A year has come to an end, and a new year has risen.
This was the first new year I experienced in this body. The year changed, but nothing in my life particularly changed. People who were busy at the end of the year were now busy at the beginning of the year. So my daily life wouldn’t change in the future either.
“Seriously, if you sprinkle chili powder on jjajangmyeon, it’s amazing!”
…It shouldn’t have happened.
“If you don’t want to get hit, put that down.”
“Ugh, you don’t know good taste.”
Han-bom’s vow to never put kimchi soup in her gukbap was definitely true. Since she was trying to add chili powder to jjajangmyeon instead of gukbap. She already tried it when she first moved in, and now, without Ham Yejin, she was doing the same thing again.
After Han-bom moved here, we started eating together often. The reason was simple. Han-bom couldn’t cook. According to her statement, she had a cursed hand that made even ramen taste like garbage. So, she naturally relied on delivery food.
Of course, Han-bom was a woman and had an average woman’s stomach size. I also wasn’t someone with a big appetite. It wasn’t strange that we soon started ordering delivery together, as we both tended to leave a lot of leftovers no matter what we ordered. There was no need to forcibly order extra side dishes to meet the delivery fee, and food waste was reduced. It was the perfect combination.
The problem was that this person seemed to have strange beliefs about food and always tried to give me unsolicited advice on how to eat. While it wasn’t as outrageous as pouring kimchi soup randomly, she kept trying to persuade me like this. I was on edge, thinking she might sneakily add chili powder to my dish.
In fact, adding chili powder to jjajangmyeon wasn’t an unusual combination. I didn’t particularly dislike it. At least, until I saw Han-bom spoon large tablespoons of chili powder into her jjajangmyeon.
“This is really delicious.”
“Isn’t it going to ruin the taste?”
“When you become an adult, you’ll understand this taste.”
“I’m already an adult.”
“You look like a pretty girl, so okay!”
“What’s okay about that?”
Tsk.
Contrary to her wild image, Han-bom’s house was quite neat. Actually, it was more desolate than clean. There was hardly anything in it, akin to my own place. It seemed like she was cleaning better than I expected.
Looking at the image, I would have thought there would be dolls stacked in her room, but it didn’t seem like there were any. If I think about it, the one who actually kept dolls was Ham Yejin.
And on one side of the living room filled with bookshelves…
“Are all those comics?”
“There are also light novels.”
Rather than the kind of literary books I thought would naturally be there, it was filled with all sorts of comics and novels. It was true she was a poet, as there were various poetry collections present. But right next to them were all those boy’s comic series; how could anyone notice the poetry?
“You can look at them if you want!”
“If I feel like it.”
She didn’t look like someone who had any attachment to the literary world. It wouldn’t be strange to aim for it again since her web novel career had flopped. Of course, poetry doesn’t make money, but the real target was novels.
“There’s not much in your house.”
“I’m currently practicing minimalism, so I threw away all unnecessary junk.”
“Considering that, there’s hardly any furniture.”
“I accidentally threw away the furniture too.”
…That must be a joke. Let’s not react unnecessarily. It would only worsen my bad habits. Fortunately, it seemed to be a genuine joke; she soon mentioned ordering new furniture.
“I have everything I need, so there’s no problem living for now. I can fill it bit by bit! There’s plenty of time.”
“It sounds like you plan to live here for the rest of your life.”
“The rent is cheap. Even if I fall behind for a few months, I think Yejin will be patient.”
If this person ever asked me to lend her money, I made a firm resolution to never lend her any.
As I started having meals with her, I naturally began to learn more about Han-bom. Since she talked a lot and shared various stories, it wasn’t hard to know her.
What I felt while doing so was that this person was probably the least poet-like person in the world. Poets are, of course, humans. I didn’t expect anything special, but still… it was a bit much.
When I read Han-bom’s poetry, I felt it was full of irrationality and absurdity. A world that was slightly off-kilter, and a profound illogic that makes it impossible to recognize one’s ideals—those were the feelings her poems evoked. Although she undoubtedly wrote about nature, the themes she dealt with connected to stars and the universe. Not symbols, but real celestial bodies and the cold universe, and what is normal.
Han-bom reasoned all of that as normal. It was indeed normal. After all, what we consider common sense is often not so. How many things in this world are not the common sense we think they are?
So in Han-bom’s world, there are no abnormalities. Because it is perfect in itself and beautiful in itself.
I imagined someone who wrote such poetry would be gentle yet firm, calm.
But Han-bom right now…
“Ah!! I failed again, again!!!”
Was pouring money into some strange otaku game in real-time.
“Is that fun?”
“No? It’s not fun at all. Who would find this kind of game enjoyable? If there’s anyone, I’d be the first to hit them. I’m going to sue the people who made this. The charges would be environmental pollution and operating a gambling den, as well as fraud.”
