[2019, May 5th | Sunday, 16:32 PM]
[Lee Joon: Number of Attempts – 2]
[Ghost Story Points: 242]
[Causality Rate: 20%]
“I’m going to meet a friend in front of our home for a bit.”
“Again? Come back before it’s too late this time.”
“I’m just going to meet them for a while and come back.”
After finishing the meal, I parted ways with my parents at the entrance of the apartment complex on the way back.
Then I headed towards the café where the Detective was waiting.
‘Is he really waiting at the Starbucks in front of my home……?’
This had never happened in the previous time slot.
As I walked, I couldn’t help but wonder why the Detective called me and what action of mine had made the difference.
Feeling slightly nervous, I opened the café’s glass door.
“Oh, here.”
Inside the stylish Starbucks store.
A bear-like man, looking completely out of place in the trendy atmosphere where men and women of the city would mingle, raised his hand to greet me.
His appearance was very casual with a basic coat, a sporty haircut, and a scruffy beard.
[T/N: Sporty haircut…. doesn’t someone has similar haircut ⊙.☉]
A dignified atmosphere that could only be found in a hard-boiled Detective, this was my assistant, Detective Park Gangwon.
“Hello.”
“Mhm. Order a coffee.”
“Okay.”
I went to the counter and picked out a drink for myself.
A café is usually a place where girls like to visit, or guys with girlfriends come to hang out.
As someone who went to an all-boys middle and high school, and has been single for my whole life, this place feels completely unfamiliar to me.
“There are so many options.”
[White Chocolate Mocha Frappuccino]
I ordered a drink with a delicious-sounding name and received a buzzer.
When I returned to the table, Detective Park had placed some documents on the table and was reading them.
“How have you been?”
“Well, just so-so.”
“Did you enjoy your time in Busan?”
“……”
“Why did you go there?”
The Detective still had his eyes on the documents while he was asking these questions.
I was a little nervous, but since it was something that would be breaking news on the evening broadcast anyway, I calmly told him.
“There’s a bundle of cash buried by a criminal in a garlic field in Gangseo District.”
“……”
“The forklift operator will find it in a little while, so I went ahead and got some money from there.”
Only then did Detective Park lifted his gaze from the documents, glanced at me, and let out a sigh.
“Alright, good job.”
“……”
“You hid it well so you wouldn’t get caught, right?”
“… Yes.”
I nodded.
For some reason, I always felt nervous around this person.
During our first meeting, I was the initial informant for the missing trainee case, and then, he witnessed a teacher being killed right in front of him.
I misinterpreted a ghost story and it turned into a mass stabbing incident at Seoul Station, and now, he even knows that I stole a criminal’s money.
‘What on earth does this person actually think of me?’
Even if I give excuses that the actions I took were necessary to resolve the cases I faced, they were not things I could be proud of or boast about.
‘Especially in front of a detective.’
For some reason, I felt like I had a lot of things to hide, and it made me shrink back.
“There was a mass panic incident on the KTX train number 240 coming from Busan to Seoul. Among the faces of the passengers caught on the CCTV, yours was there.”
“… It was a ghost story. I handled it well.”
“Did you really?”
The Detective set the stack of documents down and then scanned me up and down, as if assessing me.
“It doesn’t seem like it was resolved very well. There were more than one or two passengers who took off their clothes and caused a commotion. There was also a lot of complaints about things like accusing each other of sexual harassment and-”
“Please don’t say it like that.”
I cut off the Detective, who was trying to interrogate me again, and answered.
“I didn’t cause that, I was just caught up in it and helped to resolve the situation.”
The Detective paused for a moment before looking into my eyes with a neutral expression.
‘What could I do?’
I was frustrated too, so I frowned and glared at him.
He usually has a warm, uncle-like demeanor when dealing with the club members, but whenever it’s me, he always interrogates me with that stern attitude.
It was not the first time or second time, I was doing everything I could to save the world.
But whenever he questioned me like that, as if everything was my fault, I couldn’t help but feel upset.
Even though I’ve regressed, I haven’t graduated in the past, so I was still considered a student.
It was unfair that he treated the club members so kindly but kept interrogating me as if I’m an adult.
I glared at the Detective who wore an expressionless face, as if daring him to accuse me again.
Buzz-
At that moment, the buzzer went off, signaling that my drink was ready.
Without saying a word, I stood up from my seat and walked to the counter to pick up my drink.
“Your Frappuccino is ready. Please grab a straw from the front.”
When I returned to my seat with my drink, the Detective was looking down at the table with a solemn expression.
