Chapter 1
Chapter 1
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>Translator: Lord First
>Chapter: 1
>Chapter Title: Thirty Years Have Passed
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>1. Thirty years have passed since the prologue.
“Ah… an unfamiliar ceiling.”
Kim Seon-woo muttered in a calm voice.
No, he wasn't calm at all. He was so excited his hands were trembling.
How long had he waited for this moment? An unfamiliar ceiling, an unfamiliar world—yes. Possession, transmigration, reincarnation, whatever you wanted to call it!
In fact, he had been preparing for this moment for a very long time. The key phrase here is ‘had been preparing.’
Any citizen of the Republic of Korea would already know the basic requirements for reincarnation into another world: [Submitting a 5,700-character critique of gratitude] and [Reading the story to its completion].
Taking this one step further reveals Kim Seon-woo's 'preparation process.'
For every novel, webtoon, and game he consumed—any work he liked, that is, any work he wanted to be transported into—he submitted a [5,700-character critique].
Every single day, filled with gratitude, without rest, with a different repertoire each time, meticulously and thoroughly.
And since these were the worlds he might possess, he naturally memorized their stories, settings, potential hidden pieces or artifacts, and the relationship charts of the main characters.
5,700 characters designed solely to break the creator's spirit, until he heard the words, [Then why don't you try it?].
Of course, most cases ended with authors lacking grit quitting, or with him being ridiculed and blocked on various online communities, but in the end, he had won.
He had finally possessed a body in another world.
Now, all that was left was to figure out which story this was. That was it!
“Status Window!”
No colorful, augmented reality blue display appeared.
But that was fine. He wasn't disappointed. The list of works he'd left malicious comments on included many without status windows. In fact, this was a clue that would help him narrow down the list.
Besides, he was in the body of a young child, maybe four or five years old. Time and potential were on his side.
The old, worn-out clothes and shabby ceiling were actually a good thing.
-A genius of this caliber, in a place like this?!
>-A truly great hero!!
>-I'll give you the throne, my riches, everything! Just spare my life!!
After all, it had been proven by countless media back on Earth that a tragic childhood made one's success seem all the more grand.
Kim Seon-woo smirked and pushed himself to his feet.
First things first, yes, shall I start with something simple, like 'making soap'?
*
Age 4. One week since possession.
Kim Seon-woo learns that his body is named ‘Ivan Petrovich’.
He is bewildered to find that his parents are tenant farmers, so ignorant they don't even know the name of their own country, let alone how to read.
After failing to make soap, he is harshly scolded for playing with lye.
He then learns that soap already exists in this world.
Age 4. Six weeks since possession.
Kim Seon-woo is finally able to explore the village on an errand to fetch eggs.
>The moment he sees a newspaper lying on the ground, he begins to feel that something is off.
“A society capable of printing newspapers and distributing them to a rural village like this couldn't be medieval, could it?”
Most of the titles on his 'List of Potential Worlds' were crossed off that day.
Age 4. Fifteen weeks since possession.
Kim Seon-woo finally learns the name of the country he is living in.
>After also hearing the name of the king, who had until then been vaguely referred to as ‘the sovereign,’ he immediately returns home and throws his precious ‘List of Potential Worlds’ into the bonfire.
It was a country he had never heard of, a monarch he had never heard of, and all the surrounding kingdoms were names he had never heard of.
The important question was no longer ‘What story have I possessed?’
It was, ‘What the hell genre is this?’
Please, just don't let it be dark fantasy. The survival rate for a modern Korean as a tenant farmer with no status window or special perks usually converged below 5%.
Age 8. Four years since possession.
To his surprise, a Demon King has apparently appeared out of nowhere.
The war was still a distant affair, but the extras distributed daily were filled with nothing but grim news.
Winter, age 8.
Kim Seon-woo's, no, ‘Ivan's’ father was taken away by a conscription officer.
‘Ivan's’ mother started taking on communal labor to feed young ‘Ivan.’
From this point on, Kim Seon-woo's sense of self began to fray.
Age 10. Six years since possession.
Kim Seon-woo was now quite adept at helping his mother with her communal labor.
Age 12. Eight years since possession.
Kim Seon-woo finally learned to read. It was the price for six years of sneaking eggs to the village chief's house.
Age 14. Ten years since possession.
