Looks Like a Love Triangle
She'd managed to bump up her allowance, but even that wasn't nearly enough to cover running a practice room on top of everything else.
So Jin Gyeo-wool, knowing full well that Hon Gyeo-wool would hate it, went ahead and contacted her mother anyway.
What choice did she have? Min Cheong-ha held the purse strings in this household. There was no other way.
Getting in touch, though, turned out to be its own ordeal. Where on earth was she even listed?
Gyeo-wool scrolled through her contacts for ages under every variation of "Mom" before finally digging up an ajumma who looked a lot like her in KakaoTalk.
How bad did things have to be between them for her to save her own mother as OM?
Then again, maybe she should be grateful it wasn't something like "Witch" or "HateHerGuts."
Gyeo-wool scratched behind her ear, then quietly changed Min Cheong-ha's name in her contacts.
As long as she was living as Jin Gyeo-wool, the least she could do was try to bridge the gulf that had opened between Hon Gyeo-wool and her parents.
Sure, she could have looked the other way. But Bae Do-hyun had never properly honored his own parents while he was alive. He'd all but cut ties with them, so he had no idea whether they'd even grieved his sudden death. This was his way of making amends, even if only by proxy.
…It was a thoroughly cowardly move.
He still didn't have the courage to go see them face-to-face.
Yeah. That should be enough.
Gyeo-wool let out a quiet sigh and was about to look around the practice room when her phone buzzed again.
Kakao. Kakao. Kakao.
It wasn't enough to make her heart pound with overwhelming emotion, but something deep in her chest gave a sharp little twinge.
Gyeo-wool found herself unexpectedly grateful to Min Cheong-ha, and thought, over and over, Thank you. Thank you.
Some kind of notification sound buzzed faintly at the edge of her hearing, but she was too caught up in the warmth of the moment to really register it.
When she lifted her head again, her gaze swept across the practice room.
The interior was so polished you could have believed a pro organization with a major sponsor had set it up. Two fifteen-pyeong commercial units bought outright and joined together — the space was enormous.
From the center of the room, it split cleanly into a soundproofed zone with six computers and a lounge where you could rest, eat, and talk.
Both sides had massive air conditioners, so summer heat would never be an issue, and the floors had underfloor heating for the winter. In the living area sat one large table with two wide sofas facing it, a massage chair for working out the muscle aches that came with long practice sessions, a restaurant-grade refrigerator stocked so you could grab a cold drink whenever you wanted, and even two single beds for crashing a few hours when practice ran you into the ground.
It was a perfect space, plain and simple.
If you practiced somewhere like this and still couldn't put up results? That player needed to pack their bags and leave, no questions asked.
The first to arrive at this well-appointed sanctuary was Choi Do-yun.
"Whoa. Holy crap."
The second he walked in, he poked around every corner of the lounge, then bolted straight into the practice area to inspect the computers.
The high-end towers Min Cheong-ha had splurged on were almost painfully beautiful — like someone had bottled fireworks meant for the night sky and planted them inside each case.
"Insane…"
As much as he loved gaming, he was still just an ordinary school kid on a meal-plan budget. There was no universe in which his allowance could have bought a rig like this.
"Is this full water cooling? This is actually insane."
"Just boot it up and play already."
"Oh man… maybe I will…"
Choi Do-yun pulled his keyboard and mouse from his bag and plugged them in. But just as he was about to launch a game, something suddenly occurred to him — the unfortunate circumstances Jin Gyeo-wool was supposedly carrying around.
He turned to Gyeo-wool, who was leaning against a chair and blinking her round eyes at him.
"Noona, uh… are you sick or something?"
"…Me?"
Gyeo-wool looked utterly baffled.
Sick? She was healthy enough to grind Recon sixteen hours a day without breaking a sweat.
She answered with a smile.
"No, not at all. Why?"
"Um… then maybe your family situation—"
Choi Do-yun swallowed the rest of the sentence.
Thinking about it, the whole premise of the question was wrong. Min Cheong-ha herself had set up this entire practice room. There was no way the family was struggling. She'd even declared she'd pay the teammates' salaries out of her own pocket.
Looking awkward, Do-yun scratched the crown of his head and tried a different angle.
