Sex Coin

The Bitcoin craze.

A year ago, a single coin hadn't even been worth a million won. Not long ago, it had blown past twenty million. I'd written the whole thing off as someone else's problem—until I found out a friend of mine had struck it rich off the stuff.

"Bitcoin's already gone too high. Altcoins are where it's at now."

"Altcoins?"

"Easy way to put it? Knockoff Bitcoins. Bitcoin blew up, so a bunch of lookalikes showed up. Look into it."

"Dude, I don't know the first thing about this. Can't you just recommend something?"

"Are you out of your mind? So when you lose your shirt you can come cuss me out?"

Fair point. I could lose the money and a friend on top of it.

A crash course in crypto and all the free drinks I could handle—that had been yesterday.

Mornings after drinking were always clammy and miserable. My empty stomach lurched as I shuffled toward the stove without even brushing my teeth.

Nothing beats ramen for a hangover.

I poured a splash of tap water into a battered aluminum pot, its sides scorched black in patches. Too lazy to do it properly, I dumped in the noodles and the soup powder together and cranked the gas all the way up. There would be a little time before it boiled, so I headed for the computer desk.

The keyboard, monitor, and mouse sat on top. The tower lived on the floor. The desk was too narrow to fit it anyway, and keeping it down there had its perks—when I wanted to turn the thing on, I didn't have to pull out the chair or bend over.

I pressed the power button with my big toe, same as always. The tower whirred to life. Without so much as glancing at the monitor, I made for the bathroom.

One of the genuine upsides of living alone was being able to smoke inside. It was a one-room, so the bed, the computer, and the wardrobe all shared the same space—I couldn't bring myself to light up in there. But being able to smoke in the bathroom without stepping outside was more than enough.

"Haaah."

A long drag while I took a leak, and the queasiness in my gut started to settle. The second it did, a slow burn crept in to take its place.

I stepped out and checked the pot. The ramen was bubbling away, the noodles still a little underdone—perfect timing. I cracked an egg straight from the fridge, tossed the shell aside, and clapped the lid back on. Kimchi from the open fridge, a trivet, a pair of chopsticks, and I carried the whole setup over to the computer desk. No dining table in a place like this. Meals always happened in front of the monitor.

Everything was ready. The ramen was not. That sliver of dead time spent waiting for noodles to finish was something I hated. Sitting still made me antsy. I paced between the stove and the desk, counting under my breath.

…ninety-eight, ninety-nine, a hundred. Done.

I killed the flame and carried the pot over with the lid still on. When I lifted it, a thick white plume of steam rolled up into my face. I slurped at the noodles and pulled up a browser, the conversation with Park Sangyoon still rattling around in my head, and started looking into altcoins.

"Jesus, there's a ton of these."

I didn't even know where to begin. The exchange listed over a hundred different coins.

Why are there so many? And what the hell is this one?

I browsed in a daze, and by the time the ramen was gone I'd wandered into a Naver Cafe. I signed up for one that looked active—plenty of members, posts refreshing constantly. Without ranking up, the only board I could see was the free forum. And most of that was ads.

"What is with all these ads?"

This wasn't it. I was about to close the window when a title practically screaming for attention caught my eye. I snorted and clicked it.

"They really do have every kind of garbage. Even this."

Out of curiosity, I clicked the link. It dumped me onto a mobile app download page. I hit install as a joke, and a window popped up asking me to pick a device. Sitting right there at the top of the list was the old spare phone I used to use.

Huh. Where did I even put that thing?

I dug it out and checked. Nothing on it worth hacking—a few selfies, some food pictures. I'd never done any mobile banking on this thing, so there wasn't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠even a security certificate.

"Downloading it on this should be fine…"

I connected the spare phone to Wi-Fi and hit install from the computer. The app landed in seconds. The Sex Coin icon was an ordinary coin stamped with the ♂♀ symbol, the word sexcoin printed in small letters underneath.

Whatever I'd meant to learn about crypto went straight out of my head. I launched the app. The spare phone's screen went white, and black text began appearing line by line.

My real name appearing out of nowhere made me flinch. I cast back through my memory.

Is my info still on this old phone? Is it going to scrape my resident registration number too? Ah, whatever. My personal data got leaked ages ago anyway.

I already drowned in spam texts and spam calls. My Naver ID had been locked once after a login from overseas. I'd logged into a game one day to find the password changed and my character standing there stripped naked. My information had been picked clean a long time ago. A name—or even a resident number—wasn't much of a problem.

I looked back at the spare phone. A handful of labels sat on the screen.

The UI was as bare-bones as it got. I tapped Basic Stats at the top without thinking, and the screen changed.

A long stretch of text on a white screen. What it said was a lot harder to shrug off than the welcome message.

How does it know my height and weight?

Name and age I could give it—leftover data on the old phone. Fine. Height, sure, maybe I'd typed that in somewhere back when I used this thing. But the weight was different. I'd bought a new phone and stuffed this one in a drawer over a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠year ago. And until a year ago, the first digit of my weight had never been a seven. I'd packed on ten kilos in the eight months since I started living alone.

Which meant the information on this Sex Coin app wasn't old data. It was current. Or close enough.

It even knows the size of my dick.

I'd gone numb to personal information floating around out there. Physical details were another story. My face twisted into a deep frown, and I hit the back button.

I almost killed the app then and there. Then I remembered the 10,000 Sex Coins it'd given me as a sign-up bonus, and I tapped Withdraw underneath.

Same simple UI. I tapped the field marked with the hundred-coin minimum and a keypad came up. I typed 10,000 into the blank and hit confirm. The words Withdrawal complete appeared instantly.

Yesterday I'd been told that moving coins anywhere required a wallet address. There had been none of that. I hit withdraw, and that was it. Ten thousand coins vanished. End of story.

That's it? That's the whole thing?

Whatever scrap of interest I'd had in Sex Coin evaporated. A wave of self-disgust hit me—what the hell was I even doing?—and I tossed the spare phone onto the bed.

Forget it. I'll go smoke.

A buzz. I was halfway to the bathroom when the vibration went off. Not the spare phone I'd just thrown. My regular one, the one I actually used. Figuring it ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was a KakaoTalk message, I grabbed it and stepped into the bathroom. Cigarette between my lips, lighter in my right hand, I unlocked the phone with my left.

I stared at the message and tilted my head.

Was I supposed to be getting money from somewhere?

I opened the banking app. The money was actually there. I just had no idea who had sent it. I turned it over in my head from every angle, hunting for any reason two million won would land in my account, and came up empty. Payday from my part-time job was still ten days out, and I'd never seen that sender name in my life.

S-Coin… S-Coin?!

The thought hit like a spark. I flicked the cigarette—two drags, no more—into the toilet and bolted for the bed. I woke the spare phone I'd thrown there. The screen lit up at once.

A value of 195. I'd withdrawn 10,000 coins. The deposit was 1.95 million won.

I couldn't have explained the science or the logic of it. I didn't need to. I knew.

I swallowed.

How it had found my account was a fair question. It didn't matter. My name, which I'd never given. My height, my weight, my account number—all of it was noise. The banking app showed a confirmed deposit of 1,950,000 won.

That was enough.