Became an American Retro Novelist - Chapter 205



Only Noblemtl

205.

‘I’m currently planning a new work. I’ll try to give you good news soon.’

If there was one blind spot in that statement, it was that no one knew exactly when that ‘soon’ would be.

But that doesn’t mean I can say, “Please be more specific!”

Why? Of course, there is a social consensus among us.

‘Oh, this guy. He’s got his head wrapped around it right now.’

The interview, which lasted about an hour, ended with everyone understanding it that way.

As the people from each magazine left the daily offices prepared for the interview, I finished my greetings and went back behind the curtain, letting out a long sigh, feeling a little exhausted.

‘The interview itself was okay.’

I was confused because I couldn’t get used to the makeup and hair. It felt like I was wearing a very thin mask on my face.

Just as I was wondering how the hell women do this, Simon and Julia, who had sent everyone away, came back to me with a big smile.

I asked with a tired face, not hiding my expression of difficulty.

“How was the interview?”

“You’re the best.”

“Best writer in the world.”

Two people giving a thumbs up.

Embarrassed by the rave reviews, I scratched my cheek and answered.

“Don’t joke around.”

“No, it was really great.”

“Simon is right. Whenever you show your professional side in relation to work like this, it feels very sexy. On top of that, when you have such a well-packaged appearance, I could see that everyone who came to interview you was surprised. It completely broke the prejudice against writers.”

“Well, the very phrase ‘prejudice against writers’ sounds a bit prejudicial.”

No, does it feel like the author is a person who sits in a room, grows a beard, doesn’t wash his hair, wears a stretched-out t-shirt, smokes a cigarette and writes?

······That’s how I spend my time when I’m busy.

Julia brushed aside my passive protest and put a hand on my shoulder as she made a suggestion.

“You can give me the clothes later, so how about going to see your girlfriend instead?”

“Oh, that would be great, author!”

Why do these two people look more excited than me?

Of course, the one who benefited the most from this interview was me. I earned money and got some attention.

Still, these two were happy as if it was their own business, and I smiled softly, thinking that showing my exhaustion in front of them was a bit childish.

“Then shall we do that?”

Since you’ve already dressed up, go somewhere and show off your cool side.

That reminded me of the perfect person to show off my skills in, and I left my office and drove to Koreatown.

‘She’s not my girlfriend, like Simon said.’

I just wanted to show my mother what it looked like.

Let’s tell the person who always worries about his child how cool his son is.

With that conclusion in hand, I quickly drove to Koreatown, parked my car in the parking lot near the store, and started walking slowly out.

It was a bit quiet, perhaps because it was just after lunch time. Koreans who were looking around the store recognized me as I passed by and greeted me with wide eyes.

“Hey, Han Shin! You look so cool today!”

“You look like a movie star!”

“Go, thank you.”

I felt a little embarrassed and had no choice but to quicken my pace.

‘Clothes certainly have power.’

I arrived at the store, attracted a lot of attention, and went inside, my eyes widening.

A completely unexpected sight was unfolding before my eyes.

“Hey, God, have you come?!”

Inside the counter, four women, including the mother, were playing Hwatu.

My mother, who was surprised to see me enter the store, quickly folded up the military mat that was used as a playing card, and as if they had made a promise, they quickly took out the Bible that they had kept behind their backs and opened it up.

A series of movements that somehow seem familiar.

Soon, this excuse came out.

“Oh, Mom. I was just studying the Bible!”

“······okay.”

All the ladies were smiling with embarrassed expressions and mumbling Bible verses, but the fact that each of them was holding a different page made me feel uncomfortable and fooled.

But that didn’t last long, as someone behind my mother suddenly stood up and shouted at me.

“Oh my, oh my, oh my. What’s wrong with God? He’s become a total bachelor!”

“That’s right~. God, Mom, that would be great! My son would be a writer and go to a prestigious university!”

“Do you have a girlfriend? My daughter works as a nurse at the university hospital over there······!”

At first, I thought they were trying to break the awkward atmosphere, but the Korean ladies looked at me closely and got up from their seats with their eyes wide open and came closer to me.

