After slight hesitation,
With an ever so delicate movement, Bom received the business card as other writers, who had been intently listening from the sides, let out gasps of admiration.
“Here is the contract. Look through it first and when your manager comes later, you can sign both that and the movie adaptation contract.”
This time, Carrot Girl chimed in as her elbow brushed past Yu Jitae’s arm. Bom looked at her with a sluggish gaze before taking the paper bag of contracts that was in her hands.
That was when other writers began opening their mouths.
“Wow! That is amazing!”
“It really went well for you…! Congratulations!”
“Wahh…”
The surrounding people gave her a round of applause, saying “Congratulations!” and “Wow, it must feel great…!”. Some of them had discontent looks on their faces because that was how big of an opportunity this was.
Bom remained silent and simply held the papers in her hands. A veteran novelist, one of the executives of the Horror Institution, shot out of his seat and raised a glass of champagne with a hearty laugh.
“Haha! This truly is a happy occasion. We were inadequate and could not promise movie adaptations for everyone… but you helped us out like this! Thank you, Miss Carrot Girl.”
“Try better next year. Shouldn’t people above the Silver Prize all have the OSMU contract at least? It’s true the genre isn’t mainstream but still.”
She was showing an extremely arrogant attitude that made the entire Institution appear incompetent, but it was tolerable today. It was because the movie adaptation of a novel given the Gold Prize by the Institution could be seen as the result of the Institution’s support.
“Haha! We will devote ourselves more. Let us do a toast together in this happy occasion!”
“Ohh–!”
“Sounds good!”
Raising their champagne glasses, the writers stood up from their seats. The very last one to stand was Bom, who slowly stood up with a glass of champagne in her hand.
“Now! If Miss Broccoli could start us off with the toast statement please?”
She did not reply.
“Come on!”
“Yes. Please give us a share of your luck!”
People pressed her from the sides. With the glass in her hand, Bom slowly opened her mouth.
“I will give up on the Gold Prize.”
A cold bucket of ice was dropped. Someone who was parroting her statement murmured, ‘I will give…’ before immediately shutting their mouth.
The atmosphere immediately settled.
Wondering if they were hearing things, people blinked their eyes, but Bom remained headstrong.
“I will also destroy the manuscript.”
“P, please wait a second. Miss Broccoli?”
“Sorry to say this on such a joyous occasion.”
Saying that, Bom lowered the champagne glass and ripped the contract in front of Carrot Girl’s eyes.
It was a contract strengthened by magic but was powerlessly ripped before the grip and mana of a dragon.
Everyone was shocked. Movie adaptation was like the dream of every novelist so what in the world was she doing?
More than anyone else, it was Carrot Girl who was the most pissed.
“Look.”
Without listening to her words, Bom continued ripping the contract.
“Oi! Broccoli! Have you gone mad?”
Her hands became even faster. With trembling hands, Bom ripped the contract and ripped it again, as if trying to grind it into powder.
After throwing away the shedded contract, she grasped the business card that Yu Jitae gave her but hesitated before ripping it. In the end, she could not rip the business card.
Why exactly was she like this?
Yu Jitae was also dumbfounded and was staying still while Carrot Girl shouted at Bom, thinking that she was being ignored.
“Ey, ey! What are you even doing?”
The startled writers near her raised their arms and blocked her body.
“I’m asking you. What are you doing right now!”
“I don’t want the movie adaptation,” replied Bom.
“Then just say that and don’t rip it! You impudent brat. Just with a little award you dare look down on me like this?”
“And what?”
“What?”
“How long do I have to play around with you humans?”
In an instant, Carrot Girl’s body froze from her words.
It was bizarre. Not because it was impolite but because her words were sending chills down her spine.
Her pupils appeared to be with a vertical split for a moment but blinking her eyes, Carrot Girl realised that it was an illusion. Despite feeling chills, she couldn’t withstand her anger from the rudeness so Carrot Girl yelled out loud.
“Oi Broccoli. Do you think you can ever succeed in this field after doing this!?”
Carrot Girl was shouting furiously to the point that veins were popping out of her neck. “P, please calm down!”, “What is happening…!” The onlookers ran up and hurriedly tried to dissuade Carrot Girl.
There was no point in hearing any longer. Yu Jitae looked into the eyes of Carrot Girl and thought of shutting her mouth with a gag. Immediately afterwards, she turned silent and stiff.
It was then.
Bom raised her champagne glass, and moved her feet towards Carrot Girl.
He was sceptical of what she was trying to do, but still had to stop her.
“Bom. Calm down. This is something you were happy about.”
Yu Jitae stood in front of her. And that was when Bom’s expression that had been indifferent no matter which words were being thrown at her, changed for the first time.
“Are you going to render all your efforts into nothing?”
“…”
“Bom–”
“…”
The faint change in her expression slowly became all the more apparent. Beads of liquid appeared under her eyes; her eyebrows sagged low and she clenched her lips.
He felt that he shouldn’t stop Bom here as it would surely affect her happiness. Her eyes were conveying something to him: that she wished him to be on her side.
