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Chapter 358: Choose (1)

After we wrapped up, the evening followed its usual routine. A late-night practice session, heading back to the dorm, a quick shower, a round of video games with Goh Yoo-Joon, and firing off a thank-you text to my parents before crashing into bed.

Today had been a day filled with more smiles and a little more sparkle, making me hopeful that tomorrow would bring more of the same. However, buried somewhere in my subconscious was the nagging knowledge that immense happiness was often followed by the opposite feeling—unhappiness.

As usual, I dismissed this thought as trivial. But the moment I lay down and closed my eyes, a sinking feeling told me something was off. I couldn\'t pinpoint it, but I knew something bad would happen.

My whole body shook uncontrollably. This wasn’t just some fleeting sensation as the vibrations intensified gradually until they morphed into violent shakings. Alongside this turmoil, a cacophony began to build around me.

I opened my eyes at that moment. As I lay there on the dorm bed, it seemed impossible to be experiencing such intense vibrations, noises, as well as the chatter and cries of people around me.

"...What the... Ugh!" I gasped in shock.

And that was when it hit me that the serene dorm room had been replaced by a scene of utter chaos. My head suddenly felt like it was encased in ice. My face drained of color, and my mind blanked out, unable to process thoughts or form words. All that escaped my lips were the foolish murmurs of "Ah... Ah..."

‘What in the world is happening? Is this even real? What kind of situation have I stumbled into?’

It felt too vivid to be a dream, yet too abrupt and bizarre to be reality.

- Ladies and gentlemen, the aircraft is experiencing turbulence due to strong winds!

Beep beep beep beep beep—

- Please bend down! Head down! Hold onto your ankles! Grab your ankles!

That moment had been etched into my memory. It was the overwhelming scene, the intense atmosphere, the sharp stench of fear as the plane nosedived. Screams, a mix of fear and anxiety filling the air. I felt utterly paralyzed as my heart dropped to my stomach and left me gasping for air.

Cold sweat covered me, and my limbs trembled uncontrollably.

- Bend down! Head down! Hold onto your ankles! Grab your ankles!

‘Why? Why is this happening again...? Why now...’

Someone forcibly pushed my head down. I was enveloped in intense heat accompanied by a deafening roar and a violent jolt.

"AAAAAAH!!!" I screamed, overwhelmed by the excruciating pain. Then, all the pain suddenly vanished, and a profound silence enveloped me.

‘Am I dead?’

No, I wasn\'t dead. The damp touch of the blanket beneath me and the musty smell of mold were too real. I opened my eyes again.

"...Fuck."

Swearing felt natural after what felt like an eternity. The moldy ceiling I was staring at was unmistakably the same one from the studio apartment I lived in before everything changed.

As I sat up, the skin from my face to my collarbone pulled tight. This sensation was all too familiar.

‘Damn it. Is this reality? Was everything else... my regression, my debut, my first concert just a dream?’

"Shit."

Anger surged within me. I was the crazy one. Of course, such happy events would never happen to someone like me. What had made me believe such illusions? It was all just... fake.

"Was it all really nothing? Really? Chronos, concerts, even singer Suh Hyun-Woo?"

It was too much to bear. All the hopes and efforts I had poured into everything had vanished into thin air. I had never felt so empty. If there was a god, I wanted to scream at him and ask why he tormented me so. If my days as Chronos were merely a dream, I wished to remain in that dream forever.

I sat there, lost in thoughts, cursing the cruel twist of fate. A strange holographic window appeared suddenly in front of me.

[It\'s not a dream, you idiot.]

[Second Condition: Overcome] Mission Complete

Status : Amnesia has been removed.

The words scrolled up within the holographic window. As I read them, a sense of being hit over the head washed over me.

\'Something is off here.\'

Everything felt weird. This couldn’t just be written off as a mere dream because the peculiarity of the ongoing events was undeniable.

The text in the hologram changed once more.

[Third Condition: Choose]

-You cannot advance until you fulfill the condition.

"The third condition?"

How had I skipped the first two conditions to land directly on the third? What did \'choose\' even mean?

I lacked any solid information. Yet this window seemed to be my sole beacon of hope for returning to where I once was. It couldn’t all have been a dream. Not the vivid life I had lived as a Chronos member.

\'It definitely wasn’t just a dream.\'

Despite my denials and struggles against the notion that it had all been a figment of my imagination, reality remained unyielding. Life continued as it had. My forgotten stint as a trainer, my stiff neck muscles barely moving, the debts piled up from medical bills, the dark room I had called home, and the walls I had built around myself, my family, and my fellow group members had come back.

