Chapter 1
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Regression
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2026 61st Certified Public Accountant Second Round Exam Final Passers Announcement
I stared at the screen in front of me with an expression of utter disbelief.
My name. My exam number.
Gone.
No matter how many times I looked, it wasn't there.
Even after rubbing my eyes and searching again, nothing.
"...Ah."
Twenty-nine in Korean age this year.
While others were building careers and getting married, I was still a jobless exam prep drifter.
I'd thought this was my last shot.
But now, I'd have to start over from the first round next year.
And next year, I'd be turning thirty.
It didn't feel real that the first digit of my age would change to a three.
...Where the hell did my twenties go?
After pouring my youth into this, grinding my teeth through endless studying, and this is the result?
I felt so wronged I could go insane.
No, honestly, I was just scared.
There wouldn't be any more dramatic twists left for the life of an unemployed thirty-year-old with no experience.
I grabbed the two bottles of soju I'd bought from the convenience store and downed them straight, no chaser.
"...Ha."
It's not like I'd chosen to live like this.
In fact, obsessing over the accountant exam had been a form of escapism from reality.
The whole mess started exactly nine years ago, back when I was a college freshman.
I'd just been trying to wake up a female classmate who'd passed out drunk at the table.
I patted her shoulder and asked if she was okay.
That's when it happened.
'Hey, what the hell do you think you're doing?'
In that split second, I was branded a sexual harasser.
Looking back, it was such a trivial misunderstanding.
Just a harmless mishap.
But the problem was the guy who grilled me relentlessly right then and there.
Seon-woo Lee.
You know the type—every crowd has at least one. The kind who naturally takes center stage and leads everyone else.
Seon-woo Lee was exactly that guy.
And for some reason, he seemed dead set on ruining me.
'Ah, sunbae. She's just really wasted. I was trying to wake her up and send her home in a taxi...'
He ignored my explanation completely.
Instead, he went over to our classmate, got eye-level with her, and asked,
'You okay? You drank a lot.'
'Ugh... sunbae...'
'Did that guy touch you earlier?'
'Huh? Uh... no, just...'
'Don't hold back. Tell me the truth. We need to get this straight.'
'...'
Before I knew it, I was being treated like a perp caught in the act of sexual assault.
The cops even showed up, but it ended in a warning and release.
No physical evidence, and it was basically a non-issue. The outcome was inevitable.
But legal innocence doesn't mean social innocence.
I found out the next day at school.
'That's the freshman who groped that girl.'
'Freak, gross...'
'He sure has the balls to show his face here. What a thick-skinned bastard.'
The whispers behind my back made my skin crawl.
In the end, I bolted for the army like I was fleeing.
After discharge, I hid away in a cram study dorm, using exams as an excuse.
Still, I'd flailed around trying to make the best of it.
Told myself it was a blessing in disguise.
That while others wasted time playing, I'd prepare for my future. Mental gymnastics.
Convinced myself that once I passed, I could shake it all off and start fresh.
"...But this is the payoff? Fucking hell."
The empty soju bottles rolled across the floor.
I was so goddamn wronged, I thought I'd lose my mind.
Does God even exist?
If he does, isn't he supposed to cut someone like me some slack?
I'd never even had a proper relationship like everyone else.
I'd given my entire youth to that cramped study dorm.
And still ended up with nothing.
I'd never coveted or harmed anyone else's stuff—not once. So why was my life dumped in the trash?
The injustice was so overwhelming, even suicide didn't cross my mind.
"Ha..."
What if, just maybe.
If I could start life over.
"Send me back to twenty, before everything began."
If I got sent back there.
"I'd live for real this time, give it everything I had..."
Muttering curses or prayers—I couldn't tell which—to the heavens, I finally lost consciousness.
That was the last memory of my pathetic 29-year-old life.
Discuss the feelings of a 29-year-old exam prep failure regressing into a 20-year-old college freshman on their way to school.
If an essay question like that popped up, I could write the perfect answer without a second's hesitation.
