An Advertising Genius Falls into the Joseon Era - Chapter 60

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 60
“……!”
The word father made Jeong Ik-hyeon’s eyes tremble.
After a moment, Jeong Ik-hyeon began to turn his body slowly.
But the first words from his lips were terribly cold.
“Who said you could call me father?”
His voice rang out sharp and clear.
“I have never had a child like you.”
Deep lines of age marked Jeong Ik-hyeon’s face.
His cheekbones were prominent, and his cheeks were hollow.
Yet the sharply arched brows and the bright gleam in his eyes radiated a force stronger than that of most young men.
Song Do-hyeon looked at him for a moment before speaking.
“…You remain unchanged, I see.”
Fourteen years since their reunion.
Song Do-hyeon had left this place at thirteen and never returned.
Now, at last, he showed his face again.
Though enough time had passed to change the mountains and rivers, the two recognized each other at a glance.
That was blood.
Jeong Ik-hyeon regarded the grown Song Do-hyeon with conflicted eyes.
“But what brings you here? You left as though you’d never return in your life.”
Jeong Ik-hyeon acknowledged it, however indirectly.
That Song Do-hyeon was his son.
Yet the only thing the two shared was their cold gaze.
Everything else—their lives, their stations—was different.
Song Do-hyeon continued the conversation evenly.
“I happened to have business nearby and thought I would pay my respects.”
“Respects? Hmph.”
Jeong Ik-hyeon snorted, plainly displeased.
“Do you expect me to believe that? You—who never so much as cast a shadow here for over a decade?”
“You need not believe it.”
Song Do-hyeon’s voice trembled faintly as he spoke.
“It simply seemed… that I had to come, at least once.”
Blood kinship was a terrible thing.
Though he had wanted so desperately to sever it.
He could not.
Even buried deep in the heart, hidden and denied, it keeps surfacing.
Like a compressed spring.
Jeong Ik-hyeon studied Song Do-hyeon intently before speaking.
“Ungrateful wretch. You never sought me out for all this time, and now that you’ve learned of my grave illness, you finally deign to visit… Cough! Cough!”
Abruptly, Jeong Ik-hyeon began to cough.
He covered his mouth with his hand, and bright red blood stained his palm.
“……!”
Song Do-hyeon’s eyes wavered at the sight.
“I suppose you’ve come for my inheritance. What other reason would you have to return?”
Contempt flickered in Jeong Ik-hyeon’s gaze as he fixed it on Song Do-hyeon.
“Know this—I have not a single coin to leave you.”
An inheritance.
He had never wanted such a thing.
What he had wanted was the treatment a son deserved.
Song Do-hyeon replied in a rigid voice.
“…There is no need to worry about inheritance. I have earned enough that I need not envy anyone.”
“Well then, all is settled. So it was not wealth you sought.”
Jeong Ik-hyeon spoke with cutting sarcasm.
“If your purpose was simply to see me, then take your leave. I have nothing more to say.”
With that, Jeong Ik-hyeon turned his back once more.
Seeing this, Song Do-hyeon asked in a hollow voice.
“…Are you not even curious how I have lived all this time?”
It was always like this.
He never asked anything.
No—there had been no conversation at all.
He merely threw books at me now and then.
He never offered a single warm word.
He never held me,
never let me feel the bond between father and child.
Naturally, I ate alone,
slept in a separate room.
There was no memory worth calling a family memory.
So despite my youth—barely thirteen—I left home.
“Whether I lived or died. Whether I ate well or starved. Did you never wonder even once?”
Now, a decade and more had passed.
The resentment I’d buried deep in my chest finally tore through.
“How I’ve lived! What I’ve done! You’ve never cared about any of it!”
I never asked for praise.
Just one warm glance.
Just a small measure of concern.
I wanted only that.
Yet even that was too much to ask.
“Why would I wonder about such a thing?”
Jeong Ik-hyeon turned his head away slightly.
The way he looked at Song Do-hyeon was scarcely different from how he might gaze upon a servant.
Then he reminded Song Do-hyeon of his station.
“You are nothing but an illegitimate child.”
……!
An illegitimate child.
A child born between a Yangban and a Cheonmin.
Song Do-hyeon’s mother, herself a Cheonmin, had died giving birth to him.
Perhaps because of that.
Jeong Ik-hyeon had never granted him even a family name, despite the shared blood.
