"Honey, wake up."

Rimae's mother shook her awake.

"What is it, umma?" she asked, yawning widely.

"You're going to be late for school!"

"WHAT?" Rimae bounded out of her bed right away when she heard this. It was her first day of senior year. She did not want to become the laughingstock of the class by showing up late. It would ruin her reputation as one of the school's top students.

"That's what you get for staying up late reading. I keep telling you to go to sleep earlier. Hurry up! Breakfast's on the table."

Rimae scurried to the kitchen to scarf down the rice porridge her mother had prepared for her. It had cooled a lot in the time that it sat waiting for her. When she finished eating, she darted into the bathroom to brush her teeth at record speed and vanished back into her room to throw on her uniform.

The Woollim High uniform was very much standard, with a white button-down shirt and a dark navy blue jacket that went over it that was embroidered with her full name on the front pocket. It also included a boring dark gray pleated skirt that went to her knees. She pulled on her long socks and shoved her feet into her black shoes before snatching up her bag to head to school.

The buses ran every fifteen minutes, and she managed to catch the one that left at seven-thirty. It would get her to school in five minutes, sparing her a twenty-minute walk.

After a bit of running from the bus stop, she got to the school gate, which was about to close just as she arrived. The teacher on duty, frowned at her as she greeted and bowed to him while trying to catch her breath. "An-annyeonghaseyo, Park Seon...saeng...nim!"

"Rimae-ssi, it's not like you to be late. Hurry on in." He waved her through the gate, and she nodded at him as she passed by.

The opening ceremony was boring, as usual. The only thing worth mentioning was the principal's wig slipping a little on his head when he stepped off of the stage. All of the students giggled until he glared at them. Then, once the ceremony finished, everyone went their separate ways to find their classrooms.

Rimae wormed her way to the front of the crowd to find her homeroom assignment. She was in class 3-1. Briefly, she scanned over the list of names of her classmates. Most weren't anything interesting to her. She knew who they were, but she didn't really care. But one name caught her eye: Kim Sunggyu.

"That bastard," she muttered under her breath.

This was going to be a fun year, she could already tell.

Kim Sunggyu was one of the most popular boys in the senior class. He was tall and handsome, spoke three other languages, played two instruments, and was also the lead singer in a band he formed with his friends called Infinite. Just about every girl Rimae knew had her eyes set on him.

But Rimae didn't care about any of that. The only reason she cared about his existence was one simple fact: he was her rival for graduating as the top student at Woollim High. She had to beat him. She wouldn't be able to live it down if he beat her.

For both her first and second year of high school she had been stuck at second place behind Kim Sunggyu, but this year, she was going to reverse the situation.

"You better watch out, Kim Sunggyu," she muttered before extracting herself from the crowd to head to her classroom.