“…Then why do you spend money on such a game?”
“Because my favorite character is there…?”
Just because there’s a mountain, don’t say things like that.
“If you get your favorite character, will you stop playing?”
“I have a lot of favorites.”
…But why do you add the prefix ‘favorite’?
“How about Seol-guk try pulling once?”
And then Han-bom shoved the game screen in front of me.
On her smartphone, a gacha pull from what seemed to be a rather popular game was on display.
“This is the last shot left, if I use this up, I’ll really have to spend money.”
“Wasn’t what you did until now spending money?”
“It’s free jewels.”
I see, so there was such a system. At least it seemed she wasn’t the type to throw money at it thoughtlessly.
Whatever happens with that was none of my concern. However, I thought she would be grateful if I pulled for her, but wouldn’t be angry if things went south.
I tapped the button that said ten consecutive pulls, and soon a dazzling display appeared with a rainbow-colored envelope.
“Uh, uh?! Oh! Please!!”
It seemed like something good was coming out. If it was rainbow-colored, it must be the best. Han-bom suddenly began praying to God and Buddha without opening the envelope. It’s nice to pray, but wouldn’t that make her a heretic if she does both?
“Please!!!”
And the gacha result.
“Ah.”
“Did you get something?”
“…Something good came out, but it’s not what I wanted.”
Han-bom’s ambiguous expression was quite a sight. It was certainly good news, yet her face was radiating a feeling of unfairness. It was complicated in many ways and would likely help in describing emotional expressions.
What Han-bom had aimed for was a cute girl character with white hair, but instead, she ended up with a character featuring large breasts and revealing clothes, which seemed to be favored by boys.
“Ugh, should we stop here? Due to the move, I don’t have much money for a while… I’d need to wait another month to get the salary from the new company…”
“But you’re a girl, and you play games like this?”
There’s a lot of exposure, isn’t there? No matter how I look at it, this isn’t a game a girl should play.
“That’s gender discrimination. And there are plenty of boy characters here. Usually, the boy characters are stronger.”
“Why?”
“Because boy characters don’t sell well, they use performance as leverage.”
Isn’t that the very definition of gender discrimination…? It seemed there was a world I couldn’t easily understand. I didn’t even want to. Honestly, it seemed like knowing it wouldn’t impede my life.
Dinner had long since ended, but I was still lingering at Han-bom’s house. I could go back, but there was nothing special waiting back home. So, I ended up wasting time like this, which was similar to the pattern when Han-bom visited my house.
I was also curious about what kind of life a poet led. But of all people, it was Han-bom, so I felt it wouldn’t be very helpful, and it really wasn’t. When does this person ever read books? Why does she only lie down and stare at her phone all day?
“I’ve read all the books at home, so I have no reason to look at them. After all, I bought what I had already read.”
“Why buy them if you’ve read them all?”
“If there’s no physical copy, I don’t feel like I own it fully.”
Looking closely, more than half of the comic books in the bookshelf hadn’t even had their wrappers removed. Han-bom was definitely an unusual person. Of course, I wasn’t someone who disliked books, so I could understand that thought process, but still, this amount was just too much to think is normal.
“So what do you do all day? You’re not going to work now.”
“I read web novels, watch comics, and play games on my phone.”
You’re a NEET.
I momentarily turned my eyes to my smartphone. There were search results for the poet Han-bom. Beside her photo, the description, presumably written when she was a university student, contained the usual phrases about her being a pure university girl, yet they were written in a way that was quite blatant in its appeal. It was probably something the publisher wrote, but isn’t this borderline fraud? There seem to be others who should be caught instead.
“Ah, do you play games? I’m an EL-LOI expert.”
“I played a bit before, but I don’t play much these days. What tier are you at? Ham Yejin seems to be really high.”
“I’m Silver 4.”
“….”
Now it was hard to even tackle that. In fact, I couldn’t even distinguish whether that was a joke or a serious statement. When the publisher saw her, she didn’t seem the sort to be at that level…
It made sense to understand why she treated Ham Yejin that way.
But still, Han-bom was not someone who took her writing lightly. The illusion was shattered, she wasn’t much assistance, and she was excessively irritating, occasionally referring to herself as ‘older sister’ in a dizzy manner, but when it came to writing advice, she was serious and provided quite a bit of help to me.
“I read everything you sent me before. You apparently hit the bestseller list in the romance fantasy genre.”
“Seems it just wasn’t my style.”
“I liked it. The fairytale-like style is really enjoyable. And I liked how you left room for choices in the romance route.”
I was relieved to think that the feedback was surprisingly good, but before I could say anything about my relief, Han-bom spoke first.
“If you serialize it, it’ll probably flop completely.”
“What?”
“These days, people don’t read healthy novels like that. It would be fortunate if it hits around 100 favorites.”
“…What did you say?”
What is this girl blabbering about right now?
