Chapter 1

The First Daughter Is Suspicious (1)

If you were to ask what the biggest problem in South Korea was these days, nine out of ten people would probably give the same answer.

The birth rate was falling at an alarming rate.

At a time when even getting married was difficult, Kang Dae-oh had always thought that simply having a child was already an amazing thing.

But he never imagined that—

Kang Dae-oh himself would become the main character who did both.

“Is there a guardian for Min Seung-yeon?”

“Yes, yes!”

It had been less than twenty minutes since his wife, who was full-term, had entered the operating room.

And already, his name was being called.

The nurse waiting at the entrance of the newborn nursery smiled brightly as she spoke to Kang Dae-oh.

“Congratulations. You have a beautiful baby girl.”

“She’s already… finished with the surgery?”

“Yes.”

“It ended really quickly. In dramas, it always seems to take a long time.”

“Induced labor can take ten or twelve hours. But a C-section is over very quickly. It only takes about ten minutes.”

“Ah… I see.”

The nurse opened the door to the newborn nursery and gestured for Kang Dae-oh to come inside.

“Come and see your baby.”

“Ah, okay.”

Only then did nervousness begin to wash over him like a wave.

There probably wasn’t a parent in the world who wouldn’t be nervous at the moment they met their child for the first time.

With a stiff and nervous face, Kang Dae-oh slowly, very slowly, took his first step inside.

The moment he entered—

Kang Dae-oh felt an emotion that was difficult to put into words.

His first thought was simple.

“She’s… really small. My goodness.”

He couldn’t help wondering how a human being could possibly be this small.

Wriggle, wriggle.

A tiny baby girl with reddish skin, which had not yet completely lost its color, was moving her little body energetically.

Then, the baby made eye contact with Kang Dae-oh.

The nurse let out a small gasp of surprise.

“Oh my. How amazing. It looks like the baby recognizes her father.”

“As far as I know, newborn babies can’t really see right after they’re born…”

“Maybe she instinctively realized that her father was here? When I saw her in the operating room earlier, even her crying was very short. She was incredibly mature for a newborn.”

“Really?”

“Yes. She even smiled at the doctor. The doctor said it was amazing because she was already making facial expressions.”

Kang Dae-oh remembered the times he and his wife had visited the obstetrics and gynecology department.

Every time they went for a regular checkup, the doctor always said the same thing.

That the baby was somehow special.

Whenever they tried to see the baby’s face through an ultrasound, she would sometimes turn her body into an angle where her face could be seen clearly, almost as if she knew she was having her picture taken.

At other times, she would move her hands and feet from side to side, almost as if she were greeting her parents and the doctor outside.

It was hard to explain.

It felt as if she was already aware that she was a newborn baby.

“I’ve worked at an obstetrics and gynecology hospital for almost fifteen years, and I’ve never seen such a quiet and mature baby before. I think she’ll grow up to be someone important.”

“I hope so.”

The nurse reached out toward the baby.

She checked that all five fingers and five toes were there and carefully showed them whether there were any particular problems.

The baby seemed to cooperate with the nurse’s movements.

“Oh my! Look at this. Have you ever seen a baby cooperate this well?”

“Of course not. This is actually my first time seeing a newborn baby.”

“Ah, that’s right. Of course. I’m sorry. Hoho!”

The nurse pointed at Kang Dae-oh’s pants pocket.

“Father, if you want to take pictures or videos, you can.”

“Ah, okay.”

Only then did Kang Dae-oh realize that he had forgotten something very important—taking pictures and videos.

He hurriedly took out his smartphone.

He held it sideways and adjusted the angle so that the baby’s face could be seen clearly.

At that moment—

“Waaah!”

The baby suddenly made a very short crying sound.

Rather than actually crying, it felt more like she was saying to her father, “That’s not right!”

The baby shook her head and turned it to the left.

Does she want me to take the picture from that side?

As Kang Dae-oh tilted his head in confusion, the nurse watched the baby’s behavior and shared her own thoughts.

“It seems like she’s telling you to make sure the right side of her face is facing the camera. That side really does look prettier.”

The more he watched the baby, the stranger it seemed.

Just in case, Kang Dae-oh deliberately tried to take a picture of the baby’s left side.

However—

“Waaah!”

The baby cried out once again.

The nurse laughed and spoke to Kang Dae-oh.

“If you tease her too much, she might get angry.”

Kang Dae-oh nodded.

In the end, he took pictures from the angle his little daughter wanted.

Click. Click.

His daughter calmly posed for the pictures, even keeping a relaxed expression as if she were a child model.

Kang Dae-oh couldn’t help having all kinds of thoughts.

Should I make her a celebrity?

It already felt like she had the potential to become one.

After moving from the hospital room to the postpartum care center, Kang Dae-oh unpacked their things as soon as he and his wife, Min Seung-yeon, arrived at their assigned room.

“Are you feeling okay?”

Min Seung-yeon nodded heavily and said that she could bear it.

She was more curious about the baby than about her own condition.

“Honey. You checked where the newborn nursery is, right?”

