ROA 3

Even the act of talking to himself on the tree-lined street right now was served to reinforce his own reasoning. Coming out for a walk because he felt stuffy during exam period and muttering alone, this is…… hmm, like an ordinary college student. He’d withdraw that last piece of evidence.

As Shim Seo-woo was seriously preparing his case in his head, he saw something in the distance. Recognizing it as a pedestrian walking toward him, he moved aside to a side path. Since the other person was coming right down the center, he wanted to make way.

But that person’s gait was rather strange. Should it be called walking limply, or moving while dragging their legs? He could barely hear their footsteps either.

They must be an ordinary college student exhausted from exam studying too.

Thinking this, Shim Seo-woo walked closer to the edge, when suddenly that person stopped abruptly. Then they slowly turned their head to the side and asked,

[Excuse me. Am I, wearing my clothes properly?]

His voice fell eerily onto the quiet tree-lined street. The cracked voice echoed wetly, and Shim Seo-woo quietly looked at the man.

The person he encountered on the June night was wearing a dark red fur coat. The thick coat, which seemed to be covered and stiffened with blood, had its collar turned to the back, that is, it was worn inside out. Moreover, even considering that the early summer night was cool, it seemed like clothing that didn’t match the season.

But Shim Seo-woo looking at him was only calm, and just tilted his head as if he didn’t know why he was asking such a thing.

“Clothes are, well, a matter of personal taste.”

Shim Seo-woo also knew the other person was wearing clothes backwards. But since they asked directly, he thought it must be their own fashion, and even if it wasn’t, he wouldn’t have bothered to point it out anyway.

‘Are they filming to upload on social media?’

Like filming a video observing people’s reactions while deliberately wearing it backwards. Shim Seo-woo looked around for cameras, then thinking he’d just react casually and go, raised both hands.

Clap.

Shim Seo-woo extended both hands with thumbs up and said,

“It’s cool. Fighting.”

Making someone do a fashion show on a night like this, exam period really is harmful to everyone.

Having seen strange people all day, and Park Dong-ju also tearing at his hair and shouting for the semester to end just a few hours ago, it wasn’t incomprehensible. Shim Seo-woo accepted it calmly and left the spot.

He thought he heard a muttering of “What the……?” from behind.

As Shim Seo-woo walked the tree-lined street again, no thoughts about the man in the fur coat occupied his mind at all. He just belatedly realized the streetlights were out, and speculated that might be why the forest path felt even cooler.

He walked for about twenty minutes, making a circuit of the tree-lined street.

Having sufficiently relieved his stuffy feeling, Shim Seo-woo planned to look over the summary of tomorrow’s exam lecture one more time and then go home. He walked toward the library lights that stood out particularly in the dark path.

But then a sound came from the side of the tree-lined street, from the densely created forest.

“Why is that guy acting so rushed today? He should leave with us, why is he going first!”

“He said he didn’t want to stay here long, does he perhaps hate universities?”

“Is there a place he likes?”

The conversation between a man and woman echoed particularly loudly on the quiet night street. The woman’s voice was high and clear, and the man’s tone was tinged with sulkiness.

“By the way, Gwang-min. I saw white light in my dream today. It was an incredibly bright and brilliant light, and I have a feeling I’ll meet it soon.”

“It’s completely dark right now though. The streetlights here are broken so it’s pitch black, and we’re even lost so our future is dark too. It’s just a random dream.”

“What? You know who I am and you’re dismissing my dream?!”

“The granddaughter of a shaman, Heun’s youngest director, and a brilliant insider hire.”

“You little?!”

“Ah, no. The director’s dream seems right? In that dreams are the opposite of reality—aaagh!”

The man’s voice rose sharply. He realized the cause of the scream that grew loud enough to echo through the forest was because his ear was being grabbed, having witnessed it directly.

Shim Seo-woo happened to run right into them.

“……!”

“Eek! Is, is that a person?!”

The two who had just emerged from the forest path seemed startled at encountering a person on the dark street, and Shim Seo-woo also looked at them bewilderedly. He was just trying to understand that these were more people struggling with exam period exploring the forest path at night, but the other party didn’t look like students.

The woman was tall, wearing a bright red dress-like hanbok, with reddish-brown wavy hair down to her waist half-tied up and fastened with an ornate hairpin studded with pearls.

The small man beside her wore loose ochre-colored top and bottom like training clothes, very short dark brown hair, and carried a bag nearly as big as himself like a turtle’s shell.

