The Regressor's Ice Is Golden - Chapter 57

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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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057.

After the Gala Show ended, the final day was reserved for a team dinner among the Korean delegation.
“Ha ha, congratulations, Coach!”
“Ahem, you’re too kind.”
The atmosphere was excellent, for what it’s worth.
With gold medals in both the men’s and women’s events, the federation officials were certainly raising glasses and toasting.
Which meant I—a rookie Junior skater who’d bombed the short program and landed ninth—had slipped out of the spotlight for a moment.
‘Better eat quickly and get out of here.’
I grabbed some Peking duck and dim sum from the buffet.
Over at a distance, the adults were clinking champagne glasses and chattering away.
“Oh, Ha-seol! Over here!”
Lee Ji-su, who’d loaded her plate from the catering buffet with nothing but half a portion of salad, waved me over.
I didn’t hesitate and sat down beside her.
“Congratulations on the gold medal. You must have worked so hard.”
“Ha ha, thanks. We’re just glad it started off well, you know.”
The conversation naturally drifted toward the Senior skaters’ season ahead.
The Senior Grand Prix runs for six events after the Junior Grand Prix Series concludes.
Since it’s by invitation only, your placement in this year’s Grand Prix depends on last season’s results—perform poorly and you won’t get a spot.
For them, the real season was only just beginning.
“So you’re heading to the Grand Prix soon, aren’t you? Where was it again?”
“NHK Trophy and Canada.”
“That’s quite far.”
“Right? Ji-hwan’s doing China Cup and France. There are more if you count people with a single qualifying spot.”
She went on about the atmosphere at those competitions, which skaters had been performing well recently.
I listened with a polite, measured smile.
Given the generational shift, it was unlikely I’d face these people as serious rivals.
But it didn’t hurt to know.
“Oh, speaking of which.”
Lee Ji-su hesitated, propping her chin on her hand.
“Have you given any thought to what we told you?”
“Huh? Oh.”
I nodded calmly.
“Honestly, I’m not entirely sure what you meant, but… I think I understand your point.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? It’s not like we’re talking about hot iced Americano here.”
“No, no. I’m not feeling wronged or distressed anymore. But you said to ride the wave instead of resisting it, right?”
But what that ‘wave’ was supposed to be—I still had no idea.
“I’ve already hit the slump, and there’s no clear breakthrough in sight. I’m not sure how to transform this situation.”
“Mm, you’re still not getting it.”
Lee Ji-su transferred some grilled salmon from her plate to mine.
The lean flesh, glazed with a creamy lemon sauce, gave off a sweet, rich aroma.
“But don’t worry. You’re only in your first year anyway. With so little international experience, I’d say you’re doing fine.”
It was true—debuting as a Junior and making it to the Grand Prix Final right away had been absurdly fortunate.
That’s probably why expectations had become unreasonably high.
This level is actually normal.
“Thank you for the advice.”
“Don’t mention it. I’m just glad your mental state seems better.”
…….
Choi Ji-hwan, sitting beside us, shrugged and returned to his salad.
He’d been chatty enough yesterday, but every time I saw him, I couldn’t tell if they got along or not.
“Oh, and your Gala Show was amazing. The way you skated in that school uniform and tennis skirt.”
“Right?! When I was choreographing it, I…”
Lee Ji-su, more talkative than the two of us combined, launched enthusiastically into stories about the Gala Show.
The grilled salmon tasted even better because of it.

