Just as Jae-ha furrowed his brow at the sudden, ominous feeling of being locked in eye contact, Hyung-jun’s voice rang out across the hall.
“Right here, right now… a relay staring contest!”
The rules were simple: whoever won stayed on stage until they lost, while the losers were grouped into teams of three in turn.
“And, of course, our very first challenger will be the pride of the Business Department, the very name synonymous with business itself—Seo Jae-ha! Please come up to the stage.”
With practiced ease, Hyung-jun drew out applause and cheers as he called Jae-ha forward. Still processing, Jae-ha stepped onto the platform and found himself facing nearly a hundred pairs of eyes. The focus here was on an entirely different level than the last event.
“Wow, look at everyone’s eyes suddenly sparkling.”
Hyung-jun joked, and a ripple of laughter swept through the auditorium.
“Alright, to move things along… If you’ve ever wanted to look a handsome guy in the eye from up close, raise your hand!”
The moment those words left Hyung-jun’s lips, hands shot up all around. Since Jae-ha had been unintentionally well-known in the department since his freshman year, being singled out publicly was nothing new. It wasn’t embarrassing—at this point, it hardly even counted as a performance. He figured he’d just play along and step down when it was over.
But things didn’t go quite the way he expected.
“Dude… this isn’t even fair.”
“Is anyone actually trying to win?”
In less than a minute, he’d beaten five people in a row. Blinking at the backs of his defeated opponents, Jae-ha wondered what was happening. All he was doing was opening and closing his eyes—and yet he kept winning.
Some people shut their eyes the instant they met his gaze; others couldn’t even bring themselves to look at him in the first place. Gasps of surprise and odd little squeals of amazement came as a bonus.
…Is this rigged? Are they messing with me? The thought crossed his mind as the bizarre streak continued. But the nervous, stiff faces of his opponents didn’t look like they were faking it.
Even the ones who seemed to be holding on would falter the second Jae-ha shifted his posture—blinking reflexively and then staring in disbelief at themselves.
“Hey, Seo Jae… what’s with that face power?”
“No… this is way too close.”
“I feel weird. I’m forfeiting.”
Even his usual classmates couldn’t hold out against him. What the hell are you guys doing…? Those who hadn’t gone yet tilted their heads like it couldn’t be that hard, while the ones who had already faced him shared a look of solidarity, as if they were comrades who had survived the same battle. “You too?” “Yeah, me too…”
A few people managed a normal match with him, but even then—
“Seo Jae-ha wins again!”
“Ruthless, man… Is he even human?”
Apparently, Jae-ha was good at staring contests. A talent he hadn’t known he possessed.
“How many are left?”
“About twenty?”
“This is nuts. Oppa, are you some kind of professional?”
At first he hadn’t cared, but after a while, a competitive streak started to rise in him. Maybe he’d caught it from hanging around Ju Hae-hyun. It felt silly, but he couldn’t bring himself to just lose on purpose.
And that’s how, before he knew it, Jae-ha earned the title of the Business Department’s staring contest champion. For the record, this little episode turned into legend, and for the next five years his name was brought up at every MT.
“Wow, the game’s basically turned into ‘Just beat Seo Jae-ha.’”
Hyung-jun clicked his tongue when he saw there were no challengers left. Alone on the stage, Jae-ha shot him a flat look.
“So what am I supposed to do now?”
“Uh… good point.”
As luck would have it, all the other teams were already filled with three people, leaving Jae-ha on his own.
“Well then, wanna just pick a team? Winner’s privilege—you get to choose.”
He felt all eyes flick toward him. Friends from other teams were already waving, trying to reel him in. Scanning the groups, he was about to just pick one at random when he spotted Ji-hyang.
“Over there, then.”
“Hmm? Yoon-taek’s group? Sure.”
“Yes! Hyung, welcome aboard!”
That team was made up of familiar faces: Yoo Ji-hyang, Han Jeong-seok, and Lee Yoon-taek—naturally, since they’d all volunteered to face him earlier.
