Meeting My Favorite
Everyone, at least once in their life, is bound to stumble into something so absurd that no other living soul could possibly relate. That's what I believe, anyway.
In my case, I thought I'd already had my share: abandoned by my parents so young I couldn't even remember it, raised in an orphanage, and striking out on my own at twenty. I never imagined something even rarer was waiting for me.
"I'm off to school~"
"Alright~ Be careful out there~"
That "I'm off to school" should tell you everything. I had been on the verge of graduating from college. Instead, I was going to school again.
That might sound perfectly ordinary — until you realize the school in question isn't a university. It's a high school. At that point, ordinary goes right out the window.
That's right. Three years after walking out of high school for what I thought was the last time, I was back. And not even at a clean starting line or a finish line — I'd been dropped into that awkward middle year. A second-year.
To put it plainly: I had been transmigrated into the world of the web novel that had wounded me more deeply than anything else in my life. Your Wish. And no — this wasn't a regression. This was possession. I'd been stuffed into someone else's life.
At first, I nearly failed to adjust to the fact that I'd been dropped into a novel and had to attend high school all over again. But who do you think I am? I am Cha Jaeha, adaptation specialist extraordinaire — a man who survived the full twelve-year Korean education system as an orphan.
I was fully adjusted within two weeks of transmigrating. Two weeks was more than enough time to start calling an auntie and uncle I'd never met in my life Mom and Dad, and to greet a self-proclaimed five-year best friend I'd never laid eyes on with a hearty hey, you bastard.
On top of everything, my name in this world was still Cha Jaeha. Considering I'd never once seen that name in the novel, I was probably either possessing some nameless extra — or else I, the person I actually was, had simply been painted over this story as a new addition.
My face was a near-perfect copy of the one I'd had before, and so was my height. That was what led me to the theory.
Anyway. I made my way to school along a commute I was now thoroughly used to, taking my sweet time.
And then.
"Cha~ Jae~ ha!!"
A sudden ambush slammed into me from behind. Wham.
"Ghk."
The culprit was the very same self-proclaimed five-year best friend I'd just mentioned: Kim Haneul.
I flicked his arm off my shoulder — the one he'd slung there as his idea of a violent good morning — and shoved it aside.
"What is your problem this early in the morning."
"Whut'sh yer pwobwem dish early in da morning~"
The way he answered, you'd think he wasn't my best friend at all — more like the school delinquent assigned specifically to me. He was my best friend, though. For the record.
We stuck together at school, bickered like children, and held debates on the most ridiculous subjects imaginable. There was no way we weren't friends.
"Aigoo. I should just stop talking."
"Yeah, yeah. You just listen to this big bro and you'll be fine."
"You wanna die?"
We were still carrying on our usual WWE routine as we stepped through the school gates, and that was when Haneul's question came flying at me.
"You know what day it is today, right?"
"I know. I know far too well. You talked about it every single day last week. There's no way I wouldn't know."
Watching him snicker, I felt my fist start to twitch — but unfortunately, I couldn't use it. We were inside the school now.
I have no interest in becoming a perpetrator of school violence.
...So. The day he'd spent an entire week talking about.
"It's club interview day."
Today was the day the club Haneul and I belonged to — the Cheongyeon High School Drama Club — held its interviews.
And those Drama Club interviews mattered to me more than I could say.
Because the club that Yoon Soye — this year's incoming freshman at Cheongyeon High School, and my favorite heroine of all time — would be joining was none other than the Drama Club.
That's right. I was about to become the club senior of Yoon Soye, the heroine I loved more than any other.
I was going to see Soye in the flesh. Of course I was going to the club interviews.
On top of that, I knew her future. I knew the miserable road ahead of her — how she would fall for that damn playboy, how he would dump her, how she would leave the novel in tears. I knew all of it.
Now that I'd been dropped into this novel, I'd made up my mind: one way or another, I was going to give Soye a happy future. No. To be precise — I was going to make her happy myself.
The girl even the god of this world had discarded. I was going to make her happy. And to do that, I needed to get close to her. And to get close to her, I needed to meet her, didn't I?
