Samhon Group had eight major affiliate divisions: Electronics, Capital, Trading, Tourism, Apparel, Bio, Card, and Chemical.
The moment Yoojin heard that high scorers in this evaluation could choose their preferred division, her mind instantly filled with one word—Apparel. Her eyes gleamed.
Each affiliate did hire its own new recruits, but being part of Samhon Group's main public recruitment carried undeniable weight. It was a badge marking you as the elite—few, selected, and fast-track material.
Fast promotion. Every office worker's dream. And Samhon's public recruitment was the hidden key to achieve it quickly.
"Your afternoon evaluation will be done in pairs—two members per team. We will assess teamwork, creativity, and problem-solving."
What was the assignment?
Thirty new employees glanced around anxiously.
A moment later, HR staff approached carrying boxes and began pouring something onto each two-person table.
Spaghetti noodles. And bags of marshmallows.
"The task is simple: build the tallest tower you can using spaghetti and marshmallows. And most importantly—"
Kim, the deputy HR manager, lifted a single marshmallow with a flourish.
"—you must place one marshmallow at the very top of your tower."
His voice trembled with barely contained excitement, like a camp instructor running a recreation game.
"You have a total of 90 minutes. Ah—sorry, I used up five minutes already. Make that 85 minutes. Ready, go! First place goes to the tallest tower!"
Before he even finished the sentence, the new recruits were rolling up their sleeves, ripping open packages, and tossing marshmallows and noodles onto the table.
Dongha was already tearing open his spaghetti packet. Yoojin grew uneasy. Was he planning to build without a strategy?
"Do you… have a plan?"
One of Dongha's thick eyebrows lifted slowly.
"This is way too easy, isn't it? I thought we'd get something like a planning exercise, or logic puzzles, or business calculation problems. Isn't this what elementary kids do in art class?"
His smug tone made Yoojin's brows pinch together.
"Really? I feel like you'd need architectural or geometric thinking…"
"Yoojin, stop overthinking."
"Why?"
"Come on. We did this in middle school. Lifting. I supported you and lifted you. Same idea."
"…Ah."
Her rose-tinted lips parted slightly.
Right—ballet.
But the logic aligned surprisingly well: weight distribution, load, stability.
"You have no idea how much I struggled back then," Dongha laughed lightly. "Trying to figure out how to hold you steady without wobbling. I thought my brain would explode."
Yoojin swallowed without thinking. He really had tried his best. Maybe Dongha was a better partner than she gave him credit for.
"So… how do we do this?"
"Hmm. Hard to explain. We should just build and see."
"Fine. Explain as we go. I'll help."
She stepped close beside him, sliding off her jacket, rolling her sleeves.
Her pale, smooth forearms emerged, and her slender fingers grasped the pasta bag just beside Dongha's hand.
His gaze followed her white fingers, up her arm—Her translucent skin seemed to gleam.
An irrational desire surged in him—to press his thumb along that pale skin, to leave a warm, red trace of himself.
Heat bloomed in his gut again.
Afraid that that dangerous word—dating—might consume him, he shook his head hard and abruptly let go of the spaghetti. Yoojin naturally took the packet from his hand.
She quickly tore it open and scattered the noodles over the table.
"The base has to press firmly into the ground. Like engaging the core and sinking down. Let's make the legs and waist first."
Once they focused, time flew.
Other teams built quickly, thinking the task would end in ten minutes—but their slender towers soon tilted, collapsed, and fell.
Groans and cries erupted around the room.
But Yoojin and Dongha's foundation resembled a miniature jungle gym—precise and interwoven. Each joint interlocked, each layer reinforcing the one below, forming a stable lattice.
Though Dongha led the design, Yoojin obsessed over stabilizing the lower levels. Their tower was much lower than the others but far more solid.
"Dongha, how long are we staying on the bottom tier? Time's running out."
She checked—less than 30 minutes left.
"The diaphragm needs to hold firm. Otherwise, both of us would get hurt."
Another ballet analogy. Yoojin sighed.
"So… this height is the diaphragm?"
"Nope. More like the thighs. We're not even at the core yet."
Her eyes shook. Thighs?!
Dongha followed her anxious gaze. He knew exactly what she was thinking.
Compared to other teams' tall structures, their tower was still short—though its base was the widest.
Okay… maybe it was time.
"Alright, time to go up. Enough with the base. Let's start stacking."
Yoojin's face brightened.
They began building upward. The number of spaghetti rods per layer dropped from five to three; the structure narrowed like a real building. Their hands grew sticky from pressing marshmallows, but they moved nonstop.
Soon, the evaluation neared its end.
Teams who finished early were cleaning up, occasionally peeking at one table with growing amazement.
Yoojin and Dongha's tower kept climbing—higher, and higher.
Empty packages piled beside them.
"Are they still going?"
"Are they building… an actual building?"
So absorbed, neither heard the murmurs.
Marshmallow-smudged strands of hair kept brushing Yoojin's nose, making her scrunch it. She checked the time again.
"Dongha, we should wrap up soon."
He glanced around at other towers.
Two men across the room had nearly matched their height. But it was time to finish.
Dongha climbed onto a chair.
He inserted a single spaghetti stick into each of five top joints, pulling them together like beams—then fixed them with a marshmallow.
Back on the ground, he smirked and held out one last spaghetti-marshmallow piece to Yoojin.
"Want to finish it?"
She took it and climbed onto the chair.
At 170 cm, she reached up easily—but the moment she placed it on top, her foot slipped.
Oh no—no, no!
In slow motion, she began tilting toward the tower, about to crash into it—
Two large hands grabbed her waist—firm but gentle—and yanked her back.
It was Dongha.
He lifted her slightly and set her down in front of him.
His hands didn't immediately leave her waist.
Yoojin realized she had nearly taken down the tower… and cold sweat began running down her back.
Her breath trembled.
And suddenly, the heat of Dongha's grip on her waist grew… impossible to ignore.
These weren't the hands that lifted her countless times as a child.
These were large, adult hands. A man's hands.
"That was close," Dongha said, eyes rising toward the tower.
At the very top, the marshmallow Yoojin had placed trembled dangerously.
Right… the tower was what almost fell.
She forced a stiff smile and looked up—but her waist still throbbed warmly.
"Time's up!"
Kim's voice cut through the room.
Moments later, executives and department heads from across Samhon's affiliates entered the auditorium. They wandered between the towers, criticizing freely:
"The structure here is wrong."
"You should've anchored this point."
"This part is already leaning."
Hearing these comments—like receiving a performance review for the first time—new recruits instinctively shrank.
But the criticisms vanished when they reached Yoojin and Dongha's tower.
The wide base rose sharply into a tall, elegant peak.
The more they looked, the more impressed they became.
"This took only an hour?"
"How many packets did they use?"
"This could be an actual architectural design."
Even the stingiest evaluators couldn't hide admiration.
Chairman Yoon Taeyoung entered last.
This entire challenge had been his idea—so he was curious who had impressed the executives.
Who's getting all this praise?
As he approached, people quickly stepped aside.
And there, standing before the tower—were Yoojin and Dongha.
A deep dimple carved into the chairman's cheek once more.