“Ha, Seo Jae. Thank god you’re here. Otherwise it’s just cowards on this team.”
As soon as he joined them, Ji-hyang’s expression brightened as she complained. She was famously skittish in the department. Jeong-seok had once admitted he couldn’t even sit through a horror film. Yoon-taek at least was into superstitions, though that didn’t necessarily make him brave.
“Hyung, they say this mountain’s full of ghosts. Do you think that’s true? Not that I’m scared or anything, but should we all hold hands?”
…Not much of an improvement.
And so the four of them began trudging up the mountain path in a bizarre hand-linked chain. At every rustle of wind or whisper of leaves, they squealed and huddled closer until, before long, they were clumped tightly around Jae-ha.
“Guys, spread out.”
“Yeah, this is hard to walk—aaah!”
Pretending to play along, Ji-hyang suddenly yelped and threw herself against him, hugging so tightly he nearly toppled. The force knocked into his ribs, and he stifled a cough behind his hand. Realizing it was useless to say anything, Jae-ha gave up. They weren’t going to listen anyway.
“Hyung, how much farther?”
Jeong-seok, clinging from behind, had apparently shut his eyes completely. His trembling voice said it all.
“Shouldn’t be much.”
Shining his phone’s light ahead, Jae-ha spotted something like a desk in the distance. It was a blessing he was the tallest—at least they wouldn’t get hopelessly lost with his clear line of sight above the three clingers.
“Hyung, aren’t you scared?”
The unspoken “how could you not be?” hung in the air. Ji-hyang answered instead.
“He yawns through horror movies. He’s insane.”
“Yeah, insane—so could you let go of my arm?”
“Aaah! Don’t abandon me!”
When he half-jokingly shook his arm free, Ji-hyang shrieked and latched on again. If he teased her any further she might start crying, so Jae-ha let it go.
It wasn’t surprising, really. Seo Jae-ha, a thrill-seeker at heart, had long since devoured horror. He’d once spent a whole month shut in at home watching nothing but horror films. He’d gone through every haunted house attraction at amusement parks, cultural villages, even paid horror experiences, and escape rooms designed to terrify. With all that, a bit of walking in the dark woods was nothing.
“Hyung, do you see any trees with white cloth tied to them? That’s supposed to be a guardian tree.”
Meanwhile, Yoon-taek was craning his neck left and right like an explorer searching for signs of spirits. Hunched over and stuck to Jae-ha’s side, he looked more ridiculous than heroic.
“Guys, stop squeezing so hard. We still have to move forward.”
“Slow down, slooowly!”
“Please, hyung, I’m about to cry…”
“Fine, just don’t cry.”
Wearing a calm face, Jae-ha plodded on. They still had a long way to go.
At the first checkpoint, Min-hee burst out laughing the moment she saw them.
“Ahahaha! Oppa, what are you doing?”
Her shrill laughter rang across the mountain. Ji-hyang nearly cried that their planning was the worst, while Jeong-seok dramatically claimed even Satan himself would weep at this cruelty.
“Wow, it’s barely started and this group’s already a disaster. Jae-ha oppa, how unlucky are you, ending up with them?”
Clearly unconcerned, Min-hee giggled as she stamped Jae-ha’s card. Even among friends, he had to reach through the three barnacles clinging to him just to grab it back. Min-hee pointed them in the right direction.
“Just keep going straight. You’ll hit a big fork—make sure to go left. The right path goes deeper into the mountain, and it’s dangerous. We marked it, so you’ll know when you see it.”
“Alright, see you later. Be careful.”
Jae-ha gave her a casual wave and turned, dragging his three burdens along with him as they all shuffled to follow.
“Guys, get a grip. If you keep this up, I’ll leave you behind.”
“Ah, please… without you, we’re dead.”
“You’re not gonna die.”
As he corralled Ji-hyang’s whining and herded the group forward, the back of Jae-ha’s head looked, somehow… like a bodhisattva resigned to a path of hardship.
