The Knot Begins to Tangle (2)
The moment Jeong Hye-in made her proposal, the very first thought that crossed my mind was, Yep. Here we go.
Where had last year's resolution gone these past few days? It had slipped away somewhere between handing over the wood carvings I'd worked so hard on and accompanying her to the PC bang, back when I first sensed I was getting tangled up more than necessary.
Honestly, I'd seen this coming. And given how these familiar clichés worked, the harder you tried to pull away, the more contrived coincidences piled up to force you closer.
So rather than giving some flimsy refusal and only making things awkward between us, it made far more sense to accept what was coming naturally and move forward. That, I concluded, would be much better for preserving my peaceful everyday life.
"Well, if that girl you know says it's fine for me to join, I don't really mind. But didn't you say we need five members for an official club? Even with you and me, that's still two more people short, right?"
"……"
Perhaps relieved that I'd accepted her offer more cleanly and without complaint than she'd expected, Jeong Hye-in let out a breath so small that I'd have missed it entirely if I hadn't been paying attention.
But she quickly looked down, seeming a bit troubled, and spoke up.
"That's actually the problem. One of the other two has already given her a definite yes that she'll bring someone in somehow… but we're still one member short. Do you have anyone else you could ask?"
The question of whether I had any friends made my eyes dart reflexively to the seat right beside me.
The only person I could currently call a friend was Lee Hyun-woo. Unfortunately, the words Band Club were already scrawled across his application in letters so large they seemed ready to punch clean through the paper.
He's out… so who else could I even ask?
My social circle at school was about as narrow as Jeong Hye-in's to begin with. There was no way I could just grab some random person and beg them to join a ghost club.
You'd need actual friends to even have someone to sound out in the first place.
I was racking my brain for a while when, completely out of nowhere, a certain sunbae's face popped into my head.
Wait—didn't third-years have free choice when it came to club membership? It was the time of year when plenty of students were withdrawing from their clubs in the name of college entrance prep.
But a sunbae who fled to my multipurpose room every single lunch hour to wolf down convenience store bread? The odds that she belonged to any club at all were extremely low.
Besides, she was someone who'd needed a hiding place to escape her stalker in the first place. If I could secure her another vacant clubroom to use as a refuge, wouldn't that be a win for both of us?
"How about Choi Soo-ah sunbae? Third-years get free choice of clubs, so she probably doesn't belong to one, and if we ask nicely, I'm sure she'd hear us out."
The moment Choi Soo-ah sunbae's name left my mouth, Jeong Hye-in nodded as if she'd been waiting for exactly that answer.
"Yeah, I'd thought of that too. But it'd be better if you did the persuading, not me. I'm still not close with her."
"…Right."
Never mind that I'd only known her about two days longer than Hye-in had.
"Anyway, just convince her by lunchtime and bring her to the 3rd-Floor Club Room 4. I'll be waiting."
Jeong Hye-in cut the conversation off quickly, before any refusal or excuse could come tumbling out of my mouth. Then, apparently satisfied that her business was done, she turned on her heel without a second glance and headed back to her seat up front.
"…..."
I looked back and forth between Jeong Hye-in's retreating figure and the blank club application sitting abandoned on my desk.
…Fine. Let's just worry about how to break the news to her.
Having carefully folded the club application and tucked it into my pencil case, I was on my feet the instant the bell rang to end first period.
She'd told me to come to the clubroom by lunchtime, which meant I needed to bring this up beforehand—and if I was going to ask her for a favor, seeking her out promptly was simply good manners.
Digging up the memory of how Choi Soo-ah sunbae had once mentioned in passing that she was in Class 3-2, I made my way up one floor.
The third-year corridor, when I arrived, had a strangely calmer, somehow more serious atmosphere than the second-year floor.
So this is what an elite prep school feels like, huh.
For someone like me, whose routine never strayed from classroom and workshop, it was a refreshing change of pace. Though even so, the area around the back door of Class 3-2 was very much the exception.
The moment I passed the front door of Class 3-3, that unmistakably cheerful, bouncing high-pitched voice came ringing down the hall.
"No, I'm telling you, I clearly said it on the broadcast yesterday!"
Click!
The back door slid open, and out burst the sunbae—track pants and a hoodie thrown carelessly over them—arm in arm with three friends, clearly gearing up for a full-out sprint to the convenience store.
Guess I caught her at a bad time.
She was standing there thinking she should have come up one period later when she spotted me at the back door—and froze in shock.