The expression on my mother’s face as she stood behind me and looked at me seemed to drip with honey, but the humility unique to Koreans was on display here.

“Oh my, she’s still a child! A child! She has a long way to go before she gets married!”

“I can start putting my hair up in a topknot tomorrow!”

Oh, what was ‘Sang-two’?

“Oh my, if only my son could follow God even halfway, he would have no more wishes!”

“I’m not kidding. The ladies are saying this because they think Shin-i is really cool.”

“thank you.”

I spoke in front of him, smiling awkwardly.

And in times like these, you shouldn’t stop there; you should try to save your mother’s spirit.

“Are you feeling hungry? Would you like me to buy you something light to eat?”

“Oh my, this kid speaks so beautifully!”

“It’s okay, ladies! You need to go on a diet!”

“Hey, where do you want to take it out?”

“Kyahahahahaha-! You’ve grown up so well, kid!”

The lady who laughs so hard she’s dizzy.

The mother behind him also couldn’t hold back her laughter any longer.

But honestly accepting such polite hospitality is not the Korean style.

My mother came over to me as if she was whining, turned my back, and tried to send me out of the store.

“Oh, this kid has the same sly personality as his dad! Stop disturbing the adults while they study the Bible and go outside and play!”

Is that Bible study done with red pictures on the back?

I couldn’t bring myself to ask that question and was kicked out. I just snickered and went to a nearby cafeteria to buy all kinds of cakes and coffee and took them back to the store.

The ladies who were about to start another fight over flowers were flustered, but when I handed them the spoon while smiling as if I knew everything, they laughed heartily and kept telling the mother how good her son was, and they were happy for each other.

For me, it was the first time in a long time that I showed some filial piety.

‘I don’t feel so bad.’

Besides, talking to the ladies made me feel like I got more hints about the new work.

After leaving the store and getting into my car, I looked around the Koreatown that was right in front of me and thought.

‘Certainly, it’s a bit of a closed structure.’

Now I’m looking at this more closely.

America, a country of immigrants.

But East Asians from the distant Far East were not welcome here.

This was because their appearance was different, they could not communicate properly, and they were a race that immigrated here later than the mainstream races such as whites, blacks, and Hispanics.

To protect themselves, they banded together and formed Koreatowns, starting in Hawaii and then moving to Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles.

And that very attitude of ‘sticking together among themselves’ also became the reason for being hostile towards other races.

The main argument was, ‘Why don’t you try to get along with other people since you’re American?’

As for that, I had nothing to say in particular. If we were to argue about who started it first, there would be no end to it, and moreover, rather than refute it outright, I would rather······ How should I put it?

‘I feel like I want to say that it’s not necessarily like that?’

Just because you’re an Asian doesn’t mean you’re always shy and quiet. Just because you’re an Asian doesn’t mean you’re always the one with the Fu-Manchu beard and the mysterious magic. There are people like me. I’m here.

I felt like I wanted to say that through my new superhero film that I’m currently planning.

The times were just right.

‘That piece will be out soon.’

A superhero comic published by DC Comics in February 1986. A masterpiece of a generation.

It was none other than ‘The Dark Knight Returns’.

And at the end of this year, Watchmen, which is considered one of the best comics of all time, came out.

Since time immemorial, comics have been mainly about simple stories suitable for children to read, where good punishes evil.

However, starting in the 1970s, stories that reflected reality gradually increased, and through the two works mentioned above, one trend definitely emerged as a new mainstream.

The entanglement that makes it feel like superheroes exist in our own ‘reality’.

The comics market continued to grow without stopping, even with revisions to laws and changes in distribution methods, and this trend continued into the future, growing superheroes into a mainstream part of the film industry.

As someone who writes about the reality I have experienced, I wanted to get on that bandwagon for once.

And there was one more reason why I chose superhero stuff.

‘It’s because of what happened a while ago.’

A while ago, I returned to Stanford and was volunteering at a local elementary school, following Kate Moore’s suggestion, when I suddenly heard this from someone.

‘Hey, by any chance······are you a ninja?’

······Surprisingly, it was a sound I actually heard with my own eyes.

But in that situation, I couldn’t be as aggressive as I was when I was discriminated against before.

