A Can of Cola and a Broken Bracelet
"Are you insane?! What the hell was that for?!"
The girl drenched in cola shrieked at the top of her lungs.
Kim Yeonhee, Class 1-2. So she was a classmate, apparently.
"Sorry — I thought you were someone else."
"…What?"
"You called me a cockroach before. If that wasn't you, then my bad."
"……."
"But it was you, wasn't it?"
Her eyes were brimming with certainty and confidence.
For a moment, Kim Yeonhee found herself speechless. It was because of the sheer disconnect between this girl and the 'Seol Jihyo' she'd always known.
But the girl standing in front of her was, without question, Seol Jihyo. Which meant there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of.
Raise her voice even a little, and the girl would surely flinch and retreat at once.
A sneer curdling on her lips, Kim Yeonhee spoke.
"There's crazy, and then there's you."
Warmth drained from Jiwoo's face.
It wasn't the insult itself that had provoked her.
Kim Yeonhee stood there with her arms crossed, staring down at her as if she'd just heard the funniest joke of her life. And on her wrist, a bracelet with a four-leaf clover pendant glinted in the light.
That bracelet. She'd seen it in the video.
There was no mistaking it. This girl was—
"You looked like a cockroach, so that's what I called you. What's the problem, hmm?"
When Jiwoo said nothing, Kim Yeonhee took it for fear, and a thread of confidence wove itself back into her voice.
Jiwoo stared fixedly at the clover pendant dangling from her wrist — then lifted her gaze and met her eyes dead-on.
"…Then tell me. Is it a problem if I dump a cola over the head of the little bitch who said it behind my back?"
Clang!
Jiwoo dropped the empty can she'd been holding.
"…What?"
"Is that the right thing to do — hear someone calling me a cockroach and just walk on by with a little giggle?"
Crunch. Jiwoo ground the empty can flat under her heel, then loomed over Kim Yeonhee.
"Cat got your tongue?"
Kim Yeonhee's shoulders flinched. It was pure reflex.
"Did you all just see that? Kim Yeonhee just got intimidated by Seol Jihyo."
"Oh my god, she's scared. She's actually scared."
Kim Yeonhee's brow furrowed violently.
She refused to lose face here, of all places — and to a nobody like Seol Jihyo, no less.
Her voice climbed even louder.
"Did you get hit on the head or something? In an accident?"
"Oh, it's not just my head that got hit."
"What is with you, seriously—"
Whoosh!
Kim Yeonhee swung her hand.
But it was helplessly caught mid-air in Jiwoo's grip.
"Fuck — let go of me!"
"You don't get to be the only one cursing."
Still pinning her wrist, Jiwoo leaned in close, her face inches away.
"Watch your filthy mouth, you mutt."
Her voice was so cold it was impossible to believe it belonged to Seol Jihyo.
As if responding to it, the cola can lying on the floor crumpled inward with a hollow craaack.
'…What the hell?'
Kim Yeonhee flinched and glanced sideways. The can had just been lying there — why would it suddenly…?
But there was no time to worry about that.
"It was you, wasn't it? In my group."
"What are you…"
"The day I got bitten and torn apart by an Infected — you went into the Abyss with me, didn't you?"
"What the hell are you talking about out of nowhere?"
"Answer me. Were you there, or weren't you?"
"That was ages ago! Why are you dragging it up now, huh? What are you going to do about it — report me to the police?"
Jiwoo let out a short, dry laugh.
"It doesn't end with just that."
Craaack.
Her wrist twisted, the grip tightening like a vice.
At some point, other students had begun swarming around them like a hive of bees.
"Whoa…"
"What's going on?"
"Hey, there's a fight!"
Kim Yeonhee's face, already a mess of cola and humiliation, flushed a deep crimson.
Right now, in front of everyone, she was on display — doused in cola, her wrist locked in Seol Jihyo's hand.
But the most humiliating part of all was this:
She couldn't shake that hand off.
The girl didn't even seem to be putting much strength into it — she was clearly holding back. So how, how, was her grip this strong?
"…Wait, what's with Seol Jihyo? Doesn't she seem… different? Like something's changed about her since I last saw her."
"No idea. I've never been in her class. What was she like before?"
"You didn't know she was bullied? Back in third year of middle school, when those girls cut her hair with scissors, she couldn't say a single word."
"Oh my god…"
The murmuring grew louder.
