Episode 174: Dream
I had a dream.
I realized it was a dream because the scenery around me was not unfamiliar.
‘This place···’
A penthouse cluttered with all kinds of liquor bottles and countless trophies.
My memories were hazy, but facing it again, I could never pretend not to recognize the place I had lived in for several years as my own little nest.
Of course, there was one more reason I thought this was a dream.
The reason was that a person who could not possibly be there was waiting for me.
“You’re here?”
There was no way I wouldn’t recognize her.
The face that smiled brightly and welcomed me resembled someone.
No, it wasn’t just resembling.
It was the face I imagined she might have when time passed, after she turned thirty and approached forty.
“Zia···?”
“Who else would I be?”
With just the slightly huskier voice than the one I knew, no further explanation was needed.
Instinctively, I sensed that the Woo Zia before my eyes was not the one who had slept beside me without knowing anything, but the one who knew everything, just like the current me.
The intuition did not stop there.
“It’s over, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
I did not answer the question from Woo Zia, whose appearance should not have existed in my memories.
The absurd miracle of returning to the past.
The happy times that followed the end of that miracle.
I had realized that everything I thought I had corrected was nothing more than a mirage.
Starting with the Grammy and ending with the Daesang Artist — this was the end of the nightmare I had thought would come someday···.
“What are you talking about? No, that’s not it.”
Before I could even finish my thought, it was denied.
At the knife-sharp rejection, my mouth opened foolishly on its own. ‘Woo Zia’ let out a small sigh and muttered.
“Seriously, Han Yujin··· you still have so many useless thoughts. Tsk.”
As I stood there blankly, still unable to understand the meaning behind her shaking her head, Woo Zia opened her mouth wide once more and continued.
“Which side to make the dream was something you decided, Yujin.”
“What do you···.”
“Don’t you get it? Was my presence that big? Look again.”
At Woo Zia’s gesture of spreading her arms wide and pointing around, I obediently turned my head.
And then I realized.
“Ah.”
There was one more obvious peculiarity that made me wonder why I hadn’t noticed it until now.
Black, white, and gray.
This monochrome world, as if it had stolen away all the colors that should exist in the world, was something I had already experienced once before.
“Do you understand now? What it means that you decided?”
I think I finally understood.
The real meaning behind the moment I had grabbed that slender wrist exposed in the cold air, when color had returned to the world.
“It doesn’t matter how you think about this. Whether it’s a regression where you corrected the past. Or a prophetic dream where you foresaw a miserable future. Or even the consideration of some enormous being who liked your songs. What’s important is that you chose. This side as the dream, that side as reality.”
My mouth felt a little bitter.
Those bleak days had definitely been nightmarish times.
I hadn’t realized it at the time, but now, after living through happy days, I could clearly see it.
But hearing that fact from ‘Woo Zia’s’ mouth was a slightly different matter.
Perhaps she sensed that.
The furrowed brow of ‘Woo Zia’ softened a little, and the corners of her eyebrows gently lowered.
“Well, it can’t be helped. I knew from the beginning that you were that kind of guy. Still, I liked you.”
And then came the words that were enough to freeze me in place.
Seeing me stiffened, ‘Woo Zia’ let out another small laugh.
“When I see you like this, it feels like you haven’t changed at all. It might be like catching a rat by accident while stepping backward, but since you got one thing right, it seems you didn’t waste your years.”
“Huh?”
“Sit down first. We still have some time. Let’s talk.”
‘Woo Zia’ casually pushed the liquor bottles and trophies aside with her foot, plopped down on the sofa as if it were her own house, and spoke to me like that.
I couldn’t understand what she meant by “you got one thing right” or “we still have some time,” but from the beginning, I had no right to refuse her suggestion.
And the story that followed was,
“First··· right, Mirror. That one.”
A flood of countless questions.
Questions about the many songs I had made in the still-unarrived future, and the inner meanings I had kept hidden inside them without telling anyone.
The answer was set.
Longing for you.
“Hmm··· so that’s what it meant. As expected, I was right. Well, it’s obvious, though.”
While I, answering immediately, felt my face growing hot.
‘Woo Zia’s’ refreshing laugh, completely unbothered by such things, plunged me into an indescribable feeling.
“Why? Were you surprised? Because I knew too well?”
“Th… that… A little…”
“Isn’t it obvious? I was always watching over you.”
“Huh…?”
