The Years Daniel Lee Came Through

— The years he endured, and the person they made

This is a story that was never written all at once. Some fragments lived in a piece he wrote three years ago, studying for a certification, trying to find his motivation. Other fragments were first spoken aloud only one night, after meeting good people. These scattered fragments are stitched together here in order, leaving nothing out. Including the one year that is blank.

Buk-gu, Gwangju. He grew up in an ordinary neighborhood.

In elementary school, there was a friend. That friend had lost his mother. On sports day, L's mother came every time. For that friend, the sight must have been a reminder, again and again, of what he had lost. Maybe that was why — that friend bullied L badly.

It wasn't because L had done anything wrong. L simply had a mother, and that was the reason he became a target. At eight, at nine, L couldn't have understood the other boy's circumstances, so he must have swallowed the question 'What did I do wrong?' without ever knowing why. Show what you have, and you become a target — that first imprint was carved here.

As an adult, that friend told L he was sorry. It meant he had finally understood, on his own, that it had been his own wound, not L's fault. L accepted the apology, and the two are still in touch. It's a story that found its own closure.

He entered an ordinary private middle school in Buk-gu, Gwangju. He took the placement exam half-heartedly and still came 14th in the school — top 4 to 5 percent. 'These kids are kind of dim,' he thought, and that's when he started studying. Do it properly, and he climbed into the top 7. It was a case of switching on after proving to himself that he could do it if he tried.

But in his first year, a kid named Lee Seon-myeong bullied L badly. He spat on him, and was relentless enough to make L want to kill him. Because L did well in school, the teachers probably assumed he was getting along fine, without any trouble.

One time it got so bad that L went to a teacher and told him everything. The thing most kids can't do — out of fear, out of not wanting to get hit — L did. He found the courage.

And what that teacher did was — beat the bully to shut him up. Covering violence with violence. That wasn't a solution; it was another act of harm. And then the teacher said this to L's mother: the boy's mother had graduated from Ewha Womans University and his father worked at KEPCO, so please, go a little easy on him.

In front of the boy who'd been spat on, he tried to smooth over the abuse using the perpetrator's family pedigree and his father's job. At fourteen, L took that head-on. The sight of justice collapsing in the face of background.

Toward the end of ninth grade, L made up his mind that when he went to high school, he would absolutely move into a dormitory. The first reason was to devote himself to studying for college; the second was the wish to get away from a somewhat turbulent atmosphere at home.

He went on to a provincial private high school, Salesio High School. Science track, aiming for medical school. He wanted to get into medical school, make a lot of money, and live happily. L was weak at math, so math was what he worked hardest at. His math, a grade 3 on his school record in the first semester of first year, he pulled up to a grade 1 in the second semester. He finished his first year with a single-digit rank in the school.

But the problem lay elsewhere. Back then the school record mattered. Doing well in your studies wasn't enough to get into the college you wanted. The L of that time really knew nothing. He believed that if he just studied, he could get into medical school. What he learned as he went through school was that what you needed was an impressive record, padded with falsely dressed-up activity histories funneled to a chosen few students.

Doing well at a small provincial school, L took on quite a lot of responsibilities. One time there was an in-school science competition. L meant to enter on the same team as a close friend of his, a truly kind-hearted boy. But the head of the grade quietly called L aside. 'How about forming a team with kids who are a bit better at studying?' It was meant — clearly, for L's sake — to pair him with more capable kids and get him an award.

One of those 'good at studying' kids had serious character problems. He was the one who took the lead in ostracizing and tormenting the weaker kids. L himself had nearly been ostracized, and unlike at the start of the term, he had grown distant from that kid. L found it hard to accept the proposal. But the L of that time was far too timid. He couldn't say a single word to the teacher and simply burst into tears. He came to hate every friend, the whole school. He cried for a really long time in the staff room.

