The cheollima does a final twirl on his right hind leg and clears his throat. “So, contestants, this is the moment of truth. The moment we’ve all been waiting for. My last chance to obtain those cookies, and your last chance to gain passage into the gifted library or face certain death. Are you ready to hear the question for your final verification attempt?”

We both nod, swallowing hard. I really hope he’s joking about the certain death part….

“Third and final attempt: Which is the mightier of the two, the sun or the wind?”

Emmett and I take our time working this one out.

“The answer that first comes to mind is the wind,” Emmett muses. “I mean, the sun just shines, but the wind can be strong and blustery, right? It can create hurricanes, destroy entire houses, that kinda thing.”

I nod, thinking hard. “That’s what I was gonna say, too. The wind is the obvious choice.” But then I remember the story Auntie Okja used to tell me about the power of empathy over brute force. “Wait, do you know the old Aesop’s fable about the wind and the sun?”

Emmett shakes his head.

“Essentially, the north wind wanted to prove he was mightier than anyone else in the universe. So one day, he challenged the sleepy sun to a duel. If he could remove the jacket from a human faster than the sun could, there would be no doubt that he was the mightiest of all.”

Emmett is listening carefully, so I continue. “So the north wind went first, and he huffed and puffed, blowing on the man as hard as he could. He thought it was going to be easy, since he was so powerful, but the more wind he created, the colder the man felt, and the tighter he held on to his jacket. Eventually, the wind ran out of breath and fell into a heap, exhausted.”

“And the sun?” Emmett asks.

“Well, then the sun shone her gentle warm rays on the man. The man started relaxing, and yawning, and eventually he got too warm from all the heat. Before long—bam!—he took off his jacket.”

Emmett slaps his thigh. “That’s gotta be it, Rye. It’s the sun.”

The cheollima flaps his wings and clips his hooves on the washing machine. “Righto, time’s up, cinnamon creams! What’s your final answer? The sun or the wind?”

“The sun!” Emmett and I call out together.

The cheollima pauses. “Are you sure?”

For a second, I waver. Maybe it’s the wind?

But Emmett’s confident expression erases my doubt. “Our final answer is the sun,” he says. “Lock it in, thanks.”

The cheollima takes flight and does a few 360s in the air. “Hooray!” he cries. “The cookies are mine!”

Emmett and I high-five each other and fist-pump the air. We did it!