Two Chances Left
I still had two chances left — but they were a limited trial, nothing more. I couldn't afford to burn through them. Right now I needed to pour whatever remained into a single person and find out what kind of penalties came attached. Two chances. Looked at one way, it was generous. Looked at another, it was almost nothing.
I finished signing and handed the papers over. Lee So-eun took them with a smile.
"Alright, I've confirmed everything. Then like we talked about, you'll start next Monday."
"Ah, yes."
There was a three-month probation attached, but even that modest paycheck would be an enormous help.
When she headed out, I followed. At the counter, the woman they'd called Ah-hyun — who'd been fiddling with her phone — stood up.
"See you next week, then."
"Yep~."
The manager gave me a smiling nod, so I dipped my head in return and stepped outside.
With that, the money problem was more or less taken care of. Now I had to get ready to welcome the TA into my home.
"Hmm... first things first, I should clean the place."
I trudged home.
The moment I stepped into the studio, I had to wonder if a human being actually lived here. It was that filthy.
She's coming tomorrow.
The smell alone was a wall of bachelor funk.
I slid the window wide open. Being on the third floor, a cool breeze rolled in, thick with the scent of spring.
"Hah. Alright... let's start by throwing out all this trash."
Even if I was bringing her here under hypnosis, I couldn't let a woman walk into a disaster zone. I rolled up my sleeves and pulled out a city-issued trash bag.
"The landlord did give me these... never thought I'd actually use them."
Until now, I'd just stuffed everything into black plastic bags or hauled it to campus to dump. Couldn't be bothered otherwise. I started scooping up the trash scattered everywhere and stuffing it into the bag.
"Whoa. It's been ages. So that's where this was."
Forgotten junk kept turning up in every corner. Before I knew it, this had turned into a full-blown deep clean. Once I'd gathered all the garbage, I had three bags' worth. Add in the old junk I never used, and it easily filled five.
"Hmm..."
I mixed bleach into hot water, poured it into the bathroom, and shut the door.
"Let me go dump this first."
After hauling the bags outside and coming back in, the place already looked a lot better than it had. I stripped the bedding, stuffed it in the washer, and hit start. The machine rumbled to life as I opened the bathroom door — and a sour, chemical stench flooded the room.
"Never thought I'd actually clean this place."
I pulled on rubber gloves, strapped on a disposable mask, and went in. I grabbed the brush from the corner and scrubbed every inch, scraping off the soap scum in every crevice. It ate up a lot of time.
"Nice! That's clean!"
I blasted everything with hot water, and the bathroom came out looking brand new. I stepped out, hung up the gloves, and mopped the floor — dirty dust came rolling off in sheets.
"Wow. I actually lived like this...? Guess I have the TA to thank for getting me to clean."
Once the floor was spotless, the studio looked the way it had the day I first moved in. The washer chimed that it was done, so I pulled out the bedding and hung it on the veranda. I checked the time — two hours had already gone by.
"Hah. After all this prep, the hypnosis better not just... cancel itself or something."
I left the windows open and sat down.
"Alright..."
Paper and pen in hand, I thought hard.
"Let's think this through."
I had more than a few questions about the app. I unlocked my phone and opened it, but there was no manual, no explanation, nothing. All it offered was this:
Free Hypnosis Uses Remaining: 2
Monthly Subscription: 400,000 won
I could subscribe right now, but I couldn't just throw money around. If something went wrong, I'd be out four hundred thousand won — a massive loss. For a college student, that was a serious burden.
"Maybe I just... shouldn't."
The thought crossed my mind. Then I felt my libido crush four hundred thousand won like it was nothing. If the hypnosis actually worked, I'd pay the monthly fee and then some.
"For now... I'll get some answers tomorrow."
I started making a list on the paper. The hypnosis commands I was going to use on the TA.
Saturday finally arrived.
My phone buzzed. I checked the time — a little past one in the afternoon. I'd been wound tight since early morning, terrified she wouldn't call. The moment it rang, all that tension melted away.
"Hello?"
"Where are you. You didn't forget about the consultation, did you?"
"Yes! Of course not. You know the studios past the intersection in front of campus? That's me."
"...I'll head that way."
"Okay!"
"It'll take about twenty minutes, so come down after that."
"Got it!"
The second I hung up, my heart started hammering with excitement. She really was under hypnosis. That answered one of my questions.
Even after several days, the hypnosis still holds!
If a command I'd planted days ago was still active now, that was going to be incredibly useful going forward. I got dressed, thinking it over.
Alright. That knocks one test off the list.
I finished dressing, flipped my snapback around backward, pulled on my shoes, and headed downstairs. She'd said twenty minutes, but I was too wired to sit still at home. I walked toward the intersection and pulled out the list I'd written yesterday.
"Can hypnosis manipulate memories? And does that manipulation stick afterward? That's the first thing I need to know."
That was the biggest question on my mind right now. If I rewrote her memories and changed how she felt about me — would those feelings still be there come Monday? Would they still fire? And if I planted an unreasonable command, how far would she actually go?
The extreme case: if I told her to kill herself, would she actually do it? That was what I was most curious about. Not that I would. But I needed to know just how far this power reached.
I got to the meeting spot and checked the time. About ten minutes left.
A horn blared from down the street. Someone was coming closer, laying on it as they approached.
The TA pulled up, her face blank. I opened the door and climbed in. She spoke.
"This is just a consultation, like we said. Where's your place?"
"Ah, right. Just head in there."
We turned into the alley, studio apartments lined up in a row. She parked in front of my building, and we went upstairs. The TA followed behind me like it was the most natural thing in the world.