Neither Yangban nor Cheonmin—an ambiguous existence.
Song Do-hyeon had endured such treatment his entire childhood.
Then he learned the secret of his birth, and at thirteen, he fled.
A dozen years later, he had returned.
Song Do-hyeon’s voice shook with rage.
“Even if I am illegitimate, I am still your child!”
……!
Did his words reach him?
For a moment, Jeong Ik-hyeon’s eyes wavered.
With death so near.
To claim no regret would be a lie.
But too many years had elapsed to turn back now.
No—if anything, this was precisely the time to settle succession more firmly.
To spare his other children harm.
After a brief silence, he spoke.
“Our blood may be mingled, but you are not my child.”
……!
Those words fell like a bolt from the blue.
Song Do-hyeon’s body went rigid, as though struck.
“From this day forward, do not set foot in this house again.”
Jeong Ik-hyeon turned away coldly once more.
“Once you have left home, you should not return—how foolish of you.”
Song Do-hyeon could not speak for a long time.
He only bowed his head, his fists trembling.
At last, his voice emerged, bitter and hollow.
“…Yes, sir.”
The man I had once called father.
But no longer.
“You were never even curious about how I fared.”
Song Do-hyeon muttered, still bowed.
“I was foolish to hope you might wonder how I’ve lived all these years.”
Slowly, Song Do-hyeon began to lift his head.
When he finally lifted his head, his eyes held no emotion whatsoever.
“A grave illness, you say? Well then, how fortunate.”
“…What?”
“I won’t have to look upon this wretched face ever again.”
Jeong Ik-hyeon’s brow twitched.
“Cough, cough…!”
He expelled blood several times, his breath labored, but Song Do-hyeon showed no reaction.
If anything, one corner of his mouth curved upward in a cold smile.
“Even should you die, sir, I shall never set foot in this place again.”
“You, you wretch…!”
Jeong Ik-hyeon’s voice trembled with fury.
He had spoken those words first himself.
Yet hearing them thrown back at him from his own son’s lips left him bewildered despite his rage.
“So do remember this well.”
Song Do-hyeon met Jeong Ik-hyeon’s gaze steadily.
“Today is the last day you will ever see your bloodline.”
With that, Song Do-hyeon turned away without hesitation.
***
That night.
A tavern near Yongdangpo.
Long past curfew, the lamps in this quarter showed no sign of dimming.
Lanterns hung thick along the alleyways, and between them drifted the languid laughter of courtesans.
In one of the tavern’s rooms.
Song Do-hyeon sat alone, drinking heavily.
Glug, glug, glug.
Without a word, he poured again.
Then he drained the cup in one long draft.
Still unsatisfied, he drained several more in quick succession.
Wine bottles lay scattered about him already.
Song Do-hyeon stared at them in silence.
……
He wanted to be drunk today.
Today especially.
He wanted to lose himself entirely, to spill out all the words locked inside his heart.
But the liquor wasn’t strong enough.
Or perhaps something else was lacking.
Perhaps he kept himself barred too tightly shut.
His emotions always circled within him, never breaking free into the open.
No matter how much he drank, intoxication never touched the part of him that yearned to be honest.
Then it happened.
“I don’t believe we’ve met before. What brings you here?”
The door slid open and a courtesan appeared.
The aura that emanated from Song Do-hyeon drew people in.
Though his exterior seemed impenetrable—like there was not space enough to slip even a needle through—the melancholy in his eyes awakened an urge to shelter him.
That contradiction captivated her.
“Let me pour you another cup.”
“Leave.”
Song Do-hyeon spoke without even glancing at her.
“Don’t be like that, just one drink…”
“I said leave!”
Song Do-hyeon’s voice rose sharply.
Startled, the courtesan froze, the cup still in her hand.
“…Yes, of course.”
She was a courtesan seasoned in the ways of men.
The emptiness he sought, she could not fill.
Because someone else had already claimed that place in his heart.
Understanding this, she quietly withdrew.
Glug, glug, glug.
Left alone, Song Do-hyeon poured once more.
But no matter how much he drank, nothing would be whole.
There was only one person who could fill this terrible emptiness.
“Ha-yun… Im Ha-yun……”
Song Do-hyeon turned suddenly to gaze out the window. Moonlight streamed through the glass, luminous and steady.
Song Do-hyeon looked up at the moon and murmured softly.
“Tonight, I miss you more than ever.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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