This World is too Cruel to Men

This is just a side note, but… Yun-Seo has this strange magnetism that makes you want to tease her when she’s sulking.

‘Maybe it’s because she looks annoyingly cute…’

Thinking about having to go to some unknown storage room in this freezing weather, Yun-Seo looked utterly dejected.

It was precisely because of this that I couldn’t resist teasing her.

“Oh man… You lost ‘that’?”

It’s the impact, you could say.

I knew better than anyone here how amusing her reactions were when teased, so I couldn’t hold back.

Anyway, when I teased her like that, her response was a look of disbelief.

“Well… I don’t think ‘you’re’ one to talk…”

“Why?”

“You lost too… And I at least held out until it was just the two of us. You lost right at the beginning.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“…What?”

“I didn’t lose. I ‘let’ you win.”

To be honest, I was also bewildered since I was eliminated so quickly, but admitting it here would only mean missing out on a chance to tease her, so I doubled down on my bluff.

“What… Nonsense…”

“Why do you think it’s nonsense?”

“Well, how can you intentionally lose at rock-paper-scissors?”

Well, she had a point.

Rock-paper-scissors is a game where it’s hard to lose on purpose even if you want to, unless the circumstances allow it.

But… what did that matter?

“That’s my secret.”

“Ha… I know you too well. Don’t try to lie to me… You absolutely hate going outside in the cold.”

Tsk, this is why childhood friends are…

Even if you want to deceive them, it’s impossible because you know each other too well.

“This time is different.”

“Oh, really? Then tell me why you ‘sacrificed’ yourself by intentionally losing.”

“Now, think carefully.”

“I don’t think there’s anything to think about.”

“Tsk…! Who’s supposed to cook while we’re here?”

“Well…”

Did she feel like she was being led into a trap by playing along with me?

Yun-Seo stopped mid-sentence and closed her mouth tightly.

But that was enough of an answer.

It was game over the moment she looked at me.

“Me.”

“…So?”

“But to cook, I obviously need the right tools, right?”

“…!”

“Right?”

“…Yeah, sure. Are you done now?”

Yep, I am.

“But you see, the recipes for the meals we’ll be eating during our stay are only in my head.”

“Ha…”

“That means, unless it’s me, no one can properly gather the necessary tools.”

“So you lost on purpose?”

“Exactly. Do you understand now? The reason why I took the disgrace of being eliminated in the first round and ‘sacrificed’ myself?”

“If you can’t even speak properly…”

“It’s completely different from someone who held on and on only to be ‘defeated’ pathetically in the end. Do you understand?”

I was savoring the taste of teasing Yun-Seo, a feeling I hadn’t experienced in a long time.

It was so refreshing, and her reactions were so amusing that I felt full even without lunch.

The others, however, seemed to have a different opinion.

“Yeah, yeah, we’ve heard enough of your married couple banter.”

“Hey, it’s not like that. We’re not like that.”

Someone immediately chimed in, so I retorted, but that was just the beginning.

“Ugh, are you guys still here?!”

“We’re going to starve to death… Who suggested sending those two?”

“What can we do? Those two lost.”

“Why don’t you two just date? Seriously, I’m going to die of frustration watching you.”

“Tsk…!”

I seriously warned them to stop stirring things up, as it could make things awkward between Yun-Seo and me.

But my words didn’t have any effect on my friends, whose stomachs had fully awakened in the warm indoors and had transformed into bottomless pits.

“Hey, it’s all good, but you need to be honest.”

“Quiet.”

“Dokgun? We decided to call your act a ‘pathetic excuse of a loser’ instead of a sacrifice.”

As expected, facts are facts.

Their attacks were sharp, you could say.

“Ugh… Stop with the truth bombs!”

That was my last comment before leaving the pension.

Yun-Seo, seemingly determined not to be teased any longer, let out a deep sigh and grabbed the back of my neck, dragging me along.

“Why are you letting them verbally beat you up? Let’s just go.”

I think I should take back what I said about childhood friends being annoying.

Seeing her being the only one

looking out for me when I’m surrounded by enemies, a childhood friend is the best after all.

“Yeah, well, I was getting bored anyway.”

“…”

“What?”

“…Nothing.”

Saying that and then sighing loudly as if for me to hear makes me even more concerned.

Does she really not know that?

Or maybe she knows and does it on purpose to get my attention.

“Hey, come on!”

“Don’t you think ‘you’re’ the slow one?”

“Don’t you think ‘you’re’ the one who’s just wasting energy by rushing?”

As we walked side by side along a nicely landscaped path that could have been used as a walking trail, we were struck by a fact we had overlooked.

“Hey, by the way…”

“What is it now?”

