Bamboo Forest Manager

Not long after the semester began.

Pretending to listen to the lecture, I glance at Choi Yiseo next to me.

Wearing a beige sweater that suits the fresh spring.

The wide sleeves make her healthy body look more petite, which is cute.

As I blankly stare at her, Choi Yiseo glances at me and writes something in her notebook, then shows it to me.

- Why.

She must have noticed that I was bored.

- It’s nothing.

I said I was organizing my thoughts, but in reality, I wasn’t doing anything recently.

Since it’s a new semester, everyone seems busy, so it feels like things are flowing naturally.

I felt foolish for overthinking, and the time spent at Gold One seemed like a dream.

After all, aren’t we friends?

Seo Yerin, Choi Yiseo, and Yu Arin.

They were all good friends, so it was a bit unfortunate that I had to keep a distance for this reason.

‘Is this greed too?’

I sighed and rested my chin on my hand, feeling like this would never end if it kept going like this.

The lecture was boring, and Choi Yiseo continued to focus on studying silently.

“Let’s take a break for about 10 minutes and then continue.”

I wanted to go to the bathroom, and just then, the professor paused the lecture.

“Going to the bathroom.”

“Okay.”

I got up and went to the bathroom, but when I came back, there were a few freshmen gathered around Choi Yiseo.

“So that senior-!”

“Hey, hey!”

“Ahem, ahem! Ha-yeon? Let’s go back to our seats.”

It looked like they were in the middle of a conversation, but as soon as they saw me, they scattered as if fleeing.

It was like lifting a stone and the ants underneath scurrying away quickly.

“What’s this?”

As I sat down and asked what was going on, she scratched her cheek with a bewildered expression.

“Your reputation is really bad.”

“So it was gossiping about me, huh.”

That seemed likely.

Choi Yiseo explained briefly, looking a bit embarrassed.

“They say you’re bad-tempered because you’ve fought with seniors a lot, and there’s also a rumor that you switch girlfriends frequently.”

“That’s really unfair.”

Choi Yiseo glared at me while pinching my arm.

I tried to act shameless, but it didn’t work.

“They say you confessed to three senior girls in your third year and got rejected by all of them?”

“That’s really unfair!”

I mean, I’ve fought with seniors, but I’ve never confessed to them.

No matter what, this really is not true!

“Ugh, university is just a small society. Rumors go round and round.”

Then Choi Yiseo, who was looking at me, subtly made a suggestion.

“Do you want me to tell you? It’s all just rumors.”

“You?”

“Yeah, it’s not right for even the freshmen to get a bad impression. Anyway, the third-years will be graduating next year. I was going to tell them, but you came, and they ran away.” 𝘳

“Forget it.”

Although I was slightly worried, I didn’t expect that much from Choi Yiseo.

“It’s true that my personality isn’t great and that I’ve fought with the seniors, and…my womanizing habits aren’t good either – that’s somewhat true.”

It’s really unfair to say I confessed to the third-year seniors, though.

“Hmm, really?”

Choi Yiseo, who replied like she understood, slyly linked her arms with mine.

“What are you doing?”

It was such a sudden skin-ship that I wondered why she was doing this, but she smiled playfully.

“Just letting the freshmen know not to worry.”

“Huh?”

“Because the bad guy is firmly under my control, so they needn’t worry.”

My heart fluttered a little as she moved closer.

“You know, like in dramas. Taming a bad guy?”

“…Do you watch those?”

“I watched it with Minji.”

Choi Yiseo nudged my shoulder with her chin, insisting it wasn’t weird.

Then, she whispered, with her cheeks slightly reddened.

“I-I watch weird things too.”

“Weird things?”

“Never mind, don’t ask.”

Why is she acting like that after bringing it up herself?

“By the way. Hey, remember when you and Seo Yerin slept in my room?”

“Keep your voice down! And it was just us without you.”

“Ah…”

Choi Yiseo, embarrassed.

Yet she didn’t let go of my arm.

“Anyway. What did you do then? Why did senior Min Ju-hee tell me to keep an eye on you?”

Choi Yiseo, who had her lips tightly sealed as if she had an inkling of something, just turned her body, pretending not to hear.