The next morning, as soon as we arrived at Incheon Airport, there was a press conference.
But it wasn’t nearly as elaborate or chaotic as when we’d returned from Japan.
B-tier competitions don’t draw big crowds, and besides, the dual gold medals had already stolen all the attention anyway.
So I sat quietly, waiting my turn after the photo session wrapped up.
What kind of question is that? Compared to a joint gold medal, there’s nothing particularly special about it—
“How do you feel about your performance at this competition?”
……Right, these bastards wouldn’t just sit idle doing nothing.
I gritted my teeth and forced out a polite smile.
“This competition showed me that I need to recalibrate my overall sense of things. I’ll go back to basics and refine my technique carefully before the next event.”
Translation: figure it out yourselves and don’t bother me about it.
I hope they understood, and I’m going to disconnect from the internet for a while.
After the press conference ended, we packed up and left Incheon Airport.
“Thank you for your hard work.”
“Yes, please have a safe trip!”
We ran out of gas halfway home, so I had to fill up at a rest stop with trembling hands…….
By the time I finally got home, I started unpacking right away.
I had school tomorrow anyway.
‘Can’t we just skip on our own or something?’
I threw all the dirty laundry into the washing machine and carefully cleaned my Skates.
After I finished my shower, there was still something left to deal with.
The Fan Letter that the fan who’d followed me all the way to Beijing had given me.
The envelope itself was a tasteful navy color, and when I looked closer, I could just barely make out some kind of pattern embossed on it.
At a glance, it was clear that whoever sent it had put real money and care into preparing it.
I gently peeled off the silver owl sticker seal.
From the cream-colored stationery wafted the scent of winter trees (I’m not great with perfume, but I’m pretty sure that’s what it was).
“To, Kim Ha-seol…….”
Round, neat handwriting flowed calmly across the page.
She introduced herself—where she was from, who she was, how she’d come to know about me.
[I’d never sent a fan letter to an athlete before, so I didn’t know how to deliver it, but my friend was heading to China, so I asked them right away! If you’re reading this letter, it means my friend’s quest was a success!]
Based on this introduction, the writer seemed to be the same person who’d been crying at the Junior championship back then.
‘To this extent?’
I felt an odd mixture of emotions as I turned to the next page.
And the body of the letter—which was genuinely hard to describe—filled the entire page.
Which parts of my performances she especially loved, what she does while rewatching my competition videos over and over.
Words of encouragement and concern, hiding nothing of her passion and affection.
[Even though you’re still a rookie, getting such great results is impressive, but I hope you don’t carry too much pressure. There’s still a long way to go before you move to the Senior level, and I’m hoping your skating career goes smoothly without unnecessary emotional hardship.]
The letter ended with a note that she’d come watch me at domestic competitions and hoped to see me again.
[P.S.: You kind of look like an owl, by the way. The way you turn your head is really cute.]
“Really, I don’t know what to say.”
I let out a hollow laugh and collapsed backward onto my bed.
The white fluorescent light from the ceiling reflected off the letter I held up in the air.
I felt kind of……overwhelmed, in several different ways.
‘Something like this……’
I was immensely grateful to have actually met that fan in person.
And I was grateful I could read it.
To the person who delivered it, and to the person who wrote it.
“What’s that? Oh, that’s what that fan gave you, right?”
“……Yes.”
I slowly got up from the bed.
I carefully folded the stationery and put it back in the envelope.
“Hey, let me read it too.”
“Why would you, Coach?”
“I’m curious.”
Acting like a child—why are you whining like that?
I smartly rebuffed Coach Park and slipped the letter into the desk bookshelf.
‘You’ll read it anyway, I’m sure.’
While brushing my teeth in the bathroom, my mind felt a bit blank.
The careful handwriting lingered before my eyes, and the scent of winter trees from the stationery remained at the tip of my nose.
Because of it, I could admit something.
Until I retire, I’ll never forget this scent.
When I came back from brushing, sure enough.
Coach was holding a tissue and sniffling as he set the letter down.
“Coach, seriously!”
“Sorry. But, geez……. Kim, how did you grow up so well? Getting letters like this. Ah, how wonderful…….”
“You’re being ridiculous, Coach.”
I mumbled something in response, patting his shoulder absently before retrieving the pain relief patches.
We worked in silence, pressing one patch after another onto each other’s lower backs.
“…Sleep well.”
“You too, Coach.”
The light went out, and I curled carefully beneath the blankets.
‘A fan letter….’
I’d never imagined I’d ever receive something like that.
Of course, I’d heard that Senior skaters—especially Choi Ji-hwan—had received them several times before.
But I never thought the day would come when I’d be the one getting them this soon.
Embarrassment crept in, and I hugged the blanket tighter.
‘I never received anything like this before I regressed, either.’
They say even whales will dance for praise, and my face felt like it might split from grinning—
‘…….’
Before I regressed.
The darkened room held only silence and shadow.
In that void, the contradiction my reason had stumbled upon became impossibly clear.
Once a question took hold, it spiraled outward, unstoppable.
‘Why didn’t I receive them back then?’
Of course, now I have the Status Window boost, but I’ve already secured two Junior Grand Prix Series tickets with a Finals spot locked in.
One of them’s a gold medal—for a first-year Junior, it’s almost miraculous.
But here’s the thing.
Before I turned back time, why didn’t I—
‘Wait, hold on.’
What were my results back then?
Not as strong as I am now with the Status Window, but I don’t think I placed poorly anywhere.
My thoughts circled inward until they hit something fundamental.
‘Why can’t I remember any of it?’

I slipped quietly out of bed and switched on the desk lamp.
Squinting against the sudden brightness, I pulled out blank paper and a pencil and began to write.
The timeline from before I regressed, from around this same period.
‘Start with what I know for certain.’
My parents passed away at the end of my final Novice season, and Coach Park stepped in as my guardian.
And I was expelled from the Figure Skating Academy I’d been attending—that much is undeniably true.
Even without immediate family, I had relatives on record who could have taken me in.
But they never would’ve wanted me to keep skating, so Coach Park must have been the one who brought me to him.
And from that, I could extrapolate further.
‘My competition results were actually decent.’
The fact that I retired before high school due to false accusations and injury meant I’d kept competing until then, at the very least.
No matter how much softer I was back then, I wouldn’t have phoned in my training.
And the most decisive fact of all was the trigger for those accusations.
‘I had dealings with Cha Seo-hee.’
She was always off at training camps overseas, barely showing up to school then or now.
I skip school all the time for competitions, so it’s nothing unusual.
But if we’d fought enough to make waves between us, we must have crossed paths fairly often.
What are the odds of running into a monstrous rookie who landed the Triple Axel in her first year?
‘My international results must have been solid.’
Digging through the internet and social media, you regularly see stories of promising skaters with records worse than mine.
Which meant there was a good chance that figure skating fans knew who I was before I regressed.
So why couldn’t I remember them existing before the regression?
Question built upon question until they collapsed into a single conclusion.
‘What I remember might not be everything.’
The thought hit like a thunderbolt, sudden and terrible.
The Returnee’s Ice Rink in Gold: Episode 57
E-book publication date | June 5, 2026

Author | Corcarolli
Publisher | Heo Heung-beom, Park Geon-won
Published by | Poteen

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Phone | 02-6320-8500
Fax | 02-6320-8585

UCI | G720:N+A101-20260514092.0057
List Price | 100 Won

© Korckaroli 2026

This e-book is protected under copyright law.
This e-book is published under contract with the author, and unauthorized reproduction, copying, distribution, or sharing without written consent from both parties is prohibited.

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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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