Big Life

‘Why…?!’

She could even remember clearly the patterns of the wallpaper despite her bad hangover and the throbbing headache. Even the smell of the blanket and pillow was familiar to her.

'What? My clothes…?!'

Lee Soo-Hee turned white as day after lifting up the blanket slightly. She found herself wearing Ha Jae-Gun's baggy shirt and shorts.

Even her stockings had been taken off.

'Wait, no way…!'

The worst situation she could imagine had unfolded before her very eyes. She had no recollection of taking off the clothes on her own. Which meant that someone had changed her clothes for her. However, she was currently in Ha Jae-Gun’s one-room apartment, where there wasn’t anyone else aside from Ha Jae-Gun and Rika.

There was no way the cat could change her clothes with her front paws.

“Mmm…!” A low groan tickled Lee Soo-Hee’s ears.

Goosebumps appeared all over her body, making her tremble. She slowly turned around to see where the groan had come from.

‘...?!’

And her eyes widened...

Ha Jae-Gun and Park Jung-Jin were sleeping on the floor next to the bed. Their legs were on each other’s stomachs, and they were deep asleep in an ugly tangle.

‘Ah, come to think of it, yesterday…!’

As her memories started to slowly come back to her, she finally heard the sound of running tap water from the bathroom. Lee Soo-Hee quickly laid back in bed, pretending like she was still asleep as soon as the bathroom door opened.

A seemingly exhausted Hyo-Jin emerged from the bathroom.

“Ah, my head feels like it’s gonna explode.”

Hyo-Jin plopped back down into the bed next to Lee Soo-Hee. She frowned in discomfort and quickly fell back asleep.

‘Right, the four of us had drinks and came back to Jae-Gun’s house.’

Lee Soo-Hee calmly retraced her steps. While she was drinking alone with Ha Jae-Gun, Park Jung-Jin and Hyo-Jin came looking for them after they were done with the second round of drinking at the alumni gathering.

The group of four spent an eventful night at Sinchon until midnight and eventually made their last stop at Ha Jae-Gun’s house.

‘Wow, we drank a lot here, too.’

Bottles, glasses, and snacks were strewn across the floor.

However, Lee Soo-Hee couldn’t recall much, wondering if she had fallen asleep soon after they arrived back at Ha Jae-Gun’s house.

The sky was bright outside. Lee Soo-Hee gently escaped from the covers and started cleaning up the messy room. She then headed to the nearby supermarket and started preparing breakfast for everyone.

No one else woke up in the meantime.

‘I should hurry up and leave before anyone else wakes up.’

There was no way she would let Ha Jae-Gun see her messy makeup from last night. Lee Soo-Hee changed back into her own clothes and woke up the sleeping Hyo-Jin.

“Hyo-Jin, wake up. It’s morning; aren’t you going to go back home?”

“Mm, I don’t want to. I’ll leave after sleeping a while more. I’ve also agreed to go watch a movie with Jung-Jin later,” Hyo-Jin whined and turned away.

Lee Soo-Hee continued shaking her shoulder and asked, “I’ve got something to ask you too. My clothes…”

“Mmm…!”

Ha Jae-Gun turned around and let out a groan.

It looked like he was about to wake up.

With that, Lee Soo-Hee left the apartment without delay.

***

The remaining group of three finally woke up at noon and had their late breakfast. There were steamed eggs, seasoned bean sprouts, and pollack soup on the table.

Lee Soo-Hee had made them earlier.

“Wow, it’s fuckin’ delicious. Can Soo-Hee really do everything?”

“What fuckin’... Park Jung-Jin, can’t you use nicer words at your age?”

“Sorry, Madam Cheon. The food was just extremely delicious.”

Park Jung-Jin cleared two bowls of rice in one sitting. All the whining and grumbling about feeling nauseous when he woke up earlier had gone without a trace.

“Leave it, Hyo-Jin. I’ll do the dishes.”

“Ha Jae-Gun’s manners are still the best.”

Ha Jae-Gun quickly washed the dishes and filled up Rika’s empty food bowl.

Just then, Hyo-Jin murmured, “Ha Jae-Gun, do you wear glasses?”

“Huh?”

“Isn’t this yours? It looks old,” Hyo-Jin asked while holding up Seo Gun-Woo’s glasses.

“...!” Ha Jae-Gun’s heart pounded. He had forgotten to keep the glasses in the drawer before leaving the house yesterday.

“I wore glasses back in my university days, too. Ah, the size fits me as well.”

“Hyo-Jin…!”