Which meant that today's Drama Club interviews were the most important day I'd had since arriving in this world. It was the day I could meet Soye naturally.
"Since when does a ghost member remember club schedules?"
"I told you, I'm doing this properly starting this year."
"Sure, sure. Just run today's interviews properly, would you?"
Unfortunately, the Cha Jaeha who had existed in this world before I arrived seemed to have been a ghost member of the Drama Club. Thanks to that, I had to sit through Haneul's snide remarks and absorb every last scrap of Drama Club TMI he felt like unloading.
Just you wait. Four years of college group projects had forged my participation skills into something formidable.
Give me one semester and I'll turn the groaning about me into cheering.
Of course, if Soye wanted me to, I'd quit the club in a heartbeat. If her happiness and my leaving the club happened to be the same thing, then leaving was the only right answer.
What kind of girl was this world's Soye? Would she be exactly the same as the Soye I'd known from the novel?
Caught between that hope and the quiet worry of whether I could actually pull this off, I started my day.
Before I knew it, the school day was over. I headed to the clubroom and was handed the list of interviewees.
One, two, three, four... how many people were even interviewing. Twenty-eight? Why were there so many?
Fortunately, the name I'd been looking for was sitting right at the bottom of that list.
Yoon Soye
There she was. Of course she was. Soye.
Wasn't the name itself already too pretty? I couldn't even begin to imagine how much prettier she would be in person.
Even so, I had to remain neutral for now, so I called the names as unemotionally as I could, following the interview order.
The interviews were done in groups of three, and each group took about fifteen minutes. We needed time to discuss afterward as well, so we burned another five minutes or so after each session.
As one interview after another dragged on, Haneul — who was conducting them inside — issued me an order.
"Hey, Cha Jaeha. Go keep those kids entertained with some stories."
"Stories? What stories?"
"You know, high school life stories, that kind of thing. Hurry up and go talk. Club stories are fine too. I've told you plenty."
You've got to be kidding me. What am I, a YouTuber who tells stories for a living?
But I was in no position to refuse right now — and besides, this was a golden opportunity to watch Soye from the front row.
Heading out to tell stories. Immediately.
Rattle! Clack!!
The door opened, and every tired student in the room turned to look at me at once. This was a little much.
I forced the pressure down and swept my gaze across the room — and then I found her.
The farthest seat in the back corner. A seat no one's eyes would ever naturally land on.
Sitting there, reading a book, was a student who was terribly plain and terribly pretty all at once.
Long black hair gathered in a half-updo. Eyes that were quite large and terribly cute, with faintly drooping outer corners. Fair skin, and an oversized cardigan that clearly didn't fit her.
She looked exactly like her illustration in the novel. Exactly. Soye.
I left that pretty Soye behind me for the moment and drove my head straight into a bow toward the students.
"I'm Cha Jaeha from the Drama Club. The interviews are running long. I'm really sorry for making you wait."
"It's fine."
"We're okay!"
"It's totally fine!"
Almost every student told me it was alright — and Soye was among them.
"It's alright...."
She parted her lips in a tiny motion and spoke so timidly I almost missed it.
She matched the novel's descriptions so perfectly that my heart gave a foolish little flutter, and at the same time, it ached.
After that, I sat down in the classroom we were using as a waiting room and started talking with the underclassmen.
One by one, I ushered them into the interview room, and before I knew it the classroom held only two people: me, and Soye.
Groups of three. The count had broken off at twenty-seven, which meant Soye — number twenty-eight — had been left sitting there all alone. Who designed this interview format? I genuinely wanted to hit them.
I burned a quiet fury at whoever had planned it. Soye was such a timid, faint-hearted kid. How could anyone make her interview by herself?
Sure enough, she seemed quietly nervous, fidgeting and unable to sit still.
I felt so bad for her that I deliberately struck up a conversation.
"Um, so... Soye."
"Uh... ah... y-... yes, senior...!"
She was wound so tight she might snap.
