There are many strange things that happen on a daily basis.
For example, sometimes birds poop on people's heads. Why? The truth is, they aim for certain people they don't like. It's just fact.
Sometimes, you slip on a banana peel. Who left it there? The cartoon man who leaves banana peels in all the cartoons. You're welcome.
Sometimes, you forget to wear your pants! How did that happen? Oops, wait, it's just a dream! Still strange, though.
Anyways...in summary, weird things happen every day. All kinds of weird things. Everything is weird, kind of.
But in the case of Lee Yoona...
You most definitely haven't seen anything as weird as THIS.
On Friday afternoon, the bell rang at Lee Yoona's public high school in Seoul. She was so happy to be done with the school week that she rushed right out the door. But instead of getting to rush out into freedom, her teacher called her back!
"Lee Yoona!" He scolded. "Running out of class like that is disrespectful!"
Lee Yoona was a good student, so she tried to turn around. But she had closed the door behind herself too fast, and SLAM! A face full of door. SPLAT! went the door with blood from Lee Yoona's broken nose.
Now with a damn broken nose, Lee Yoona stumbled around, not able to see from the pain! Maybe things would've been okay, if only so many other students hadn't also run out into the damn hallway! Lee Yoona was stumbling around with a blood face in the crowds, and everyone was screaming and pushing to get away from her. She got jostled all the way across the hallway, until she reached the stairs.
There was a window on the wall next to the stairs. Maybe things would've been okay if Lee Yoona had just fallen down the stairs, but noooooo! The gods of mercy truly had cursed her; she bumped into someone, and they got annoyed, not seeing who had elbowed them, so they turned around and pushed!
SHATTER!
Out the window went Lee Yoona, backpack, broken nose, scream of confusion and all.
Maybe things would have been okay if she had just fallen down two stories into the trees below. But nooooooo! No mercy for Lee Yoona, the poor, innocent, good student who always kept her head down! Nope! Not even a drop! Lee Yoona bounced off a tree branch with a crack, breaking a rib, and bounce, bounce, bounced all the way to the road in front of the trees. And who could have been driving towards that spot, besides....
THE NOTORIOUS BUS-KUN?!?!?!
SLAM!
Crash went the bus into Lee Yoona, "AIEEEEEEEEEE!!!!" went all the high schoolers leaning out the window, and splat went the blood on the pavement. And that was that.
As for what Lee Yoona experienced from beginning to end, it went something like this:
RRRRING!
BASH!
CRASH!
CRACK!
And darkness.
Lee Yoona was dead on a Friday. Whose fault was it? Lee Yoona's, for running out of class? Her teacher's? The shover? The tree? Bus-kun?!?!?! Who knows. All that's fact is that Lee Yoona was dead.
Everything was blackness for Lee Yoona. Everything was timeless and spaceless, like transcending reality truly and reaching a solitary nirvana where mind expand beyond human comprehension. And then, faintly, came a light...
Oh, it was a VERY bright light. Very, very bright. Lee Yoona squinted at it, trying to squeeze her eyes shut, but it was so bright that she couldn't do anything about it. What was this, an alien sun?! Heaven?! A white flashlight?!?!
Suddenly, something hit her on the back of the neck.
"Lee Hwa! Sleeping again? Next time you'll have to hold a book over your head for an hour, you hear me?"
Lee Yoona groaned, rubbing the back of her neck.
Wait—she had hands?!
Hadn't she died?!
She could've sworn she broke her nose, then got pushed out a window, then broke her rib on a tree, then got run over by bus-kun...
The thing rapped her on the back of the neck again. It felt like a wooden ruler. Ouch!
"Lee Hwa! Wake up this instant! We paused the presentation because of you!"
Wincing, Lee Yoona opened her eyes. It took her eyes a second to adjust to the bright light...which turned out to be a rectangle. A whiteboard projection! Of a scientific diagram showing how birds go to the bathroom.
"...Huh?!"
"No 'huh''s!" The same voice snapped. Lee Yoona looked up, squinting, into the darkness outside of the light. When her eyes adjusted, she saw an ugly-looking man with square glasses and a suit. He had a nametag that read Teacher Kang. "Are you awake now? Finally!"
"...Awake?" Lee Yoona muttered, holding her head and still squinting. "...But I'm dead!"
This Teacher Kang stared at her, lost for words, still looking as mean as ever. Lee Yoona looked around in the dark. Oh...
There were MANY people here!
Not TOO many, more like thirty. They were all sitting in rows and columns at school desks...wearing school uniforms that were a dark blue color...and they were all staring at her.
Suddenly, someone nudged her in the ribs, not too hard, but not too gently either. Lee Yoona looked at the person: it was a very pretty girl with dark hair flowing down, long eyelashes, and shining pink lips.
