The Genius Decided To Live An Ordinary Life [EN]: Chapter 25

“Mom, Dad.”

“Huh? What is it, son?”

His mother, who was feeding his four-year-old sister Yujin, and his father, who was smiling at their daughter, were startled and turned to look at Jinhyuk. After the seven-day war triggered by the pork cutlet incident, their son rarely spoke first or initiated a conversation.

“I have a competition next week, so I’m going to Taeyang Middle School.”

“Why? What kind of contest is it this time?”

His father, Son Kwang-yeon, asked, thinking that he would be getting another award.

His son was excellent in all subjects—math, science, art, music, and even computers. He swept awards in every competition he entered. Jinhyuk’s parents had reached a point where they were only curious about the subjects their son participated in, not the results.

“It’s a track and field meet.”

“Hahahaha!”

His father suddenly burst into laughter.

Wasn’t this too much? Math, science, art, music, and now track and field? It was too much.

He was happy.

“That’s my boy!”

“Hehe, it seems he’s good at everything because he takes after his dad.”

His mother’s priority always seemed to be her husband. Even in this situation, she subtly praised her husband. Watching their thirteen-year-old son, who was already as tall as his mother, Jinhyuk’s parents were filled with happiness.

“Okay, is there anything you need?”

‘That’s why I called you, Father.’

It seemed his father had a knack for reading Jinhyuk’s mind.

“Running shoes.”

“Oh, right. You’ll need spikes, won’t you?”

Son Kwang-yeon was a man of common sense and knowledge. He knew what kind of shoes were needed for short-distance running. His son, though much taller now, was still precious to him, so he would buy him anything, even from a shoe store.

“I don’t need spikes. My current running shoes are a bit slippery on the sand.”

He wasn’t a professional athlete, so he didn’t think he needed spikes. Even when measuring his time with Mr. Kim Young-tae, he felt a slight slip every time he stepped. He didn’t like the uneasy feeling, so he was thinking of getting running shoes with good grip. He wanted to compete without regrets.

“Okay. Let’s go buy them tomorrow with Dad. Are Asics or Rapido good these days?”

For some reason, his father seemed more excited than Jinhyuk. Jinhyuk thought, ‘Is this what it’s like to be a parent?’ He had never been a parent in his previous life, so he couldn’t even imagine what it would feel like.

However.

‘I feel good because Dad is happy.’

If it were a sport like soccer or baseball, would they have stopped him, saying he might get hurt? Of course, there weren’t any schools with such sports teams nearby, but Jinhyuk was curious about his parents’ feelings.

He even thought about trying wrestling if his parents liked him doing sports.

Taeyang County was famous for wrestling.

***

Taeyang Elementary School in the town.

“Mr. Kim Young-tae, is tomorrow the county track and field team selection?”

“Yes, Vice Principal.”

“The marathon representative is from our school, and the short-distance runner will be from our school too, right?”

Since it was a large area adjacent to the West Sea, there were schools and branch schools everywhere, but most of the population lived in the town, the seat of the county. Naturally, Taeyang Elementary School had the most students. A large number of students meant potential. The potential to produce talented athletes.

“We might have one.”

Two short-distance runners were selected from each administrative district. Those two were chosen based on their records. Since it was a record-based competition, there was no room for the judges to intervene, and the school couldn’t exert any influence. This meant that they couldn’t specially select their own students.

“Only one? Why? Is there a school that’s showing outstanding performance?”

Kim Young-tae handed the record sheet to the vice principal. There were a total of 16 athletes who had advanced to the county finals. It was a list organized by 100-meter record, and the name of the student at the top was familiar.

“Son Jinhyuk?”

The vice principal, with his receding hairline and eyes that were as narrow as Nakamura’s, frowned.

“Son Jinhyuk? That Son Jinhyuk from the academic competitions?”

“Yes, that’s him.”

“What? Twelve point one? Isn’t that a middle school record?”

The vice principal, who had no eyebrows like Tanaka, shouted, and Kim Young-tae muttered in a small but annoyed voice, ‘It’s not an easy record even in middle school.’

He didn’t like the vice principal’s habit of saying whatever came to mind to deny reality, but Kim Young-tae didn’t argue back, since he was his superior.

“We measured it twice.”

Kim Young-tae answered briefly, as if he didn’t want to explain further.

