ABFR 05

Chapter 5

Railey Kraha had actually lived that kind of life in his former world. He prepared a revolution for his own people, who were discriminated against on the continent, and for the people who lived under oppression.

In the middle of it, he discovered that the revolution itself had actually been manipulated by someone else.

But even after learning that his entire life had been used by someone else, he decided to burn up his own life in order to take responsibility for what he had chosen to do.

That was the kind of person he was.

Even though all sexual contact and intimate expressions of affection had disappeared between us, I found myself wondering if the reason he insisted on taking such good care of me might actually be something like that.

“He still has that pathetic habit of being obsessed with people, though.”

In the end, as I looked at Railey Kraha’s car arriving in front of my apartment at around three in the morning, I had no choice but to mutter bitterly.

I had no idea whether that obsession was with something he had already obtained or with someone he loved. Damn it, I knew this was all pointless overthinking.

In short, as unpleasant, irritating, and unsatisfying as this situation was, perhaps I really wanted Railey Kraha to clearly state where he stood.

But even in the novel, it had taken two whole years before I finally heard a proper confession of his feelings. What could I possibly expect now?

Forget it. Forget it, Ajin.

Life becomes about three times happier when you throw away unnecessary expectations and greed.

“What are you thinking about so seriously?”

Railey got out of the driver’s seat and personally opened the door for me. His silver eyebrows lowered coldly.

Beneath his neatly arranged silver hair, partly swept back, his cool, sculpted face continued sharply. The distinct mole beneath his left lip and his delicate features, like those of a finely made ball-jointed doll, gleamed blue and cold under the neon lights. His violet eyes shone clearly, almost as if they were made of crystal.

He stood in front of me and tilted his neck slightly.

He was lowering his gaze and doing that to match my height. But my real-world body was more than ten centimeters shorter than the body I had used in the novel, so whenever he did that, I always felt as if I were being threatened.

He was nearly 190 centimeters tall, making him at least thirty centimeters taller than me. Even if I wore heels, we would only be about the same height.

Besides, Railey also preferred traditional formal dress shoes with sturdy heels, so the difference in height would more or less remain.

Below Railey Kraha’s beautiful face were broad, solid shoulders, a trim waist, and long, large limbs and hands. Just as one would expect from someone who had ruled the underworld of a highly fantastical world as its number one, his body was both sleek and strong, the kind that was difficult to see on an ordinary person in reality.

The body I had used in the novel had been tall and slender, so I had never really felt the difference back then.

But when I looked up at him with my original body, his presence was genuinely intimidating.

He had a rather slender build, but if you touched him, you would find that it was all firm muscle. He always wore suits, so it was difficult to see, but unlike his pretty face, his entire body must have been covered with countless scars.

His face also felt strangely unfamiliar to me every time I saw it.

When I saw that face in my real world, I felt a completely different kind of incongruity compared to when I had seen it in the fantasy world.

“No…”

It had actually started the moment he got out of the driver’s seat.

Every person still on the street was staring endlessly at this handsome, well-built foreigner with their mouths hanging open.

In any case, even though he was in reality, he still didn’t look like a person from reality.

I let out a sigh of exhaustion and lightly pushed his shoulder with my fingertips.

First, I moved his shoulder slightly backward and slipped past him. Instead of getting into the back seat whose door he had opened for me, I opened the passenger-side door and let out another deep sigh.

Even if I didn’t particularly want to know the details of how it happened, Railey had become an extremely wealthy man, so the sedan he drove was also a high-end model that an ordinary person wouldn’t even dare to consider.

“I was thinking that it would be nice if Kim Railey Kraha interfered less in my life.”

“That is a hopeless wish.”

Railey answered calmly. After gently closing the back-seat door, he also neatly closed the passenger door.

Then, before returning to his own seat, he took a cardigan from the back seat and handed it to me.

When I accepted it, I saw that it was the white cardigan Railey had given me before. It seemed I had left it at his house.

“What is this?”

“The night breeze is cold. Since we are going to the riverside, please put it on.”

He answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“The riverside? Why the riverside?”

“You said you wanted to go there last time.”

Railey answered casually as he fastened my seat belt for me.

But even after hearing his answer, I had to think hard for quite a while to remember.

The car started moving smoothly.

“Oh…? I really don’t remember saying that. When did I say it?”

“You were probably trying to say, ‘I want to go somewhere, anywhere!’ because of the stress from your deadline, but you phrased it differently. In any case, I heard you say it, so I will take you there.”

“Hmm… That is possible.”

“Are you not writing these days? I haven’t seen you write.”

Well…

Why did I think I had fallen into a slump for the past four years?

Because my relationship with Railey Kraha inside the book had been too stimulating, and because I missed it too much, I had spent years unable to properly adjust to my own life.

Even after meeting him again, I hadn’t managed to complete anything meaningful during the six months that had passed. It was for the same reason.