"Or maybe… is someone in your family sick? Or a friend?"
Gyeo-wool thought hard about that one. Nothing came to mind, so she answered honestly.
"No? Why are you suddenly asking me all this?"
"…Ah, well… Min-jae was worried about you. So I figured I'd check if something was up. Guess that idiot just misunderstood."
"Huum…?"
With that, Choi Do-yun turned back toward the monitor.
The one left reeling from the barrage of random questions was Gyeo-wool. What on earth was going through Yu Min-jae's head?
She decided that the moment he arrived, she'd dig into his intentions based on the conversation she'd just had with Do-yun.
Second to arrive was Gong Je-hyeon. He walked in and went straight for the fridge.
"Team captain noona, are all these drinks free?"
"Since when am I your noona. And no, they're not free — if you drink one, restock it yourself."
"Ah… right, well, you're paying us a salary, so I can cover it with that."
"At least you've got a conscience."
Gong Je-hyeon muttered, sounding a little irritated.
"What do you mean 'at least'? I've always had one, okay?"
"Oh yeah? After freeloading off Ha Jeong-uk and pocketing a hundred thousand won in skins, the least you could do out of gratitude is restock some drinks."
"…Ah. Well… that's that, and this is this! Haha!"
Even so, there was no way he was giving back what he'd already received. Gong Je-hyeon laughed awkwardly and fled into the practice area. From outside the soundproof room, his "Whoa!" at the sight of the flashy towers he hadn't been able to see properly before carried all the way out.
Third to arrive was Ha Jeong-uk.
Of course the person she actually needed to talk to would show up last. Didn't they say even a tiger shows up if you mention it?
"Hey."
"Thanks for coming."
"It's nothing. Nice that it's close."
Ha Jeong-uk had become dramatically more outgoing than before. Back when he'd been living the miserable life of a tool, he'd been passive and barely asserted himself. But ever since he'd started playing a completely new kind of Recon and his days had turned happy, he'd become a different person.
He was only a year or two older, but the second he arrived he stuffed himself into the massage chair like it was the most natural thing in the world. Being a high school senior apparently made the docking process seamless. The chair whirred and rumbled to life, accompanied by a middle-aged-man groan of pure bliss — "Uuugh, that's the stuff~"
Gyeo-wool had been mentally casting him as Amumu, the famously timid Recon champion, but watching him now, she was starting to think Braum might be a better fit.
Ha Jeong-uk had been baking in the massage chair for about fifteen minutes when the long-awaited Yu Min-jae finally arrived.
"Oh, noona. Were you waiting?"
"Yeah. I've been waiting forever."
For me? Why?
At the words "waiting forever," Yu Min-jae's lips pushed out in a pout.
I wasn't even late for the meeting time?
A glance at the clock confirmed he still had five minutes to spare. If it wasn't about being late, why on earth had she been standing around waiting for him for so long?
Serious by nature, Yu Min-jae mulled it over carefully before asking her.
"Did I do something wrong?"
"……Uh… wrong? I don't think it's quite that far."
All Gyeo-wool wanted was to clear up whatever misunderstanding Yu Min-jae was under. They were standing at the edge of a future packed with nothing but hope — if he was worrying about her, he had to have gotten the wrong idea somehow.
"It's just, Do-yun mentioned it. He said you've been worrying about me."
"Ah."
So that was it.
Yu Min-jae pressed his lips shut and let his eyes wander as he sank into thought.
Of all times, Jeong-uk hyung has to be here.
If Ha Jeong-uk hadn't been parked in that massage chair, Min-jae would have come right out and talked about Gyeo-wool's health. But someone was listening. He racked his brain for a way to phrase it carefully, then leaned in close to her ear and whispered.
"Noona, you don't have much time left. That's why I'm worried."
Gyeo-wool's eyebrow tilted at an angle.
She had no idea how he'd figured it out, but of everyone on the team, Yu Min-jae was definitely the sharpest. She'd barely let it show, not wanting the others to stress over it, but the truth was she was the most urgent person on this roster.
The Memory Erosion Rate of Soul Assimilation, which she'd thought was climbing at a leisurely pace, was already at 26.8%.
