“Tae-san, congratulations on graduating.”

Dad looked at me, his eyes brimming.

The whirlwind of the graduation ceremony was over.

The VIPs had gone, and my arms were full of awards.

The board chairman, the mayor, the alumni association president—everyone in town whose farts carried any weight had handed me a certificate and a little scholarship. (TL Note: The Korean says people who “can fart a little” in the city — the ones with enough clout to get away with it.)

Everyone assumed I’d graduate from Hanguk University law and become a judge or a prosecutor.

“Son… thank you.”

Mom held a bouquet, her eyes wet.

Thanks to her brilliant son, she’d been the envy of everyone around her today.

“It’s all thanks to you two. Thank you.”

I bowed my head to my parents and meant every word.

In my last life, I’d been a sorry excuse for a son.

But they never once gave up on me. They believed in me to the end.

At this point, I highly recommend living life over.

Last time, I’d failed to get into college, and we’d hurried through lunch at a Chinese restaurant and gone our separate ways.

That was my high school graduation: afterward I met up with my friends and drank my misery away.

Today, though, I was the star.

Every time I went up on stage to accept an award, my friends cheered and applauded.

Thanks to me, the school had been cleaned up, and they’d been free to play, run around and study.

The number of kids getting into college was the best in Jangju High School’s history.

Ten got into Hanguk University, and close to fifty went on to Goyeong University and Yeonji University.

For a school out in the provinces, that put the elite special-purpose high schools to shame.

“Oppa, I’m so proud of you! The best!”

“Oppa. You look a little extra cool today. Hehe.”

The twins, dressed to the nines, clung to my arms.

They weren’t high school kids anymore; they’d become grown-up young ladies.

Nothing but lotion on, and their skin still glowed like crazy.

They’d shot up too, with figures like models.

Thank God they both took after Mom.

Getting prettier by the day, the twins stood out in the graduation hall, no question.

Well fed, settled, doing well at school—the twins were the picture of a sweet eighteen.

My buddies had set up camp around them.

The twins had done themselves up in puffy coats and skinny jeans, and my friends were smitten.

Wolves circling their prey.

“Hey! What are you doing! Where do you think you’re drooling! Get lost!!! Shoo~ shoo~.”

I swatted them away like flies.

“Tae-san, aren’t these your friends?”

Mom recognized them.

“Father-in-law, Mother-in-law—I mean, Mother! Your first son-in-law pays his respects!”

“And I’m the second son-in-law!”

“Hey! You shameless bastards! I’m the first!”

“Father-in-law, you remember me, right? Hyeong-sik—I came to pick apples last fall. You told me you’d love to have me as a son-in-law!”

A dozen or so of my friends came swarming over as if they’d been waiting for their cue.

It turned into a circus in no time.

“Let’s settle it fair and square—rock, paper, scissors!”

“Deal!”

R-rock, paper, scissors?

My gorgeous twins’ futures, decided by rock, paper, scissors?

Haah… you crazy sons of bitches!

I wanted to yell This is my sacred graduation! but my friends were all falling over themselves to get in good with my parents. (TL Note: The Korean is “get their eye-stamp” — make sure someone important sees your face and remembers it.)

The twins gave my friends a cool, sidelong once-over.

Guys, what you don’t know is that those two are little foxes, tails and all.

They were at the age where having a boyfriend wouldn’t be strange.

With a strict older brother around, they’d never strayed, but no one can stop a girl’s heart.

Still, twins… a few of those guys over there, absolutely not!

I remember every minute of my friendship with those bastards, and that’s exactly why I can never hand you over.

“Get lost. Even with dirt and cement both in my eyes, I’ve got no sister to give you!” (TL Note: The Korean vow is “not until dirt goes in my eyes” — that is, not until I’m dead and buried. Tae-san adds cement.)

They’d each gotten into college and become freshmen, but at the high school graduation they still hadn’t shaken off the high schooler in them.

I was acting exactly like them.

“Haha. You’ve all got good taste.”

Dad laughed heartily.

The ease of a man with beautiful daughters.

Don’t be fooled, Dad. Those bastards’ heads are crawling with dirty little devils!

