# Chapter 150
At first, he denied it. There was no way he would do this. There must have been some mistake.
Then he was dumbfounded. By the fact that he had left him at home, broken the door lock, and somehow escaped by himself.
Finally, he got angry. If there was some reason to confine him temporarily, he could have explained and persuaded him beforehand, but instead he was telling ridiculous lies.
Throughout all this, he still thought there must have been some unavoidable reason, but what was wrong was wrong. Hiding his agitation and pretending not to know anything, he raised his voice and asked Taesung.
“This is a problem… Do you think we need to replace the whole thing?”
—Probably. It’s not working at all.
“Hmm, I see.”
Apart from the quite shocking situation, honestly, he didn’t feel threatened at all. Lee Hwan lightly touched the handle.
‘Did he really think I’d just stay put and rest?’
It was a cute, petty trick that relied entirely on his goodwill. There was no way an ordinary door lock could stop him.
—…Lee Hwan, Joo Lee Hwan.
As if sensing something, Taesung’s call suddenly came through the receiver. Lee Hwan half-listened, extending his idle left hand to grab the handle and applying gentle force.
Crack- crunch- clunk!
Clang, ting…
The door lock handle bent and completely detached. Lee Hwan threw the broken handle on the floor and peeled away the circular lock of the entrance with his hand, smirking.
“Good thing there’s another one on the first floor, right?”
If that one didn’t open either, he’d just break it too. Lee Hwan muttered inwardly, listening to the silence on the other end of the phone, then abruptly hung up and walked out.
The March air was cold and chilly, with the grass still yellowed and dead. Lee Hwan passed trees with scattered new buds emerging and immediately caught a bus heading home.
Despite it being a weekday afternoon, the streets were full of people walking around. Well-paved roads, buildings tall enough to pierce the sky, vitality overflowing everywhere…
Lee Hwan stared blankly out the window, unconsciously counting in his head. One, two, three… Even past fifty and beyond a hundred, there was no sign or attack of monsters. People were still bustling noisily around the city.
It felt strange. It was as if he alone had been ejected from that scene. Lee Hwan closed his eyes for a long time and opened them again, trying hard to savor the energy of others.
The world was so peaceful, but his insides were too noisy. Still, when the wind brushed his hair, he unconsciously clenched his fists. When the bus stopped with a hissing sound, he instinctively designated a space, then startled and quickly released it.
After repeating this four or five times, he was finally able to reach his familiar neighborhood, which looked more shabby and empty. Seeing the empty streets, his mind calmed down somewhat.
As his tense nerves settled, he thought about the entrance he had broken through. Lee Hwan pouted and thought about Taesung.
What was that guy thinking? Why did he keep trying to detain him, doing something he’d never done before?
It was somewhat understandable if he was worried because the situation right before the regression had been so desperate, but if that was the case, Lee Hwan should have been more anxious.
Remembering Taesung’s face soaked in blood at the last moment still sent chills down his spine. Just the thought that he might never see him again made it hard to breathe.
‘He’s lost it.’
His fingertips started to tremble slightly. Lee Hwan firmly clenched his fist, applying strong pressure to his hand, then hurriedly took in the intact outside scenery.
The world is now fine. Taesung is safe too. So safe that he was even telling ridiculous lies until just a moment ago.
That thought seemed to be effective as his heartbeat slowly subsided. By the time he got off at his destination, Lee Hwan finally reached the point where he didn’t flinch at bus sounds.
‘I should… check up on my past activities when I get there.’
Seven years ago, Lee Hwan had quit the university he’d been repeatedly taking leaves from due to tuition issues. It was thanks to becoming a “Mana Reactor,” someone who didn’t get addicted to the mana inside gates.
Mana Reactors could handle all the trivial tasks related to gates, such as cleaning up monster corpses after Awakened people passed through, collecting byproducts from gates, or performing tasks at research facilities.
Though they were more numerous than Awakened people, it wasn’t a common constitution, so it was almost like winning an instant lottery jackpot.
Lee Hwan wasn’t one to miss an opportunity. He snagged one of the most prestigious jobs a Mana Reactor could get within the shortest period.
Getting hired at Naru’s support team, one of Korea’s top companies!
If he had family to congratulate him, that evening would have probably been a Korean beef bulgogi party. Unfortunately, Lee Hwan was alone, but he did cook soy sauce marinated beef with imported meat. He marinated the meat with especially expensive kiwi, making it melt in his mouth.
That had happened at the beginning of the year, so it was quite close to March now.
‘Wait, come to think of it, my start date…’
The first day of work, the greatest celebration of his life, was still firmly etched in his mind. Lee Hwan’s steps halted abruptly. He quickly pulled out his phone to check the date again: March 9.
‘The start date is… the 15th.’
Lee Hwan silently counted the days with a face that couldn’t decide whether this was good or bad.
‘Hmm… I don’t plan on becoming a supporter again anyway.’
It felt quite strange and unsettling to let go of an opportunity he had struggled so hard to secure in the past. If his past self had known about this, he would probably have punched someone with rage.
Of course, he knew that relying on Taesung’s wealth was a thousand, ten thousand times better than entering somewhere as a new employee, but…
‘That guy seems a bit strange right now.’
