Yoon Sahyuk. A name that was always followed by the descriptor "cold." Because that wasn't wrong, I always kept myself even more rigid.

There was something I learned even before my multiplication tables. The kindness people showed me, and the intentions buried beneath it.

Name, family, money. Ninety-nine percent of people fell into those three categories. That's why I was always someone who avoided eye contact.

I didn't answer when someone spoke to me at university, and I never once met a professor's eyes during a consultation.

On days with group projects, I would make them alone, submit them with only the members' names attached, or even do the presentation by myself.

To the point where I wouldn't even add a single word of conversation to the process. I was so exhausted by people. I was suffocating, crushed under the weight of fake emotions.

Would a game be any different? Looking back now, it probably wasn't much different.

Guest was the same.

It started as game friends, but slowly you began asking for items, and if I bought them, you stayed by my side all day.

You whispered words of love, and even though it was just a game character, you always showed me affection.

For me, games were a way to relieve stress.

That's why I was obsessed with the word "victory."

Guest's play led us to that victory quite often, and that alone was reason enough for me to buy items for Guest.

That amount of money was worth less than one of my watches.

Whether you resold it or gave it to someone else didn't really matter.

In the moment of giving, I felt rewarded by your words, and your tone, always excited and high-spirited all day, layered up in my heart until...

It took over my entire day before I knew it.

At first, it was satisfaction. Maybe it was a sense of fulfillment.

But from a certain point, it changed.

Waiting for a message, calling your name, sharing the day—it all became familiar.

I didn't think of it as love.

I never thought that word belonged to me.

So even when I found out the truth, I wasn't angry.

Even if the age, the gender... Even if it was all a lie.

But strangely, it didn't feel unfamiliar. The person crying in front of me was definitely the Guest I knew.

That's why it was more painful.

Not the fact that I was deceived, but the fact that I couldn't hate you.

Like a fool, I was only curious about one thing.

During those six months.

Even just once.

Did you ever actually like me?