Grab the Regressor by the Collar and Debut - Chapter 475

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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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475. Confrontation (4)
“So you just quit? Because they weren’t paying you?”
“It wasn’t so much quitting as… I just left.”
“That’s the same thing, what’s the difference.”
“Is it? …Then let’s call it the same.”
Bland bastard.
Ha-jin showed little reaction to Peer Soldier’s grumbling tone of frustration, but when he immediately flicked the cigarette he’d been smoking onto the ground and crushed it under his foot, Ha-jin’s brow furrowed.
Crouched near the entrance to the Shopping Complex, Ha-jin tapped Peer Soldier’s leg with the hand that had been propping up his chin and spoke dryly.
“Hey, there’s an ashtray right next to you.”
“Ah, you’re such a stickler. There must be about three hundred cigarette butts scattered on this street alone!”
“You want to pick up all three hundred, or just one?”
“I’ll pick it up, I’ll pick it up.”
Ha-jin, usually composed and withdrawn, exuded quite an oppressive aura whenever he let even the slightest hint of warmth fade from his expression.
As he watched Peer Soldier grumble while hunching his large frame to pick up the cigarette butt, Ha-jin propped his chin up again. He paid no particular attention to the snickering remarks from those nearby about who brought a non-smoker to the Smoking Area anyway.
“Ha-jin, keep telling us the story. So? Did you submit your resignation right then?”
Another Peer Soldier who had been listening intently to Ha-jin’s story urged him to continue.
Ha-jin, not long after his discharge from the Military and wearing a black baseball cap over his short hair, pulled the mask he’d been wearing down slightly beneath his chin because of the cigarette smell and shook his head.
“No, I worked for another… three or four months after that.”
“Really? Why?”
“Well, the work was actually fun. And from the start, I thought experience was more important than money at that place anyway. It felt wrong to just leave the kids I was looking after.”
“What about your salary? Did you get paid?”
Watching his Peer Soldiers interrogate him as if it were the most important question, Ha-jin let out a bitter laugh.
Why are they so interested in other people’s past.
As he muttered quietly, a friend who had been close since freshman year and knew all of Ha-jin’s history suddenly interjected into the conversation.
“Did he get paid? That crazy CEO bastard held out without paying three months of salary until this guy submitted his resignation. And then, without a shred of conscience, he kept calling him to come work part-time after he quit, using the Academy kids as hostages.”
“Hey, hey. Why are you angry?”
“Because you guys didn’t see what he went through back then. Seriously, day and night he’d call asking about this and that. Asking for help with this, then asking him to do that. And then whenever salary came up, he’d just clam up. He never got paid, did he? Hey, Ha-jin. You got paid?”
At the question while tapping Ha-jin’s shoulder, Ha-jin shook his head slightly.
No, that was years ago and still!?
Even the perpetrators of the Imjin War who rose up with sand mixed into their military rations would clutch the back of their necks at the deeds of such an unscrupulous employer, and Ha-jin’s Peer Soldiers, living the part-time job life of this era, grew indignant and furious.
“No, that’s insane…. Can’t you report that somewhere and get the money back? There’s that place, what is it. The Ministry of Employment and Labor or something? The Labor Bureau?”
“Right, you could report it even now and get something? Hey, Ha-jin. Report it. You should at least get what you’re owed.”
“That’s what they’re most afraid of anyway. Will you help us look into it?”
“Hmm….”
Yet despite his Peer Soldiers’ enthusiastic attitude, Ha-jin only pressed his innocent earlobes repeatedly with a troubled expression.
Around the time the black cross-shaped piercing his Younger Sibling had given him as a discharge gift began to leave marks on his finger, Ha-jin opened his mouth in a difficult voice.
“That would be nice, but I can’t report it.”
“Why. Is that crazy bastard threatening you?”
“No, it’s not that….”
“…?”
“I never signed a contract. When I first started the job.”
It’s my fault, what can I say.
As I added this with self-deprecation, the atmosphere grew solemn.