“Ah, you don’t know about this yet? Well, don’t worry about it. You’ll find out soon. No matter how well you hide a secret, if someone is always by your side, ‘that’ is bound to get caught eventually. Yeah. No need to worry about it.”
After those incomprehensible words came a brief silence.
Once again, ‘Woo Zia’ was the first to move.
“Don’t you have anything you’re curious about?”
I was about to say no.
Of course, it wasn’t that I had nothing I was curious about.
I simply thought I didn’t have the right to ask.
However, the steady gaze directed at me was granting me that right, and eventually I hesitantly brought up the question I had buried deep in my heart, thinking I would never ask it.
“How… have you been?”
“Hmm… How have I been, huh…”
‘Woo Zia’s’ body, which had been leaning slightly toward me, sank deeply into the sofa.
At the sense of distance created by that small movement,
‘Was it really a question I shouldn’t have asked?’
The thought lasted only a moment.
“It was ordinary.”
‘Woo Zia’ continued speaking with her head slightly raised.
“I studied like other people, worked a regular job.”
“Like other people…”
For some reason, those words felt a little bitter.
There was no need to think hard about why.
‘And loved someone.’
It was probably because I had hoped that the phrase “like other people” did not include those words.
“Pfft.”
At my lowered head, ‘Woo Zia’s’ laughter reached me.
“Seriously, you’re so easy to read. Ah, I was going to tease you a bit, but seeing you look so down, I can’t even do that.”
“…”
“What was different from other people was that I didn’t hold anyone in my heart. Because that spot already had an owner.”
It was the words I had desperately wanted to hear.
At the same time, they were words that pressed down on my heart just as heavily.
“Well, I heard a lot of gossip behind my back — that I was an idol fan even at my age and that it was pathetic. Anyway, that’s how it was. Other than that… I did some acting from time to time.”
But there was one thing I couldn’t help asking in between.
“Acting?”
The moment I uttered the word, ‘Woo Zia’ smiled very brightly.
“It was a small local theater troupe in a provincial city. I wasn’t a formal member but a guest member, but acting is still acting. Well, there was still some demand for me. It feels a bit like bragging, but I even received scouting offers from quite famous theater companies.”
‘I turned them all down,’ she added at the end, and I couldn’t ask her the reason.
The gaze that was deliberately not directed at me this time was the answer itself.
“Amazing, right? I didn’t even know I had that kind of talent. It probably isn’t strange to the current you, though.”
“That’s…”
“I’m not blaming you. I’m thanking you. When I first stepped on stage, I was thirty-three… It shortened by nearly ten years, didn’t it?”
While ‘Woo Zia’s’ voice grew lighter, my head only grew heavier and drooped.
“Tsk. I didn’t come here to see you like this.”
With that, ‘Woo Zia’ spoke and stood up from her seat.
“There’s still a little time left… but I should go.”
“W-where?!”
It was probably the loudest shout I had made since meeting ‘Woo Zia’.
“I told you. Even if it was like catching a rat by stepping backward, you got one thing right. When the east brightens and morning comes, dreams come to an end. Since you ended your own night, the nightmare should end now too.”
“…”
“Congratulations. Best Producer, More Famous Song, and this year’s Daesang Artist. Winning the triple crown at MAMA is probably familiar to you, Yujin.”
I still couldn’t fully understand the meaning of this moment.
But there was one thing I seemed to know.
‘This… is the last time.’
The congratulatory words she left about the three trophies I had obtained today were the last greeting ‘Woo Zia’ would give me.
And that I still had something I needed to say to this ‘Woo Zia’.
And what that something was.
“I’m sorry.”
The words burst out of my mouth without any hesitation, and ‘Woo Zia’s’ back stopped in place.
Yes, this was the very first thing I should have said to ‘Woo Zia’.
Even on the day I returned to the past.
Instead of scolding her through sobs asking why she suggested breaking up, I should have immediately said I was sorry.
Even at this very moment.
Instead of standing frozen and unable to speak properly, I should have bowed my head deeply from the start and apologized.
Even if the cold times that came to us were not the fault of either of us.
Between two people who had carved each other’s existence deep into their hearts, those words should never have been held back.
“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry…”
The monochrome world began to blur between the tears welling up in my eyes.
Even though I wiped my eyes with my rough sleeves until they stung, my blurred vision showed no signs of returning to normal.
“My, my… you’ve grown up well, our Yujin… At least you didn’t age in vain.”
