THE BEST OF TOMORROW

Episode 51

//"...Eunchan?"//

//"Don't look for Im Sol anymore."//

Sunjae's mouth opens silently to the familiar name that flows out of Kwon Eunchan's
mouth. His mind became ordered, dizzy, distant, and confused. The raindrops, which
had been drawn diagonally in the air, spread like thorns on the stem. Light is
constantly fragmented, and the fragmented light sweeps all over the landscape.

//"We flow to the same face in many different worlds, and the only face you
know..."//

//"..."//

//"You'll be in the world she'll reach someday."//

All the broken light was sucked into the wall, and only darkness fell. Sunjae, who
was lying on the bed, slowly lifted his eyelids. Whenever he blinked, the quiet
inside of the hospital room becomes clearer and clearer. He stood up straight and
saw the bed across the street. Kwon Eunchan lay still.

"...Is it a dream?"

He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand and swept his hair. It was too clear a
voice to be a dream. Someday in the world she will reach. The last word that ended
like that flowed unsteadily as if it had not reached a perfect point. He felt
strange. It shook unsteadily, and his head was as confused as his shaken heart.

The gaze at the bridge touched the book that fell to the floor. Sunjae's hand,
which stretched out toward the floor, picked up the book. When the cover was
unfolded, a short note written by Im Sol remained.

[Page 78. Make sure to read "Insomnia" and "Sleep tight".]

His heart was pounding, and his eyes were getting hot. He choked with tears. He
felt like he was left alone in a strange world. The thing that shone beside him
disappeared, and he seemed to be wandering alone in the dark, and then deep into
the low place.

Only uncertainty remained in the fish lamp whose depth could not be measured. In
the darkness where there was nothing in hand, the vague understanding that he would
believe, the fact that it was one, became hopeless. He couldn't believe what he saw
in his dream. He can't believe it, but he had to. That was all that was left.

♠ ♠ ♠

"Mom..."

Im Sol's mother, who was moving the cucumber gourd to a plate, raised her eyes to
the timid voice. She pointed to her daughter's forehead, who was hesitating without
continuing her words, saying, "What's wrong with the child?"
"I don't have a fever."

"..."

A look of lack of confidence is directed to a low point. Why are you so

discouraged? No matter how strange the gourd looked, Im Sol's mother put her
chopsticks and sat down.

"What's the matter?"

Until a few months ago, she said she wanted
but recently, she thought it was okay to go
seemed to be full of energy, so she thought
fell, but she was worried that she suddenly
gloomy and anxious emotions.
to quit school day and night crying,
to school without saying anything. It
it was a relief even if her grades
felt like she was regaining her old

"What's the matter? Tell your mother."

"It's..."

"Well."

"I... I think I've become something like that."

"Something like that? I'd like that."

"No, another soul..."

An uneasy look went to Im Sol's face.

"Come on in."

♠ ♠ ♠

The road was blinded by the cold wave. It hurt whenever it touched her skin as if
she was sharpened by the wind. Im Sol was walking on the street, almost dragged
away, holding his mother's hand. Two loaves and a red nose froze in the cold.

"Mom, I don't want to go!"

"The lady next door told me this is the best place!"

"Oh, I hate it. I'm afraid."

"I'm more frightened! You punk! How can you not remember for two months?"

"It's not that I don't have it, it's just that I can't remember..."

"You said someone whom you don't remember know you. And I heard he had your things.
Is this normal? Huh?"

In the middle of the street, her mother screamed. The wind glanced at the two
people walking along the street. Im Sol's head sank like rice. Tears welled up
around her eyes.

"Don't talk to me, just follow me."

Im Sol's mother took her foot off again and pulled her wrist. Her body moved
weakly. Im Sol followed her mother without any resistance.

Their steps stopped in front of a house. At the end of the long alley, there was a
fortune-teller. The end of the alley was a dead end, and at the gate of the house
with a red flag, it was written "Jang Gun-sin, who gave me a famous fortune-telling
book."

Im Sol's face turned to contemplation in a gloomy atmosphere. When she faltered and
stepped back, her mother grabbed her wrist and gave her strength. Then, as if she
had made up her mind, she pushed open the wooden gate.

The door opened with a squeak. She put strength in her legs and crossed the
threshold. Passing through the small yard, a house with a roof with tiles appeared.
There is a floor on the stone steps, and a red cloth came down inside the floor to
cover the space beyond. And on the right side of the yard, there were several
earthenware that two people could easily enter and leave.

"Come on in."

His voice rang behind the red cloth, perhaps even feeling the presence of someone.
Im Sol's shoulders tremble at the sudden sound.

