A woman screamed at the top of her lungs, her face flushed with excitement and fervid animation. She was jumping on her toes, giddily pointing as she did so.
Wait, not something. But someone.
It was her, the hooded girl he was facing right at this very moment. She seemed just as startled as him as she quickly pulled on her hood to cover her face even more from the outside.
But it was far too late. The woman's ardent and incandescent scream seemed to have become a signal or a beacon that awakened a virus within everyone's bodies like a sleeping agent.
The key words: Yuna and here seemed to have created a veritable zombie apocalypse outside the library grounds.
Even before Michael could fully grasp at what was happening, he suddenly felt the ground underneath his feet tremble profusely as hundreds of feet began stomping towards him.
"YUNA! I'M YOUR BIGGEST FAN!"
"PLEASE LOOK AT ME! YUNA!"
"SIGN MY AUTOGRAPH AND TAKE A PICTURE WITH ME!"
In just a few seconds time, he found himself getting swarmed by people of all ages and walks of life. They jostled, pushed, and rammed their way through as they tried to get as close to the hooded girl as fast as possible.
Michael became the unfortunate victim of this stampede. He felt himself getting lost in the crowd, growing further and further away from where he was.
He looked at the hooded girl and saw that she was looking back at him too. There was a sense of longing in her eyes, as if there was still something that she wanted to say.
However, the tumultuous crowd kept pushing them further and further apart.
It was at this moment that Michael's gaze with the hooded girl broke. They both turned to look to their side and saw the old man once again getting pushed around helplessly through the growing sea of rabid fans. The peanuts were crushed under their feet.
The hooded girl opened her mouth to shout, but even her voice was getting drowned out by the crowds of people wanting to take a picture or an autograph with her.
Then, she stopped, realizing that there was only one way to stop the crowd.
Taking one last glance at Michael, who had already rushed to the old man's side, the hooded girl slowly turned around and led her zealous fandom away from the scene.
Immediately, bodyguards surrounded her from all sides and led her away into safety.
Soon, the raucous and cacophonous shouting and stomping softened as the group ran after the hooded girl. This left Michael and the old man alone to deal with their destructive wake.
The fresh, steaming peanuts were now nothing more than a stepped-on mush on the ground. No peanut left uncrushed, there was no recovering them anymore.
Michael sighed, knowing that there was nothing left he could do.
"It's alright, young man. What's done is done."
But this still didn't sit right. "What about your family?"
The old man picked up the flattened basket from the ground. "They're gone. I'm the only one left. Selling peanuts has just been a way for me to pass the time. But you… you have a full life ahead of you."
Then, he approached Michael, giving him something in his palm.
"Go. I know you were in a hurry for something."
Michael looked at the pile of money and coins in his hand. Once again, he felt a prick in his heart. Why was it always the people who didn't have much, end up becoming the most generous of people?
"Oh, and don't forget that," the old man said, pointing towards a certain keychain on the ground.
This was a keychain from her phone: a white fox curled up in the snow.
Michael picked it up from the ground, dusting it of dirty footprints.
"Follow your heart," said the old man. "Don't make the same mistake that I did."
Michael ruminated on the old man's words, and by the time he raised his head and got ahold of himself, the old man was gone. He was all alone.
Then, his gaze glanced at the crowd in the distance. Lingering, he could only mutter, "Yuna Kim…"
It was only now that the gravity of the situation truly dawned on him.
He just met a global superstar.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
Michael never really did meet that old man again to thank him for the money. Even after he succeeded in life and earned enough money to live a comfortable life, he wasn't able to repay the favor. If it weren't for the old man, he wouldn't have gotten the money to pay for a taxi to go to the Entrance Exam.
Thanks to that, he only ended up being late by almost 20 minutes, but thankfully, his endless nights of studying ended up paying off. He was able to ace the test and enter into his dream university. And the rest was history.
As for his first encounter with Yuna Kim, that was one of his most memorable memories of his previous life.
It basically started his admiration for her. He became her fan.
But that was just it. He was just her fan.
After all, he did go to the place. He stood at the center of the library grounds waiting for her to show up again. But she never did.
He waited in the cold night, the winter breeze frosting his eyebrows, but he still persevered.
And as it turned out, Yuna Kim had a surprise concert on the other side of the town during those times.
Was he mad, no. Disappointed, maybe.
But who was he to be angry? He wasn't even an ordinary man. He was on the bottom of the social totem pole. They lived a completely different life. Two extremes of the same scale.
What was he supposed to do, pursue her and demand an explanation as to why she didn't show herself? She didn't owe him anything. They just had a small interaction that probably meant nothing to her, something that she doesn't even remember.
…
…
…
Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the ballroom at the conglomerates' table, a white fox mask turned to stare at the lonely lion masked youth.
Her gaze, lingering.