Save a Failed Idol’s Life

Translator: MarcTempest

Editor: NicoleTempest

Chapter 267 Even if it’s just for a moment (3)

Should I let Jinwoo know that I didn’t disappear? But I didn’t feel like asking him to believe more nonsense here.

‘Let’s just think about it slowly for today.’

I have plenty of time now, unlike a few weeks ago when I had a goal and a quest to accomplish.

Life, which was once so natural, felt awkward and strange now.

I didn’t have to worry about the quest duration or the unknown external intrusion attempts. And it was only natural that I didn’t have to be anxious about being trapped in a virtual space just because I wanted to see the past.

A normal life without the system’s interference or help, or seeing someone else’s past.

The realization that I had to live as a normal human being, Cheon Ise, from now on hit me hard. It felt like I had stolen someone else’s life, even though this body was already dead.

Of course, all the achievements I made as ‘Cheon Ise’ were my own.

But I was bothered by the elements that belonged to Cheon Ise by default, such as his family.

‘I’m curious about what it means to get a new chance.’

If it was something like reincarnation, I would have been born as a different person. Even though I was treated like a parasite by my father in the last years of my life and had to cut off my allowance…

‘I still feel a bit resentful about changing from a chaebol’s son to a normal family’s child…’

It was the family I had when I still had the memories of my previous (?) life.

‘Hmm…’

There were ups and downs, but as long as there was no major accident, both the composition and the salad business seemed to go smoothly in the future, so I honestly didn’t think I would have any trouble living without the inheritance I would have received as the second generation of Cheon Soo Group.

For now, I would continue to use the name and power of Cheon Soo Group for the stability of my business, but I planned to gradually reduce its influence. ṛ�

If, later, I no longer needed Cheon Soo Group’s help.

‘Then I’ll have to think about how to deal with the share that the original ‘real’ Cheon Ise should receive.’

If I could meet the ‘real’ Cheon Ise again in this life. And if we could recognize each other. Then I would have to think about how to give him what I received as Cheon Ise.

If I couldn’t find him even after decades of searching. Then I would just set up a foundation and return it to society, like I did as Lim Hyun-seong.

I didn’t feel comfortable receiving unnecessary wealth that wasn’t originally mine. I wasn’t a person who liked luxury anyway.

I shrugged my shoulders and lay down on the bed again. A faint light from the cars passing by outside the window shone through.

‘I’m alive.’

The thumping of my heart and the sound of my lungs shrinking and filling with air again proved that I was alive.

I still felt shaky. What was Cheon Ise thinking at the end?

Whatever it was, it wasn’t bright or hopeful. My eyes felt sore.

I didn’t pity Cheon Ise that much… But when I couldn’t shake off his hand and held it at the end. I felt his desperate fear and I couldn’t let go of his hand.

What was he so afraid of? That I would take his body? Or that he would disappear completely?

According to the cycle diagram that the system showed me, death wasn’t the final end. It was like raindrops falling from the sky, flowing into the river, becoming water for living, and then being reused after going through the sewage treatment plant and flowing back into the river.

‘It’s all going around in the end.’

Originally, it would have been like returning to the dust of the universe and scattering with the other dust.

But Cheon Ise would go through the restoration process and be reused as a whole person.

It might be awkward to keep calling him ‘Cheon Ise’ even after he got a new chance.

I hoped that his last emotion as Cheon Ise wasn’t loneliness or fear. All I could do was wish for him.

‘Let’s just go to sleep.’

I had a lot of work to do tomorrow when I returned to the site.

I thought it was the last time I could catch my breath.

I had a dream after tossing and turning for a while.

Woof, woof-!

Something kept shaking in front of my eyes, and it was a familiar tail. A fluffy and tempting tail like a fox wagged and expressed its good mood.

‘Ha… Calm down. Stay still.’

I grabbed the fur ball that was shaking in front of my eyes and hugged it, but I didn’t feel the familiar warmth. This was a dream.

Pposili was much heavier and warmer than this.

Woof-!

Pposili didn’t seem to notice the bitterness in my mouth and scratched my hem with his short legs and hugged me. I silently stroked Pposili for a while, but when he suddenly jumped out of my arms, I groaned and rubbed my stomach that was kicked by his hind legs and bent over.

‘Ow… You bastard, stop…!’

I wondered why he was so distracted and looked at the direction he ran to, and there was someone who had the same face as me lying with his eyes closed.

‘…!’

I suppressed my surprise and approached him.

Cheon Ise was sleeping without a twitch, holding his hands over his chest.

I knelt down on the floor and fixed his messy hair.

‘Sleep well.’

As if to give me one last chance to say goodbye, the video call became blurry again. I closed my eyes.

