Chapter 175

The Dan Haru in front of me was definitely not the that Dan Haru I knew.

You could say he looked like the Dan Haru I knew now, aged about 10 years, having taken the full beating of life's weathering and weariness across his whole body.

By feel alone, he looked very close to the "earliest timeline" Dan Haru I'd once seen.

"Ha. Fuck. How did my life end up saddled with this kind of fantasy hashtag…."

It feels like only yesterday I was thinking at least I'd gotten lucky it wasn't a #hunter story — with monsters, you can at least beat them into the ground. This thing though — a formless scrap of 0-and-1 data thrashing around trying to become human — I can't even beat the crap out of it. Genuinely a bind.

While I sat on the bed clutching my head in frustration, Retty — wearing Dan Haru's shell — walked slowly over and perched on the desk. Then he smiled and spoke to me.

"Relax. I only borrowed the appearance briefly so I could talk with you."

"You're not human, so maybe you don't know, but when you kidnap someone, hold them prisoner, and then start talking at them, that's called intimidation, not conversation."

"Aw, come on. Even if I did threaten you, you wouldn't listen."

Retty flashed a skin-crawling smile, red eyes shining.

Living long enough, apparently a day does come when Dan Haru's face gives you the chills.

Honestly, the person giving me the biggest chills in the middle of all this was me — spouting these calm, unbothered running commentaries. That I was slowly adapting to this genre was another thing that pissed me off.

"So — what conversation did you want to have? Let's hear it."

There was no way out of here on the spot anyway, so — figuring I might as well see what garbage he came out with — I asked Retty. Retty slowly opened his mouth.

"Hajin. Do you hate regression?"

"If it were you — worked hard your whole life, got it all rolled back, ended up staring down doing military service three times — you'd be happy about it?"

"Ha ha. Don't lie. You didn't work hard."

This punk—?

"I asked you last time, right? Should I put things back the way they were? You couldn't answer, could you, Hajin?"

At that punchable smug smile, I couldn't come up with a comeback, which pissed me off.

As I ground my teeth, Retty's words continued.

"Hajin. You should be grateful to me."

"……."

"Getting swept into regressions is what flipped that trash-heap of a life of yours 180 degrees around. Am I wrong?"

"……."

"I don't get why you leave out everything you gained from this and cast me — only me — as the villain. I'm not the enemy. Not to Haru, and not to you."

I'm just giving you the chance to choose.

The whispered voice was straight out of a devil's mouth, I thought.

Retty pointed at the small, narrow single bed I was sitting on and said:

"If it weren't for me — if there'd been no regression — how would this version of you have ended up loved by so many people and debuting as an idol?"

Unfortunately, before I could even get to the debut, my life's genre was mid-drift into fantasy horror.

Impressed all over again by Retty's exceptional talent — clear from last time — for hitting people right where it hurts, I asked:

"…did you gaslight Dan Haru like this too?"

"Gaslighting, please. We just struck a deal."

"If the price is taking Dan Haru's body, that's human trafficking. You know that?"

"I gave Haru options. Haru's the one who chose. I don't see why you're throwing a fit."

The expression on the Dan Haru face Retty was wearing turned cold in an instant.

Those always-sparkling eyes with not a trace of life in them somehow sent an actual chill through me.

Forcing my stiffening facial muscles to move, I said:

"So? What can you actually do to me? From last time till now, all you've done is run your mouth — you haven't done a thing. Unless you're planning to possess Dan Haru's body and come at me with a knife, there's nothing about you for me to be scared of."

"Mm. That is scary. Maybe I should give that method some thought."

"This sociopath punk is announcing intent to murder now, straight to a person's face."

Thirteen, please. What are you doing, not showing up at a time like this.

Thinking that at any rate these damn Time Administrators were no help at all to my Fixed Regressor life, I kept my guard up against Retty. Apparently he'd picked up that I was scared — Retty burst out in a mocking laugh and stepped slowly toward me.

