Na-yoon and Seo Na-ri were walking through Adventure Island in the southern part of the theme park.
It was because the attraction they were supposed to go to was in this direction.
“Um…”
“……”
An awkward silence lingered between them the entire way.
To be precise, the awkwardness was felt only by Na-yoon; Seo Na-ri didn’t seem to have any particular thoughts at all.
This is… uncomfortable….
She thought about starting a conversation to break the ice, but Na-yoon’s MBTI was strongly introverted.
Trying to initiate small talk with someone she had only met today was simply beyond her.
Still, the other party was a child. As the adult here, shouldn’t she be the one to take the first step?
Na-yoon gathered her courage and managed to speak.
“D-Do you think the other teams will be all right? I’m a bit worried since it looked like the Team Leader’s group didn’t get along too well~”
“Mhmm.”
“..…?”
“……”
Th-That’s it?
Na-yoon regretted bringing it up at all.
Why did this kind of exchange feel strangely familiar?
It was probably because she had been spending so much time with Kang-joon lately.
Now that she thought about it, talking with Kang-joon always felt like this too.
He was always so wrapped up in his own world that no matter what she said, he would simply respond with whatever he wanted and end the conversation.
Come to think of it, they both have the same last name, Seo… Could they be family?
She thought it was a reasonable guess, but upon further reflection, it didn’t make any sense.
If her hunch was right and Seo Kang-joon really was the human Kang-joon from the past, then considering the time he’d been missing and Seo Na-ri’s age, wouldn’t that make her nearly young enough to be his daughter?
She didn’t know much about Kang-joon yet, but somehow she couldn’t imagine him as someone’s father.
No way, right…? There’s no way they’re actually related.
Na-yoon glanced at Seo Na-ri’s profile and tried to picture Kang-joon’s face back when he was human.
Do they… maybe look a little alike?
Honestly, she couldn’t tell at all. Their overall vibe was completely different.
Their blunt manner of speaking did seem somewhat similar, but other than that, it was hard to find any similarities.
The only thing she could say for certain was that Seo Na-ri was really pretty.
Even though she was a Korean, she had such beautiful white hair. She really looked like a doll.
At that moment, Seo Na-ri stared at her with a blank expression.
Had she been too obvious and finally gotten caught staring?
When their eyes suddenly met, Na-yoon was startled and quickly turned her head away.
Na-yoon watched Seo Na-ri’s expression for a while, but eventually, her curiosity got the best of her, and she spoke up.
“Uh, Na-ri-ah…”
“..…?”
She felt too awkward to ask directly, so she tried to approach it subtly.
“Don’t… don’t your family members mind that you’re working here?”
“Here?”
“Y-You know, the Security Bureau.”
Seo Na-ri was silent for a moment before she gave a small nod.
“Mhmm.”
“Oh, r-right… I see.”
It was the brief answer she expected, so she wasn’t exactly disappointed, but now there was something else nagging at her.
She wasn’t even attending school at her age and yet her family had no issue with her working at a place as dangerous as the Security Bureau?
The thought crossed her mind that Seo Na-ri’s family might have a complicated story of their own.
Before long, the two arrived at the entrance to the mirror maze attraction.
The first thing that caught their eye was the large sign posted at the entrance.
[Please enter one person at a time.]
“What’s the point of pairing us up in twos if they’re going to do this?”
Na-yoon muttered to herself, but only the eerie sound of wind replied.
The entrance to the mirror maze was a giant mirror itself that radiated an unmistakably ominous aura.
Now that she thought about it, this might be a trap carefully prepared by the devil just for intruders.
The thought of walking into it on her own made her legs start to tremble.
S-Sir Kang-joon… you’re watching, right? You’ll help if things go sideways, right?
While Na-yoon hesitated over whether to enter, Seo Na-ri strode forward and went in first.
“I’ll go ahead.”
“H-Huh?”
In the blink of an eye, Seo Na-ri disappeared into the mirror.
Watching her disappear, Na-yoon debated whether to follow.
But being alone here wasn’t an option either, so she finally forced herself to push down her fear and step into the mirror.
After a strange sensation, as if she had passed through water, Na-yoon suddenly found herself in a corridor filled with mirrors.
She was certain she had followed Seo Na-ri inside, yet no matter how hard she looked around, Na-ri was nowhere to be seen.
Under the dim lighting, only endless mirrors reflected back at her from every direction.
Just then, she noticed something faintly flitting by in the distance.
“Eek!”
Startled, she hunched her shoulders, but on closer inspection, she saw it was only her own reflection in the mirror.
Na-yoon felt as if she had aged ten years in that instant.
“I-I nearly died of shock…”
Just as she breathed a sigh of relief, someone suddenly spoke beside her.
[Scared?]
“Of course I’m scared—heeekyaaaa?!”
When Na-yoon turned her head, her reflection in the mirror was grinning at her with a strange twist to its lips.
