Descent of The Demon Master [EN]: Chapter 1795

“Aah—! Aaaah! Ah! Aaaah!” The peace vanished from Kang Jin-ho’s face.

‘Is this… sonic power?’

As the Demon Lord ravaging the Central Plains, he had once fought against masters of sonic arts who tried to stop him.

What was that guy’s name? The ‘Death Wail’ Gwak, Gwak…

Anyway.

That guy’s level was quite high, but in terms of grating on one’s nerves and causing pain, he couldn’t even compare to Choi Yeon-ha right now.

‘Why are the notes cutting off like that?’

It was also cutting off at the most irritating moments, and the following notes had lost all sense of pitch.

How can such sounds come from a human throat…

“Aaaah!”

The chorus, which should have been pleasant, echoed more tragically than the death throes of someone falling to his sword.

Kang Jin-ho did his best to calm his twisted face.

‘I told you to manage your expression, manage your expression.’

It was at that moment.

Bbam! Ba-ba-bam! Ba-bam!

“Huh?”

A large number ‘100’ appeared on the screen in the center of the room.

One hundred?

One hundred points?

Come on, machine dude.

Isn’t this too much? Even if it’s like this, how can you be so shameless to give a hundred points?

“Kuh, class!”

Kang Jin-ho’s eyes twitched.

Choi Yeon-ha looked at the score on the screen with a triumphant face.

“You have to sing at least this well! I was even offered a chance to be a singer, after all.”

The best thing about successful people is that they can try things that ordinary people can’t even imagine.

Kang Jin-ho seriously wanted to use all his information network to find out who had offered Choi Yeon-ha a chance to be a singer.

To beat them up?

No. To get them a mental evaluation. To see how out of their mind they were.

“How was it?”

The moment Kang Jin-ho met Choi Yeon-ha’s sparkling eyes, cold sweat began to form on his back.

The worst thing about Choi Yeon-ha is that flattery doesn’t work on her. If you speak your mind, you get cursed at, and if you try to be diplomatic, you get double the curses.

“It was… very impressive.”

“Right?”

Choi Yeon-ha wore a proud expression.

He couldn’t understand what she was so proud of, but it was a relief that Choi Yeon-ha seemed to be in a good mood.

Choi Yeon-ha opened a can in front of her and gulped down the cider.

“Kaaaaah!”

It’s like she just had a beer. Her reactions have become so lively.

Choi Yeon-ha kept making happy faces.

“I really wanted to come to a karaoke.”

“Huh?”

“I think it’s been about five years since I last came. There were times when I really wanted to come, but I couldn’t.”

“Why?”

Kang Jin-ho tilted his head, and Choi Yeon-ha waved her finger.

“It’s not as easy as you think. First of all, I don’t have anyone to go to karaoke with.”

“You don’t have any friends…”

“Ah, shut up.”

Seeing Choi Yeon-ha’s serious face, Kang Jin-ho subtly turned his gaze away.

‘I guess I was a bit too blunt.’

“Anyway… no, thinking about it makes me angry again. You don’t have many friends either, do you?”

Of course, Kang Jin-ho had proud friends like Park Yu-min and Joo Young-gi.

But the current Kang Jin-ho had grown enough to understand that he didn’t need to voice every thought.

“Then you could have come alone.”

“…It’s just awkward to go to karaoke alone, and coin karaoke places are too exposed from the outside, so I can’t go.”

“Ah…”

He didn’t know why, but he felt like he understood.

“Ah, I feel so refreshed after belting it out for a while.”

“Okay, next song!”

“W-Why don’t you rest a bit…”

“Rest? What’s there to rest for! We’re going until our throats give out today!”

Kang Jin-ho smiled contentedly.

‘I’ve gone crazy.’

Why did I transfer my inner energy to that person?

Thanks to the check-ups in between, Choi Yeon-ha’s endurance was several times stronger than an ordinary person. It was unlikely that her throat would give out, or even that she would sweat much.

The world is fair.