That’s why I didn’t want to bring it up in the first place.
Ha-jin, who had anticipated that mood long ago, laughed as if to say it was truly fine. Only the friend who had already known about it exhaled with a face like he’d been chewing sand.
“Then… surely there must be some kind of record, right? Whether it’s the four major insurances or taxes…?”
“They did deduct about 3.3% in taxes, but since I’d be classified as a freelancer anyway, there’s nothing I can do about it. I didn’t enroll in the four major insurances. My monthly salary was 140,000 won. After deducting the four major insurances, there wouldn’t have been anything left, right?”
“No, I mean…”
“Why did you work for over a year under a guy like that? You should have quit on the spot!”
“That’s why I ran away—to a place no one could possibly chase me to without losing their mind.”
Ha-jin raised his hand and removed his hat, revealing his short hair.
Everyone present now understood that his escape meant military enlistment.
After all, today’s gathering was a discharge celebration for Ha-jin, who had enlisted abruptly without even saying goodbye. Except for the one closest friend, he had changed his contact information and gone dark, so we simply asked how he’d been doing all this time.
The reason ‘Kang Ha-jin, who got top grades in his first semester right after retaking the entrance exam and receiving a full scholarship in the second semester, suddenly abandoned the scholarship and enlisted’ was far more realistic and brutal than any rumor.
“What’s with the mood? You guys, I didn’t get sold off to some deep-sea fishing boat. Lighten up your expressions.”
Still, Ha-jin seemed fine.
Actually, he really was fine.
Though the ending was a bit messy, during that time I was genuinely quite happy. The kids I taught were adorable, and I still kept the rolling paper they wrote for me when I quit at home.
The experience I accumulated while working proved useful during entrance exam interviews, and for someone like me who had wondered what else to do besides singing and dancing, it became a good opportunity to confirm my own work abilities.
“I’m fine.”
Though I had to change my number to block the CEO’s contact, which meant losing all the connections I’d made in the meantime (even my students!), and had to rush to the military, which messed up my academic completion schedule quite a bit, and lost the scholarship, and upon discharge realized I was already twenty-three, with a sense of time’s emptiness remaining.
Still.
“I’m fine, really.”
I was still fine.
Because I had the belief that all of this was simply a process leading toward some good day in the future.
* * *
I enlisted at twenty-one and was discharged at twenty-three, yet I was still a first-year student.
At the Arts University, retaking wasn’t particularly taboo, but that was the talk of those in departments like music or fine arts that directly practiced art. For someone like me with dreams of being a planner creating work behind the stage and behind the camera, it didn’t really apply.
Already once through trainee life, and once more through retaking.
Already falling behind the “ordinary” life route twice over, I still wasn’t particularly anxious about it.
I believed in my abilities and believed I could do it.
Though the successes I achieved at my first company were very small and trivial, not impressive enough to present plausibly to major industry players. Still, they were successes.
When I eventually faced the big leagues, I had faith that my true worth would definitely be revealed.
“Ha-jin, who took the memory backup?”
“Um… Hyun-su said he’d take it yesterday.”
“Sigh… come here for a second.”
Ha-jin worked quite consistently, yet inconsistently.
Considering my family’s circumstances, I needed money, so I had to work, but I didn’t have time to work at ordinary restaurants or shopping malls.
Ultimately, what I chose was to participate in short-term part-time jobs or internships posted on the school bulletin board.
Fortunately, the department I enrolled in was called the Performing Arts Department, which allowed exposure to a very diverse range of artistic genres, and I had the quick adaptability to adjust rapidly to all of them.
“Hyun-woo went out for drinks with the directors yesterday, didn’t he? You heard about it, right?”
“…Ah. I’m sorry, I don’t think I heard about that.”
“Look, I really hate saying this to you, but… anyway, we don’t force you to come to company dinners, and we give you a lot of conveniences in other ways. So shouldn’t you be taking care of these miscellaneous tasks a bit more? You know how Hyun-woo is—he’s already half-hearted about work, so do you really think he properly backed up the memory on a day when he was drinking?”
