Novelist Running Through Time-Chapter 160

TL: KSD

That night, I couldn’t fall asleep easily.

Embarrassingly enough, it wasn’t because I was worried about the kids running toward their grueling paths.

It was just… the group dormitory I hadn’t used in so long was uncomfortable. As a former resident of New Light Spring Orphanage, this was embarrassing.

Throughout my adolescence, living in the orphanage and dormitories, I never had a personal space of my own. I always slept in a group dormitory, surrounded by the sound of others snoring and breathing, in a space filled with unfamiliar sweat smells.

I had a childish sense of pride for having endured such an environment. A pride that said, “I can sleep comfortably anywhere. I’m different from you pampered kids.”

But after earning some money and living in my own studio, I was now too bothered by the sound of others breathing in the same sleeping space. The blanket wasn’t mine, and the snoring of some nameless kid buzzed in my ears.

“……”

I had given up on sleep that night.

EP 10 – Starry Sky

Feeling like a monkey accustomed to wearing flowered shoes, I carefully stepped out of the dormitory.

The pitch-black night sky, the cool evening air, and the bronze-colored streetlights greeted me.

It was the perfect night for a cigarette.

“Whew…”

But I had no cigarette to light up. The only thing escaping my mouth was a sigh. The chirping of crickets was the only sound filling the air.

I bought a can of coffee at the dorm entrance and plopped down on a bench under the streetlight.

Only after sitting down did I notice something belatedly, the swarm of insects rushing toward the streetlight.

“Ptuh…”

I spat out, thinking they might get into my mouth, but I didn’t go out of my way to flee from the insects.

It was the shock of realizing how much I had grown accustomed to comfort, to the point where I could no longer endure the conditions of a group dormitory.

Out of sheer stubbornness, I opened the can of coffee right in the middle of the swarm of insects.

And then, I watched as one of the bugs slipped into my drink.

“Ah, fuck.”

Frustrated, I poured the coffee onto the dirt floor and tossed the can into the trash.

I make tens of millions of won in royalties every month. I can afford to indulge in such wastefulness.

But it still gnawed at me that I’d thrown away a few-hundred-won can of coffee without even drinking it.

No matter how much money I earned, my mind was still stuck in those days at New Light Spring Orphanage when I used to scrape by on pocket money.

My thoughts grew unnecessarily complicated.

“Haah…”

With a lifeless sigh, I looked up at the sky.

Before my eyes could take in the night sky, what I noticed first were the countless insects flying toward the streetlight.

Watching those insects, I recalled the kids from the practical dance class I had seen earlier that evening.

For those insects, finding warm solace in the illusion of the streetlight’s glow was an impossible task.

The light they saw wasn’t salvation, it was just the electric light within a hard glass bulb.

It’s the same for them.

The dream of the aspiring idol trainees in the dance team, achieving dazzling success in the entertainment industry, is also an impossible task.

The success rate of less than 1% might as well be nonexistent. And when it’s a gamble that determines your entire life, the odds are even bleaker.

Let’s say, somehow, they do become celebrities.

Let’s say, against astronomical odds, they manage to debut as idols.

But the dream they’ll face isn’t the brilliant light they once envisioned as children.

Like the electric light within the glass bulb,

It’s hard, artificial.

There’s no warmth in it…

And,

It’s the same for literature.

Endless cycles of practice and more practice, rigorous and conservative judges, networks built on school ties and nepotism, a bleak future, competitors swarming like insects in the Annual Spring Literary Contest, a life marred and sickened by rejected manuscripts and contest failures…

Let’s say, against all those adversities, you manage to become a novelist.

Is that the end?

No.

Let’s use as an example the best-positioned novelist I know- a bastard named Moon In-seop.

That bastard, despite leaving this world in a pitiful state, somehow found himself blessed by heaven, traveling back in time.

And with a talent unbefitting of his age, he managed to grasp immense wealth and fame.

Is that the end?

No.

Even if I set aside all my concerns as a time traveler, the worries I have as a writer still remain.

A novelist who used suffering as their raw material has now lost that suffering. In that case, where should their literature head toward?

