You come with nothing and leave with nothing. Isn't that the truth!
Everyone comes into this world empty-handed and leaves empty-handed. And that is an undeniable truth of life. When you looked at it that way, his current situation wasn't all that bleak. He, too, had come into this world empty-handed, and now he was empty-handed once more. So all he had to do was go. To live up to the truth that you come with nothing and leave with nothing.
Joo-young stood atop the cliff, thinking that way.
He had blown away every last thing he'd hurriedly, desperately, and foolishly clutched in his two empty hands after coming into this world, now that he was past his mid-fifties. He still had a family, technically. But his children were grown and busy with their own lives, so they probably didn't need him to stick around. He did feel a little bad about being absent from their weddings, but both daughters had declared voluntary singlehood long ago. They couldn't possibly resent Joo-young later for this.
He had a wife, too, but it had been a long time since that was meaningfully true. The only reason they hadn't divorced was the pension insurance they'd signed up for early in their marriage—a bizarre marriage-escalation plan that paid out more only if they were still married when the payments began.
A cold gust of wind rose from below the cliff. The cliff he'd found through a meticulous online scouting trip was quite satisfactory. If he fell from here, he would definitely die, and there was no doubt his body would never be found. Just as he'd hoped, he could leave quietly without anyone knowing, without the commotion of a funeral or anything like that. Later, once he was subjected to death registration by presumed death, his family would be able to collect the life insurance money without a hitch.
Benches had been placed here and there around the railing running along the cliff's edge. The place was fairly well known for its beautiful fall foliage, so there were still a few hikers out enjoying the season. Joo-young headed for a bench. All that remained was to wait until the people disappeared, then throw himself over the railing.
Just as Joo-young sat down, something lying in the grass between his feet caught his eye. It looked like a piece of jewelry about the size of an egg. Had someone dropped it? Joo-young picked it up absentmindedly. But the instant the object came fully into view, a long-forgotten memory came crashing into his mind like a thunderbolt.
It had been the summer vacation of his freshman year of college.
Even though it was vacation, his daily routine of traveling between home and school was no different from the semester, because of a club activity called the summer alumni drive—freshmen visited graduated seniors, paid their respects, and gratefully accepted club donations needed to keep the club running.
Aside from having to go to school during vacation, it wasn't particularly difficult work. The seniors were happy to make club donations, and they often bought the students meals or drinks. Every now and then, there was even a respectable senior who would hand them extra spending money, saying, “Use this for yourself.”
Every morning, the freshmen gathered in the club room, turned in the club donations they'd received the day before, collected a list of seniors they were supposed to visit that day, and set off with enthusiasm. First, they had to use a pay phone to make appointments before visiting them. If they couldn't arrange an appointment, or if there was a long gap between appointments and they had to wander the sweltering streets in midsummer, then it could be called grueling.
One day, while out on club business, Joo-young was worn out from the heat and opened the freezer case in front of a corner store. That's when he noticed a little boy standing pressed against the side of it. He wore the same expression as a kid glued to the side of an arcade machine, doing nothing but watching someone else play.
“Want one?”
At Joo-young's question, the boy nodded so vigorously it looked like headbanging. Joo-young took out an ice pop and held it out to him, but the boy didn't accept it.
“Not that one. A Nugabar.”
For a moment, Joo-young thought, Beggars can't be choosers. But since he'd already decided to be generous, there was no reason not to respect the kid's choice. When Joo-young handed him a Nugabar, the boy accepted it with a huge grin and sprinted off somewhere without even saying thank you. That was when Joo-young began to reasonably suspect he was a habitual offender.
“Hey, student.”
A hoarse voice called out to Joo-young.
“Give me one of those, too.”
The speaker was a strange man sitting at a folding table in front of the store.
He was a man in a long trench coat that reached his ankles, drinking beer in broad daylight in the middle of summer. He wasn't particularly young or old, but Joo-young couldn't begin to guess whether he was in his thirties, forties, or fifties. At a glance, there was simply something strange about him.
“It's not that I particularly want to eat one,” the man said. “I want to give you this, but I can't just hand it over. You have to pay some kind of price to receive it.”
What he slowly pulled from his coat pocket was a star-shaped pendant. A five-pointed star. Each of its five sharp points, made of metal, was set with something that looked like a red gem.
It looked fairly convincing, but of course Joo-young wasn't interested in it in the slightest. Still, by his reasonable calculation, trading an ice pop for the pendant was better than turning down the strange offer of someone who was obviously strange. He took out another ice pop and walked over to the man.
“All right. Deal.”
The man accepted the ice pop Joo-young held out and set the pendant on the table, wearing an expression that might have been a smile, judging by the twitch at the corner of his mouth.
“Sit down. I'll explain how to use it.”
Once again, reason prevailed, and Joo-young obediently sat down in front of the man.
“You see those five red gems?”
“Huh? Those are real gems?”
For the first time, Joo-young became interested in the pendant and snatched it up. Maybe it was worth a fair bit of money.
“So, basically... it's a device that lets you register a time point.”
Huh? What was he talking about? Joo-young asked with his expression.
“Now, sometime in the future, you'll experience a really good moment, okay? Something incredibly happy and beautiful, or whatever. And you'll think, I want to experience this moment again at least once before I die.”
Seeing Joo-young's expression grow even more openly suspicious, the man continued.
“When that happens, you press one of the red gems, slowly and firmly. If the gem changes color to yellow, that means you've successfully registered that time point. You can register five time points in total, since there are five gems.”
The questions building on Joo-young's face finally reached their limit and burst out of his mouth.
“And then?”
“After that, well, sometime far in the future, you press the gem with the registered time point, and you can return to that moment.”
Pffft. The pressure that had twisted Joo-young's face into a knot escaped all at once. Of course. He'd wondered if there might be something to it, but sure enough, it was complete nonsense.
“Ah. Right...”
Joo-young weakly rose to his feet, now certain that the pendant in his hand could not possibly be worth anything.
“Oh, right. But you can't return whenever you want. There are... conditions that have to be met....”
He didn't even want to ask what the conditions were. It was all nonsense anyway.
“You don't need to know the specifics. Anyway, once all the conditions for returning to the registered moment have been met, the yellow gem turns green.”
“Green?”
At Joo-young's reluctant one-word response, the man raised his index finger and stretched his mouth into a grin that reached his ears.
“That's right. It's the signal that says, ‘Now you can go!’”
The aftershock of the thunderbolt still seemed to linger around his ears.
Joo-young was certain that the thing in his hand now was the very pendant he'd received from that strange man back then. He remembered carrying it around for a while after that day. But he had no memory of when or where he'd lost it—or whether he'd really lost it at all, rather than simply throwing it away or giving it to someone. In any case, the pendant that had vanished completely from Joo-young's memory and life had now reappeared before his eyes. And on top of that, all five gems set in the star-shaped pendant now glowed green.