No Regression for the Victor - Chapter 22

A normal and peaceful morning. Hyun woke up early and waited for the sun to rise high in the sky. Having never allowed himself to relax even once in his original life, such a leisurely day was unfamiliar to Hyun.

Except for the flaw of not being the chairman’s biological child, Hyun’s daily routine had always started as soon as the sun rose, to the point where there wasn’t even room to stick a needle.

Before going to work, Hyun would visit the private swimming pool he could use alone and soak his body in the water. Now that all the other members of the executive family who managed the company, except for Hyun, had been ousted, this ritual was no longer necessary, but Hyun didn’t stop his steps toward the pool.

Having started from the time he had just learned to walk, he had practically lived his whole life with water. Naturally, the reason Hyun began swimming was because of his parents.

‘……’

When he submerged himself completely and closed his eyes, he could hear the familiar sound. The terrible sound of a man and a woman screaming, struggling, and sinking deeper into the water, desperate not to die.

Every time Hyun went into the water and began gasping for breath in pain, his adoptive parents pushed him back into the pool without hesitation. Their logic was that a successor who would bear the immense responsibility of managing a company could not afford to fail at even this much.

It was only when Hyun entered elementary school that he was finally able to stop fearing the water, and he thought all those unexplainable screams were just his imagination born from his fears. Only after he took the seat as successor did he realize they were actually very old memories of his.

When the real son returned and it was time for Hyun to give up the foundation he had built as successor to the true heir, he looked into his biological parents—something he had never once been curious about while growing up as his adoptive parents’ proud son.

What Hyun barely managed to find was a short news article. It reported that the company’s accountant had embezzled a huge sum of money, squandered it on gambling, and after failing to flee overseas with the remaining funds, attempted a joint suicide with his barely two-year-old child.

‘These days, instead of “joint suicide,” they call it “murder of one’s child followed by suicide.”’

At his secretary’s brief personal comment, Hyun let out a sigh, pressing his forehead. Both parents were found dead at a nearby pier, while the child was the only survivor. No one knew what happened to the surviving child.

Even after learning the reason he had so feared water as a child, the strange feeling of déjà vu never faded. Even when he stopped visiting the pool, the now overly familiar sound continued to hold him back, tied to the sense of loss that even his biological parents had tried to kill him.

He realized this was a scar he would carry forever, until the day he died.

Just how much of one’s humanity must be given up to forcibly push a two-year-old child, a face so much like your own, back into the water to drown? Knowing this, Hyun once again began his day with a swim.

Gurgle, glug. Only when the sound of water splashing up to the surface filled his mind did the familiar noise finally cease.

Unable to do what he had always done, the morning felt endlessly long to Hyun. Even after reading and rereading the book he’d brought from the study to the bedroom, it was still too quiet, too long, until the time when the caretaker would begin bustling about preparing breakfast.

‘Now, even though I don’t have to do anything, I’m left fidgety because there’s nothing to do.’

Hyun thought himself ridiculous, but still accepted his situation. If every morning, each sprout had grown just a little bit by the time he opened his eyes, perhaps the morning wouldn’t feel so endlessly long.

As this unanswerable question settled in his mind, change came to Hyun’s daily life.

“Whoa, it’s a mole!”

Hearing a commotion outside, Hyun, wearing only an evening shirt, walked over to the window and saw a now-familiar face making a fuss. What’s this? Wondering what was making such a racket, he looked down and saw a young man wearing comically round glasses, leveling the field while chasing something.