“Yes, Father! Your eldest son-in-law, Hyeong-cheol!”

“Loyalty! Your second son-in-law, Hyeong-sik!”

My head started ringing.

Those hopeless idiots had shown up with a few layers of sheet steel welded to their faces. (TL Note: A Korean with “a steel plate on his face” has no shame at all.)

“Father! Shall we share a glass tonight?”

Whoa, share a glass, he says. Lunatic!

They’d graduated, but they were still minors, and they were getting way too big for their britches.

“Mother, I’ll count that brood hen you killed for us as a down payment. Hahaha.”

That wasn’t a down payment, it was your wages, you knucklehead!

While I stared in disbelief, the onslaught continued.

“Hi, oppas~.”

Ju-hui, the youngest, stepped up with a sparkling smile.

“Oh, uh… hi.”

“Do you know which one I am?”

“Ju-a???”

“Hmph. What? You want to marry me and you don’t even know my name?”

Aagh! The fox is wagging her tail!

And I’m not just saying it because she’s my sister—when Ju-hui smiled, the whole place lit up.

My idiot friends were half out of their minds.

“S-sorry.”

“It’s because you don’t see us often. Right?”

“Right… I mean, yes!”

Right, like hell! Even I saw them every day and still had trouble telling the twins apart sometimes.

“Don’t forget us once you’re in college. Come work for us on your days off and over vacation. You have to see each other a lot to feel like family, don’t you?”

The little vixen smiled sweetly.

“Father! I’ll come see you every Sunday!”

“Don’t you need a strong farmhand over winter break? I got into the national university nearby, so I’ve got time to burn!”

“Just give me a pickax, and I’ll turn over even frozen ground for you!”

I regretted every meal I’d ever fed those idiots in the name of friendship.

“Oh my~ you’re all so cool, oppas. Then put your phone numbers in here.”

“Ju-hui! It’s an honor!”

“M-me too!”

“Oppas, line up, please. We don’t have much time.”

At Ju-hui’s word, some thirty dumb slaves lined up in an instant.

If it had been sweet Ju-a, maybe, but they’d been caught by Ju-hui…

Dad wouldn’t have to worry about farmhands for a while.

I shook my head.

Even the law doesn’t protect you from danger you bring on yourself.

Still, she wasn’t a sweatshop boss, so they’d make some decent pocket money.

Ju-hui’s got a real knack for business. Should I give her something to run someday?

At the same time, I gave Ju-hui a lot of credit for knowing how to seize an opportunity.

Running a company comes down to using people well to turn a profit.

In that sense, Ju-hui had the makings of a businesswoman.

Bzzzzt, bzzzzt.

Just then, the phone I’d set to vibrate buzzed hard.

Who’s this?

It was a number I didn’t know.

“Jang Tae-san speaking.”

“Oppa!!!”

“Seo-ryeon?”

“Our beloved oppa~.”

Seo-ryeon sang it in a voice as sweet as could be.

“Congratulations on your graduation~ Congratulations on your graduation~ ♫”

Then a chorus joined in, singing the congratulations song in harmony.

The FOB members had started a sing-along.

Hearing it only over the phone felt like a waste.

Listening quietly to their song, I couldn’t help smiling.

It was worth more than any graduation present.

“Oppa. Congratulations on graduating, a million times over, from the bottom of my heart~ ♬.”

Seo-ryeon’s voice, bubbly as ever, was music to my ears.

“Tae-san oppa, congratulations on graduating! Seo-ryeon says she loves you like crazy. Every night she hugs her stuffed doll and falls asleep calling out oppa’s name.”

Somebody on the other end shouted out what Seo-ryeon got up to.

“Hmph. What would you know about my deep and noble love? Go drink some more of your mama’s milk, you babies.”

Seo-ryeon came back hard.

“Hohohohohohohoho~.”

The girls’ shrieking laughter was a bonus.

The FOB members were always cheerful.

Partly they were still young, but it also seemed to be who they were.

Their new song hadn’t been a smash, but it had been a solid hit.

The song suited the winter, so they were on TV a lot.

For newcomers, their faces were pretty well known.

Now and then I caught Seo-ryeon, the center and the face of the group, on TV.