Should I become a copy machine that writes the same story over and over until I grow old and die, whining endlessly about being an orphan, being a victim of school violence, about how cold the world is, and so on?

If that’s the case, I’d rather die again.

A butterfly cannot live as a chrysalis.

It must shed everything and fly somewhere.

But…

Where?

“Ah, fuck… Ki-hoon hyung…”

Ma Ki-hoon was the reliable older brother at New Light Spring Orphanage, but he was also the kingpin of cigarette smuggling in the underworld.

As long as he controlled my smoking, there was no way I could ever get my hands on a cigarette.

Even if I somehow managed to sneak one, there was no way I could avoid getting caught by Ma Ki-hoon, the emperor of underage secret smoking. And once I got caught, all hell would break loose.

“Haa…”

Seriously. Not being able to calm my mind with a puff of cigarette smoke on days like today, when my head was this cluttered, was a cruel curse.

Yes.

Cruelly merciless.

That’s what this path of art is.

It doesn’t end until you either die or give up.

There is no completion.

How empty is a race without a finish line?

No one ever finishes it. They either die or collapse from exhaustion.

The kids who went on stage at Baekhak Arts Middle School’s talent show, dressed as zombies, had all stepped into that race.

Every single kid who performed on that stage, every single kid who watched from the audience, every art school student in this country, and even Moon In-seop, the kid from New Light Spring Orphanage who wrote on scraps of manuscript paper with the meager allowance he received-

They were all naive amateurs who had jumped in without realizing how brutal this race is.

What they all wanted was just one thing:

To achieve their dreams.

To become stars.

That vague determination was all they had…

The passion for art, the dream, the beauty – it sparkles so brightly that it makes you wager your life on it.

But the path is unbearably harsh and endlessly far.

The girl who won Best Actress at Cannes had to survive by seriously denying allegations of dating her friend, painstakingly dispelling those rumors to keep her career afloat.

The boy everyone called a genius was tormented, unable to decide what to write for his next novel, falling deeper into neurosis with every passing day.

Therefore, there is no starlight here.

There is only an endless race of reckless fools rushing toward the stars.

“Ah…”

It’s overwhelming.

This is why I can’t help but obsess over Eisaku Siedehara’s new work.

Master Siedehara. Though I haven’t felt particularly close to you compared to what you’ve given me, I must ask:

When you concluded your literature, what did you feel?

Where does literature come from, and where does it go?

Oddly enough,

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The answer didn’t come from Siedehara. It came from Gu Yu-na.

“What are you doing here?”

“Whoa, you scared me!”

Startled, I turned to the side to find Gu Yu-na standing there.

Thankfully, she wasn’t wearing that atrocious casual outfit.

It was her familiar and endearing yellow fuzzy animal hoodie.

I smiled warmly and patted the bench beside me.

“Don’t just stand there. Sit here.”

Gu Yu-na tilted her head but did as I said.

She plopped down heavily and asked me,

“You avoided me all day, so why are you acting different all of a sudden?”

“Yu-na. That hoodie suits you the best.”

“…Really?”

Gu Yu-na’s lips curled slightly into a faint smile.

Even though she kept a blank face in front of others, I could catch glimpses of her confident, cocky smile.

It seemed she’d regained confidence in her sense of fashion. Pleased, I watched her fondly as she fiddled with her yellow fuzzy hoodie and asked her,

“And what about you? Why have you been acting strange lately?”

“…”

Gu Yu-na froze in place, falling silent for a long time.

The silence that followed was long enough for others to think Gu Yuna was ignoring what I had said.

But I knew that Gu Yuna was carefully choosing her words. And someone who chooses their words is always better than someone who doesn’t.

It just took Gu Yuna a little more time than most.

I waited patiently for her.

Eventually, her honest answer came.

“A bit… I have a difficult request.”

* * *

Gu Yuna’s troubles had started quite a long time ago.

From the moment she encountered the novel “Dark Adaptation”.

“Dark Adaptation” was the third most meaningful novel to Gu Yuna.

