Chapter 3
Chapter 3
Did You See Something You Weren’t Supposed To?
“Did you perhaps leave behind a lover in your previous world? You never truly open your heart to me, Great Hero, so honestly, my heart aches every single day. But I’ll wait for you forever. Unlike most women, I never learned how to hide my feelings.”
Yeonhwa.
Jihun suddenly remembered the words she once said long ago, the woman who loved someone as insignificant as him for absolutely no reason.
A question about whether he had left behind someone he loved.
At the time, he had thought about Seol Yujeong, the girl he had secretly loved for over three years.
But he could never call her a lover.
It had only been a pathetic one-sided crush he never once confessed.
“Why did Yeonhwa love indecisive me that much?”
Even after seeing his old crush again for the first time in ten years, the only person Jihun naturally thought of was Yeonhwa.
“Ah… fuck.”
His thoughts shattered instantly, and his mind snapped back to reality.
The distance between the bookshelf Jihun stood at and the table where Seol Yujeong sat was fairly far.
Yet her low muttered voice had reached his ears perfectly clearly.
“…?”
Had she really cursed just because their eyes met?
After returning to reality for the first time in ten years, Jihun still hadn’t adapted to people looking at his very existence with disgust.
Because for a very long time, the only people around him had been Yeonhwa, who loved him unwaveringly, and martial artists who gazed upon him with awe and admiration.
After standing blankly for a moment, Jihun began walking toward Yujeong’s table.
“Hey, what the hell? Why are you going to Yujeong again, you loser freak?! How are you this bad at understanding—”
The short-haired girl who had been talking beside Yujeong grabbed Jihun’s arm sharply while yelling—
Then froze on the spot.
The firm male physique she felt beneath her hand.
And Jihun’s eyes quietly lowering toward the hand gripping his arm.
“Was he always this tall…?”
As her gaze met his indifferent eyes looking down at her, Jihun finally spoke.
“—Don’t.”
His strange atmosphere left her so shaken that she failed to understand him at first.
“…Huh? Wh-What?”
“Don’t touch people carelessly.”
This time she understood perfectly and hurriedly pulled her hand away.
In truth, Kang Jihun—the E-rank hunter from Class 11 and the academy’s most infamous failure—was someone nobody considered remotely intimidating.
Differences in physical strength between men and women meant nothing among hunters.
And since every academy student knew how terrible Jihun’s stats were, everyone simply looked down on him.
“But… what is this? Why do I suddenly feel so overwhelmed?”
“What’s your name again?”
“K-Kim Sunhee.”
“Right. Yujeong’s friend, Sunhee. It’s dangerous to touch other people recklessly. In some… places, even bumping shoulders slightly at an inn— no, at a restaurant—could immediately lead to a fight to the death.”
“What the hell is this guy even talking about…?”
Leaving behind the utterly confused Sunhee, Jihun resumed walking toward Yujeong.
“Yujeong… Seol Yujeong, right? Long time no see. Good to see you!”
Jihun approached with a bright smile and greeted her warmly.
Yujeong responded with an expression full of revulsion.
“What do you mean long time no see? We saw each other yesterday and the day before too… We run into each other way too often.”
The words themselves weren’t especially harsh.
But the meaning behind them conveyed her disgust clearly enough.
“Right. Why do I keep forgetting? Seriously… But why’s she so prickly?”
“Sorry, sorry. I’ve just been out of it lately. Anyway, did something bad happen?”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“The shape of your mouth looked like you were cursing the second our eyes met. Did I do something wrong?”
He was asking that directly?
Of course, Yujeong had cursed because seeing Jihun annoyed her.
But when the actual person involved shamelessly asked her like this to her face, how many people could honestly answer?
“Ah… no. It’s just… it wasn’t directed at you.”
“Right? I figured. There’s no way I did something bad enough to deserve getting cursed at just for making eye contact.”
Yujeong stared at Jihun as he kept saying bizarre things.
She had always disliked the gloomy vibe Jihun gave off and naturally avoided him.
Yujeong naturally knew that Jihun had liked her since high school.
He never openly showed it or confessed, but he often awkwardly greeted her or panicked and fumbled around like an idiot whenever he saw her.
And honestly, she could tell just by his eyes.
Yujeong had been popular since childhood thanks to her large eyes, sharp nose, and beautiful face.
