Chapter 2
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I protested in an exasperated tone as I looked at my mom.
“What do you mean high school… Mom, I’m twenty-six!”
At my words, my mom froze for a moment, then burst out laughing. As if she had just heard something absolutely ridiculous, she started cackling without restraint.
“Mom!”
My mom, who had been clutching her stomach as she laughed, took a deep breath and said, “Did you have a dream? Twenty-six? Oh my, sure. Then go get a job and earn some money.”
How could she bring up getting a job to a daughter who had just been in a car accident? I was so dumbfounded that I was at a loss for words.
In the meantime, my mom quickly closed the door as if she were busy and went straight to the kitchen.
“No, there's a limit to joking around...!”
Just as I sprang out of bed, ready to confront my mom out of frustration, my momentum came to a grinding halt when I felt how light my body was.
It felt as though I had never even been in a car accident. No, it actually seemed better than before.
“Why does my body… huh?”
After glancing down at myself for a moment, I absentmindedly turned my head and looked at the mirror hanging next to the door.
“…What?”
The moment I saw my reflection, my body froze. It felt like I had stepped into a horror movie.
The cheek that had been swollen from a customer hitting me before the accident was now pale without even a trace of swelling, and the worn-out look from being beaten down by reality was nowhere to be found.
“W-wh-what is this…?”
My startled heart began pounding hard.
Long, straight black hair without any trace of dye, and a neat, clean face without so much as a scratch, not even a small earring.
“……”
The reflection staring back at me looked much younger. As if I had gone back to my student days.
Feeling like I might faint, I quickly averted my eyes from the mirror and let them wander. Right next to the mirror hung a school uniform.
It was exactly the same design as the high school uniform I had worn years ago and thrown away.
Wondering if I was dreaming, I reached out and pinched my cheek.
Streeetch—
“Ah, ah! That hurts.”
A groan escaped me involuntarily.
“Lee Hayeon! Aren’t you coming out after getting changed already?”
My mom’s nagging continued from outside. I turned my gaze back to the uniform.
Even looking at it again, aside from the color of the tie, it looked exactly like the one I used to wear.
“What is going on?”
Muttering repeatedly about how strange this was, I nevertheless changed clothes out of habit as I was told and went out to the living room.
“Sit down. Eat. It’s just the pre-orientation, so you have to be there by ten, right?”
“Pre-orientation?”
Come to think of it, when she first woke me up, Mom had mentioned something about starting high school.
As I roughly pieced the situation together in my head and lowered my gaze, I saw the table Mom had carefully set.
“Wow…”
Feeling cheerful, I began moving my spoon and chopsticks frantically, shoveling food into my mouth, when Mom spoke again.
“Are you taking the bus? Your dad left early for work, so he couldn’t drive you.”
“Uh… um, th—where’s the school?”
“What?”
At my question, Mom looked at me strangely.
The way she looked at me made it seem like she might smack my back for not even knowing my own school, so I immediately let out an awkward laugh and changed my words.
“I-I’m kidding. If I leave right after eating, I won’t be late, right? But do students usually wear their uniform to the pre-orientation?”
At that, Mom froze mid-motion with the spatula in her hand.
“…Is that not it?”
“No.”
She had rushed me without knowing.
It felt awkward to change again, and there wasn’t much time, so as soon as I finished eating, I went outside still wearing the uniform.
Even after stepping out of the house, the uneasy feeling remained.
A high school student… I’m a high school student?
There were too many things that did not add up for me to believe my family was playing a prank just to fool me.
Even my phone model had changed back to the one I used when I was a student, and the year displayed on the calendar was a full nine years earlier.
“Nine years ago…?”
My mouth fell open at the distant date.
At this point, I could not even tell whether the time before the accident was reality or if this was reality.
For now, I guess I have to go to high school like Mom said…
In truth, there was only one high school I could possibly go to. My alma mater.
Even though so much time had passed, my feet, remembering out of habit, automatically began walking toward the school.
As I followed the familiar path, before I knew it, the school building came into view in the distance.
It was my alma mater, which I had not seen in a very long time.
“Shinyeok High School!”
It looked exactly the same as when I had attended. Feeling a rush of nostalgia at the sight, I ran toward the school.
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⟬ Shinyeon High School ⟭
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The name of the school in front of me made me stop in my tracks.
“Shinyeon?”
Not Shinyeok, but Shinyeon?
There was no way I would misremember the name of the high school I had attended for three years.
The moment I saw the school’s name, unease crept into my heart. I even began to feel a strange sensation, as if I had stepped into an entirely different world.
After standing there frozen for a moment, I hesitantly walked through the school gate. Then I stopped in front of the glass doors.
There was a printout posted there with each student’s class assignment and name.
“Lee Hayeon, Lee Hayeon…”
First, I needed to check whether my name was even on here. I muttered to myself as I carefully scanned the list.
“…?”
No matter how much I searched, I could not find my name.
“It’s not here? Lee Hayeon.”
A voice mixed with hollow disappointment and anxiety slipped from my lips.
Just as I was thinking that I should head back home, someone lightly tapped my shoulder.