Though he didn’t think his intentions came from a bad place, the anxiety that kept churning inside him was unavoidable. Thinking that stability really does come from money, Lee Hwan unconsciously recalled his bank balance from this period.
It was just then, as Lee Hwan had reached the alley in front of his house and was standing frozen for a while, that the sound of footsteps in dress shoes echoed from the direction of his home.
As Lee Hwan snapped to attention and turned his head, a man in a formal suit walked out from the curved road. He was a middle-aged man with a neat crew cut and dark sunglasses.
“Why did you stop coming…”
He muttered, seemingly for Lee Hwan to hear. Is he talking to me? Lee Hwan turned around needlessly, only to realize that the only people here were himself and the man with sunglasses.
No matter how you looked at him, he seemed like a suspicious character. Though he couldn’t read his expression since his eyes were completely covered, that made him appear even more dangerous.
Moreover, the aura he gave off was somewhat unusual. Though he wasn’t going around reading other people’s energy like some martial arts master, he could sense that the man before him wasn’t someone to be trifled with.
Why had he been waiting at someone else’s house? Why was he standing firm like that? Should he fight, or should he run? After a brief hesitation, Lee Hwan slightly twisted the space at the man’s feet, and the man stopped with ghost-like awareness and spoke again.
“Keep. Keep walking this way. I won’t eat you, so stop that beaming with your eyes.”
His tone suggested he had known about such tricks all along.
Damn it. Indeed, glowing eyes were disadvantageous in combat against people. It was good to subdue ordinary guys with sheer presence, but this man didn’t look like some random thug.
The only fortunate thing was that instead of rushing at him or spewing curses, he spoke quite politely with formal speech.
“Who are you?”
Lee Hwan asked cautiously, assessing the atmosphere, to which the man shrugged slightly with a calm face, not even raising an eyebrow.
His heart sank a little. If someone had come looking for him knowing about the regression, what should he do? Could he still make a run for it? Just as Lee Hwan was tensing up.
“I was sent by Mr. Kang Taesung. Please don’t be on guard.”
An unexpected name came from the man’s lips. Lee Hwan finally understood roughly how the situation was unfolding and frowned deeply.
“…Kang Taesung? Are you here to capture and confine me?”
“Well, I didn’t hear anything like that. The young master says he has something to explain.”
Before he could even get angry, he was momentarily stunned by the unfamiliar term.
“Young master…”
Right. Come to think of it, that guy was a wealthy young master. Though he was somewhat on the periphery, he was part of the Naru family, and the place he lived was a penthouse in an expensive neighborhood.
Feeling awkward anew, Lee Hwan stopped in his tracks again. Since the regression, his mood had been constantly unsettled. It felt like things almost fit but were slightly off.
“If he has something to explain, he should have come himself.”
“It seems he still has things to take care of. But anyway, he’ll be here soon.”
Lee Hwan pressed his temple with his fist and sighed deeply as he looked at the man. Seeing how he kept saying “young master” while relaying messages, it seemed that Taesung had someone like a secretary during this period.
Moreover, he didn’t seem like just an office worker. When the thought occurred that he might have been quite close to Taesung in a past he didn’t know about, he couldn’t bring himself to treat him disrespectfully, even if he was upset.
He knew Taesung would come looking for him anyway. He had thought that he would try out his skills, trace his past memories, wait, and Taesung would appear with an explanation on his own. Now that he had a tail, even if he couldn’t use his skills, he had to wait for Taesung from now on.
In the meantime, it felt a bit wrong to just leave the man, who looked over ten years older than him, standing alone on the street. He wasn’t just anyone, but someone related to Taesung.
“Haah… I won’t run away, so you can stop looking at me like that.”
Even though his eyes were hidden by dark sunglasses, Lee Hwan felt like he knew what kind of gaze the man was giving him. It gave him a headache.
“If we’re going to wait anyway, why don’t you come inside and wait?”
“…Hmm.”
At Lee Hwan’s suggestion, the sunglasses man’s eyebrows twitched as if it was unexpected. It seemed like a briefly incomprehensible expression.
“If he sent you to do something so trivial, you must be one of Kang Taesung’s people. He wouldn’t make you do anything dangerous.”
It was an act based on his trust in Taesung. It was quite ironic that he still trusted him after running away because of his strange behavior.
In addition, if there was one more reason he had let a stranger into his home, it was largely due to a strange intuition. The man might be dangerous, but he didn’t seem like someone who would harm him. For some reason, that’s just how it felt.
So Lee Hwan loosened his guard somewhat and walked past the sunglasses man toward the entrance. After unlocking the door and entering, he could feel the man quietly following behind him.
Would there be tea in the house? No, forget tea, there probably wasn’t anything to eat. Lee Hwan imagined steeping cup ramen powder like a tea bag in water and handing it to the man as he removed his shoes by using one foot to push off the heel of the other.
And just as he was about to enter the room.
Sssip, there was a short sound of someone inhaling at the nape of his neck. Lee Hwan immediately hunched his neck and turned around with a surprised face.
‘What the hell… Did he just smell me?’
The man’s face was still composed. The front door closed with a click behind him.
It was so absurd that he couldn’t even protest. The man made a small tsk sound as Lee Hwan stood there with his mouth agape.
“Tsk… He said there shouldn’t be a sweet scent.”
Lee Hwan suddenly began to regret his decision to let this strange person into his home.