As she grew older and her figure became more feminine, even more boys began approaching her with interest.
Because of that, Yujeong could immediately tell when a guy liked her.
Being liked by someone should generally feel nice.
As long as that person wasn’t a loser like him.
After realizing Jihun liked her, Yujeong’s friends constantly teased her about it, whether jokingly or intentionally.
“Yujeong~ Isn’t it about time you accepted Jihun’s feelings already? Hahaha.”
“Yujeong! At this point isn’t it basically a confession already? Didn’t you see how red his face gets every time he greets you? Pffft.”
Puberty.
Sensitive and emotional, Yujeong absolutely hated those jokes.
She hated being associated with poor and talentless Jihun.
Of course, Yujeong also knew Jihun himself hadn’t really done anything wrong.
Other than liking her, he had never confessed uncomfortably or followed her around annoyingly.
But for a teenage girl, reputation among friends was more important than anything else.
At some point, Yujeong started openly belittling and ignoring Jihun whenever he appeared, making sure everyone around could hear it.
She didn’t care whether Jihun stopped liking her or not.
And if she acted that way, maybe her friends would tease her less too.
“If something’s bothering you, try eating pizza and drinking cola. It’ll make you feel a lot better. I know a really good pizza place—”
What kind of ridiculous nonsense was this?
Was he finally trying to openly flirt with her now?
Yujeong snapped back sharply.
“What? Why would I eat pizza with you?”
At Yujeong’s harsh response, Jihun seemed startled and waved his hands while stepping back slightly.
“No, no. I wasn’t asking to eat together. I just meant I could tell you about a good pizza place. Maybe with other people, but definitely not with you. It’d feel like I was doing something wrong…”
Yujeong’s brows furrowed deeply.
What kind of bullshit was this guy spewing since earlier?
To Jihun, eating pizza with Yujeong—the girl he used to secretly like before crossing into the parallel world—felt like betraying Yeonhwa somehow.
Feeling the conversation would only get weirder if it continued, Jihun decided he should leave quickly.
“Study hard. Bye.”
“What the hell…”
“And goodbye to you too, Sunhwa.”
“It’s Sunhee…”
As Jihun abruptly left, Sunhee grabbed a book and walked back over to Yujeong.
“Yujeong… doesn’t he seem kinda weird?”
“Huh…? Wh-What do you mean?”
“No, when I grabbed his arm… his muscles… And also, his height… Was he always that tall?”
Truthfully, Yujeong had already felt that Jihun somehow seemed much bigger than before.
“Oh, and earlier I heard something from the Class 11 students who just returned from the E-rank gate mission… Apparently Jihun killed the King Goblin in one hit?”
“What? That’s ridiculous. Kang Jihun? Of all people, Kang Jihun? You must’ve heard wrong.”
“R-Right? The Class 11 students looked pretty out of it after returning from the raid anyway. I’ll ask them again later.”
As they continued talking and reopened their books, Yujeong herself failed to realize that her eyes kept drifting toward the door Jihun had exited through.
Chairman’s Office
“No, Professor Jin. Everyone knows you’re capable… they do… but isn’t this report way too carelessly written?”
After completing the E-rank gate mission and submitting the related report, Professor Jin Seokhyun found himself in serious trouble.
“Kang Jihun… this student. He’s so infamous even I remember his name. You mean that same guy who spent an entire year as the academy’s worst failure, right?”
“Yes… that’s correct.”
Jin Seokhyun’s expression twisted further while dissatisfaction filled Chairwoman Song Yookyung’s face.
“No matter how low-rank the gate was, a single Class 11 student instantly killing the boss monster in one hit? Since when did our academy become this high-level exactly?”
Listening to her criticism, Jin Seokhyun felt incredibly wronged—
But he understood her reaction.
If he hadn’t seen it himself, he wouldn’t have believed it either.
“The report contains neither exaggeration nor errors. Everything written there is the truth.”
“No, listen here, Professor Jin—”
“Next month’s quarterly evaluation. Chairwoman, you should come observe it personally. I think our academy’s about to become very noisy.”
After finishing his words, Jin Seokhyun bowed deeply and left the chairman’s office.
“Kang Jihun… Kang Jihun… Professor Jin isn’t someone who talks like that lightly…”
A faint glimmer appeared in Song Yookyung’s eyes.
And before she realized it, a strange sense of anticipation had begun filling her.