Chapter 35: If You’re Going to Use Me

“Now, keeping the momentum going, it’s your turn, Senior.”

“…”

“I’m not thrilled about having to change this amicable atmosphere again, but you must have something you truly want to write in this contract.”

Eun-ru’s face showed he already knew.

Watching him tap the contract lightly with his fingertip, Jin-yeop nodded.

“You’re right.

Since it’s something I need to explain, I won’t hide it.”

“Good.

No secrets between us.”

“Don’t call it something so grand…”

It was a difficult topic to bring up himself, so he was genuinely grateful that Eun-ru had raised it first like this.

“You didn’t say it in detail, but you mentioned you needed someone to use.”

“Yes.”

“If I sign a partner contract with you, that plan gets a little disrupted.”

“…”

“That doesn’t mean you have to bear all that risk.

So I have two conditions to propose.

You can choose one of them.”

Taking a deep breath in and out, Jin-yeop spoke.

“The first is to limit this partner contract to three months.

Externally, I’m temporarily acting as your partner for your training, but in reality, it’s a contract to find out about matters related to Shamar.”

“…”

“If I can’t resolve everything within three months, I’ll report Shamar’s existence to the Management Department and officially wash my hands of it.

Of course, as someone involved, I can’t completely step away from the dungeon re-awakening case, but at least the part you’re worried about won’t happen.”

“And the second?”

“We enter a general partner relationship.

It lasts until either of us finds another partner.

However, there’s a condition.”

“…”

“After I divorce Kang Jung-hoon…”

“…”

“I want you to announce that you and I are dating with marriage in mind.”

Jin-yeop, having made the proposal, squeezed his eyes shut, thinking it was an absurd thing to say.

He was so shameless that he couldn’t bear to open his eyes and face Eun-ru.

A relationship where they met through a blind date and one side was unilaterally courting the other.

And him making such a proposal in that situation.

Jin-yeop was still asking himself if he really needed to drag a young man ten years younger into his personal revenge.

“Before I choose, I have something I want to ask.”

At those words, Jin-yeop opened his eyes and looked at Eun-ru.

“Tell me what your plan is.”

“…”

“I don’t want to get on board without knowing anything.

It might be presumptuous of me to say this since I told you to use me if you wanted…”

“No, no.

You should know.”

Jin-yeop let out a long breath.

Having decided to drag him into his life arbitrarily, he shouldn’t hide or conceal things.

“On the surface, it’s a very simple thing.

I want to show that I can meet someone with much better conditions than Kang Jung-hoon.”

“…”

“It might seem childish, but it’s pretty important to me.”

It was embarrassing, but a matter of pride.

Regardless of what others said, it was absolutely necessary to restore his own completely shattered sense of self.

“Of course, I know that… could be painful for the other person.

From the moment it’s known that you’re seeing me, you might have to sacrifice more than you think.”

“…”

“That’s why I told you this early on.

I said I needed a relationship where we could use each other more.”

Jin-yeop had hoped for someone who wouldn’t mind being used as a means to restore his pride.

Someone who had their own purpose for wanting to use his name.

He thought a relationship based on personal gain like that would be easier.

“Beyond the surface?”

“…”

“Can you tell me what the other parts are that you’d call ‘using’?”

Eun-ru carefully reached out and lightly covered the back of Jin-yeop’s hand, holding it.

At the warmth felt along with the firm touch, Jin-yeop slightly bowed his head.

His own fingertips, placed under that large hand, were trembling.

It was something he hadn’t even been aware of, but Eun-ru had noticed first and held him.

“You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.

I understand enough.”

“…I’m doing this because I feel shameless.

It’s not that I don’t know how you feel.”

“…”

“I don’t want to use those feelings.

I know too well how miserable that can make a person.”

Jin-yeop steeled himself.

Knowing the favor Eun-ru held for him, he knew that he couldn’t see Eun-ru’s choice as solely his own will.

But just as Eun-ru’s choice was important, Jin-yeop wanted to tell him everything.