Everything had stayed the same, unchanged.

***

[Third Condition: Choose]

"..."

‘What’s this all about? What am I supposed to choose from?’

The text flashed repeatedly before my eyes as if urging me to quickly grasp its meaning. Despite racking my brain all night, which was a full day since my return here, the choice I was supposed to make remained a mystery.

Catching glimpses of my reflection occasionally startled me. I had lived with this face for years, yet it felt almost foreign now after briefly reverting to my original features. And now, here I was, back to being a trainer at YU.

I used to be a Chronos member, a singer performing on stage, so this was a harsh downgrade that left a bitter taste. But there was no way I could avoid it. This world had erased Chronos.

"Hyun-Woo, you look troubled. Is everything okay?"

A cup of coffee slid across the table toward me. As I looked up, I saw Ji-Hyuk smiling down with an offer of kindness in his eyes.

I began to return the warmth but hesitated midway.

"Please, take the coffee. Oh, unless vending machine coffee isn’t your thing?"

"No, it\'s not that. Thanks, Ji-Hyuk."

Ji-Hyuk\'s demeanor was strictly professional, which was strange. Thinking back, High Tension was already a hit group holding concerts when I joined YU. The only artists I had coached were from the group Crown with On-Sae. Therefore, I didn’t have a personal connection with Ji-Hyuk. Our interactions were limited to polite greetings in passing.

It seemed Ji-Hyuk had merely tried to cheer up a familiar but forlorn face. "If it\'s nothing serious, then I\'m relieved. I will leave you be."

His indifferent manner, so unlike the Ji-Hyuk I remembered, struck a chord in me. He wasn’t the only one whose relationship with me had drastically changed.

On-Sae timidly called me Teacher. The Chronos members who used to frequently check in now only sent occasional, cautious check-ins. Yoon-Chan was almost a stranger now. I had completely lost touch with Su-Hwan and Tae-Seong. And I had distanced myself far from my family.

I was at a loss on how to begin mending these fractured bonds.

I sighed. What could be done? These estranged relationships were the consequences of my own choices.

I stared blankly at the coffee Ji-Hyuk had left and finally stood up.

‘Let\'s just go home.’

Clutching onto any hope of returning to Chronos seemed increasingly futile.

[Third Condition: Choose]

-You cannot advance until you fulfill the condition.

The text box in the corner of my vision persisted. This was a nagging reminder that I had an unresolved task, though I couldn’t even grasp its meaning.

***

When I arrived home, a musty odor assaulted my senses.

‘Have I really been living here all this time?’

Adapting from the comfortable accommodations of Chronos to this shabby place made it starkly apparent just how far I had fallen. As I flipped on the light and stepped toward the room, a clattering sound from the kitchen halted me.

\'What now?\'

I peered around and caught sight of a figure obscured behind the refrigerator door standing upright.

"Dad?"

It was indeed my father, who seemed unable to meet my gaze directly and appeared visibly flustered. "Uh, well, your mom wanted me to leave some side dishes for you. You had left the door open, and I thought you had left it that way for me. Sorry for just walking in."

"Oh, the door."

The Chronos dorm had a touchpad lock device, so I forgot that my current home required a key for its door locks. That was when I realized I hadn\'t seen my parents since being trapped back in this one-room apartment.

That explained my father’s avoidance of eye contact. The way he couldn’t look at me now painfully overlapped with the memory of how he looked at me during my days as a Chronos member.

"Hyun-Woo, I put some side dishes in the fridge for you. Make sure to call next time." My father brushed past me quickly and headed for the door. Then, he hesitated, turned, and offered a strained smile. "It\'s good to see you anyway. Call anytime, and, well... take care."

The door clicked shut behind him. I stood there, and a lump formed in my throat as I swallowed hard and the emotions threatened to spill over.

Before I became a Chronos member, I hadn\'t been privy to such tender moments from my father.

After a while, someone knocked the door again as I turned back from the door. Then my phone buzzed.

- Are you home?

It was a message from Goh Yoo-Joon. It seemed he was the one outside my door. Another vibration followed.

- I just wanted to have a drink with you. If you are not home, it\'s fine.

Footsteps echoed outside. I had never properly replied to Goh Yoo-Joon’s texts before. It wasn’t that we had never met, but those times were just coincidental encounters at the broadcast station where we ended up having a meal. Personal communication was almost nonexistent.

Goh Yoo-Joon was leaving. Because my mind was almost blank, I debated whether to just let him go, but then I turned on my phone again.

- Okay. Let’s drink.