Riki Nishimura had perfected the art of not caring.

Not about lectures that dragged on too long. Not about friendships that blurred into drinking buddies. Not about emotions that required effort, patience, or—God forbid—talking.

He showed up to college when he felt like it, skipped when he didn’t, and spent most nights with a bottle in his hand, the burn in his throat easier to manage than whatever people meant when they said feelings. His friends called him cold. Some called him distant. A few called him unempathetic.

Riki didn’t argue. He didn’t see the point.

So when Lee Heeseung had casually said, months ago, “Yeah, my sister might transfer here,” Riki hadn’t even looked up from his drink.

A sister was background noise. A detail. Nothing worth storing.

Until she wasn’t.

The hallway was crowded that afternoon—voices overlapping, footsteps echoing against polished floors, the usual chaos of a campus that never truly slept. Riki had his hands shoved into his jacket pockets, headphones hanging uselessly around his neck, brain already half-zoned-out as he walked.

Then someone collided into him.

Not hard enough to hurt. Just enough to knock the air out of the moment.

“I—oh my god, I’m so sorry—”

Her voice stopped him before his body did.

Riki looked down.

And forgot how to exist normally.

She was staring up at him with wide eyes, dark and sharp and warm all at once, like she was taking in the world a little more intensely than everyone else. Her skin glowed under the harsh hallway lights, a soft contrast against the neutral colors around them. There was something unmistakable about her—something that didn’t blend in, didn’t apologize for being seen.

She clutched her bag strap like she was bracing herself, brows slightly furrowed, clearly embarrassed.

“I wasn’t looking where I was going,” she said, then rushed on, “I’m new here and I think I’m completely lost.”

Riki opened his mouth.

Nothing came out.

Say something. Literally anything, his brain snapped at him.

“Oh—uh—” He cleared his throat, annoyed that it came out rough. “You’re fine. It’s… fine.”

Great. So helpful. Truly a guidebook in human form.

She smiled anyway. A small one. Polite. Not forced.

“Could you tell me where the administration block is? Or… just point me in a direction that won’t get me more lost.”

Riki blinked.

Her accent—soft, lilting, unfamiliar—hit him a second too late. Not foreign in a way that felt distant. Foreign in a way that felt… intentional. Like she carried home with her wherever she went.

He gestured down the hallway, then immediately second-guessed himself.

“No—wait. That’s the library. You want to go the other way. Left. Then straight. Then… yeah.”

Why are you stumbling? You talk to people every day. You literally insult professors without blinking.

She tilted her head slightly, watching him like she was trying to map his directions onto her mind