Grab the Regressor by the Collar and Debut - Chapter 296

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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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296. The Necessary and Sufficient Condition for Happiness (4)
“The sea―!”
“Ha-ru, slow down.”
“Just let him be. He’ll come to his senses once he trips and sheds a few tears.”
The moment we stepped out of the car, Dan Ha-ru bolted toward the sea like a madman. Jeong Si-u, who had tried to stop him, let out a hollow laugh at Yoo Gun’s words—spoken with the wisdom of someone who’d seen it all. Yet Si-u’s feet, which had started to chase after Ha-ru, slowed. It was because he trusted Yoo Gun’s exceptional childcare experience to some degree.
“Let’s rest here for a bit before heading in. The manager called—the cottage still isn’t ready.”
“Why don’t you just play with us, hyung? You won’t be tired?”
“If we’re all together, that’s not playing—that’s work.”
“You must be exhausted from driving since dawn. Rest for a bit. We’ll watch the kids.”
“Alright then. I’ll catch a quick nap. I still need to pick up Tae-hyun later….”
Manager Kwon Wook yawned and climbed back into the driver’s seat. Si-u, now that Kwon Wook had entered the boundary of ‘trustworthy people,’ even lent him his own neck pillow from the passenger seat so he could rest comfortably.
Meanwhile, Yoo Gun, who had said to let Ha-ru fall on his own, caught up with him and walked slowly behind at a distance of about five paces.
‘Is that… something like an instinct carved into his bones?’
Settled on the moderately warm sandy beach, Lee Do-ha observed the entire scene, his pure scholarly curiosity burning bright once more.
No one had ever assigned Yoo Gun the role of guardian, yet Do-ha found himself curious about the principle behind how Yoo Gun naturally looked after his younger companions in moments like these.
The March sea wasn’t particularly warm.
Though the sand was warmed by the morning sun, the wind brushing against Do-ha’s nose remained chilly.
Do-ha, who had retained the habit of taking care of his body through exercise since childhood, instinctively pulled up his mask. Beside him, Si-u was meticulously applying sunscreen to his face and hands.
‘Peaceful.’
I hadn’t often enjoyed the sea so leisurely in my life, and I’d never come down to Namhae before. This southern beach, which I was visiting for the first time, was quieter, cleaner, more secluded, and emptier than I’d expected.
“Ahhh! Yoo Gun hyung! Run away!”
“I knew this would happen….”
“Oh! I only brought one shoe!”
A large wave suddenly surged in, and Ha-ru and Yoo Gun, who had been writing letters in the wet sand with their fingers, noisily fled from the seawater.
Si-u, who had applied sunscreen so meticulously, was now sitting under a shaded parasol reading a book he’d brought from the dormitory. Do-ha thought it odd—why apply sunscreen so diligently only to hide in the shade?—but somehow it made sense coming from Si-u, so he simply nodded to himself.
Then suddenly, he thought of someone who hadn’t yet entered his field of vision.
“…?”
Where did Ha-jin go?
Remembering his only same-aged friend, Do-ha looked around, glancing about. There had been plenty of occasions when they stopped at rest stops during events and miscounted the members, departing without someone.
“…Ah.”
Fortunately, Do-ha spotted his friend not far away and let out a sigh of relief. If it were Ha-jin, he’d probably try hitchhiking by grabbing any random person, even if he were left behind at a rest stop without his phone, and make it back to the dormitory….
Regardless of such thoughts, Ha-jin was holding a camcorder he’d purchased recently, filming Ha-ru and Yoo Gun. Ha-jin had tied up most of his first settlement payment—except for a portion—in savings and fixed deposits, and this camcorder was one of the few items from that ‘portion’ he’d spent on.
Do-ha had asked why he’d chosen a handycam when he could have bought a better camera, and Ha-jin simply smiled in response.
-Just. Thought I’d recapture my original spirit. …This was my first camera.
It was a strangely vague answer, but Do-ha didn’t pay much attention. Ha-jin always said things like that from time to time.