He didn’t want to deceive and manipulate someone who knew nothing.

“My brother died ten years ago.”

“…”

“He was ten years old then, and I was twenty.”

Jin-yeop’s throat tightened, and he had to pause and close his mouth between words.

While he spoke those fragmented sentences, Eun-ru’s expression twisted strangely.

“I took my brother on a trip to Busan.

Our parents died in an accident when I was fifteen, so I raised him.

Life was hard, so I never did anything properly for him.”

“…”

“Not a single decent set of clothes, not one pair of shoes.

I couldn’t even buy him a common toy.

We couldn’t even dream of traveling.

Naturally, I couldn’t afford college, so I got a job right before graduating high school.

Then I got my first paycheck, and suddenly I wanted to go on a trip.”

Jin-yeop quietly turned his head and looked out the window.

A gentle breeze was blowing through the half-open window.

The sky around sunset was dyed a muddled orange.

“I wanted to show him the ocean.”

“…”

“It wasn’t that he’d never seen it, but the last time we went on a family trip, he had just learned to walk, so he didn’t remember.”

“…”

“Those things are really important.

Eating, sleeping, wearing clothes are important too.

But people need good memories, good experiences, to want to live.”

His brother, only ten years old, was more mature than other kids his age.

While it was heartbreaking that he was placed in an environment that forced it, he was also incredibly grateful.

Without a single complaint like other children, his brother would prepare his own meals with his small hands and spend nearly half the day alone.

It was unbearably pitiful, but they were in a situation where he couldn’t take care of everything for him.

So he wanted to show him the ocean.

He wanted to give him a day of eating delicious food and playing to his heart’s content, hoping that the memory of that day would help him endure for months to come.

“He loved it so much.

The night before we were to take the train, he couldn’t sleep, he was so excited.

He smiled the whole time even after we arrived.

I thought I’d made a good choice.

But that wasn’t it.”

It was a tragedy no one could have predicted.

The largest-scale dungeon break in history occurred at Gwangalli Beach.

Who could have known they would be caught up in it?

Back then, it had only been about five years since dungeons first appeared.

The system was just being established, and although Awakeners existed, their response wasn’t at the level it is now.

Those who founded agencies anticipating that dungeons would become profitable were extremely rare.

A dungeon break was like a natural disaster, and the world was in chaos.

It was a world where one couldn’t even dare to think of becoming an Awakener.

Days where you could only hope that nothing like this would happen around you.

Even after witnessing parts of roads being blocked off and people’s livelihoods being destroyed by dungeon breaks, he had felt nothing, as his own life was already a disaster.

“You probably heard about it during training.

The S-class dungeon break in Busan.

My brother and I were there.

That day, my brother died, and I awakened.”

The monsters pouring out of the dungeon, the people dying at their hands.

Amidst that horrific scene, the most devastating thing was the sight of his brother reaching out towards him, crying out to be saved.

As he replayed that dizzying memory, Jin-yeop’s hand trembled helplessly.

Eun-ru held it tighter.

As if pulling Jin-yeop out of a nightmare, Eun-ru gently lifted Jin-yeop’s limp hand, which had been loosely overlapped, and gripped it firmly.

“I awakened, but I couldn’t save him.

My brother was already too late, so I…”

“Stop.”

“…”

“Stop there.”

As Jin-yeop slowly turned his head towards Eun-ru, tears fell from his eyes.

Holding Jin-yeop’s hand, Eun-ru reached out his other hand and wiped away the tears.

But despite his touch, the tears streamed down Jin-yeop’s cheeks like a pouring rain.

“I got something then.”

“…”

“Kang Jung-hoon took it.”

“…”

“He took it and sold it.”

Still holding Eun-ru’s hand, Jin-yeop poured it out as if tattling.

“Even knowing that, I forgave him.

Over and over, countless times.

Convincing myself that the object was really nothing.”

“Senior.”

“Because I was afraid of being alone again.

For that single reason alone.”