Round 1-1
“Yo, when’s the wedding, huh?”
“Next month, the eighth. You free?”
“What could keep me from coming?”
“Geon-woo, you? Can you make it too?”
Geon-woo answered with a troubled look at Seong-hyeon’s question.
“You know I have classes on weekends. Still, I’ll try to clear as much time as possible.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’d love for you to come, but work comes first.”
Mijeong spoke as if she was fine with it.
“Yeah, but since it’s Seong-hyeon’s and my wedding, I’ll talk to the boss about it.”
The four friends—Seong-hyeon, Mijeong, Dae-yeon, and Geon-woo—had first met at a university board-game club freshman welcome party. The connection formed back then had lasted for ten years now.
Seong-hyeon and Mijeong were getting married next month. They hadn’t dated in school; back then Mijeong had someone else in mind, and Seong-hyeon had been too busy scraping by for a living, so he hadn’t been able to join the club after graduation or even before his military service.
After graduating and starting their jobs at the height of chaos, Dae-yeon had contacted Seong-hyeon. Dae-yeon, Geon-woo, and Mijeong had often gathered for get-togethers, and when they ran into each other again after so long, Dae-yeon had reached out.
That reunion turned into a bond, and Seong-hyeon and Mijeong became a couple. The group had started going out regularly again. These days it was less about board games and more about sharing the ups and downs of everyday life.
This gathering was a one-night-two-day mountain villa MT to celebrate the end of the year. Dae-yeon had booked a small villa tucked away in the Gangwon Province mountains, a place that felt both remote and deeply romantic.
“Geon-woo, that boss of yours is still as troublesome as ever.”
“Aw, brother, come on. Last time during class he caught me sneaking a glance at my phone for a second, and a parent complaint came in. He grilled me about it for a whole hour. I really wanted to cry.”
Geon-woo taught at the community elementary and middle schools’ physical education academy; his dream of becoming a professional soccer player had been crushed by a car accident during school. Now he worked as an instructor there, though he called it more of a place for exam prep and extracurricular sports than anything professional.
“Yo, ditch that half-assed academy. You’ve earned enough money by now. That’s more than enough to build serious wealth.”
“Dae-yeon hyung, you still doing crypto?”
“Of course. In this market, skipping crypto is just handing over profit, right? I’ve already made more than triple what I started with.”
Dae-yeon pulled up the CoinApp and proudly showed his account balance. The yield had hit 320 percent.
Years earlier, during the crypto boom, Dae-yeon had quit his solid corporate job and declared himself a full-time investor. Everyone had tried to talk him out of it, but his resolve was ironclad. In that single year he had turned twenty times his money through crypto alone. Now, saying labor pay meant nothing, he had poured every penny saved and his retirement funds straight into crypto.
A month later the crash hit, and Dae-yeon lost almost everything. Even his futures had been liquidated; the balance was reduced to fragments.
At that point the three of them had barely stopped him from killing himself. After that, Dae-yeon swore he would never touch crypto again and started helping with his father’s company.
But when liquidity dried up and news articles about crypto resurfaced, he had once more reached for it.
“Aw, hyung, crypto’s too complicated for me. Speaking of which, Seong-hyeon hyung, that house you bought has been rising a lot, right? Congrats.”
“It’s still just a bank loan. Thanks.”
“Yo, impressive. How do you keep snapping up houses like that?”
Seong-hyeon smiled and glanced at Mijeong. Unlike him, who had barely managed to save for retirement, Mijeong knew far more about real estate and stocks.
Once the wedding was set, she had dragged him around showing him properties until she suddenly signed the contract. The location had turned out to be excellent; the news of its sudden surge had just come out.
Mijeong was nothing like the cautious, shy Seong-hyeon. She was bold, fearless, and took charge without hesitation. That was why she said their personalities matched perfectly—neither of them was weak and timid, after all.
“You already have a house, a car, and a wedding. Congratulations, Seong-hyeon.”
“Thanks, hyung. There’s more meat. Eat up.”
“Sigh, the hanwoo really is delicious.”
The wedding invitation party had been turned into an MT too. They had split the lodging cost, but the meat for dinner had been bought by the two of them—a prime hanwoo sirloin. Even though Seong-hyeon and Mijeong were already buried in debt from the house, they wanted to treat Dae-yeon and Geon-woo properly for once.
After the meal, everyone sat around the living room chatting when Dae-yeon suddenly stood up.
