The Genius Decided To Live An Ordinary Life [EN]: Chapter 159

< Kwakran's Summer Camp (7) >

It must have been after seeing the spirit of Grandma Choi Mi-kyung.

Sometimes, Jin-hyuk wondered what ordinary ghosts looked like and what sounds they made. It was a childlike and human curiosity, but ghosts were never visible to the eyes of ordinary humans without spiritual sight.

Tung- Tung-. Srrr-.

‘Scary, isn’t it?’

He was curious, but that didn’t mean he wanted to see one.

Tung- Tuung-.

The sound finally got closer.

‘Oppa, are you sleeping?’

Ah, it was Yujin.

Tung-tung-. Srrr-.

With her hand gripping its ear, Azzi Bear was being dragged down the stairs, its bottom bumping on each step.

When her brother settled in the living room, Yujin had followed, holding Azzi Bear by the ear. Thanks to Jin-hyuk’s careful surgery, the doll had become a pot-bellied figure, and Yujin, with her still-short arms, struggled to hug it. Besides the cotton stuffing, it seemed something else had been added, as its weight had increased considerably.

‘I went to Oppa’s room, but Seulchan Oppa was snoring.’

‘Yeah, I’m going to sleep in the living room today. Let’s sleep together, my baby.’

‘Okay-. Ehehe-. Itcha!’

‘Ugh-!’

Yujin plopped down on Jin-hyuk’s stomach.

It was a sleeping position she often took, but as her weight increased, Jin-hyuk had to clench his groin. Especially when the kids were diving, their knees were a threat.

‘That was close.’

He had seen his father writhing in pain after being hit by Yujin’s diving knee kick. The indirect experience was enough of a lesson. There was no need to experience that firsthand.

‘Aebuu-?’

What was today? Responding to his older siblings’ voices, Jungwon toddled into the darkened living room.

‘Aebuu-.’

‘Does Jungwon want to sleep with his brother too? Come here, my baby.’

As Jin-hyuk lifted the blanket, the baby crawled into the tent-like space created by the blanket.

It was a rare sight to see the three siblings together, and Jin-hyuk was smiling contentedly when.

Po-waong-.

What was that sound? It felt like the blanket had also been shaken.

As he lay there, only lifting his head to ponder, there was a baby who showed the situation through action.

‘Eoubububu- ummamma! Bbeppappa!’

Desperately crawling out of the blanket, Son Jungwon went to the master bedroom, calling for his mom and dad.

He had been enjoying walking lately, but crawling now showed an amazing survival instinct in that instant. It seemed that in an emergency, it was more advantageous to use one’s specialty rather than one’s preference.

‘Ehehe-. One more time?’

Poaang-.

Ah, Yujin. What do you mean, one more time?

You ate so many duck eggs; this is more like a gas factory.

He couldn’t throw his sister off and run away, so Jin-hyuk, pinned underneath, quietly closed his glottis [the opening between the vocal cords].

Children should be praised even when they fart or poop.

For his beloved sister, Jin-hyuk closed his nasal passages and only smiled with his mouth.

‘Ahahaha······.’

‘Ehehehe-, one more time?’

As if she were a typical Korean child, Yujin insisted on the rule of three [a common cultural concept where things are often repeated three times].

Was she trying to send her brother to the afterlife?

Jin-hyuk’s senses, with his nose on the border between life and death, were heightened to the extreme. With his already developed senses and the added effect of the electronic signal gun training, it was to the point where he could hear the sound of a mosquito’s wings flapping, to exaggerate.

He could feel Yujin straining her lower abdomen, and time seemed to slow down.

His vision expanded, and everything around him came into focus.

‘That’s it!’

Jin-hyuk quickly grabbed Azzi Bear and blocked the gas vent with the doll’s nose.

Po-wa-shshshshsh-.

‘Ehehe-! It’s hot on my butt because you blocked it.’

Yes, it must be very nice and hot. Still, it’s better than being cold.

Ahaha-.

He tried to smile because Yujin was still cute, but Jin-hyuk’s nose couldn’t smile.

‘I’d rather you just poop.’

Jin-hyuk felt his mind becoming hazy. It was similar to the feeling of falling asleep under Yujin’s strange spell.

The Azzi Bear lying next to him also looked yellowish, as if it were on the verge of death from suffocation. Even though it had died a glorious death, Azzi Bear’s mountain-sized belly was higher than the siblings lying together, boasting the dignified spirit of a hero.

As his consciousness faded, Jin-hyuk gently took Azzi Bear’s hand.

‘I will not forget your noble sacrifice.’

Sleep well, comrade.

***

Puff- Puff- Pshh-pshh-.

While his friends, exhausted from training and the heat, were taking a nap, Jin-hyuk strolled along the waterway. With Yeom Byung-taek, who seemed to be activating his turbo direct injection repeatedly to match Jin-hyuk’s pace.

‘I talked to Dad today because he wasn’t here yesterday, you know?’

Yeom Byung-taek’s hand made a gesture of swatting a fly somewhere around his buttocks.

While faithfully listening to his friend’s pointless words, Jin-hyuk was buried in his own thoughts.

