Chapter 26
Even after that, the sisters tried their hardest to bring the couple together….
"There's the zoo…."
"Hyeonwoo! There's a shooting game over there! Let's bet on it, let's bet!"
"Sure. If I win this time, you owe me a hot dog."
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"A two-person sky bike…."
"Ueeh…. I'm out of stamina…. Hyeonwoo…. Give me a slushieee…."
"Good grief…. Wait a moment."
"Eek…."
======
"There's the teacup ride over there…."
"Ah! Bumper cars! Let's ride the bumper cars, Hyeonwoo!"
"Yeah, yeah."
Due to the two of them going their own ways, all the plans they had originally set up came to nothing.
In fact, this plan was doomed to fail from the start.
They had made their plans assuming an ordinary childhood-friend relationship between a boy and a girl, so there was no chance they'd work on the decidedly unordinary Seolhwa.
On top of that, the two currently had no romantic feelings for each other.
In the end, it was a fight the cat sisters had already lost after getting ahead of themselves.
"Sigh…. Today's operation was a total failure…."
"I'm depressed…."
As time passed, the sun began to sink, and the evening glow came into view.
The two sisters were resting hidden in the grass, with their backs turned to each other.
They had given up halfway, since almost all their plans had ended in failure.
"Let's give up, Yuri…. I guess those two just aren't meant to be…."
"Failure…."
“The Cupid operation failed. It failed spectacularly…. ”
“What operation are you talking about?”
Just then, Hyeonwoo, who had taken care of some business and was wandering around nearby at just the right time, appeared after pushing through the grass where the twins had been hiding.
“I've been hearing strange things about operations and fate for a while now, so spill everything.”
======
“Good grief…. I never imagined you were planning something like that…. ”
After interrogating the sisters and learning the truth about the amusement park, Hyeonwoo could do nothing but be dumbfounded.
In his opinion, what the two sisters had been trying to do was utterly pointless.
“Seolhwa said it before, but we're just friends-”
“But, but if you're not even flirting, how can you be that close?”
“It's strange…. ”
“No, what I'm saying is…. ”
Having only read romance manga, the sisters didn't seem to understand what it meant for a boy and a girl to be just friends, and they still suspected Hyeonwoo and Seolhwa were flirting.
“We're just close because we've been friends for a long time, that's all.”
“But you touched her cheek!”
“Friends touching cheeks…. Strange…. ”
“Uh…. When you put it that way, I really don't have anything to say…. ”
Hyeonwoo himself knew that continually touching her cheeks was wrong.
However, her addictive mochi cheeks made it impossible for him to stop touching them.
He made that excuse to himself, but….
Since saying that in front of high school girls would obviously get him branded a lolicon pervert, Hyeonwoo exercised his right to remain silent.
“Then, oppa…. ”
Since Hyeonwoo offered no excuse at all, Yeri looked at him and spoke.
“You don't have any feelings for Snow Woman unnie?”
“Feelings…. ”
At Yeri's final question, Hyeonwoo was momentarily rendered speechless.
What was he supposed to say about having feelings for Seolhwa?
He couldn't come up with an answer at all.
"No, in the first place, Seolhwa and I…."
"Hyeonwoo, where did you go?"
Just as Hyeonwoo was trying to come up with an excuse.
Seolhwa, returning at the worst possible time, was looking around for Hyeonwoo.
“Oh, everyone, what are you doing here…. Aah! My hair's caught!”
And as she emerged from the grass a moment later, her hair caught on a tree, and she flailed her hands in the air.
“Seolhwa…. ”
“Phew…. That was almost bad…. ”
Rubbing her hair, which had nearly been pulled out, Seolhwa had tears slightly welling in her eyes. She cleared her throat and continued.
“By the way, does everyone want to ride the Ferris wheel last? There isn't even a line right now!”
Seolhwa suggested it to everyone with a silly grin, excited at the thought of riding the Ferris wheel.
“No, I was just-”
“Sounds good! The Ferris wheel!”
“Sounds fun…!”
Hyeonwoo, feeling a little troubled, tried to refuse, but the sisters cut him off, saying they would ride it first.
“We'll go ride it first!”
“Hurry up…!”
With that, the two of them ran off ahead of Seolhwa to ride the Ferris wheel by themselves.
“Looks like they still have some stamina left…. ”
Seeing the two sisters suddenly regain their energy and run off, Seolhwa remarked in mild admiration, then looked at Hyeonwoo and spoke.
“All right, then, shall we go too, Hyeonwoo?”
“Uh…. Uh…. Sure…. ”
In the end, the Ferris wheel pairing was decided regardless of Hyeonwoo's wishes.
======
Grrrrrrr-
With the rough sound of the massive machinery starting to move, the Ferris wheel carrying the two of them began to rise into the sky.
The Ferris wheel slowly carried them upward, farther and farther from the ground.
