Summary
The life that flashed before his eyes in the face of death was, without exception, wretched and filthy.
Park Dong-shik was a low-life thug in charge of debt collection for the loan shark Moon Ho-chul. Cold-blooded and loyalty-free when it came to overdue payments, Dong-shik prided himself on getting the job done.
To squeeze out money, he wouldn’t hesitate to perform bizarre acts, like unzipping his pants and urinating in someone else’s place of business. His only hobby? Watching adult videos featuring men in sharp suits. One evening, while getting worked up watching a video alone in his car, a stranger suddenly approached.
Hunched over, the man asked for a light. He was beautiful and elegant…someone Dong-shik felt he hadn’t even seen the likes of on TV. The man took the lighter and walked away, but as Dong-shik watched him go, he witnessed the man standing precariously at the end of the breakwater suddenly plunge into the sea.
Without a second thought, Dong-shik dove in after him. However, in the pitch-black water, the man was nowhere to be found. Just as Dong-shik tried to swim back to the surface, something began to seize his ankle and drag him down into the depths…
He remembered being abandoned by his parents and fleeing an orphanage to escape abuse. When he finally reunited with his father, the joy was short-lived as the man vanished again, taking every cent of Dong-shik’s savings. Working under a loan shark, he had handled all sorts of dangerous jobs and survived several brushes with death. Dong-shik’s final memory was a desperate plea: In the next life, please let me be born as the son of a rich family so I can live without a single worry.
When he opened his eyes again, he wasn’t in heaven or hell, but in a high-end private hospital suite. And in the mirror stood not Park Dong-shik, but the very man he had tried to save.
While Dong-shik was reeling from this incomprehensible phenomenon, another man appeared, claiming to be his guardian. This stranger suddenly kissed him, demanding to know how he could possibly forget him, and addressed Dong-shik as his “Sister-in-law.”