VLA | Chapter 1.2

At the same time, Cha Sooha realized the source of the stench filling his apartment. Around Ha Kangji’s mouth was a mess of pink vomit. Cha Sooha couldn’t stop his body from shaking.

“Ha Kangji, you bastard—!”

“Ugh.”

Without giving him time to figure out what was going on, Cha Sooha screamed as if coughing up blood. That idiot dared to vomit his alcohol-soaked mess on the expensive carpet…!

“Huh?”

About to unleash a torrent of curses, Cha Sooha stopped, struck by a sense of déjà vu. This situation felt familiar. And…

Cha Sooha looked at the carpet stained with Ha Kangji’s vomit. It was the same carpet Ha Kangji had ruined with vomit four years ago. There wasn’t another like it in the country. It was a gift to Cha Sooha.

Even after rubbing his eyes, it was the same carpet from back then. Cha Sooha wondered if he was dreaming and slapped his cheek.

The stinging pain suggested it wasn’t a dream. So what was this situation?

Could it be that being beaten to death and trapped in a drum with cement was a dream?

That couldn’t be. That was real. This seemed more like a dream. Still, with a sense of disbelief, Cha Sooha approached the mirror. He saw a much younger face and the ash-khaki hair from his freshman year.

“…”

Everything pointed to a day four years ago. Cha Sooha carefully touched the cheek he had just slapped. A red handprint was swelling up. Maybe he had time-warped like in dramas or movies?

Honestly, that made more sense. Cha Sooha’s heart fluttered with an inexplicable hope. Maybe God saw his unjust death and gave him this chance? A second chance? A chance to live a new life?

Just as his expectations for a new life grew, a husky voice snapped him back to reality.

“Why are you suddenly slapping yourself? Finally having some self-reflection?”

Turning around, he saw Ha Kangji mumbling while lying on the floor. Cha Sooha spoke to him in a chilling voice.

“Wipe that puke off your mouth.”

Turning back to the mirror, Cha Sooha quickly began planning his new life. Human Cha Sooha, starting a new life today? Is that it? Then first, the winning lottery numbers…

Wait.

“What’s today’s date?”

“You don’t even know today’s date?”

Ha Kangji mumbled from the floor. Ignoring him, Cha Sooha hurriedly searched for his phone. The first thing he noticed was that it was already Thursday.

He needed to buy a lottery ticket quickly. The draw was on Saturday!

As he excitedly imagined what to do with the winnings, a fact suddenly hit him. He didn’t remember any of the winning numbers from any draw. He only remembered the ones he got wrong. He didn’t recall which draw had which winning numbers.

If he’d known he could travel back in time, he would’ve memorized them somehow. But he hadn’t. He felt like someone who had just lost 2 billion won right before his eyes.

Then…

Something else. Coins! Let’s do coins!

Cha Sooha urgently entered the app store to download a coin app. Yes, there were coins. He thought about how much money he had left in his account at this time.

If he bet all that money, he had a good chance. Cha Sooha felt the rosy future unfolding before him again. He started buying up names he’d vaguely heard of, unable to contain his excitement. Now he was rich. Filthy rich!

Ah, there’s so much to buy, but not enough money. Cha Sooha couldn’t help but feel regret.

If he was going to live a new life, he should live as a rich man. That way, the first version of himself who died unjustly wouldn’t seem so pitiful.

❀ ❀ ❀

Cha Sooha stared blankly at his now blue account balance. He realized that when a person is extremely excited, they can become eerily calm.

This was the money he had set aside for his loan repayment. But the coin that had been rising so well suddenly plummeted to -89%.

He had heard that many people became rich with this coin, so why did it crash the moment he invested?

His mind was so cold it felt like it was freezing to the bone.

All the money he had, and didn’t have, was poured into this coin, and it turned to zero in an instant. Money he hadn’t even used vanished into thin air. Who was to blame? His mouth began to dry up.

What good was having four years of information?

He wasted that chance like this.

Cha Sooha’s mind couldn’t come up with another way. How could he recover all this money and become rich?

Honest and diligent methods didn’t even cross his mind. He was only filled with thoughts of making a high profit quickly and boarding the rich train.

How could he become rich in a short time? Rich…

‘Even if you’re not really Kwon Ram’s lover, there’s nothing we can do. Huh?’

“Huh?”

‘Kwon Ram liked you so much it’s unsettling to let you live.’

“What?”

Cha Sooha jumped up from his seat at the voice echoing in his mind.

‘It’s not just a few million won, it’s billions. Huh?’

After thinking that far, an unbelievable method came to mind.

‘Because of that damn will, it’s going to Kwon Ram’s kid!’

Very easily. In an instant.

A way to board the rich train.

❀ ❀ ❀

Cha Sooha quickly checked the information on his target, Kwon Ram. Kwon Ram was a sunbae three years his senior. They had only met at the freshman welcome party and MT. He had no idea when Kwon Ram started having a crush on him.

