Chapter 1

More than half the students in the lecture hall were asleep. Keeping over a hundred college students engaged in a lengthy lecture would be a near-impossible task for even for the most seasoned professor. To make matters worse, the presenter at the podium didn’t have a single distinctive feature that commanded attention. He wore a loose plaid shirt, dark jeans that ignored all fashion trends, and a black cap that hid his facial features. It was only when he clicked the button on the laser pointer to bring up his presentation slides that the droopy eyes of the audience snapped wide open in horror. There, on the screen, were the words: The font size alone—at least 93 point—was shocking enough, but the choice of Comic Sans was especially alarming. In addition, each letter had been painstakingly changed to different colors of the rainbow, while behind the text loomed a blurred illustration. “I will now begin,” the presenter said, his blank, indifferent expression in stark contrast to the audience’s shock. He clicked to the next slide. This time, the image that appeared on the screen was composed of only a single line of text against a black background. The ugly font and alarmingly large text size, however? It remained unchanged. “Over the course of this lecture,” the presenter began, “I will examine the effectiveness of Hanguk University’s attempts to bestow their core values—honesty, creativity, and passion—upon their students through an investigation of the reputations of our most distinguished alumni, during which I will redefine the archetype of the model student and explore what roles and responsibilities current students should aspire to in the future, through which…” The students who had been jolted awake soon slipped back into a stupor, the shock of the presentation’s visuals quickly wearing off. It didn’t help that the voice of the presenter was low and monotonous, with no pitch variation whatsoever, or that his first sentence seemed to go on forever. “For honesty, I focused on the following alumni…” The lecture content was surprisingly in-depth, and the logic was solid. The presenter had conducted a thorough investigation into whether the university’s talent development system—as described on its website—actually worked, and concluded that it didn’t. The alumni he cited as examples included a politician stripped of office for fraud, a professor caught fabricating academic research, and a businessman who’d accepted bribes for job placements. For a group assignment done for a mere two-credit course, the level of dedication was rare. Unfortunately, by the end of the presentation, less than ten people were still listening, including the professor. Thus, when the presenter wrapped up his presentation ten minutes later with some final words on the importance of honesty and fairness, he was met with only a small, haphazard round of applause. “Thank you for listening,” he concluded, then flipped to the last slide. Gasps immediately burst from the lips of the few who’d still been paying attention. Even the students who’d been dozing abruptly shot up in their seats, staring at the screen in disbelief. As the room erupted in whispers and murmurs, the professor pushed his glasses up his nose, visibly bewildered. The presenter—Sangwoo Choo—briefly observed the stir that had broken out among his audience. That illustration I used in the background must have really brought the presentation together, he silently concluded. return 0; A student wearing a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes entered the office to meet with the professor, who looked slightly troubled as he gestured for the student to sit. “Thanks for dropping by, Sangwoo,” the professor began. “I wanted to talk about your presentation from earlier today.” “Was there some kind of issue with it?” Sangwoo asked. “The content was impressive, but…” The professor trailed off, flipping through the attendance sheet. “Did none of your group members participate?” Sangwoo had delivered a remarkably in-depth presentation on his own, but it was, after all, a group project. There were supposed to be three other people in his group. “No,” Sangwoo replied without a hint of emotion. The professor rubbed his forehead with a sigh. “Could you expand on that, please?” “Originally, I was only responsible for the first part of the research and the presentation slides,” Sangwoo explained. “However, the person assigned to the second part of the research didn’t send their material to me by 6 PM yesterday, as he had promised to do, so I completed it instead. As for the designated presenter, he said he couldn’t attend class due to grief over his great-aunt’s passing, so I filled in for him as well.” “What about the last one, then?” “I never even met them.” The professor nodded silently and made three marks on the attendance sheet. Then he peered at the paper closely, as if he had just discovered something. “It seems there’s a graduating senior in your group. He emailed me in advance to let me know he wouldn’t be able to attend class this week, as he’d won an award and would be traveling abroad to accept it.” “Yes, I did hear about someone entering a competition.” The professor studied Sangwoo for a moment. “Given the circumstances, don’t you think leaving his name off the project might be a bit harsh?” “No, I do not,” Sangwoo answered simply, his tone unwavering. “How come?” “If he had only missed class today but participated in every other instance, I would be willing to be more considerate of his situation. But he never attended any of the in-class meetings for the project, let alone contributed.” The professor pushed the attendance sheet toward Sangwoo. “Take a look. It shows he attended every single class, aside from today’s and last week’s.” Sangwoo didn’t even blink. “Perhaps he had someone else mark him as present.” A peculiar expression flickered across the professor’s face. “I see. Thank you, Sangwoo. Have a good rest of your day.” “Yes, Professor.” Sangwoo bowed politely and exited the office, his face just as impassive as it had been when he first walked in.