Chapter 4: It’s time to make a decision.

Late evening.

Restaurant forum.

“Thank you.”

The restaurant owner, who had finished reading, scratched his head as if embarrassed and went down from the podium.

“Uncle! That was really great!”

Kitty, seeing the restaurant owner coming down, ran to him and jumped into his arms.

“Really?”
“Of course!“

Kitty, clinging to him, looked up at the restaurant owner and smiled bashfully.

Kitty had never seen such an excellent student while working as a tutoring part-timer and teaching assistant.

To organize one’s thoughts in a coherent manner and write a text that will remain in people’s memories for a long time. This is quite difficult.

Even with the help of sophisticated modern pedagogy, what’s the use if the student doesn’t have the will? Kitty was just grateful to the restaurant owner for trusting and following her.

The restaurant owner stroked Kitty’s head with his big hand. Very carefully, but enough to be felt.

Kitty closed her eyes and quietly enjoyed the touch. When the audience saw the two of them and smiled quietly, Kitty realized her actions, blushed, and took a few steps back.

Have you ever heard the saying that all humans have a spirit that matches their level?

Kitty just made it up.

After the body was switched, Kitty’s spirit gradually regressed in time to match her age.

Action precedes thought, and impulse precedes system. She became more cheerful and noisy than her original personality.

Kitty tried to restrain herself as much as possible as she became aware of her changes.

However, as the highs and lows of the emotional graph became larger, the door of emotion would open at will without consulting the owner, always making Kitty’s efforts futile.

Kitty was wary of this mental regression and tried not to lose herself.

“Ugh… what am I doing…”
“But it was cute, right? Have a drink.”

But the people around her thought differently.

Some days, she would open her mouth with a gaping look at a loaf of bread thrown by the bakery lady, as if she had gained the world.

But when she went up to the podium or took on the role of chair, such childish aspects disappeared without a trace, and people received an unexplainable tension as if their minds were being seen through.

Kitty’s appearance of tightrope walking between the child state and the wise state was… something indescribable.

She herself disliked such evaluations from the people around her, saying that she was like a multiple personality disorder patient.

Quiet restaurant.

Just an hour ago, it was like a bustling market, but now, only the sound of the restaurant owner washing dishes was heard sporadically.

“Aren’t you going, old man? Old man?”

The restaurant owner, while doing the dishes, spoke to Karmin, who was still there.

Karmin was watching the heart-shaped donuts coming out of Kim Chun-sik’s mouth when he was startled and replied.

“Heh heh… Does the old man’s presence make you uncomfortable?”
“It’s not that… Aren’t your students worried?”
“You don’t have to worry. They’re probably partying without their eccentric teacher.”

At the end of the conversation, he felt a dampness stemming from an unknown sense of loneliness, but the restaurant owner didn’t say anything.

“Ah, yes. Then take your time and go.”

Life is a pyramid, so the closer you get to the apex, the fewer people stand side by side. The restaurant owner decided not to think deeply, presuming that the old man’s loneliness was also of that kind.

“Of course it’s salt on boiled potatoes. That’s the unchanging truth, grandpa.”
“Since you haven’t lived long, your knowledge of gastronomy is as short as your height. Sugar also has a different depth.”
“Isn’t what’s short not my height, but grandpa’s lifeline?”

As he silently did the dishes, the two were having a conversation that was full of elegance.

It was a content that would make outsiders flinch, but since our method of discussion started with slandering the other party, no one thought it was rude as long as it wasn’t crude insults and criticisms.

By the way, I can’t stand it. Everything except ketchup on boiled potatoes is heresy.

“Of course it’s on boiled potatoes… Welcome.”

The restaurant owner’s intrusion was unfortunately thwarted by the guest who just came in.

Discussion is something to do when there’s time left. Since it’s still business hours, the restaurant owner went back to the counter to fulfill his role.

“Is Professor Kitty here?”

Kitty. Kitty Oppenheimer.

It was the name Kim Chun-sik gave himself when he came here. That’s because he couldn’t use the heterogeneous name Kim Chun-sik in a place that uses Western-style names.

Why Oppenheimer of all names?

That’s because the last movie he saw before he died was Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, and Oppenheimer’s wife’s name was Kitty Oppenheimer.

