The nation’s worst game ever, Player Meister High, was well known for its delicate portrayal of the characters’ facial expressions.
The title hero, Suhyuk Joo, was rich in emotional expression among many characters, but outside, he only smiled as the heir of a prestigious conglomerate, always prone to media exposure.
Even in times of crisis, Suhyuk Joo never lost his smile to reassure his comrades.
However, there was one thing that made him lose the smile.
It was related to Dain An.
‘That was the stupidest look that Suhyuk Joo could make. He had that face when Suhyuk and Dain’s personal toxic fans, who they got after clearing Other-worlds, had such a big fight they grabbed each other’s hair in Gwanghwamun square.’
Even that dull, stupid face had received hot reviews among some fans, like “his eyes are full of despair” and “It makes my heart so lonely.”
Gotta admit, they weren’t wrong.
Our title hero, “face genius” Suhyuk made those cringy reviews feel like they were the truth.
‘Anyway, he is for sure struggling with Dain problems right now.’
I approached Suhyuk with a level of certainty that a super hardcore player of this game should have.
“Wassup? Classes are about to start.”
“Oh, Ui-shin.”
Suhyuk responded slowly.
Usually, he would’ve sensed I was coming and said hello before I came to him.
‘Is it more serious than I thought it was?’
Suhyuk’s expression and reaction made it likely that he had a problem that was not easy to solve and was related to Dain.
“Nothing. Just needed fresh air.”
“Had lunch yet?”
“……No.”
Was the problem so serious he skipped lunch?
Was he here sulking for the entire lunchtime?
I looked back at the possible conflicts between Suhyuk and Dain in my head.
Before I could make a hypothesis, Suhyuk opened his mouth.
“Ui-shin, are…… you coming to that party on board?”
The problem must be related to that party.
When I nodded, Suhyuk sighed.
“There may be strange rumors between Hyeji noona and me.”
When I heard Suhyuk, I came to my senses.
‘Yeah, that must have been what happened!’
In the game, there was a story about the marriage and engagement between Joo and the Oh family to stabilize the Juo group.
The Juo Group began with the co-establishment of the Joo family and the Oh family.
The chairman was always from the Joo family, but many Ohs were presidents of the major affiliates and foundations.
‘Then they had a falling-out and went to the brink of disbanding the Juo group.’
The fight between the two houses, aka “Juo’s war,” sent Juo’s stock price plummeting.
Due to the bottom-breaking stock price, all kinds of psychic battles flooded at the general meeting of stockholders, and protests continued in front of the group’s headquarters.
There was even a ridiculous rumor that shareholders hired professional foreign players specializing in assassinations, saying that they’d kill the Juo group and die along with them.
The Ju and Oh family were driven into a state of disaster.
In the end, shareholders and public criticism managed to push them to reconciliation.
‘They would have decided to solidify the relationship between the two families by establishing an in-law relationship in the wake of the Juo war.’
The victims of this decision were Suhyuk’s second cousin and Hyeji Oh’s sister, Hyejung.
However, this ended when Hyejung rebelled and ran away on the day of the engagement ceremony.
A male and female that are about the same age and was directly related to the company’s chair.
The only ones who currently met this criteria were Suhyuk Joo and Hyeji Oh.
‘In the game, due to the Jamsil Baseball Stadium incident in May, the engagement couldn’t happen. Then Hyeji Oh died before Suhyuk was in his second year, so the engagement got canceled.’
The incident at Jamsil Baseball Stadium on Children’s Day was complete.
That’s why the engagement is still going on.
‘Suhyuk’s second cousin and Hyejung Oh was described as young adults in their early 20s. Maybe they decided to hurry the engagement to lay hold of Hyeji after they saw Hyejung run away.’
Suhyuk’s heart was only for Dain.
Hyeji Oh considers Suhyuk to be his close brother.
If they force them together, all they will get is one unhappy couple.
‘They were both my playable characters. I can’t let them be unhappy.’
In the worst scenario, I will pull a “Hyejung Oh” that is even crazier than the original one and escape with all of them.
