Prologue.
His forehead glistened with sweat as he stared at the target.

At this point, the cheers from the crowd of the stadium was irrelevant. His complete focus was to ace this shot. He rolled his shoulders back and cracked his knuckles to give relief to his very tense body. Taking a deep breath, he took an arrow with a yellow vane from his quiver which was stationed to his right.

He stood straddling the shooting line and pointed his bow toward the ground, tipping it slightly clockwise of vertical and placed the shaft of the arrow on the arrow rest. He attached the back of the arrow to the bowstring with the nock. Making sure the three vanes were oriented such that a single vane is pointing away from the bow (to improve the clearance of the arrow as it passes the arrow rest), he lifted his bow off the ground and up. Then, pulling back, he closed his right eye and aligned his sight with the bullseye. The boy knew he had to make yellow if he wanted to win.

That’s when everything went downhill.

His breathing started to become unstable. His breaths were short and many and he just couldn’t bring himself to release the arrow.

Just do it. Release it before the buzzer. Please. Just please.

Fortunately, his pleas were heard by whatever it was in his body and he released the arrow a millisecond before the buzzer. But when he came face-to-face with his result, he groaned. He’d made red, which was 8 points. Meaning, he lost to Gong Chansik (better known as Gongchan). Finally paying attention to his surroundings, he could hear the announcer’s voices as well as the groans of the stadium.

The loudspeaker blared, ‘Aw, another promising game for Interplex Co. heir and rookie archer, Lee Jihoon. This makes his 3rd game since starting his career that he made second place. No matter how I look at it though, his long pause before release was a bit fishy. Miyoung-sshi, how’s it down there?’

A lady who had walked up to Jihoon with a microphone, Miyoung, was now looking at a camera which was probably filming all of this live. “People are celebrating and fans of Jihoon-sshi are just plain disappointed. But let me ask the man himself. How did you feel about today’s competition?” Miyoung held the microphone up to Jihoon.

Shifting awkwardly, ironically uncomfortable under the pressure, he mustered up enough courage and answered with a cold exterior yet warm words, “I am truly thankful to my fellow competitors. It was a tough line-up and a tension filled competition. I tried the best I could and I’m thankful for winning silver.”

Lies.

He wanted the gold, he could’ve done better. Loss over loss, silver after silver, and for the same damn reason, that pause. Miyoung smiled, seemingly happy with that answer but wouldn’t let him go just yet. “So being 21 and an heir to a huge corporation, don’t you have some girl in your life, Jihoon-sshi? Your fans are dying to know.”

He nearly choked on his own saliva but he kept his calm. He shook his head, “Because I figure I’ll wait till I find someone who I’m really interested in giving my time to. Someone who makes me feel wonderful and who feels wonderful with me.” The crowd aw-ed and Jihoon was shocked as to how smooth and instinctive those words were. The crowd then started chanting his name.

Miyoung giggled and looked at the camera again, “You heard it here folks. Lee Jihoon’s a single bachelor and looking for his special someone. Back to you, Jinyoung-sshi.”

After the camera lights dimmed and she turned off the mic, Jihoon released a breath that he didn’t even know he was holding.
 

I'm so sorry for such a late update and short one, at that. But I hope you enjoy this prologue!!!