That’s right. It’s a name he just made up without much thought.

“Ah! Yes, that’s me.”

Kitty, who ran over at once at the title of professor, greeted the guest with an excited expression.

Morning when the sun rises.

Kitty was leisurely wandering the streets.

“It’s been a while since I came here.”

Belk, a frontier village, was like a faded old photo due to the fluttering sand dust filter.

Everyone builds the village’s buildings, everyone harvests the fruits, and they share them.

The sticky feeling unique to a small society where consumers and suppliers are ambiguous. Kitty liked it.

In Kim Chun-sik’s world, society was a well-organized coffin that proliferated paranoia.

Kim Chun-sik was always an outsider in both the in-group and the out-group, and he was always ostracized because of his heterogeneous appearance and background.

Relentless nationalism and a dichotomous way of thinking were enough to isolate Kim Chun-sik.

But this place was so different. No one cared whether Kim Chun-sik had meat scraps, mustard stains, or cheese powder, and as long as they fulfilled their obligations as a person, they could get along well whether they were orphans or bastards.

“Hello, Professor!”
“Professor Ki! Do you want to eat this?”
“Thank you always!”

Kitty strolled down the street, reveling in the unfamiliar but not unpleasant sense of incongruity with her whole body.

“Dark circles and dirty eyes… Are you the rumored professor?”

Kitty put down the fruits she received from the greengrocer lady and turned around.

A red jacket, white pants with dust smeared on them, and a hat that was soaring high like a sky-piercing pride.

The man who called out to Kitty was obviously a soldier, and the man briefly showed a face as if he was asking something obvious.

But since it’s mostly not good things when a soldier talks to a civilian, Kitty asked the reason with a bit of wariness.

“No! I didn’t stop you for inspection… I heard that you know everything.”

As much as he volunteered to be an educator because of the regret he couldn’t fulfill in his previous life, a lot of people came to Kitty and asked her questions.

It was the same reason this time too. Kitty let out a hollow laugh with a bit of relief and the impression of “What kind of soldier has such a stupid face.”

“Do you have something to ask?”
“That’s… It might be a bit difficult…”

The soldier carefully pointed to the rifle he was carrying on his back and asked.

“You know what this is, right? As you can see, I’m…”
“Ah, I think I know what you’re going to ask. It’s a problem because it doesn’t fit well, right?”

The soldier’s eyes widened.

“So… You’re as smart as the rumors say. I can see why people call you professor.”

Whether the soldier was surprised or not, Kitty told him to give her the gun hanging on his back for a moment.

Then the soldier hesitated for a moment, but soon made a face like “What the heck” and obediently handed Kitty his weapon.

“I knew it.”

In fact, the accuracy problem was obvious.

In this world where muskets with smoothbore barrels without rifling and directly filled with gunpowder were the trend, it didn’t fit terribly well, just like in the world where Kitty lived.

Kitty skillfully aligned the sights and put her finger in the muzzle to check for rifling.

“As expected… there’s no rifling, and the sights are a mess.”
“Is your father a soldier?”
“I’m an orphan.”
“Ah… I’m, I’m sorry.”

The soldier, who unintentionally committed a rudeness, kept bowing to Kitty.

But Kitty didn’t seem to care.

In fact, she was desperately maintaining a poker face to endure the nausea rising from within.

Gun.

A weapon that anyone can easily take a life if you teach them how to use it, even to a five-year-old kid.

Furthermore, the operation method was not an enlightenment gained after a lot of effort, but just a series of processes of loading – aiming – firing.

Kitty hated that simplicity so much.

But the reason she was explaining it sincerely in this place was because he called Kitty a professor.

The authority of a professor comes from respect. Since he showed her respect first, it was right for Kitty to establish authority.

“Do you have paper and a pen?”
“Huh? Wait, wait a minute.”

A moment later.

The soldier handed Kitty the paper and ink pen he had borrowed from somewhere, breathing heavily.

Kitty, who picked up the pen, immediately began to draw something on the paper.

“Show this to the blacksmith in town and ask him to make it with lead.”
“Huh? What is this… Wait, wait a minute!”

Kitty left the place as if running away, leaving behind the bewildered soldier.