“You’re talking about the head of the student guidance department, aren’t you? I won’t believe the rumors, even if I hear one.”
“Okay……”
That was very halfhearted.
According to the game’s worldview, Suhyuk was the most awesome character in the world, but when it comes to Dain, he completely loses his confidence and falls into negative thoughts.
If he was so anxious, he could’ve made an excuse- for example, the book again- to go see Dain, but nope, he was sulking and suffering all by himself.
My playable character’s pure love was very… unique.
I should help this guy change his mood.
“So, I’m skipping class to so somewhere. Wanna come with?”
Suhyuk was a perfect student, so he never experienced skipping class to have fun.
Suhyuk hesitated at first but nodded when hyo-don’s name came up.
* * *
At the end of lunch, First-grade class 0’s classroom.
It was empty because all the students have gone to their selected classes.
Whoosh-.
“Hey, vice prez. Why did you call me? Class is starting.”
The automatic door of the classroom opened and Hyo-don appeared.
I entered the password of his locker installed in the back of the classroom without answering.
“Uh, that’s my locker……”
Beep beep beep-!
Inside Hyo-don’s locker.
I saw a pile of textbooks and a crumpled gym suit.
On top of a pile of textbooks that were on the verge of collapsing, there was a basket of carnation flowers with a bunch of math symbols glued to it.
“Change your locker password. Why is it still 0000, the password assigned on the day we got our lockers?”
“What’chu doin’ opening someone else’s locker?!”
I knew his behavior patterns.
He wouldn’t change the password just because I found out. It was too much of a work for him.
Hyodon will keep his password as 0000 until he graduates.
“Let’s go.”
“Go where, man? Leave that and fuck off.”
If I really left this, this basket of carnations will never be delivered to Hyo-don’s middle school teacher.
How pathetic, not being able to man up even after he went flower shopping all night, which he hated every moment of.
“If you want it back, come and get it.”
I shook the basket of flowers as if to taunt him.
Then,
Thump thump-!
I sprinted out of the classroom as fast as I could.
Hyo-don did not respond quickly to the situation.
He blurted out something, but it was too late.
“What? Vice prez, you crazy bitch! Stop acting like a fucking child!”
The mischief and bullying in the classroom of an elementary school.
grabbing people’s things and running off.
I was doing that now.
“Oh you BETTER get over here!”
Hyo-don started running.
Obviously, I started first, but he was catching up fast.
‘His physical abilities are like Hulk.’
Well, then, I’d better use a more Hulk-like skill, Gwanglim.
〈Gwanglim, use ‘player’s trajectory’.〉
The character I used was a grown version of Green Min.
There were only a few playable characters with better leg strength than Green.
〈Use the character’s skill, ‘Sprinter’.〉
In addition to that, I used another skill to increase my speed for a short time, a skill which Yuri Kim also had, and distanced myself with Hyo-don.
“Ah fuck. You’re too fast! You used skills, didn’t you!”
Hyo-don, who was chasing me without any use of skills, did not seem out of breath.
If it hadn’t been for the Gwanglim, I would have been caught.
While the Sprinter skill was activated, I was able to check my device message.
Seeing me running away and still having time to check my device, Hyo-don was furiously screaming again like a maniac.
“Seriously! I’m going to kill you!”
The first message came from Saeron Moon.
[Saeron Moon] Yeah, I know that because of the interview I did the other day!
[Saeron Moon] Sent you the coordinates! Fighting! (fighting is a term used in Korea that means ‘go for it!’, ‘I’m rooting for you!’, or ‘pull a leg!’ etc)
Saeron always has the information.
As Player’s Meister High’s best information source, she is quick at it, too.
I copied the coordinates and sent them to Suhyuk, who answered immediately.
[Suhyuk Joo] got it. meet you at the front gate!
We were moving so fast that we arrived at the front gate in an instant.
When the white clock tower came into sight, I lifted my Gwanglim powers and started running on my own.
The distance between us narrowed.
I dove into the rear door of the vehicle which was waiting in front of the front gate.
Hyo-don followed me in and reached for the handle of the carnation basket.
“Gotcha!”