I offered her a small smile and tried again.
"If there's anything you want to ask me, go ahead. I'll answer everything."
"R-really?"
"Of course."
There wasn't anything I wouldn't answer. If Soye wanted to know, I would tell her anything at all.
She started working her mouth, as if searching for a question to ask.
I found myself a little excited and a little worried about what she might come up with. If she asked something I couldn't answer, I'd be in trouble.
She kept parting her lips and closing them again, and then, very carefully, she offered up a single question.
"Um... senior, are you... staff...? Or an actor...?"
"I'm staff. You're applying for staff too, right?"
"Yes... that's right...."
She nodded.
Now that we'd started talking, I wanted to keep it going just a little longer....
"While you've been doing staff work... has there been anything hard about it...?"
Soye had asked a question first. Our Soye. That little coward.
I was so grateful for her courage that I answered with everything I had.
Haneul's TMI dump made it easy, too. Thanks, Haneul.
"Lifting heavy things was a little tough, I think. And drawing."
"You lift heavy things too...?"
"The boys handle most of the heavy lifting, so you don't need to worry about that."
"Then... I feel so sorry for the boys...."
Wow. How could anyone be this kind.
No matter how I looked at it, Soye was an angel. Just feeling sorry for the boys who did the heavy work was proof enough of how good she was.
"Then later on, I'll carry any heavy things you're supposed to lift. In exchange, could you draw the pretty pictures for me? I have absolutely no talent for art."
"Ah... leave it to me...!"
She nodded so hard her head might come off, beaming, and I smiled right back at that adorable face.
At the same time, I wanted to give her a little more courage, so I decided to throw out a blank check.
"I think you're going to get into our club right away, Soye."
"M-... me...?"
"Yes. I've got a pretty good instinct for these things."
"Pfft... I really hope so...."
The tiny laugh that slipped out of her was cuteness itself.
If she was going to look that cute and then let out a laugh that lovely, it was genuinely bad for my heart.
"And if it looks like you might not get in, I'll threaten my friend into accepting you. The interviewer right now is my friend, so if I tell him, 'If you don't accept Soye, you're dead,' that ought to do it, don't you think?"
"You can't do that...!"
"Haha! I'm kidding, kidding. Honestly, you'd do just fine without me lifting a finger."
"Ah... hehe... thank you...."
Even the way she took my joke at face value and startled was too cute. I genuinely could not understand how that idiot had ever kicked a girl like this to the curb.
And the fact that she laughed at my unfunny joke only confirmed it: she really was an angel. That smile was angelic. That nature was angelic.
While I was busy marveling at Soye's sheer angelic power, a message arrived on my phone.
The previous group's interview must have finished. Which meant my one-on-one conversation with Soye was over too. What a shame.
"You've been waiting a long time, haven't you, Soye? I think you can go in for your interview now."
"Ah...! Yes, understood...!"
She gathered her bag and stood, and I walked her to the interview room.
She stopped in front of the door and drew a long breath in, then let it out. She must have been so nervous. She was going in to interview alone, after all.
The only thing I could offer her was a little encouragement.
"Hang in there, Soye. Fighting."
"Ah... yes...! Fighting...!"
She smiled a little, squeezed both hands into tight little fists — showing off that cuteness in full — and then slowly stepped into the interview room.
When she came back out after finishing, she gave me a deep little bow and slipped out of the school.
I watched her go, then sidled over to Haneul with a question.
"You finish picking who you're accepting?"
"One of them's a lock, at least."
"Who?"
"That last junior we saw. Soye."
Of course. Our Soye. She must have absolutely crushed the interview.
That was what I thought, and then—
"...She waited until the very end, and she had to interview alone. We have to accept Soye, no question."
If you wanted to call the reason for accepting her ridiculous, it was ridiculous. If you wanted to call it understandable, it was understandable.
The one thing I could be sure of was this: this world was still cruel to Soye.
She was getting into the club regardless of her ability or how hard she had tried.
Even so, I decided to be a little happy about it for now.
Because Soye was going to be in the same club as me.