The price for breaking the unspoken rule of not recklessly transferring martial arts was now coming back to Kang Jin-ho.

“Why that face?”

“…No.”

Kang Jin-ho reached out and desperately grabbed his flying soul.

‘Did a ghost who died without singing attach itself to her in her past life?’

How can someone stay in a karaoke for five hours?

Kang Jin-ho barely held the microphone, which meant she had been singing for more than four and a half hours by herself. First of all, whether it could even be called ‘singing’ was a question he’d rather not dwell on.

“Ah, I feel refreshed. I guess I had a lot pent up. Before, my throat would give out after singing about twenty songs, but today I’m still going strong even after singing this much…”

It was all Kang Jin-ho’s fault.

He was being crushed by the disaster he had brought upon himself… no, that’s not it.

Looking at Choi Yeon-ha, who looked so refreshed that her face seemed to glow, he didn’t feel too bad. He felt a bit nauseous, but it was nothing he couldn’t handle.

“Hmm, with this much endurance, you could really become a singer…”

“Hey!”

“Huh?”

“…No, nothing.”

Choi Yeon-ha narrowed her eyes.

“Why? What? What were you about to say?”

“Does this person think I’m an idiot? I know I’m tone-deaf.”

“Then why a singer…”

“I was just saying.”

Choi Yeon-ha waved her hand.

“And being a singer is not something I can do. How much energy do you think it takes to dance and sing? A pine caterpillar should eat pine needles, so I’ll just stick to acting.”

“You made a good choice.”

She really did make a good choice, really.

“How was it? Was it fun?”

“Huh?”

“…Why that answer? You’re not nervous, are you?”

“It was really fun.”

Choi Yeon-ha smiled contentedly, as if she liked the answer.

“That’s right.”

Kang Jin-ho chuckled.

It was indeed fun. Though there wasn’t even a gram of peace to be found.

“It’s nothing special, right?”

“Huh?”

“It’s just about having fun like this.”

Kang Jin-ho looked at Choi Yeon-ha with questioning eyes.

Then Choi Yeon-ha shrugged.

“That’s what other people do, I guess. They don’t live each day trying to achieve something great. It’s enough if they can enjoy each day.”

“Ah…”

“So, Jin-ho, you don’t have to think too much about what you have to do. I don’t know if this saying exists, but you seem like a bit of an achievement addict.”

“An achievement addict?”

“Hmm, that sounds a bit weird. A results-oriented person? Or a result-bug?”

“A result-bug…”

“No matter what process there is in between, you’re the type who thinks the result is everything.”

“I was surprised. You even play so aggressively. It’s because you’re trying to get something out of playing, like you absolutely have to relieve stress.”

Kang Jin-ho stared blankly at Choi Yeon-ha.

“So, first, learn how to play without thinking. Don’t try to do something with it.”

“…Is being tortured for five hours just to learn that lesson a bit too much?”

“What?”

“It’s nothing.”

Kang Jin-ho smiled contentedly.

‘Good things are good.’

“So, was that what you wanted to say when we went to karaoke today?”

“No. I just wanted to go?”

“I’ll keep doing this in the future, so prepare yourself. I’ll call you out to play for no reason.”

“Let’s go. I’m hungry. I want to eat budae jjigae [Korean army stew] today.”

“…Yes.”

Kang Jin-ho shook his head as he watched Choi Yeon-ha walk away.

“Ah, I feel alive.”

Choi Yeon-ha patted her bulging belly.

“…Adding ramen noodles twice was a bit too much, I think.”

“Let it be. I’m going to eat until I die.”

Well, yeah.

It was ridiculous for Kang Jin-ho to talk about self-management to Choi Yeon-ha. She was maintaining a healthy body now, but in the past, she had been nothing but skin and bones.

‘Compared to that, she’s much better now.’

“Next course!”

“Huh?”

There’s another course?

Here?

“Now that we’ve eaten, we need to have a cup of coffee. Let’s go to your father’s shop. I want a proper coffee today.”

“…I will escort you.”

“Okay.”