“Was the track short?”

“We measured it again after it was over. It was 100 meters. The field is quite big.”

Even though there weren’t many people, there was a lot of land in the rural school. With so much land, the field was bound to be large. There were even a few cows wandering around on one side of the field.

Kim Young-tae checked Son Jinhyuk’s record again. Even though he had written the numbers himself, his mind couldn’t easily accept it.

「12.12 seconds」

It was a record that a runner wearing spikes on a professional track would achieve. And that was at a national-level competition.

“Is the competition being held at our school tomorrow?”

“It’s at Taeyang Middle School.”

The county finals to select the representatives were held on the same day and at the same place as the middle school athletes. There was no other reason. It was just more convenient to do it all at once. That’s how most things were handled; the priority was smooth administration rather than the students’ condition.

The vice principal clicked his tongue in disappointment.

He wanted to see the monstrous elementary school student who was sweeping academic competitions and was also good at running.

‘I heard the principal tried hard to transfer him.’

It might sound absurd to scout students at an elementary school, but a student’s grades were the school’s grades. If they accumulated awards from various academic competitions, the Office of Education would look at the school differently. If the school became famous, students would flock to it, and if the number of students increased, the budget would also increase. The wrestling team was a good example. All school administration was geared towards the students’ grades and the school’s performance in attracting students.

Anyway, Taeyang Elementary School’s plan to transfer Son Jinhyuk had failed.

The student had refused. The student’s parents had said that their child’s opinion was important and hadn’t said a word.

Taeyang Elementary School hadn’t produced a single top award winner in any academic competition for three years. One student from a remote rural school called Eodong Elementary School had swept them all.

The vice principal, with his sharp eyes like Suzuki, muttered a statement that pierced through Jinhyuk’s essence.

“That monster…”

***

It was definitely spring. The sky was so blue that you could believe it was autumn. The plane trees were already boasting leaves as big as an adult’s head. It was the tree that Jinhyuk had loved so much in his previous life. The large trees always provided shade and hid him, allowing Jinhyuk to live like a shadow, an invisible person.

The field at Taeyang Middle School was clean, having been newly maintained for the upcoming sports day. Well, it was still a sand field, though.

Jinhyuk wandered around the wrestling practice area in the corner of the field.

‘It was around here.’

The place where he used to sit on tires and read books during sports days.

The place where he used to spend time alone, pulling on wrestling training tubes during picnics and school trips.

The swing where he used to sit and spend time every lunch break was swaying in the spring breeze.

There was a middle school-aged Son Jinhyuk, who was smaller than the thirteen-year-old Jinhyuk now. He was sitting on the swing with a blank expression.

Jinhyuk carefully grabbed the swing’s ropes. He slowly pulled it back and let it go.

The middle school Son Jinhyuk turned around with a surprised look.

The blue bruises and scratches on his face made the current Jinhyuk feel a lump-like scar in his heart.

‘How scared were you back then? How lonely and hungry were you? Huh? Jinhyuk.’

He was happy now, he had met his family again, which was his lifelong wish.

But did the scars that remained on his soul not disappear even if the wounds healed?

Jinhyuk sat quietly on the swing where his past had existed and disappeared.

People say that you have to move forward.

Some say that you can only develop by looking back and reflecting.

What the right answer was, he didn’t know, and it didn’t matter. Jinhyuk just thought that only wild animals caught in a snare were creatures that were only faithful to their instinct to move forward. The instinct to move forward even after realizing they were caught in a trap. And thus, a sad and foolish fate of having to strangle themselves.

‘If I didn’t have the memories of the past, I wouldn’t have been able to save Mom, Dad, and Yujin. Janggun wouldn’t have survived either.’

He would have repeated the nightmares of the past like a blank slate, like a newly drawn canvas.

He couldn’t force himself to erase the past that wouldn’t be forgotten just because his current life was satisfying. Jinhyuk decided to live while savoring the old wounds, even if they hurt. He just gently rubbed his chest as if embracing and comforting the old Son Jinhyuk.

‘You are a scar that I am responsible for.’

You were also me.

***

He was in his growth spurt, but he often went hungry, so he had lingered around the wrestling team. The wrestling team had a meat feast after their evening training, and Jinhyuk wanted to join the wrestling team just to eat meat.

Of course, he was rejected.

