The Circle Drawn Around a Birthday

Sihyun had found the staff office by simply grabbing a passing student and asking.

He knocked, opened the door, and the middle-aged man seated by the window immediately beckoned him over.

“Lee Sihyun? There you are, kid. Come in here.”

Is that the baldy teacher?

Sihyun walked straight up to him.

“Hello, sir.”

“Lee Sihyun, is a greeting all you've got? Not even wearing your uniform. What's gotten into you lately?”

“Sorry. There was blood on it and it wouldn't come out.”

The teacher's hand, reaching for his pen, stopped mid-air.

“……Blood?”

“I got a little hurt while awakening.”

The teacher looked Sihyun over through his glasses. The nagging died on his lips, and in its place a sudden, heavy seriousness settled over his face.

He lowered his voice.

“Sihyun. Don't tell me you did that dangerous stunt again?”

“What stunt?”

“Trying to force an awakening on your own, wrecking your body to do it. How many times have I told you it's going to get you killed?”

……Again.

So this wasn't the first time.

The teacher, catching that reaction, apparently read it as the flustered look of a kid caught red-handed. He leaned back in his chair and let out a long sigh.

Lately, 'awakening accidents' had been multiplying among poor students—ever since research went public confirming that awakening was inextricably tied to brushes with death.

They couldn't afford the astronomical fees of an Awakening Helper, so they threw their bodies at the wall in a desperate gamble on a miracle.

“What were you planning to do if you hadn't awakened this time, huh? Planning to make your teacher attend a student's funeral?”

Sihyun didn't know what to say.

The funeral had already been held, in a manner of speaking. The man sitting before him simply didn't know it.

What could have been desperate enough that no amount of talking him out of it made a difference? No parents, no money. Was that really explanation enough?

“I'm sorry for worrying you.”

Sihyun went on slowly.

“But it's fine now. I awakened.”

He held out his hunter registration card.

At the sight of the rank, the teacher's eyes went wide.

“You—Sihyun, you awakened as an S-Rank?”

“Yes, sir.”

“……So dragons still crawl out of ditches these days, huh.”

But when he checked Sihyun's class, he clicked his tongue.

“Ah, what a waste. Anything but a Summoner.”

The jab at Summoners made Sihyun bristle, but he didn't argue.

He'll find out soon enough.

Rather than waste breath on pointless spats, showing rather than telling was always the faster road.

The teacher handed the registration card back.

“I've verified it, so I'll mark you down as an excused absence. But you—no matter what, you show up to the graduation ceremony. Understood?”

“I don't really need to gradua— …Yes. Thank you.”

Sihyun swallowed what he'd been about to say.

There was no need to drag this man's memory of Lee Sihyun down to a middle-school diploma. Attending one graduation ceremony was a small price to pay.

“And, Sihyun. About that other matter.”

The teacher's voice dropped another register.

“The school violence committee convenes this week. Everyone connected to Kang Hayul is being placed on mandatory separation—they won't be coming to school for a while, and they're barred from contacting you at all.”

“……”

No parents, no money. And now, one more thing layered on top.

“So don't even think about taking matters into your own hands. The adults will handle it, by the book. Got it?”

“……”

He had no such intention. He was an awakened hunter now, and they were unawakened minors.

The teacher had said he'd handle it, so for now, Sihyun was willing to trust the process.

“Lee Sihyun?”

“……Yes, sir.”

Sihyun nodded obediently.

Though I'll be watching to make sure it's actually seen through to the end.

The teacher waved a hand, as if to say that was all.

“Pack up your things properly, and don't come whining later about how you lost something.”

“I will. Thank you for everything.”

Bowing his head, Sihyun walked out of the staff office without a moment's hesitation.

The teacher stared at the closed door for a beat, then smacked his lips.

That stings a little.

The kid had been nothing but heartache, so he should've felt relieved to see him go.

Just then, the door opened again.

“Sir?”

Sihyun's head poked through the gap in the door.

“Um, about that.”

There was something hesitant in his manner, like a confession coming.

The teacher smiled—kids would be kids—and asked, amused,

“What, now that you're leaving, you realize you'll miss me?”

“No. Which class was I in again?”

“……”

“Must've lost my memory from the shock of falling off the building. I can't remember.”

“You can't remember your class, but somehow you found your way here just fine?”

“I asked some students where the baldy teacher was, and they told me.”

The kid was now openly, point-blank calling him baldy to his face.

Faced with a student this relentlessly polite, his denuded scalp seemed to heat right up.

“……Lee Sihyun.”

“Yes?”

“You're in Class 3. Now get lost. Please get lost.”

Miss him, my foot.

With that kid gone, maybe the few strands of hair he had left would finally survive.

Sihyun pushed open the back door of Class 3 and stepped inside.

“Lee Sihyun?”

The teacher, his lesson interrupted, shot him a sharp look.

“Sorry. I'm just grabbing my things and I'll be right out.”

The classroom buzzed briefly, then went quiet.

There were no shocked faces, no worried ones.

Nobody pretended to know him. Nobody asked if he was okay. When their eyes met, they slid away—and a few turned their heads outright to the window.

Empty desks dotted the room here and there. Cleared by the mandatory separations, no doubt.

Sihyun swept his gaze slowly over those empty seats, and over the students who remained.

There was no malice in it.

Not hatred, not concern—just the flat expressions of people watching someone else's business.

Sihyun lifted the bag hanging on an empty chair and gathered what was inside his desk.

Textbooks and workbooks. A crumpled handout.

His hand, sorting the papers one by one, stopped.

At the very bottom, a familiar neon color showed through.

It was the same poster he'd seen at the Association office.

Every blank space on it was crammed with small, cramped handwriting.

The words from the Association employee came back to him.

Sihyun stared down at that circle for a long moment, then started moving his hands again.

Behind the poster, several pages of research on Natural Awakening were layered one atop another.

Underlines ran beneath a few success stories. Slashes struck through every passage warning of the danger.

Squeezed between them, short memos remained.

Sihyun couldn't tear his eyes from that line for a long while.

The ground behind the gymnasium. The sand. The exact place he had opened his eyes.

Some lines had been erased and rewritten so many times the paper had worn thin.

And on the very last page, in handwriting pressed down hard and heavy:

It's okay, Lee Sihyun. You're someone who's going to shine someday.

Sihyun stared at that sentence for a long, long time.

The message he'd seen the moment he first opened his eyes superimposed itself over the page.

Sihyun smoothed the crumpled poster flat with his palm, slowly, and slipped it into his bag.

He had decided to leave the school matter to the adults and watch how it unfolded.

But that stage was different.

That was something he could carry out with his own hands.

Sihyun slung the bag over his shoulder.

Live so that your name shines, Lee Sihyun—that's what it said.

Last night, he hadn't understood. Hadn't known where those words were meant to point.

Now he thought he did.

Let's go. All the way to the highest place you ever wished for.

Before leaving the classroom, he glanced back once.

No one spoke to him still. No farewell, no see-you-again.

Sihyun didn't wait any longer. He closed the back door behind him.

NEW TOP 50 — production conference room.

Dozens of application forms lay scattered across the round table.

“Applications are closed, right?”

Chief Producer Kim Taeseok drummed his pen against the tabletop.

“Narrow down the paperwork and start with the basics. One slot per guild—where a guild submitted several candidates, we check their rank and class and pick ourselves.”

Kim Taeseok turned to head writer Oh Jihun.

“Any applicants catch your eye?”

“Two of them.”

Oh Jihun laid two profiles down on the table.

“Do Suho.”

Oh Jihun's fingertip slid past the first profile and stopped on the second photograph.

“And Lee Sihyun.”