Returnee’s Life Report

17

Ho opened his eyes and blinked around his surroundings. First of all, he was lying in his bed. The ceiling and bedroom decorations were all familiar. He was in the Jaya Apartment Penthouse, his own house.

‘What is this smell?’

The whole place smelled like stew, kimchi stew, to be more specific. It smelled a little different from what was usually sold in the market. Maybe he just got used to it? Or maybe it’s just been a while since he smelled this?

After a while, he finally figured out what was different. Longing, the smell was full of that particular feeling.

Lee Ho got up and moved to the kitchen, where the smell was emanating from. As he walked across the bedroom, he looked outside the window.

It was nighttime. Was it a little past nine o’clock? Looking at the wall clock, he saw that it was already 9:32 p.m. A deep voice suddenly reached his ears.

“You woke up just in time. Sit down.”

In the kitchen was a man wearing a sweatshirt and an apron. He had a similar appearance—almost unchanged from his childhood face…

It was Lee Hwan.

“Why do you look so wary? Sit down. I made stew for you. Do you want a lot of rice or only a little?”

Ho didn’t show it, but he was very hungry. He opened his mouth and said quietly.

“…A lot.”

At this, Lee Hwan’s smile brightened. “Yeah, you’re a very busy man, you should eat a lot.”

He had been completely distracted by Hwan’s appearance here, but he came back to his senses and realized he had a lot of work to do today…

Lee Hwan noticed the change in his expression and added, “I forgot to tell you. I canceled all of your schedules today.”

“…Huh?”

“I think you had a meeting or dinner with the President? And another meeting with the world hunter-something? I canceled all those things.”

He was right, Ho did have a scheduled dinner with the President and a meeting with the President of the World Hunter Association.

Even in this situation, Lee Hwan’s smile continued to shine bright. “Is that more important than having a meal with the brother you haven’t seen in ten years?”

“……”

“Well, that’s disappointing. Even though you were suspicious of me at first, didn’t I put your worries to rest already? Aren’t you sure by now? But you still keep thinking about something else.”

Lee Hwan’s hand stroked the table gently. Not only his words but also the small movements he made were smeared with disappointment.

“Did I come back here for nothing?”

Ho shook his head. What should he say to this? Should he tell Hwan it was awkward? Meeting with the President of the World Hunter Association was important, and the dinner with the President was also crucial. Everything was important, but… On second thought, this actually was more important.

He finally sat down, scratching his head.

Lee Hwan put down a steaming bowl full of rice in front of Ho. He raised his head and looked up at Hwan, who was still smiling at him. Lee Ho opened his mouth and said what he had to say to Hwan, something that he thought he should have said earlier.

“…I’m sorry.”

Hwan didn’t say anything, he just patted Ho’s head. And that was how the two started eating. They ate rice and delicious kimchi stew. The more Lee Ho ate, the redder his eyes became.

This was it.

The kimchi stew that his mother used to make. It tasted just like this.

He had eaten a lot of food in all these years. He has been to all the famous restaurants and eaten food of a very high standard, each meal served by seven-star chefs. However, this taste was certainly different. It was the taste of longing.

“This took me five years.”

Lee Ho wiped his eyes and raised his head questioningly.

Five years? Five years of what?

“I went to one of the best chefs on that continent, and I learned from him.”

“You learned to make kimchi stew?”

Lee Hwan shook his head.

“Not kimchi stew specifically, I learned how to put emotions in food. Dude, does it make sense to learn how to make kimchi stew for five years?”

“You’re right.”

“It took me four years and eight months to learn how to put my memories into food. That’s it.”

“What happened to the chef?”

“He’s dead.”

Lee Ho was speechless for a moment. He was dead? Did Lee Hwan kill him?

Seeing his reaction, Lee Hwan laughed as if he had guessed his brother’s thoughts.

“I didn’t kill him. He was simply quite old, and he died of old age. He was around a hundred and two years old before he died.”

“…I see.”

After that, their conversation stopped. They focused on eating, but the atmosphere between them grew comfortable.

Lee Hwan was happy to finally have a proper meal with his younger brother, whom he was seeing again after ten years, and Lee Ho was happy to taste his mother’s kimchi stew again after ten years. Everything was good.

After their meal, the two brothers washed the dishes together and cleaned up the kitchen. They then headed to the living room, where there was an awkward silence. Even though they were brothers, they couldn’t help but feel awkward around each other.

Lee Hwan moved first.

He picked up a chair, placed it in the middle of the living room, and sat on it.

“Draw me a picture.”

“…What picture? Your picture?”

“Yeah.”

Ho smiled faintly.

“It won’t be difficult if it’s just a sketch. I’ll draw you in a minute.”

As he stood up to get drawing materials, Hwan shook his head and said that it was not like that.

“Draw me like an Implementer would.”

Ho stopped in his tracks before slowly turned his head toward Hwan. He was still sitting in the chair and laughed as he did when he was young. Only then did he realize the source of this familiarity. Lee Hwan’s laughter was still the same as his laughter when he was young.