Im Sol and her mother knelt side by side. They didn't mean to kneel, but when they
saw a person sitting in front of the mural, they knelt down. Jill was a young man
with sharp eyes on his eyebrows. Perhaps because the sunlight poured through the
red cloth, the room was all red. The redness felt strange.

The chief priest said that he was a general, but the mural depicted a woman wearing
a long white cloth wrapped around her body walking on a tightrope. The man, who was
watching Im Sol staring at the mural, stretched out his lips and smiled before
opening his mouth.

"The general is a master of martial arts."

"What?"

"He can hide his body or turn into something else."

"Oh..."

"It could be that the god of fate borrowed the image of a general, or that the god
of general might have taken the form of a god of fate."

"..."

Im Sol, who grabbed the hem tightly, quietly turned her head to see her mother.
Perhaps the sound in front of her was strange for her to hear, she turned her head
and made eye contact with her daughter. Im Sol shook her head quietly. Mom, this
place is weird. Then his mother shook her head quietly. They have already stepped
in.

The man smiles low when he sees the mother and daughter exchanging eyes.

"Was what I said frightening?"

The voice drew their attention to the man. The man looked at Im Sol with a smile on
his face.
"What's really scary is that I'm going to build a sand castle. I didn't know I had
built it."

Im Sol's mother was increasingly suspicious of a man who said nothing about what
they had come for, whether he was going to use a talisman or anything else. Since
he hasn't said a word yet, she was thinking about just leaving, but her cell phone
rang. When surprised by the loud ringing of the bell, the man smiled softly and
said, "I think you're going to leave the house, pick it up."

Im Sol's mother, who confirmed the sender, blindly believed the words of her
mother, who was a minor next door, who said they were really useful. She called
from real estate. The house that was released a few months ago was finally about to
leave. Oh, my God, Im Sol's mother took her cell phone and went out to the yard.
She was so surprised that she couldn't even tell her daughter to wait.

Her mother left and Im Sol was left alone. She heard voices talking on the phone in
the yard. The man, sitting upright, stared straight into Im Sol's face. Im Sol's
eyes, unable to find a place to look, looked anxiously through the wall.

"There's a different smell of time on your shoulder."

Im Sol looked down at her shoulder with a frightened face. There was nothing, but
she didn't know what the smell was.

"I don't know if it's years from now, but it doesn't smell in the world yet."

The man sitting upright narrowed his upper body's eyes and stared at Im Sol's
shoulder.

"But your shoulders smell like mine, too."

Her lips are dry and her dry saliva is killing her.

"There is no sign of anyone else's soul in it."

The man's gaze from her shoulder caught Im Sol's eye.

"Did my future friend come and go?..."

The man smiled lightly as he watched Im Sol, who was getting paler and paler.

"The overlapping time can't be clean. I'm sure there are traces left. Why don't I
protect it with a generous heart?"

"...Will you protect me?"

The man nodded.

"It should be fun to find my traces".

The man rubbed his chin by biting back on his lower upper body.

"It must have been some sort of trip."

★ ★ ★

The heavy snow the previous day had piled up and the road turned white. Early in
the morning, Sunjae and Im Sol sat side by side on the playground bench. There was
no sign of snow accumulation like an island that only fell here because of the
pavilion roof.

"I thought you wouldn't come out."

Im Sol, who sat far away at Sunjae's words, dropped her gaze at her toes.

"Your name is... You said you are Ryu Sunjae, right?

Sunjae bowed his head, unable to see Im Sol's face in the awkward way she spoke his
name.

"I don't know, either. I really don't remember."

"..."

Im Sol, who was looking at her toes while fiddling with the hem of her clothes,
took something out of her pocket and held it out. Her little hand was holding
Sunjae's iPod. Sunjae stared down at it.

"Is this yours?"

Not knowing what to say to Im Sol, who keeps speaking formally, Sunjae nodded.

"...I'll give it back to you."

Sunjae's face was slightly distorted in an incomprehensible situation. Even if he

chose the words, he couldn't get the answer. He rubbed his forehead, swept his
hair, and stared at the scenery. He couldn't look into Im Sol's eyes without any
warmth.

"You gave me an MP3 player, and that's why I gave it to you."

"Me?"

The warmth of the words came and went was different, so Sunjae nodded instead of
answering "yes" this time. He felt like crying over and over again. She really
doesn't know him?

When did she come to school in gym clothes? When did they listen to music and walk
on the street together? She doesn't remember anything? He wanted to ask so badly,
but he couldn't speak easily.

"I'm really confused, too."

"..."

"I really don't remember."

Because she has a depressed face like him. He thinks that's because of him. Sunjae
shut up.

"I wasn't going to come out, but..."

She hands something over. The wind flapped a piece of paper in her hand.

"I wrote you a letter."

He looked at her small hand, which had always embraced him, and was handed a piece
of paper. His name was written in familiar handwriting.