His eyes weren’t even directed at the documents on the table, but rather somewhere on the table pattern.
“… Are you angry?”
As I sat down and deliberately put down my drink with a thud, the Detective looked up at me. Surprisingly, he had an embarrassed look on his face.
“My tone was a bit harsh.”
“I was just a bit frustrated.”
“… I’m sorry, really.”
The Detective half-rose from his seat, extended his large hand, and patted me on the shoulder a couple of times.
Even though it was a simple gesture, the glass in my hand shook violently because of his bear-like body.
If it had been regular coffee instead of a thick Frappuccino, it probably would have splashed out with a loud thunk.
“It’s a habit from my job. I’ll apologize, I hope you understand.”
“…Ah, yes.”
At my awkward tone, Detective Park scratched his head.
“Don’t misunderstand, I think of you as a very important person.”
After saying that, the Detective took a sip of his iced coffee.
I asked in a slightly more relaxed tone.
“You called me because of that? Because I went to Busan?”
“No, we had already agreed to meet. Last time, in front of Seoul Station.”
“Ah, that’s right.”
Right before we parted ways in front of Seoul Station after the Kim Eunjung case was over.
The Detective had mentioned meeting on his day off to have a thorough conversation.
“I was originally going to call you out tomorrow, but I was worried about the KTX incident, so I called you out a day early. You’re not busy anyway, right?”
“Yes, I have plenty of time.”
We both adjusted our postures and got ready to get to the point.
“About the KTX mass panic. There was nothing I could have gotten involved in, right? You just happened to find me among the crowd, and it made you think of me for no reason.”
“Yeah. I was just scanning through the platform CCTV, looking at the passengers, and I spotted you, so I called you out. In reality, no one was paying attention to you except for me. There were a lot of passengers, and the cabin you were in was several compartments away from the one where the disturbance happened. Plus, you’re obviously a student.”
“Just as I thought.”
I snapped my fingers, feeling a sense of satisfaction as if I had figured something out.
This bag of money incident was a perfect crime that even the police didn’t know about.
“It seems like you often get called to strange cases like this, Detective. By the way, it may sound strange but in my past life, you actually came looking for me.”
“Hmm? When?”
“It was during the Nakseong High School 300-person head explosion incident.”
In this life, the incident didn’t happen because I understood the structure of the ghost story early and moved accordingly.
“Haha……”
After finishing the rest of his coffee, the Detective laughed.
“Well, if it was an incident like that, of course I would’ve been called. But we’ll talk about that later. So, how much money did you take?”
In response to his questioning tone, I sipped my Frappuccino and answered vaguely.
“It’s more than enough to cover the club fees for three years. But even so, it’s not even one-tenth of the amount buried in the garlic field.”
“Hmm, you took around ten million won, didn’t you?”
“You’ll find out if you watch the evening news tonight.”
By now, the forklift operator must have discovered the jars buried in the field.
And the fact that the amount exceeds 10 billion won was something that even the Detective, who has experienced many strange things, could never have imagined.
‘Maybe he’s thinking around 100 million won was buried, and I took about 10 million.’
“Anyway, that money will be returned to the national treasury. It’s better for me to spend it than for dirty politicians.”
“You’re saying it as if it’s obvious.”
“If you have common sense, it’s obvious.”
I deliberately sat straight and spoke more confidently to the Detective.
“I don’t care where that money was originally supposed to go, but in the end, what’s the point if the world is going to end? It’s all useless anyway,”
As I said that, the Detective sighed in response.
“I took the money to use it for saving the world, and the commotion on the train was a ghost story that suddenly came up and I solved it. Let’s wrap up those stories here and call it a day.”
“…I guess so.”
The Detective nodded as if he agreed.
If we didn’t wrap things up cleanly right here, I’m sure he’ll call me again after watching the evening news tonight.
He would probably think a student wandering around with 1 billion won was dangerous.
“Let’s not talk about this anymore, okay?”
“Alright, I get it. Just as you said, you’re going to use it to save the world.”
The Detective raised both hands as if conceding.
“But just because you got money, don’t go doing anything strange. I’ll always be watching you.”
The Detective leaned in closer, as if trying to scare me.
“I’ve seen my fair share of people who went crazy after getting a large sum of money.”
He warned me in a low voice, as if telling a scary story.
“Have you ever heard of people who win the lottery and end up losing their minds? People may seem good when they have nothing, but once they get money, they lose their minds. Be careful.”
“… That’s not me. I know the story about people winning the lottery and going insane. That’s a ghost story.”
