HMN C1

Chapter 1

He mulled it over. In this world, there is no such thing as a perfectly noble human being. Everyone carries facets of themselves they wish to hide, and sometimes those depths are exposed to complete strangers. For instance, stepping into a muddy puddle and falling on the subway platform on the way to work, or getting into an argument with one’s lover in a crowded café and turning the bystanders into unwilling jurors. Listening to breakup songs the day after a separation and bawling until snot and tears pour down, only to lock eyes with a passerby—that was the sort of thing.

Still, most of the time, once you endured those moments, they were easily forgotten, especially if the audience was just an anonymous crowd. After all, once a person passed by, you never saw them again. At most, those moments could be burned away by a single kick at empty air or turned into a funny anecdote at a drinking party.

Conversely, to be caught revealing your most humiliating sides by the same person again and again was unbearably shameful.

Unfortunately, for twenty-three-year-old Ahn Daeyeong, just about to return to university after a break, such a person existed.

It happened during his very first orientation after admission. In the midst of all the newly admitted students, dressed up like peacocks in the flutter of their new adulthood, he lurked under the brim of a heavily pressed-down cap, hiding his salt-dried cheeks and swollen eyes, loitering by the emergency exit. That morning, he had tossed aside the round, rimmed spectacles perpetually glued to his face during exam prep, but it hadn’t been to improve his appearance—simply because he no longer had any studying to do.

He paced about like a puppy desperate for a bathroom break, glued to his phone. The only saving grace was that the spot he had chosen was empty and quiet. After stepping through the broad glass doors of the student center, one found staircases and a cluster of elevators in front, while the right-hand side overflowed with cafeterias and club rooms, always noisy. By contrast, this section was out of the way—unless one was deliberately headed here, there was no reason to come. That a first-year, who hadn’t even properly toured campus, had wandered in here at all was sheer coincidence.

Bzzz. Bzzz.

At the vibration, he checked his phone, instantly pressing it to his ear as he opened his mouth. Without having uttered a single word to another human being all morning, his voice came out half-sunken, splitting the still air.

“Noona. Noona. Why are we breaking up…?”

Instead of the usual bland “hello,” those were his opening words. His tone quivered like a drenched cat, disconsolate and imploring.

—You’re starting university now. You’ll meet someone good.

“But to me, to me you are that good person…”

Paying no heed to the chill of her reply, his lips jutted out in protest as he begged for her affection.

“Noona, you said even after I started college, we would keep seeing each other. That’s why I… that’s why I came to the same school as you…”

—Ah, I only said that to encourage you to study harder for the entrance exams.

Heartless as ever, this woman was not only Ahn Daeyeong’s first love but also his final private tutor. The smile she had once given him, the voice that had told him she liked him too, the hand that had ruffled his hair whenever he solved a problem—all of it was crystal clear. What’s more—

“We even kissed.”

Trying to suppress the surge of emotions, his words faltered strangely.

“If you manage to pass into our university, I’ll let you have a kiss.”

It had been under such a bargain. In the eyes of Hina—then a twenty-one-year-old college student herself, forced to spend time among crude male classmates trading vulgar jokes—her shy high school tutee’s innocent infatuation had seemed little more than a charming diversion.

Truthfully, Hina had also found the boy somewhat pleasing. Despite the boy’s stuffy all-boys’ high-school uniform reeking of adolescence, his overgrown hair, and those round-rimmed glasses crowding his face, she had sometimes noticed—his nose was surprisingly fine, his lips more plump than expected. “Was there something more to this one?” she had occasionally wondered.

But holding a grubby stone and earnestly debating whether it was a gemstone or just a pebble—her discerning eye was hardly keen. Once the tutoring session was over and she returned to her busy campus life, she easily forgot about her pupil, who quickly blurred into the background. The tutoring sessions had ended over a month ago, during which she hadn’t seen him at all. Since then, he had been just another ordinary face, quickly overshadowed by the talk of famous incoming freshmen.

Yet, cruelly enough, for Daeyeong—now twenty—the memory of reporting his college acceptance and receiving that quick kiss on the cheek remained the greatest achievement of his life. To him, it had been genuine love, and that was why rejection stung all the more. He had thought that, now enrolled in the same school, he could finally escape his gloomy high school days and freely enjoy romance with her.

“Damn…”

His very first heartbreak, delivered right at the start of campus life, hit heavy and bitter. He buried his face into the sleeve of his coat, chilled by the lingering winter air. The crinkling fabric’s fibers were quickly stained with his grief.

