1st in Class Hides Regression - Chapter 1

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Top Student Hides Her Regression
Episode 1
Ten years ago. The morning I went to take the College Entrance Exam.
An old man grabbed me by the hair on the Subway.
‘How disrespectful—won’t even give up your seat to your elders!’
‘Aaaah!’
‘Oh, sir! The student was reading and didn’t notice!’
‘Help me! Please, help!’
I was the kind of student for whom Korea University was all but guaranteed—as long as I didn’t bomb the entrance exam.
As long as I didn’t bomb it.
And ten years later, in the present day.
I’m standing on a rooftop.
Obviously not because I’m planning to jump.
‘I’m just here because I’m fed up…….’
I’m twenty-nine years old now.
Even my male friends from university who’ve already done their military service have all gotten jobs.
The ones who landed positions early are busy talking about promotions and job-hopping; the restaurants where our college friends gather every quarter keep getting more expensive.
And here I am, still unable to find solid footing, stuck doing a Conversion Internship.
An older colleague—a perpetual deputy who’s eleven years my senior—has been tormenting me ever since I turned down his proposal for a drink after work, and my evaluation scores for permanent conversion are abysmal.
The conversion’s already off the table, so I’ve been grimly holding on just for the intern salary.
All while swallowing the urge to walk out.
Ding.
[Mom: I made stew at home. Eat it when you get off work]
“…How am I supposed to face Mom if I bomb this one too?”
It’s been four years now since I started tanking applications—sometimes at the resume stage, sometimes in the interview.
With rejection after rejection pouring in, Mom doesn’t say it outright, but I could see it written all over her face this time—she was genuinely, desperately hoping.
This Formal Suit I’m wearing now, I have nothing else to wear to work, so Mom bought it for me.
When I come home late at night, the counter is piled high with medication envelopes she takes. Working twelve-hour shifts on her feet with that body, just to feed a perfectly healthy twenty-nine-year-old daughter.
“What am I going to do if I fail this one too.”
I sighed and looked up at the sky.
If someone back in high school had spoiled this exact future for me—telling me ‘This is how you’re going to live’—I would have laughed it off.
Where did it all go wrong?
“I have no idea.”
I sighed again and cast my eyes toward the opposite building.
I could see a massive digital billboard blazing from the exterior wall of a high-rise.
The biggest billboard on Gangnam-daero displayed an unnaturally handsome man in an American football uniform with black eye paint, his face plastered across it like a movie poster.
The text below read:
[Congratulations on Jung Eun-sung’s 10th Anniversary Debut]
“Why are you chasing me even here and making my life miserable?”
I grumbled at the beautiful man smiling like the sun itself.
“I came up here specifically to hide from you, you know?”
I glared at the photo with narrowed eyes. Must’ve been edited out during retouching—the faint scar on the left side of Jung Eun-sung’s cheek was nowhere to be seen.
“Still, congratulations, Jung Eun-sung. You made your dream come true.”
As long as you don’t cause any scandals, you’ll keep soaring forever. That little scar on your cheek isn’t going to slow down your charm one bit.
Q. Why did you suddenly stop complaining about your situation and start talking about some guy? Who is he anyway?
A. Actor Jung Eun-sung.
He debuted at nineteen as the main vocalist of a male idol group under a major entertainment company.
The group exploded in popularity right after debut and became Korea’s representative boy band, but…….
Before three years had even passed, the group leader got caught with drugs and went to prison.
The youngest member got tangled up in a premarital pregnancy scandal with an influencer girlfriend; one of the guys who appeared frequently on variety shows got drunk at a club and assaulted staff; the eldest was caught in illegal gambling abroad; another hit-and-ran while driving under the influence; the one foreign member quit and moved to America.
Jung Eun-sung alone survived, completed his contract term, and switched to acting.
He was my classmate in high school ten years ago and even sat in the same class once, but we hadn’t met since graduation—
Until today.
I ran into Jung Eun-sung again after ten years, when he came to our company to do a photoshoot.
‘Kang Da-hye, I’m going to make sure you don’t get converted no matter what it takes, you got that?!’
It was right when my boss was tearing me apart with his criticism.
I was getting flustered and apologizing while he screamed at me in front of all the staff, and at that exact moment, Jung Eun-sung walked onto the set—and our eyes locked.
“…You recognized me, didn’t you?”
Of course he did.
Look at the expression on Jung Eun-sung’s face. Does that look like the face of someone who didn’t recognize me?
At least Jung Eun-sung had the sense not to acknowledge me there, for which I was grateful.
A short laugh escaped my lips, white breath scattering into the cold.
I took another look at Jung Eun-sung’s tenth-anniversary debut advertisement.
“You haven’t changed since high school.”
High school.
Looking back, it felt like the most hopeful period of my life.
Difficult, yes — but I believed without question that a radiant future waited ahead of me.
And now?
“I’m doing a fine job of destroying myself.”
I don’t want to keep living like this, but I can’t see any way out.