“You’re not going to tell me?”

Choi Yiseo, blushing and nodding slightly, avoided the conversation.

Fine, if she really didn’t want to say, I wasn’t planning to press her either.

Just as the professor re-entered the lecture hall and the class was about to resume.

“Uh, but Woojin.”

Choi Yiseo cautiously called out to me.

“Wouldn’t it be hard to handle six people at once?”

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

---

I thought I might have lunch with Choi Yiseo, but she said she had an appointment because of the first-year mentor-mentee program.

I was just going to eat at the dorm separately, but an appointment came up.

The place was a PC café.

The person who called me was senior Han-kang.

When I arrived at the PC café, which held many memories, our idiots were gathered there in a huddle.

Even Jeong Chan-woo, the part-timer here.

‘He said he’s got a girlfriend, so why is he doing this here?’

He was happy saying he started dating a first-year junior.

Anyway, I pat the backs of those gathered around a single computer.

“What are you doing, idiots?”

“You’re here, moron.”

“You’re late, trash.”Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Look at them, not backing down at a single word.

“What are you doing?”

I checked what they were looking at, gathered around Han-kang’s seat, and it was some amusement park.

“Why an amusement park?”

When I asked, Jeong Chan-woo, who had a dark expression, immediately pleaded with me.

“Please, try to stop them. They’re saying we should all go to the amusement park!”

“…With this group?”

Are these guys crazy?

I couldn’t believe it, so I asked again, and Pyo Jin-ho and Han-kang responded immediately, almost screaming.

“We’re enlisting in a week!”

“Damn it! Is it real that everyone’s leaving me just because I’m joining the army?”

It’s understandable for Pyo Jin-ho, but I thought Han-kang-senpai had a lot of women around him.

‘That’s as far as it goes, I guess.’

He met them for fun, so the feeling must have been mutual.

There was no relationship deep enough to foster knowing he was going to the army, nor someone willing to wait.

“I haven’t even gone with my girlfriend yet, why do I have to go with you guys!”

Jeong Chan-woo protested in frustration.

“Go! Aren’t you going to the army, you bastard?!”

“Are you bringing up your girlfriend when we’re talking about our little guys?!”

This won’t do.

These bastards have lost their minds.

Ahn Hyeon-ho, who has been silent all this time, is focused intensely on texting someone on his phone.

- Gyu-ah: Oppa, are you buying me drinks tonight? Promise!

- Ahn Hyeon-ho: Hahaha, okay, got it.

‘Ugh, damn.’

This place is just an animal kingdom.

That bastard criticized me about Choi Yiseo, and now he’s already flirting with a girl who looks like a freshman.

This is the problem with these guys.

They’re idiots on the inside, but people get fooled because they look decent.

‘Gyu-ah? Was she the first-year class rep I saw last time?’

Well, anyway.

I hoped they’d manage on their own and tried to somehow stop them from going to the amusement park.

---

I failed.

‘Why are they so obsessed with the amusement park?’

They were making a fuss about seeing pandas eating bamboo, and I barely held back from wanting to kill them.

If I were better at fighting, I would have beaten them up right away, but it’s a shame.

We ended up at a PC café, so we decided to play games together.

“Why did you even call me here if this is how it’s going to be?”

While the four of them are playing a survival game, I’m sitting alone, staring blankly at the monitor like a duck on the Nakdong River.

It’s a waste of time to have recharged.

“Anyone need a first aid kit?”

“Me, me, me, me.”

“Anyone got a 5.56?”

“In a month, I’ll be shooting a real gun, and here I am shooting in a game. My life is legendary.”

If they were just going to talk amongst themselves with their headsets on, why did they even call me?

I didn’t play that game, and it was a co-op game for four people, so I couldn’t join in from the start.

‘…Should I just go back to the dorm?’

Since there was nothing to do here, I decided to leave and stood up.

“Hey?”

A girl wearing a white cap sat next to me and tapped my shoulder.

Wearing jeans and a light hoodie, Seo Yerin was smiling at me.

“Hmm? Seo Yerin?”

“What are you doing? Did you come to play games together?”

“Uh… Yeah, kind of.”