He wished things he had in mind would be handled quickly, but even in trivial daily life, life didn’t go as planned. He would feel good about pulling the bathroom door handle at the perfect time, only to find someone already inside, or he would try to play a computer game after finishing his homework, only to find Yujin had already taken it.

‘It’s been over a year since he last saw that man’s face. He doesn’t even come to the union meetings.’

It was the same when he was working.

He would finish one page of a report after gathering data, but then the data for the next page would be nowhere to be found, and his boss would throw another project at him.

‘It would have been nice to sort things out and move on at this time.’

Could that be simply attributed to human error?

Perhaps it was because time was uncooperative.

People who occupy different spaces and show different tendencies should not be dismissed as errors simply because they exist in the same time frame.

‘Thanks, Byung-taek. Still, thanks for checking it out.’

‘Sorry I couldn’t help. I’m going inside to read a book.’

What book?

He’ll probably just take a nap and fart.

Yeom Byung-taek’s sphincter was opening so frequently that it caused a commotion during the morning exercise. Thanks to that, Jin-hyuk had lost about half of his sense of smell.

He considered going into the gym to avoid the scorching sun, but then he sat down in the shade of a zelkova tree on the lawn.

‘Should I wait?’

Mun Seok-il had already volunteered to look into it, but Jin-hyuk had stopped him.

Investigating private information was clearly illegal. If it was publicly available information, there would be no problem, but the information Jin-hyuk needed was that sensitive. Regardless of being caught, it was something that any human with a conscience and ethics should avoid.

He hadn’t lived irresponsibly as a member of society in his past life, and he wanted to stand as a dignified member this time as well. Just like most ordinary people lived.

Sapak-.

The dry friction sound made Jin-hyuk’s ears perk up like a cat’s. A man weighing 80 kg was approaching from the 5 o’clock direction behind him, crushing the grass.

‘Found him, Park Dae-soon.’

The owner of the footsteps stated his business instead of greeting, it was Mun Seok-il, who had received the message from Jeong Sang-tae.

Due to various obstacles, he sometimes had to take on other cases without seeing the conclusion of a case, but sometimes a forgotten case would provide another clue.

Just like now.

‘Shall we take a walk?’

Jin-hyuk dusted off his bottom and stood up.

Before he could say anything, Mun Seok-il followed Jin-hyuk, unable to say he didn’t want to because it was too hot.

As they walked along the waterway track, Mun Seok-il took out a photo from his pocket.

‘Sang-tae sent it by registered mail. He’s in Changwon.’

Jin-hyuk’s eyes, as he received and examined the photo, were hotter than the scorching sun.

Park Dae-soon in the photo looked extremely shabby.

It was a photo of him doing manual labor at a construction site, his eyes sunken and his body emaciated like someone with consumption [a wasting disease, often referring to tuberculosis]. The body he had built up through farming was nowhere to be found.

‘Do the other family members seem to be doing well?’

‘Um. That’s what Sang-tae said. Still, he cares deeply for his wife and children, so he must have taken care of them.’

He was a man who had only farmed his entire life.

Having gone to a large city with many people, the only work he could do would be manual labor.

He felt sorry for him.

‘It would be nice to help him.’

He wasn’t talking to Mun Seok-il.

He was talking to Hong Ki-joon, who was behind him.

‘I’ll suggest it. But-.’

Mun Seok-il closed his lips tightly for a moment. He seemed to be pondering something.

‘Is there a reason you want to do that for those people?’

‘They’re pitiful.’

Mun Seok-il nodded.

He had also been shown mercy, so it wasn’t hard for him to understand.

If Jin-hyuk hadn’t shown leniency that day, all four of them might have been buried somewhere after soiling themselves.

‘He should have come back and farmed······.’

Jin-hyuk muttered as if for someone to hear.

But Park Dae-soon would not return.

Because he was a man who had abandoned his lifelong home because of guilt.

‘Jae-jung and Jae-gu, was it?’

‘Yes, that’s right.’

Those were Park Dae-soon’s daughter and son’s names.

Park Jae-jung was the same age as Jin-hyuk and was in the same class at Eodong Elementary School. She was a quiet and gentle child. Park Jae-gu was her two-year-younger brother, and he was mature beyond his years from a young age.

‘They’re good kids. Sigh-.’

Jin-hyuk was repeatedly confused between resentment and sympathy for the person who had put their parents in danger.

‘His wife and children seem to be doing well. Leaving those people as they are now is also a generous thing to do.’

Mun Seok-il patted Jin-hyuk’s shoulder. He wondered how such a kind-hearted guy had learned such deadly skills.

Jin-hyuk nodded and returned Park Dae-soon’s photo to Mun Seok-il.

‘It seems like Daejeong has given up.’

‘Yes······.’

They had no choice but to give up.

For Daejeong, destroying evidence was not important now.

With over 50 years of history and accumulated wealth about to disappear like bubbles, would they have the energy to care about anything else? Daejeong was being gradually dismantled and absorbed by the public. Behind that, of course, was Hong Ki-joon’s sophisticated scheme.

‘You’ve worked hard.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Shall we run two laps together?’