News of his father's death reached his village.
The ridiculous part was that the official notice had been issued two years ago.
Clutching the few coins he received in place of a life, he watched his sobbing mother and had two thoughts.
First, that the genre of this world must be a strategy simulation.
No wonder it felt so detailed. If it were an RPG, there usually wouldn't be this many countries. It's normal not to implement backgrounds the player can't experience, right?
It couldn't be a novel or a webtoon either.
The proof was this world itself—a world with strangely subtle settings, where simple firearms, steam engines, knights, mages, the Demon King, and other races all coexisted.
A novel with such a setting would inevitably be met with comments like, 'What's that, you damn nerd?' or 'There he goes, talking about stuff only he knows,' and end up discontinued during its free serialization.
If that was the case, he obviously had to go to the front lines. If he lived and died as a tenant farmer in this backward village, he would never even set foot in the main story.
The ending of a strategy simulation usually involves world conquest, and he had to avoid an ending where he was conquered by the Demon King's army without knowing a thing.
And his second thought was.
“Don't worry, Mother.”
He stroked the hair of his mother, who had cried herself to sleep, and submitted an enlistment application to the recruiting officer. The annual salary was 15 copper coins. He signed a contract to have it all sent directly to his mother.
‘Ivan Petrovich’ hoped this woman's hands would never again grow chapped and raw.
It wasn't out of some sudden filial piety, but rather pity for this great woman who devoted her entire being to him, a complete stranger, and the guilt of having essentially killed her only flesh and blood by taking over the body of the young boy named ‘Ivan’.
Age 18. Fourteen years since possession. Four years of military service.
Thanks to minor military achievements and a bit of luck, Ivan's status was upgraded from ‘conscript’ to ‘regular soldier.’
He realized that Ivan's body had an unexpected talent for fighting.
Age 22. Eighteen years since possession. Eight years of military service.
When the front lines were pushed back to a critical point and half of the allied nations were in flames.
The Hero appeared.
At this point, Ivan finally understood the genre of this world.
It was a hero story—a classic RPG.
But the Hero was a distant tale, and the front Ivan was fighting on was still being pushed back disastrously.
Age 28. Twenty-four years since possession. Fourteen years of military service.
The tide of the war turns as the Hero's Party begins to intercept and defeat the Demon King's generals.
Ivan was now assigned to the ‘Liberated Area Control and Hostile Force Eradication Unit.’
This long name could be simplified to this:
-Annihilation Squad
It was a special operations unit deployed when the Hero's Party killed an enemy general, and the disorganized enemy ranks collapsed into chaos.
For about a year from this point on, Ivan moves with the Hero's Party, sharing the same barracks.
Age 30. Twenty-six years since possession. Sixteen years of military service.
The Hero's Party killed the Demon King.
Ivan now decided to wait for the ending.
He just wanted to escape this godforsaken world.
Age 32. Twenty-eight years since possession.
Two years after the Demon King's death, there was still no ending.
In that time, the personnel of the Annihilation Squad had been reduced to one-fifth of its original size.
Seeing that no new recruits were being supplied, Ivan realized the higher-ups intended to disband them.
After carrying out a final, suicidal mission, Ivan considers this situation a long epilogue and applies for discharge.
His mother back home had passed away ten years ago, so he was completely alone.
He established an orphanage near the capital and took in war orphans.
It was a small act of hypocrisy.
Age 34. Thirty years since possession.
Still, even now, to this day.
The ending credits are nowhere in sight.
*
The thought that this might not have been an RPG after all was turned into certainty by a visitor to his orphanage.
“Shit.”
>“Pardon?”
>“Shit. This was an academy genre story?”
>“Senior…?”
The visitor smiled awkwardly at the orphanage director (war hero, 18 years of military service, former Annihilation Squad, acquainted with the Hero's Party) who had suddenly started swearing.
The visitor, dispatched from the royal court, broke into a cold sweat as he recalled the orphanage director's many nicknames.
The Great King's Executioner, the Woodchipper, the Man Who Slaughtered the Seven Dragon Generals, the Undying, the Reserve. The Living Legend of the Conscripts.
Since this menacing man looked ready to bury an axe in his head if he said the wrong thing, the visitor could only smile awkwardly and hold his breath, waiting for the orphanage director's anger to subside.
*