The Tutorial Begins

I searched for somewhere I could be alone to sort out my thoughts, but the stares kept finding me. They were oddly relentless—almost as if they were following me—and circling the building a few times did nothing. My frayed nerves snapped; I just wanted to be left alone.

In the end I looped around the department store about three times before slipping in through the rear entrance. Then I found the emergency stairs and took them two at a time, nearly running.

Fortunately, on a weekday afternoon the restroom on the third floor—right by the children’s section—was empty. I slipped inside quietly and shut myself into a stall. Something murmured outside, but no one came in.

“Hah…”

What I could sort out right now was this.

First: I had died, and for some reason I was alive again. Reincarnation, possession, regression—it had to be one of the three.

Second, related to that: I was younger, or my body had changed. The condition of it felt different. My fingers were thin the way they had been as a kid, and that felt strange. My skin looked paler, too.

Third: this situation was clearly tied to the mobile game I had been playing. I remembered the bizarre gacha screen I had seen right before I died. The error window overflowing with cats, something I had never seen in my life—and then the sudden car accident. The timing was too neat. The last thing I saw before I closed my eyes was my phone glittering in every color.

There was no room to doubt that my original body had died in that crash. It had been close to instantaneous. Even if I had been taken straight to a hospital I would not have survived—let alone after a hit-and-run.

In weather like that, I must have been dead for sure.

Remembering the accident sent a spike of stress through me. I put the toilet lid down, sat, and tried to cool a head that felt feverish. I needed a moment of empty rest just to accept any of this. How long I sat there vacant, I could not say.

Still. I should check what I can check.

I could not stay like this forever. In the quiet restroom, with no one coming or going, I carefully opened the stall and stepped up to the mirror. A face both familiar and strange looked back at me.

Whether I had liked my ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠own looks, whether I had ever benefited from them—setting all that aside, objectively speaking, the original had not been a bad face.

After the baby fat melted off under the stress of exams, my features had taken on a strangely refined cast. In college I got a lot of confessions. Even in the military, seniors used to tell me almost every day that a guy had no business looking that pretty.

But I clearly remembered that it had never been this. It was the same face as a base, yes—but every feature, eyes and nose and mouth, had been sculpted with a fineness that left nothing to hide. The whole of it looked strikingly refined.

The features were so perfectly symmetrical it almost felt uncanny, with only a faint trace of youth still lingering—and they felt endlessly foreign.

I need more information.

I started by emptying my pockets. Digging thoroughly, I pulled a thin wallet from the inside of my coat.

No smartphone?

I searched hard, but no matter where I looked, there was nothing.

That part’s the same, at least.

The days of living without a smartphone felt impossibly distant now, but I had not owned a phone until after high school.

I gave up hunting for a phone and opened the wallet, which felt oddly familiar—but nothing useful came of it. The student ID I used to carry around at this age was nowhere to be found. In its place sat a resident registration card.

—Lee Han-hee XX1210-3XXXXXX

Same name. Same date of birth. And with that, every investigation I could manage right then was finished—and still no clean conclusion.

Some things matched. Some things did not. Whether I could call myself the same person was still deeply uncertain.

Where am I supposed to go?

The sun would be down soon, and all I had was a worn wallet, an unfamiliar check card, and five thousand won in cash. Should I head for the house I had lived in as a high schooler?

Without a smartphone, there was only so much I could figure out. I wanted to hide this conspicuous face, but I could not even buy a hat without knowing how much money I actually had. It was hopeless.

Sleeping outside is out of the question, right?

A sudden chill made me hunch my shoulders—and only then did I notice the coat, far too thin for the weather. Sleeping outside in this would be a fine way to freeze to death. And I had somehow been wandering around like this.

I had been sitting in a restroom the heat never reached, cold seeping into the air, and only now had I noticed. I must have been more out of it than I thought.

Realizing my body was trembling faintly under the cold that had worked its way into my bones, I let out a short, humorless laugh.

And I thought: even after dying, my circumstances had not changed at all.

“There’s no answer.”

Stress made my eyes go dry and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠stiff. I pressed them with shaking fingertips. A tight band closed around my chest, and the words I spat out without meaning to rang through the quiet restroom. I was still startled by how loud my voice had come out when a stranger’s voice cut in.

“No answer to what?”

“…!”

The voice came from right nearby. I jumped and spun to look. A man holding a small child—and the child, maybe six years old.

When my scanning gaze met the boy’s, he grinned, wide and easy. He looked like he was in a good mood.

“Hyung, I need to pee—”

“Okay. You can handle it yourself, right?”

“Of course!”

The boy hopped down with a brave little swagger and went into a stall without hesitation. I had heard that these days a lot of families taught kids to use adult toilets—this was a different situation, but for a second I remembered the school years of slipping into a stall under my older brother’s watchful eye, and my mood sank.

If even death could not cut a bond that stubborn—what then?

“Are you in some kind of trouble? Can I help?”

The man who had spoken so suddenly smiled with a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠strikingly handsome face.

No money. No phone. Nowhere to go. I did not even have a hat to hide my face, and the coat meant to keep out the cold wind was barely there. It was true that I needed help. But a helping hand arriving right on cue was not something I was used to.

“No, I’m fine.”

Needing help did not make me naïve enough to grab a hand when I had no idea why it was being offered.

“Is that so?”

He gave a light shrug and nodded as if he understood. Then he spoke again.

“Still—if you go out like that, you’re going to have a hard time.”

“Excuse me?”

“There were some students outside. I think they followed you here.”

“….”

“You don’t have to be so on guard. I’ve been in a similar kind of mess myself, so I butted in without thinking. That’s all.”

“Hyung, I’m done!”

“Good job, Jae-jin. Excellent. Now let’s wash our hands nice and clean.”

