.

I continued with a sigh.

“So… I was just looking at you, but the district magistrate… oh, it was Ban Yeo Ryung who took that position. She said to me, ‘How dare you covet my wife?’ going over the edge.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I mean, you appeared, wearing a skirt and jeogori, which looked more hilarious than usual, so I said, ‘No, I wouldn’t even have it as a gift!’ She then commanded the guards to administer a straw mat punishment to me. Thus, I… um… begged you… to save me.”

Carrying on my words in hesitance, I finally finished the sentence like that and diverted my eyes back onto Eun Jiho’s face, which was truly something to see. With a look of distress, he was wrapping his forehead with both hands. His long downcast lashes cast shadows over his cheeks.

Um… is he mad? Did my words, not even having him as a gift, pissed him off? Well, I would also feel upset if I heard such a word like that; however, if it was Eun Jiho who said that, I wouldn’t take so offense at it though.

Anyway, I stayed still, wriggling my fingers, but as he didn’t respond anything, I opened my lips.

“Um… but, you won’t even have it as a gift too, will you?”

“Have what?”

At last, he answered back. Shoving his face into his hands like a corpse, Eun Jiho remained silent for quite a while. He eventually raised his head. His perverse voice, as usual, sounded as the Eun Jiho I’ve known. Feeling relieved, I tossed a question.

“I mean, if I show up in your dream with those outfits, you won’t even have me as a gift too, huh?”

Eun Jiho furrowed his handsome brows again. Then at the next moment, he replied in a sulky voice while tilting his head. It sounded nonchalant, just like his usual tone.

“You got it wrong.”

“…”

It was me who wondered about what he meant. ‘What did he just say? If I asked him about will he not have me even as a gift, but he answered that I got it wrong, that means he would have me…’ Thinking further until that point, I just gave up rambling such thoughts. Then I slightly pulled my chin and stared at Eun Jiho carefully somehow.

‘He is now… Oh, but we had different prerequisites!’ With that thought, I asked him again.

“No, think about it. I said you were wearing jeogori and skirt in my dream? Thus, in my case, it’s like me wearing hanbok… oh, that ain’t so weird! Let’s say it’s like I’m wearing a spacesuit.”

“Uh-huh.”

Eun Jiho nodded sullenly. Like a student who had gone through private tutoring lessons before taking actual classes in school, his attitude looked as if my explanation bored him too much. I asked back again.

“Still?”

“What if I say yes?”

Flinging the question, he lifted his chin and directed his eyes on me. ‘Oh, boy…’ I pulled the doorknob, becoming stricken with panic.

‘Hey, where are you going?’ Regardless of Eun Jiho asking me with a perplexed look or not, this time, I pulled the doorknob firmly and opened my lips.

“Dude, then… um… even if I wear tiger skins?”

“Yeah.”

“What if a crocodile skin?”

“I said, yes.”

“Hey, then… um, goat skin…?”

“Geez, are you gonna skin all the animals over the world?”

When Eun Jiho responded in a seemingly irritated voice, I, at last, pulled myself together. I mean, it felt like my whole brain was made up of dense circuits, and they seemed to be all mixed up right now.

I raised my eyes again to gaze at Eun Jiho. As usual, he looked self-possessed and relaxed like a young man of noble presence. ‘Does he know what he’s talking about?’ I wondered, staring at him.

The clock was ticking with our eyes entwined in the air. The gaze we had at each other swiveled silently like a coffee swirl. Then suddenly, I heard a burst of laughter. Eun Jiho was smiling at me. Bringing his hands back, he motioned to me to leave the room.

He said, “Hey, go wash your face ASAP or else we won’t be able to study that much.”

“Oh, yeah. I’ll be quick!”

With that said, I left the room in a flash. On my way to the bathroom, I grumbled to my mom, watching TV in the living room leisurely as she usually did, stop liking Eun Jiho. Until the moment when I went inside the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror with a toothbrush in my mouth, I was still in a daze.

There I saw my reflection in the mirror under the orange light. Staring at my clear brown eyes blankly for a while, I soon spat out the foam in my mouth then raised my head again.

‘Weird,’ I furrowed my brows while brushing my teeth.

Eun Jiho’s words and the reactions just now were utterly against the usual Eun Jiho I’ve known. The look on his face that I had seen on my way out of the room revealed signs of sorrow and emptiness, which I couldn’t estimate how deep they were at all.

‘And Eun Jiho just now…’ I murmured vacantly. Eun Jiho seemed to avoid my touch. Of course, I knew it was quite something for a girl and a boy holding hands, but mine was just brushing against his hand. Eun Jiho, however, brought his hand behind him as if he got burnt. Such a reaction was deeply engraved in my sight that it hardly disappeared in my head.

Geez. After washing my face, I walked within the living room then dropped my glance outside the veranda. Everything was full of green. The blade-like sharp sunlight, the watercolor painted blue sky, and the kids playing in the apartment complex parking lot under the green and blue scenery…

As soon as I washed, my neck turned sweaty again. Fanning it with my hand, I suddenly came across a thought.

Anyway, summer break has arrived at last.

* * *

Now that we were in high school, I had thought about our break would be a little different than that in middle school. In middle school, the novel was just before the stage to be actually developed; therefore, there was quite a time to move forward, but now we were in high school!

In the author’s perspective, high school summer break was a perfect background for something to take place. No need to force the main characters to go to school the next day… I mean, these characters seldom went to school, but good for the author to make the characters travel far away! Having the male and female protagonists going to the movies or courage test together was even better!

And that was why I once had promised myself that this time I would never get involved in a stormy summer break of Ban Yeo Ryung and the Four Heavenly Kings. What I planned for that was very simple and effective.

So to explain this arrangement, there’s something that needs to be addressed, which is the entrance examination system in Korea. If those of you were students like me, you would have heard of the annual Korean SAT, the devilish college admission test.

Oh, the god dang Korean SAT! How cruel and vicious it is to bet our 12-years education on just one day and decide the level of college for us to enter.

We, the high schoolers, take something called a mock exam to prepare the upcoming Korean SAT and estimate the level of college we’ll enter from that result…

Although it was quite pitiful to say for myself, my test scores were way behind from, of course, Ban Yeo Ryung and Eun Jiho, the nationwide top rankers in the exams, but even from the rest of the Four Heavenly Kings. No, not just way behind… way more, I was so much behind.

If I were just a run-of-the-mill girl, I would’ve felt a deeply rooted fury or jealousy to Ban Yeo Ryung at this moment of time. Thankfully, I was the only person who was aware of Ban Yeo Ryung taking the female lead position in this web novel, so I didn’t have that much of harsh emotions to her. I would say, I just gave up. Hoping for common sense in this world would just make myself a sinner.

Although they didn’t reveal their thoughts verbally, it was true that the Four Heavenly Kings and especially Ban Yeo Ryung were worrying about me somehow.

Thus, when the summer break had just begun, I declared to them in confidence.

‘I would be studying in the library this summer.’

If I said this sentence in the beginning, it would sound like I simply declared such a thing to avoid spending my summer break with them. In fact, my test scores were actually quite serious too. Anyway… I also didn’t want to end up going to a college, so different from where they all would enter. Neither did they looked for the same thing to happen.

It would feel more comfortable for me to just regard that my first summer break in high school was given up for the sake of my enjoyable college years with them. I wasn’t just tying myself in the library because I hate to hang out.

Um, but, anyway… my overall intention wasn’t proving successful somehow.