Prologue: The new shop

Classes at SM High had ended for today and all the students were bursting with bliss. Groups of people went out of the school gate, laughing and chatting. Cheer was present in every student's face. Some people remained for their club activities, while others were just spending some time hanging out with their friends, not wanting to part.

Flowers along the path were in bloom and a refreshing fragrance filled the air. Everyone exiting through the gate was calmly walking… except for a young teenage girl named Kim Taeyeon, who was hurriedly running towards the bus stop which is just a few meters away from their school gate.

“W-wait for meee!” She shouted.

She ran as fast as she could, ignoring the gaze of other students around her. She doesn’t care. All she wants is to get inside the bus and relax as she waits calmly for her stop. But before she could reach the bus stop, the blue automobile had already closed its door. Her shoulders slumped.

“Sigh. What a day.”

Today was an unlucky day for Kim Taeyeon. She was assigned to clean the classroom today, which took lots of her time since she was alone. She swept the floor, took out the trash bags and erased the writings on the board by herself. No Good Samaritan or whatsoever had helped her clean. Not even her close friend and roommate, Choi Sooyoung, bothered to help her.

“The lucky cleaner is…. Tadaaa! Kim Taeyeon! Congratulations! Make sure you clean the room after class, okay?”

She remembered Sooyoung smirking at her the moment the teacher called out her name. Out of the twenty nine other students on the class roster, their homeroom teacher just had to pick her name.  And to add more to her unlucky streak, she missed the bus by mere seconds.

“Arrrrrgh. Now I need to walk.” She let out a pout.

She decided to walk her way to the dorm. Their dorm was not that far from their school, but being the lazy girl she is, she always took the bus since it is free for the students of their school. She only had to swipe her ID and voila! She could ride the bus without paying.

Along her journey back to her dorm, she saw a newly opened game shop. Luck was once again on her side.

Wow. I definitely need to check this out.

THE HOTTEST GAME SHOP

Open Mon – Fri 10:00 am – 10:00pm

She took a glance at her wrist watch. 5:50pm… This day isn’t so bad after all, she thought. Taeyeon was feeling a little bit better than a few minutes ago.

She breathe in the evening air… not noticing the nearby trash can. All her gladness had left her, leaving deep melancholy set down upon her body. Her eyes set upon the source of her troubles. The stale odor in the air gave off faint smell of diapers and vomit. Even though the strong aroma of Taeyeon's perfume is pleasant, the musty odor from the rubbish still made her uneasy.

Oh my. My ing nose is about to rip off

After smelling the horrid dump, she smiled, trying to stop her face from cringing. She awkwardly beamed to the people outside the store as if she never inhaled anything nasty. The stench brought Taeyeon agony and suffering. It made its way over and over her senses. The people noticed her and smiled back. Taeyeon slowly moved away from the spot she was standing, away from the filth, as she pinched her nose in order to not further inhale the unpleasant smell.

"They really should throw the garbage away." Taeyeon muttered.

A few moments after her nose had recovered from the wretched smell, she fixed her black backpack. She sighed and finally decided to enter the game shop.

Taeyeon could hear a cute tone as she pulled the door open. She saw a monitor hooked onto the ceiling, showing the people who had entered the shop. Two other people simultaneously entered as soon as she got in. She waved at the camera and continued to walk inside the store. She went bonkers upon seeing the view in front of her.

Shelves full of games for different consoles were present. The newly opened game shop had black-colored walls with several game posters, a few life-sized toy figures near the entrance and a red carpeted floor, befitting the shop’s name; The Hottest Game Shop. Taeyeon felt like she was going to explode. It was paradise, she thought.

Mii, Wintendo3DX, Xboy360, PC.

Kim Taeyeon was in heaven. A game shop just near her school and also, just nearby her dorm. Nothing else could ever be this convenient. Games were her drugs. She said to herself that she could not live without games.

As she was wandering around the shop, her eyes had led her to a certain spot.

The PX3 Section; the single area reserved for her favorite console.

Blood rushed to Kim Taeyeon’s face as she saw hundreds of PX3 games lined up in front of her. She was instantly glued to the floor. Her feet won’t budge and she grinned uncontrollably. She could not control her feels. If she could roll around the shop, she would do it. She was just too happy right now.

She scanned the entire section, not wanting to miss any single detail of any game. She checked if the game she wanted was here. The game Dynasty Fighter 6, to be exact. She was fond of fighting games.

…

“Ah!! It’s available!” She exclaimed.

True, the game she wanted was available. But the question is, does she have enough money?

Taeyeon opened her backpack and rummaged through her stuff. She found her wallet and straight away opened it.

“Holy sh*t.” Her face turned into a disgusted one. Her navy blue wallet only contained pictures of herself and her friend Sooyoung… A few notebook papers with bubblegum stuck on it and… And five thousand won.

“I’m ing poor!” She took out the lone bill left inside her wallet.

