ISDPF-02

CHAPTER 02

People gathered outside the bridal waiting room, murmuring among themselves.

“Is the bride not ready yet?”

“I didn’t see the groom or his mother on the groom’s side either.”

Outside the wedding hall, political figures had filled the place with chatter.

It was packed with people hoping to make an impression on Jin Suseong, a key figure in the party whom anyone would recognize by name, and a man often mentioned as a potential presidential candidate.

The next place those people gathered was in front of the bridal waiting room.

Everyone was curious about who the daughter-in-law of Jin Suseong, the most powerful politician in the country at the moment, would be.

“I heard she comes from an ordinary family.”

“I heard her father is a manual laborer, and that his health isn’t very good.”

“I heard Representative Jin’s side is paying for all his surgery expenses.”

“As expected, Representative Jin certainly does things differently.”

People chimed in with curiosity and interest.

Then it happened.

A loud voice erupted from inside the bridal waiting room.

“You’re saying you’re not getting married? Have you lost your mind?!”

The voice coming through the door clearly belonged to Jin Dongchan.

Everyone’s gaze simultaneously turned toward the door.

And then—

Bang!

The door flew open, and the bride burst out wearing a pure-white wedding dress.

As the bride came out of the waiting room, Dongchan shouted at her.

“Woo Seolhee, have you gone crazy?”

Eventually, Inok grabbed Seolhee by the hand.

“Please, son, calm down.”

“And Seolhee, don’t do this.”

“It’s normal to feel unsettled right before your wedding, but it’s only temporary.”

“Don’t do something you’ll regret, and listen to your mother.”

“Let’s have the ceremony first, then talk things over calmly.”

“You trust Mom, don’t you?”

Seolhee swallowed a breath.

She was sick to death of hearing that woman call herself her mother.

Her stomach churned with nausea.

“Who’s your mother?”

“Uh… huh?”

The innocent twenty-four-year-old Seolhee, who had once been desperately starved for affection, was gone.

Only Woo Seolhee remained—the woman who had endured every kind of hardship, survived countless brutal blows, and even gone through regression.

‘Not this time.’

“Did you give birth to me?”

Without even having time to control her expression, a look of bewilderment spread across Inok’s face.

Seolhee shook off her hand, causing the dazed Inok to stagger.

“Mom!”

Dongchan supported Inok.

“How dare you—”

As Dongchan angrily shouted at her, Seolhee strode toward him.

His shoulders flinched at her ominous gaze.

Seolhee rummaged through her memories.

‘The woman Jin Dongchan met shortly after our marriage… Was her name Ryu Areum?’

Of all the women who had passed through his life, she had been the most special.

Dongchan, a womanizer, had been so disgusted by women for quite some time afterward that he could barely stand the sight of them.

She couldn’t bring up the future incident that had not happened yet.

She needed a valid reason to call off the wedding.

Seolhee narrowed her eyes.

“You were sponsoring her.”

Dongchan’s eyes, which had looked ready to kill Seolhee on the spot, visibly wavered.

She pressed her advantage.

“…She’s twenty years old, isn’t she?”

“You’re eight years older than her, so didn’t you leave your conscience in your mother’s womb?”

Dongchan’s face went pale.

His expression clearly asked how she could possibly know.

‘Of course I didn’t know at the wedding.’

If she had known back then, she never would have even walked into the wedding hall.

It was something she only discovered after getting married.

“So, that’s…”

Seolhee suddenly raised one hand as though she were about to slap him.

Dongchan stumbled backward, tripped over his own foot, and fell.

‘That pathetic lower body still couldn’t do its job even ten years ago.’

And yet this man, equipped with nothing but the necessary equipment between his legs, had the nerve to pull such shameless stunts.

“You’re not even worth hitting.”

Seolhee gave him a short, derisive laugh, then turned away.

Inok screamed from behind her.

“There’s a limit to how much shame you can bring upon a family!”

“Are you not going to stop right there?”

Without stopping, Seolhee answered.

“No, ma’am.”

She plunged straight into the crowd.

People began murmuring, while the shutters of countless cellphone cameras went off without pause.

“Hey, Woo Seolhee, when I catch you—Aagh!”

Dongchan, forcing his way through the crowd, suddenly pitched forward.

Thud!

Seolhee turned around at the exit.

Inok ran toward the fallen Dongchan, screaming as though she had lost the world.

“Oh, my poor son!”

Leaving Inok’s tearful voice behind, Seolhee headed outside.

It was the tail end of summer.

She ran without looking back, beneath the sunlight filtering through green leaves, until she was gasping for breath.

She ran as though she needed proof that she was alive.

Unaware that someone was watching her, unaware of the gaze fixed upon her.

A little earlier—

“That was freaking entertaining.”

Jin Dongchan’s friends had stood watching the commotion in front of the bridal waiting room with great interest.

“Looks like his fiancée found out he was seeing Areum.”

“He almost managed to keep it hidden.”

“What an idiot.”

The men snickered about how entertaining it was, but a cold shadow fell over them.

“What are you talking about?”

At the low voice ringing beside their ears, they all turned toward the sound.

Lee Hyuk, a full head taller than them, lowered his gaze at an angle.

His tranquil eyes made them instinctively watch themselves.

Standing in front of Do I-hyuk always made their courage shrink.