“Yo, I found something fun. Want to try it?”
He had gone upstairs and come back down carrying a strange box.
“What’s this?”
“The Forbidden Board Game”
“The title’s kinda lame,” Mijeong said, opening the box.
Inside lay a folded paper game board, two black dice, and four human-shaped pieces. In the center of the board a black glass marble had been embedded, with the board stretching out in a long line divided into squares around it. At the end of that line was a square marked “START.”
“Is this the starting point?”
“Is this a team game?”
Geon-woo picked up one of the pieces and asked. The pieces came in two colors: two black and two pink.
Mijeong chose the pink one, and Seong-hyeon followed suit. After Geon-woo and Dae-yeon claimed the remaining black pieces and placed them on the START square, Dae-yeon rolled the dice and gently spun them across the board.
“No manual or anything? What kind of game is this?”
Mijeong set the pieces down and searched the box for instructions, but found nothing. Then, suddenly, the black marble in the center began to glow.
“Is this like one of those battery-operated games?”
Seong-hyeon asked, and Dae-yeon replied that he had no idea what it was— he had only grabbed it off the shelf.
After a moment the glow faded and words appeared on the marble.
“Welcome to the game.”
“Game rules are as follows.”
“Roll the dice and move your piece the number of spaces shown.”
“Perform the mission listed on the square you land on.”
“Completing a mission grants a reward; skipping it incurs a penalty.”
“Lying during the game will result in a penalty.”
“Physical violence between players is strictly forbidden.”
“Any other foul play will result in a penalty.”
“The first player to clear the game will receive a reward.”
“*Caution: This game may permanently alter a player’s life.”
“It says it can change your life forever? Is this even a good game?”
Seong-hyeon asked, and Dae-yeon shrugged. “It’s just a game. Probably just some junk I picked up because it looked fun.”
“If you agree to play the game, place your thumb on the central sphere.”
“It feels like signing a contract,” Dae-yeon muttered as he was the first to place his thumb.
One by one the others followed—Mijeong, Geon-woo, and finally Seong-hyeon.
“The game will now begin.”
“Play will proceed in the order of agreement.”
“All right, let’s start.”
The first to agree was Dae-yeon.
He picked up the die, rolled it smoothly across the board, and watched it land on 3 and 4.
Dae-yeon’s chosen black piece moved forward seven spaces automatically.
“Whoa, this is like the old Jumanji movie, right? You guys seen that?”
Dae-yeon said in surprise, and everyone else nodded the same way. They had only ever seen such pieces moving on computers or phones; they had never actually played one before.
When the piece stopped on the seventh space, a message appeared above the black marble.
“Issue a command to Player 4.”
“Who’s Player 4?”
Seong-hyeon answered Dae-yeon’s question.
“Probably me. I was the last one to put my thumb up.”
“Really? You’re the one who has to follow my command?”
Seong-hyeon and Dae-yeon exchanged bewildered looks at the absurd instruction.
“Let’s just try it. Give me something simple.”
“All right. Hmm… then fetch me a glass of water.”
Seong-hyeon chuckled and headed to the kitchen. He took a bottle of water from the fridge, poured it into a glass, and brought it to Dae-yeon.
“Is succeeding at a command that easy?”
“Looks that way. Nothing to it. What kind of game is this?”
A moment later a new message appeared on the black marble.
“Mission successful!”
“Reward: +1 Confidence, +1 Dominance over Player 4, 10 Gold Coins.”
“Dominance? Gold coins? What kind of nonsense is this?”
ZZZIIING
At that instant Dae-yeon’s phone rang. When he checked the notification, his eyes widened in shock.
“Yo, what the— my account just got a sudden deposit?”
The transaction showed more than seven million won in the deposit.
“Whoa, with just fetching a glass of water? That’s ridiculous.”
“Wait a second, it said gold coins, so…”
Mijeong glanced at her phone and exclaimed in surprise.
“Whoa, jackpot. Ten gold coins— that’s almost sixteen million won! Is this real? They’re giving away this kind of money for something so small?”
“Holy crap, this game is insane! It actually changes your life!”
Dae-yeon shouted in excitement and began cheering.
“Mijeong, if we two play, how much would one round be?”
“Twenty gold coins is almost sixteen million, right? Big brother, if we keep winning, we can pay off all the debt from buying this house today!”
Seong-hyeon and Mijeong’s voices rose with excitement too.
“Come on, quick, next turn—whoever it is, let’s start making money.”