After all, Kwon Ram had no connection with him and didn’t even use a smartphone. There was no chance for him to secretly look at profile pictures and develop feelings!

Trusting the words of the man who killed him and trying to win over Kwon Ram was risky. No matter how much Cha Sooha enjoyed light relationships, he never got involved with people from his department. He knew that dating within the department would become gossip fodder even after graduation.

The idea that the aloof ice prince liked him so much was hard to believe. A crush usually shows, but Kwon Ram hid it so well that Cha Sooha only found out when he was about to die.

But if that guy knew, it must have shown somewhere…

He wondered if Kwon Ram’s room was filled with his pictures. Did he stalk him despite not looking like the type?

He didn’t seem like that kind of person, not creepy at all.

Cha Sooha found out Kwon Ram’s schedule and was secretly attending his classes. He watched Kwon Ram’s back in silence.

Even without any direct contact, he occasionally heard things about Kwon Ram. Being so famous, rumors reached him whether he wanted to hear them or not.

Kwon Ram had received many confessions from people in the department but accepted none. When he rejected all the girls, rumors spread that he was gay. Then male omegas started approaching him.

But Kwon Ram rejected all the guys too.

Could it be true that Kwon Ram, the darling of everyone, liked him for a long time? If so, why didn’t he confess and instead kept his feelings until he died?

A thought suddenly struck Cha Sooha.

Could Kwon Ram have committed suicide out of despair because his unrequited love didn’t come true? Cha Sooha pondered over his past four years. He never lacked a partner. Did Kwon Ram die of heartbreak because he was taken?

“Crazy…”

It seemed plausible.

Cha Sooha was genuinely impressed with his deduction. Now, shouldn’t he fulfill that unrequited love? It wasn’t because he was after Kwon Ram’s wealth. In a relationship, a mistake could lead to a child, and that child…

That child…

Would be his lottery ticket.

Cha Sooha suppressed a smile and scanned Kwon Ram with a greedy gaze. Kwon Ram seemed to sense the creepy stare and turned around. If Cha Sooha hadn’t quickly looked away, their eyes would have met.

Cha Sooha was surprised by Kwon Ram’s animal-like instincts. He knew it wasn’t true, but he was nervous that Kwon Ram might have noticed his interest in his wealth.

Anyway, the current plan was solely about getting pregnant.

Even though he was a recessive omega, an omega was still an omega. Spending nights with him ten or a hundred times would eventually lead to a child. As far as he knew, Kwon Ram was an alpha. A dominant alpha at that!

Alpha and omega.

Weren’t they a pair made in heaven?

He had to have sex with Kwon Ram and get pregnant. It didn’t matter if it was a son or a daughter. As long as it was Kwon Ram’s child, billions would be his.

Cha Sooha looked at Kwon Ram’s back, immersed in class, with greedy eyes. Suddenly, Kwon Ram seemed so lovable.

He wanted to kiss him right away and ask where he’d been hiding all this time.

Of course, he had no intention of dating Kwon Ram. If Kwon Ram clung to him, the man who killed him might come back immediately.

That couldn’t happen.

He planned to get pregnant, escape to a safe place, have the child, and return.

He would hide for four years and appear just when Kwon Ram was about to commit suicide.

Cha Sooha felt proud of his perfect plan until he realized not everything would go as he wished.

❀ ❀ ❀

Without doing anything, the person he needed to seduce had already fallen for him. Heaven was clearly on his side. Everything seemed like a piece of cake to Cha Sooha.

Until he actually talked to Kwon Ram.

“Kwon…!”

Kwon Ram quickly left the lecture hall before he could even speak. It seemed like he was wearing noise-canceling earphones. He called Kwon Ram a couple more times, but he disappeared without hearing him.

Cha Sooha ended up looking like someone who got ignored while trying to talk to Kwon Ram. He felt the glances from his department mates. They seemed to think, “Even ‘that’ Cha Sooha is hitting on ‘that’ Kwon Ram.”

“…”

This wasn’t it.

Cha Sooha was a bit flustered by the situation not going as he had imagined. He thought everything would proceed smoothly once he spoke to Kwon Ram.

He planned to invite Kwon Ram for a drink, get him drunk, and then… well, you know. Unless Kwon Ram was truly impotent, the plan had a 97% success rate. In Cha Sooha’s experience, as long as there was alcohol and night, guys would mess up 99.9% of the time.

Even with someone they weren’t interested in, alcohol led to mistakes. If he ended up alone at night with someone he’d been pining for, it was a guaranteed 100% hookup.

And sex was only hard the first time; it got easier the second time. His goal was to become Kwon Ram’s sex partner and keep having sex until he got pregnant. No contraception, just internal ejaculation! Wasn’t that what every guy wanted? He thought Kwon Ram would be thrilled to do it without protection.

But ‘that’ Kwon Ram was so aloof.

He had no close friends in the department. He seemed like someone who had built a wall to cut off from people. Kwon Ram was a voluntary loner. His striking appearance made people keep approaching him.