– “You’re too small. And you don’t seem to have any guts.”

That wasn’t the only reason.

Parental support. To join a sports team, the support from the school or the Office of Education was not enough. Especially at Taeyang Middle School, where promising athletes transferred from Gangwon-do and Jeju-do thanks to the famous wrestling team, the parents’ support was substantial. The wrestling coaches and managers even bought luxury cars with the kickbacks they received. The coaches and managers knew that they couldn’t expect any support from Jinhyuk.

‘Shin Woo-sung was the son of a butcher, and Lee Seung-hoon was the son of a fishing village chief.’

They were friends who had raised the school’s name in wrestling in his previous life. Unless there were any unexpected changes, he would be able to see them again when he entered middle school.

Since they had to neglect their studies because of training, Jinhyuk had helped them a lot with their studies, and they had protected Jinhyuk, who had no friends, like a shield. They had also shared snacks from the wrestling team. Jinhyuk had continued his friendship with Shin Woo-sung and Lee Seung-hoon even after they had entered society.

He would be entering middle school next year. Jinhyuk’s heart was pounding with anticipation of seeing his friends again. Apart from his old memories, he had long since pushed away the sadness after safely saving his parents.

***

Rustle, rustle-.

“Hey, Son Jinhyuk. Don’t be nervous, okay? When you hear the gun, just run. Got it?”

“Yes.”

Mr. Park Jae-seung, who had come as the supervising teacher, tucked Jinhyuk’s shirt into his shorts as he spoke. He looked like a father taking care of his runny-nosed young son, which made Jinhyuk chuckle.

Competing in the National Youth Sports Festival.

Even though it was just the preliminaries, it was the first time since Eodong Elementary School was established. Therefore, Jinhyuk could understand why Park Jae-seung was nervous. Jinhyuk, who had answered firmly to Mr. Park Jae-seung, whose voice was even trembling, entered the waiting area.

“Group 3, get ready.”

The 16 participants were divided into four groups of four for the preliminaries.

Four people were selected based on their records in the first round, and after a 30-minute break, the finals were held. The final four would participate in the National Youth Sports Festival unconditionally. Two would participate as short-distance representatives, and the other two would participate as relay runners.

The pink shorts and uniform that the school had hastily prepared felt unfamiliar.

Jinhyuk loosened the shirt that Mr. Park Jae-seung had tucked in tightly and carefully observed the starting positions of the children in the previous group.

‘Ah, right. It’s better to lean forward so that the weight is shifted forward.’

In his previous life, he had been very interested in sports, so he had enjoyed watching sports highlight reels. The explosive power of the black and white athletes who ran like racehorses when the gun went off, their bulging thighs and deltoids that looked like they had been injected with volume shots. He had been so fascinated by them that he had worked out a lot.

“Group 4, get ready.”

Although he wasn’t running on a professional track like those athletes, Jinhyuk was lost in the illusion that he had become a track and field athlete. The empty tiered concrete structure of the rural middle school had transformed into an Olympic stadium, and he could hear the cheers of the crowd filling the stands.

“On your marks-.”

He placed his feet on the starting blocks, which he had adjusted to fit him, as he had learned by observing the children in the previous group. Then, he spread his hands appropriately and placed them inside the starting line. The grains of sand that were poking his knees on the ground were annoying, but he decided to endure it.

The children who had taken their positions glanced at the next lane.

Jinhyuk made eye contact with a child who had noticed his gaze and greeted him with a nod. The child was flustered by Jinhyuk’s unusually deep eyes, but he nodded back silently.

As the athletes got ready, the next signal was given.

“Set-.”

The athletes stretched their legs at the same time.

As they stretched their legs, their upper bodies leaned forward.

The spectators in the stadium held their breath.

He wasn’t nervous.

He gulped.

For some reason, his heart was pounding.

Inhale-exhale.

He inhaled, exhaled only a third of the air, and stopped.

The gun would go off soon.

“Heads down-.”

Someone must have seen the gun.

It was a common occurrence among children who were not familiar with the rules of the game. Jinhyuk had also been holding back from looking at what he wanted to see, so he had no intention of criticizing them.

“Ready-.”

A false start caused the ready signal to be given again.

Inhale-.

He inhaled. A silence as if even the air wasn’t flowing came over him.

Crack-!

The sound of the paper firecracker exploding tore through the air.