"…Huh?"
The instant she recognized me and her eyes went wide with surprise, the three girls beside her—apparently well-accustomed to situations like this—let out irritated sighs and planted themselves in front of me like a wall.
"Already showing up, huh? Look, I don't know who you are, but you don't just come after our Soo-ah out of nowhere like this. It's a total nuisance, in case you didn't know?"
"People are trying to walk through here. Move, would you?"
"Ugh, seriously. Things were quiet for a bit and I thought it was over, but now you're here to confess or something? Don't you ever get tired of it?"
Before I could get a single word in, the iron-clad defense came pouring out, and I froze on the spot, mouth agape.
I hadn't imagined I'd be instantly lumped in with sasaeng fans and aggressive confessors.
I haven't even opened my mouth and they're throwing the first punch… Are they trying to pick a fight?
"Ah, no, it's not that—…"
Just as I opened my mouth to explain myself, Soo-ah sunbae—recovering faster than I did—started frantically smacking her friends on the back.
"Agh! Guys, are you crazy? Do you have to say that stuff to my junior?!"
"Ow, why are you hitting us?! We're just protecting you!"
"No! That's—ugh, it's not like that! And anyway, you three go do your convenience store time attack without me! I have something to talk about with my junior!"
Her face flushed tomato-red in the blink of an eye. She grabbed the end of my sleeve and began towing me down the corridor.
Behind us, I could see the three girls' eyes go perfectly round.
"…What? His reaction's completely different from all the guys who've come after her before?"
"Don't tell me our Soo-ah's finally got herself a reliable younger boyfriend like that?"
Doing my best to ignore the commotion and misunderstandings spilling out behind me, I resigned myself to being dragged along.
When we reached the window at the end of the corridor, she buried her face in her hands, clutching her burning cheeks, head hanging low.
"S-sorry! The girls have seen so many creeps hound me that they're on high alert… I'm really sorry!"
"…It's fine. Your friends clearly care about you a lot. It's nice to see."
At my utterly lifeless attempt at comfort, the sunbae shook her head back and forth a few times, then looked up with the flush still on her face.
"Ahem, anyway… Sihun, you came looking for me first. What's up?"
"Ah, right, so about that…"
After a quick glance around, I gave her a brief explanation about the club founding—what Jeong Hye-in and I had discussed during morning homeroom.
"So with that in mind, we're thinking of setting up another vacant clubroom you could use as an escape room of sorts, besides the multipurpose room on the fifth floor. All you'd have to do is put your name down. Would you join us?"
Before I'd even finished speaking, Choi Soo-ah broke into a wide grin and shouted.
"Obviously it's a call! Embarrassing as it is to admit, your sunbae gave up on studying ages ago—I've got nothing but free time! And sneaking off to the multipurpose room every day was starting to feel risky anyway. Now we'll have our own official secret base!"
"…I suppose so?"
"Then that settles it!"
Not a hint of hesitation in her acceptance. She stomped her foot with the energy of someone about to sprint back to her classroom that very moment to fill out the application.
"Anyway, I'll head straight back and write up the application. What am I supposed to put for the club name?"
"Ah, it's called the Anime Exploration Club."
Good thing I'd asked for the name in advance.
"Exploring anime from foreign countries, especially Japan, and examining its potential to develop Korean comics culture. A perfect name for slacking off, wouldn't you say?"
"Okay! The Anime Exploration Club! I like the sound of that!"
With the conversation wrapped up, Choi Soo-ah turned to head off and fill out her application. I'd accomplished my goal too, so I was getting ready to head back to my own classroom—turning my head toward the central staircase, and that was when it happened.
My gaze locked directly with that of a male student standing by the stair railing, staring this way with unblinking intensity.
Before I knew it, I'd stumbled back a couple of steps.
…What is with that look?
This was not the glance of someone who'd merely spotted a passerby. It was a sticky, repulsive gaze—glaring at me, no… glaring at Choi Soo-ah sunbae, who had been at my side mere moments ago, as if he wanted to kill her.
And at the same time, I felt it in my bones.
That boy was the stalker I'd heard cursing every single time he came to the workshop.
Soo-ah sunbae, noticing me frozen mid-stare, turned her head to follow my gaze—and flinched harder than I had, going rigid on the spot.
A reaction I had never once seen from her before.
"…..."
After a moment, the sunbae instinctively staggered backward, then slipped herself behind me, hiding as if pressed against my back.