It had been that way since childhood.

Even though they were the same age, the difference in their bearing and presence had always made it difficult to casually strike up a conversation with him.

As the son of a respected political family, he possessed an undeniable air of authority.

One of the men awkwardly opened his mouth.

“You wouldn’t know since you were overseas, Hyuk.”

“That bastard Dongchan has been sponsoring a woman.”

The man lowered his voice and moved closer to Hyuk to whisper.

“Her name is Ryu Areum, a rookie actress who’s been getting popular lately.”

“She’s the girl who appeared in the coffee commercial for Gayoon Foods.”

“Dongchan is completely obsessed with her.”

“I heard they’re so sexually compatible that she helps him relieve all that pent-up energy or whatever.”

“His mother is just as crazy about shamanism as he is.”

“Imagine having a mother who reads their saju compatibility and even finds him a mistress.”

“Must be nice.”

Hyuk’s indifferent gaze fell upon them.

They felt as though a razor-sharp blade were pressed against their throats.

They all fell silent.

Then Inok’s sharp voice rang out from in front of the bridal waiting room.

“There’s a limit to how much shame you can bring upon a family!”

“Are you not going to stop right there?”

The bride in a pure-white wedding dress had just passed in front of them.

Click, click—

The cheerful heels of her wedding shoes struck the marble floor as she crossed through the crowd.

Hyuk’s gaze fixed on the woman passing right before his eyes.

The smile on her face, tinged with both liberation and reckless abandon, held his gaze for a long time.

Hyuk’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Even after she had completely disappeared into the crowd, his gaze remained fixed in that direction.

“Hey, Woo Seolhee, when I catch you…”

That was when it happened.

Dongchan, who had just begun to move, suddenly pitched forward.

Thud!

With a dull sound, he fell straight onto the floor.

It seemed he had struck his forehead hard.

“My son!”

Inok hurried over.

Dongchan clutched his forehead and knee as he writhed on the floor.

From within the crowd, someone glanced at Hyuk and muttered quietly.

“Hey, didn’t Do I-hyuk just trip Jin Dongchan?”

“Hyuk did?”

“What nonsense are you talking about?”

“He’s not a kid.”

“Why would he do something that childish?”

“No, but… I definitely saw it.”

The man’s suspicious gaze fell upon the expressionless Hyuk.

As he watched Hyuk walk away, he repeatedly tilted his head in confusion.

—

“I’m back!”

Holding her wedding shoes in both hands, Seolhee shouted toward the Han River.

She had run all the way to Mapo Bridge without stopping.

She was so out of breath that it reached her throat, and it stung, but she loved even that sensation.

The wind raised goosebumps across her skin.

She wiped away the small amount of mucus from her nose with the back of her hand.

As she gazed at the setting sun, her heart swelled with emotion.

If she hadn’t been wearing a wedding dress, she might not have been able to accept that she had returned ten years into the past.

She glanced down at the soles of her bare feet, which had grown hot from running, and grinned like a madwoman.

There were countless things she wanted to know—how she had returned and why.

But for now, she was satisfied simply knowing that she was alive and had come back.

“Ha… Now I can set everything right.”

She wanted to live a real life without ever getting entangled with Jin Dongchan’s family again.

But—

Darkness fell across her face, which had been bathed in a brilliant orange glow.

“They won’t just give up like this.”

Inok and Dongchan were anything but easy opponents.

They were the kind of people who would stop at nothing to get what they wanted.

After spending ten years with them, Seolhee had learned that they were people she absolutely could not afford to make enemies of.

That was also why she had never been able to easily decide to divorce him.

But she couldn’t continue living that way, not even for the sake of the child she had lost.

Perhaps because of the river breeze, or perhaps because she missed the child she had sent away, her eyes grew moist.

Her grief over losing the child had been even greater because she had once hoped to finally have a family she could genuinely cherish and love.

Having not a single blood relative in this world had left her with an immense emptiness.

Suddenly, she thought of her late father.

Her only ally.

“Dad, I miss you.”

Her words scattered into the air with the wind.

In an instant, Seolhee’s eyes flew wide open.

“Dad…!”

She had forgotten.

“He was still alive ten years ago!”

She had been so focused on escaping the wedding hall that she hadn’t thought of her father.

Seolhee stamped her feet in agitation.

Since she had called off the wedding, he must be on his way home by now.

“Home… I need to go home.”

There had been countless nights when she had prayed for just one more chance to see her father, saying she had no other wish and begging him to appear even in her dreams.

Her heart grew frantic.

“A taxi… I need to take a taxi.”

Only then did she realize she had no money.

She had left her clothes and handbag with Inok’s aide.

How long would it take her to walk all the way home?

To make matters worse, her body, which had only just recovered from the dopamine surge, began to shiver with cold.

Why was the neckline of this dress cut so low?

Her resentment toward Inok, who had gleefully dressed her up in a dress she didn’t even like as though she were playing with a doll, grew even stronger.

“Ugh, it’s cold.”

Ring, ring—

Just then, a group of young-looking students stopped their bicycles in front of her.

Perhaps their curiosity had been piqued by the sight of some woman in a dress standing alone on a bridge.

Just as Seolhee tensed, wondering if they were looking for trouble, an unexpectedly gentle voice reached her.

“Miss, are you okay?”

“…Miss?”