“Yeah. If we go out and turn right, there’s a hallway. If we keep walking down it, we’ll reach the central stairs of the postpartum care center. The newborn nursery is there. They said they’d explain everything later when they called us for feeding.”

Min Seung-yeon sat down on the bed and slowly brushed her messy hair back.

“I want to see our daughter already.”

“You just saw her earlier.”

“Isn’t it a mother’s nature to want to keep seeing her?”

“Well, that’s true.”

Kang Dae-oh also stayed by his wife’s side and frequently went back and forth to the newborn nursery while they were still at the hospital.

Whenever visiting was allowed, he hurried over to see his daughter.

Sometimes Min Seung-yeon went with him, but because she was still having difficulty moving around due to the effects of the surgery, she hadn’t been able to see the baby very much.

Perhaps that was why she wanted to see their child as soon as possible.

Just then, the director of the postpartum care center came to the couple’s room.

She quickly began explaining everything the couple needed to know during their stay.

Most of it was, of course, related to the baby.

“A helper will come and teach you many things, starting with how to bathe the baby, how to change her diaper, how to burp her, and so on. You can record videos or take notes and then do the same things when you return home. We also have our own postpartum care center channel, so you can subscribe and watch the videos there.”

“Excuse me…”

Min Seung-yeon carefully asked her a question.

“When can we see the baby?”

“Anytime you want.”

“Really? At the hospital, there were specific visiting hours.”

“There are no such restrictions at the postpartum care center. If you want to see your baby, you can go see her whenever you want. You can even bring the baby directly to your room.”

“Really?”

Min Seung-yeon’s eyes began to sparkle.

Perhaps realizing what she was thinking, the director smiled gently.

“It happens to be cleaning time in the newborn nursery. Would you like to go get your baby? From 10 to 11 in the morning, cleaning time is fixed, so during that time, the babies are always brought to their respective rooms.”

“I-I’ll bring her! Honey, let’s go quickly!”

They had already heard all the basic explanations.

Now they wanted nothing more than to see their baby.

Following his wife’s wishes, Kang Dae-oh also got up and followed her.

The closer they got to the newborn nursery, the louder the cries of the babies became.

The fifteen babies inside the nursery were crying loudly.

Crying and crying again.

No, not all of them were crying.

There was exactly one exception.

Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon’s daughter was the only one lying there, lazily yawning.

She had an expression that seemed to say—

Ah, it’s so noisy.

At that moment, the helpers were looking at the couple’s daughter with curious expressions.

“This baby doesn’t even cry. She’s quite impressive.”

“Exactly. Usually, when one baby nearby starts crying, the others start crying too.”

Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon’s daughter had already attracted everyone’s attention at the hospital newborn nursery.

And even after coming to the postpartum care center, she continued to attract the attention of the adults around her.

When the helper heard that Min Seung-yeon had come to pick up the baby, she walked over.

A short while later—

At last, the baby was placed in Min Seung-yeon’s arms.

“Chukbok. It’s Mommy. Mommy.”

The helper asked Kang Dae-oh and Min Seung-yeon,

“Is the baby’s name Chukbok?”

Kang Dae-oh shook his head.

“It’s not her name. It’s her prenatal nickname.”

“I see. Then you haven’t decided on her real name yet?”

“We have a few candidates, but we haven’t decided for sure. We’re going to register her birth at the end of this month. We need to choose a name before then.”

They still hadn’t found a name that truly felt right.

The couple returned to their room while holding Chukbok.

Just as they were about to place their daughter down in the baby bed—

“Waaahhh!!!”

Suddenly, as if a sensor on her back had been activated, Chukbok’s crying echoed through the room.

The couple was greatly confused.

The baby had been quiet in the newborn nursery, so they couldn’t understand why she had suddenly started crying after coming to the room.

“Is it because of her diaper? Or maybe she’s hungry?”

As a first-time mother, Min Seung-yeon was almost losing her mind because of her daughter’s unfamiliar crying.

Then—

Kang Dae-oh turned his head toward the direction where the baby was looking.

Before bringing the baby, they had turned on the TV and left the room.

At that exact moment, a music video by a famous idol group was playing.

If they placed the baby in the baby bed, the TV screen would be outside her field of view.

No way.

Just in case, Kang Dae-oh took the baby from Min Seung-yeon and laid her down at an angle where she could clearly see the TV screen.

Then—

“…”

She became completely silent.

Min Seung-yeon tilted her head in confusion.

“Can she already see the TV? She shouldn’t be able to see it yet.”

“Maybe she noticed it from the direction of the sound.”

Kang Dae-oh watched Chukbok move her lips slightly along with the idol group’s song.

His mind became complicated.

It almost looked as if she were singing along to a song she already knew.

“Honey.”

“Yeah? Why?”

“This might just be my imagination.”

From the moment he first met his child until now—

Kang Dae-oh had felt something strange.

“Don’t misunderstand me. Just listen.”

“What is it?”

“I mean our child.”

Kang Dae-oh carefully spoke.

“Doesn’t our child seem… a little suspicious?”