Why go out of his way to care? Even if he had been through something similar, did that really give him a reason to help me? Still—he said it was, so I decided to take it as it was.

Thinking about it, he had a child with him, so it would be hard for him to try anything, and if he was offering a way out of here safely, there was no point in bristling for no reason.

Maybe he was hoping I’d ask one more time.

I had clearly decided I could not trust him, and yet my heart swayed like a reed—I was almost startled at myself. But what did it matter? I was just… so tired.

“If it’s help… how would you…?”

“Hmm. Just a second.”

I watched blankly as he squeezed soap for the child who held out his hands, saying he could not reach. Then the man’s large hands rummaged through a shopping bag and pulled out a long padded coat.

And before I could blink, the roomy garment was wrapped around me.

“…?”

I tried to take it off, but there was soap on my hands. Trying not to get any on the fabric left me in an awkward half-pose.

“Good thing I bought the one with a hood. Put that on and go.”

“I’m really grateful, but this is too much.”

A long padded coat, just like that? This was help? Anyone could see it was excessive.

What’s his angle?

No one simply gave away their own things for free. That was a fact I had learned the hard way, being knocked around by life. You could not even fully trust people you had known a long time—so someone who handed an expensive coat to a total stranger on the spot deserved every bit of suspicion.

“Well, you look young, so don’t feel too burdened. I’m just helping because I want to help. And this is just a hunch, but I have a feeling we’ll run into each other again. Think of it as the price of making a good first impression.”

He added that kids should just accept help quietly—and then he was out of the restroom before I could catch him. Over his shoulder, a small face rose up and mouthed a bright farewell. Bye-bye.

Left standing there alone, I washed the soap from my hands. Then I pulled the zipper all the way to my throat, tugged the hood down low, and left the restroom, slipping past other customers on the way out.

I caught a glimpse of noisy students in school uniforms—out of place in the children’s section—but I got out of the department store fast.

If you could call it luck, it was luck. The padding, expensive at a glance, cut off the winter wind that turned vicious the moment the sun dropped. Without it, I could already picture myself suffering badly in the cold.

I had always meant to buy one of these someday. Leave it to me to only wear a long padded coat after dying.

“I didn’t even ask his name…”

Aside from the little brother’s name being Jae-jin, neither of us knew who the other was.

Kids should just accept help quietly, huh?

He had a mature air about him, but looking at his face, he did not seem all that old.

As a twenty-four-year-old who had already done his military service, being treated like a lost child was embarrassing—but considering the price ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of that long padded coat, maybe being treated like a kid was fine.

He said we’d probably see each other again.

A face so neat and elegant he could have been a celebrity. Not an easy impression to forget.

The kindness had been excessive, and even if we met again I did not know whether I would have the money to repay him—but I did not feel bad about it.

Thinking back, when life had been rough and grinding, I used to seek out posts and videos collecting little stories of human goodness. I was pretty sure I had even watched a social experiment where someone unhesitatingly took off their coat for a child who needed it.

It was around this time of year, I think…

But living had left me doubting, more often than not, whether unconditionally warm people really existed in the world. At some point a weary skepticism had set in—do people like that actually exist?—and I had stopped looking.

Even if they did, I figured none of them would ever be near me.

Was it following the body? Being younger again brought those old feelings rising up, fresh and sharp.

“Hm.”

Yes. Thinking it over again, the feeling was not half bad.

The cold wind stung my face, but my body was warm.

First I went into a PC bang.

I put in two thousand won and started by going through the email accounts I had mainly used back then. In those days, without a smartphone, important contact mostly went through email on the school computers. There would be important documents and records backed up somewhere.

Luckily I could get into a few of the IDs. For nearly an hour I combed through emails and drive files. Then I logged into the bank and checked the balance.

Once I had my situation laid out, it was far better than I had expected. Astonishingly so.

It was only a one-room place, but there was a jeonse apartment in my name, and I had completed the full elementary, middle, and high school curriculum. The unusual part was that, unlike the past, I had not actually attended school—according to the records, I had passed the academic qualification exams for elementary, middle, and high school all the way through.

How I cleared the standards for someone under supervision, I have no idea… but does it matter?

In short: a nineteen-year-old high school graduate who had, roughly a week ago, started living alone under the name of independence. It was January now, so that meant I had already finished high school while my peers were still in their second year.

Compared to the version of me at twenty-four, living on a monthly lease and trying to return to college as a freshman, the gap between then and now was enough to leave me reeling.

From the trail of records, it looked like I had been living practically locked in the house—and then, suddenly, independence. There was clearly some story there, but I did not care.

What mattered was that I had a place where I could live alone. Jeonse, no less. The account held a modest but steadily accumulated sum, and a fairly large deposit that had come in not long ago.

“Hah…”

It could not have been better.

The tension drained out of me all at once. I was out of that house. Free of it. Joy ran electric all the way to the crown of my head. Was this what people meant when they said the universe helps those who wish hard enough? I had a home. I had money. I was young—and most decisive of all, I had not failed at anything yet.

I barely managed to swallow the tears that tried to prick free. Then, with my mind spinning at full speed, I started laying out a plan for my life.

I had gotten out of that house. With that, I could naturally avoid the situation of missing the CSAT on exam day. The college entrance exam had always been my main event anyway, so getting into university would not be a real problem. The problems and answers I had worked through again and again whenever the rage boiled up during exam prep were still vivid now.

I could never forget them.

Remembering every question felt a little like cheating, but I had confirmed long ago that even if I had taken the exam as a first-time senior, the score would have been more than enough for the university I had aimed for. So I felt no pang of conscience. I had studied for years after that, and that time had not been a lie.

And then, just as I was thinking of completely remaking a life that had already crashed once, with my chest full to bursting—a bucket of cold water dumped over everything.