The first was “The Automaton Murder Case”, the very first story she wrote after receiving guidance from Moon In.

The second was “Isomer”, which she co-wrote with Moon In on equal footing.

The reason “Dark Adaptation” was third was that this novel was written upon Gu Yuna’s suggestion.

-You’ve written about ‘yourself,’ and then about ‘others’.

-Now, it’s time to write about ‘the world’.

Gu Yuna gave this advice to Moon In, who was lost and unsure of his next step.

She had said that his literature had been a process of expansion, starting from himself and moving to others, so the next step should naturally be about the world.

And Gu Yuna had not been wrong.

Moon In had not failed.

“Dark Adaptation”, which had been released to the world, was a masterpiece among masterpieces, one that deconstructed the worldview and the ugly nature of humanity from the perspective of novelist Moon In.

Even though ignorant fools mocked him for it, Gu Yuna couldn’t help but be endlessly awestruck as she read “Dark Adaptation”.

However, despite all this, Gu Yuna couldn’t bring herself to smile while reading that book.

Because Moon In looked so tormented.

While others couldn’t easily grasp the reason, it was painfully obvious to Gu Yuna. And that made it hurt even more.

Moon In was the type of novelist who processed his pain through literature. But this time, he had tackled the world. For the first time, he internalized feelings that were outside of himself.

But the “world” Moon In saw was far too dark.

To Moon In, the world wasn’t something to live in but something to endure. His literature had become the story of an individual enduring a harsh world. It reflected his own experience of surviving in a cold and unforgiving environment.

Thus, writing about the world was almost akin to torturing himself.

Wasn’t it akin to forcing himself to confront his greatest fears, immersing them into his psyche, and stewing over them until he could transform them into a novel?

It was self-harm.

And the one who had pushed him into this act of self-harm was none other than Gu Yuna herself.

It was because of her advice that Moon In had ended up like this.

And Gu Yuna had watched closely as Moon In wrote his novel amidst pain and isolation.

By the time “Dark Adaptation” was completed, Moon In looked like a patient who had lost all his physical and mental strength.

And perhaps, Moon In would have no choice but to continue writing this way in the future.

Because of Gu Yuna…

* * *

“So, I’ve decided to take responsibility.”

Moon In couldn’t believe it.

Gu Yuna’s assertion was excessively self-blaming.

That he had been broken because of her advice?

“You are broken. You didn’t seem to enjoy yourself while writing. You even tried to run away by saying you were working on a movie script. And do you have a next project you’re working on? You don’t, do you?”

“Well, that’s true, but…”

“You developed a block after suddenly changing your approach to writing. That’s not right. It’s my fault. I have to fix it…”

“What are you even…!”

The only reason Moon In didn’t immediately explode at Gu Yuna’s almost offensive advice was simply that it came from Gu Yuna.

Had it been Gu Hak-jun or Park Chang-woon, Moon In would have been more than ready to bare his fangs at anyone who dared attack his literature.

He was the kind of novelist who could tolerate insults to his parents, endure personal attacks against himself, but absolutely couldn’t stand anyone insulting his novels.

And that stubborn pride was something he had co-created with Gu Yuna through their joint works. Thus, Moon In listened to the proposal of his co-founder with a deeply uncomfortable feeling.

Eventually, Gu Yuna handed him her prescription, one that could only be described as a potent remedy for a desperate patient.

“Here. This is a novel I wrote.”

“…”

“Take it.”

Moon In cautiously accepted the stack of manuscript paper.

Gu Yuna took a deep breath.

What Gu Yuna was about to say next was so audacious that it justified the effort she had put into trying to stay on Moon In’s good side over the past few days.

“Study that novel.”

“What?!”

“Memorize it perfectly. I’ll test you on it later. And once you’re completely familiar with it, rewrite it with me from the beginning.”

The roles had been reversed.

A student was now telling her teacher to study.

An amateur who had never won a single notable literary award was telling a genius who had been shortlisted for the Booker International Prize for his novel and helped produce a Cannes Best Actress award through his screenplay.

Gu Yuna was afraid of Moon In’s reaction.