‘If anyone else had said that, I would’ve asked what they meant.’
Lee Do-ha admitted to himself that he was particularly lenient with Ha-jin.
Even things that Do-ha’s way of thinking—which always prioritized understanding the situation—found incomprehensible were generally acceptable when Ha-jin did them.
It wasn’t that he treated Ha-jin specially; if anything, it was trust born from experience. Trust that had begun when Ha-jin entrusted him with dance breaks despite everyone else viewing him as a dancing liability.
Since meeting Ha-jin, Do-ha had never clearly understood his friend’s actions even once, but the results Ha-jin produced were always satisfying.
“Do-ha.”
“…?”
While I was lost in thought, Ha-jin, who had been filming in the distance, had quietly drawn near. The sun was at his back, making it hard to see his expression clearly, but his cheerful voice came through distinctly.
“Can we talk for a moment? Just the two of us?”
“….”
“…I need to ask you for something.”
“What is it?”
To my straightforward question, Ha-jin closed his mouth as if it were difficult and hesitated in an uncharacteristic way.
“It’s a strange story. So strange that even after you hear it, you might not understand what I’m saying.”
Had Ha-jin ever hesitated like this when bringing something up before?
It had only been roughly a year since I came to know Ha-jin, but even so, this side of him felt profoundly unfamiliar.
I paused to consider.
And I made my decision.
“Is it something you absolutely have to do?”
“…Yes.”
“Is it illegal?”
“No.”
“Alright then.”
“….”
“Tell me. I’ll listen.”
After all, I had never once understood Ha-jin’s choices.
I simply believed in the results he would create.
There was not a trace of hesitation in my clear nod.
* * *
Dan Ha-ru suddenly woke up.
I had played so hard that I didn’t even remember when I fell asleep—the moment I opened my eyes, my entire body felt heavy and limp, as if I’d been pulled out of water.
‘When did I fall asleep…?’
I traced back through my memories carefully.
I had run around excitedly at the beach, which I hadn’t seen in a long time, written letters in the sand with Yoo Gun, and eventually waded into the seawater with my socks and shoes off.
And also….
I had almost started a live broadcast to show this beautiful scenery to Desty, but then worried that fans might track my location, so I ended up just taking photos instead of going live.
I video-called Eun-chan and Tae-hyun, who were still on their schedules, urging them to come quickly, went shopping at a nearby mart with my brothers, and ate twenty thousand won worth of tteokbokki and fish cakes from a street food stall….
‘I did quite a lot.’
After spending a fulfilling day off, I must have fallen asleep in the car on the way back to Eun-chan’s villa.
As I slowly blinked my eyes, I felt the soft cushioning of the sofa beneath my hands. It seemed my brothers had carried me inside the villa while I was asleep.
‘Having older brothers is really convenient.’
Just as I was thinking something that would draw criticism from countless younger brothers around the world who suffer under their older siblings, someone approached with a sound.
“Ha-ru, you’re up?”
It was Ha-jin, holding two white mugs in both hands.
“Brother….”
“Yeah. Drink some of this. You must be thirsty.”
“Yes. What about the other members?”
“…Well. They all seemed exhausted.”
Even as Ha-jin spoke those words, exhaustion hung heavy in his eyes, and I rose to my feet with a touch of concern. Only now did the cottage’s interior come into proper focus. The expansive window across from me framed a coastal view of such breathtaking beauty that it seemed almost cruel in its perfection.
“Wow, this place is really amazing.”
“Yeah. It is amazing. Your brother made a special effort since you were coming.”
At Ha-jin’s characteristically self-important tone, I let out a soft laugh. I took a sip of the warm tea cradled in my cup and rose to my feet, moving toward the window. The sight of the beach at sunset was almost unbearably beautiful.
“…Ha-ru.”
“Hmm?”
“Your grandmother lives around here, doesn’t she? You mentioned that before.”
“Oh. Um, yes. But it takes another hour by car to get there. My grandmother’s house is really nice too. I miss Deok-gu. Deok-gu is so cute.”
