Chapter 9

I hate people.

I hate good people and bad people equally. To me, the two are not different in the slightest.

I don’t judge people by good and evil.

Because everyone hides a cruel nature deep in their hearts that can rival evil.

I remember starting to properly recognize my ability around the age of four or five. I think it was around then.

The first victim was, naturally, ‘Mom.’

Mom was afraid of me and loathed me, tried to kill me once, and in the end couldn’t handle any of it and abandoned me and left.

Since then, I’ve been alone the whole time.

My father is indifferent to me, and my grandmother tried to fix me and failed once, tried to use me and failed once—after two failures in total, she abandoned me like Mom did.

I’ve lived alone since I turned fifteen, and ever since, I’ve been handling myself alone.

Desperately carrying on my back a secret no one would believe even if I were caught, crawling like a turtle.

Somehow, like a cockroach.

Holding one of the most beautiful flowers in the universe preciously to my chest.

The only fortunate thing is that I wasn’t dragged off to some government agency like in movies or dramas.

I’ve briefly thought that might actually be better, but that was literally only for a moment—I’m satisfied with my current life in my own way.

Because, as I mentioned earlier, I have a precious flower—though it hurts my heart that I have to pluck it—anyway, a flower that is like salvation.

So now I don’t want to be dragged anywhere.

I’d rather die without fully understanding my ability than be dragged away—I want to live freely like this.

There was a time I wanted to know the identity, the true nature, of this curse-like ability I have.

I read all kinds of books, wandered the internet, and formulated hypotheses, but now I’ve given up to some extent.

First, my only test subject is me, and the risks of attempting experiments were too great. More precisely, it’s accurate to say I gave up because continuing to try was too hard and painful.

From the spring I turned twelve to the summer I turned eighteen, I accumulated experimental data on about three hundred people with no connection to me whatsoever.

The experiment locations were safe, open places that weren’t too crowded. The subjects were anyone who looked ordinary, regardless of age or gender. For those I couldn’t read with a single touch, I chased them and tried repeatedly until I could read them, and including data obtained through unfortunate accidents, the amount was considerable.

Nevertheless, all I’ve been able to figure out so far are a few fragmentary things.

First, physical contact is a required condition.

Second, meeting the condition doesn’t mean it always activates.

Third, even for someone I couldn’t read on the first attempt, I can always read them within an average of three or four tries.

Fourth, therefore the probability is slightly above thirty percent.

Fifth, if contact lasts longer than three seconds, the probability rises exponentially.

Sixth, the memories read are random.

Seventh, it is a deeply shameful and painful process for me.

And eighth, random doesn’t mean completely random.

Intense memories, intense emotions, intense feelings—whatever it is, one of the intense things is selected at random.

And most people—almost ninety-nine percent of people—hold onto negative things intensely.

Things like anger, hatred, disgust, greed, envy, frustration, and fear.

Things like joy, sympathy, happiness, fluttering excitement, sorrow, mourning, and guilt are weaker than those.

Far weaker.

I have never read the weak things through people’s skin.

Except for one single time.

Lee Dong-hwi is the same.

The year I became a university student, I informed several people in the English department that I had a long-standing illness and that because of it I couldn’t come into contact with people.

‘Humane Contact Inability Syndrome.’

It’s a disease name I made up, but if you say such a disease exists, then it exists. Because there are many rare diseases in the world, and people are less interested in others than you’d think.

But wherever you go, there are bound to be a few suspicious and curious humans.

Lee Dong-hwi didn’t seem to believe me. Or maybe he was half in doubt.

During a first-year required major class, Lee Dong-hwi eventually caused an incident.

During the break given after an hour of class, he grabbed the nape of my neck with that large, thick palm of his as I was lying face down on my desk taking notes. Gently, as if measuring the circumference of my neck, with a slight squeeze and release. In other words, like kneading.

As if mocking the thirty percent probability, I collapsed face down onto the desk and convulsed like someone electrocuted. Eight, nine seconds later, I got up as if nothing had happened and, in front of my year-mates who had crowded around murmuring, exposed his secret.

‘Why are you dating Imina? While thinking Kim Jina is prettier than Imina. While thinking every night, every time you masturbate, that you actually want to date Kim Jina.’

Then I left the raving Lee Dong-hwi behind, packed my things, and went home. A few days later, I heard the rumor that Lee Dong-hwi and Imina, who had been a campus couple, had broken up. I felt satisfied.

I also thought he was a pervert.

No matter how much of a joke it was, I thought it was nothing short of sexual molestation.

I thought Lee Dong-hwi was bad, that it was entirely his fault.

