Has Winter Become Spring? (1)
Sunlight falls equally on everyone, but few are those who rise to meet it first thing in the morning.
The man jolted upright, leaving behind a dream so vivid it still crawled over his skin.
"Hah…!"
It had been a truly terrifying dream.
In it, he had beaten a junior senseless just to prop up his endlessly battered pride, then fled like a coward—only to be hit head-on by a massive truck. He even remembered how many meters he had flown, how many times his body had tumbled across the asphalt.
"What… the hell? What is this?"
And yet he was alive. He had been struck hard enough to shatter every bone in his body, and somehow he was still alive.
How? The man pulled both hands out from under the blanket and turned them over, inspecting them. When he found them intact, he moved on to his face—patting, prodding, then checking his neck, his waist, his legs.
Every joint sat perfectly in place. Not a single wound. Not a flicker of pain.
He was in peak condition. Good enough to get up and run a lap right then and there.
And why does my skin feel so… soft?
In life, Bae Do-hyun had never taken care of his body. His skin had suffered for it. He had never gotten a proper facial, never once stuck to a daily lotion routine. From a distance he looked fine enough, but up close he was a landscape of blemishes and trouble. "Fine" had never really meant fine.
Now that same skin was not only clear—it was so smooth he couldn't feel a single uneven patch. It was as if someone had pressed a soft lump of silicone over his entire face.
Without thinking, the man kept stroking his cheeks. He had never been in a real relationship, but he had always carried a vague fantasy about women. Celebrities, people famous for their skin—they must feel something like this, right? Thinking that, he began to run his hands over the rest of his body.
Then a thought struck him.
Wait. Why am I groping myself like this?
The realization that he was doing something only a narcissistic pervert would do made him snatch his hands away in alarm.
But the sudden movement sent the long hair hanging on either side of his face brushing lightly against his cheeks. The bangs that had been pushed back over his forehead slid down in a soft cascade and covered his eyes.
Only then did the man sense that something was wrong.
"What. What. What the hell."
Everything was suddenly off. He had never been great about keeping his hair trimmed, so waking up after a long sleep with it a little longer—he could accept that. But the voice? The voice should not have changed.
Bae Do-hyun's original voice had been low, weak, and cracked.
"What the hell?!"
So what was this clear, ringing sound traveling through his skull and eardrums right now?
He scanned the room until he found a mirror mounted on one wall. Then he sprang up, leapt high, and landed cleanly in front of it.
The athletic ability was absurd—something he never could have imagined back when he was Bae Do-hyun. One jump was all it took to know.
"What is… what is this. What the hell…."
At last, standing before the mirror, the man faced the truth. He was no longer a man. He had become a girl—one with dark circles so deep they looked almost wasted away.
Seventeen or eighteen, high-school age at a glance. Her hair was a light brown that stood out among Koreans, and her bangs, left uncut for too long, hung all the way down to her nose.
A thick sleep set printed with little chicks wrapped her body, but a man who had looked at countless photos of women knew exactly what he was seeing.
The girl in the mirror was a beautiful sculpture come to life.
And from behind that beautiful girl's head, someone who looked exactly like her peeked out.
"Waaaaaah!"
The girl flailed a hand behind her back in pure shock, but she couldn't make physical contact with the figure that had appeared behind her reflection.
"What. What is this?"
……Hey.
And it was speaking. Some strange presence—person or ghost, he couldn't tell—was speaking.
……ya?
"What?"
It should have felt bizarre, but the man was remarkably open-minded about isekai reincarnation and possession stories. He figured that if anyone knew how he had ended up like this, it would be the girl behind him.
Who the hell are you!!!
The voice that had been muffled and distant, as if he were wearing earplugs, finally came through loud and clear.
"Me… me? Are you talking to me?"
Yes. You. Who are you, and why are you inside my body?
How should I know? The man shrugged with genuine bewilderment.
"I don't know either. I was… crossing the street, and a truck hit me……."
A truck? A truck??
"Yeah. Got hit by a truck."
Ah. So you were that crazy bastard?
Being cursed out of nowhere made the girl—no, the man—bristle with indignation.
"Crazy bastard? I didn't even see the truck coming, okay?"
That's exactly the point—who told you to go sprinting without looking either way?
"I… I had my reasons……."
He couldn't exactly admit that he had snapped under the relentless scorn of his smug little brother, beaten the kid to a pulp, and then gotten into an accident while running away. How was he supposed to tell a story that humiliating? He would only get called an age-inappropriate idiot for it.
Haa…. This is actually driving me insane….
Still clinging to the back of the girl's head, the ghost girl let out a sigh and muttered to herself.
I was trying to meet Bom, and I didn't even get to see her. My body's been stolen… what even is this.
The man occupying the girl's body finally understood with complete clarity. Yesterday he had definitely been hit by a truck, and afterward—against his will—he had flowed into this girl's body.
And the ghostlike presence visible in the mirror right now was the soul of the girl who originally owned it.
"I… I'm sorry. I didn't mean to take your body. Honestly, I don't really know what's going on either."
Same here. Whether it's a curse or what, I haven't been able to get back into my body since yesterday.
"That… that sucks."
Not only had he unintentionally stolen someone else's body—it just had to belong to a girl. Bae Do-hyun could tell things had gone seriously sideways.
Ah. Wait. If you get out of my body, maybe I can get back in?
"Is there a way?"