"You said what's messing you up is constantly getting regressed, right? So how about this? I'll erase every timeline you've regressed through. And you go back to being twenty-nine-year-old loser Kang Hajin."

"……."

"No fans loving you, no cool Comrades. In exchange — no regression, and you don't have to see me anymore either. Well? You don't like that one, do you? You want the regressions to stop, but tossing out Kairos Kang Hajin is a waste."

"……."

"If you don't like that, I've got another offer."

Coming right up to my face and crouching down, Retty — with a bright smile — pitched it.

"You just let me finish my deal with Dan Haru cleanly."

"……."

"I made a deal with 'Selected Regressor' Dan Haru. When it's all over, the 'Selected Regressor' Dan Haru personality gets snuffed out, and I take over Dan Haru's body — with only his base personality left. To use your word for it, possession."

"……."

"Which means the Selected Regressor Dan Haru timelines that got you tangled up in this will all naturally vanish — so you won't have to keep repeating regressions along with him anymore."

You get to live as Kairos-Kang-Hajin, and you never have to fear regression again.

"What's precious to you is Dan Haru anyway — not the 'Selected Regressor.' You've never even met that side of him, have you?"

"…that doesn't exactly make you more precious to me either, though."

"Even if I possess this body, what you'll see is just Dan Haru. Nothing changes."

"……."

"Don't play the nice guy, Hajin. Just think about what's good for you."

In that instant, those unusually dead-fish-glassy eyes shifted back to the ones I knew.

In front of me now was the that Dan Haru I knew, looking at me with a sparkling smile.

"Hajin-hyung. Choose me."

What does some Selected Regressor personality you don't even know matter?

Just as I was starting to get seriously worn down by him even mimicking that trademark carefree-sounding voice —

behind the Dan Haru — no, the Retty — looking at me, something glinted.

…what?

Beyond Retty was our plain old front door. The navy-blue steel door the whole family had hand-painted to save money when we first moved in.

Above that door — familiar enough that I sometimes even saw it in dreams — something wildly out of place was faintly glowing.

〈☆★EXIT☆★〉

Why is something like that stuck above our front door?

The moment I saw that jarringly-out-of-place sign, I realized where it was I was trapped.

And what this queasy, unpleasant motion sickness churning in my gut actually was.

"…yeah, no wonder. For this kind of situation, I was way too fine."

Retty — who'd been threatening me with every option in the book — froze at my words.

I flipped the middle finger, once again, at Retty — who'd been putting so much work into using Dan Haru's face to sweet-talk me around.

"Fuck off. Dumbass."

With that, I shoved Retty away with everything I had and immediately bolted for the front door.

"Ack, fuck! Please, pick just one genre!"

Apparently he'd caught on to my plan — the front door, a moment ago right in my face, suddenly stretched way farther away, and all kinds of obstacles started popping up.

At the same time, certain now that this was the "Unconscious Space," I ran for the front door, vaulting over and dodging all sorts of walls and obstacles rising up from the ground and shooting in from the sides.

"You think I got my nickname wall-vaulting champion for nothing— ack!"

Now some ball had come rolling in trying to knock me over — I jumped clear of it on superhuman reflexes and kept moving. The closer I got, the bigger the 〈☆★EXIT☆★〉 letters grew, the blue light shining more intensely.

Certain that was Thirteen's mark, I threw my whole body forward and grabbed the door handle.

"I don't understand. Why won't you accept it? It's a reasonable offer."

Behind me, Retty's voice — crackling with static, oddly distorted — came flying in.

I threw the door open without so much as a look back.

"You think people are machines? Weighing things out gram by gram like a scale before doing anything?"

That's why you're 0s and 1s, punk.

As I said it and stepped out through the door, a sensation like being sucked in somewhere enveloped my whole body.

When I opened my eyes again —

"……."

Ding—

"Hyung, aren't you coming in?"