“Ah….”
Yesterday at the filming studio, today behind the stage at the theater.
Though I moved freely through all sorts of places without discrimination, there was a limit to how deeply I could integrate into that group—I didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, didn’t even drink coffee, and since my home wasn’t in Seoul, I had to leave early.
“Yes. I’ll take better care of things.”
Being recognized solely for my abilities.
And….
“Yeah, thanks…. Anyway, since you’re the senior here, take better care of things. I’m asking you. Who else would I trust with this if not you?”
Becoming a ‘good kid’ that no one could deny.
That was essentially all I could do at my best.
“Senior, could you let me know when you might be able to give me those items you said you’d organize related to the outdoor location shoot last time? Apparently there are some official documents I need to receive regarding that.”
“Ah, yeah, yeah. I got it, I got it. Let me just finish this one deadline and I’ll really organize it.”
So if I just work hard enough.
“Ha-jin, did you get the official documents for the outdoor location? Aren’t you guys leaving tomorrow?”
“Ah, well…. Hyun-woo needs to organize some things first. Once he gives the okay, I’ll figure it out somehow.”
“Well, alright…. Anyway, make sure there are no slip-ups~”
So, so not here.
If I go to a place that doesn’t work like this—a place where I can really learn to do things properly.
“Hello, Hyun-woo. This is Ha-jin. You said you’d let me know about the outdoor location by 8 PM tonight, but I haven’t received any contact yet. I was wondering if I missed something, so I’m calling….”
-Ah, seriously. Ha-jin. I said I’d do it. This is my item, not Ha-jin’s item, right? I said I’d do it, I will do it. I’m thinking about it. Stop nagging me, really.
“…Ah, yes. I’m sorry.”
-I have a plan for everything, and there’s a process to how this unfolds, so I’m waiting. What, what. If you’re so capable, why don’t you just do this yourself, Ha-jin? Huh? We’re supposed to see how it goes on the actual set tomorrow, so you should know how to wait, people….
“…I’m sorry, senior. I overstepped. Then I’ll just prepare the rest well.”
-Just do it well, really. Don’t be annoying about it.
This is all just a process, after all.
“Ha-jin. Did we not receive the official documents here? You were trying to look into this before and called around, remember?”
“Ah, Hyun-woo said he needs to organize that on the actual set, so we didn’t receive it.”
“No, Hyun-woo just called. Apparently we can’t use that location, so we need to find an alternative. So what do I do? Rewrite the script now? No, then what are we supposed to do? I already coordinated with all the actors to shoot this outdoor scene?”
“…Uh, just a moment.”
This is all just a process.
“Yes, senior. This is Ha-jin. I just heard from Yun-ji….”
-Hey, Ha-jin. What do we do? We’re in trouble. These crazy guys didn’t say anything until yesterday and now they’re telling us to figure it out…. No, we absolutely have to get the outdoor shots, ah, what do we do, really?
“….”
This is all.
“First, I already sent you a few park locations I had listed in advance, so please check those. And it looks like there’s some outdoor terrace space at the Company Building we’re going to this afternoon. Just in case, I already contacted the person in charge to open that up, so you’ll probably need to pick one of those options and create an alternative plan.”
-Okay, then…. Ugh, this is giving me a headache. The Company Building terrace is fine, but won’t the shots overlap too much? How do I set up the previous scenes and all that, wow, this is giving me a headache.
This is all.
-Hey, Ha-jin. When we went to shoot other VCRs before, didn’t we have situations like this? Ah, what do I even tell the camera directors. This changes all the equipment settings, do we even have the equipment? Huh?
“That’s….”
-…?
What if I’m simply not capable of holding something of this magnitude?
“That’s something you’ll need to figure out for yourself, Senior.”
-…What?
“This is your item, after all. Not mine.”
Twenty-six-year-old Kang Ha-jin, in that moment―,
‘Am I really okay like this?’
Gazing at the endless walls of the well, I slowly sank deeper into those stagnant, murky waters.

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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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