Critical Point
March 10th, Saturday. The instant I opened my eyes, a blue number pulsed at the bottom of my vision.
Remaining Time: 20 Days 23 Hours
The System’s threat that it would erase my soul if I failed to finish the mission in time. Rather than gamble with my soul, I chose the far more efficient route: complete the “homework” as quickly as possible.
After all, this body belonged to Cha Seolah, and the target was my past self—Baek Gangho. The fact that the homework’s subject was “me” brought a strange sense of relief that dulled any resistance. Therefore, today it ends.
I rose from the bed and headed for the master bedroom’s dressing room. When I opened the most secret drawer, I found provocative items sleeping there that were light-years away from the refined taste my memories told me her mother had possessed.
Among them I picked out a set of “victory lingerie” covered in red lace. I paused for a second. Standing in front of the mirror and holding the lingerie against my body, I let out a hollow laugh. I’d suspected as much, but the size was a perfect fit. Now I understood why the saying “you should look at your future mother-in-law before you marry” became a proverb.
I had created Cha Seolah myself, yet the genes clearly supported that plausibility. Her mother must have been anything but ordinary.
I changed into the lingerie, then sprayed on a hibiscus perfume whose scent would linger for a long time. Instead of a skirt I chose sweatpants with the word PINK boldly printed across the hips. They looked comfortable at first glance, but the hip line that would show the moment I bent over or broke a sweat would be more blatant than any skirt.
For a top I picked a thin, loose white cotton T-shirt. But the twenty-year-old Cha Seolah’s body refused to let even that look ordinary. The volume of my breasts stretched the fabric tight, and the faint red lace silhouette visible beneath it was already stimulating enough without me doing anything else.
The person in the mirror was no longer a simple college girl. I was a being that could paralyze a man’s reason and leave only raw instinct behind.
Sub Quest: Help With the Move
Fully armed and ready.
What exactly is it perfect for… I left the System’s blatant notification behind and stepped out the front door.
The alley outside the boarding house on a weekend morning carried a somehow damp atmosphere. Two boxes of instant noodles and one large sports bag—those were the entire possessions of the twenty-one-year-old Baek Gangho before he fled to the military right after finals.
“He really came.”
Baek Gangho, who had been waiting for me at the entrance, fidgeted awkwardly. Even though I wore sweatpants, the curves of my body were impossible to hide; his gaze immediately dropped to the floor. He must have seen the red lingerie outline through the thin white T-shirt, because his eyes behind those glasses shook violently.
“Is this all your stuff?” I asked, even though I already knew. He didn’t know where to look and kept pushing his glasses up.
“……I threw out everything I didn’t need. But, Cha Seolah, your clothes are a bit… aren’t they too casual?”
“What’s wrong with them? You expect me to show up in a suit to help you move? Hey, grab that. I called a taxi.”
I lightly snatched one of his boxes. At that moment a man who had been smoking in the corner slunk closer. Political Science, class of ’09—Jo Beom-chan, was it? The shameless bastard who practically demanded side dishes from home and stole them from me.
Jo Beom-chan looked me up and down and smiled with oily friendliness.
“Hey there. You live around here? I’m Jo Beom-chan, class of ’09. If you need any help adjusting to college life, just ask anytime.”
He treated Baek Gangho like he was invisible and blocked my path. When we tried to walk past without reacting, he blocked us again. I coldly cut off his stream of fake nonsense—asking for my number, claiming he looked after Baek Gangho like a little brother.
“As you can see, we’re busy right now. Senior Jo. Beom. Chan. If you’re not going to help, please move.”
My icy attitude made Jo Beom-chan retreat with an awkward expression. I tossed the box into the trunk of the arriving taxi and hurried away from that place.
The newly rented villa had good sunlight, but the unventilated room quickly grew warm from our body heat. The real operation began the moment we started unpacking.
Every time I bent over or crouched inside the narrow room to open boxes and organize belongings, I could feel Baek Gangho’s breathing grow rough. The thin cotton T-shirt clung to my sweat-dampened skin, making the pattern of my lingerie stand out, while the pink sweatpants displayed the explosive curve of my hips without any restraint right before his eyes.
Whenever our fingers brushed while passing items, Baek Gangho’s shoulders jerked as if he’d been electrocuted.
“Aigoo, young man, you’re so lucky. This young lady worked so hard to find you a good room.”
I deliberately put on a shy expression and tucked a strand of hair that had fallen across my face behind my ear, playing the part of a modest, proper college girl. I’m really doing everything under the sun just to let this little lamb live a little more comfortably.
The landlady nodded with a pleased smile at my fake one.
“My, what a rare, good-hearted girl these days. So kind-hearted too.”
Then her gaze slid openly over the curves visible beneath my T-shirt and the lower body wrapped in pink sweatpants. It was a blunt but harmless stare—the so-called “elderly people’s physiognomy reading.”
“And those wide hips… you’ll give birth to babies nice and easy.”
The landlady’s unexpected bombshell instantly froze the air in the room.
“……!”
Baek Gangho’s face flushed so hard it looked ready to explode; he could only stare blankly at the plum tea on the tray. The landlady laughed heartily, as if her job were done, and left, but a strange silence settled between those of us who remained.
