The next day, they played. They ate, played around, watched another show and ate again. There was an incident that happened in the middle – while she was at a slot machine inside the casino, she called it the ‘biggest fraud alongside claw machines’ and chucked the machine.
It was fine because Yeorum was now loaded with money. However, she couldn’t avoid getting kicked out of the casino no matter how much money she had.
Throughout the day Yu Jitae was treated like a slave. Yeorum seemed to have forgotten about it but suddenly remembered it during the show and said to him.
“Hey slave. Your shoulders.”
Well, placing her on his shoulders because it was hard to see wasn’t a difficult task. Carrying her on his back because she couldn’t be bothered to walk and lending her his knee for her to tie her shoelaces were all okay.
But once they started having a meal, Yu Jitae became slightly unsatisfied with the result of this bet. It was because she ordered chopped steak, before giving him the fork and asking with an open mouth.
“Hey slave. I’m a baby. Gimme fud!”
This girl. She must have seen something. She knew exactly what Yu Jitae hated doing and was trying to make him do it in this temporary master to slave relationship.
“Use your own hands when you’re eating food.”
“Uuunng~ Yeowum, dosen no how to use choppstwicks…”
“Yu Yeorum. Have you gone crazy?”
“Hinng. Eeeingg. How shuld I eet dis? If my slave feeds me, I can swallow da whole thingg…”
For some reason, Yu Jitae really didn’t want to do this from the bottom of his heart today. Even Gyeoul eats her food by herself, doesn’t she?
“Hello? Where’s my slave.”
However, a bet’s a bet and he had to inwardly give up on something as he picked up a piece of steak and brought it to her mouth. That was when Yeorum stuck her tongue out and started licking the sauce that was on the steak.
It wasn’t suggestive in the slightest and was disgusting at a glance. He frowned.
“Kyahahaha–!”
Staring at his indifferent frown, Yeorum laughed her heart out. She then murmured to herself as if she had figured something out, ‘Ah, so this is why Bom said that huh…?’
What did Bom say?
Whatever the case, up to that was fine. Yu Jitae could force himself to do such things but once they were in front of an event clothing store, he could no longer endure it.
“Ohh. Look slave. Those clothes look pretty!”
Pointing at one of the clothes, Yeorum turned around but Yu Jitae had long disappeared.
“Huhh? Hey slave! Where did you go…!”
Yeorum shouted in regret. It was because her finger had been pointing at a bunny boy clothing revealing the body line alongside rabbit ears.
“Aoh fu*k… he’s usually dense so how did he even know that I was gonna make him wear it?”
In regret, Yeorum called him but his watch was already off. Thinking that he would come back soon, she waited for an hour but Yu Jitae did not return.
At this rate, he probably wouldn’t come back until the end of the slave contract.
“Where did you go? Come back!”
Paradise – in the city quiet at noon,
“I won’t make you wear it! I really won’t…!”
Yeorum’s shout echoed across the town.
*
Night arrived while they were playing to their heart’s content.
At a certain bar inside Paradise, Yeorum and Yu Jitae ordered an extremely expensive bottle of alcohol under the moonlight. It was a cognac named Remy Martin Louis XIII. This cognac made in Champagne was quite unique because of its rarity, not its price.
A bartender in clean clothes poured the cognac into a burgundy glass with a snap of his wrist. Once the bartender walked away, Yeorum glanced at Yu Jitae and asked.
“How do you drink this?”
“Just drink it.”
“No ice or salt or anything like that?”
“You can just drink it straight.”
“What. So it’s the same as soju.”
With a sip, the alcohol entered her mouth and Yeorum, who had been savouring the taste and the smell of the drink, widened her eyes. The soft texture of velvet. A fragrant fruity smell incomparable to average brandies filled her mouth and after swallowing it, a residue of the delicate scent of oak remained on her tongue.
“Ohh.”
“Not bad is it.”
“Yeah.”
After having a few more drinks, Yeorum seemed slightly drunk due to lowering her body’s detoxification speed to its bottom. With every breath, the smell of cognac rose up from inside her. Enjoying that sweet scent, she quietly continued taking deep breaths in and out.