While pouting, she looked at the price for Dynasty Fighter 6…

“Thirty five thousand won?!” Her head hurt. She felt like she was having a migraine. Her resources were way too low to get the game she wanted. With a frown, she gave up and placed Dynasty Fighter 6 neatly back to the shelf.

Off limits. Too expensive.

Taeyeon went to search at other places. While she was looking for other games, her eyes stumbled upon something. At the far end of the ledge down to the lowest row, there she saw a dark blue cd case. She took it to further inspect the game she found.

“Blue…?” She read the game title. Taeyeon did not bother to read the text at the back of the case. She hurriedly looked at the price of the game.

“Three thousand won.” She blinked. “Three thousand won…..” She trembled..

“Aw yissssss!!!” Taeyeon screamed, sounding like a war cry which made several other people inside the shop to look at her. She lowered down her head and tried to apologize to the people she had bothered.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry…” She bowed.

After the ruckus, she quickly went to the counter to pay for her newly found cheap game before somebody else gets it from her.

“Hello” The cashier greeted. He smiled at Taeyeon. The cashier looked extremely fashionable and Taeyeon could not deny the fact that he was cute.

“Hi. Here, I’m going to buy this.” Taeyeon shyly handed out the game. The young cashier took the case from her hand and searched for a disc from the file cabinet, just nearby the cash register.  He put the disc inside her cd case and scanned the game. He then put the game inside a small, black shopping bag.

“Wow. You’re a lucky girl. That was the last disc we had for that game title.” He smiled. “That would be four thousand won, ma’am.”

Oh sh*t. How could I forget that there’s still tax…

Taeyeon reluctantly handed out her last cash… which was five thousand won.

Huhuhu… My last money… she mentally cried…

The boy behind the counter took her money without further ado and gave her change.

“Here’s your change.”

Taeyeon smiled as she took her change. She squinted her eyes to look at the young man’s name tag which was pinned on the left side of his black uniform.

E-em…buh?

The young man’s name was definitely not Korean. It didn’t even sound like a boy’s name but… whatever, she was glad that she had a new game in her hands.

With that, Taeyeon went back to her dorm, broke with a thousand won left inside her wallet.

The few minutes of walking had paid off. At exactly 6:30pm, Taeyeon safely got to her dorm and used the elevator to get to the third floor, then made her way to their room. Feeling exhausted, Taeyeon went directly to her own room the instant she arrived. She threw her black backpack someplace on the ground as she plopped down her bed, with the newly bought game still in her hand.

“Blue... What the hell? What if this is some kind of a tetris game… Arghhh.” She whispered as she took out the game from the shopping bag. Taeyeon was feeling a bit awful right now. What if she got rigged? The game case didn’t even look eye-catching to her, but why the hell did she buy it?

She could not tell it, but she certainly felt an attraction the second she laid her eyes on the game case. -As if someone or something was calling her, pleading her to buy the game. The point is, she positively felt attached to the cd case. Maybe because blue is her beloved color? Whatever. She stopped thinking and decided to try the game on her PX3.

She sluggishly turned her flat screen TV and turned the game console on. She used her foot to drag her black PX3 controller which was placed down the blue carpeted floor. She then took the controller and sat at the edge of her bed, eyeing the white walls of her four cornered room while waiting for the console to read the disc she put in.

She selected the game from the browser and then waited for it to load.

“Yeah yeah yeah black screen…” Taeyeon sat down the floor, still staring at her TV. “Loading loading loading… Whatever” She mumbled as she kept tapping buttons on her controller.

She finally got to the title screen and selected new game.

Huge blocks of text flashed on her TV screen.

“What the… More yadda-yadda???” She was getting bored of all the text flashing on her screen and thus, she pressed the start button and skipped all of them. Kim Taeyeon was tired from all the walking she did. She was impatient right now. She only wanted to know the game play of this Blue game… All those text could be viewed later. She just wanted to try the game first.

“Finally….” Now, Taeyeon reached the point where she should enter her name. Her eyebrows furrowed. Naming her character is an important segment for her.

“Should I use Taeng? Tae-tae? Taeyeonie? Or Buttman?” She had a mental debate. Thinking of names is truly a hard task for the girl, since she could not choose one from all of the pet names her friends had given her. After a long while of thought, she entered the name she had chosen… and probably her most favorite nickname…

“Taengoo”

After confirming the name she had entered, another loading screen appeared. It was a spiral of dark blue and gold, swirling. It made an optical illusion… As if the viewers of the screen were getting inside the tv. She stared at it for minutes…

 And it was still spinning.

“Oh great! Way to go, three thousand won game” She thought that the game was stuck.

She was about to press the power button on her game console to restart the game… But all of a sudden, her eyes felt heavy and drooping.

Taeyeon's energy did not last. She was already nodding her head, gradually getting drowsy. Feeling extremely tired because of today's events, she finally gave in.

As far as she knew, her vision out with an unknown reason.

Dun dun dun dun