Cheongse Elementary Branch School didn’t have an official gym uniform. There were store-bought sets they wore during PE class, sure—but none of them had the school logo stitched on or anything.
When Cha Eui-sung first heard that, he had one simple thought: This place really is held together with duct tape.
And yet, for a place that barely scraped by, they sure had a lot going on.
“They say they used to hand out embroidered patches for students to sew on themselves, but I guess that kinda fell apart since nobody managed it properly.”
Kim Jeong-baek casually lifted a box full of sports drinks with one arm as he offered the unnecessary explanation.
“At least pretend it’s heavy. And stop being so careless.”
Rather than acknowledge him, Cha Eui-sung just called him out. To think the weakest of the three unregistered Awakened in Cheongseri was this sloppy. He wasn’t someone who took safety lightly—he must be seriously out of it today.
As he’d mentioned beforehand, Cha Eui-sung dropped by Kim Jeong-baek’s house early that morning. Usually quiet with just the two of them, the place was uncharacteristically chaotic now that Sports Day had arrived. As it got closer to the time they needed to leave, Kim Jeong-baek began loading snacks and drinks into the trunk by the boxload.
Word was, this was part of some charm campaign—trying to win people over by handing stuff out. But with his reputation already circling the drain, it was doubtful this would help much.
“Is it straight?”
Meanwhile, Seo-ryong had strapped blue bands around her wrists and head all by herself, and now she turned to show off to her uncle.
“Of course it is. You look great in blue, Seo-ryong. White bands are only for kids who want to look dirty.”
Kim Jeong-baek fussed over her with one of his weird compliments, and naturally, the kid’s eyes drifted over to Cha Eui-sung next. Not that it was hard to say something nice—so he went along with it.
“It’s not crooked.”
Still, Seo-ryong lingered like she was waiting for something more. What now? A compliment?
Sure, his written reports always praised her, but they weren’t exactly on the kind of terms where he’d dish out warm praise on demand.
“Looks like the Blue Team’s gonna win.”
He gave in to her expectant eyes and threw out something—anything. Seo-ryong’s lips twitched at that, and her gaze finally shifted away, seemingly satisfied.
Seated on the sofa, Cha Eui-sung stared absently at the gray tracksuit with neon yellow accents. The PE uniform he used to wear as a kid had been a garish yellow thing with a questionably ugly cut. Kids these days got to run around in decent-looking outfits.
“In the morning, it’ll probably just be the kids and a few parents. I doubt there’s anyone who outright hates you enough to make a scene.”
As he started the car, Kim Jeong-baek gathered the remaining bags and tried to sound reassuring.
Cha Eui-sung nodded absentmindedly while double-checking his hair in the phone screen.
A look that said get over yourself came his way, but the moment their eyes met, it vanished.
“A-Alright, stop checking yourself and let’s go. We’ve got everything ready.”
“I was waiting for you, Mr. Kim. I even offered to help, but you wouldn’t let me.”
“I thought you’d lost it, seriously! After everything yesterday, then showing up this morning looking like the damn poster boy for some shady cult—”
Shady cult, huh? All things considered, his current appearance was far too gentle and clear-eyed to match that description.
He tilted his head, as if daring him to say more. Kim Jeong-baek quickly averted his gaze.
Still, he didn’t push further. Like he said, Cha Eui-sung really was strangely calm right now, while Kim Jeong-baek had likely been a nervous wreck all night.
“What’s the schedule looking like again?”
When he shifted the topic, Kim Jeong-baek snuck a glance before answering.
“They’ll probably start with an opening ceremony or something. Some morning stretches for the kids, too.”
“And after that?”
“Hold on. I’ve gotta check… Ah, here it is. First program: music jump rope, sprinting, musical chairs, dodgeball. Then lunch break.”
“What the hell is ‘music jump rope’?”
“Guess it’s just jump rope to a song.”
“They do choreography too,” Seo-ryong added as she paused halfway through tying her sneakers.
Maybe the half-assed answer had annoyed her.
Kim Jeong-baek gave an enlightened nod, then caught sight of Seo-ryong’s outfit and hurried over with a different jacket.
“So if that’s part one, what’s in part two?”
“Let’s see… Tug-of-war, obstacle race, and color-flip. All the events are split between kids and adults.”
“So the villagers will probably start trickling in around then.”
“Some will. Others will come earlier to watch. The lunch is prepared by the women’s association, and they’re getting paid for it, so they’ll be there from the morning.”
“They’re making it so complicated. They could’ve just ordered burgers or something.”
“Who’s gonna deliver that many? You’d need to order at least a hundred sets just to get someone to come out this far. And if they were that big, this school wouldn’t have shut down in the first place.”
Step, step. As the door opened, warm sunlight poured across his face. Unusually mild for the cusp of winter.
Cha Eui-sung approached the idling car and glanced at his phone.