“This alcohol’s very interesting.”
“In what sense.”
“Even breathing is enjoyable.”
“That’s nice.”
Every breathing moment became special – that was why Yu Jitae had chosen Remy Martin Louis XIII. Outside the bar was dark so the ambient light of the bar was very snug. The two of them quietly remained sitting there for a short period of time until Yu Jitae eventually broke the silence.
“We’ll be going back in a few hours.”
“Nn.”
“How was it. Did you enjoy yourself?”
“Uh, no…?”
Yeorum swirled the glass in a circle with a grumble.
“It wasn’t that fun.”
Yu Jitae ignored her comments and nodded. He had already gotten used to her way of speaking.
“It’s fine to enjoy yourself but once we go back, you must return to what you have been doing. You know that right?”
“I do.”
“Do you think it’s a shame?”
“No. I’ve enjoyed enough already.”
Her eyes were fixed on the glass. Her fingers scratched the surface of the glass.
Yeorum pondered for a while before opening her mouth.
“You know. Yu Kaeul…”
She added more words after a short hesitation.
“…If I, find her irritating, is that a problem?”
“Why.”
“Nothing. I was just, curious.”
“Who knows. If it’s to the point that you are not comfortable with living together, that would be a problem.”
“No. It’s not like I hate living together. It’s not that but…”
“But?”
“…I don’t know. I do think it’s a little uncomfortable… Don’t really want to go back and see her face either. It’s also slightly annoying. Actually, I’ve been trying to avoid walking into her recently.”
“Why.”
“What do you mean why…”
The pace of her breaths turned slightly more rapid.
“But I don’t think she’s the problem. You know me right? My personality is quite trash. I’m a b*tch that hates a lot of things in the world. So… I just…”
After that, Yeorum did not say anything else. For a very long time.
She couldn’t speak of her weakness. It was embarrassing and disgraceful. It made her detest herself since acknowledging her weakness was like the value of her existence being denied.
Meanwhile, Yu Jitae thought to himself.
Although he was imperfect with human relationships, Yu Jitae could understand almost exactly how Yeorum was feeling. There was a commonality between his life and Yeorum’s.
While he was thinking along the lines of that,
He suddenly thought of something that he wanted to share with her.
“I had a dream.”
With a light voice, he opened his mouth. Still indulged in silence, Yeorum looked at him.
“It’s a dream I have had since I was very young and extremely weak. Naturally, it was hard to achieve and I’ve repeated countless failures.”
Yeorum appeared slightly surprised.
To her, Yu Jitae was the strongest human in the world. The strong was a target of worship for the red race and yet such Yu Jitae was talking about the times where he had been ‘weak’.
“There was a method that I used to think was correct and I felt that I would achieve everything as long as I could earn it. But that wasn’t the case. I’ve gained a lot of things, but still couldn’t achieve my goal.”
His voice sounded slightly melancholic to her.
“Thus, I decided to grab more things, regardless of the means. More and more. Wouldn’t I reach my dream one day? I thought that but in the end, I couldn’t reach it.”
“…And then?”
“Repeating countless failures, I became impatient. I started giving up everything I had tried for from the slightest of mistakes. Let’s restart from the beginning whenever there’s a problem – that was my mindset. Should I borrow your words?”
“Yeah?”
“Fuc*~ It was going well but I got f*cked~ Let’s just do it again from scratch~”
When Yu Jitae awkwardly copied Yeorum, she dumbfoundedly giggled.
“That’s not the same at all.”
“Isn’t it? Anyway, being impatient like that was a stupid thing to do. My vision was narrowed and I couldn’t look far ahead. Your head becomes a mess and it forgets what’s important.”
With the joke set aside, there was something inside Yu Jitae’s words that rang her heart.
“Hmm…”
Yeorum closed her lips and contemplated.
“What is your dream,” he asked her.
Seeing her guardian with a different and unusual atmosphere around him, Yeorum also deeply thought to herself. She remained hesitant so Yu Jitae asked again.
“Is it to survive? Or becoming stronger?”
“No.”
“Aren’t those the only two options? If not, then for what are you becoming stronger.”