Even after she was gone, he stood in an awkward pose facing the wall. Having lived as a man let me see things that Cha Seolah’s eyes should never have noticed—the unnatural angle of his lower body, the reddened backs of his ears. Whether it was the landlady’s “boyfriend” comment that had planted fantasies in his head or the sight of my sweat-soaked silhouette, his junior had clearly begun making a vigorous claim for itself.
“S-sorry! I… I wasn’t thinking anything like that! I swear!!”
Baek Gangho babbled like someone caught doing something bad and buried his nose in the cup of plum tea.
“Hmm… thinking what, exactly?”
I thought about teasing him a little more to reach the goal easier, but Baek Gangho suddenly started putting distance between us.
“……Anyway, I’m enlisting right after my freshman year. The moment finals end, I’m gone… so don’t be so nice to me.”
“Who said anything? Let’s eat first.”
Exhausted by his iron wall, I declared a tactical retreat. The memory of my past self who had fled to the military right after finals and watched the New Year’s sunrise on the training ground parade field made me laugh bitterly.
The delivered black bean noodles, sweet-and-sour pork, and a bottle of strong liquor sat on newspaper spread across the floor. When the pungent alcohol scent filled the room, Baek Gangho’s eyes wavered.
“You’re even letting me drink? There’s still so much to organize. And right now it’s just the two of us… is that okay?”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
I filled the glass to the brim and pushed my face right up to his nose. Watching the sweat-beaded line of my neck and my flushed cheeks, Baek Gangho swallowed dryly.
“If I get drunk, what are you going to do about it? Hm? Gangho?”
At my provocative words, Baek Gangho froze with chopsticks still in hand. The tent pitched in the front of his pants trembled faintly.
By the time the black bean noodle bowl on the newspaper was empty, the room lay heavy with the thick scent of strong liquor. I set down my chopsticks and stole a glance at Cha Seolah sitting across from me.
Just a few hours ago I had been inhaling cigarette smoke in the moldy-smelling alley outside my old boarding house. Now I was sitting on the floor of a new place, drinking with a girl famous throughout the school for her beauty.
It had only been a week since I started college. Some called her the “Goddess of the Liberal Arts College,” others the “Ice Princess.” And that very person was now sitting right in front of me in a sweat-soaked T-shirt, tilting a glass of liquor.
Is this a dream?
Through my glasses, Cha Seolah’s face was faintly flushed. The smell of hibiscus perfume mixed with her own scent, the sweat-beaded line of her neck. I swallowed dryly and looked away.
The landlady’s blunt comment about “giving birth nice and easy” had planted forbidden fantasies in my head. My gaze kept drifting to the curve of her breasts and the prominent pelvic line above the sweatpants. The “ideal body” I had only seen on internet communities was right in front of me.
But self-loathing immediately crashed over me. Why? Why is a girl like this being so good to someone like me? It’s way too much if it’s just because of grades.
She had bought me lunch for no reason, introduced me to this cheap but nice villa, and even helped me move. She had paid for the black bean noodles and this expensive liquor too. A corner of my heart stirred with inferiority.
If she saw me as a man even a little, could she really be this defenselessly generous? The suspicion that she was certain nothing would happen even if she got someone like me drunk tormented me.
“Hey, Baek Gangho. Why aren’t you drinking? I bought it, so hurry up and drink.”
Cha Seolah urged me with a slightly slurred voice. I reluctantly emptied my glass. She was already on her third glass of the strong liquor. She had confidently ordered it as an essential for moving day, but apparently hadn’t calculated how weak her body was to alcohol.
“……Seolah. You seem pretty drunk. You should stop.”
“Who’s drunk? I’m totally fine…… Ah, but why is it so hot? Maybe the landlady turned the boiler up too high. The floor feels like it’s boiling.”
Cha Seolah suddenly fanned the front of her chest. The red lace bra had been faintly visible beneath the thin white T-shirt from the start, but her bold movement now revealed the deep cleavage between her breasts in full, shameless detail.
I flinched and whipped my head away.
“Hey, hey! What are you doing!”
Cha Seolah brushed off my urgently restraining hand as if it were annoying.
“Ugh, I don’t know. I’m really hot…… I need to take this off.”
She grabbed the hem of her T-shirt and started to lift it. The moment her pale skin and the vivid red bra were about to burst into view, I rushed forward with a shout and caught both her arms.
“No! Snap out of it! You’re not the only one here! I’m here too!”
“……That’s why I’m taking it off. There’s only you here, so why are you acting like this when I’m dying from the heat……”
Cha Seolah looked up at me with hazy eyes. Then her body, losing balance, collapsed heavily into my arms. Her feverish, sweat-dampened body heat pierced the thin fabric and pressed against my arms and chest. My heart pounded as if it would explode.
The moral sense that I had to protect her and the primitive instinct that said just like this collided violently inside me.
For now I carefully pushed her away and leaned her against the wall. But Cha Seolah refused to give up and grabbed my collar, pulling me close.
“Gangho…… don’t you see me as a woman?”
“……Huh?”
“Why are you putting up such a wall? Once you go to the military anyway…… this chance might never come again in your whole life.”
At Cha Seolah’s provocative voice, my reason teetered on the edge of snapping. I knelt in an awkward position, breathing hard. Did she know how dangerous the situation was right now? Or was she truly convinced that someone like me could never do anything to her?
My gaze lingered on her red lips. The pungent scent of strong liquor heated the air between us even more fiercely.