To My Dearest Roseanne

Chapter 40

As the driver was calling someone, presumably the police, Roseanne dusted herself off, checked if the backpack was intact, and withdrew from the scene in a nonchalant fashion. For a minute, the driver considered chasing after her, but he gave up and continued talking on the phone.

It was difficult for Roseanne to stomach the type of sorcery she had experienced, but indeed, she arrived in Seoul, South Korea, the city of towering skyscrapers, bright neons, endless expressways, footbridges, and the perfect marriage between nature and architecture. It was just like in the movies.

If anything, Seoul seemed like a city that never slept, never stopped, not even for a single moment. For a girl who never travelled outside the Land of Po, the new setting was too much to take in. It was hard for her to call Seoul a city. It was like a country when compared to the modest alleyways of Bydgoszcz, the tallest buildings of which usually didn't exceed 30 metres in height.

Roseanne tried to stay cool and reminded herself about the objective of her mission. Yes, she was on a mission, not a tourist excursion, a mission to find Cho.

Unfortunately, she didn't learn as much as Cho while journeying from one world to the other. She understood nothing of the gargling language people spoke around here, and visions of the past didn't give her any clue about Cho's possible whereabouts.

However, Roseanne was prepared for everything. She took out her phone. The only thing she strongly counted on was that the passage would jettison her exactly in the place where Cho originally crossed over.

"Yes!" Roseanne shouted at the screen. The location app showed she was in Yeouido district, which was an area of the bookstore from Cho's card.

Now Cho opened the Maps app and charted a route from the place she was at to the bookstore. She typed in the complicated address from the card, letter by letter, not sure what the words meant.

Thankfully, the bookstore was only two kilometres away, near the subway station, so without hesitance, Cho began marching through the streets.

***

It was difficult for her to adjust to the macro size of everything, but she pressed on. On the way to the bookstore, she passed some food stalls, a large building that was some sort of a financial centre, a wide crossing, and a bus stop behind which there was a lovely backstreet hidden in the shades of trees and bushes. It was exactly the same spot which inspired Cho to come up with a poem, but of course, Roseanne had no idea about this.

Following the directions from the phone, Roseanne passed the backstreet, which led her to the front of a massive modernist structure that looked like something more appropriate of a government building from America of the 1930s.

Well, that's my luck. I ended up at the wrong place, Roseanne thought. Still, just to be sure, she approached the main entrance and read the label on a glass. Thankfully, it was written in both Korean and English:

National Assembly Library of the Republic of Korea

Open: Monday to Friday (9:00-21:00)

Weekends (9:00-17:00)

Closed: National holidays, every 2nd and 4th Saturday of the month

Roseanne looked beyond the label, through the window, and saw dozens of young people, probably students, searching meticulously for books on rolling stacks, sitting focused in front of computers, or reading something at empty tables. They were as busy as bees in a hive.

Before she realised, a large head of a security guard grew out next to her.

"Nuguseyo?" he asked in a demanding tone.