I Became My Ex-Boyfriend’s Concubine - Chapter 101

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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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Chapter 101

“Hyun, what did you just say?”
Hyun set the cup down slowly onto the table. The espresso, which had always tasted merely sweet until now, was unusually bitter today.
“Let’s break up.”
“What do you—!”
Leaving Ha-rin flushed in the face before him, Hyun rose from his seat.
Without hesitation he moved toward the door, and urgent high-heeled footsteps chased after him from behind.
The moment he felt Ha-rin’s hand seize his shoulder, Hyun spoke in a flat, measured tone.
“You knew it anyway. That this would happen eventually.”
“What?”
“That even if we had really married, things would have been no different underneath.”
Hyun turned around slowly.
Ha-rin’s face cycled between red and purple with fury. He placed his hands gently on her shoulders.
“Have you ever truly looked at me?”
“What are you talking about?”
“We both just wanted what we wanted—you couldn’t stand Dan-bi, and I coveted your background.”
At those words, Ha-rin’s lips pressed shut at once.
Hyun had known it for some time. How deeply Ha-rin despised Dan-bi.
That was why. He had suddenly resolved to marry Ha-rin.
He had believed it was the only way to sever Dan-bi completely, the one who would not release her hold on him.
Dan-bi had always been beside him.
In childhood she was his only family; as they grew, his closest friend; and later, his lover.
He had traced every arc of his life alongside her.
He had thought that by remaining at Dan-bi’s side, he might finally bury that despair embedded in the tail end of his deep childhood.
But in the end, nothing changed.
The memory of those damp fingertips as she abandoned him at the orphanage remained vivid, and reality remained immovable.
That was when the thought had struck him: what if he filled his life with something other than Dan-bi—could he not escape from this?
Perhaps the reason he remained so trapped in the pain of the past was that a single person called Dan-bi was pitifully insufficient to fill his wretched life.
So he had resolved to possess many things.
Whether power, fame, or some grand love—he grasped at everything he had not coveted before, clutching it in his hands.
He believed that the more he filled himself, the more the shadow coiled in the corner of his heart would pale. He thought that if he filled it enough, wounds he could not bear to face would become invisible.
But it was a miscalculation. The more he grasped, the more boldly the darkness within him raised its head.
And atop it all, not only the face of his mother, which had grown dim with time, but also the phantom of Dan-bi weeping pitifully before him began to overlay one another.
Day by day a terrible sobbing spread through his chest. Even as he swallowed back the flowing tears, refusing to acknowledge them, word came that Dan-bi had fallen into a comatose state.
After that, nothing could be seen before his eyes. Only the face of her, turned cold and still and unawakening, flickered at the edges of his vision.
It was only too late that he grasped it bone-deep: the hunger that no amount of filling could assuage had sprung from his own arrogance.
The shadow of all those desires—aimed at erasing and burying Dan-bi—had finally tightened around his own throat.
Hyun visited Dan-bi’s hospital room every day. Gazing at her lying motionless with closed eyes, he whispered to her each time.
Come back, he begged. If only she would wake, he swore he would never leave her side again.
No matter how many pleas steeped in regret he cast into the void, Dan-bi remained always sleeping in stillness. It felt as though he was receiving back every debt he had accumulated.
That was when, faithfully keeping vigil in the room as always, Hyun’s gaze came to rest on the VR Device sitting on the bedside table.
As his eyes lingered there for some time, Som, standing nearby, seemed to sense something odd and spoke to him.
“Why the game device? Is something different from usual?”
“… No, it’s the same.”
“Then why do you keep staring at it?”
That was the problem.
That these terrible days flowed by always identically, no different from any other. And that Dan-bi’s eyes still did not open.
With each passing day, his fear grew ever larger, eating away at him.
What if Dan-bi truly never woke? The despairful hypothesis clawed through his mind relentlessly, at all hours.
Each time it struck, he felt only the desire to die.
According to Som’s estimation, Dan-bi had logged into this game at the exact moment she had called him countless times.
At that time, Hyun had been with Ha-rin. While staring at the screen lighting up with endless calls, he had simply turned it away.
If only he had not been so cruel then. If only he had picked up even once, would this tragedy not have happened?
