Ten years ago. The morning I was heading to take the CSAT. An old man grabbed my hair on the subway. ‘How dare you not give up your seat to an elder, you insolent brat!’ ‘Ahhh!’ ‘Oh my, sir! I think the student was just focused on studying!’ ‘Help! Someone save me!’ I was the kind of student who was certain to get into Korea University if I didn’t mess up the CSAT. If I didn’t mess up the CSAT. And now, ten years later. I’m standing on the rooftop. Of course, I’m not here to end my life. ‘I’m just standing here because everything is so damn frustrating…’ I’m twenty-nine now. Even my male classmates who went to the military have all found jobs already. Friends who got employed early are busy talking about promotions or changing jobs. The price range of the restaurants where we gather for our quarterly college reunions keeps going up. Meanwhile, I’m the only one still struggling to find my place, doing a contract-to-hire internship. The perpetual assistant manager, eleven years my senior, has been harassing me ever since I refused his invitation for a drink after work. My evaluation scores for permanent employment are rock bottom. The conversion is already a lost cause, but I’m stubbornly hanging on just to get that intern’s salary. …While suppressing the urge to run away. Ding. [Mom: I made some stew. Eat when you get home. “…How am I supposed to face Mom? If I fail again.” It’s been four years since I started slipping up in applications, sometimes in interviews. I’ve failed so many times that even Mom doesn’t say it out loud anymore, but I could see in her eyes that she had high hopes this time. This suit I’m wearing now, Mom bought it for me because I had nothing to wear to work. When I come home late at night, there’s a pile of medicine packets on the sink that Mom takes. With that frail body, she works twelve-hour shifts standing all day to feed her perfectly healthy 29-year-old daughter. “What am I going to do? If I fail this time too.” I sighed and looked up at the sky. If someone had spoiled this future to me back in high school, saying, ‘This is how you’re going to end up,’ I would have scoffed. Where did it all go wrong? “I don’t know.” Sighing again, I turned my gaze to the building across the street. I could see a large electronic display on the exterior of the high-rise building, emitting light. On the biggest billboard on Gangnam-daero, there was a huge face of a handsome man wearing an American football uniform with black paint under his eyes. The text below read: [Congratulations on Jung Eunsung’s 10th Debut Anniversary] “Why is he following me all the way here to torment me?” I grumbled, looking at the handsome man smiling like the sun. “I’m hiding here because I don’t want to see you right now, you know?” I glared at him with all my might. The faint scar on Jung Eunsung’s left cheek, which must have disappeared during photo editing, wasn’t visible from here. “Congratulations anyway, Jung Eunsung. You’ve achieved your dream.” As long as you don’t cause any trouble, you’ll keep rising forever. That little scar on your cheek doesn’t affect your charm at all. Q. Why are you suddenly talking about a man in the middle of your self-pity? Who is he? A. Actor Jung Eunsung. He debuted at 19 as the main vocalist of a boy group under a major entertainment agency. The group became an instant hit, representing South Korea as one of the top boy bands, but… Less than three years later, the group’s leader went to prison for drug use. The youngest member had a premarital pregnancy scandal with his influencer girlfriend, the variety show's regular assaulted a club employee while drunk, the oldest was caught gambling abroad, someone else had a DUI hit-and-run, and the only foreign member left the group and went back to America. Jung Eunsung was the sole survivor. He finished his contract and transitioned to acting. He was my high school classmate ten years ago, we were even in the same class at one point, but I hadn’t seen him since graduation until- Today. I reunited with Jung Eunsung after 10 years when he came to our company for a photoshoot. ‘Kang Dahye, I’m going to do whatever it takes to make sure you don’t get converted, you hear me?!’ It happened just when I was getting an earful from the assistant manager. While I was apologizing in embarrassment as my superior yelled at me in front of everyone, I locked eyes with Jung Eunsung, who was just entering the scene. “…He must have recognized me, right?” Of course. You should have seen Jung Eunsung’s expression then. Was that the face of someone who didn’t recognize me? Still, I was thankful that Jung Eunsung had enough tact not to acknowledge me there. A puff of white breath escaped through my slightly smiling lips and dissipated. I turned once more to look at Jung Eunsung’10th-anniversaryry advertisement. “You haven’t changed at all since high school.” High school. Looking back, I think that was the most hopeful period of my life. It was tough, but I never doubted that there was a bright future ahead of me. On the other hand, the current me… “I’m steadily heading towards ruin.” I don’t want to live like this, but I can’t see a way out. I always feel suffocated, and thinking about the future makes it hard to breathe. Every night when I lie down to sleep, all I can think is: ‘What if I hadn’t taken that subway on the day of the CSAT?’ I know it’s ridiculous to still blame the CSAT after 10 years. I know that failing the CSAT doesn’t mean your life is ruined. I just want to say that my life went off track from that day on. While preparing to retake the exam alone, I got into a car accident, which made me miss the next year’s CSAT, too. After that, everything I tried kept falling apart. A few years ago, Mom’s shop went out of business due to the effects of COVID. Nothing worked out. As if someone had twisted my fate. For ten years straight. It was enough time to turn an ambitious teenage girl into a depressed, jobless 20-something with no dreams or hope. “Sigh.” I rubbed my eyes with my palm as they started to heat up. Don’t cry. If I cry here, I’ll become pathetic. “I don’t want to live.” More precisely, I don’t want to live (like this). Just as I removed my hand from my eyes and got up, brushing myself off, it happened. My eyes met with someone who was just opening the rooftop door. It was Jung Eunsung. His expression was serious, as if he had heard my soliloquy. As I stepped back in surprise. “…Huh?” My body, exhausted from being pushed around since 7:30 AM without even eating, swayed. “Kang Dahye?” “Wh… What? What?!” “Kang Dahye!!!!!!” I fell from the rooftop. And I regressed. -The Top Student Hides Her Regression- 1st Period. Share Your Luck “…This is crazy.” Me. Kang Dahye. Age before regression: 29. A hopeless, unemployed youth. Current age: 18. Second year of high school. Current time: March, about three days after the start of the new school year. =I’ve traveled back in time. “Crazy, crazy, crazy.” I sprang up and spun around on the spot. My body feels so light. I haven’t reached my full height yet. The body of a teenager, not yet worn down by the hardships of life. The calendar on the desk, the clock on my smartphone, and the main page of the portal site I accessed all tell me that this is 11 years ago! Wow. “Was that gloomy life just a dream?” It seemed too vivid to be just a dream, though. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. “This is awesome.” I’m not even curious about how or why this happened. Please, don’t let this be undone. I promise I’ll live a good and hard-working life from now on. “This is awesooome!” I’ve never been so happy to smell the musty odor of the semi-basement apartment I shared with Mom. I hugged my uniform, which was carelessly hung on a doorknob due to the lack of a proper closet, and spun around. “Even if I had gone back to the morning of the CSAT, I would have been grateful, but high school second year…” And it’s March…! I squeezed the uniform in my arms so tightly it wrinkled. “This time, I swear.” I’ll take the bus to the CSAT exam site. I’ll get a perfect score on the CSAT. I’ll go to Korea University. As soon as I turn twenty, I’ll earn money from tutoring and invest in stocks and Vitamin Coin. I’ll become a first-generation YouTuber with Study With Me videos. I’ll succeed. I’ll become rich. I’ll stay focused so I don’t end up being humiliated in front of my old classmates at twenty-nine! Slam! “Kang Dahye, aren’t you going to sch… What’s wrong?!” “Waaah! Mom!” I threw myself into Mom’s arms as she opened the door. “Wow, Mom, you’re so young too…!” “Oh my! Why are you crying?” “It’s okay, these are tears of joy…!” Mom, I’ve been through so much… On my way to school for the first time in nearly 10 years. I marveled at my uniformed reflection in the convenience store window, at the clothing store that was still standing strong years before it would close down. “Hehe!” And I marveled at my excellent eyesight that allowed me to see everything so clearly. ‘Right, this is who I used to be.’ A girl who smiled at the slightest breeze. I can’t remember the last time I smiled so much that my cheeks hurt. ‘I’m going to live well this time around.’ I stopped at a crosswalk, making this promise to myself. I quickly opened the memo app on my smartphone to check my plans. There’s only one thing I need to do to live differently this time. ☆Study☆ Although we’re approaching an era where studying isn’t everything, for someone like me with no particular talents or assets, studying is the easiest and fastest way to success. So I’ll study no matter what. And of course, I! Ab! So! Lutely! Won’t do anything like dating. ‘I didn’t date in high school in my previous life either.’ But this time, I’ll be even more proactive about not doing it. However. “Dahye, let’s not do this. We’re just friends.” “……” “I don’t want to say anything harsh to you. Let’s not make things uncomfortable between us, okay?” “…Huh?” I tilted my head, looking at the boy in front of me who was frowning. Why am I getting rejected right after my regression?