Mine Alone

This villa was a place he used whenever he met his biological mother every few years, so Jiwan knew its layout well.

Entering the room he always used, a wave of exhaustion suddenly overwhelmed him.

‘I’m tired.’

Falling onto the bed, Jiwan thought.

Does that woman know?

That in the future, just as she wished, he would take control of the Domun Group.

And that once he solidified his position as successor, she would rejoice as if it were her own success—only for him to lock her away in a rehabilitation center under the pretext of gambling and alcoholism?

She had screamed that it couldn’t be true.

But with her power alone, she could never leave that place.

Every year Jiwan received updates about her.

As time passed, the venom in her faded.

In the end, she wore a peaceful expression.

Laughing with friends she made at the center, she even seemed… satisfied.

As Jiwan sank into thought, the man kept tugging at his sleeve.

The small, persistent prods irritated him.

When Jiwan brushed him off sharply, a bruise appeared on his arm.

His stepmother used to pinch him like this whenever his father wasn’t around.

Jiwan was used to it.

But the man looked startled.

Then it was Jiwan’s turn to be surprised.

Light seeped from the man’s hand.

The bruise vanished.

“You…”

Jiwan stared at him, shocked by the disappearing wound.

The man only made a gesture for silence, as if it were a secret.

That bruise had once lasted two or three days.

Now it was gone instantly.

As Jiwan looked at him blankly, the man smiled foolishly.

Strangely, that foolish smile made Jiwan’s chest itch.

After that, whenever Jiwan got a small injury, he sought the man out.

Normally, he wouldn’t have done such a thing.

He would have ignored it or gone to a hospital if necessary.

‘Only I can see him… he’s mine.’

At some point, Jiwan began to think of the man as his own.

He didn’t know exactly what the man was to him.

Perhaps medicine.

Perhaps a shadow that followed him.

Perhaps the only living warmth he could lean on.

He didn’t know what he meant to the man.

But he was certain he could confidently call him ‘mine.’

That day too, he held out a small cut.

The man frowned, as if asking whether he really had to heal even this.

Still, he complied.

Jiwan admired his neatly healed finger.

Just then, someone interrupted his time.

Only one person would come looking for him here.

“Hyung.”

It was his younger brother.

Unable to see the man, his brother sat in the chair Jiwan had left out for him.

The man, who had been sitting there, startled and stood.

Jiwan didn’t like that.

His brother was perceptive, yet pretended not to be.

Otherwise, he couldn’t remain by Jiwan’s side.

In this rotten family, his brother was at least a decent person.

So Jiwan tried to accommodate him when possible.

“I… just want to live like this.”

His brother said he didn’t care about the Domun Group.

He wanted to be a YouTuber.

Jiwan fell into thought.

He himself had no interest in the company either.

So who would inherit it?

He wondered silently.

If he had voiced that thought back then, would the accident have happened?

He didn’t regret it.

But he was curious.

Not long after, the incident occurred.

“This is all your fault!”

It was the hit-and-run accident.

In the past, he had heard those words from his stepmother.

Every year, in dreams, he heard them again.

When he first heard them, he had felt absurd.

But in dreams, the feeling was different.

In reality, he had known the accident would happen.

Yet he had done nothing.

Still, this was only a dream.

Changing it would not alter reality.

‘It would only make the dream inconsistent.’

Saving his brother in a dream would not wake the real one.

So Jiwan endured his stepmother’s fury and turned to leave.

Then he saw the man approach his brother.

‘No way.’

A sudden weight pressed on Jiwan’s chest.

But when the man returned with a dark expression, the pressure eased.

Just in case, Jiwan asked,

“Can’t you wake him with your ability?”

The man shook his head.

Satisfaction filled Jiwan’s heart.

He felt sorry for his brother, who had liked him.

But he wished the man would heal only him.

‘Wholly… mine.’

He hoped the man would never heal anyone else.

He knew it was petty.

So he kept it to himself.

Driven mad with grief, his stepmother made a disastrous move.

She revealed the secret of his birth.

Having lost her precious son, she decided they would all fall together.

Even for Jiwan, who never expected much from others, this was a shock.

Not the revelation itself.

But the way people’s attitudes changed overnight.

He hadn’t changed.

Yet everyone looked at him differently.

Eyes once filled with envy or admiration turned cold.

As if he didn’t belong there.

Only the man remained unchanged.

Jiwan was relieved.

He did not love humanity.

But he did not wish to hate it either.

Perhaps this man in his dream was the last line preventing him from hating people.

As long as the man didn’t change, that was enough.

His anxiety faded.

‘How did I endure this back then?’

He had simply endured it.

Insults were unpleasant but bearable.

Jiwan could ignore noise.

But violence was different.

Even if labeled an illegitimate child, he was still Do Jiwan.

Still blood of the Domun Group.

Yet people acted as if that title erased everything.

“As if being illegitimate changes anything?”

When a fool tried to use violence, the man flinched in fear.

He feared Jiwan would be hurt.

That concern was oddly pleasant.

Yet Jiwan was furious that someone else had frightened him.

He snapped sharply.

Only then did the fools realize their mistake.

Fear replaced arrogance.

Watching history repeat itself made Jiwan laugh bitterly.

He realized again that he needed power.

‘Idiots.’

He hated that others had made the man afraid.

That expression didn’t suit him.

He preferred his usual shameless smile.

To protect himself and what was his, Jiwan needed strength.

So he decided to seize the Domun Group.

Not out of desire.

But necessity.

Soon after, his father and stepmother divorced.

She left with his brother.

She never apologized.

She told him never to forgive her.

But Jiwan never hated her.

She meant nothing to him.

He had no emotion strong enough even for forgiveness.

The label of illegitimate child followed him.

Peers were subdued by his presence.

But older generations were not.

They were mountains he had yet to climb.

‘What should I do…?’

He had nothing to appeal to them with.

They held power.

Compared to theirs, his was insignificant.

When he needed extraordinary achievement, opportunity arrived.

The world changed drastically.

Feeling the power flow through his body, Jiwan thought of the man.

Was this the ability he used?

Then why had the man possessed it even before the upheaval?

Jiwan was curious.

But afraid to ask.

For ten years, he had asked the man nothing.

His name.

His age.

Why he stayed beside him.

He wanted to know.

But knowing felt frightening.

‘If he could tell me, he already would have.’

He spoke to him even about trivial things.

So perhaps if Jiwan learned the truth, he would disappear.

Thus, he buried his curiosity deep.

Sometimes it surged up impulsively.

But he suppressed it with patience.

In any case, Jiwan gathered people.

Opportunity had come.

He would be a fool not to seize it.

It was too late to stand out through studies or business.

While others hesitated, he had to solidify his position.

But inside the dungeon, when the first murder occurred,

Jiwan’s composure wavered.

His vision darkened.

His body grew heavy, as if submerged underwater.

His ears rang dully.