I couldn’t see a single thing clearly through my clouded sight.
However, I could feel that the voice reaching my ears was trembling intensely, causing my tears to pour down even more fiercely.
And soon, a warm touch landed on my shoulder.
“…”
At that whisper, which was as warm as the touch itself, I lifted my head and looked at her face.
Fortunately, even within my blurred vision, I could clearly engrave ‘Zia’s’ face into my mind.
She was wearing a face that smiled more brightly than ever before, even though tears were brimming in her eyes.
“You’d better think of an excuse for why you were crying.”
With those words, ‘Zia’ drifted away.
Unlike the feeling of sinking into deep darkness when I first returned to the past, it felt as if I were floating up toward a bright place.
“I’ll be waiting.”
“Hey, Han Yujin! Yujin! Why is he suddenly crying in his sleep?!”
Then, ‘Zia’s’ voice and another voice overlapped.
***
I’m not sure.
To be honest, I don’t know if that day’s dream was a simple illusion created by my guilt, or if the ‘Zia’ from my pre-regression life truly came to visit me one last time.
‘Common sense says it’s likely the former.’
But while ordinary dreams fade after just half a day, Zia’s face—which remains vivid even now, months later—gives weight to the latter.
Of course, I don’t intend to hang onto the truth of that dream forever.
“The ‘me’ who is here now, and the ‘me’ who is by your side. In the end, we can only smile if you, Yujin, are happy. It’s the same for both of us.”
Just as ‘Zia’ had whispered to me that day when I couldn’t stop crying.
“Be sure to be happy. Because ‘I’ will be, too. If we spend our time being happy like that, then ‘we’ will be able to meet again.”
The only thing I have to do is turn that request into reality. There is nothing else.
That is why I am not afraid at all right now.
Even though I am standing before a stage that makes my heart pound more than any performance I’ve ever done.
This very place is the first step toward the ultimate mission I hold in my heart: ‘happiness.’
“Hey, Mr. Han! Why are you just spacing out?! Hurry up and take your place!”
I was slightly shaken by a comment that didn’t quite fit my solemn resolve—or more accurately, a line that wasn’t in the script.
Well, that much is far, far from enough to fluster me.
“Ah, yes sir!”
I answered in a deliberately exaggerated voice and finally took a step forward.
Out of the deep shadows.
And onto the brilliant stage that cut through that darkness.
“Whew-woo!!”
“Wow, he’s handsome!!”
“Yujin, look over here!”
“Hyung, over here too!”
Familiar faces flashed by in the shadows.
Seo Yoonje and Madam Moon Sook-hee.
Baek Kyung-min, looking burdened between Bang Ho-kyung and Heo Yul-bok.
Ji-woo, looking enviously at Jung Eun-hye sitting next to him.
Behind them were the four judges who opened the path for me on <Blind Singer>, and the four colleagues who are still walking that same path with me.
The employees of <My Way>, led by Ailee and Jeon Seon-woo, and Reporter Kwak Sun-bin, who looked awkward as he fiddled with his hands, unable to exercise his professional persona.
Four idol groups wearing outfits that looked like they had rushed straight from a music show stage.
A titan of the business world who still feels unfamiliar, but nevertheless sends me a smile.
And finally, the saintess who acts like a witch, who created this very moment by placing the honor I rightfully deserved into my hands.
Clap clap clap clap!!
Receiving everyone’s congratulations, I reached the end of the path and turned around.
Then, Ji Sehyuk’s voice followed, announcing the arrival of the final protagonist.
“Now, let us welcome today’s true protagonist! Please give her a big round of applause!”
Dun-da-da-dan~!
Behind the melody that I once felt a sense of rejection toward, but now feels like nothing, the doors opened.
A presence finally revealed itself, cutting through the thick darkness and approaching me.
“Entrance of the bride!”
The one who was the light of my past,
The color of my present,
The spring of my future,
The one who will become the dream of my life,
The only one who holds everything that makes me smile.
“Starting anew rather than ending—you’ll do just fine at that, Yujin. After all, you’ve already done it well once before.”
The smile blooming above her pure white dress was so similar to the one that had been etched clearly in my mind through my blurred vision back then.
If only I can walk alongside that smile, the homework of ‘being happy’ doesn’t seem like it will be very difficult.
A smile bloomed on my face as well.
-The End-
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TL Note: This concludes the main story. But There are 4 side stories remaining.
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