Seolhwa was pressed right against the Ferris wheel window, watching the ground recede below.
“By the way, that's unexpected. Did you used to like Ferris wheels?”
Hyeonwoo lightly joked as he watched Seolhwa.
“It's not that I like them…. Doesn't it feel like the day isn't complete unless you ride this at the end?”
“I suppose that's true.”
After spending all morning riding amusement park attractions, ending the day with a Ferris wheel against the backdrop of the setting sun….
There really was no better way to wrap things up.
“The view is incredibly pretty even though we've only made it halfway…. ”
Seolhwa muttered, glued to the window as she looked outside.
“It is…. ”
Hyeonwoo, on the other hand, answered halfheartedly without even looking outside, despite being on the Ferris wheel.
“Why are you reacting so weakly? Are you sick?”
“...No, it's just…. ”
Hyeonwoo was staring blankly at the distant mountains, as if lost in thought for some reason.
'Feelings for Seolhwa….'
It was because the cat sisters' words had continued to bother him for some reason.
Hyeonwoo believed that he had no feelings for Seolhwa.
To Hyeonwoo, Seolhwa was-
At first, a friend who was fun to tease,
until recently, a friend he'd known for so long that she had become downright tiresome,
after the mutation, a friend he was a little worried about,
and now, a girl who was like a younger sister he needed to take care of.
Because they had a relationship that went back as far as family.
Because he knew better than anyone what she had been like when she was a boy.
Even when she wore a beautiful one-piece dress,
even when she put on a cute hairpin,
he might have thought she was pretty, but he had never regarded her as a member of the opposite sex.
He felt that way because they'd known each other for far too long to think of her as the opposite sex,
and because Seolhwa was so short and looked so young.
That was something he had always thought, both before and now.
He could never think of Seolhwa as a member of the opposite sex.
That was what he had been telling himself.
“Hyeonwoo! Look outside!”
“Why?”
“People look like trash.”
“What nonsense are you talking about?”
Hyeonwoo's heart had been shaken a little by the cats' pointless words, but
seeing Seolhwa smile brightly, joke around, and act mischievously as usual, he was finally able to return to normal.
Why bother thinking about things like this for no reason?
No matter what had happened to her body, Seolhwa was still Seolhwa; becoming a woman shouldn't change anything-
Only after thinking that did he put those pointless thoughts aside and finally turn his attention to the scenery outside the window.
The view from above combined with the beautiful sunset to create a breathtaking sight.
“It sure is impressive…. ”
“Right, right? I'm glad we decided to ride the Ferris wheel at the end.”
“Yeah, it really was a good idea…. ”
But when he happened to glance toward Seolhwa-
Hyeonwoo found himself momentarily unable to say anything.
“Today was really fun. Wasn't it?”
“Uh…. ”
It wasn't because she was wearing a pretty dress,
nor because she had put on beautiful makeup.
Nor because she had dressed herself up cutely.
But,
Seolhwa's innocent smile, with the sunset at her back,
looked beautiful enough to make him think of her as the opposite sex for a moment.
"Hyeonwoo? What's wrong?"
"...Ah, no…. I just felt dizzy for a moment…."
“R-really? Isn't that serious?!”
“N-no, it's fine…. Don't worry…. ”
Blocking Seolhwa as she tried to come closer, Hyeonwoo turned his gaze out the window.
For some reason, he found it difficult to look at Seolhwa's face right now.
======
After Seolhwa and Hyeonwoo had ridden the Ferris wheel, the four of them finally left the amusement park.
The cat sisters left in an expensive-looking car, their faces filled with disappointment.
Hyeonwoo and Seolhwa decided to return in Hyeonwoo's car.
"Hweee…."
Seolhwa must have been tired after playing all day, because she fell fast asleep as soon as she sat in the passenger seat.
"......"
Hyeonwoo drove for a while before pulling over to the side of the road, resting his head against the steering wheel as he fell into thought.
He was agonizing over Seolhwa's smile, which had been circling in his mind ever since earlier.
"This is driving me crazy…."
It wasn't the first time Hyeonwoo had thought Seolhwa was pretty.
Even when she wore a one-piece dress last time.
Even when she put on a cute hairpin and asked him to look at her.
Given her natural beauty, it wasn't as though he had never thought she was pretty.
But this time was different.
Back then, he had thought that way for only a moment and was soon able to go about his day as usual,
but for some reason, the memory from just now was etched powerfully into Hyeonwoo's mind and refused to fade.
"...I guess it's because I'm tired."
But Hyeonwoo forced himself to dismiss that memory as nothing and move on.
If….
What if….
If what he had felt just now wasn't merely a fleeting whim.
It was a feeling that could never be fulfilled.
And it was a feeling he must not have for a friend who had once been a man.
Because he absolutely wasn't a lolicon.
He deceived himself, telling himself that he had merely seen something that wasn't there.