Yun-Seo had responded curtly, thinking I was teasing her again, but she couldn’t ignore what I said next.

The fact that she stopped dead in her tracks as soon as the words left my mouth was proof enough.

“We··· Are we really going the right way?”

Even though I knew it couldn’t be true, I asked cautiously as soon as she heard those words.

“Do… do you know the way?”

“…I thought ‘you’ knew, so I was following you.”

Wait, is she shifting the blame to me now?

Even though she was walking right next to me?

I was dumbfounded, but thankfully, we realized it early on.

If we hadn’t, we might have ended up filming “Walking into the Mountains” or “Walking into the Countryside” instead of “Walking into the World.”

“Well… Maybe we’ll find something if we just follow the path?”

“I guess… It’s not like we can just stand here.”

Well, whether we could successfully find the storage room was uncertain, but… as long as we didn’t pass the campground entrance we saw on our way in, we should be fine.

“This place is huge…”

“It is…”

Considering that it was a wilderness campground with four more pensions similar in size to the one we were staying in, it was definitely vast.

But it wasn’t just a wide-open space.

Before arriving, I had imagined a place with nothing to do, but…

“Oh? There’s something over there.”

As Yun-Seo said, there ‘was’ something there.

Quite a lot, actually.

“Tsk… That doesn’t look like a storage room…”

What Yun-Seo had found was a temporary structure-like building wrapped in black cloth over barbed wire.

So, I wondered if there was any need to go all the way there since it wasn’t a storage room anyway, but… the unusual appearance of the building seemed to have sparked Yun-Seo’s curiosity.

“Let’s just check it out, just in case.”

She said that to me and then marched towards the building as if telling me to follow her… What could I do?

I had to follow.

While I reluctantly walked, Yun-Seo, who had arrived in front of the building first, suddenly widened her eyes.

“What? Is there something strange inside?”

She shook her head, so thankfully, it seemed like there wasn’t.

“It’s that thing?”

“If you say it like that, how am I supposed to know…”

“You know, that thing… What’s it called?”

Was she having trouble remembering the word?

After furrowing her brows for a moment, Yun-Seo exclaimed, “Ah!”

The problem was what she said next…

“That’s right! A ‘bangbangi’!”

That was it.

A ‘bangbangi’?

What was this ridiculously childish name?

Besides, I had no idea what a ‘bangbangi’ even was.

Yun-Seo seemed to have expected me to react with an “Ah! That thing?”, but how could I empathize when I didn’t even know what it was?

Wondering what kind of thing had such a pitiful name, I checked inside the building as soon as I arrived next to Yun-Seo.

And then I understood.

The identity of what Yun-Seo called a ‘bangbangi’.

“That’s not a ‘bangbangi’. It’s a trampoline.”

“What are you talking about… Who calls it that? Everyone calls it a ‘bangbangi’.”

“No, the official name is a trampoline.”

“Who doesn’t know that?”

Well, whatever the name… Yun-Seo seemed quite pleased to see the nostalgic play equipment after a long time.

Her eyes were sparkling as she looked at what she called a ‘bangbangi’—

“Why? Do you want to try it?”

“…What? No way, that’s for kids. Aunt probably set it up for the kids who come with their parents.”

“Yeah, good thinking. If you go up there and mess around, you might break it because of your weight, which isn’t what it used to be…Oof?!”

Hey, don’t splash water on me while I’m talking…

“Hey!”

“Do you want another one?”

“No… I apologize…”

Thus, Dokgun, like the incompetent person he was, knelt before Yun-Seo, the true competent one.

Feeling frustrated, Yun-Seo started walking wherever her feet took her, fuming inwardly.

***

‘Ugh…’

Who doesn’t know that?

And if it were really going to collapse with just one woman on it, they would have taken it down for safety reasons.

‘He’s so annoying…’

What was even more frustrating was that even though Dokgun kept teasing her relentlessly, she couldn’t bring herself to hate him.

“…The kids are waiting, so it’s not a good time now… Should we come back later after lunch to digest our food?”

Look at him now.

He was teasing her about it collapsing, and now that she seems upset, he’s subtly following her and saying things like that.

How can those words melt away her frustration so easily?

The reality made her worried.

She was worried that she might be too easy on Dokgun.

But it was hard to suddenly change her attitude now because—

‘What can I do, I like him that much…’

That was the reason.

So, all she could do was make a resolution for the future.

‘Just you wait…’

Once she successfully confessed, she would make him fall head over heels for her, and then…

And then…

Then…

Her face flushed with the thought.

Fanning herself with her hands, she made a firm resolution.

Someday, she would definitely see Dokgun groveling before her.