Chapter 671

Yuna opened her eyes as her right leg flinched. She had a dream where she ran to her heart’s content until she slipped, but the place she slipped turned out to be right in front of a cliff. Was she about to grow taller[1]? She rubbed her arms, which had gotten gooseb.u.mps. There was the freaky dream, but there was also the air conditioning within the train that was pretty chilly. She sighed a little and looked next to her. Maru-s...o...b..e was sleeping with his arms crossed.

“s...o...b..e, are you asleep?” she called out in a small voice.

There was no reply. The man sitting to her right seemed to be dreaming as he widened his legs while licking his lips. Yuna was pushed towards Maru a little. She was able to see her s...o...b..e’s face - his eyelashes that protruded out of his closed eyes, clearly. Yuna looked at his face for a while. He had a cold-looking impression when he had his eyes open, but he looked much softer when he had his eyes closed. Perhaps the reason he looked so cold was because of his eyes.

Maru-s...o...b..e, who was sleeping soundly, suddenly frowned. Was he having a bad dream? Looking at his face, she felt worried. He lowered his head even further and curled up his body. He seemed cold. If he was having a nightmare, she thought that she should wake him up. Yuna touched Maru’s shoulders. Tap, tap. She tapped his shoulder a few times, but he did not open his eyes. The sound of stale breathing came out of his mouth. Yuna lowered her head and checked his face. Fortunately, his frowning face had returned to normal. It seemed that he was cold due to the air conditioner as well.

-This stop is….

Yuna opened her bag that she placed on her lap. Although it was summer, she had brought a cardigan because she thought that it might get cold during the night. She took out her cardigan and covered Maru’s back.

“The air conditioner is too strong.”

Yuna crossed her arms and kept rubbing them. The words ‘air conditioned carriage’ on the sticker on the door opposite her looked rather mean.

* * *

Warning: Gore, Depression

-How many times, huh. Well, then. How many times indeed.

The masked man’s voice was devoid of any vitality. His cheerful hands had calmly sunk into his lap and the shoulders he jerked every time he spoke looked like they were fixed in position. He put his mask back on again.

-Talking face to face is a little uncomfortable after all, right?

“Just what are you?”

-Don’t you have the answer already? But let me introduce myself anyway, shall I? Greetings, my name is Han Maru. However, this is all meaningless. You will end up forgetting this anyway.

“I’m aware that my memories are becoming blurry. But this isn’t right. My memories aren’t fading out, they’re changing. And what are you? Why are you inside me? Does the personality split if you get another chance at life?”

-If it’s now, I can tell you about the things I am not allowed to, so let me answer your questions. First, I’ll tell you the same thing I said just now for your first question. Greetings, my name is Han Maru. As for the reason I’m inside you, I don’t really know either. That’s because I also don’t know why I remain. And lastly, it’s not that your personality was divided.

The masked man stopped and tapped on his mask before speaking with a rather prankster voice.

-Strictly speaking, you can consider me closer to the original.

“Original?”

-Yes. I’m saying that I’m closer to being the first one. I’m not saying that I am the original. Mr. Han Maru - that is, you and I - has experienced several deaths. Every time we experienced death, our memories were reset to a certain point as though we’ve gone back in time for the first time. I was like that as well. I first started off living with the memories that I’ve gone back in time before I got hit by a car. In other words, there have been several deaths before me as well.

“Did you hold a conversation like we’re doing now too?”

The masked man shook his head.

-In my case, I didn’t have an ‘inner ego’ to speak of. In fact, there was nothing. I only did acting based on experience.

“Then why are you inside me?”

-That, I don’t know either. However, I can tell you some things for sure. My memories were cut off the moment I became aware of my death. According to the sequence until now, I should have started another life with the memories of an actor in his thirties who died in a traffic accident, but without the memories of the life before it, and I would think that it’s my first time going back in time. However, something interesting happened. I was inside a Han Maru who started a new life. Of course, back then, I wasn’t in a state where I could speak or even be conscious. I was like a c.o.c.kroach. A trivial being that lives in hiding inside the house known as Han Maru. I could not speak nor think properly. The only thing I could do was one thing - to view the new life of Han Maru as a third person.