Unconsciously, I turned my head slightly to look at senior Han-kang.

As I was at the far end, even though I was far away, he noticed like a ghost and looked this way.

“Ah, Yerin… Hi. It’s been a while.”

“Senior? Aren’t you in the military?”

Seo Yerin asked, surprised.

“Ah, about that-”

Han-kang tried to answer awkwardly.

“What are you doing, Senior!”

“Ah, why are you just standing there!”

“You bastard! Are you going to drop your gun and greet even if a war breaks out?!”

At the scolding from the three, his mouth clamped shut.

“Go ahead.”

Seo Yerin responded with a kind smile. It was a commercial smile reminiscent of when she worked at the Gold One bakery.

“Ah, okay.”

In the end, Han-kang sat back down as if half-pushed.

They resumed the game, but he kept glancing over, still seeming regretful.

“Woojin, let’s play the game together!”

Seo Yerin, who had a short conversation with Han-kang, smiles brightly as if nothing happened and makes a suggestion.

Honestly, I didn’t want to play games with a bronze player, so I changed the subject on purpose.

“By the way, why are you here? No class today?”

“Yeah, I have no classes on Monday. Let’s play a game.”

“Aha. But didn’t you hate coming to PC cafés?”

Even now, people naturally turned their eyes because of the bronze player’s appearance.

But the bronze player replied coolly.

“I don’t care much anymore. Join the game.”

If the old Seo Yerin saw this, she would have been really surprised.

You’ve grown a lot, bronze player.

“But don’t you have a computer at home? Why come to a PC café?”

“I stayed out last time, so my mom took my computer. Why aren’t you logged in yet?”

“Sigh.”

She was talking about the time she slept in my room.

I heard that Choi Yiseo and Bronze were caught by senior Ju-hee sleeping in my room.

“Come in, Woojin.”

Bronze’s voice, although smiling, carries an eerie tone.

Without realizing it, I gulp and make a bold statement.

“I won’t play games with Bronze.”

“What is Silver saying?”

“Yes, I’m Silver, but I’m better than Bronze.”

“Are you really not going to play?”

“Yeah, I’m not.”

I tell her firmly, knowing that playing games with that rascal will only exhaust me.

“BDE-578. It’s quite a classic work.”

“…?”

Bronze suddenly starts saying strange things.

“Yuehara Yui? That person has a lot of works, right?”

This girl.

I wondered what she was doing in my room, and she must have looked at my laptop!

There’s nothing to hide except for adult videos, and she found them.

In a panic, I grab Bronze’s shoulder and threaten her.

“You know that’s an invasion of privacy, right? You’ve crossed the line.”

“Did we even have a line? We’ve already seen everything. That line was crossed when you…inside…”

“Shh!”

The guys behind us, who are going to the military in a week and are playing shooting games, might kill me if they hear this.

After the warning, Seo Yerin continues in a whisper.

“We’ve already shared everything from the start.”

“That, well…”

Right.

When we were Anonymous69 and the Admin, we even recommended product codes to each other.

“Why did you pretend not to like cosplay when you actually do? Was it DVQ-117?”

“Yerin!? Let’s play the game now! Let’s do it right away!”

As I urgently shouted to play the game, Seo Yerin finally smiled in satisfaction and nodded, then suddenly.

“But Woojin.”

“…What.”

“PSV-693. Isn’t that a bit too much?”

“What’s that? I don’t memorize all the product codes.”

“7P, you say.”

“…Ah

Just as I was about to answer, thinking it wouldn’t hurt to have something like that.

The conversation I had with Choi Yiseo in the lecture hall earlier flashed through my mind.

’But, Woojin.

Wouldn’t handling six people at once be tough?’

“Aaah!”

Overcome with shame, I screamed while clutching my face.

‘I must delete it! I’ll completely format my laptop!’

I resolved to go home today and delete all the porn videos on my laptop.

After playing a 30-minute game with Seo Yerin.

‘Hmm, porn isn’t really a crime.’

Deleting them seemed a bit overboard, so I decided to put it off.

Then I played another 30-minute game.

‘Wouldn’t it be better to just download porn that’s not embarrassing?’

I decided to update my folder after a long time when I get home.