I recalled my grandmother and her home from my memories, my eyes filling with longing and warmth. Ha-jin set his cup down on the table and, with his hands in his pants pockets, slowly rose and stopped a short distance away from me.
Ha-jin, his expression unreadable, asked me in that still-gentle tone of his.
Just like that time long ago in the Maze Corridor, when I had spilled my story without a moment’s hesitation.
“Your grandmother has a dog, right?”
“Yes. A Jindo dog. Really cute, and really big.”
“But wasn’t its original name Rex? Something like that? I thought I heard that last time.”
“Rex? Um… No. It’s Deok-gu.”
“Is that so? Then I must have gotten it wrong. …What does your grandmother do? Is she retired now?”
“Yes. I heard she used to run something like a daycare. Maybe that’s why? I grew up under my grandmother’s care from a young age, and it seemed like I grew up without much hardship.”
“I see.”
It was then that Dan Ha-ru, gazing at the breaking waves, sensed something amiss.
‘The waves… they seem to be crashing the same way over and over.’
A strange sense of dissonance crept over me, but Ha-jin’s voice came before I could dwell on it.
“So that’s the setting in this timeline, I guess.”
“…What?”
I turned around. There stood Ha-jin before me, and beyond him, I could see another floor-to-ceiling window.
A spectacular view unfolded beyond that glass as well, but there was one strange thing—it was snowing outside.
Pure white snowflakes fell like feathers.
Against the backdrop of that bizarre March snowscape, Ha-jin took a slow step toward me.
“But Ha-ru. It wasn’t a daycare, was it? It was an orphanage, wasn’t it?”
“…What?”
“What your grandmother did. It wasn’t a daycare—it was an orphanage, wasn’t it? The place where you stayed.”
“…Why are you being so scary, hyung? Come on, don’t joke like that.”
“Where are your parents? Do you remember what they do? What kind of work do they do so diligently that their child is living as an idol in Korea with members they didn’t know, and they haven’t made a single phone call?”
“Why, why are you like this, hyung? Really…?”
“Ha-ru. Look carefully again.”
A dream? Is this a dream?
Terrified, I tried to back away, but the cold glass window blocked my retreat.
Like Alice catching a cornered rabbit, Ha-jin, his expression inscrutable, grabbed my shoulders and turned me around to face the window again.
Then, with a chilling low voice, he spoke coldly.
“It’s a familiar beach, isn’t it?”
“H-hey, hyung. Why are you doing this? I’m scared, seriously…?”
“It’s the place where you buried Grandmother with your own hands.”
Ha-ru’s struggling movements to break free from Ha-jin’s grip suddenly froze.
Ha-jin, as if he had anticipated Ha-ru’s reaction, tightened his grip on the other’s shoulder and continued.
“It’s that beach where you sent off Grandmother while crying, right here.”
“….”
“Look straight ahead, Dan Ha-ru.”
In that moment, Dan Ha-ru, who had briefly bowed his head, spun around sharply and seized Ha-jin by the collar.
Ha-jin readily offered his collar to Ha-ru, meeting the other’s gaze with cold, lifeless eyes.
“Hey.”
From Ha-ru’s mouth came a low, growling voice that hadn’t been heard in a while, along with a somewhat disrespectful form of address. The eyes facing Ha-jin were clouded with murky rage instead of the vitality that had been there before.
Without time to stop the trembling felt in the two hands gripping Ha-jin’s collar, ‘Ha-ru’ glared at Ha-jin and screamed.
“What the hell are you doing, you crazy bastard!”
Ha-jin, still maintaining a composed expression despite the harsh voice, lightly pried away Ha-ru’s hands that had been gripping his collar and pinned him against the glass window.
A fierce physical and psychological struggle ensued, and a voice filled with rage burst from Ha-jin’s mouth as well.
“What have you been doing with Dan Ha-ru all this time, you son of a bitch.”
Finally caught him, this bastard Seon-gwi.
In Ha-jin’s voice, grinding his teeth, an unmistakable killing intent could be felt.

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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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