"Lee Hwa was working so hard on her homework that she didn't sleep last night," The girl said to Teacher Kang, giving Lee Yoona a look that said, 'Please pull it together, I am lying for you right now please why does this always happen aiya' and so on. Lee Yoona was still disoriented, but she coughed and went along with it by instinct.
"Uh—Yes! Teacher Kang, I'm sorry, I didn't get to sleep! So I got really tired and disoriented! But I, uh, because of the little nap, so I'll feel better soon!"
Teacher Kang eyed the two of them suspiciously, tapping his wooden meter stick on the ground. He turned to the pretty girl. "...Since you're such a good student, I'll believe you two for now. But you'd better stay away, Lee Hwa," He added, narrowing his eyes at Lee Yoona, which made his expression and greasy appearance even more stinky than it already was. Lee Yoona nodded eagerly. Teacher Kang moved on, saying something about the cloaca and starting the presentation slideshow again.
Lee Yoona leaned over to the very pretty girl—wow, she was so pretty, just like someone out of a webcomic!—and said quietly,
"Thank you!"
The girl smiled mischievously and winked, subtly grabbing Lee Yoona's hand in a friendly gesture. "Anything for my best friend."
Lee Yoona's cheeks turned pink. "Um..." She looked down at the girl's name tag, eyes trying to wander anywhere other than the girl's sparkling brown eyes and their entwined hands. The nametag said "Hwa Lee".
Lee Yoona frowned.
Why was this ringing a bell?
In fact, why was this whole strange situation ringing a bell?
Since she'd opened her eyes, she'd been feeling a very strange sense of deja vu, like she had been here before. It wasn't her high school; their uniforms were yellow, not blue...but at the same time, she could swear she recognized so many of the faces, and these names...Lee Hwa...Hwa Lee...Teacher Kang...
Was she just making this up? Maybe it was a hallucination!
Hmm, that's right! Maybe she had died and this was her dying brain making weird things happen, like a sort-of nightmare but not really!
Or maybe, she hadn't really died, and she was just really disoriented?!
Or maybe...
Lee Yoona's mind raced like an eagle, touching down at last on the right branch.
SCREEEECH!
Lee Yoona's chair made a high-pitched screeching sound as she whirled around to stare at the girl next to her, Hwa Lee. Everyone turned to stare. Teacher Kang stopped talking.
Lee Yoona leaned so close to Hwa Lee's face until they were only inches away. Her eyes were wide, looking for something in this strangely familiar, beautiful face. Pale skin with no blemishes, rosy cheeks, shining pink lips, flowing black hair, those eyebrows, that chin shape...
"You're HWA LEE!" Lee Yoona pointed at Hwa Lee, croaking out the words like a dying fish on cocaine.
Hwa Lee stared at her, blinking with wide eyes. "...Um...yes...I'm...Hwa Lee..."
Lee Yoona whirled around to stare at Teacher Kang now. Short, ugly, glasses, half-bald, angry look, greasy, carrying a wooden meter stick...
"TEACHER KANG!"
In response to her shouting, Teacher Kang stared in disbelief. This sort of thing didn't normally happen in a classroom. But strange things happen sometimes, and something strange was happening now.
"Which means..."
Lee Yoona grabbed the black backpack off her chair and rummaged through it desperately while everyone watched. She pulled out a compact mirror and flipped it open almost violently with excitement. She saw a pretty face with light brown dyed hair in a ponytail, long lashes, and sparkling, manhwa-blue eyes staring back at her.
"I'M LEE HWA!"
Lee Yoona shrieked, nearly knocking her desk over.
Then, like nothing had happened, she quickly sat back down, adjusted her uniform skirt, and placed her hands neatly folded on her desk, looking at Teacher Kang attentively. To herself, she thought with a racing mind:
I died...
And I was Isekai'd into the best teen manhwa series EVER, Heartbreak High School!
"...Go to the nurse," Teacher Kang stammered, pointing confusedly towards the door. He was gripping his meter stick, and it seemed he couldn't decide between bearing down on Lee Yoona—now Lee Hwa—with the stick, or pretending none of this strange behavior had happened.
In response, Lee Hwa sat up happily at her desk, shaking her head brightly. "I'm okay, Teacher Kang! I was just disoriented! But now I'm completely awake! I want to hear all about the cloaca! I'm so excited!"
Looking disturbed, just like just about every student in the classroom, Teacher Kang dazedly pressed play on the projector and continued explaining how birds go to the bathroom. Lee Hwa giggled to herself meanwhile, trying not to jitter in her seat.
This is the best day of my life!