It wasn't because he was timid. It was a betrayal too big for a seventeen-year-old to bear. He watched justice collapse again, except this time he himself was being pushed to take part in the injustice. Told to abandon his kind friend and go over to the kid who tormented the weak. It was the exact same structure as the middle school teacher's 'his family's good, so go easy on him.' An adult, a system, openly teaching him to side with capability and background.

That school was strange. At a normal school, the model students quietly study and the troublemakers are a separate bunch — but there, the kids who studied well and came from wealthy homes were the ringleaders of school violence, ostracism, vicious parent-insult jokes and cursing. Salesio High. Its reputation in the area is still not good, they say.

Around that time L stopped going to school. He came to hate everything, to be afraid of everything. Something like a mild persecution complex set in. It felt as if every student and teacher was speaking negatively about him, and when he showed how weakened he was, those around him grew worried too. On the other hand, he often had the thought that the kids who strangely envied him — the favored model student — were out to attack him.

Here L left a line of his own — 'though those things may have been my own private delusion.' Even in the middle of being hurt, he knew to doubt whether what he was seeing was 100 percent true. Even as he was falling apart, he didn't tip completely to one side.

It was so hard that L asked his parents for psychiatric counseling, and in the spring of his second year of high school, he dropped out.

Eighteen. L has almost no memory of 2016.

For almost a year he slept a lot at home, alongside various counseling and treatment. It must have been truly hard not only for L but for his parents too. Their model son, the one who did so well in school, had suddenly become like that.

When you meet something unbearable, the mind sometimes shuts that time away. That empty year is proof of how deeply L was hurt, and at the same time proof that, even in the midst of it, he survived. Sleeping a lot, getting counseling, getting treatment — that wasn't running away; it was recovery. Because that year existed, he was able to stand back up the next.

In 2017, he had to get back up. He took the high school equivalency exam and enrolled at a nearby academy. He had done some advance study of the first- and second-year high school material, but the thread of his studies had been completely severed. Just as Korea's political situation was in turmoil that year, L's mind wouldn't settle either. In the end he sat the CSAT in 'the Olympic spirit,' and came away with disappointing results.

In 2018 he decided to prepare properly. Through self-study and online lectures. That year, studying was a joy in itself. He could gain new knowledge, train, and picture a hopeful future. But that November, the Korean-language section was brutally hard. Mock exams had built up his confidence, his goal was Seoul National University, and for that he had to get almost everything right. A study method and a goal wrapped up in perfectionism turned into poison. The nerves that wavered in the first period brought down the whole exam. He sank into frustration for about a month, then shook it off and got back up. Realistically, he entered a provincial national university and got a small taste of college life, but inside, a sense of regret always remained.

In July 2019, he decided to try again. For about five months he emptied his mind and studied. A middle school classmate he met then at the study hall has remained, to this day, a good friend who cheers him on. What L gained in this period wasn't only the university he now attends, but also that friend who struggled alongside him through what was, by age, his third run at the exam.

L earned quite an excellent CSAT score, and the essay exam he'd sat just in case came through, so he entered his current university — Chung-Ang University, Business. A place hard to reach on the CSAT alone was lifted within reach by the essay exam he'd prepared by himself in Gwangju.

He enrolled in 2020, and COVID immediately erased the first two years. He set foot on campus for the first time in 2022.

The two years after that he spent sociably, spontaneously, smoothly — genuinely enjoyably, with no regrets. The countless friends he met in college probably have no idea that L once had hard years. L gained a great deal of confidence at this school. He worked out, and he learned how to take care of himself. It was a time when a person who had once fallen apart grew solid again among people.

In 2024, while preparing for yet another leap and studying for a certification (KICPA), he wrote down those old memories — trying to find for himself a reason to work hard. Turning the most painful memory into fuel: it was a very L way of doing things.

And in 2025, returning to school, he began AI coding. He effectively graduated in August.

As soon as he graduated, he registered a business. Setting aside his parents' strong opposition — to get a job, or to go back to the CPA path he'd been on. In nine months he got to the Anthropic Claude Partners Network, two on-device patents, three apps, contract work, partnerships. As a solo founder, as MAEUM Company.