‘What-.’

Tadadak-.

Jin-hyuk ran off as soon as he finished speaking.

Two laps around the waterway was 10 kilometers.

‘Selfish bastard.’

If he went any lighter in this weather, his anus would loosen and he would die. He swallowed his curses, thinking that he had been kind-hearted just a moment ago, and Mun Seok-il chased after him like a pheasant chick.

‘But I guess I don’t need to mention that story, right?’

The fact that it was the vice president who had evacuated Park Dae-soon early on. Mun Seok-il had noticed it because Hong Ki-joon had subtly hinted at it.

‘No, that guy probably knows.’

Mun Seok-il shook off his 잡념 [japnyum – distracting thoughts] and increased his speed.

‘Jin-hyuk-! I’m wearing shoes-.’

‘Then take them off. Running barefoot is good for your health. You don’t have to run if you’re tired.’

That son of a bitch······. Even so, Mun Seok-il threw off his shoes.

Wait, come to think of it, am I a substitute for Jang-gun?

He felt like he was lower in the hierarchy than Jang-gun, who was looking down from the lawn.

It must be his imagination.

‘Aish-, the soles of my feet are hot.’

***

Grumble-.

It was late at night. Jo Seul-chan, who was looking at a math reference book, clutched his stomach.

He had been eating delicious food made by Han Yu-young all day, so his stomach had expanded, and his energy metabolism had become more active as he adapted to training and his muscle mass increased. It was no different from a car with a high-performance turbo engine that craved more fuel.

Grumble-.

He was so dull that he didn’t realize it at first, thinking the sound was coming from his friend Yeom Byung-taek’s stomach.

‘Jo Seul, are you hungry again?’

‘Y-yeah, I guess so-.’

Did he have a beggar in his stomach? Yeom Byung-taek swallowed the words he was about to say.

It was something he shouldn’t say to Jo Seul-chan, who had been teased as a beggar since he was a child. Because they were friends.

‘Eat some fruit from the fridge.’

‘I want to eat meat.’

Sigh-, Yeom Byung-taek sighed.

Well, meat is better than fruit.

A clattering sound came from outside the door.

The only thing outside would be the refrigerator, so it seemed Park Sang-gi, the beast, had come out for a night hunt, unable to overcome his hunger.

Without needing to say a word, the best friends, Jo Seul-chan and Yeom Byung-taek, made eye contact.

‘Let’s go out.’

‘Okay.’

***

Jin-hyuk, thinking of feeding his energetic friends to their fill, assigned them tasks one by one and sent them to the yard of the mud house.

‘Seul-chan, get the dry firewood, Byung-taek, pick and wash the lettuce and peppers from the garden, and Sang-gi, take out the whole rice cooker and bring it.’

Jin-hyuk decided to get the pork from the refrigerator.

‘Will four geun [a Korean unit of weight, approximately 600 grams] be enough?’

No, they need to eat at least two geun per person to be full.

Fortunately, there was plenty of meat. It was also thawed just right, as if the heavens had helped. It was a bit unexpected, since his mom always kept it frozen, saying they had to be careful in the summer.

As he rustled around in the kitchen, Yujin, who was sleeping alone in the living room while clinging to Azzi Bear, stirred.

‘Sleep well, my baby.’

Jin-hyuk patted his sister’s bottom and then moved to the mud house with the meat, garlic, and ssamjang [a thick, spicy paste used in Korean cuisine].

He supported two cement bricks with three holes each and placed a clean pot lid on top.

He lit a fire with pine needles and added firewood to increase the heat.

After checking the temperature of the pot lid with his palm several times.

The pork belly was finally placed on it.

Chiiiiiiii-.

‘Kuuuuhhhhh-.’

‘Huuuuhhhhh-!’

‘······True music.’

Without anyone saying anything, the sixteen-year-old hungry beasts let out a harmonious cheer.

If they had been any hungrier, they would have thrown off their underwear.

The pork belly was cut into bite-sized pieces at the butcher shop, so there was no need to cut it separately. Thanks to Jin-hyuk’s hands, which were busy carrying the meat, the pot lid was soon filled with meat.

His friends, holding chopsticks, swallowed their saliva and fixed their eyes on the meat.

The fierce and desperate gazes were more like those of hyenas starving in the dry season.

‘Pork should be cooked well-.’

Before Jin-hyuk could say anything, the meat disappeared.

Yeom Byung-taek roughly dipped it in sesame oil, Jo Seul-chan wrapped it in lettuce, crown daisy, and perilla leaves, then stuffed his mouth full with ssamjang, garlic, peppers, kimchi, and rice, and Park Sang-gi dipped it only in gochujang [a savory, sweet, and spicy fermented Korean condiment]. Their tastes were as diverse as their personalities, but their attitude toward meat was equally special.

‘Uheo-.’

‘Eoeo-.’

‘······Huh!’

Well, it seemed like they were saying it was delicious.

Was this what it felt like to be an uncle taking care of his nephews? Jin-hyuk was deeply moved.

Hehehe-.

A familiar dog bark tickled his ears. He was a dog nose, so there was no way he would miss this feast.