The Great Storyteller

Translated by: ShawnSuh

Edited by: SootyOwl

“What are you doing?”

“… Uh… ”

She hesitated. As he studied her state, he saw the stack of papers in her hand and grasped the situation immediately.

“You’re here to collect my introduction,” Juho said as he took it out of his notebook and handed it to her. Coming to her senses, she quickly took the pages from him. She was wearing a peculiar expression on her face. After returning to his seat, Juho placed his hands on the keyboard to resume writing.

Even with Juho’s papers, she was standing completely still in the same place.

“Did you have something to say?” Juho asked.

“Huh?”

“Are you just going to stand there?”

As Juho asked that, she stared intently at the stacks of paper in her hand.

“Are you always like that?”

“Like how?”

“Just… like that,” Bo Suk answered as she gave up looking for a better word. Juho smiled. She seemed like she needed to work on her vocabularies.

“I don’t really know what you’re trying to describe, but it’s nothing special.”

“… You’re incredible.”

“What?”

“Nothing. I’m gonna get going now,” she said as she bowed to Juho with enough force to blow wind. Juho watched her as she rushed out of the room, and while he was curious, he quickly returned to writing.

—

Since then on, Bo Suk adjusted to the Literature Club without any issues. She followed the instructions seamlessly while maintaining a decent relationship with the rest of the club members. However, there was something that bothered Juho, and he had been quietly searching for it.

At that moment, the door flung open with a loud noise, and Mr. Moon walked in with a pile of things in his arms. They seemed quite familiar to the veteran club members.

“OK. Bo Suk, you get the privilege of looking through the works of my previous students.”

It was the compilations.

“We want to look too!”

“You guys need to be planning for what to write in the future.”

“Oh! C’mon, Mr. Moon!”

No matter how much the club members complained, Mr. Moon shook his head and stood his ground.

“Well… if it’s part of the process, then feel free,” he said.

“Yes! It’s essential!”

“Whatever floats your boat,” he said as he sat on his chair and opened a book as if he couldn’t even see his students. The title read ‘The Language of God.’

Despite knowing that he was reading in front of the author, Mr. Moon seemed to pay no attention to what he was doing. While Juho remained indifferent, Seo Kwang poked at his sides repeatedly.

At that moment, Sun Hwa began to complain to Mr. Moon as he had just started reading, “Mr. Moon, aren’t you being too loose with us since we became sophomores?”

The sophomores in the Literature Club had been each working on a free-topic composition. They had to plan everything out from beginning to end, from the topic to the genre.

“It’s almost time for you all to be independent.”

“Still!”

Bo Suk was the only club member who was listening to Mr. Moon’s lecture, and Sun Hwa seemed to miss those days.

“This is the compilation you guys made, right?” Bo Suk said as she picked up one of them, and Baron’s cover design became visible. Five distinct colors were mixing with each other.

Without hesitation, she opened the compilation and flipped through the pages one by one. Juho already knew that the club members were merely pretending to look indifferent while feeling incredibly proud internally.

“Wow.”

At the sound of the quiet exclamation, all eyes fell on the source of the sound. Glancing over her shoulders, Seo Kwang saw that she was reading Juho’s work. At which, he explained without hesitation, “He wrote that in a subway station.”

“A subway station? Did you all go outside?”

“Yep. That was when we were learning to write only up to the beginning of the main event.”

With that, her eyes widened.

“Does that mean the story ends at the beginning of the main event?”

“Yep.”

As Bo Suk turned her eyes in Juho’s direction, Juho gave her a gentle nod. She seemed rather attached to the story.

“How sad. I was really getting into it.”

“It was for the lesson.”

“Still. I want to read the entire story.”

“I know. Bummer.”

Juho didn’t offer to write the rest of the story until the end. It was the story about an elephant and a woman who suffered from a phobia towards it. The story ended abruptly as the woman was on the verge of running into the elephant that had escaped the zoo. Because she couldn’t do anything to change Juho’s mind, she only smacked her lips quietly. Seo Kwang was fully aware of what she was feeling.

“I know what you’re feeling. Oh, the desperation! You feel your body twisting from within, because you want to read it so much, right? Do you feel like your heart’s shrinking?”

“No, not to that degree,” Bo Suk answered. Despite her brief answer, it was clear that she was still attached to the story. She looked intently at the compilation.

“I can see that everyone’s worked really hard.”

“Of course!”

“Ugh! It was hell.”

Sun Hwa and Seo Kwang answered in an exaggerated manners.

When Juho looked at Bo Suk, she was wearing the same expression she had been wearing at the computer room. It was rather peculiar.

“You’ve been learning quickly yourself!” Bom complimented her, being oblivious to the look on her face. As the expression faded from Bo Suk’s face, Juho also took his eyes off of her and agreed with Bom.

Compared to when she had written her first self-introduction, Bo Suk had made huge improvements. She acquainted herself with the act of writing rather quickly.

“You must be transcribing a lot,” Juho asked.

“So-so. Actually, not at all,” Bo Suk answered, shaking her head. At her emphatic answer, Juho asked her no more and nodded.

“Man, I miss the lessons. Mr. Moon, can we play word chain? That was so much fun,” Sun Hwa grumbled.

Freedom was a rather heavy burden, and she wanted to run away from the fact that she had to be responsible for her own work from beginning to end.

In response to Sun Hwa, Mr. Moon took his eyes off of his book and said, “Why don’t you play amongst yourselves?”

“Eh? Play what? Word chain?”