In front of me wasn't that lunatic psychopath, but the real Dan Haru.

"…Hajin-hyung?"

Looking at Dan Haru — blinking those wide round eyes as if asking what was wrong — felt slightly unreal.

I quickly took in my surroundings, then pulled out my phone to check the time.

It had felt like I'd wrestled with Retty inside the Unconscious Space for ages, but in reality only a few minutes seemed to have passed. Once I'd confirmed the time and date checked out, I called Kim Wonho straight away.

—…hello?

"Kim Wonho. When did we say we were grabbing that meal?"

—That? Day after tomorrow. Why the sudden ask?

"Nothing. I was heading over near Lime Ent, right?"

—Yeah. I've got lessons that day, so you said you'd come by this way. Why. Something up?

"No, nothing. Just couldn't remember. Bye. See you day after tomorrow."

—Huh? Yeah, sure…. see you then.

Just in case, I made sure even Kim Wonho's timeline was intact before I hung up.

I was a little worried about the Park Sangyul kid too, but I could check on that later through Mom….

For now — nothing had happened.

"Hyung, are you meeting up with Wonho-hyung? Ohh. Can I go too?"

Just as I was hanging up and letting out a sigh of relief, Dan Haru — the root cause of every incident, and yet without a single clue about any of it — came fluttering over to me.

I stared down at Sparkles — who gave off a distinctly different vibe from the version I'd been looking at just moments ago.

"…gwah! whad ah oo doin, seewiousy!!!"

When I abruptly pinched that soft cheek hard, Dan Haru flailed, stomping his feet to try to pry my arm off.

Mm. Definitely back to reality.

The reaction confirmed this was the Sparkles I knew, and yet somehow I couldn't shake the annoyance — so I put just a little more force than usual into the pinch before I let go.

"Dan Haru."

"Huh?"

I wanted to demand what the hell he'd been thinking, making a deal with a sociopath punk like that, but Dan Haru was looking up at me with wide, know-nothing eyes. Looking at that face, all the fight went right out of me, so I just grabbed Dan Haru's shoulder and headed into the corner store.

"…forget it. No point saying anything to you."

"iit huts…."

"I'll buy you ice cream."

"I don't want any. I already had some earlier."

"Then pick out some snacks."

"Yesss!"

Whining and clutching his stinging cheek, Dan Haru let me steer him into the corner store.

While Dan Haru grabbed a toothbrush in three seconds and spent three minutes picking out snacks, all kinds of thoughts were piling up in my head.

"Hyung! I'm done picking."

"…you eat all that, your teeth really will rot."

"That's why I bought the toothbrush!"

I gave a lazy nod to Dan Haru — arms full of a whole haul of snacks — and off he went to the counter, humming a tra-la-la tune.

Pulling out my wallet to pay, I thought back to the last thing Retty had said to me right before I left the Unconscious Space.

—Would you still say that if a real problem hit your life? Would you still be able to push my hand away then?

Leaving behind Retty's question — one that stirred up a whole lot of thoughts — I stepped out of the corner store with Dan Haru.

After that, contrary to my worry, nothing happened.

We were able to wrap up our peaceful, fun overnight bonding get-together as originally planned,

and on the last day of vacation, as promised, I met up with Kim Wonho outside Lime Entertainment as he wrapped up practice and came out. Somehow the plans for that day kept snowballing, until it wasn't just me and Kim Wonho but a full group hangout with Lee Doha, Gong Seok, Yoon Taehee, plus Dan Haru and Ju Eunchan.

And then, at last, on the first day the whole vacation ended and we entered the dorm as Kairos —

I understood what Retty's parting words had meant.

Penalty — 〈Butterfly Effect〉 activating. title: My dreams and my whole life have been trampled because of Kang Hajin — Kairos Kang Hajin character exposé — Miro Maze

"They really won't give a person a moment to breathe, huh."

Karma-clearing time had come.