To raise her dominance in-game she needed to push the erosion rate higher — but thinking about the future, she also needed to carefully manage how many games she played. It was a contradiction. A race between whether the erosion rate hit 100% first, or whether she claimed the trophy she was aiming for.
What would happen when the erosion rate filled all the way to 100%, even Gyeo-wool didn't know. She might have to hand the body back to Hon Gyeo-wool. Their souls might merge into one. Bae Do-hyun's soul might vanish completely. But whichever way it went, the odds of Bae Do-hyun's self surviving intact were basically zero.
While his self was still alive, Bae Do-hyun wanted to become a pro gamer and hoist a championship trophy. If only Jin Gyeo-wool remained — with her somewhat fragile will and fiery temper — she clearly wouldn't be able to handle pro life with any peace of mind. Lee Do-jin would get in her way, and the harsh environment would close around her throat.
In the end, the only path to the goal was for him to pour everything he had into the limited time remaining.
How Yu Min-jae had picked up on her dilemma was still a mystery, but either way, he was following her without conditions.
Can't hurt to say something now.
If she tugged the reins a little tighter here, maybe he'd take practice even more seriously.
Gyeo-wool dropped a line loaded with clear intent.
"If you're that worried, why don't you just play on the same team even after we go pro? My goals include winning the 2019 Spring, you know."
It was an extremely effective wake-up call.
Yu Min-jae, who had been operating under the assumption that she had roughly two years left, was forced to revise his estimate on the spot.
2019 Spring… that's only a year from now.
The CCK Spring split usually ran from early February through the end of April. And right now it was the end of April 2018. The close of next year's Spring would land almost exactly one year from this moment.
Yu Min-jae, who was a corpse without his seriousness, arbitrarily shortened Gyeo-wool's remaining lifespan to one year — and carved a vow deep into his chest that he would grind himself to dust to win every tournament for her sake.
Without warning, he grabbed Gyeo-wool's hand tight and added something completely unnecessary.
"Noona. I'm breaking up with my girlfriend right now."
"…? Why your girlfriend?"
"Because I have to practice. Every minute, every second counts if we're winning 2019 Spring."
Gyeo-wool was thrown.
She'd only meant to tighten the reins a little. She had not expected Yu Min-jae to announce he was dumping his girlfriend over it.
"No, as long as she doesn't interfere with our joint practice times, you don't really need to—"
"No! I have to break up. To make you champion, I have to. I've never seen a successful pro gamer who was dating."
Okay, that was true enough, but did he have to? They were still amateurs.
Gyeo-wool worked her drying lips, trying desperately to talk him down.
"Forget it. I'm going in to practice right now. We've still got a while before the team founding party, don't we?"
"Hey, hey! Hey!!"
Just like that, Yu Min-jae let go of her hand and strode into the practice room with magnificent resolve. He was strong enough that Gyeo-wool couldn't physically drag him back even if she tried.
He's just breaking up like that? Then why was he even dating in the first place?
Completely blindsided by this turn of events, Gyeo-wool sighed and followed him into the practice area.
Working hard was great. Breaking up over it was a bit much. But it wasn't like she could explain her entire situation, Soul Assimilation and all.
Ha Jeong-uk, who had been watching the whole thing from the start, muttered under his breath.
"What the hell."
It really was a what-the-hell kind of situation.
"Is Min-jae into Gyeo-wool enough to dump his girlfriend over her…"
Yu Min-jae had whispered something in Gyeo-wool's ear and her expression had gone stiff. She'd said something back, and he'd grabbed her hand out of nowhere. Then, without anyone asking, he'd announced he was breaking up with his girlfriend.
The problem was that Yu Min-jae wasn't the only one on the team who liked Jin Gyeo-wool.
Choi Do-yun never said it out loud, but he went around practically advertising his crush whenever he got the chance.
The real owner of the team was someone else, but Ha Jeong-uk was still the oldest member. It was only natural that Gyeo-wool — a gorgeous girl who was also absurdly good at the game — would be popular. What would be a problem was if that popularity tore the team apart from the inside.
"Guess I'll have to manage those two carefully."
The massage course wrapped up right on schedule. Ha Jeong-uk stood, stretched long and hard, and headed into the practice room.