“No, the lessons.”

Seeing the baffled look on the members’ faces, he added, “There’s not much to it. You just have to write a lot, and if you want to be a better writer, you can’t get sick of writing. If you don’t want to get sick of it, it has to be fun. That’s why we played word chain or met at the subway station. Now, ask yourselves: ‘How can I make writing more fun?’”

“Uh…”

Sensing that yet another responsibility had been added onto him, Seo Kwang let out a sigh and said toward Sun Hwa, “Thanks for nothing.”

“At least we get to enjoy the process, right?” she answered quietly with guilt all over her face.

“That doesn’t sound like a terrible idea. Let’s think about it. What can we do?” Bom said, smiling.

“Nothing screams more “fun” than books. Let us read, my friends, and then we’ll write a report on it.”

“Speak for yourself,” Sun Hwa said and then suggested, “Speaking of reports, why don’t we just go watch something while we’re at it?”

“You mean something entirely different? Like a musical?”

“That could be an option.”

“The tickets are really expensive though…”

The fact that it cost money was a crucial matter to be discussed.

“What about a movie? It’s not free, but it’s much more affordable.”

“That’s true, but what if we end up writing something that reads like a book report?” Bom asked, and Sun Hwa nodded in agreement.

“Good point. Seems like you don’t want to write a report?”

“Kind of. I’d much rather write a story.”

“Why don’t we we decide the genre on our own, then?” Juho suggested.

Because it would allow them to write in the fashion that they wanted, the club members agreed.

“OK, so what should we watch?”

As everyone was lost in thought, Baron chimed in, “How about you guys?”

“Huh?”

“You guys, yourselves.”

His pencil pointed toward Juho. He had been drawing the club members frequently, and Juho caught on immediately.

“We make each other the main character.”

“Make each other the main character?”

“Yeah. Let’s make each other the protagonist, whether we’re writing a book report or a novel.”

The club members expressed interest. Being the primary character of a story brought about excitement. Everyone looked at each other, curious about who would write about whom.

“That sounds like an idea,” Mr. Moon interjected. With the affirming words of their teacher, the club members jumped right into setting rules, until…

“Make sure to include the freshman.”

“Eh?! Is Bo Suk that good of a writer?” Alerted of the news, Sun Hwa asked.

Mr. Moon smiled quietly and said, “You guys get to choose the genre for yourselves. I’m sure Bo Suk has what it takes.”

“In that case, why don’t we include Baron while we’re at it?” Sun Hwa asked as she looked at him, but he waved his hand and turned her down.

“I’m gonna stick to drawing.”

Therefore, a total of five people decided to participate. Now, they had to decide who they were going to write about, so they discussed methods by which they would reach a decision.

“Rock-paper-scissors?”

“Should we draw straws?”

“Let’s pick a king and do as what he says.”

As they struggled to agree, Bom opened her mouth and said, “Should we each decide this on our own too?”

“On our own?”

“Yeah. Everyone gets to write about whoever they want. Some might end up writing about the same person, but on the other hand, there might be a person who nobody writes about.”

“I like it. It’s simple.”

With that, the five looked at each other as if probing. Amid the excitement, Juho was the only calm person. Suddenly, Seo Kwang poked at his sides and whispered, “Hey, pick me. Make me the protagonist.”

He was rather direct in his appeal. Of course, Sun Hwa wouldn’t have let it slide.

“Don’t you dare to be sneaky. Juho, there are others around you.”

“Consider me!”

“Who stands out here the most?”

Bom and Baron each took turns to chime in.

“Feel free to include me.”

With the addition of Mr. Moon, Juho mulled it over, and then…

“OK. I’ve made up my mind.”

“Already?”

“How can you make everything so simple?”

“Who?”

As questions poured out, Juho gave them a puzzling answer.

“Bo Suk Noh.”

A perplexed look appeared on her face.

“Me?”

“Congratulations, Bo Suk.”

“Lucky!”

Sun Hwa and Bom said simultaneously. Though they sounded playful, it was clear that they had hoped to be called. Bo Suk had become the lucky recipient of a prize that she knew nothing about. What were the odds of being chosen as the protagonist in a Yun Woo story?”

As the rest of the club members comforted one another, Juho added, “You guys each made an appearance already.”

“Eh?”

Ignoring the confusion on the club members’ faces, Juho looked at Bo Suk and decided to write a short story. Though it would be about twenty pages long, Juho felt she was better suited for a short, yet powerful story. The fact that an author decided to write about a person meant that they had to be able to understand the choices made by the person. Because Juho had been curious about Bo Suk, it would be the perfect opportunity to get to know her better. It was time for his favorite activity in the entire world: writing.

Accepting the result, the rest of the club members went on to decide the person they wanted to write about.

“I choose Seo Kwang,” Bom said. He tended to be clear about his preferences, so getting to know him would be a smooth sail for her.

“I choose Baron. You wouldn’t mind, would ya? I guess it’d be better to write a story,” Sun Hwa said. Baron smiled confidently and asked her to portray him as “cool as possible.”

“I’ll go with Bom. We’ll figure out the style over time,” Seo Kwang said.

Lastly, it was Bo Suk’s turn. Having been hesitant up to that point, she chose Juho in order to return the favor.

“Juho Woo, huh.”

Despite having known him for the past year, there was a reason why the club members weren’t choosing him.

“Have fun.”

The club members wished the fearless freshman good luck, and Bo Suk couldn’t help but feel insecure about her choice.