Chapter 10.9

“Why are you crying when they aren’t even real people?”

“Because it’s sad. What did you read, oppa?”

“Sunhee and Jaeyoung.”

“Is that one fun?”

“Nope.”

He’d never encountered such a boring plot in his entire life. He just mindlessly kept flipping the pages to see the name that repeatedly appeared.

They left the manhwa café and walked around campus for a while. Meanwhile, Jihye said that she kept a photo diary which she updates every day because she easily forgets her daily tasks. That is why she insisted on needing a picture of her companion. She stopped for a moment and had them take a selfie together. Then, Sangwoo’s feet stopped in front of a poster on the wall.

Hosted by the Classic Games Club! Arcade game competition

Even if he had subconsciously reacted to the word ‘game,’ he simply couldn’t let go of it. Skimming through the poster, he found that there was a now discounted gaming console among the prizes. It was an item he had tried to get in the past, but had failed to.

“Wow! Oppa, do you want to go and do this? There’s a mechanical keyboard among the prizes. I was going to buy one in the past.”

“Really?”

It was an event that met both their needs. It was a fruitful challenge that was incomparable to the moronic activities they had done up until that point. Sangwoo and Jihye headed to the front of the engineering college with one mind.

There was already a large crowd there. There were four events: Tetris, Bubble Bubble, Tekken, and Metal Slug. They began to discuss strategies before filling out the application.

“Is this the one you want, oppa? SuperFormicon CX.”

“Yeah. That’s the prize for winning Tetris.”

“Leave Tet to me.”

Jihye swept her long hair in a mysterious way and smiled confidently . She said that when she was young, she played “some” online Tetris and became “the best” in elementary school, and even went to the “God” level, where she even beat adults. This wasn’t very reliable, but Sangwoo left it to Jihye since he wasn’t very good at Tetris.

“The keyboard is the winning prize for Tekken. I’ve never tried it before, though. Do you know how to play it, oppa?”

“I’ll do this one.”

Tekken Switch. Even though it had been a while, he used to play it quite a bit in arcades, so he knew how it works. Since it was a fighting game and the mechanism was simple, he was going to choose a character on the Internet and memorize the combinations in advance. It was a small competition, so he thought there would be a chance of winning just by trying hard enough.

Sangwoo and Jihye looked at each other and made their decision.

“We’ll win the prizes and exchange them with each other!”

“Okay!”

They submitted their applications and waited for a while. About 50 people had gathered, but the Tekken corner was the most crowded one. All were men, and apart from Jihye, there was only one other girl there. After squatting down on the stairs and waiting, a seat on the Tetris side cleared first. Jihye got up and rolled her neck around ready for battle.

“Trust me. I’ll get the gaming console,” she told Sangwoo in a confident manner.

The sound of her shoes hitting the floor could be heard as she walked over to a low chair and sat down. Tetris wasn’t a fighting game, but a game where they counted the scores. Since Jihye chose the “hardest” difficulty level, over half of the screen was filled with obstructions as soon as the game started, and the speed of the descending blocks was very fast.

Against the backdrop of addictive music, Sangwoo watched Jihye’s hand movements as if he were possessed. Her blocks fell into the correct places without any hesitation. Perfect hand-eye coordination, judgment, and control. Jihye’s control didn’t allow useless moves, and even her left and right rotating movements were kept completely to a minimum. Whenever a long rectangular block dissolved four rows on densely stacked walls, Sangwoo felt a deep pleasure in his heart.

“Look. What did I tell you?”

After sitting for 14 minutes, Jihye gave up on the game when the speed of the blocks came down in a blur. You didn’t even have to check to know that she won first place. There was a 100,000 point difference between her and the person who came in second, so she was likely to win the gaming console if nothing else happened.

“Good job!”

Sangwoo nodded and praised her. She reached out for a high five, and he was happy to do it. Then, Jihye sat down next to Sangwoo with a smile on her face that displayed her pride. Both cheeks were red because of the excitement the game had brought her.

While waiting, Sangwoo familiarized himself with the combos by looking up two Tekken characters on the Internet. After waiting for a bit longer, it was finally his turn.

“Oppa, do well.”

“I’ll do my best.”