As I was about to turn my head to check who it was, a large hand suddenly came into view within my sight.
Long fingers with veins bulging pointed at the sheet of paper.
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⟬ Lee Hayeon ⟭
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It was my name.
Startled, I stood there with my mouth hanging open, then quickly lifted my head to look at the person who had pointed it out.
“Wow.”
He was incredibly tall. Even after tilting my head back, I could barely see his face properly.
At the very least, he had to be 180 centimeters tall, maybe even 190.
Is he really a first-year high school student?
He was a man wearing a windbreaker over a tracksuit.
Since the high school I had attended was an all-girls school, he might have been a P.E. teacher.
His face was obscured by shadows from the sunlight, but even from his silhouette alone, I could intuitively tell.
He’s handsome.
But this was not the time to be staring at his face. Coming back to my senses, I gave him a small bow and greeted him.
“Thank you.”
There was no reply. I could only feel his gaze fixed intently on me.
Did he not hear me?
I looked up again, but since I could not see his expression, I had no way of knowing whether he had heard me or not.
“Thank you!”
The moment I said it again in a clearer voice, his hand twitched slightly. He soon gave a slow nod.
After pointing out my name, he slung a sports bag over his shoulder, the kind athletes might use, and casually walked away.
As I watched his retreating figure, I found myself admiring his impressive physique once again.
Then, snapping back to my senses, I turned my head and looked at the paper with my name on it.
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⟬ Class 1 – Lee Hayeon ⟭
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My name was really written there.
The school name, Shinyeon High School, remained unchanged.
“This is really strange...”
No matter how I looked at it, it was reality, yet somehow it did not feel like reality at all.
At first, I wondered if this was some kind of lucid dream.
But even the day after I returned from school, and the day after that, nothing changed.
My appearance, much younger than before, my room, my parents’ faces, and even the date, exactly nine years earlier.
Everything was exactly as it had been when I was a student.
And so, with vivid memories from before the accident, I found myself facing the day of the high school entrance ceremony.
Without the slightest idea what kind of world I had stepped into.
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* * *
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The day of the entrance ceremony arrived. The moment I set foot in the school again, my heart felt troubled.
High school at my age.
First of all… let’s look at their names. The names first.
Last time, I had been too out of it to check the names of my classmates.
If I had really returned to the past, then the list would include the names of the friends I had back when I was in high school.
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⟬ Class 1 – Kang Sunwoo ⟭
⟬ Class 1 – Kim Nari ⟭
⟬ Class 1 – Kim Chanseung ⟭
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I scanned down the list from the top, but I did not see a single name I recognized.
On top of that, the school I had attended was an all-girls school, yet the list was filled with names that were clearly male.
What on earth is this?
Even just looking at the people walking around the school right now, there were plenty of male students mixed in.
That alone made it clear that this was not the high school I had attended.
“But…”
I narrowed my eyes and looked at the list again.
I feel like I have seen these names somewhere before.
They felt strangely familiar, to the point where I wondered if I knew them. But no matter how much I searched my memory, no one came to mind.
Unable to shake my uneasy feelings, I took a seat in one corner of the auditorium.
The surroundings were identical to the auditorium of my alma mater, which made it all the more familiar.
No matter how I think about it, this feels like I am attending a high school I have already graduated from for the second time.
With a dull expression, I sat through the orientation again, feeling as if I had already heard every part of it once before.
[Next, we will present awards to the scholarship students.]
Just as I was about to fall asleep during the principal’s speech, the students’ names began to be called. I heard whispering from in front of me and beside me.
“Hey, do you see the guy up there? He’s really handsome.”
“The freshman representative? He’s famous. I heard he’s from a family of judges.”
“A family of judges? So both his parents are judges?”
“His parents, and even his grandparents, are all in the legal field.”
“That’s even possible?”
“I guess that’s what you call an elite family. My friend went to the same middle school as him, and apparently, he was really famous.”
Wow, an elite family straight out of a drama.
I could not see clearly who they were talking about because my view was blocked, but from what I heard, it sounded like someone who lived in a completely different world from me.
If he’s the freshman representative, does that mean he ranked first in the entire school?
Suddenly, I remembered my past self struggling through job applications. While kids like that were living so diligently, what had I been doing? The thought left me feeling momentarily hollow.
[For the reasons stated previously, we present this award. Freshman representative, Kang Sunwoo.]
The name that entered my ears at that moment made my head bolt upright. I frowned and quietly murmured his name.
“Kang Sunwoo?”
I was sure I had heard it somewhere before.
This time, it was not a mistake. It was not a vague memory or confusion.
It was definitely a name I knew. And knew very well.
Where on earth did I hear…
I felt as if I were missing something important.
“…Ah.”
Kang Sunwoo.
The moment I remembered where I had seen that name, my breath caught in my throat as if something were stuck there, even though I had eaten nothing.
That day, I learned for the first time that when a person experiences too great a shock, their mind can go blank and their vision can truly blur into darkness.
Freshman representative, first in the entire school, from a family of judges, Kang Sunwoo.
He was exactly the same as a character from the novel I had written in high school.
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