[You coming today?]
[Eh… not sure. Depends on how things go.]
That had been the last conversation he’d had with Moon Tae-young that morning, right before leaving the house. Not that Moon Tae-young was ever verbose, but today’s messages were particularly clipped.
Because they both knew what day it was. Neither of them wanted to be the one to bring up Sports Day.
Moon Tae-young probably hoped, just like Cha Eui-sung had suspected, that he wouldn’t show.
But Cha Eui-sung had every intention of dropping in unannounced, regardless of his worries.
What, does he think I’ve got zero social sense or something?
No one—especially not Moon Tae-young—could believe for a second that he couldn’t keep it together on the outside, no matter what he was thinking inside.
It wasn’t that.
He just didn’t want to see it. Didn’t want to witness someone misinterpreting things. Didn’t want to watch him stuck in the middle of people he didn’t care for, sensing the tension in the air.
It was pointless worry. And yet, it didn’t feel bad.
If anything, the emptiness inside filled with a quiet warmth, and Cha Eui-sung found himself taking long, slow breaths again and again.
***
Sports Day… What did the parents even do at those things again?
Cha Eui-sung remembered a lot. Not just work-related knowledge—he could recite facts about economics, society, major figures, incidents and scandals…
But that didn’t mean he could store everything. If something wasn’t useful, it slipped away easily. The brain only had so much space, after all, and scrubbing out pointless memories was simply efficient.
No one ever came to my school events anyway, so of course…
To be honest, Cha Eui-sung barely remembered Sports Day at all. All that came to mind was the scorching autumn sun, the free hamburgers, and the throat-burning thirst.
He had no recollection of how the games went, what he did while other classes were up, or even if he was good at anything. Maybe once or twice there’d been a stir about someone’s parent being a Hunter… something like that.
He stared at the white line drawn on the dirt field, a faint sense of something brushing the edge of memory. But it never came into focus. That was it.
It couldn’t be helped. With two regressions behind him, his childhood felt less like a past and more like a past life altogether.
In the end, Cha Eui-sung just gave up and looked across the sports field, thinking of Moon Tae-young instead. Replacing the faint blur of childhood with the image of that man made things feel a little easier.
What kind of face is he going to show up with?
He turned his head and spotted a small patch of sand on one side of the field. Back when he’d first arrived in Cheongseri and snooped around, Moon Tae-young had been standing there in casual clothes, a whistle slung around his neck.
Every time he blew it—pweeeet—the kids clumsily attempted long jumps.
It hadn’t been anything remarkable, but for some reason, that moment stuck with him in vivid detail.
Weird, how unsettling this feels all of a sudden.
That man who was teaching kids in a way so completely unlike what he’d expected. Just seeing his silhouette stirred a strange, distant emotion.
Maybe because that image had been burned in so strongly— Even now, when he suspected Moon Tae-young might be pulling real villain shit in some hidden dungeon, he just… didn’t seem like the Demon King.
Physically, he was terrifyingly strong. His personality definitely had some warped edges.
At best, he was playing the role—posing as the Demon King. That was as far as Cha Eui-sung could push the label. No matter what he was really doing inside that so-called “Control Tower” dungeon.
“Oh hey, the Yeo-joon family just got here!”
While Cha Eui-sung had been lost in those thoughts, Kim Jeong-baek—who was never exactly a social butterfly—was suddenly rushing around, greeting people with energy.
As few in number as the students were, there were even fewer parents. They stood in twos and threes around the edges of the field, chatting in quiet clusters.
Then someone must’ve said something, because several heads suddenly turned in his direction all at once.
Only when he locked eyes with them did Cha Eui-sung snap back to himself.
Hair’s fine. Outfit’s fine. Eyes…
Since he’d already gotten compared to a cultist earlier, he made a point to wipe any trace of that “pure and radiant” look off his face.
Instead, he sharpened his gaze a little, lowered his eyebrows—just enough to look like a young man who’d been through a lot in life but hadn’t lost his goodness.
He even averted his eyes shyly, playing up the reserved type. Given his history, looking too confident wouldn’t land well. This played better.
Right on cue, Kim Jeong-baek circled back and muttered in a hushed voice.
“Sports Day’s about to start. I made sure the spotlight’s on you for now, so before the teachers and kids come out, just… you know what to do, yeah?”
The moment he heard the word “teacher,” a chill ran down Cha Eui-sung’s spine.
“How many minutes left?”
“Let me see… Twenty-one. But they might come out a bit early, honestly.”
“Got it. Thanks for the heads-up.”
His tunnel vision began to ease, and he started taking in his surroundings all at once.
As expected, the spot where he was standing had a weird, awkward atmosphere hanging over it.
It was far too late to try scoring sympathy points now.
Fifteen minutes, tops.
If he could clean up the mood in that window, everything that came after would go much more smoothly.