I handed over the basket of carnation flowers to Hyo-don without further resistance.
Swoosh-!
Click.
“……Huh?”
When Hyo-don looked back, the door of the unmanned air taxi was already closed automatically.
Then at last he noticed something was strange.
But guess what? Too late.
“Let’s go.”
“Nope! Ui-shin, Hyo-don. “Seatbelts!”
“Hey, vice prez, Suhyuk Joo! What the hell!”
Suhyuk, who was sitting inside already, manipulated the button, and the air taxi rose into the sky.
Vroom-!
The landscape out the window changed rapidly, and Hyo-don looked at us ridiculously.
“Hey! What are you doing? Y’all need to get to class!”
“Nope! I decided to skip class with Ui-shin today. It’s more fun than I thought! Would you like a cream cheese caramel pretzel? It’s sold in the unmanned air taxi, and it’s delicious.”
“Vice prez is a bad influence on this dude. Tell me where we’re going!”
Suhyuk was excited about skipping class for the first time ever.
Hyo-don looked at us in bewilderment, saw us with our seatbelt on, then put on his seatbelt also.
I checked his seatbelt and told him.
“The middle school you graduated from.”
The destination of the air taxi was marked with the coordinates of Hyo-don’s middle school, “Tanrae Middle School,” which Saeron kindly informed us.
* * *
Shinwol-dong, Yangcheon-gu, Seoul.
Team EverLake’s building, near West Seoul Lake Park.
The top floor with a view of West Seoul Lake Park.
Screech- squeak! Screech! Scritch!
A noise was heard, like a violin screaming in pure agony.
The source of the noise was a psychic-made blue violin held by EverLake Team master Jae-in Kwon.
“Jae-in, stop! Stop putting your noble, incredible talent to waste! This is self torture, an artistic suicide!”
Jared Lee kneelt down behind Jae-in, was speaking distorted Korean.
Even at Jared Lee’s pleas, the eerie noise didn’t stop.
“Shut up, Team sub master. This is all because of you!”
“That’s right, shut up. If you’re a true fan of Jae-in, you, you······ have to accept even the noise that disgraces Jane’s musicality!”
“If you keep listening, that sorrowful and painful melody isn’t that bad. Our Jae-in is showing her genius talent by expressing her emotions with sound today, as well.”
“Playing or not playing, shouldn’t she eat something before she passes out? She hasn’t had a sip of water since she went to Seokchon Lake.”
“It’s not just Jared, but it’s also because of what that fucking butterfly said to her……!”
“The team Doctor is waiting outside, ready with recovery items and a bed just in case she does faint.”
The executive members of team EverLake were on pins and needles behind Jae-in.
Jae-in stopped playing, peering down at Jared with a pale face.
Her blue eyes were full of agony.
“Jared……”
“Jae-in, I’m so sorry! This is all my fault!”
After telling her everything that happened, Jared Lee apologized without making any excuses.
However, Jae-in did not think it was Jared Lee’s fault in the slightest.
It was herself that she could not forgive.
“No, you did nothing wrong. It’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have left it entirely to you, I should have done it myself. I’m sorry you got caught up in this.”
“Jaaaaeeeiiin! Please don’t apologize!”
Jared Lee felt even more remorse at Jae-in’s attitude.
“Sorry, I want to be alone.”
“If you promise to eat more than one meal today, we’ll go out.”
The youngest of the EverLake team executives, but also the longest member next to Jared, said.
At those words, everybody, including Jared, agreed.
Jae-in nodded, feeling guilty again, thinking that she worried her teammates.
“All right.”
At her word, the team executives went out in relief.
Jared, who couldn’t move because of a cramp in his foot, was dragged out of the practice room.
Jae-in placed the blue violin on the table, called out an address book that had been hidden from the device, and made a call.
Before two rings, someone at the end of the line answered right away.
“There’s a student in first grade class 0 of Eun-kwang High I want to investigate. One…… No, two people. Their names are……”
Jae-in spoke the names of the two juniors and proceeded to end the call.
“That’s all I need. Thanks, Mr. Clever.”
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