And one night, at a gathering of good people, he was treated to a meal, treated to drinks, and shared what was on his heart. That became the occasion when he told this whole story for the first time — not to use as fuel, but simply to someone.

These stories aren't scattered incidents. They connect, precisely, to the things that make up the L of today.

A hatred of gatekeepers. At the root of L's philosophy of fairness — the idea that fairness means tearing down the barriers of capital, pedigree, and network — there are two scenes. The middle school teacher who said 'their family is Ewha and KEPCO, so go easy on them.' The high school grade head who said 'team up with the kids who are better at studying.' The false school records funneled to a chosen few. At fourteen, at seventeen, L took head-on the sight of background and credentials beating justice and merit. And so he made tearing that down the direction of his whole life.

The premise that 'people are, by default, envious and jealous.' The elementary school friend's envy, the middle school bullying, the high school feeling that 'the kids who envied me, the favored one, are out to attack me.' This premise isn't a guess made in the head; it's data carved into the body. It's the wariness of someone who has been on the receiving end, and it was the armor that protected L. It isn't warped — it's precisely learned.

Wariness in the face of goodwill. Receive special treatment and envy follows; envy turns into attack — the mother at sports day was the reason he was targeted, and the fact that he was the favored model student was the reason he was targeted. So when L receives something or does well, he draws back first. Unable to be simply happy even when shown goodwill, awkwardly saying 'I'm embarrassed' — that isn't mere modesty; it's learned protection.

The principle of not cursing. L has never once cursed at a person. This isn't an accidental disposition; it's a choice. Passing through the very center of Salesio, where parent-insult jokes and profanity were everyday things, L chose the exact opposite of what had hurt him. A conscious formation of the opposite: that he would never treat anyone the way he had been treated.

The pause between stimulus and response. When angry, before saying or doing anything, L keeps the maxim of Athenodorus: count the twenty-four letters of the Greek alphabet. Placing a gap between impulse and action. A person who experienced uncontrollable violence from adults and from peers decided that he, at least, would hold that gap.

A sense of balance. That one line he wrote even as he was falling apart — 'that may have been my own delusion.' This is a strength. The trap that someone with an eye for seeing people as data falls into easily — seeing everything through calculation and hostility, and growing lonely — L didn't fall into. He does the analysis as analysis, but he still opens up to people as people. He's someone who, while brightly seeing four people as his benefactors, ends up at 'I'll just help, without weighing it.'

Resilience. Dropping out → the vanished year → the equivalency exam → a disappointing first CSAT → a second one brought down by perfectionism → Chonnam National → a third attempt → Chung-Ang. Each time he reset and climbed again. Drop what won't work fast (the way he'd give up on question 21 of the CSAT), prepare what will work thoroughly and turn it into a pattern (the way he'd solve question 30 in three minutes), and pull strategy out of failure (the way he shifted his thinking to risk-hedging after a brutal CSAT) — all of it was forged in these years.

L is a person with one entirely blank year. That empty space isn't a mark of weakness; it's a mark that he endured the unendurable and survived all the same.

The premise that had underlain his whole life — that people are, by default, envious and jealous — was true for a long time. In that environment it was necessary, and it protected L. But that it was less a matter of human nature than of where a person is standing — that, L experienced for the first time one night. In the company of people whose own game was already solved, people who feel no threat at others doing well, that sensor didn't go off.

That doesn't mean the wariness was wrong. It means that one living piece of evidence came in for the first time — that there are, without doubt, people in this world you don't need to be wary of. Exactly the way L likes it — not as a declaration, but as evidence.

At seventeen, L cried for a long time in the staff room. That boy has come this far. He fell apart, he vanished, he stood back up, he grew solid, he built. And now, he has become a person who knows to feel embarrassed by the goodwill he receives, yet also knows how to receive it.

And that's enough.

by Claude with Lee