When he stopped his body from the instinctive feeling, Bom walked past him. On top of the face of Carrot Girl, whose arms were being grabbed by other people,
She poured the champagne.
Huh huh? People gasped in shock but it was already too late by then. She dumped it so hard that it splashed above Carrot Girl’s head.
“Ahhkkk! You crazy b*tch—-!”
The champagne that had been filling the glass wetted Carrot Girl’s face, hair and all her clothes. Her hair that she had carefully tied up was undone, making her look like a vagabond while her thin dress was also drenched. Her managers dashed towards her in fright and quickly covered her with napkins.
It was chaotic and the writers inside the room couldn’t make anything out of the situation. Why in the world would that gentle-looking Broccoli do this? They were frozen stiff from shock when a low and soft voice resonated across the banquet hall.
“Sorry for pouring cold water on such a joyous occasion. Please deprive me of every qualification and right. If there is anything I must take responsibility for, please contact me.”
Lowering her head, she said with a sorrowful voice.
“…I won’t write a novel, ever again.”
From her dragon heart beating like crazy left an uncontrollable language of mana. She was pretty much using her [Dragon’s Voice] for this declaration.
After her words, Bom slowly walked out of the hall, and due to being suppressed by her aura, no-one could go after her.
Except for Yu Jitae.
*
Bom walked fast.
He chased after her.
Suddenly, her body rose into the air before vanishing into thin air – it was teleportation. Yu Jitae closed his eyes and tracked her aura. He felt traces of her from the waiting room they had been at, a relatively close place.
He quickly moved his body. Going through walls, he closed his eyes and enshrouded himself in darkness.
By the time he reopened his eyes, he was in front of the waiting room but the lights of the corridor couldn’t sense him and remained off.
Yu Jitae opened the door of the waiting room and walked in. He found Bom sitting on the sofa with her back towards him, under the bright lights of the room.
He walked towards her.
“Bom.”
“……Yes.”
“What did you just do. Why did you do it.”
“…”
“I’m asking you why. Why have you done it.”
“…”
Bom was silent for a very long time.
“I’m not trying to blame you. It’s just that I cannot understand. When was it that you and I decided to write a novel together? It was one year ago. You were working hard on it for close to a year so why did you mess it up with your own hands.”
“…”
“Same with the movie adaptation. That was something I prepared in my own way, so what did you not like and what made you do such an unreasonable thing, huh?”
“…”
“You could have stayed still and everything would have gone well. And yet you messed it up like this. Answer me. Why exactly did you do it.”
Her quivering voice oozed out.
“…A bit of time.”
“What?”
“…Please give me a little bit of time.”
Her body was once again covered in light, in an attempt to teleport somewhere else.
However, he couldn’t let her do so since this problem had to be taken care of right here. He grabbed her by the shoulders and dispersed her mana.
“Yu Bom.”
When he pulled the child by her shoulders, Bom was forced to turn towards him.
Bom gazed up into Yu Jitae’s eyes with an indifferent expression,
With tears flowing from her apathetic eyes.
“…”
Bom was crying. Wearing an extremely familiar expression.
His head turned blank.
Several times, he had seen Bom cry in the 7th iteration. Once, she cried from regret and once she cried from heartache.
But it was different this time. Her eyes indifferently looking at his eyes with flowing tears –
It coincided with how she cried,
At the end of the 6th iteration, emptying out words that had filled her heart. It was the result of a lack of communication.
“What will you do by running away. I still don’t know anything.”
Both now and back then, there was a definite reason behind her tears. But back then, he did not try to hear and this time, Bom was not trying to say it.
“Tell me. So that I can listen and understand!”
His voice became a little louder.
With tears still travelling down her cheeks, Bom coarsely gasped for breath seemingly both agitated and anxious. But soon, her eyes formed a frown as if she was unable to hold it in any more.
“…likes you.”
“What?”
Swallowing her tears, Bom opened her mouth.
“…That woman, said she likes ahjussi.”
Words he had never even imagined, left her mouth.
“…She said to me, that you had a date.”
“A date?”
“…Didn’t you?”
What did that crazy thing babble about? Swallowing the surge of irritation inside him, Yu Jitae opened his mouth.
“No.”
Like a child, Bom continued speaking under her breath.
“…That woman, calls ahjussi Jitae-ssi… she said you ate together… she likes looking at you… she thinks you’re sexy… she said, ahjussi, ahjussi was appealing…”
Bom continued whilst swallowing her tears.
“…I, I hated that so much.”
She lowered her head in tears.
Seeing the child cry, he gave her a hug. Her body flinched in shock.
He did not know what he was supposed to say. However, he did have the wisdom of hugging a child until she could calm herself down again.
In his arms, she at last bursted into tears and started pouring out her honest thoughts.
“Actually… I don’t need anything like novels. One year, ten years, a hundred years… it doesn’t matter how much time I spend on it… I don’t feel pain even if others ignore and look down on it…”
“…”
“But, why does my heart ache so much when ahjussi has a meal with someone else…?”
Instead of a reply, he returned a tight hug and quietly hugged her until her tears came to a stop.
After roughly 6 hours, only once the veil of night covered them did Bom stop her tears.