Just how angry would he get?

But it had to be done.

If Moon In continued writing the way he had written “Dark Adaptation”, he would inevitably face a psychological breakdown.

That destructive tendency had to be corrected on a literary level. And to do that, Gu Yuna, the person who understood Moon In’s literature best, had to take the lead.

So she stepped forward.

Because it had to be done.

But people don’t always see the world in such rational terms.

In situations like this, the expected first response is, “How dare you!”

Despite all her efforts to smooth over Moon In’s mood by following her dumb friends’ advice, it didn’t seem to have had much of an effect.

So Moon In’s anger probably wouldn’t have lessened at all… That’s the equation Gu Yuna had learned from this world.

Gu Yuna clenched her eyes shut and braced herself for the outburst. She had already prepared the next step in her persuasion.

But something was strange.

Why wasn’t Moon In’s anger coming?

Curious, Gu Yuna slowly opened her tightly shut eyes.

To her shock, Moon In was crying.

“H-ha, haha…”

For the first time in a very long while, Gu Yuna’s face clearly showed “shock”. It was a look of genuine astonishment, one so vivid that even other people could have noticed it.

Had Moon In been paying attention to Gu Yuna’s expression, he would have been startled by this rare phenomenon.

But Moon In’s mind wasn’t focused on what he could see. His thoughts were elsewhere, drifting to a distant past.

-I can’t stand this. Fix it right now.

-What? I write better than you, so why should I fix it?

-Shut up, Moon In-seop.

-Gu Yuna, worry about your own story. Why are you messing with mine-

-Stop babbling! Fix it if I tell you to!

Even in the days when competition outweighed friendship between them, what Moon In and Gu Yuna each thought first upon reading the other’s work wasn’t about defeating the other but about fixing their writing.

Because it was good.

-In-seop, why don’t you ever improve?

-Be quiet.

-I’ll do you a favor and revise it for you, so you better be grateful.

Even after they became friends rather than competitors, the two never went to places like movie theaters or cafés like others did. Instead, they played in the world of literature.

Their mutual respect for and complaints about each other’s writing, as well as their unsolicited advice, didn’t change even after they became a couple.

Some things never changed.

And Moon In had just seen one of them.

“You’ve always… been trying to teach me.”

“…What?”

“What’s so unsatisfying, what stands out to you so much, what do you like so much about my writing that you…?”

Gu Yuna couldn’t understand what Moon In was saying.

And, as always, she considered it a lack of understanding on her part regarding human beings.

But Moon In was someone who, unlike others, was on the same wavelength as her… Yet now, she couldn’t figure out what was going on in his heart.

Still, there was something that had to be done, and that meant there was also something Gu Yuna had to do.

“So, will you do it?”

Moon In gently stroked the manuscript Gu Yuna had handed him.

Then, with a bright smile, he nodded.

“Of course.”

* * *

「To gaze upon the starry sky,

To read the map of the paths one could and must take-

How blissful was that era? And how happy was the time when starlight illuminated those paths so brightly?

In such an era, everything was at once new and familiar, filled with adventure yet destined to ultimately become one’s own.

The world was infinitely vast, yet as cozy as being at home,

Because the flame burning within the soul was, in essence, the same as the light emitted by the stars.

The boy always loved these words. They were the opening lines of an old book left behind by an ancient, nameless person. In this passage, the ancient individual praises an era that belonged to people far older than himself.

The era of navigators who charted their course by the constellations in the sky.

The age of adventurers who ventured toward the hidden mysteries of this world.

The mystical epoch when starlight guided travelers on their journey…

Just from these opening lines, one could roughly guess the era in which the author had lived. Surely, they must have been born too late to explore the Earth and too early to explore the cosmos.

And so, how fortunate was he!

To have been born in the starry era that the nameless ancient so longed for!

Suddenly, the boy placed his hand on the window. A brilliant starlight illuminated the path before him.

The infinitely vast world was brimming with adventure. It was a path he could and must take.

A spacecraft drifting through the void of space was slowly advancing toward the starry sky.」

*****

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