The baby-faced man who looked barely twenty glanced at Shim Seo-woo’s shadow and visibly relaxed.

The woman in hanbok smiled broadly and asked,

“Excuse me, you’re a student here, right?”

“…Yes.”

“Do you happen to know where the old library is?”

At the sudden topic, Shim Seo-woo was puzzled.

Old library? The central library was right in front, but since it had “old” attached, it couldn’t be that place. However, he’d never heard a place called that, and as he was pondering, the man beside her added,

“The, uh, science library they said?”

“Ah, the building next to the pond…”

A vaguely old building floated into his mind. The university was so large that generally people didn’t know places outside their own department’s area well, but long ago during a festival, Park Dong-ju had burned with determination to see all the booths and forcibly dragged him around.

It was already a long time ago so it was hazy, but a science college student he met at a bar had pointed to a building surrounded by vines next to the pond and said,

‘That’s the library. The old science library.’

When he answered by recalling that memory, both their faces brightened. When he also conveyed the information that this tree-lined street led straight to the pond, the man bowed deeply at the waist in greeting and the woman waved both hands gently and shouted,

“Thank you, benefactor! You’ll be blessed!”

Benefactor…

It was the first time hearing that word directly so it felt strange to turn over in his mind, and while he did, the two quickly moved away. He didn’t know what their whispered worry “If we’re too late we might get bitten” meant, but he just shrugged his shoulders at their gradually shrinking backs.

It seemed like he was encountering quite various people on his walk today.

After that, Shim Seo-woo returned to the library wanting to finish studying as planned. He opened his book as if the strange incident just before hadn’t happened at all.

But his hand turning the pages gradually slowed.

“Phew…”

His eyes started hurting again.

It seemed to have improved briefly while walking, but his vision became stuffy again and now he even felt a stinging sensation. Unable to concentrate on the book at all, Shim Seo-woo finally cleared his spot.

The dream’s aftereffects were severe today, was there no way to confront that boy? Like reaching an agreement not to appear in dreams at least during exam period.

…No, that wasn’t very appealing. In fact, Shim Seo-woo didn’t feel the dream of seeing that boy was particularly bad. Still, if he was going to make it hurt this much, he could at least show his face.

Six years had already passed, how had the boy who suddenly assaulted a high school student grown now? Were his hands still quick?

As Shim Seo-woo walked toward the library exit making idle thoughts inwardly, his steps slowly stopped.

Swoooosh…

Rain was pouring down.

Even just a few minutes ago not a drop had fallen, was it a sudden shower? Shim Seo-woo rummaged through his bag to find an umbrella. As the rainy season approached, he unfolded the white three-fold umbrella he’d prepared, and as the canopy spread wide above his head, something came to mind.

‘That’s the library. The old science library.’

Why the demonstrative “that” was attached when talking about the building called the old library, the science library.

They said there was a ghost story connected to the library the science college students used. It was one of the stories students crowding around Shim Seo-woo at a festival bar several years ago poured out to draw his interest.

They said a ghost appeared in the library on rainy days.

A book would fall from a bookshelf in the empty library, and when you picked it up and put it back, another book would fall out soon after. No matter how many times you reorganized them, they’d repeatedly fall, and if you checked that gap, you’d meet the ghost’s bright red eyes.

‘So if you hear the sound of books falling in the library on a rainy day, you have to come out without even looking back!’

At the eerie warning, Park Dong-ju had screamed, but Shim Seo-woo had doubts.

Perhaps it was a librarian who got angry because books with wrong classification numbers were being shelved. They were quietly coming in to organize books, but books kept being incorrectly re-shelved, so they pushed their face in to check who exactly it was, he’d even pictured that background in his mind.

Even if it really was a ghost, thinking they might have been a librarian in a past life just made him feel sorry. To be trapped in the duty of organizing books even after death. Could it have been death from overwork…

On the other hand, he also seemed to have felt it curious that science college students seriously talked about unscientific things happening in the science library. As expected, the world has truly various aspects, he’d even made philosophical contemplation that one can’t judge by just one facet.

So the reason Shim Seo-woo hesitated now was because of news he’d heard recently rather than the ghost story.

“That library, they said it’s under construction now…”

It was an old building, so it was a library students didn’t go to well originally. Even more so after the central library was newly built, and as it became deserted, the building became increasingly decrepit, so he heard they were proceeding with a major remodeling this time.

Students seemed to have said ‘Finally the school is carrying out physical exorcism.’