Morning in Seoul carried the kind of quiet that only came before the rush.
In one of the city's shorter apartment blocks, a narrow corridor stretched between rows of identical white doors. Among them, one stood still and silent, giving no hint of the small world behind it.
Inside, the room was plain yet neatly kept. The apartment was shaped like a long rectangle. At the entrance lay a small stone-floored area scattered with shoes—slippers, sneakers, a pair of worn boots. Beyond that, the floor rose slightly into polished wood that gleamed faintly under the dim ceiling light.
To the right stood a small bathroom door. To the left, a low cabinet table cluttered with keys, unopened mail, and a half-finished can of coffee. Past it, the room widened. Heavy gray curtains blocked the morning sun, turning the air inside a gentle shade of silver. Against the far wall sat a white bed, facing a television. Beside the bed rested a couch and a small wooden coffee table. The kitchenette beside it held a sink, an induction stove, and a compact refrigerator humming in quiet rhythm.
A boy sat on the bed, half-buried in white blankets.
Yoong Soo, eighteen years old, dark hair messy from sleepless nights, stared intently at the book open in his hands. His eyes were rimmed red, dark circles carved beneath them like proof of devotion. For two days, he hadn't closed them for more than a minute.
He hadn't planned on it.
Two nights ago, while wandering through a small bookstore near his school, he had found a paperback with a curious title: Love.exe: 1000 Breakups to Freedom. The summary was strange, the cover plain, but something about it had pulled him in.
Now he couldn't escape it.
He flipped another page, completely absorbed. The story followed a girl named Evelyn, an ordinary student living in a world where magic and monsters existed alongside normal life. She wasn't rich or gifted, just someone easily overlooked. Not bullied, but invisible.
Everything changed when she awakened a strange system.
The system promised her anything she could dream of: power, wealth, beauty, even magical strength. But there was a condition, she had to break hearts.
Each time a man confessed his love to her, Evelyn had to accept it, reach his full affection, and then reject him herself. Only by breaking up could she grow stronger and gain her next reward. If she ever refused the system's orders or chose to stay with someone, she'd be cursed with relentless misfortune.
It was cruel, yet strangely addictive.
Yoong Soo couldn't stop reading. Each chapter pulled him deeper. Evelyn wasn't written like a cold manipulator, she was confused, clumsy, and heartbreakingly sincere. She tried to find a way out of her cruel deal, but the system never relented.
Now, as he reached the final volume, the world around him ceased to exist.
The soft buzz of the refrigerator, the morning light sneaking through the curtain edges, everything faded except the black print on white pages.
His lips moved as he read, barely breathing. The book described Evelyn's thousandth breakup, the moment her freedom was finally achieved. Her power reached unimaginable heights; she was now a symbol, a legend, the strongest figure alive. She had defeated monsters, saved cities, and crushed every evil that rose before her.
But something inside her was gone.
After all those years, after countless men who had once loved her, Evelyn discovered she could no longer feel the warmth of affection. She tried to rekindle it. She went back to some of them, men who had been arrogant and proud, the kind who believed she couldn't live without them. They had mocked her return, smug and certain that she still loved them. She even shared nights with some of them, hoping to feel the spark again.
Yet nothing came. No heartbeat, no thrill, no love. Only emptiness.
And when those men realized she was not the same girl they once adored, she left them again, calm and detached. Each scene left Yoong Soo's chest aching and yet, somehow, he laughed bitterly, almost crazily. Those men deserved it. Their arrogance, their obsession, their disbelief that she had moved on once more, it was pathetic.
But Evelyn's sadness wasn't something he could laugh away.
When the story reached its last page, she had adopted a child, smiling faintly at a world she no longer loved. The system was gone, her chains were broken, yet her heart remained frozen.
Yoong Soo's eyes lingered on the final line for a long moment. Then, with a soft exhale, he closed the book.
He stared at its cover, motionless, as if afraid to move and break the fragile stillness.
