The morning was still blue when it happened.

6:14 AM. A quiet stretch of pavement near Buam-dong — the kind of residential slope where delivery trucks haven't started yet and the only sound is someone's gate clicking shut.

User was walking. Not thinking about anything in particular.

An old woman stood near the edge of the sidewalk thirty meters ahead. Small frame. Cardigan over a soft hanbok. She swayed once — like a tree catching wind that wasn't there.

Then her knees buckled.

User's legs moved before the thought finished forming.

Caught her — barely. One arm hooked under hers, the other bracing her shoulder. She weighed almost nothing. The skin on her wrist was cold. Her eyes were open but unfocused.

Her bag hit the pavement. A leather portfolio slid halfway out — heavy paper, official seals. User didn't look at it. Just scooped it back in, lowered her carefully to sit against the wall.

Called 119. Stayed on the line. Talked to her — small things, steady things, even though she probably couldn't hear him.

Seven minutes until the ambulance arrived.

Somewhere during those seven minutes, her eyes focused. Just for a moment. She looked at User's face with a clarity that didn't belong to someone mid-cardiac event.

She smiled.

Three days later.

A black car arrived at User's apartment. Not a taxi. The kind of vehicle that has its own driver and the driver has his own earpiece.

A secretary bowed exactly fifteen degrees and delivered an envelope.

Inside: a handwritten note on cream-colored stationery.

"Thank you for staying with me. I'd like to thank you properly over dinner. Please allow my driver to bring you. An old woman's selfishness — humor me."

— Yoon Soo-Ja

No address listed. Just the car waiting.

Forty minutes later.

The Yoon estate unfolded behind iron gates that opened without anyone visibly pressing anything. Not a skyscraper penthouse. A house — traditional bones, modern renovation, surrounded by old trees and stone walls that had been standing since before the war.

The kind of wealth that stopped needing to announce itself two generations ago.

A housekeeper led User through a hallway of dark wood toward the dining room. The table was set for five. Not two.

Five.

The dining room was already warm with noise — someone's chopsticks clicking, a phone buzzing, the residual energy of an argument that ended thirty seconds ago.

Grandmother Yoon sat at the head. She saw User enter and her face softened into crescent-eyed warmth.

"Ah — you came! Good, good. Sit, sit — here, next to me."

Three other women were already seated.

The first barely glanced up. Chae-Rin — dark hair pinned clean, still in a silk blouse from a twelve-hour workday. She acknowledged User with the briefest nod.

"Halmoni said she invited a guest."

Cool. Even. She returned to her soup. Assessed. Filed. Moved on.

The second was mid-bite when User sat down. Ha-Eun — oversized t-shirt, red hair still damp from practice. She looked at User with open curiosity.

"Oh. You're the one who helped halmoni?"

A short nod — genuine.

"Thanks for that. Seriously."

Back to eating like the conversation was already over.

The third had been watching User before they even sat down. Sae-Bi — curled in her chair, oversized hoodie, chin in her palm. Her eyes tracked User all the way to the seat.

A smile. Slow. Sweet. The kind that shows teeth just a little too late.

"Oooh~ so you're the hero."

"You're younger than I thought. Halmoni made it sound like some big dramatic rescue — I pictured someone more..."

"Never mind~ Welcome!"

She waved her hand vaguely. Eyes never left User's face.

Dinner moved at a comfortable pace. Grandmother Yoon steered the conversation gently while refilling side dishes. It felt almost normal.

Chae-Rin barely spoke. Ha-Eun complained about practice. Sae-Bi asked User three questions that sounded innocent and were absolutely not.

"Do you live alone?"

"What's your apartment like?"

"Are you a light sleeper~?"

Nobody thought much of it.

Then dessert arrived, and Grandmother Yoon set her chopsticks down with a soft, deliberate click.

The table noticed.

Ha-Eun stopped talking mid-sentence. Chae-Rin's eyes lifted. Sae-Bi straightened slightly.

"Girls."

Her voice hadn't changed. Still warm. But the room had already shifted.

"I've decided something."

She looked at each granddaughter in turn. Then at User.

Smiled.

"This young man saved my life. And more than that — he showed me something I haven't seen in a very long time."

"So I've invited him to live here. For one month."

Silence.

Ha-Eun's chopstick hit her plate. Chae-Rin's hand paused mid-reach for her water glass — frozen for half a second before completing the motion. Sae-Bi's smile didn't drop, but her eyes went flat.

"And at the end of that month —"

Grandmother Yoon took a bite of pear. Chewed. Let the silence do the work.

"— I'd like him to choose one of you to marry."

Three seconds of absolute nothing.

Then — chaos.

Ha-Eun's chair scraped backward.

"WHAT?!"

Chae-Rin set her glass down. The clink was louder than it should have been. Her expression hadn't moved, but her knuckles were white.

Sae-Bi laughed — bright, musical, completely hollow.

"Ahaha~ Halmoni, you're joking right?"

She wasn't joking. The old woman ate another slice of pear, serene as a lake in windless morning.

"Halmoni — this is absurd —"

Chae-Rin's voice was low and barely controlled.

"I have a board meeting Monday. I don't have time for —"

"You work too hard, Chae-Rin-ah. That's part of why."

Ha-Eun was standing now, palms flat on the table.

"I don't even know this guy!! Halmoni, this isn't some drama —!!"

"Sit down, Ha-Eun. You'll knock over the water."

Sae-Bi hadn't moved. Her smile was still there — pinned in place like a butterfly under glass. Her eyes slid sideways to User.

Recalculating.

Grandmother Yoon turned to User, warm and unshakeable, as if three women weren't currently having three different kinds of cardiac event around her.

"Don't mind them. They warm up."

"More tea, dear?"