The days bled into one another. Each morning, Eunji awoke with a deep sense of dread, her body stiff from the previous day’s grueling training. The relentless cycle of study, modeling practice, and school had become her new reality, and she was slowly drowning under the weight of it all. The intensity of the pressure had begun to suffocate her, leaving her little time to breathe, let alone think.

Hiroto’s expectations weighed heavily on her shoulders. Every success was met with a demand for more—more effort, more perfection, more of herself that she wasn’t sure she had left to give.

The only escape Eunji found was in the quiet moments late at night when everyone else in the house was asleep. She would lie awake in her bed, her eyes wide open in the darkness, thoughts swirling in her head like a storm she couldn’t control. What was I before this? she would wonder. Who am I becoming?

Her school life wasn’t much better. The pressure to excel in her studies was almost as suffocating as the pressure to succeed in modeling. Every test, every class, felt like a race against time. Every interaction with her classmates was like a reminder that she was still an outsider, someone who didn’t belong.

Her Japanese was improving, but not fast enough. It wasn’t just the language that held her back—there was an invisible barrier, something she couldn’t bridge with textbooks or grammar exercises. The cultural divide was wide, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t seem to fit in.

Every day she arrived at school, she was greeted with indifferent stares, her classmates’ eyes flickering over her as if she were nothing more than an exotic curiosity. Eunji longed for someone to reach out, to offer her some sense of belonging, but no one ever did. She was alone.

At the modeling academy, it was worse. Miko and Takashi, though skilled, were relentless in their criticism. No matter how hard Eunji tried, they always found something to nitpick. Her posture wasn’t perfect. Her gaze wasn’t strong enough. Her smile wasn’t convincing.

“You’re not trying hard enough,” Miko would say, her voice laced with disdain. “Do you think this industry is built on effort alone? It’s about transforming, becoming someone else entirely. And you? You’re still clinging to the girl you were before.”

Eunji would stand there, frozen, trying to hold back the tears that threatened to spill. But they never cared. It was always about the image, always about the end result. Become what they want you to be. Lose yourself.

She could feel it happening—her sense of self, her identity, slipping away. Every day, she felt herself growing smaller, more detached from the girl who had arrived in Japan with a sense of hope and possibility. What had happened to her?

The breaking point came one afternoon, after a particularly brutal session with Takashi. He had been criticizing her every move, each mistake met with harsh words and impatient sighs. Eunji had pushed herself so hard, had tried so desperately to meet their impossible standards, but it was never enough.

“Again. Again!” Takashi barked, snapping his fingers. “You think this is enough? Do you think you can just walk into this world and be something? You have to earn it. And you’re not earning it.”

Eunji felt the weight of his words crush her, her chest tightening as tears blurred her vision. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could take it.

When she left the academy that evening, Hiroto was waiting for her in the car, his face impassive as usual. Eunji climbed in beside him, not bothering to hide the exhaustion and frustration that weighed her down.

“Another good day?” Hiroto asked, his tone businesslike.

Eunji’s silence was the only answer he needed. He glanced at her, his sharp eyes scanning her face as if assessing her very soul.

“You must keep pushing forward,” he said, his voice soft but firm. “Your future depends on it. You understand?”

Eunji’s heart was heavy with resentment. She didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t sure she could keep going. The constant strain, the lack of understanding, the feeling of being suffocated by the weight of his expectations—it was too much.

“I can’t do this anymore,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

Hiroto’s gaze hardened, and for a moment, Eunji feared he would reprimand her, tell her that failure wasn’t an option. But instead, he remained silent, his expression unreadable.

“I understand,” he said quietly. “But you have no choice. You must finish what you started.”

Eunji’s breath caught in her throat as she turned to look out the window, trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to spill. She didn’t want this anymore. She didn’t want to be a model. She didn’t want to be perfect. She just wanted to be Eunji—her, the girl from South Korea who had dreamed of something simple, something real.

But Hiroto’s words, his expectations, hung over her like a cloud. You must finish what you started.

And so, despite the crushing weight of it all, she found herself nodding, forcing a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. She had no choice but to keep going. For Hiroto. For herself.

The next few days felt like a blur. The modeling academy had become an even darker place for Eunji, the weight of every critique bearing down on her like a stone. At school, the stares and whispers never stopped. It felt like everyone around her was moving in a world she couldn’t enter.

But there was a small flicker inside her that refused to die—a spark of defiance, a spark of who she had been before. She had always been someone who fought, someone who didn’t give up.

And for the first time since arriving in Japan, Eunji made a decision. She was going to fight back.

She didn’t know how, and she didn’t know what the future held. But she wasn’t going to let herself be erased. She wasn’t going to let Hiroto’s world consume her.

The battle for her identity was just beginning.