When I opened them, it was already morning. The morning rounds were about to start, and I got up to pack my things and prepare for discharge.

“Are you really going straight to the dorm tomorrow?”

Vice Chairman Ahn looked at me with a worried expression and asked.

I had to. There was no more time to delay.

The Offbeat activities had just ended, so there was nothing urgent on my schedule, but all the members had their own individual fixed schedules, at least one each.

Yi-jun and Yu-geon started a web variety show in the form of a radio, Kyunghwa got a supporting role in a daily drama, and Seong-won was the busiest of all, with various featuring and OST recording requests coming from outside.

Seon-woo was flooded with CF offers, from cosmetics to clothing, to household items. He said it was hard to even see his face at the dorm for a while.

‘While I was away… they were all working hard to raise the sales.’

I felt proud and sorry at the same time. Every time they appeared somewhere, they had to deal with the haters who kept asking where their leader was and what he was doing.

I was grateful to the members who waited for me to come back, even though I was lying down and doing nothing.

‘But then again… it’s not like they have any choice, right? We’re bound by contract anyway.’

I called Yu-geon in the afternoon to tell him that I would be back at the dorm by tomorrow evening, but I didn’t care about his sarcastic remarks.

‘What, are you jealous? If you’re envious, you can wander for five years too.’

The members proudly defended me, but Yu-geon was not impressed.

‘Even if you wander for five years, there are only a few groups that end up in a dogfight. Forget it.’

He ended the call with a disgruntled response. The dinner that started under the anxious gaze of Vice Chairman Ahn who had finished work was not a pleasant one.

“Try this too. You look like you’ve lost half your face.”

My mother, the Vice Chairman of the company, was fussing over me as usual. She kept telling me to eat this and that, and asking the manager to bring more food. She didn’t seem to care about anything else.

“Are you feeling okay? Don’t push yourself too hard. Experience is good, but your health is the most important thing.”

Maybe it was because Composition was doing well in terms of profit. My father, the president, gave me a rare fatherly advice that made my sister and brother glare at me.

“Dad, you should scold him harshly at times like this. He doesn’t know his own limits and causes trouble for everyone. You should give him a piece of your mind, shouldn’t you?”

“Exactly. He’s already young enough to be sick of business and not doing his job properly. Isn’t that what people are saying?”

They poured gasoline on the fire, but for some reason, my father didn’t pay much attention to them and told me to just eat.

I wondered what was going on and continued my meal.

The braised ribs in front of me were so delicious that they felt like melting in my mouth as soon as I put them in.

“Thank you for the meal.”

I finished the last rib and put down my spoon. That was the end of the meal.

Everyone went to their own study or room, and only then did my mother smile and talk to me.

“When you were number one, your dad asked me how to do ‘streaming’. He’s just shy, you know. He must have bragged about you a lot at the meetings.”

Was it because there was no visible result until then? It was the first time I got the first place in 24 hours and the first place in the music show.

It was a result that I could show off to the outside world without being ashamed, even if they didn’t know much about idols. He was worried about me collapsing, but he didn’t seem to mind at all.

“Thank you…”

I felt awkward and embarrassed, and my mother laughed and patted my back. Then she brought up the topic that she had passed earlier.

“Isae, are you really going back to the dorm tomorrow? Didn’t they say you could commute from home?”

Ah, so Cheon Isae had casually made up that excuse. I shook my head and denied it.

“No, I think it’s better to stay at the dorm if I want to share schedules and communicate with the members.”

“It was nice to come back home for a while…”

And Cheon Isae had always had a bad relationship with my sister and brother, and he might have been able to endure their treatment.

But I couldn’t. I hated the thought of having to face those people every meal, let alone dislike them.

‘I don’t have to care about them if I live outside.’

Tsk. I lightly clicked my tongue and packed my luggage, and my mother kept hovering around me with a worried voice, wondering if there was anything else she could do for me.

“Is there anything else you need, mom? Just tell me, I’m so anxious I can’t even work.”

‘That’s why… you’re making him… No.’

I swallowed what I wanted to say and forced a smile.

“Um… I’m really fine right now…”

At that moment, something that I had forgotten came to my mind. That’s right. There was something I wanted to ask.

The thing that I had tried before but was rejected once. I didn’t have much hope, but I tried my luck.

“Can I ask you something…”

Then she finally said something! She looked like she had won a lottery, and her eyes sparkled.

“Yes, what can mom do for you?”

I tried to calm down my expectations and answered.

“Can we have a meal at Sky Aqua?”

Of course, that wasn’t enough.

“With the members, all together.”

I could easily make a table for one person by separating it, but beyond this point, it was impossible without the owner’s cooperation.

I shrugged my shoulders and smiled broadly.

“Is it not possible?”