Suspicion (5)
The black-haired girl vanished in the blink of an eye.
“Why is that bitch here…?” Yeon Minha muttered with a puzzled expression.
Black hair, golden particles flashing in her pupils, and the faint, distinctive scent of her particles lingering in the hallway. It wasn’t difficult for Yeon Minha to guess the girl’s identity. Yet even setting aside her antipathy toward Baek Seoyeon, she couldn’t fathom why the other girl had come to the classroom at this hour. The way she had fled the scene as if she’d done something wrong only deepened Yeon Minha’s suspicion. It was behavior rarely seen from the usual Baek Seoyeon.
“…”
But Yeon Minha quickly erased the ripple in her heart. She had no time to spare thinking about Baek Seoyeon right now. She needed to clean out his locker, which those wretched girls had undoubtedly defiled. Besides, only a few minutes remained until the end of class.
She strode forward without hesitation, heading toward the row of lockers in the hallway behind the classroom.
“…What the hell?”
The moment she arrived, Yeon Minha frowned, clearly displeased. The hallway behind the classroom was already in complete disarray. Lockers with broken or wide-open doors were scattered everywhere. Some might not have been locked to begin with. Every single one of them belonged to male students. Many compartments stood empty, stripped of even the faintest trace of sweetness, looking utterly desolate and pitiful. Yet it wasn’t hard to find quite a few still filled with candy.
Yeon Minha swept past them and stopped in front of the locker bearing a familiar nameplate. The lock that should have been firmly secured lay shattered on the floor, and the door itself dangled precariously, its hinges broken.
“Ha.”
She let out a short sigh, clearly displeased by the sight. Then she grabbed the locker door and yanked it open with a violent jerk. Her plan had been to burn every filthy thing inside before he arrived. Without leaving a single trace.
“Huh…?”
But confusion quickly surfaced on Yeon Minha’s face. What lay before her was nothing like what she had expected—a savage, unrefined scene of destruction. His locker had already been ravaged by a storm. Someone’s candies, crushed and pulverized into near powder. Notes torn to shreds so thoroughly that the handwriting was unrecognizable. It looked as if someone had beaten her to the task, a bizarre crime scene steeped in fury and sorrow.
And as Yeon Minha stood there speechless, she soon noticed something.
This is…
In the center of the locker sat a single small box made of unmistakably luxurious material. The only object left intact amid the wreckage. Without thinking, Yeon Minha reached for it. Unlike everything else, it bore no clue to its owner. Yet for some reason, its pristine condition irritated her even more.
Before she knew it, she was carefully lifting the lid of the paper box.
— Click —
“…”
Inside the box lay candies and cookies packed to the brim. Neat, delicate, and charming snacks that made her own creations look utterly shabby by comparison. They were clearly made with great care, and each piece had even been individually portioned. Before she could even register her surprise, a familiar yet deeply unpleasant scent slipped straight into her nose.
It shared a vague sweetness with sugar and cookies, yet it was unmistakably different. Because Yeon Minha had arrived at the scene too quickly, the scent hadn’t had time to dissipate.
“What… what is this…?”
By then she was clenching her fists so tightly that her whole body trembled. She knew the owner of that scent all too well. Therefore, grasping its meaning was not difficult at all.
“Why… why…? Why would she…?”
Yeon Minha bit down hard on her lip. Her face had gone deathly pale, and her mind refused to process it, making even anger difficult.
“Why, why the hell…!!”
Lee Hyun’s expectation that they could get through Falling Star Day without any major commotion was shattered from the very first period.
When he opened the locker he used between moving classes, something rustled and poured out in a cascade.
“Whoa… I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone receive this many before…”
A familiar voice came from beside the frozen Lee Hyun. It belonged to Ryu Seungheon, the younger brother of Ryu Sehwa and one of the few acquaintances he had at the academy. The good-natured-looking male student wore an expression of genuine admiration.
“For someone saying that, you don’t seem to have received any less…”
While not quite as extreme as Lee Hyun’s, Seungheon’s locker was also fairly packed with candies and snacks. Yet he shook his head with a slightly regretful smile.
“Sigh, they’re all useless anyway…”
He gathered the candies and dumped them all into the nearby trash bin.
“If Yeoul finds out about this, I might actually die. I have to get rid of them before that happens…”
While cleaning out his locker and gathering his things, he offered Lee Hyun some advice.
“You should be careful too. Especially, it’s better not to eat any candies when you don’t know who gave them.”
“Why?”
“Because there might be something weird inside.”
At those words, Lee Hyun immediately rummaged through the pile of candy, picked up three or four, and crushed them. He tore open each wrapper one by one to check the contents. One was normal. Another contained some unknown liquid that smelled of alcohol and made his body feel strangely hot. And the last one… was a knot of someone’s hair.
“…”
He experienced a chill running down his spine. It was a bizarre kind of horror he had never felt even when facing demons. Lee Hyun immediately scooped up all the candies and shoved them into the trash bin. The previously empty bin filled up to the brim in an instant.
“Whoa… what a waste…”
Seungheon glanced at the overflowing trash and muttered.
“Hyun-ah~ Take this!”
“This too.”