Draw him like an Implementer would…

“It will take a while. Will you be okay?”

Lee Hwan nodded, and with this, Lee Ho headed to the pantry. The conditions of implementation were simple. He had to draw a picture of what he had seen once. It didn’t matter whether the subject was dead or alive; if he just drew it and made it a picture, he could ‘implement’ or ‘manifest’ the object for up to five minutes. This was the main reason why he was not called a Summoner. Regardless of whether the subject of the picture was dead or alive, the object that was embodied was only a kind of replica.

However, there was one problem. As mentioned earlier, he had to see the implementation subject in person. Seeing didn’t mean passing by the subject in the street or sometime in the past, he had to feel the moment completely. He had to see the power of the target to be implemented firsthand. It had both advantages and disadvantages. However, no matter how it was packaged, it was a clear fact that implementation was a deceptive ability.

After getting his things ready, Lee Ho slowly began to draw his brother. As he concentrated on drawing, he could hear Lee Hwan’s voice reach his ears.

“At first, I started out as a slave.”

His brush stopped moving.

“A slave?”

“Well, it’s a world where words have quite different meanings. I wasn’t just a slave, I was a gladiator.”

“….”

“There was an arena where I fought with beasts and people, armed with only one sword and one shield. It was kill or be killed. I’ve had multiple chances to run away, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I couldn’t run away because it was a shitty thing to do. I was a gladiator for about a year and two months—or three months? About that long.”

Lee Hwan’s voice was calm as he told his story, and he was so composed.

“You know why I was able to survive that long, right? I’m not the type of guy who lives to be defeated.”

“…I know that well.”

He was Lee Hwan, who didn’t lose a single fight against those who bullied him, even when he was still on Earth. There was a time when he had bent over, retreated one step, and even lowered his head. Perhaps Lee Ho didn’t know, but maybe he once even knelt down. But it was all part of the process, the process that created results.

Those who argued against Hwan, those who ignored him, those who cursed his family, those who treated them as beggars and did all kinds of crap to them—not one of them was left intact. Hwan was that type of man.

He then continued telling his story.

“I gathered the gladiators and killed those who opposed me. Then I controlled those who seemed to be informants.”

“…….”

“Everyone showed up on the chosen day. I tore the limbs off the guy who brought me to be a gladiator, and I killed all the men who were even a little involved in charge of the arena. I didn’t just kill them, I fed them all to the dogs. I don’t know how many people I killed, about five thousand people? Did I kill that many?”

Lee Hwan was telling the story of his life as realistically as possible.

“Then I met her. A little kid called Yeo-Hwa.”

“Yeo-Hwa?”

“It was something like a common cliché. She is a descendant of the Archmage, and there were faction fights… Political fights… She wiped them all out and ran away.”

Ho nodded in understanding. It was a familiar story from many novels.

“I’ve been with her for about nine years now. At that point in time, other people started calling me titles.”

“What did they call you?”

“The God of War, the God of Valhalla, the God of the Valhalla, the Greatest of All Time. And the Sword Majesty.”

Ho continued to draw as he listened intently.

“Then did you keep staying with that Yeo-Hwa?”

“Something like that. There were also some kids along the way that I could call my colleagues.”

Unlike his usual self, Lee Hwan’s words were vague. Lee Ho was curious.

“Colleagues?”

“They’re dead.”

“Ah…What happened?”

“Well, that continent was divided into two, the Eastern and Western continents. I was active in the East Continent, but the situation there was pretty bad.”

“Bad?”

“You know about the Warring States period, right?”

Ho smiled a little. “I do. I think I learned about it in middle school, but it’s been quite a while since I heard it.”

“That’s what the East Continent was like. There were originally seven countries, but the people trying to fill their stomachs struggled for supremacy and made all sorts of schemes to gain an advantage. In such a world, weak kids never survive.”

It was simple, just looking at the context. Lee Hwan had colleagues, but everyone had died except for Yeo-Hwa.

“Still, if there was an afterlife, I think they’d be quite satisfied.”

“You’re talking about your colleagues, right?”

“Yeah.”

“You said they were dead? How can they be satisfied?”

It was a very simple reason, the reason why they had no choice but to be satisfied.

“Because I killed them all.”

“…Huh?”

“The guys who killed those kids, I went and killed them all.”

“…….”

“I killed the King, the Queen, the Princess, and all Princes who were pushed up the ranks, including the Crown Prince and all those who even brushed their fingertips against them. There were a lot of people hiding, but I found them all and killed them.”

Lee Hwan’s voice was calm. Lee Ho felt little goosebumps rise all over his body, but he didn’t show it.

“I said there were seven countries, right? That’s how five countries fell apart.”

“…I see.”

There was a moment of silence between the two. Eventually, it was Lee Ho, not Lee Hwan, who broke the silence.

“So, what was your relationship with Yeo-Hwa?”

Lee Hwan was silent, but Lee Ho, who was still drawing him, could already tell. Lee Hwan’s eyes were wet with longing.