Jiho's POV
He didn't sleep.
Not for lack of trying— just that every time Jiho shut his eyes, the day replayed itself in disjointed flashes: the blurry photo, the whispered speculation, Hana's face tightening when she saw the comments naming her. And the worst part wasn't the rumor or even the photo.
It was the look she gave him at the bus stop.Not pity.Not fear.Something steadier. Something that made the walls he'd spent years building feel suddenly paper-thin.
By morning, his head ached, his eyes burned, and his uniform felt too tight across his shoulders. But none of that mattered. He had only one job today:
Stay invisible.
The irony stung.
He stepped onto campus before most students arrived, hoping to slip into homeroom unnoticed. But Seonghwa always knew when blood was in the water. Whispering started before he even reached the courtyard.
"—t hat's him.""— heard the admin deleted it but someone still has the original.""— the transfer girl's involved somehow.""—r egular track drama is wild."
His shoulders stiffened. He didn't look up.
Then a quieter voice:"Do you think he threatened her?"
Jiho stopped mid-step.
For a second, the urge to turn around, confront someone—anyone—burned bright and dangerous behind his ribs. But he forced it down. His father didn't need more excuses to drag him out of this school. He inhaled once, slowly, and kept walking.
The hallway leading to homeroom was mercifully empty.
Until it wasn't.
Someone stepped out from the stairwell with practiced precision, blocking his path in a way that looked casual but wasn't.
Kang Jiwon.
Older brother.Elite Track prince.Perfect heir.Everything Jiho was engineered not to be.
His posture was immaculate as always, uniform straight, watch gleaming. Emotionless, except for the faint twitch at the corner of his mouth—disapproval disguised as neutrality.
"Morning," Jiwon said.
Jiho brushed past him. "Move."
Jiwon shifted just enough to stay in his way. "I heard there was an incident on ClassNet."
"Wow. News travels fast when you have an entire tower of elites echoing it for you."
"This isn't funny."
"Didn't say it was."
Jiwon took in the dark circles under Jiho's eyes, the tension in his jaw—the whole portrait of someone hanging by a thread. His own expression didn't soften but sharpened, like he was collecting data.
"You need to be more careful," Jiwon said.
Jiho let out a humorless breath. "Careful? I step out of a car one time and suddenly I'm the season's mystery scandal."
"You know how this works," Jiwon replied. "Any sign you're still connected to the family—"
"I'm not connected."
"You are," Jiwon said quietly, "whether you want to be or not."
Jiho's jaw locked.
They stood in the hallway, tension twisting the air between them—two versions of the Kang legacy, one polished and public, the other hidden and dangerous. The fluorescent lights above hummed in the silence.
Finally Jiwon said, "The chairman will hear about this."
"Obviously."
"You should let me handle it."
Jiho stared at him. "Since when do you handle anything for me?"
Jiwon blinked, and if Jiho hadn't known better, he might've thought the older boy flinched. But the mask returned just as quickly.
"Since you're about to make things worse."
"I already did," Jiho muttered, stepping around him at last. "Too late to play the dutiful brother now."
He didn't wait for a response.
He didn't need to see Jiwon's face to know he'd hit a nerve.
Homeroom was louder than usual. Students turned as he entered, conversations dropping to whispers or stopping altogether. Mr. Han looked up from his attendance sheet with a mixture of worry and resignation.
Jiho walked to the back, ignoring the stares.
Two desks away, a student snickered. "Maybe he's actually rich. Explains the attitude."
Someone else whispered, "Where's that transfer girl? Maybe they rode together."
Jiho's knuckles tightened around the strap of his bag. He lowered himself into his chair and stared blankly at the board.
Mr. Han cleared his throat before things escalated. "Phones away. Let's begin."
The room reluctantly fell silent.
But there was one empty desk.
Hana's.
Jiho's fingers tapped once against the tabletop. A quick, involuntary pulse of something that wasn't anger. Something closer to worry than he wanted to admit.
She hadn't said she'd skip class. Had something happened?Had someone actually confronted her?Had she read the comments after all?
He forced himself to focus on the lesson, though every minute felt heavier than the last.
Ten minutes later, the classroom door slid open.
Hana stepped in.
She wasn't late enough to draw teacher attention, but late enough that every student glanced up. Her expression was composed, but Jiho noticed the tightness in her shoulders, the faint red mark on her wrist where she'd been gripping something too hard—maybe her bag, maybe her courage.
She didn't look at him.Good. Safer that way.
But when she walked past, her steps faltered for a fraction of a second. No one else noticed.
Jiho noticed everything.
Mr. Han nodded her toward her seat without comment. She sat down slowly, letting out a breath so quietly only someone watching for it would hear.
He looked away first.
Because looking at her made everything worse.
By lunchtime, the whispers had evolved into certainty.Not truth—certainty.Which was always more dangerous.
"Maybe she's dating him."
"No way, she just wants attention."
"Maybe he threatened her to keep quiet."
"My friend in Elite says even THEY heard about it."
The cafeteria buzzed like a beehive full of sugar and gasoline.
Jiho took one step inside and regretted it instantly.
Too many eyes.Too much noise.Too much oxygen feeding the wrong fire.
He pivoted out just as fast and headed for the back stairwell—a place that technically smelled like mold but at least didn't talk.
He sat on the steps, elbows on knees, staring at the scuffed tile floor. He tried to smother the rising frustration under logic. Rumors died if you ignored them. If you didn't feed them. If no one added fuel.