That mocking expression was one she would never wear, not in a million years.
[What will you do if you’re already scared? This is just the beginning.]
“Ahhh! A ghost!!”
Na-yoon spun around to flee but ended up slamming her face directly into a mirror.
“Eww—!”
She collapsed to the floor and was momentarily dazed from the impact.
When she finally regained her senses, Na-yoon found herself surrounded by reflections of herself in the mirrors.
Every version of Na-yoon in the mirrors had their mouths twisted in mocking smiles, all sneering at her.
[You’re really stupid and slow, aren’t you?]
[Since you were young, you’ve never been good at a single thing]
[Even your parents liked your younger sibling way more than you.]
[Look at you, all grown up and still haven’t achieved anything, with not a single close friend.]
“S-Stop…”
The reflections continued their mocking and criticisms. They were stirring up the deepest traumas within Na-yoon.
[No one’s going to come save you, you know. Everyone just finds you a burden.]
[Wouldn’t it be better if you just didn’t exist?]
[Ah, really. Why are you even still alive?]
[You’ve never had a single truly happy moment in your life, have you?]
“A-A happy moment in my life…”
Not a word the mirror reflections said was wrong.
The light in Na-yoon’s eyes slowly dimmed.
“C-Come to think of it… this is the first time I’ve even been to a theme park. Back then, in the classroom, I couldn’t pay the activity fee… I just stayed alone in the empty classroom and waited until school finally ended…”
Na-yoon’s expression sank into sadness.
“When it was lunchtime, I didn’t even have friends to eat with… My homeroom teacher once invited me to join her, but that just made me feel even more embarrassed… So, in the end, I spent every lunch hiding in the bathroom until the break was over…”
Her voice grew quieter and quieter.
“There were days when… from morning until evening, I didn’t say a single word. No one ever spoke to me… It wasn’t like I’d taken a vow of silence… Eventually, when my mom told me to come eat dinner, the first thing I’d say that day was ‘Thank you for the meal’…”
The reflections of Na-yoon in the mirror stopped their jeering and looked at one another with startled expressions.
“…….”
[“-Yeah, that’s right. You’re worthless. It’d be better if someone like you didn’t even exist.]
“You’re right… maybe that’s true… Now that I think about it, that’s how it was during the sports festival too. No one asked me to join their group, so I couldn’t participate in any individual events… I only got to join the class jump rope event, but every time I jumped, I kept getting tangled up, and our class was the first to lose… The way my classmates looked at me then… I really wanted to disappear…”
[S-Stop.]
[Just stop…!]
“And there was that time… during vacation, when everyone got together, but I was the only one who didn’t know the date—”
[Aaagh!]
[Stop! Stop it!]
[I can’t take this anymore!!]
Suddenly, a loud shattering sound echoed from all directions.
Mirrors around her broke into countless fragments, followed by sharp screams that soon gave way to silence.
At that moment, it was as if a spell had lifted, and light returned to Na-yoon’s once-clouded eyes.
“H-Huh?”
Na-yoon looked around her in a daze.
Only then did she realize that all the mirrors surrounding her had shattered into pieces.
While she stood there, still bewildered and unable to make sense of the situation, Kang-joon’s incredulous voice sounded in her mind.
[You are… really amazing, in a way.]
“S-Sir Kang-joon!”
When she heard his voice, a surge of anger rose in Na-yoon.
Wasn’t Kang-joon ultimately the reason she’d gone through this ordeal?
If he had been standing in front of her, she would’ve grabbed him by the collar and shaken him with all her might.
Of course, she knew full well that if it came down to it, she would never actually be able to do that.
As her anger subsided, she began to feel a wave of relief.
Like him or not, in the end, the only one Na-yoon could rely on was Kang-joon.
“Please, Sir Kang-joon! Get me out of here! I’m seriously going to die at this rate!”
[You handled it fine on your own, so why all the fuss]
“Th-This place is practically a den of devils! There’s no guarantee things will even go well… Ah! Or maybe Sir Kang-joon could just take them out? You know, like last time, with one punch—bam! Boom! Pow!”
Kang-joon responded in a dismissive tone.
[No.]
“Wh-Why not?”
[If I solve everything for you, how exactly are you planning to get promoted?]
Na-yoon suddenly felt dizzy.
Promotion to team leader…was he seriously being sincere about it?
[This is an opportunity. I hear it’s a pretty strong one. If you get good results here, the contract process will speed up that much more.]
“I’m saying this because I feel like I’ll die before I can get any results!”
[I even gave you powers so you wouldn’t die. Besides, there’s someone who seems more likely to die before you do.]
“Huh?”
[That little white-haired kid.]
Na-yoon’s mind suddenly cleared.
Come to think of it, what happened to Na-ri, who went in before me?
Just then, as Na-yoon was lost in thought, she heard a distant, painful sob echo in her ears.
“No… stop…!!”
It was Seo Na-ri’s voice.
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