Maru saw through the point of his words immediately. He asked the important question,

“How many times have you seen it? Just how many Han Marus were there that started anew?”

-Twenty-one times.

“Twenty-one?”

-Yes. You are the twenty-first. Until now, Han Maru - though it’s kinda funny to say your own name like it’s a stranger’s - anyway, I quietly watched the life of the Han Maru who began a new life. It was a curious experience. The characters in it are the same. It’s the writer who changes every time.

The masked man raised his head. His eyes were directed at the ceiling lights above.

-The first and the seventh Han Maru lived a surprisingly similar life. Oh, the thirteenth and the fifteenth was like that too. Both of them wedded the woman they loved, had a child, and died on their children’s first birthday. When they died, they were guided to begin anew. I kept watching the process without missing a single thing.

“That sounds horrific.”

-Yes, it was horrific indeed. I couldn’t even begin to imagine who or what was doing such a terrible deed with what kind of intentions.

“From the moment you started remembering the first life, you remember all of the lives of Han Maru that have died? Not missing a single one?”

The masked man said ‘yes’ in a small voice. Maru groaned. What would it feel like to watch his own life in third person? It definitely wouldn’t be a good experience.

“Do you share the sensations as well? I mean like the five senses.”

-If that was the case, I would probably have been trying hard to commit suicide even now. Interestingly, I became a totally separate third person and watched my death. It was like watching a movie. A life began, ended, and then began anew. In that process, the twenty-plus Han Marus lived without even suspecting the fact that it was their first revival.

“In terms of time, then….”

-It should be meaningless, but I’ve lived here for at least 300 years. Among them were Han Marus who lived until forty-four. But all Han Marus did not live past forty-five. Forty-five, I also tried hypothesizing the meaning behind this number and…

“The first Han Maru that died probably died at forty-five. Considering that none after that could break that barrier.”

-I thought of something similar. You are Han Maru after all, huh, as I am.

The masked man smiled bitterly.

“Can you tell me about those that died before?”

-If it’s now, it’s not too hard. Hm, the ninth should be interesting. The ninth Han Maru died of overexhaustion. Work stress, frequent overtime work drove him to have a heart attack. He fell on his desk and died just like that. He was found the next day by another employee. The tenth Han Maru, who remembered that life, abandons the route of being a salaryman and turns his eyes to self-employment. He worked as a blue-collar to save up money and opened his own store. He seemed to do well after marrying the woman he loved until his store went out of business. He became homeless and worked unstable, daily jobs until he eventually died at Seoul station. The last thing he did was to send his wife money. What he saw as he died were other homeless people looking at him from a corner as though he was a nuisance. Like that, the eleventh life begins. The eleventh Han Maru. In the memories of the eleventh Han Maru, the memories of the death of the ninth Han Maru do not exist. The only thing the eleventh Han Maru remembers is the tragic death of the tenth life as well as the self-employment that led to it. What do you think he did then? He studied hard, went to college, and got employed by a super company. He gets married to the girl he loves, has a child, and strives towards the middle point of his life until he dies due to a traffic accident. He was driving slowly in the 2nd lane, but a drunk truck driver crashed into him from all the way on the other side of the road. His torso breaks right through the windscreen, kisses the front of the truck killing him instantly. During the twelfth life, the new Han Maru does not choose to be a salaryman and walks the path of an actor through a background actor part time job he chanced upon.

“But he must have died eventually as well, huh.”

-Yes. He dies two months after he gets married. The reason for his death? He slipped[2].

“The cause of the death is not consistent.”

-There is a lot, but most of the time, it’s traffic accidents. The second most frequent is illness.

Maru breathed out faintly. He felt like something important that made up his body was slipping away along with his breath. He wanted to believe that the masked man was lying. He wanted to believe that this entire situation was an illusion created by his brain. It would have been much easier if it wasn’t true. He really had the urge to deny everything, but his head, his heart, and a mysterious something that transcended the judgemental powers of his brain, all whispered to him that the masked man’s words were nothing but the truth. Prediction, premonition, hypothesis, intuition - everything indicated that this situation was indeed true.