He couldn’t stop Hyo-Jin in time and watched as Hyo-Jin wore the glasses. She was already picking up a book to read when Ha Jae-Gun went over to her.

“It doesn’t have a prescription?” Hyo-Jin asked as she flipped through the pages of the book half-heartedly.

Ha Jae-Gun didn’t answer and just stood there blankly. This was an unprecedented situation.

“Can you lend me this book? I want to read it.”

“Um, Hyo-Jin.”

“I can’t borrow this book?”

“No, I can lend it to you, but… do you not feel anything?”

“What feeling?” Hyo-Jin asked curiously; she was still wearing the glasses.

Ha, Jae-Gun wasn’t sure how he should answer. He pondered for a moment before asking once again. “It’s prescription glasses. Are you sure you’re not uncomfortable?”

“Really? I thought it was prescription-free. I had surgery, so my eyesight is 1.0.”

Hyo-Jin picked up the book once again. After a while, she nonchalantly took off the glasses and put them back where she had found them before pocketing the book into her bag.

‘...?’

Ha Jae-Gun stood by the bookshelf. He stared into space and was lost in his own thoughts. He thought Hyo-Jin would be alarmed at the sudden increase in her reading speed upon wearing the glasses, but she didn’t experience anything off.

Ha Jae-Gun wore the glasses himself and picked out a book to read.

The effects were still there. He could still read at an alarming speed.

‘Could it be…?’

Ha Jae-Gun unlocked his drawer and took out Seo Gun-Woo’s cup. Now, his target was the groaning Park Jung-Jin on the ground. He was writhing like a live octopus on an iron plate.

“Jung-Jin, have a cup of coffee.” Ha Jae-Gun made him a cup of coffee.

Park Jung-Jin looked at him and refused, waving his hand.

“I don’t want to drink anything hot now.”

“Have a sip, it’s from Switzerland.”

“Nonsense, I saw you take out the instant coffee sachet.”

“Jae-Gun, let me have it. I want to drink it.” Hyo-Jin took the cup and drank it instead.

Ha Jae-Gun observed Hyo-Jin quietly for a while as she read the book and drank the coffee. However, she didn’t have any reaction.

“Hyo-Jin, how are you feeling?” Ha Jae-Gun asked as he cleaned the cup.

Hyo-Jin found his question strange. She tilted her head at him and replied, “What do you mean? I’m still feeling terrible. I’m sore…”

“I see…”

Ha Jae-Gun, you’re kinda weird. Are you sure you’re sober?”

“Maybe I’m not…”

After a short conversation, Hyo-Jin and Park Jung-Jin finally left his house. Now that Rika and Ha Jae-Gun were left alone, he made another cup of coffee with Seo Gun-Woo’s cup.

Upon taking a sip, his exhaustion was immediately washed away.

“This…” He locked eyes with Rika and smiled. “Am I the only one who can experience these effects?”

“Meow?”

“They only apply to me.”

He felt a bit proud knowing that the great writer Seo Gun-Woo had only acknowledged him. Even though he could only show off to Rika, Ha Jae-Gun still felt great.

“Well, I should start figuring out what its effects are as well,” Ha Jae-Gun murmured as he took out the fountain pen from the drawer.

Ha Jae-Gun already knew the abilities of Seo Gun-Woo’s laptop, cup, and brown horn-rimmed glasses, including Rika’s, who had now become his life companion.

However, he still had no clue about the fountain pen’s abilities.

‘I should start using it more often now.’

Deciding to bring it along with him wherever he went, Ha Jae-Gun stuck the pen into the pencil holder on his desk. He believed that putting it where it was visible to him would make him use it more often.

“Nice. Now that my stamina’s recovered, let’s work for a bit.”

Ha Jae-Gun motivated himself and turned on the laptop.

The game scenario job at Nextion that he had discussed with Lee Soo-Hee would only be decided in the next few days. In other words, he should focus on the fantasy novel—Oscar’s Dungeon.

He was stuck and couldn’t quite progress with the plot, but he was still at ease since it was the only project he had to work on right now.

However, just as he reached for the keyboard, a text from Lee Soo-Hee came in.

- I left in a hurry this morning because something urgent came up. Have you eaten yet?

- Yeah, it was delicious. I realized this back at your house, but your cooking skills are incredible.

It took a while before Lee Soo-Hee’s reply arrived.

- Let me know if there’s something you want to eat, and I’ll cook it for you. You should eat well so that you can produce great titles. What are you doing today? I mean, it’s the weekend…

- I was about to start working on my novel.