Tense, I kept my eyes fixed on the boy's every move.
But the standoff, born so abruptly, didn't last long.
The bell announcing the start of second period rang through the corridor, and as the noisy clatter of students came flooding up from the stairwell below, the boy—gripping the railing tight—ducked his head darkly and melted away down the opposite hallway.
Only after his shadow had vanished completely from sight did Soo-ah sunbae and I, as if on cue, exhale the breath we'd both been holding in one long sigh.
"Haaah…"
The breathing behind my back was ragged—noticeably so.
I turned around slowly and gave her shoulder a couple of gentle pats as she struggled to catch her breath, terror written all over her.
"Wow… that was the stalker you kept telling me about, right? His eyes looked completely unhinged."
"Y-yeah! Creepy, right? Usually he just watches from far away… Even I've never seen him like that. Honestly, I thought something terrible was about to happen."
She was putting on a brave front, forcing her usual bright energy, but the fingertips clutching my shirt sleeve had gone white.
I chose not to point out the trembling. Instead, I shifted my gaze out the corridor window and asked,
"Have you ever tried reporting him? With those eyes just now, they could haul him in and lock him up on the spot."
"Ah… that."
Choi Soo-ah sunbae smiled bitterly and let go of my sleeve.
"I've reported him plenty of times. But he's never caused me direct physical harm, and above all, there's no solid circumstantial proof that would actually qualify as stalking—so apparently the police can't do anything about him right now."
"…Oh."
So no matter how vile the person, without physical confrontation or clear evidence, it all ended with a warning and a slap on the wrist.
When I heard that, I genuinely couldn't help shaking my head in disbelief.
Unbelievable. Did they really have to bring reality's obnoxiously legal gray areas into this too?
This was supposed to be the world of a rom-com dating sim—and yet here it was, faithfully simulating even the murky, irrational limits of the law, down to the finest detail. It was almost comical.
Bottom line: there was no legal way to get rid of that stalker right now.
I stepped ahead of her and spoke up.
"Understood. You probably won't feel safe walking alone, so I'll escort you back to your classroom."
"Huh? No, I can walk by mysel—"
"Just come on. It's not like I'm doing anything heroic—we're walking what, twenty steps together."
"…..."
Faced with my firm tone, the sunbae offered no further protest and quietly fell into step right behind me.
Only after delivering her safely to the door of Class 3-2 did I turn to leave.
"Then, I'll see you at the 3rd-Floor Club Room 4 we talked about, at lunchtime."
"Yeah, thanks, Sihun. See you then!"
After watching her wave with her usual energy as she crossed the classroom threshold, I started slowly toward the central staircase.
But with every floor I descended, my thoughts began to knot themselves tighter and tighter.
Damn it… wasn't there a scene just like this in the original story?
I rifled quietly through my memories.
It was probably the Han Yeo-wol route.
A dangerous lunatic in the form of an obsessive fan who ran wild with a weapon at a cosplay event.
Back then, Lee Hyun-woo had barely managed to subdue the guy, but the story made a point of mentioning that he'd suffered a serious wound to his arm in the process.
Wasn't it thirty stitches in his forearm?
Reading it as text on a page, I'd taken it purely as a dramatic device—a setup designed to showcase the protagonist's self-sacrifice and bring him even closer to the heroine as they overcame the crisis together.
After all, that branching moment had sent Han Yeo-wol's affection—previously devoted entirely to anime and cosplay—skyrocketing.
But the look in that boy's eyes on the staircase just now was too vivid, too threatening. It was enough to remind me, all over again, that this place was real.
Ugh… no way. Don't tell me I'm the one who's about to get stabbed at school?
The moment the thought landed, goosebumps prickled up my arms. Unconsciously, I rubbed my perfectly intact forearm.
Damn it all.
I was no protagonist with Hyun-woo's absurdly cheats-tier physical abilities, and I hadn't gained any great power from some transmigration bonus, either.
I was just a would-be sculptor with slightly better hands than most. I could hardly be expected to square off against a guy with a knife armed with a carving chisel.
Not that I was entirely without hidden cards, mind you… but still.
"Haaah…"
As I stepped into the second-year corridor, I let out a deep sigh.
Unforeseen variables kept adding themselves, one by one, to my plan for a peaceful everyday life.
But it already felt a little too late to back out.
"…In that case, I might as well start preparing for the worst-case scenario now."