Chapter 25
The second I got home, I dug into every scrap of information I could find about Yu Dohyun. The articles and documents that surfaced were all things I already knew by heart. No matter how legendary he was, time had reduced even him to a footnote—every piece of news about Dohyun was buried in the distant past, gathering digital dust. I skimmed through the same details I’d memorized when I first “possessed” this body, flipping through page after page. I reconfirmed it all: his death at the scene, his body discovered two hours later, the cause of death listed as a sharp weapon.
Then a strange title caught my eye:
<Yu Dohyun’s Death Was Planned.>
I clicked. It was a personal blog, written by what looked like a stubborn conspiracy theorist. Their hobby seemed to be dissecting the deaths of top-ranked Rankers in obsessive, excruciating detail.
***
“Every media outlet and associate claims that Yu Dohyun died saving the life of his housemate, Yu Hyunjae (hereafter referred to as Yu). But I disagree.”
***
The writer’s reasoning went like this: First, Yu Dohyun was far too powerful to die so easily from a common blade. Second, it made no sense for someone as skilled as Dohyun—someone who made a habit of saving others—to leave himself vulnerable because of a single child.
I was about to dismiss it as another baseless conspiracy—until a new detail jumped out at me.
***
“Additionally, we must consider that the person present at the scene was not just Yu, but also—”
***
The writer was dragging out the suspense, hitting the enter key like a cheap thriller novelist. I highlighted the text, my cursor trembling as I reached the end of the dragged section. There, in plain text, was a single sentence:
***
—Yu Dohyun’s younger brother, Yu Chanhee, who had been brought in as a hostage by the assailant, Mr. Kim.
***
My body locked up. My own name stared back at me from the screen.
***
When I first took over this body, the flood of memories had been overwhelming—what we’d eaten for dinner the night before, the performance I’d given at kindergarten graduation, even the scent of the diffuser in my father’s car. But among all these fragments, nothing about Yu Dohyun’s death stood out. I’d assumed it was because, to Yu Chanhee, Dohyun was just a distant, not-particularly-close older brother. As I grew up, this assumption hardened into fact. That was why I could grow closer to Yu Hyunjae, accepting his guilt-ridden kindness without hesitation.
Early in my first life, I had told Hyunjae, “It’s not your fault. My brother’s death wasn’t because of you. It just… happened.” Hyunjae had stared at me for what felt like an eternity, as if trying to peel back the layers of my words to find the truth beneath.
I bolted upright in bed. Then I stormed straight to Hyunjae’s room and threw open the door without knocking. He was sitting at his desk, reading a book—always so predictably boring. I marched over, grabbed his shoulder, and spun him around.
“Yu Hyunjae.”
Hyunjae looked up at me with his usual hollow gaze, not even startled.
“One question.”
“……What?”
“About my brother.”
Hyunjae answered like a machine, devoid of emotion:
“It’s my fault.”
“What?”
“Dohyun died because of me.”
I just stared at him, unable to process it.
“I didn’t ask you to—”
“It had to be.”
Hyunjae seemed slightly uneasy, his fingers tightening around the edge of the desk.
“You said you’d let me stay here.”
I was speechless.
“What more do you want?”
His words left me staring at him for a long, suffocating moment before I finally shook my head weakly.
“Did you really kill him?”
“Yes.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“What does the truth matter?”
“Why doesn’t it matter? I—”
“I decided it. And if you’re pitying me, don’t.”
The conversation spiraled into absurdity. The world was nothing but lies. In the end, all I could do was turn my back on Hyunjae and stumble out of the room like a fool.
Yu Dohyun’s death wasn’t Hyunjae’s fault.
It was… mine.
But why?
Then what the hell was the novel I’d read? In that story, Dohyun had definitely died because of Hyunjae—
***
The only people who knew the exact details of what happened were Yu Hyunjae, the pre-possession Yu Chanhee, and—if I had to add one more—the perpetrator’s son, Han Jaemin. But asking Han Jaemin anything came with far too much risk. And Hyunjae was out of the question.
A word suddenly flashed in my mind:
Necromancy.
The protagonist of that scene was undoubtedly Yu Dohyun. And since the pre-possession Yu Chanhee had been collaborating with Han Jaemin to summon him, the results would come soon. I knew what happened to those who summoned the undead—forbidden rituals always demanded a price. In the novel, Yu Chanhee had been absorbed into a Gate only the dead could enter. Throughout my nine previous lives, I’d fought desperately to avoid that fate.
“Hah…”
The laughter that had been building in my chest finally spilled out, raw and bitter.
“This is so fucking funny…”
If I’d just done as I was told from the start, I wouldn’t have had to die so many times. Instead, I’d thrashed around, clinging to survival, even ending up in some stupid romance with Hyunjae. Truly, the most useless deaths in the world. No one else would ever die ten times for something that could have been settled in one.
My phone buzzed on the table beside me. The preview showed a message from Han Jaemin:
***
[Han Jaemin]: How’s it going?]
[Han Jaemin]: You feeling the high?]
[Han Jaemin]: Or did you actually turn brain-dead?]
***
I picked up my phone and replied:
***
[Me]: Should I apologize to my brother if I see him?]
[Han Jaemin]: LOL, you’re insane.]
***
His next message made me laugh again, sharp and humorless:
***
[Han Jaemin]: You gonna say sorry after killing him?]
***
See? I told you I did it.
Han Jaemin’s mockery didn’t even sting anymore. In this rigged story, he wasn’t the worst villain. I almost pitied him.
As if sensing my thoughts, Han Jaemin sent a few more photos:
***
[Han Jaemin]: Who’s this?]
***
I recognized the slightly blurry subject of the candid shot immediately. Han Jaemin didn’t seem to expect an answer, talking to himself:
***
[Han Jaemin]: When did he learn martial arts? So cheeky.]
***
In the photo, Hyunjae was smiling as he petted the head of a child holding a puppy. It had been so long since I’d seen him smile like that. Ignoring the incoming messages, I stared at the image. That hand had once rested gently on my head, calling me Chanhee with a warmth that made my chest ache. He had been my only ally, the person I’d loved.
Now, as the owner of this original sin, all I could do was stare at this photo of Hyunjae until death claimed me. A bitter, choking resentment clawed its way up my throat. I didn’t do anything wrong. But I also knew I had no right to feel that way. I’d worn the skin of Yu Chanhee to be with Hyunjae. Even if I were given another chance to return to my original self, to leave this world behind, I couldn’t bring myself to leave him.
As I thought this, everything left to me felt like a lie. The things I hadn’t done, this body that wasn’t mine, the fate I couldn’t change, and even the love I’d wanted to embrace—none of it was truly mine. I was a person so drenched in falsehood and hypocrisy that if you scrubbed it all away, not even bones would remain.
Slowly, I saved the photo. Hyunjae’s face appeared at the very top of my nearly empty gallery. I sat there, crouched on the floor, staring at that single image all day long.