But Hana had been dragged into it.And if someone kept the original photo—not just the copy—things could escalate.
He heard footsteps coming up the stairs.
Soft. Hesitant.
He didn't have to look up.
"You're avoiding the cafeteria too," Hana said.
He scrubbed a hand across his face. "You shouldn't be here."
"Why? Are you dangerous now?"
He snorted. "Funny."
She sat one step below him, leaving space but not much.
"You look tired," she said.
"You look like you read the comments."
She didn't deny it.
He frowned. "I told you not to."
"I'm not a child," she said. "And they're talking about me. Of course I looked."
He shut his eyes briefly. "Did anyone say anything to you?"
"A few." She ran a thumb along the seam of her skirt— not fidgeting, just grounding herself. "Mostly girls. Mostly stupid."
"Arin?" he muttered.
Hana blinked. "How'd you know?"
"She likes being relevant."
"That explains the attitude."
Silence settled between them. Not soft—heavy.
Finally Hana said, "I don't get it. Why are they so obsessed with you? You barely talk to anyone."
"That's exactly why," Jiho replied. "People can turn mystery into anything they want. And they usually choose the worst version."
"You don't even give them a chance to see the real one."
He let out a low, bitter laugh. "Trust me, the real one makes things worse."
Hana studied his profile for a long moment. "I don't think that's true."
Jiho swallowed. Hard.
He didn't deserve that kind of certainty. He wasn't sure what to do with it.
So he pushed it away.
"Just keep ignoring them," he said. "The more attention you give, the more they twist it."
"Easy for you to say," she murmured. "You've had years of practice."
He didn't respond.
A shadow flickered on the wall—someone passing the stairwell, then pausing.
Footsteps hesitated outside the door.
Jiho's body went rigid.
Hana turned slightly, sensing the shift in him. "What is it?"
He almost told her nothing, but the tension in his shoulders was too sharp to hide.
"That person's been there for thirty seconds," he whispered.
Her eyes widened a fraction.
The door creaked.
And a voice said, cool and controlled:
"Skipping lunch? How predictable."
Jiwo n stepped inside the stairwell.
Hana froze.
Jiho cursed under his breath.
Jiwon's gaze moved from one to the other, clinical and unreadable, but something in his expression tightened almost imperceptibly.
Of all times…
Jiwon looked at Hana first.
"So you're Yoon Hana."
Her breath caught. "You… know my name?"
"ClassNet made it hard not to."
Her cheeks flushed—not with embarrassment. With anger.
Jiho pushed himself up from the step. "Leave her out of this."
"I'm not 'in' anything," Hana said quickly. "It's just rumors."
Jiwon's attention returned to Jiho, irritation flickering across his otherwise perfect calm.
"Rumors don't appear out of nowhere," Jiwon said. "Someone started it. And someone is still pushing it."
"No kidding," Jiho muttered.
Jiwon ignored that. "Do you realize what happens if the original photo spreads? If someone recognizes the car? Or worse—him?"
His voice dipped, quiet but sharp.
Jiho's fists clenched.
Hana looked between them—two brothers who shared eyes, bone structure, shadows—but carried completely different storms inside.
She spoke carefully. "I won't say anything. And I didn't start this."
For the first time, Jiwon really looked at her. Not as a rumor, but a person.
"You're certain?" he asked.
Jiho stepped between them instinctively. "She said she didn't."
"I'm asking her."
"She said—"
"Jiho," Hana interrupted quietly, "it's fine."
He went still.
She faced Jiwon without flinching. "I didn't start it. And I won't make it worse."
Jiwon studied her for a heartbeat before nodding once. A decision sealed in silence.
Then he said to Jiho, "We need to talk. Alone."
"No."
"It's not optional."
Jiho felt the familiar, suffocating pressure of expectation pressing down—the role he wasn't allowed to have, yet wasn't allowed to escape. Being ordered around by the heir while being erased as one.
"I'm busy," Jiho said.
Hana glanced at him. "I can go."
"No," he said too quickly.
Jiwon raised an eyebrow. "You think staying here makes her safer?"
Jiho stopped breathing.
The older brother's voice didn't change, but the implication landed like ice in Jiho's stomach.
"Some people will come after her," Jiwon said, "because they can't reach you."
Hana's eyes widened.
Jiho's pulse thudded, hard and violent.
Jiwon stepped back toward the door. "Ten minutes. Outside."
The door clicked shut behind him.
Hana exhaled shakily. "Is he always like that?"
"Yeah," Jiho said softly. "Worse, sometimes."
She hesitated. "Should… you go?"
He didn't want to.
Not because he feared Jiwon.But because the thought of leaving her alone now made something twist painfully inside him.
Hana seemed to understand the conflict without him saying a word.
"I'll be fine," she said. "Really."
He looked at her—really looked—and realized she was steadying herself for his sake, not just hers.
He stepped past her, pausing when they were level.
"Don't go anywhere crowded," he said quietly. "And don't be alone somewhere empty."
"I'm sitting in homeroom," she said. "Safe enough?"
"No place in this school is safe enough."
Her breath hitched. "For me… or for you?"
He didn't answer.
Because the truth was uncomfortably tangled.
He forced himself to walk away.
Every step felt wrong.
He reached the door, hand hovering over the handle.
Behind him, Hana's voice called softly:
"Jiho?"
He didn't turn, but he listened.
"You don't have to protect me," she said. "But I'm not going to run away from this."
His throat tightened.
He opened the door.
And stepped into whatever waited for him.