—Oh come on, that doesn’t even count as a kiss. …Listen, Daeyeong, I like somebody else.

Her muttered response, almost sighing with impatience, turned the sting of heartbreak into a lumpen ball of humiliation.

“Noona… were you toying with me?”

His lips trembled violently. And still, because their relationship had been defined by the roles of pupil and tutor, he could not even strip away his veneer of courtesy—an unbearable indignity. Fortunately, there was nobody else around to witness it. Tears soon welled until they fell in great droplets, unchecked.

“Pfft.”

Startled, Daeyeong’s swollen eyes widened. Slowly, he lowered the phone pressed to his ear and lifted his head.

Rustle.

There was someone there in the emergency exit. He had thought himself alone. No door had creaked open. Which meant—that person had probably been there from before his call began. Which meant—they had heard everything.

Blinded with tears and mucus streaming down his face, Daeyeong stared blankly at the man before him. Tall, towering, with chiselled features still clear even in his blurred vision. He clenched his brows to shake off the tears, only to feel the stranger’s gaze travel downward, sweeping his entire being.

In his hands, the stranger carried no phone, wore no earphones—his laugh was meant entirely, cruelly, for him. By the time Daeyeong belatedly spun away, it was already too late. The narrow stairwell left him no escape. Their clothing brushed audibly as the man shoved straight down the middle.

“Ah.”

At the faint voice, Daeyeong swiveled in panic, realizing only now that his sleeve had brushed the stranger. He hunched in apology, shrinking back to make way—but before that, he caught sight of the man’s face more clearly.

“Filthy.”

The word came laced with disgust, his expression steeped in scorn. Brushing imaginary dirt from his garments, the man’s lips moved again.

“Move.”

Hurriedly, Daeyeong yanked his sleeve back and stepped aside. Only then did it hit him: he had been pressed against the wall all along, and it was the other who had strode arrogantly through the center, brushing him deliberately. His brows knit in belated realization, but the other was already pushing out the emergency door a half-flight below.

“Damn it…”

—Let’s just hang up. Don’t contact me again. Congratulations on admission.

The call, too, ended in emptiness. Alone at last in the stairwell, Daeyeong collapsed to the floor, burying his face in his arm. Sniffling, sobbing, his scalp prickled with scorching humiliation—whether from exposure of his pitiful first breakup, or from being witnessed in such a sorry state, he could not tell.

He hated the world. He hated the noona who had wrung out tears and snot from him right at the start of university life. He hated that some stranger had seen him at his lowest. Though he told himself it didn’t matter—he would never have to see that man again—the truth was, he kept running into him.

The very next encounter seared most vividly. About three weeks into term, he was again with Hina.

On the grassy incline of campus, walking side by side, they were absorbed in conversation. Spotting them from afar, Daeyeong froze on the spot. Though the scar of heartbreak had long since dulled amidst the start-of-term commotion, the sight of Hina’s radiant face, alight as she laughed beside him, left his heart racing with shock.

His legs trembled, refusing to budge. As their footsteps drew closer, even their voices became plain to hear. He forced himself to shuffle aside at last, though his feet stuck like glue.

“There’s a gathering later. Want to come?”

“Why the hell would I? Stop following me.”

Hina’s voice carried a tinge of playful excitement, but the man’s was utterly flat, even irritated. Hearing it, Daeyeong was nearly struck dumb. It was only then that he tore his gaze off Hina and turned toward her companion. She, who had been gazing constantly at him, never noticed. But the man had spotted Daeyeong instantly. His lips curled into a crooked smirk—that alone was proof.

Daeyeong’s fists quaked in rage. How dare you, with my Hina noona… The mix of fury and sorrow frothed over, and yet another stab of self-loathing joined in: that given his enviable looks, of course anyone would have chosen the man over him. The realization stoked his humiliation further.

He remained rooted, floundering, as the two walked past and faded into the distance. Not long after, Hina halted abruptly, raising her voice into a phone call in clear frustration—his rejection had stung her pride. The image seared itself into Daeyeong’s chest.

It was at that moment that Daeyeong pinned the label of “enemy” squarely on the man.

And astonishingly, from then on, they began running into each other with relentless frequency. If circumstances had been different, he might have wondered whether fate was pushing them toward becoming friends. But this was plainly no such thing. Nearly every encounter left him miserable, humiliated, desperate to hide.

At length, even Daeyeong—who had tried to brush it off as coincidence—redirected all his indignation, all his anger, toward this man. Yes, from the very beginning, things had gone wrong.

Nemesis.

He was the first Nemesis to appear in Ahn Daeyeong’s life.