Because the person who said that was just an elementary school student.

That too, third grade.

In addition, a third grader who wants to become a ‘superhero’ like his friends.

‘That’s terrible.’

Now that I had to go back to school soon, I felt my head spinning.

I’m not a ninja. Of course not.

I started the car, recalling the memories from that time.

***

The Pulp Fiction Club has become increasingly corrupt.

With Rebecca Wong and John Smith as editors, it didn’t seem like Nana Kate’s feedback would be of much help, and naturally, at some point, it became a gathering where we read novels and chatted.

To overcome this situation, the club president(?) Rebecca Wong made a suggestion.

‘Let’s do some activities that will help you write genre fiction.’

Everyone took the suggestion with interest, and from then on, the Pulp Fiction Club became a club that met from time to time and wandered around for deep conversations.

I had a variety of experiences, such as going to restaurants with good atmospheres and delicious food, going to art galleries, and visiting other departments.

In the process, I also got inspiration for new works.

‘Most of them just ended up being small ideas.’

Inspiration becomes intuition, intuition disintegrates and gets stuck in the brain. Then, I naturally think, ‘Ah, I should write this,’ and start conceiving. This was my general routine.

But most of the stimulation I received during that time did not pass the hurdle of intuition and just turned into bubbles and disappeared from my head.

But just when I was thinking that this was a good experience in its own right, Kate Moore suddenly made this suggestion to us as the winter semester began.

‘Would you like to try doing after-school helper work together at an elementary school?’

Volunteer work that can be included in your career history later.

Naturally, the three people in the Creative Writing Department responded with, “Why bother?” It had to be that way. The Creative Writing Department is a cursed department where you can never easily get a job through normal methods, no matter how many more lines you add to your resume. In such a situation, how dare you make such a suggestion to us, Kate Moore!

······At that moment, Kate Moore’s persuasion continued.

Kate, pushing up her glasses, convinced us that ‘if you do after-school helper work, you can meet young children, observe them, memorize their behavior, and use that in some way.’

And no matter how well I tried to listen to it, it sounded like something a child kidnapper would say, so I politely asked that the subject be specified.

Anyway, we thought it wasn’t a bad suggestion, so we followed Kate’s instructions and filled out the application, and all four of us proudly started working as ‘after-school helpers’ at an elementary school near Stanford.

The words sounded good, but in reality it was no different from being a day laborer.

Escondido Elementary School, located right next to Stanford.

John and I worked hard to move supplies, Rebecca was assigned to help with after-school study sessions to round up troubled children, and Kate Moore was assigned to go around the school with the teachers to help children who hadn’t left yet.

While I was busy moving boxes into the warehouse according to my assigned task, I witnessed something strange.

A boy wearing a fluttering black cloak and tights, kneeling on a bench.

Flutter, flutter.

“······.”

“······I am Batman.”

The boy landed on the ground about a foot below with an exaggerated superhero landing, then ran off. Just as I was standing there dumbfounded, I noticed a group of second-graders huddled under a tennis ball hanging from a tree, squirming like baby Chihuahuas.

So I just took it out.

It wasn’t a particularly tall tree, and there were plenty of places to step, so I climbed up and took out the ball. The kids said, “I’ll give you potatoes,” and went back with bright smiles. While watching their backs, I smiled happily, and then I finally got to meet that guy.

A young schoolgirl with a wounded expression, like a squirrel that has had its acorns stolen.

“Oh, by any chance······are you a ninja?”

“······what?”

“Please! Please accept me as your disciple!”

A girl who brazenly kneels down and sings ‘Jeol’.

I shouted in front of him, thinking that if anyone saw this sight, they would definitely be accused of being a child kidnapper.

“T-What are you talking about! Get up!”

“Please! Please! Be my master!”

“Oh, what are you talking about! Why do you want to be a ninja!?”

“I need strength!!”

“What, what?!”

“Revenge, bloody revenge······!”

What on earth could possibly make a third grader decide to seek ‘bloody revenge’?

I was speechless for a while as I looked at the girl who was giving me a look of hatred like a squirrel that had lost all the acorns it had saved during hibernation.

I had a gut feeling that I was involved with the wrong kid.