The cherry blossoms were supposed to fall.
In Seoul, spring never missed its cue. Petals always drifted down like soft confessions—onto sidewalks, onto shoulders, onto the steaming lids of takeout coffee.
But tonight—
They stopped.
Kang Min-Jae didn't notice at first.
He was too busy trying to rescue his dignity.
"Hyung, I swear—if you spill that on me, I'll sue you," his coworker muttered as Min-Jae jogged out of the convenience store with a paper cup balanced in one hand and his phone in the other.
Min-Jae rolled his eyes. "You can't sue me for being generous."
"You're not generous. You're clumsy."
"That's… a form of generosity," Min-Jae argued, turning the corner—then immediately regretting turning the corner.
Because the street was full.
Students, couples, tourists—everyone had gathered beneath the cherry trees like they were waiting for something.
Min-Jae slowed. "What's going on?"
His coworker peered past him. "Festival?"
"No festival today," Min-Jae said automatically. He'd lived in this neighborhood for years. He knew the street schedule better than his own bank balance.
A child pointed upward.
"Mom! Look!"
Min-Jae's gaze followed the little finger.
And his breath… simply stopped.
The petals were floating.
Not falling. Not swirling. Not caught by wind.
Floating—perfectly still in the air, like the world had pressed pause.
A woman beside him whispered, "Is this… a prank?"
A man laughed nervously. "It's probably a drone show."
Min-Jae stared harder.
He didn't see drones.
He didn't hear wires.
He didn't feel wind.
Instead, he felt something else.
A hush that had nothing to do with sound.
Like the air itself was listening.
His phone screen flickered in his palm.
Once.
Twice.
Then the screen went black.
His coworker groaned. "Ugh, my phone died—"
But the coworker's voice cut off mid-sentence.
Min-Jae turned sharply.
His coworker's mouth was open… frozen in place. Eyes blinking halfway, like he'd been captured in a photograph.
Min-Jae's heart dropped.
People around them were frozen too.
A couple mid-laugh. A child mid-step. A scooter suspended as if gravity had forgotten it existed.
The street wasn't quiet.
It was stopped.
Min-Jae couldn't move.
No—he could move.
He looked down.
His own fingers trembled.
His chest rose and fell.
He was the only one still breathing.
"Oh… no."
The words came out too loud in the frozen world.
Min-Jae tried to step forward, but the air resisted him, thick like syrup. He reached out toward a floating petal—and as his fingertip brushed it—
The petal shimmered.
For a second, he saw something inside it.
Not a flower.
A memory.
A woman's hand clutching a thread bracelet.
A child crying.
A voice whispering: Forget. Live.
Min-Jae yanked his hand back like the petal had burned him.
"What the—what is that?"
His heart pounded faster.
And the world responded.
The frozen people twitched, like time was trying to restart.
The petals trembled.
Min-Jae's breath came fast.
"Okay," he muttered to himself, half-panicked, half-thinking like a man who'd watched too many dramas. "This is either a nightmare… or I'm about to become the main character."
A laugh escaped him—sharp, nervous.
Then, without warning—
The air behind him split open.
Not like a door.
More like a curtain being pulled apart.
A thin line of golden light appeared, widening into a ripple. The floating petals around it spun slowly, drawn into a silent spiral.
Min-Jae turned—
And someone fell out of the light.
A woman.
She hit the pavement hard, knees and palms scraping.
The golden ripple vanished as if it had never existed.
Min-Jae rushed to her instinctively, crouching beside her. "Hey—are you okay? Are you—"
She looked up.
Her eyes were startling—dark, sharp, and painfully awake, like she'd been running for days.
She grabbed his sleeve with a grip that didn't match her trembling hands.
And the first thing she said was not "help."
Not "where am I."
Not even "who are you."
She whispered—
"Kang Min-Jae…"
Min-Jae froze.
His name didn't leave strangers' mouths like that.
Not with certainty.
Not with fear.
He swallowed. "Do I know you?"
Her gaze flickered over his face as if checking him against a memory she hated.
Then her voice broke—just slightly.
"You're… younger than I expected."
Min-Jae stared. "Expected?"
She released him abruptly and tried to stand, wobbling.
He caught her arm. "Wait. You're injured."
She jerked away, startled like she wasn't used to being touched.
Min-Jae raised both hands. "Okay—okay. No touching. Got it. I'm sorry. But you just fell out of… a glowing tear in the air. So maybe don't act like I'm the weird one here."
For the first time, her expression shifted.
Not softness.
Not warmth.
Something like confusion—because his tone wasn't fear.
It was… normal.
Min-Jae pointed upward. "Also, everyone is frozen. The flowers are floating. My coworker is basically a statue. So if you know anything about whatever this is…"
He trailed off, because her eyes were suddenly fixed on the petals.
The floating cherry blossoms trembled again.
They rotated toward her.
Like they recognized her.
The woman's face tightened.
"You shouldn't be here," she whispered.
Min-Jae blinked. "Me?"
She looked back at him.
And suddenly, the air felt colder.
Not temperature.
Meaning.
"You're not supposed to exist in this time," she said.
Min-Jae laughed once. "Wow. Rude."
She didn't smile.
"I'm serious."
Min-Jae's laugh faded.
Something in her voice made it impossible to brush off.
He stared at her, and for reasons he couldn't explain, his heart began to race.
The petals vibrated.
The frozen people twitched again.
The whole street trembled like a sleeping creature stirring.
The woman's eyes widened.
"No—"
She reached for something at her wrist.
A thin bracelet of black thread with a small gold charm.
As her fingers touched it, the charm glowed faintly.
Min-Jae felt it.
A pressure in the air, like someone's hand closing around his chest.
The woman looked at him with the expression of someone who had just found a disaster she'd been sent to prevent.
"Listen carefully," she said, voice low and urgent.
"My name is Yoon Seo-Ha."
Min-Jae swallowed.
Seo-Ha's eyes locked onto his.
"And I came here to find the Golden Heart of Time."
Min-Jae opened his mouth, ready to ask a thousand questions.
But he didn't get to.
Because the moment she said those words—
The sky above them cracked.
Not with sound.
With light.
A golden fracture stretched across the night like a vein of fire.
The cherry blossoms began to spin faster.
The frozen world shuddered violently.
And Min-Jae realized, in the worst possible way—
Whatever was happening…
It had been waiting for her.
And it had been waiting for him.
Seo-Ha grabbed his sleeve again, harder this time.
"Run," she said.
Min-Jae stared at her. "Run where?"
Seo-Ha's voice turned almost desperate.
"Anywhere," she whispered.
"Before time remembers you."