Playing the demure rookie idol, so unlike her real self—how fake it looked.

The girl who’d boldly claimed me back in her first year of high school was nowhere to be seen on TV.

Anyone watching would take her for an innocent, fragile teenage girl.

“Okay, thanks, everyone. Oppa’s buying you a nice meal.”

“Really? Kyaaaaa! Oppa’s the best! Hee hee hee.”

At the word meal, “the best!” came at me in surround sound.

For idols on murderous diets to keep their figures, food is the best thing in the world.

I was grateful to Seo-ryeon for remembering my graduation and calling in the middle of her busy schedule.

Her words, that she’d earn money to support me through the bar exam, still rang in my ears.

I’d have to send something nice Seo-ryeon’s way soon—her and her members.

“You know oppa’s in Seoul now, right?”

“Uh-huh. That’s why I feel even better these days. Just knowing we’re under the same sky makes my heart so full~.”

She even talked sweetly, with manners to match.

It was almost a shame that I was the only one who knew this charm of Seo-ryeon’s.

“Can I reach you at this number?”

“No, not yet… I don’t think the president will give me one until he’s earned back more of what he put in.”

The life of an idol…

But Seo-ryeon seemed to understand the entertainment business surprisingly well.

She’d always been quick, so she couldn’t have missed what the president was thinking about his investment.

Just let him try something. I’ll…

Everyone goes through hard times in life, but if anyone pulled anything funny on Seo-ryeon, I intended to take them out on the spot.

Cleaning up my corner of the world starts with family and spreads to the people around me. That’s the rule.

That was the least I owed Seo-ryeon, after all she’d done for me.

“I’ve always got time, so get in touch. I can’t pick up during class, so text me.”

“I want to walk around the Hanguk University campus with you, oppa…”

Seo-ryeon’s voice dropped.

Carving time out of an idol’s murderous schedule was hard.

“That day’s coming soon, so don’t worry.”

I said it with confidence, already thinking up an event.

“Okay. I’ll hang in there, waiting for that day.”

I couldn’t be sure Seo-ryeon loved me.

Maybe she just needed me to get through a hard world.

Even so, I liked it.

Who these days gets a girl group singing him congratulations on his graduation day?

“Seo-ryeon, hang in there. FOB, you’ve got this!”

“Oppa… I love you tons~. Mwah mwah!”

Seo-ryeon blew kisses.

Today, more than ever, I wished we were in the same place.

“Kyaaaah! Sh-she kissed him.”

“Seo-ryeon unnie, that’s so unfair!!!”

The girls shrieked all over again at what Seo-ryeon had done.

And so the short but steamy call came to an end.

And then…

“O-oppa, what was that call just now?”

Ju-hui, who’d been saving her new workers’ numbers, asked in shock.

“What?”

“FOB? The FOB I know?”

Ju-hui stared at me in horror, and so did my friends around her.

They had ears too. There was no way they hadn’t heard.

“That’s it! That bastard’s still been in touch with Seo-ryeon!”

“Aaaaaagh! You rat! You told us it was over, and all this time you’ve been sneaking around behind our backs?” (TL Note: The Korean is “peeling pumpkin seeds” — quietly doing the thing you swore you weren’t.)

“Jang Tae-san, you rat!”

Hostile laser beams fired at me from every direction.

The bastards’ eyes had gone wild.

The rage spread through them like a zombie virus.

“Friends, punish the villain! Charge!”

“Waaaaaaaaah!”

In an instant, I went from the hero who’d made the school proud to the most wanted villain on earth.

And then…

Rrrrip, shreeeeeek, rrrrrip.

Dozens of my friends’ hands tore my school uniform to shreds without mercy.

I met the attack of those jealousy-blinded losers with an unmoving mind.

Graduation hazing, straight out of the good old days. (TL Note: Korean graduates traditionally celebrate by ambushing each other — tearing school uniforms to shreds, pelting each other with flour and eggs — on the last day they’ll ever have to wear them.)

Buoyed by the cheers of Seo-ryeon and FOB, I stood strong and laughed my way through it.

This too would pass—just one more memory in the making.

(End of Chapter 86)