My chest feels constantly tight, and thinking about the future makes it hard to breathe.
Every night when I lie down to sleep, the same thought circles through my mind.
‘What if I hadn’t taken that subway on the day of the College Entrance Exam?’
It’s been ten years since I took the exam, and I know it’s absurd to still blame it.
I know that failing the exam doesn’t have to mean failing at life.
But I want to say that my life twisted out of shape from that day onward.
I’d been studying for a retake on my own when I got hit by a car, so I missed the exam the following year as well — and after that, nothing I touched came out right.
A few years ago, my mother’s shop went under because of the pandemic.
Everything fell apart.
As if someone had deliberately warped my fate.
For ten years.
Ten years was enough time to turn an ambitious teenage girl into a dejected twenty-something with no job, no dreams, and no hope.
“Ugh.”
I rubbed my eyes quickly with the heel of my palm.
Don’t cry.
If I cry here, I’ll really lose it.
“I don’t want to live like this.”
More precisely, I don’t want to live like this.
I pulled my hand away from my eyes, brushed off my uniform, and stood — and that’s when I turned around.
The rooftop door had just opened, and I locked eyes with someone coming in.
It was Jung Eun-sung.
His expression went rigid, serious. He’d heard what I said.
I panicked and stepped backward.
“…Huh?”
My body, worn out from not eating since 7:30 this morning, lurched.
“Kang Da-hye?”
“Uh…? Uh uh…? Uh uh!”
“KANG DA-HYE!!!!!!!”
I fell from the rooftop.
And I regressed.
—The top student hides her regression—
Period 1. Sharing Fortune
“…Insane.”
Me. Kang Da-hye.
Age twenty-nine before regression. A jobless youth with no dreams and no hope.
Current age eighteen. High school second year.
Current date. About four days after the new semester started, in March.
=I had traveled backward through time.
“Insane insane insane.”
I sprang to my feet and spun in place once.
My body felt impossibly light. I hadn’t reached full height yet.
A teenage body not yet worn down by the world.
The calendar on my desk, the clock on my smartphone, the main page of the portal site I’d just accessed — everything confirmed that this moment was from eleven years ago!
Unbelievable.
“Could it be that dark life was all just a dream?”
But it had felt far too real for that.
It doesn’t matter. I don’t care about anything else.
“This is incredible.”
I’m not even curious how this miracle happened.
Please, please don’t let this be undone.
I’m going to live so carefully and diligently from now on.
“I’m freeeeee!”
The stale, musty smell of the semi-basement where I’d lived alone with my mother had never felt so welcoming.
I grabbed the School Uniform hanging haphazardly on the closet doorknob and spun around and around with it in my arms.
“Even if I’d only regressed to the morning of the College Entrance Exam, I’d be grateful—but I’m in second year of high school…”
And March at that…!
I squeezed the uniform so hard in my grip that it crumpled.
“This time, I will absolutely.”
Take the bus to the exam hall on test day.
Score a perfect mark on the College Entrance Exam.
Get into Korea University.
The moment I turn twenty, I’ll tutor for money and buy stocks and cryptocurrency. I’ll become a first-generation YouTuber through my Study With Me channel.
I’ll succeed.
I’ll get rich.
To avoid the ending where I humiliate myself in front of my classmates at twenty-nine, I need to stay sharp and focused!
The door flew open.
“Kang Da-hye, you’re not even—why are you like this?!”
“Waaaah! Mom!”
I threw my arms around my mother as she stepped through the doorway.
“Wow, Mom, you’re so young…!”
“What? Hey, why are you crying!”
“It’s okay, these are tears of joy…!”
Mom, I’ve had such a hard time all this while…
* * *
The walk to school for the first time in nearly ten years.
I marveled at my reflection in the convenience store window—there I was in my School Uniform—and marveled at the sight of clothing shops that wouldn’t close for several more years, still standing intact.
“Hehe!”
I marveled at the sharpness of my vision, at how vivid everything appeared.
‘Right, this is who I was.’
Someone who smiled at the slightest breeze.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed so hard my cheeks ached.
‘I really have to do better this life.’
I made the resolve and stopped at a crosswalk.
I quickly opened the notes app on my phone to review my plans for the future.
There was only one thing I needed to do to live differently this time around.
☆Studying☆
An era would come soon enough where studying isn’t everything, but without any particular talent or wealth to speak of, studying was my easiest and fastest path to success.
So I would study, no matter what.
And needless to say, I absolutely, positively—
Ab—
so—
lute—
ly would not do anything like fall in love.
‘I didn’t really date in high school before the regression either.’
This time, I’d be even more proactive about avoiding it.
But then.
“Da-hye, really, let’s not do this. We’re just friends.”
“…”
“I don’t want to say anything harsh to you. Let’s not make things awkward between us, okay?”
“…What?”
I tilted my head, looking at the boy in front of me who was frowning.
Why am I being dumped the moment I regress?
To reflect the time period in which this work is set, all ages mentioned in this work follow the Korean system of age reckoning.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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