a difference between feeling sorry for him and knowing I might die.’
‘Honestly, as a guardian, it’s over.’
Those who lived with their hearts and emotions, not their heads and reason, couldn’t ignore Sun Ki-joon’s mistake.
Could a guardian who couldn’t even protect his own family, a guardian who had even killed his own daughter, really protect a party properly?
All the players turned their backs.
And the person who reached out to him, drowning in alcohol, having lost his family, the one who had lost everything including his honor and reason to live, was Eunha.
‘…I need a guardian who is not afraid of death.’
‘I have nothing to lose now, child. Do you think a man with nothing to lose has anything to fear?
‘Then come on. The terms are…I’ll pay you twice as much as before.’
‘I’m not protecting anyone anymore, so fuck off.’
‘I like that. I don’t like having anyone to protect me either.’
‘Huh. Right. Then why do you need a Guardian?’
‘Guardians can clear a path well. They can also draw aggro well.’
‘Are you kidding me? You want me to play aggro and cut a path?’
A guardian who had spent over ten years drowning in alcohol, unable to escape from the past where he killed his daughter.
Even though he had lost the reason to live and feared death, the <Loser> had simply taken Eunha’s outstretched hand to die.
«Sorry for being late!»
«Hey, why did you leave your one and only daughter to me and go shooting around!»
Snapping out of his reverie, Eunha looked up at the man who had run up to her, breathing heavily.
I never thought I’d see him here.
A man clumsily dressed in a suit.
Broad-shouldered, he was looking for his daughter, who was playing on the playground, even as he was tired of dealing with her mother.
«Mi-ye! Daddy’s home!»
«Daddy~!»
Miye ran to the man.
The man picked up his daughter and hugged her. The child hugging the teddy bear looked down at her father and giggled.
«I’m sorry I’m late. You were waiting for me, weren’t you?»
«No, it’s okay, Dad.»
«Really?» «Yes! I have a friend.»
«Really? Where is she? If she’s your friend, I’d like to see her, too.»
Eunha looked longingly at the man who was looking at him with a happy smile.
«You must be Eunae. How are you?»
«Hello!»
«And this is Eunae’s brother?»
The man who had been the pillar of support for the Misty Flower Party before the regression.
Sun ki-joon spoke to him in a friendly manner, with a face that Eunha had never seen before.
His face was lightly colored, but there was no sign of the diagonal scar across his left cheek.
«…I’m No Eunha. hello.»
It’s been a while, mister.
Eunha held Eunae’s hand and greeted him politely.
He didn’t care if Ki-joon was embarrassed.
It was the least he could do to show his gratitude. The Guardian who had fought for him in the past, the Guardian who had claimed to protect no one, who had paradoxically given up his own life to protect death, to protect him.
The Guardian he knew was not yet in this world.
Yes, he hadn’t.
Eunha knew.
That Sun Ki-joon’s daughter would be infected by the monster the year she turned seven.
…Him too, Eunae too.
I must find a way to protect them somehow.
I couldn’t just ignore it.
I vowed to kill the <Loser> that would one day be born into this world.