And that wasn’t all.

There was still a clear distance between us that hadn’t existed before.

Was this something that inevitably happened between former lovers who had once separated?

Either way, I didn’t want to make such a pathetic appeal to Railey now.

I didn’t want to become desperate for love.

Just as I had eventually become able to write without him after nearly four years, I would be able to write the things that were difficult to write again once enough time passed.

“Of course you don’t know. I don’t feel like writing when you’re watching.”

I spoke coldly, but Railey didn’t seem to take my words particularly seriously.

I glared at him pointedly, then took off my shoes in the passenger seat, pulled my knees up to my chest, and began looking out the window.

Half of what I said was sincere.

Whenever I curled up on my bed with my laptop in my arms to write, Railey would always come over and watch me from behind.

Even though I told him to stop doing that, he seemed unable to understand.

His logic was always the same.

And, sure enough, he said it again this time.

“It will not matter anyway. I will read it once it is published.”

“Watching me write it in real time is different. You really don’t understand a creator’s feelings. Anyway, I really am writing.”

“Hmm.”

“I mean it. I’ve already finished the synopsis for my new work.”

Since he clearly didn’t believe me, I started rambling about the synopsis of my new novel while he stopped the car, calmly unfastened my seat belt, walked around to the other side, and opened the door for me.

“The protagonist is a female university student who wears a red college jacket. She’s twenty years old and has a really fiery temper. She’s a freshman.”

“Is it set in modern times?”

“Yeah. I’ve suddenly become obsessed with raid stories lately. It’s a team-hero story that starts with the premise that one day, Gates suddenly open in the middle of Seoul and start pouring out creatures.”

“‘Team-hero story’?”

Although Railey had become surprisingly familiar with modern Korea over the past six months, he still couldn’t properly understand words like this.

He furrowed his eyebrows and asked again.

Since he was someone who had almost perfectly adapted to reality except for his appearance, I sometimes had to think for quite a while about how to answer questions like this.

This time as well, after receiving his unexpected question, I pulled the front of the cardigan together with my fingertips and began walking beside him along the riverside promenade.

Railey quickly made room for me beside him.

Surprisingly, people walking along the riverside where the lights shimmered were still appearing from time to time.

Well, it wasn’t even four in the morning yet. Maybe it was actually a good time to have a drink and wander around afterward.

“Uh… How do I explain it…”

“Is it a particular genre?”

“Umm… Several people… wear uniforms… form a team… and fight villains or monsters… Something like that.”

“Hmm…”

Perhaps the explanation didn’t sound particularly special, because Railey let out an ambiguous sound and looked dissatisfied.

After thinking a little more, I decided to just tell him the synopsis of my new novel.

I figured he would get the general idea once he heard it.

“In my story, people with superpowers form teams and fight the creatures that come through the Gates. They’re called by colors based on the color of the clothes they were wearing when the first Gate opened.”

“Ah.”

Railey made a sound as if he roughly understood.

At that moment, a man walking past me bumped shoulders with me. He had already started to spit out half a string of profanity when Railey, who was standing beside me, wrapped an arm around the shoulder that had been bumped and lowered his gaze menacingly at him.

The man immediately shut his mouth.

Those weren’t the eyes of someone who had killed only one or two people.

Actually, he probably hadn’t killed only one or two people.

Ugh, no. Let’s not imagine it.

Anyway, the man quickly said, “Oh, I’m sorry,” and disappeared.

To block Railey’s murderous gaze as it followed the man’s retreating figure, I lightly pushed his chin upward with my fingertips.

“Don’t threaten innocent citizens…”

“‘Innocent,’ you say. Are you sure he was innocent?”

“Compared to you, isn’t he probably a law-abiding citizen…?”

After answering regretfully, Railey narrowed his eyes for a moment before calmly returning to the previous topic.

“In any case, you are referring to those hero shows in tights that are sometimes broadcast on television.”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Do they wear tights?”

“No, not necessarily. I told you earlier. The protagonist is a woman who wears a red college jacket, so she’s Red. There’s a guy her age from a rival university who wears a blue college jacket, so he’s Blue. Black will be someone from the financial industry or a company employee wearing a suit. White will be a doctor. Purple and Pink will probably be celebrities, and I’ll probably make Green and Yellow have different age groups… Hmm. I’m still thinking about that part.”

“In other words…”

Railey had me stand in front of the railing first, where the night view across the river could be seen nicely, and answered indifferently.

“You haven’t actually decided anything in detail.”

“Shut up.”

I immediately clenched my fist and pounded it against his chest and shoulder several times.

Railey merely snorted as if my actions were laughable, lowered his gaze, and didn’t react to my punches at all.

Instead, he simply fixed my cardigan and straightened my collar properly.

The way he looked down at me quietly was somehow extremely irritating.

It was as if he thought of me as something less than a person.

Like a cat.