“A-and this one…”
During the break right after the first class, three female students approached him where he sat in the corner of the classroom. A girl with bleached hair whose skirt was shortened to a risky length, a blunt-looking girl with a scar on her right arm, and a timid brown-eyed girl. Three packages landed on his desk with a soft thud.
“What is this?”
“What do you mean, what? They’re obviously candies.”
When Lee Hyun asked, Sera responded as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“Are we really the first ones?”
Lee Hyun recalled the anonymous poisoned candies that had filled his locker earlier. He didn’t particularly want to count those. When he nodded, Sera widened her eyes slightly and murmured.
“Really? That’s surprising… I thought a lot of people would have already come by…”
“The three of us made them together. The shapes are a bit weird, but they should still be edible.”
Summer spoke in her flat voice. A slightly crumpled and squished animal-shaped candy poked out from the top of one package.
“Don’t get the wrong idea, okay? We’re giving them because we’re close friends. Let’s keep getting along. Hehe.”
Sera continued with a voice full of mischief. Then she shot a teasing glance at the brown-eyed girl standing beside her.
“Though one of us might be a little different.”
“W-what are you talking about… I told you not to say things like that…”
Yena glared at Sera with all her might at the cryptic remark. But the bleached-haired girl paid her no mind and turned back to Lee Hyun.
“The one Yena made might taste a bit different. She was chatting while making them and two or three drops of saliva might have gotten in. Maybe it turned out sweeter…”
“I-I didn’t spit! And that only happened because you kept tickling me…!”
Yena shouted at Sera with a face full of grievance. She swung her weak fists wildly, but Sera dodged them with a bright laugh. Eventually giving up, Yena looked at Lee Hyun with a pitiful expression. Her face was flushed red, and her eyes glistened with unshed tears.
“W-what should I do… Are you upset…?”
But Lee Hyun simply shook his head. Yena’s face brightened instantly. Beside them, Sera clicked her tongue again.
“It’s hopeless. Absolutely hopeless…”
“I told you to stop…!”
“Ow, that hurts! Hyun-ah, enjoy them~”
The bickering girls naturally drifted out of the classroom. Only their bright laughter echoed behind them like a lingering refrain.
Lee Hyun opened the package Yena had given him. It was filled with small bluebird-shaped candies.
He had thought it would be a brief commotion, but every time he changed classrooms, he had to repeat the task of throwing away the candies stuffed in his locker. Meanwhile, some students gave him candy directly. Most of them were people who had gone south with him and owed him their lives. Since the givers were clear in those cases, there was no particular reason to refuse.
“Here. Take this. You remember me, right?”
A female student handed him a single candy with a light toss and asked. It seemed less like an attempt to win his favor and more like an effort to build familiarity. Her face looked somewhat familiar, but he couldn’t recall her name.
“I’m Ki Haewon. We went south together.”
When Lee Hyun hesitated, the girl spoke as if it were no big deal.
“I heard you’re going to duel Yeseo this time? I’ll cheer for you. Yeseo is my friend too, but since I owe you my life…”
“Th-thank you.”
“It’s nothing. If you ever need my help later, just come find me. I’ll help with anything I can.”
The girl named Haewon waved her hand casually and quickly left. After passing through several more classrooms like that, the sound signaling the end of the Demonology lecture finally echoed through the hallway.
Lee Hyun trudged toward his locker. Just imagining the mountain of candy waiting inside made him shudder involuntarily. However, what greeted him this time was something he had never expected at all.
“Senior?”
“…Hic.”
At his call, Yeon Minha spun around abruptly.
“What brings you here?”
“Ah… um, that is…”
Lee Hyun immediately noticed that something was off with Yeon Minha. She wouldn’t meet his eyes, and her pupils were trembling wildly. Both hands were hidden behind her back. Meanwhile, the locker door beside her hung open and dangling. It was in the worst condition he had seen all day. The lock that should have been secured was completely shattered, and the hinges were broken off.
A few pieces of candy lay scattered on the floor in front of his locker. He bent down to inspect the inside.
“…”
It was a complete mess of torn wrappers, shredded notes, and candy powder. The scene was reminiscent of a battlefield. After a brief hesitation, he asked Yeon Minha.
“Did you do this, Senior…”
“I-it wasn’t me… I didn’t do anything…”
Before he could even finish speaking, Yeon Minha shook her head violently. She had to desperately ignore the guilt pricking at her conscience. After all, she had come here fully intending to do exactly that.
“I see.”
Though puzzled, Lee Hyun nodded as if accepting her words.
“Then why are you hiding your hands behind your back like that…”
“W-why would I be hiding anything? I’d appreciate it if you stopped saying strange things…”
Her guilty conscience made Yeon Minha blurt out things he hadn’t even asked. And every time he stepped closer, she retreated further to maintain distance. In the end, she spun around with her arms still behind her back.
“I-I just remembered I have something urgent to do… See you at the banquet later…?”
“Senior? Wait…”
Without waiting for his reply, Yeon Minha vanished in an instant, like a gust of wind.
“…”
Lee Hyun stood there in stunned silence for a moment. Then he turned his gaze back to the ruined locker. Nothing intact remained in the devastated space. The only thing he could sense was the faint, lingering sweetness of sugar.