"What is all this racket? Do I look like I'm standing in a street market? Huh?!"
A passing teacher noticed the commotion and pushed his way through the crowd.
The homeroom supervisor.
Even at his arrival, Jiwoo did not release Kim Yeonhee's wrist.
No — instead, she bowed her head deeper still and whispered into Kim Yeonhee's ear.
"I'm looking forward to the next time you go into the Abyss."
"……!"
"I hope we're in the same group again. You and me."
Snap!
The four-leaf clover bracelet on Kim Yeonhee's wrist snapped apart, as if cut by an invisible pair of scissors.
The pendant and beads scattered from the broken cord, tumbling and rolling across the corridor floor.
"You two! Break it up right now. What do you think you're doing in the hallway?"
At the teacher's bark, Jiwoo finally, slowly, let go.
Kim Yeonhee clutched her wrist, the rims of her eyes gone red.
A handprint stood out vividly against her skin. The bones of her seized wrist throbbed with a stabbing ache.
"Talk. What happened here? Fighting in the halls, the lot of you! Huh?!"
"I didn't do anything wrong."
Jiwoo replied, calm and even.
"What? Then why is there all this commotion—!"
"She started it. I just gave it back to her, that's all."
At that, the teacher turned his gaze to the girl beside her — Kim Yeonhee.
"Is that true?"
Kim Yeonhee, still massaging her mangled wrist, stole a glance back at Jiwoo.
The instant her eyes met those blue ones, her shoulders gave a violent shudder.
Her head dropped of its own accord, and she shut her mouth tight.
"……."
The words wouldn't come out.
Damn it all. They simply wouldn't.
'…I'm exhausted.'
Jiwoo got back to the dormitory at five in the afternoon.
Of all places, of all times — it had to happen in that corridor.
"Yeonhee, don't let anything like this happen again. You're classmates — you should get along."
"…Yes, sir."
Afterward, Kim Yeonhee had fled across the corridor without once meeting Jiwoo's eyes, vanishing in a hurry.
It wasn't as though that alone had quenched her anger. But letting the incident blow up any bigger wasn't a development Jiwoo wanted either.
That girl, Kim Yeonhee, apparently didn't have as much spine as she put on.
Looked at another way, the fact that Jihyo had been put through all of that by such a pathetic little nobody made her blood boil all over again.
…In any case, she'd made an example of the girl. She'd behave from now on — assuming she had any sense at all.
That said.
'I did kind of make a scene back there, didn't I. So much for keeping my head down.'
But there was nothing to be done about it.
The moment she'd heard someone insulting Jihyo, something in her had simply snapped.
…And then there was that bracelet.
The sight of it gleaming on Kim Yeonhee's wrist had turned her blood to ice the instant she saw it.
'Whatever. I'll figure it out somehow.'
Perhaps from thinking too hard, drowsiness crashed over her all at once.
It had been a very long day, after all.
It was the first time she'd been outside since entering 'that place' at the age of six — so it made sense.
'Besides, it's probably because I used my Core today for the first time in ages. I feel kind of sluggish.'
Twice, somehow, without even meaning to.
Come to think of it, that boy who'd gotten hurt — had he made it back to his dormitory all right?
As her thoughts drifted from one thing to the next, her eyelids grew heavier and heavier.
Just a short nap. Just to close her eyes for a moment.
Then when she woke up, she'd sort the rest of it out—
"Hah—!"
—By the time her eyes flew open, it was already the next morning.
She scrambled to check the wall clock. The hands pointed to six a.m.
How many hours had she slept? Had she been dead to the world for at least twelve?
When was the last time she'd slept this long? She couldn't stay in bed a second longer.
Ready for school, Jiwoo slipped out of the dormitory and checked the time again.
Seven a.m.
Two whole hours before first period started. That seemed absurdly early…
Well, no harm in getting there ahead of schedule, surely.
Worst case, she'd arrive in the middle of the rush and stumble into another unpleasant encounter.
And since she still wasn't familiar with the campus layout, she decided to treat it as leaving with time to spare.
'…It's quiet.'
Given the hour, a hush hung over the entrance to the main building. It made sense — hardly anyone would be heading to class this early.
Jiwoo approached the shoe lockers just inside the ground-floor entrance.
She was about to open the locker door to change into her indoor shoes when—
"Kyaaagh…!"
A scream rang out from somewhere, and her footsteps froze on the spot.