Every time we passed each other, every time we unavoidably ran into each other during major classes, every time I met Lee Dong-hwi’s gaze filled with hatred and resentment toward me, I thought so.

Even without speaking, those thoughts of mine must have been conveyed to Lee Dong-hwi intact. I heard through rumors that Lee Dong-hwi was talking behind my back, but it was just laughable.

Still, I avoided him as much as possible whenever I saw him.

I was afraid of that kid.

I remembered elementary school. Because I recalled young boys who had nothing to fear or hesitate about, who were cruel because they were ignorant.

And now this kind of mess happened again. Because of a stupid revenge mentality.

Piercing through the thirty percent probability twice.

Probability is just probability.

But that bastard Lee Dong-hwi—those sneakers aren’t even his, so why did he wear them out?

*

I opened my eyes to the sensation of hands slapping my cheeks. Even if they hadn’t slapped me, I would have woken up on my own when the time came, but they deliberately slapped me… dangerously…

But what I saw was a flower. No, Gi In-hwa.

Gi In-hwa, rivaling a flower. No, Gi In-hwa, more beautiful than a flower.

Gi In-hwa…?

Startled, I shot up my upper body. Only then did all the noises of the restaurant rush into my muffled ears like a wave.

“Student, are you awake? No, what on earth is all this?”

Someone who looked like a cafeteria lady picked up the tray rolling on the floor and wore a worried expression.

“Are you okay?”

A male student in a cap asked loudly from a distance.

“Excuse me, I recorded what just happened on video almost from the beginning, you know? If you’re going to press charges…”

A female student in a leather jacket approached and held out her phone. Just then, Lee Dong-hwi sprang out from beside her and blocked the female student.

“Press charges, what charges? I’m the victim here! She’s putting on a whole show! She’s a total repeat offender—this isn’t even the first time I’ve been hit by her! Ah, frustrating!”

“I saw with my own two eyes that you hit her right here, like this—wham!—and she passed out! What are you talking about?”

“That’s not what I mean!”

“What do you mean it’s not? You’re literally a violent offender caught in the act! And a man! Hitting a woman! At school, no less!”

The woman even mimed striking the side of her own head as she argued passionately, and Lee Dong-hwi was on the verge of tears, looking like he was dying of injustice. As I watched them blankly, Gi In-hwa asked beside me in a flat tone, “Any injuries.”

Injuries…

After feeling the back of my head for a moment, I soon shook my head.

If he meant physical injuries, there were none. My back ached a little from hitting the table when I fell backward, but everywhere else was fine.

But my heart seemed a little hurt.

A short time—less than ten seconds at minimum, twelve seconds at most.

It was only that much time, but the sight of me convulsing must have been quite ugly. It was something I would have to show him someday if I wanted to stay by his side, but I didn’t want to show it at this point.

Gi In-hwa still doesn’t know me well, thinks of me as a bothersome blackmailer, might even hate me, I’m not as pretty as No Joo-eun, and on top of that I showed him such an ugly sight…

No, maybe… he might have heard what I said when I threw those paltry bills at Lee Dong-hwi’s chest.

I feel like I can hear my image hitting rock bottom. If there’s any image left to fall further, that is.

If there were a mouse hole, I’d want to hide in it, but there’s no hole anywhere big enough for me to fit into, and above all, I’m still a spectacle even now.

The woman in the leather jacket, still confronting Lee Dong-hwi, pointed at me and shouted.

“You have eyes, so look! She’s awake but still can’t even get up!”

“It’s not that she can’t get up—she’s just not getting up!”

Lee Dong-hwi shouted just as loudly, not to be outdone, and was almost in tears. Wearing one-million-two-hundred-thousand-won sneakers, white ones at that, not even his own, covered in side-dish soup.

I slowly rose from my seat. Gi In-hwa, who had been kneeling on one knee, rose at the same speed as me.

A kind person.

He acts so blade-sharp, but in the end he’s a tender person.

A person like his name—knife (刃) and flower (花).

I looked up at Gi In-hwa’s profile for a moment, and when he turned his head this way, I lowered my gaze again.

The woman in the leather jacket opened her eyes wide and asked, “Are you okay?” As she did, she looked at me, then at Gi In-hwa. In the end, she looked at Gi In-hwa. While asking after my well-being.

To the woman who wasn’t looking at me, I said, “I’m fine, thank you,” and unusually for me, I was polite.

Then I added, “I appreciate it, but I don’t think I’ll need the video.”

“Why not?”

The woman, her round eyes growing even wider, looked at me again and asked. Her expression said: how can you just let something like that slide?