Kang Jin-ho smiled wryly and stepped on the accelerator.

Against the backdrop of the darkening sky, the buildings lit up. Kang Jin-ho’s car moved through the rows of lights on either side.

“I canceled one of the schedules that came in later.”

“A schedule?”

“Yeah. Another movie came in, but, hmm…”

Choi Yeon-ha lowered her voice slightly.

“I didn’t think it was right.”

Kang Jin-ho looked at Choi Yeon-ha with a puzzled expression.

She didn’t say ‘rejected,’ but ‘canceled.’ That meant she had pushed back a schedule she had once thought was good.

Knowing how ambitious Choi Yeon-ha was, Kang Jin-ho couldn’t help but find it strange.

“Why? Is the scenario bad?”

“The director is amazing, the scenario is sparkling, and the investment is huge.”

“…Sounds like good conditions.”

“Yeah. So, I was thinking of focusing on it from the second half of this year, but…”

Choi Yeon-ha’s gaze turned to Kang Jin-ho.

“Someone said they have some free time.”

“If I’m the only one busy, it’ll be hard to see each other again. Then I’ll feel like a grass widow again.”

Cold sweat ran down Kang Jin-ho’s forehead.

“Ah, no…”

“I’m just kidding.”

Choi Yeon-ha chuckled.

“Of course, I thought about it a lot. I still have a lot of career to build, and if I push a little harder, I feel like I could achieve something more.”

Kang Jin-ho nodded slightly.

Choi Yeon-ha was already a well-established star in the Chinese-speaking world, and through her past negotiations with Hong Wang, she had begun to be exposed to the media again.

The money she had earned from the commercials she had filmed since then was enough to match what most top stars would earn in their entire lives.

On top of that, the project she was filming in Hollywood was nearing its end. Her role had become bigger than in the initial scenario, so it was worth expecting a positive response.

Since admitting her relationship with Kang Jin-ho, her position in the domestic market had weakened slightly, but she had built such a solid position that it wouldn’t even leave a scratch.

It was a situation where the phrase ‘riding the road to success’ was more than appropriate.

“So, I think I need to rest a bit.”

“Huh?”

Choi Yeon-ha chuckled.

“Right now, things are going well, really well, but when I think about it, it doesn’t feel like I’ve achieved this because I’m good at something.”

“I’m not at that level yet, but it feels like the world is forcibly pushing me up. I don’t think I can handle it yet.”

“Uh, that…”

“I’m not saying you were too much. Why do you always blame yourself when I say something? You’re so timid.”

Choi Yeon-ha smiled gently.

“So, I’m going to reorganize myself. So that I can become someone who really deserves to be there, and to check my acting one more time.”

Kang Jin-ho nodded.

A person intoxicated with success cannot look back at themselves. They’re too busy running, so how could they think about stopping?

Kang Jin-ho knew this because he had experienced it himself. Stepping on the brakes takes a lot of courage.

“That sounds like a good idea.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

Kang Jin-ho smiled.

“Sometimes, when I look at you, Choi Yeon-ha, you seem like a truly amazing person.”

She was someone who could do what Kang Jin-ho couldn’t. That’s why Kang Jin-ho respected Choi Yeon-ha not as a woman, but as a person.

“Hearing you praise me makes me feel good? Try a little more.”

He couldn’t respect her in this aspect. Choi Yeon-ha smiled gently.

“So, I’m going to rest in the second half of the year and sort out everything I couldn’t do. I have some house issues, some company issues, and I want to do a little more to help my juniors.”

“Yes.”

“I also need to exercise, learn some things, get married, and go through a few curriculums…”

“…I think there was something strange mixed in there?”

“Huh? There wasn’t anything like that?”

“…I’m sure I heard something.”

“Hey, you’re talking nonsense. Don’t say useless things and let’s go quickly. I want to have coffee.”

“No, something strange…”

“Go.”

“…Yes.”

Kang Jin-ho, with a face full of anxiety, stepped hard on the accelerator.

Mom.

I think I’m going to be led around by the nose…