- I see… You’re working hard even during weekends. Don’t push yourself too hard, though.

- Thank you, you should not push yourself too hard as well.

After replying to Lee Soo-Hee one last time, Ha Jae-Gun turned his attention back to his screen, and his eyes were ablaze with motivation.

He was about to start writing the sixth volume of Oscar’s Dungeon.

‘Let’s break through this wall. Ignore the vocabulary and sentences… even the coherence!’

Tadadak! Tadadadak! Tak!

Sparks seemed to erupt from his fingers.

The ability to type 10,000 characters per hour on Seo Gun-Woo’s laptop started.

Ha Jae-Gun glared intently at his screen as if he wanted to devour it.

His fingers moved tirelessly, thanks to the anger directed at the unresolved plot progression. He thought that if he were to continue working away in earnest like what he had done for Storm and Gale, the muse of the plot would eventually come to him.

Time passed, and it was soon evening.

Ha Jae-Gun totally forgot about the passage of time. Rika would usually not disturb Ha Jae-Gun while he was working, but she decided to leap up onto his desk this time.

When Ha Jae-Gun heard Rika’s cries, he finally stopped working.

“I’m doomed, Rika!”

Ha Jae-Gun looked at Rika with an ugly expression and explained, “I can’t think of anything to write! I wrote 80,000 characters, but this isn’t even a novel; it’s just a combination of words! The story is boring without a resolution between Oscar and the guild master’s conflict.”

Rika approached Ha Jae-Gun and consoled him by pressing her front paws on his chest. Seeing how there wasn’t any response from Ha Jae-Gun, Rika licked his cheeks and cried sadly.

“Yeah, I must have lost my desperation,” Ha Jae-Gun muttered. His head drooped as he said, “I’ve been spending less time thinking deeply into my plots. I am the problem. I’ve forgotten about my early days, I’ve forgotten about why I started.”

“Meow?”

Ha Jae-Gun came to his own conclusion and turned off the laptop before standing up. He needed to take a breather from writing by taking a walk and getting some fresh air.

Ha Jae-Gun changed his clothes and packed his notebook into a backpack.

However, he spotted an old notepad and stared at it for a while.

A thought suddenly came to him.

How long had it been since he stopped using his notepad? He had totally forgotten about the times when he often recorded everything he saw, heard, and felt whenever he was out and about.

Plop!

Ha Jae-Gun put down the heavy backpack on the floor and picked up the notepad, as well as Seo Gun-Woo’s fountain pen, which he had placed in the nearby pen holder.

Without a single heavy load in his hands, Ha Jae-Gun stepped out of his apartment.

***

Ha Jae-Gun arrived at a small cafe nearby after spending some time in a bookstore.

“Thank you.”

Ha Jae-Gun ordered a cup of coffee and took a seat in a corner. He had specifically chosen this cafe, as this was the very same cafe where he had come up with the story for The Breath, the biggest hit novel he had published under the name Poongchun-Yoo.

‘This fountain pen definitely has a special ability as well.

Ha Jae-Gun held the pen in his hand and opened the notepad. Nothing was coming to his mind. However, the tip of his pen was unknowingly scribbling the lyrics of AppleT’s song.

‘An idea for the development might come to me if I… listed out the characters, events and background?’

Ha Jae-Gun wrote down a list with high expectations.

However, no magic happened. Ha Jae-Gun wasn’t too discouraged.

He had already tested the fountain pen, after all.

‘Ah... But seriously, how should I resolve the conflict between Oscar and the guild master?’

Ha Jae-Gun recalled the plot and translated the concerns he had in his mind onto the notepad. Oscar, who gained tremendous strength after obtaining the dragon’s artifact, and the guild master who became jealous of Oscar, got into a…

‘Huh? This is it!’

A bell rang in his ears.

‘The guild master lost his parents because of the dragon! So it’s not weird that he hates Oscar! Plus, the guild master originally wanted to grow stronger just to get rid of the dragon in the empire! In that case…!’

Ha Jae-Gun’s tired hands moved rapidly.

He started scribbling, filling up the notepad with sentences.

The thick iron wall that was in his way was starting to crumble.

‘Yes, this is it! It’ll be resolved at some point if you keep thinking about it!’

The feeling of joy bubbled from within him as he continued working on the idea. The fountain pen, accompanied by Ha Jae-Gun’s deep-rooted concerns, displayed its ability to its maximum potential.

On that night, Ha Jae-Gun only departed the cafe when the owner had to close it.