Dream…
That mellow word touched the depths of her emotions. It pricked at something inside her heart.
Lowering her gaze, Yeorum touched the glass with her two hands.
Words she had never let out of her mouth.
Words she had never forgotten, not even for a single day.
Yeorum had such a dream.
“There are some words that I haven’t conveyed yet…”
Her honest thoughts escaped with a sigh.
“To your oldest unni?”
“Yeah. And also to my youngest unni…”
He didn’t ask what it was.
“You’re becoming stronger in order to convey those words. Right?”
Slowly she nodded her head.
He gave the child some time to think. When he drank his glass of alcohol, Yeorum belatedly drank hers as well. Soon, he could feel her fragrant breaths.
“Yeorum… Listen carefully to what I say.”
Hearing his words, Yeorum raised her gaze up from the glass and looked into his eyes.
“You and me. For lacking existences like ‘us’ the path is always narrow and is covered with sharp pebbles.”
Us…
From the mouth of an undoubtedly perfect existence, whom she assumed had been strong from the beginning, left the word ‘us’.
“If you only look at what is right ahead, it is difficult to move forward. There are tonnes of sharp rocks in the world.”
“Sharp rocks?”
“Yeah. The world is filled with obstacles that will block you, interfere, scoff at your steps that are eager to hurt you. Sometimes it might be painful and sometimes it will be sad. You might become afraid of going forward.”
“…”
“That’s why we need to looking far ahead.”
Yeorum clenched her lips.
She could finally understand why he had brought her to this place, as well as why he was giving such answers to the doubts in her mind. She started understanding all his words.
Las Vegas.
In this place, Yeorum got to experience various joys that she had never felt before. Enough to remind how she was a red dragon herself, each and every moment had been fun and it was a shame that she had to return despite there being more enjoyable and exciting things here.
However, the reason that she had to give up on such interesting things to become stronger was because Yeorum had a dream.
Didn’t she vow to herself on the day of her Amusement? That she will definitely convey those words that she couldn’t before on the day of her return?
“Of course, if you don’t look at what’s right ahead of you, you might easily miss trivial things. You might stumble on a rock, or get scraped by a thornbush and you might even fall in a quagmire. But that’s fine. No matter what, we can stand back up and walk forward again. Do you know why?”
“…Because, we are looking at what’s far ahead?”
“Yes.”
The road sign was pointing into the distance.
There was no reason for Yeorum to consider Kaeul a competitor.
“So that means I don’t have to be overly considerate of the trivial things in front of me.”
“Exactly.”
Kaeul was just Kaeul, a being unrelated to Yeorum’s dream so there was no reason to be jealous of her even if she was in front of her, nor was there a need for self-hatred.
“If you’re simply feeling the competitiveness and trying harder to overcome it, that’s fine. Because although the talent Kaeul has is great, you can be more desperate.”
“Nn…”
“I believe you won’t be pushed back by Kaeul but what I’m saying is that it doesn’t matter even if you do get pushed back. You do not need to be in a constant rush for now. Have your feet on today, and your eyes on tomorrow. Got that?”
“…”
Feet on today,
Eyes on tomorrow.
His lesson shook her mind from its core as the complex array of emotional knots became untangled.
Being satisfied by getting stronger every day.
Feeling a sense of superiority from winning the competition,
Being anxious of a genius that was about to overtake her.
The times she spent worrying and those childish emotions began to dissipate as Yeorum finally felt her heart gaining peace.
“Do you understand what I’m saying?”
She realised that this was his lesson not as a ‘guardian’, but as a ‘teacher’.
“…”
Yeorum looked up at him.
Today, he appeared all the more like an adult. She had always considered him big but today he was even bigger.
That might have in turn made her feel smaller in comparison. The words that left her mouth after she contemplated and ruminated over his words were slightly wrong, when she reflected on it after a few seconds.
“Yes sir…”
*
That was the end of their enjoyable time in Las Vegas. On the way back inside the car, Yeorum built up everything that had happened in the last few days and carefully saved them in a corner of her memories.
Thinking that when something unbearably difficult happens,
That she would open it again.