A life that was repeated twenty one times, or even more. A life that was moving around like a hamster wheel was no different from punishment. Maru wanted to know why such a thing happened to him.

-Oh, no. Time’s up. It’s time to part.

“Wait! I still have more to ask!”

Maru saw cracks appearing on the stage around him. Light seeped in through the cracks. The dark stage became brighter.

-Don’t worry too much. If you don’t know it, there will be no pain either. Once you leave this place, you will forget everything. Everything down to the fact that your life has been repeating. You’re returning to the lucky child who received another chance at life. Nothing changes for you.

“Just because I’m not aware of it doesn’t mean that the terrible thing disappears!”

-Yes, that is true, too. I’m experiencing that very thing myself. But what can I do? I don’t know how this all started nor how to end all this.

“Was it because of the desire to live again? If that’s the case, why is it me who got this opportunity? Before that!” Maru shouted as he resisted the force that pulled him back.

“Who is that woman that guided me? What’s up with the woman who told me that I was given the opportunity to live again? Is she G.o.d? Is she the G.o.d that planned out this G.o.dd.a.m.ned life?”

At that moment, a white rabbit jumped in through one of the cracks. Maru looked into the rabbit’s eyes. All the sadness of the world was contained in its eyes. The rabbit hopped onto the masked man’s shoulder. The masked man slowly took off his mask. He was faintly smiling.

-Looks like time will tick faster. Thanks to that, I think I can tell you a few more things. First up, I actually know the reason why all of this started. This little rabbit, she told me everything. However, just because I know, it doesn’t change much.

She - the masked man pointed at the rabbit on his shoulder.

-Second. I said this the last time we met, but don’t hate her too much. She should have spent even more despairing times than you and I did.

“She? Who’s she!”

-The woman you’ll love forever.

“Hey! Han Maru!”

Maru was pulled back. His feet were lifted into the air and his body started heading towards the ceiling. Amidst the collapsing stage, the masked man was waving his hand. The rabbit on his shoulder was gone.

-It will be our first meeting again the next time we meet, right? It was nice knowing you, Mr. Han Maru. The twenty-first you was very special.

At the same time the masked man said those words, the world split apart.

* * *

Having opened his eyes, Maru placed his hand on his shoulder. He touched an unfamiliar cardigan. When he looked next to him, he saw Yuna dozing off. There was no way a stranger put this on him, so this cardigan should belong to Yuna.

He was smiling due to her kindness when he felt an aching sensation around his heart. The chest pain wasn’t that serious, so he became okay after taking a deep breath once. The images he saw in the dream came to his mind along with that pain, but he couldn’t understand the meaning of any of it. He tried his best to connect the fragmented memories together, but they were blown away the moment he heard an announcement.

“That’s what happens with dreams, I guess.”

Maru crossed his arms while yawning.

[1] There’s a myth in Korea that dreaming about falling off will make you grow taller.

[2] Korea cla.s.sifies a lot of things as ‘slipping to death’. You might have fallen off a high place. You might have slipped and fell into a body of water and drowned, or simply slipped and hit your head on a bad place. All of these are cla.s.sified as ‘slipping to death’. The specific reason for the twelfth Maru’s death is not mentioned.

KTLChamber"s Thoughts

Gosh, why did it have to be my birthday when I translated this (by the time it becomes available for even sponsors, it would be long past my birthday so don"t bother congratulating me)

Editor"s Note:

Wow that was depressing. He"s forgetting absolutely everything.

It is interesting that a couple of chapters ago when he was experiencing flashbacks, those are the lives covered by the Masked Man. All the details match.

Plus, it is not explained why the Masked Man told Maru to not hate her so much. It is guaranteed Gaeul who caused this entire situation. But that brings up the truly horrid point. Gaeul has seen the love of her life die *more than 20* times, stuck in an unending loop. Hopefully, the special quirks of this 21st loop can end the misery for them both.