The morning light finally slipped through the curtain's edge, painting the edge of his pillow gold.
Yoong Soo sighed, whispering under his breath, "Evelyn…"
For a while, Yoong Soo just stared at the ceiling, his mind blank, his chest oddly hollow. The story that had consumed two sleepless nights was finished, yet the ache inside him refused to settle.
He reached over to the nightstand, set the book carefully beside the lamp, and collapsed backward into the sheets. The blanket twisted around his legs, almost strangling him as he rolled over in frustration.
"This can't be it," he muttered, voice hoarse from disuse. "After everything she went through, that's how it ends?"
He pressed a pillow over his face and groaned loudly. "Why would the author do that? Evelyn didn't deserve that kind of ending!"
He yanked the pillow away and threw it across the room. "Who even writes a story like that? You make a world that's so good, so full of life, and then you tear it apart at the end? Are you trying to kill your readers?"
His words echoed through the quiet apartment. The refrigerator answered with its steady hum.
He sat up, hair sticking up in every direction, and glared at the book like it had betrayed him personally. "If you wanted to make a tragedy, you should've warned me at the start! You can't give her everything, make her laugh, make her real, then freeze her heart like that!"
He let out a small, humorless laugh. "You're cruel. Whoever you are, you're cruel."
For a few seconds, he said nothing. Then, a small smile tugged at his lips, bitter yet fond.
"She really went back to them, huh…" he whispered.
He remembered those chapters vividly the ones where Evelyn revisited the men she had once broken. They had been so arrogant when she returned, certain that she couldn't live without them. Some welcomed her with smug grins, others with desperate affection. She tried, for their sake and hers, to feel something again. She spent nights with them, chasing the ghost of warmth she once knew.
But nothing.
Not even a flicker of emotion. Only the faint echo of what used to be love.
When those men finally realized that Evelyn's heart no longer belonged to anyone, their pride cracked. Their pain mirrored her emptiness, and she walked away from them once more calm, untouchable.
Yoong Soo laughed softly, shaking his head. "Serves them right. Acting like she needed them."
But the laugh faded quickly. His eyes softened, the amusement replaced by quiet grief.
"She deserved better," he murmured. "She should've been happy. After all that pain… she should've been allowed to feel love again."
He slumped against the wall, exhaustion catching up to him. His thoughts blurred, but the ache in his chest remained.
Evelyn wasn't just a character to him anymore. She was everything he had dreamed of gentle, flawed, funny, kind. She laughed too easily, complained too often, and still kept going no matter how much it hurt.
He wanted to protect that version of her, the one who hadn't yet turned numb.
His hand fell over his chest as he whispered, "If I ever had the chance… I'd make sure she doesn't lose her heart. I'd keep her from turning cold."
The words grew louder, his conviction spilling into the empty room. "If I were in that world, I'd save her! I'd keep her love alive until the end!"
Silence answered.
Yoong Soo froze, realizing how ridiculous he must look talking to no one, declaring his devotion to a fictional woman. His cheeks warmed. "I'm going crazy," he muttered, rubbing his face. "Two nights without sleep and I'm already begging the universe."
He leaned back, closing his eyes. The tension in his body loosened as fatigue finally pulled him down.
"Still…" he whispered, voice barely audible. "If it's even possible… let me meet her. Just once."
His gaze shifted to the book lying on the nightstand. The cover gleamed faintly under the soft light, as if waiting for him to touch it again.
He smiled wearily, reached out, and brushed the edge of the cover with his fingertips.
"I hope I dream of you tonight, Evelyn," he murmured.
His hand slipped away, and sleep took him at last. The curtain swayed gently as a faint breeze passed through the narrow gap. Morning light spilled across the floor, climbing up the bed, touching his face and the quiet book beside him.
Love.exe: 1000 Breakups to Freedom.
The world beyond that title waited patiently, silent, unchanging, until the boy who had wished for it finally closed his eyes.