**EP.22 Encounter**
“Haru-ya, over here, over here!”
At the entrance of the Ice Cream Festival venue.
After getting off the bus, Shin Haru met up with her senior.
“Oh, unni. You got here first?”
“I just arrived too! Let’s start looking around!”
“Alright.”
The two decided to explore the festival together.
Haru looked at her senior, who was chirping away happily, with an affectionate gaze.
Although Senior Chae-hyun was one year older, because she was petite and bright, she somehow gave off the impression of a younger sister.
“Senior, do you want to try this? It’s called rice-flavored ice cream.”
“Sure!”
Watching her senior enjoy the ice cream made her feel good as well.
Although Haru was not particularly fond of ice cream, spending leisure time with a close unni after so long lifted her spirits.
In truth, Shin Haru didn’t have many friends. Since childhood, she had been engrossed in studying and her hero activities, building walls between her and others. Even in college, if Senior Chae-hyun hadn’t taken the initiative to cling to her, she would have lived friendlessly.
Of course, she did have friends she made through her hero identity. A-grade heroes like Shadow Walker and Arctic Ice Woman were prominent examples. However, as communication with them had been sparse, their group chat often remained silent. In fact, Stardust herself was busy due to being egotistic…
Engrossed in such thoughts, she continued walking with her senior.
Naturally, they attracted a lot of attention along the way. Senior Kim Chae-hyun was also quite a beauty with her cute looks, but Shin Haru, a tall woman with flowing blonde hair, stood out much more. Though she appeared cold and haughty to onlookers, her smiling and chatting with her senior made many men’s hearts race.
Among those men, some even looked her way while walking with their girlfriends, unwittingly stirring disputes among those couples. The two girls seemed unaware of this effect they had.
After roaming around and trying most things, Shin Haru and Kim Chae-hyun headed back towards the event venue.
“Wow! Look, there’s Egotistic-flavored ice cream too!”
Her senior pointed excitedly, suggesting they go check it out.
Haru’s expression turned stiff, considering she came out to forget about Egotistic, but her senior, already ensnared by the mango flavor, didn’t notice.
Thus, they lined up to buy the ice cream.
Haru could only sigh as she took photos of her senior, who was happily enjoying the treat.
She felt a bittersweet sentiment looking at her senior who, thankfully, never bad-mouthed Stardust in her presence. After all, among the vicious mango fans, there were those who insulted Stardust… The shock was real when Haru searched and read about Stardust on Google herself.
As they took pictures and walked the remaining distance, a considerable amount of time had passed.
It had been quite rewarding to spend so much time with Chae-hyun unni.
The unease she felt whenever she thought of Egotistic remained, though…
“Let’s do that last thing before we go!”
Chae-hyun unni pointed to a booth where a dart-throwing game was set up to pop balloons.
Written across it, an offer – hit a certain number and win a 10-tier ice cream. What on earth was a 10-tier ice cream?
“Okay.”
And so, they made their way towards the booth.
The booth was designed to accommodate two players at once.
One side was already occupied by another customer.
At first, she thought it was a family out for fun.
Maybe a mother, father, and daughter?
But while the parents had black hair, the daughter had white. Was it dyed?
Since it was her first time seeing silver hair, curiosity got the better of her. Getting a closer look, it seemed the daughter was in middle school, and the parents looked too young for their age. They didn’t seem like a family. What was their relationship?
While mulling over this, she felt puzzled. Since when had she been the type to scrutinize others like this?
Maybe it was the unusual silver hair that sparked her curiosity…
✧˚·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥·̩̩̥͙✧·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥˚·̩̩̥͙✧ 𝑔𝓇𝒶𝓋𝒾𝓉𝓎𝓃𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁𝓈 ✧˚·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥·̩̩̥͙✧·̩̩̥͙˚̩̥̩̥˚·̩̩̥͙✧