Surviving without dying was a relief, but Bae Do-hyun wasn't so rotten that he would keep a body that already had an owner. He told the girl that if there was a method, he would give it back.
There's an incense candle by the head of the bed. The one covered in weird writing.
"Yeah. I see it."
That—
But the moment Do-hyun stepped away from the mirror to check on the incense candle, the girl's voice cut off mid-sentence.
"…Hey. Hey? You there?"
He kept calling into empty air, but no answer came. Panicking, Bae Do-hyun hurried back to the mirror.
"Hey. Are you still there?"
—Hey! Come back! Can you hear me? Can you hear me?
"Yeah, I can hear you now."
Damn it. Without the mirror I can't even talk.
To coexist with this girl's soul, a mirror was required. Some religions treated mirrors as a medium that reflected the form of the soul—apparently that was true.
Bae Do-hyun spoke like a scientist who had just made a stunning discovery.
"Weird. When I'm not looking at the mirror, I really can't hear you at all."
No time to be amazed—— — ———try it. Give me my body back.
"Huh. Weird."
Stop messing around and hurry!!
"Okay, okay. Sorry."
Light the incense candle and lie down. There's a sleeping pill—take one.
But as Bae Do-hyun lit the candle and lay down, some instinct told him he would not be separating from this girl so easily.
That was how these things always went. If a problem were the kind that resolved the way you wanted, it never would have happened in the first place.
He lit the candle and fell asleep, but just as expected, Bae Do-hyun failed to bounce free of the body.
Didn't work….
"Guess not."
Having eaten nothing for nearly two days, his stomach began to howl in painful protest.
"For now… mind if I grab some food and think about it after?"
At that question, the girl floating behind his head in the mirror spoke up.
No. Don't leave the room.
"So is there anything to eat in here?"
…Not right now. I didn't make it to the convenience store yesterday.
How do you even live if you're surviving on convenience-store meals? The room was a disaster, sure, but it didn't look like a house that was hard up for money.
Bae Do-hyun scanned the room with a dissatisfied look.
A large trash bag sat open near the door, its contents completely unsorted.
"Why can't I go out?"
I'm… in a cold war with Mom.
"A cold war?"
She really was just a girl, wasn't she. Bae Do-hyun thought that and stuck out his lower lip.
Still better than parents you don't even talk to anymore.
Bae Do-hyun had cut ties with his parents a long time ago. They had at least treated him like a son before he enlisted, but once he came back and kept throwing his life away on games, they had no interest in looking after him.
It wasn't as if he had any results to show for it. The only money he made each month came from an unpopular stream and odd part-time jobs.
That was how Bae Do-hyun had wasted four years after discharge, alone in a cramped, run-down one-room apartment.
"Why the cold war?"
Unless you were actively trying to kill each other, having family was supposed to be better than not having any—wasn't that what people said?
……. More precisely, I'm the only one fighting the cold war.
"Just you?"
I haven't talked to my family in months.
When Do-hyun asked why, the girl muttered as if venting.
My friend… died. In an accident….
An accident. Bae Do-hyun startled and asked again.
"They… died in an accident?"
Yeah. Last night. Like you. Stop talking about it. Talking only twists my insides up.
Apparently done with the conversation, the girl hid herself behind the back of his head. Do-hyun swiped a hand back there, but of course there was nothing to catch.
"Hey. Hey!"
But he was starving.
The growling in his stomach had gone past ordinary noise and was now rumbling like thunder.
"Tch…. Survive a traffic accident just to starve to death…."
He understood that losing a friend so young must have hurt terribly—but trying an out-of-body experience just to go see that dead friend?
Bae Do-hyun muttered at the changed reflection in the mirror.
"Hey. Hey!"
The girl didn't answer no matter how many times he called.
"Ah, screw it. Whatever. There's got to be something in the fridge…."
If she didn't live alone, her mother might have left something. Thinking that, Bae Do-hyun led his empty stomach out of the room.
But the moment he opened the door, he found a small tray sitting right beside it. On the tray lay a warm egg toast that looked freshly made, paired with a carton of soy milk.
A sticky note was attached to one corner of the tray.
You're eating properly, right?
If you're hungry, just say so anytime…. I'm worried.
It was almost certainly a note from her mother.
He looked around, but there was no sign of anyone else in the house. That made sense. The parents would be at work, and even if there were siblings, they would be at school.
Bae Do-hyun quietly picked up the tray, stepped back into the room, and shut the door.
The ravenous hunger moved his body on its own. His mouth greedily demolished both slices of toast. Only after sucking down the soy milk as a chaser did Do-hyun stretch and declare himself back among the living.
With the need to fill his stomach satisfied, Bae Do-hyun's instincts naturally turned toward something else.
"Maybe I should figure out who this kid even is…."
Even if he went back to the mirror now, the girl didn't seem likely to engage. And if she could see everything he did even without the mirror, she was probably furious that he had eaten the toast her mom left.
So Do-hyun sat at the desk, chin in hand, and sank into thought.
Nothing useful came to mind—until something caught against his outstretched foot.
A computer tower.
"Whoa. She's running some pretty nice hardware."
Definitely a kid from a well-off family. The interior he had glimpsed on his way out was pure rich-apartment territory.
…The fact that I'm thinking about Recon even in this situation means I'm not normal either.
Addiction, occupational hazard—call it whatever. Bae Do-hyun switched the tower on without thinking.
A faint fan whir rose, and inside the white case, beautiful rainbow LEDs began to shimmer to life.