Terrible hypotheticals chained themselves endlessly, but no amount of regret could undo it. He had already released Dan-bi’s hand, and she still had not opened her eyes.
Hyun stared blankly at the game device, then finally spoke in a low voice.
“Say—is this game device still operational?”
“Well… to be precise, it’s currently running.”
Hyeon knew that already.
From the moment he’d first discovered the device in this hospital room, a red indicator light had been blinking continuously, showing it was active.
“So right now you can’t touch it at all?”
“Looks that way. Ever since Dan-bi last logged in, it’s just been showing that operating light. The company’s tech team checked it too, and it’s the same.”
“Then what about that?”
Hyeon’s gaze shifted to the side. On the desk sat another device, identical in appearance to Dan-bi’s.
It was the Beta Test Device that Som had brought from the company some time ago.
Som had mentioned comparing its specifications with the one Dan-bi used to see how similar they were, but after concluding they were indeed nearly identical, he’d left it sitting there untouched.
Som followed Hyeon’s line of sight and tilted his head curiously.
“Well, that’s a beta test device, so we can fire it up. Why—you want to play a game or something?”
Instead of answering, Hyeon picked up the device. After examining it slowly from front to back, he began to position himself as if to put it on, but Som stopped him with a puzzled expression.
“You’re really going to try it? You never even look at games normally.”
“I said it before. Maybe Dan-bi is still trapped inside the game right now.”
“But that was just a theory…….”
“You said this was an RPG Game. Then maybe.”
Hyeon suddenly turned his head to look directly at Som.
“Could you encounter other users within the server?”
“No. Like I explained before, you’re the only user in this world. It’s basically a standalone game package. It’ll be easier to understand if you think of yourself as the protagonist in a novel.”
“So even if I activate this, I won’t be able to meet Dan-bi.”
Only then did Som grasp Hyeon’s intention, and his brow furrowed.
“You don’t actually think you’ll be able to meet Dan-bi by using this, do you? Don’t say nonsense like that.”
Som turned to look at Dan-bi lying on the bed and sighed.
“That was just something I said carelessly back then, wondering if maybe Dan-bi couldn’t turn the game off. But no matter how I think about it, it’s physically impossible. You’re not even wearing the device right now—does that make any sense?”
“You know better than anyone that we’ve already seen plenty of things that defy logic.”
At that chilling remark, Som fell silent.
Without another word, Hyeon slowly placed the device over his head. Transparent goggles descended over his eyes, and a blue light began to fill the darkness.
“Whether that’s true or not, I have to try. Either way, Dan-bi had the exact same device, and the fact that things have come to this is undeniable.”
No matter how hard he tried to push the thought away, Hyeon couldn’t shake the feeling that the reason Dan-bi wouldn’t open her eyes was inextricably linked to this device.
So he had to see it for himself. What in the world this damned game really was.
“Wait—hey……!”
Drowning out Som’s urgent voice, Hyeon shut his eyes without hesitation and pressed the button on the right side of the device.
Flash!
At the same instant, a splitting headache crashed down on him. Like being struck by a powerful electric current, a sharp shock pierced through his entire body, and Hyeon’s eyes snapped open as he staggered.
His vision blurred and swam.
‘Where is this…….’
Sensing an unfamiliar weight against him, Hyeon looked down. Someone was pressed firmly into his embrace.
Below that, a familiar face came into view. Hyeon’s brow narrowed involuntarily.
“Your Highness, Your High…….”
Small fingers gripping his robes trembled carefully. Then a voice—one he’d longed to hear with painful intensity—reached his ears, and Hyeon’s heart lurched.
Dan-bi’s clenched lips slowly opened.
“I want to see Your Highness……!”
“……Dan-bi?”
In that instant, the figure in his arms suddenly lifted her head.
There was no doubt. Clear, luminous eyes turned toward him alone.
It was Dan-bi.
“Your Highness?”
“Dan-bi. You’re really Dan-bi, aren’t you? You’ve actually been inside this game all this time?”
Hyeon, consumed by emotion, gripped Dan-bi’s shoulders fiercely. Unable to steady his ragged breath, he cried out desperately.
“Do you recognize me? It’s me—Hyeon!”
“How did you…….”
Without waiting for her answer, Hyeon immediately pulled Dan-bi into a tight embrace.
Dan-bi’s eyes wavered aimlessly as she found herself suddenly held close.

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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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