The story was that most lottery winners spend their money recklessly and squander it all in a few years, then end up living like losers.
Although there are actually a lot of articles like that on the Internet, the truth is the exact opposite.
Since reporters only focus on sensational news, the cases of people who live well and quietly after winning a lottery are not considered interesting, and thus not covered in the news. In reality, most end up paying off their debts, buying homes, becoming property owners, and living peacefully while pursuing simple hobbies.
“… Ahem. I knew that. Then, here’s another example.”
The Detective, as if embarrassed, grabbed his coffee cup and set it down again before sharing a different story.
“Have you ever heard of a guy who broke up with his girlfriend after passing the civil service exam, even though she waited for him when he joined the military?”
“Yeah, I think I’ve heard that one a few times.”
“It’s common for people’s minds to change even with such a small achievement. They think it’s the end of suffering, and the start of happiness. That superior feeling you get after becoming successful is what drives people crazy.”
“…Is that so?”
“How about the story of someone who worked as a personal fitness trainer for 20 years? He was so passionate about fitness that he even won awards in bodybuilding competitions. One day, he decided to gain weight to show the obese members, and then lose the weight again to prove that losing weight isn’t difficult, it’s all about mental strength. Do you know what happened in the end?”
The Detective chewed on a few ice cubes before putting down his glass with a thud.
“He gained weight and completely lost interest in exercise. Now he’s running a restaurant business. He never realized how hard it is to escape obesity because he lived his whole life as a muscle-pumped gym guy. Did you know, there was a foreign researcher who injected himself with drugs to study withdrawal symptoms? He became an addict in the end, and now he sells his body in brothels to get drugs.”
I looked at the Detective with a questioning expression, wondering what point he was trying to make.
“The point is.”
The Detective straightened his back.
“If possible, live a normal life, just like you always have in the past. Now, let’s say someone knows how to defeat the Demon King, but the information can only be obtained by killing that person. Would you kill them?”
“… If necessary.”
I didn’t like the idea, but if it was related to the ultimate goal of defeating the Demon King… I thought I might actually do it.
Because I had the power to turn back time.
“I was just advising not to do such things……”
The Detective let out a chuckle and looked at me.
“I know you’re not the type to be overly righteous. Even though you’re not at all the outgoing type, you took on the role of club president and is now fighting to death. Honestly, I know well that you’re just doing it to save yourself.”
“… Yes.”
“That’s why I’m telling you not to do such things. It’s good that you’re willing to do anything to achieve your goal, but still, don’t kill anyone. Don’t hurt anyone either. I understand that the money incident this time was unavoidable, but after this, it’s best not to get involved in anything related to crime. This is advice for your own good.”
“……”
“I believe you can reach a good outcome without having to steal from others or doing anything wrong. Besides, you have the ability to turn back time, don’t you? If you use that wisely, I believe you can somehow get through it all without resorting to cruel actions.”
“Well……”
“You understand, right? Don’t do anything bad.”
The Detective extended his thick fingers, raising his thumb and pinky as if to make a promise.
“Your life will continue even after the graduation ceremony in February 2022 when the Demon King is resurrected. You have many more days to live. Growing up with blood on your hands won’t bring you happiness, I can guarantee that.”
“……”
“Do you understand? Don’t do anything bad. Even if you have a good cause for it.”
Perhaps he thought he couldn’t guarantee how I would change in the future because of the events, so he decided to advise me.
The Detective quietly held out his hand as if to make a promise and waited for me.
I stared blankly at his thick hand.
‘So that’s what he meant.’
At first, I thought he was just telling me to live a good life because he’s a detective.
But as I listened, I realized that it was something I had been struggling with myself to some extent.
‘It wouldn’t be a problem if my body died, but what if my mind died?’
There are many ways for the mind to die.
From literally becoming a vegetative state, to falling into trauma and suffering from depression, panic disorder, and anxiety disorder.
What if I acted without regard for the means to defeat the Demon King?
I used to think that killing people wasn’t a problem as long as I had the ability to turn back time. I wouldn’t hesitate to get blood on my hands, and I would do anything possible to achieve my goal. If anything went wrong, I would run to the window, break the glass, and jump down to kill myself.
But if I continued like that, in February 2022, after the graduation, would I be able to live as a full-fledged, responsible adult after everything?
I slowly hooked my fingers into the thick hand of the Detective, who held it out to me and made a promise.
“I promise. I won’t do anything bad.”
“Good.”
The Detective shook our warm intertwined hands a few times before quickly pushing the documents that he had been reading until now toward me.
“Then I’ll tell you. What kind of detective I am.”
