The thick, damp smell filled the narrow, dingy room, which was half-buried underground. The walls were speckled with mold, and a small fridge that looked too decrepit to sell even at a secondhand store hummed feebly in the corner. Outdated, worn-out clothes hung limply from a rickety clothes rack, while the dining table doubled as a cluttered workspace.
Beneath a threadbare blanket that seemed to have gone unwashed for years, lay a middle-aged man with a pallid, exhausted face. His frame was gaunt, his skin dull and lifeless, and his beard, rough and unkempt, gave him the appearance of a homeless vagrant.
This man was Ryu Ji-ho.
He was a director and a scriptwriter of adult films.
---
The water in the pot atop the portable gas stove began to boil.
"To pay the gas, electricity, and water bills, I need to work…" Ryu Ji-ho muttered, his voice thick with anxiety as he dropped instant noodles into the bubbling water. Despite his fatigue, his hands mechanically stirred the noodles to keep them from clumping together.
This basement was slightly more bearable during the summer months. Though the heat and humidity often made it difficult to sleep, at least he didn't have to worry about freezing to death. Winter, however, was a different beast entirely. A sudden cold snap could easily be the end of him, given his fragile health.
Since last autumn, his body had begun showing signs of illness. Living on soju as a substitute for proper meals and consuming instant noodles daily had wrecked his stomach. He also suffered from high blood pressure and early symptoms of pneumonia. To make matters worse, payments for his film scripts were consistently delayed, causing his bills to pile up.
As a writer of adult film scripts, barely earning enough to feed himself, Ryu Ji-ho couldn't afford to demand his wages. The fear of losing his job held him back, knowing that without this meager income, his situation would become dire. Now, his days were consumed with the struggle of figuring out how to afford his next meal.
His pay was a pittance compared to other writers. Losing this job would be akin to a death sentence for Ryu Ji-ho, whose life was already hanging by a thread. The industry was saturated with writers willing to work for even less.
---
"Just thinking about it is terrifying," Ryu Ji-ho sighed, as if this had become a daily ritual.
"What should I do after eating this bowl of instant noodles?" he whispered, feeling utterly lost. Everything seemed bleak, devoid of any hope.
"Being a loser is just miserable," he said, his voice tinged with self-mockery.
He was a failure in the film world.
He was a failure in life.
No one felt any sympathy for him. No one extended a helping hand. He had dedicated his whole life to one path, but what good had it done? Now, he had to fight just to find work so he could eat. His existence was pitiful.
What had once given him so much confidence? Was it merely the fact that he had managed to endure in the film industry for so long?
---
"Hah."
Ryu Ji-ho let out a long, weary sigh.
Thinking back, everything seemed inevitable. Dreaming of becoming a director, he had jumped straight into an assistant role right after high school. Eventually, he worked his way up to become an assistant director, producing low-budget films and flaunting his empty pride.
He had once believed that if he became a famous director, his lack of a formal educational background wouldn't matter. Perhaps it was due to his mother's desperate pleas that he finally completed a vocational academy course later in life, at an age when most people would already have established careers.
But his arrogance isolated him from his peers, and he ended up in a position so low that it couldn't even be classified as a third-rate director.
When reality began to dawn on him, he tried to escape into the military. However, after spending years in denial and returning from his conscription as an older man, he was greeted by the harsh, cold reality of the world.
With money saved up from part-time jobs, he attempted to make short films and submit them to film festivals. But he failed to secure any meaningful recognition.
Meanwhile, he spent his time indulging in what he called romanticism, mingling with all sorts of people, living a reckless life.
It was during this time that he befriended a producer, and by clinging to the slim opportunity this connection offered, he walked with swagger and arrogance, as if he were some renowned director, confidently barking out orders, "Ready, go," without a hint of doubt.
"Wake up one day and suddenly become a star? What a load of nonsense!" he scoffed, irritated.
Ryu Jiho was caught up in a ridiculous daydream that, one day, he would magically become a big star. It was a fantasy, pure and simple, yet Jiho let himself get lost in it. He knew his life was going nowhere, but he was too afraid to change course. He kept running from reality, getting more and more entangled in the mess he'd made for himself.
The friends who used to be around in his youth had all disappeared, becoming unreachable shadows of the past. Occasionally, he'd bump into old colleagues from the Chungmuro film industry, but they would only look at him with pity in their eyes. Some had found great success, climbing the ladder to become CEOs of renowned film production companies. Others had left the film world behind, opting instead to build families and lead ordinary lives. Sometimes, Jiho wondered if they were the ones who truly won at life.
"There are just too many annoying geniuses in this world," he muttered bitterly.
The digital era had stormed in like a tornado, tearing down the walls between amateurs and professionals. Now, anyone could make a film with their phone, pushing people like Jiho, who were stuck in the analog past, to the sidelines. Even in Korea, talented amateurs were outshining Jiho's abilities.
"Maybe it's time to find a different path?" Jiho mused, his face clouded with confusion.
The few friends who still stuck around offered him advice, telling him it wasn't too late to start something new. But Jiho had always brushed them off. Now, however, he felt like he couldn't keep pretending to be blind. This wasn't just about making a choice anymore; it was about survival. He was standing at a crossroads, with his future hanging in the balance of whatever decision he made next.
For someone like Ryu Jiho, who half-heartedly faced life, the world was a cruel place. He often worried about being looked down upon by younger juniors, and gradually, his confidence shattered. When that confidence disappeared, everything started to intimidate him. As a result, Jiho couldn't even imagine trying something new.
"Should I just give it all up? Mom doesn't have much time left anyway…" he thought, drowning in a wave of deep guilt.
Ryu Jiho felt like the most ungrateful child in the world. He had left his elderly mother, who was suffering from a stroke, in the care of his younger sibling, while he lived like a vagrant in a basement room. His shabby appearance and the state of his life only deepened his disappointment in himself.
"A film that never gets finished... Enough is enough!" Finally, Ryu Jiho made the heavy decision to leave the film industry, a world that had been a part of his life for so long.
"Tomorrow, I'll find a job, anything that lets me live," he told himself, trying to muster up some courage.
Ryu Jiho planned to find work that would give him an income, something that would allow him to support himself, at least temporarily. After that, he intended to visit his mother and sibling.
Ryu Jiho finished his last meal of the night, a simple bowl of instant noodles. The pot and bowl he had used were abandoned in the sink, victims of his lethargy. His old laptop sat open on the table. As Jiho reached out to shut it down, his hand suddenly paused. On the screen, he noticed a film treatment he had once intended to submit to a scriptwriting competition.
[In an open field blanketed with snow, the body of a man slowly freezes. In the distance, lightning strikes suddenly among the dark, heavy clouds. A deafening thunderclap follows a blinding flash of light. The protagonist's body is slowly dragged into the darkness.]