"Is this a school or a hiking trail?"
Making us climb a slope this steep.
Shouldn't they at least install an escalator?
That'd be the bare minimum conscience from the foundation raking in our tuition.
I'd grumbled the exact same thing nine years ago on this path, and nothing had changed.
Actually, one thing had.
My eye level was about 10 cm lower than usual.
And with every step, unfamiliar long hair slapped against my cheeks.
"...This is really hard to get used to."
Just yesterday, I'd been a 29-year-old who bombed the CPA second round.
Whining in my dingy room about being sent back to twenty, then blackout.
I opened my eyes, and boom—really back nine years, a freshly admitted twenty-year-old college freshman.
...But my gender had flipped.
And everyone else treated it like I'd always been a girl. Seamless.
Through the lingering confusion, memories of this morning seeped in.
"Honey! Still sleeping?"
"..."
"Today's orientation. Get up already."
Mom sat lightly on the edge of my bed and stared right into my face.
Like she'd hit the lottery jackpot.
One of the first things I realized after regressing?
Mom doted on me... well, on girl Ha-rang Seo, something fierce.
She gently brushed my hair back and smiled for a good long while.
Just gazing at her kid's face made her crow's feet crinkle with joy.
"How is our daughter so pretty?"
Her stare made me sweat bullets, so I awkwardly mumbled,
"Mom... why are you like this first thing in the morning? Seriously."
"Look at that skin. Not a single pore? Who'd you get this from?"
Mom kept cooing in awe.
I played it sly to hide my discomfort.
"Who else? You gave birth to me, so obviously I take after you..."
Her cheeks shot up like they were piercing the sky.
She waved it off and kept going.
"Pfft, you're just saying that to make me happy. If I'd been this pretty at your age, I wouldn't have ended up with your dad."
"Dad'd grab his neck if he heard that."
"Hehe. Kidding."
Mom ignored my deadpan reply.
"You really... feel like you dropped from the sky."
I escaped to the bathroom to dodge her endless doting.
Wondering why she was making such a fuss, I went to wash up—
And a goddess in the mirror stared back.
"...Wow."
This face should've been familiar by now, but I still gasped.
It went beyond pretty.
I poked and prodded at my reflection and had to admit it.
'Yeah... no wonder Mom's going gaga.'
If I had a daughter like this, I'd parade her around the neighborhood like a treasure.
Breathing alone counts as filial piety, huh?
"Ha-rang! You fall asleep in there?"
"Huh? Coming."
"I have something to tell you. Come out and listen."
The door-rattling voice made me hastily splash water on my face and step out.
What now?
"Ha-rang, listen to Mom carefully."
She grabbed both my shoulders solemnly.
"At orientation today, watch out for guys."
"Guys? Out of nowhere?"
"Boys'll drool buckets when they see you. Mom's heart's already pounding."
"What?"
"Don't smile at just anyone. Got it?"
"What are you even talking about?"
"One grin from you, and they'll drop like flies."
Mom was dead serious.
No hint of joking.
"Campus ambulances'll need at least ten units."
"..."
"Your face is a weapon, a weapon! You, Ha-rang, your very existence is murderously beautiful!"
Ambulances? My face a weapon?
Memories from before the regression flashed up.
Mom avoiding my eyes every time she saw my sallow, burned-out face from studying.
Like she was the guilty one.
'Ha-rang, you eating properly? Your face looks half-dead...'
The real criminal was me.
My incompetence at nearly thirty had bruised her heart.
Yet the filial piety I'd failed to give as a son for 29 years?
This pretty new shell achieved it effortlessly overnight.
Realizing that brought a bitter smile.
"Ha-rang, Mom's not joking."
"..."
"Be careful. Guys are all wolves. Mom knows."
Now she looked ready to bodyguard me personally, laying down the law.
As a 29-year veteran man, did I not know men's lecherous inner thoughts?
"Mom."
"Yeah?"
"I know how guys work. Their dark hearts? I get it. Don't worry."
Her eyes went wide at my words.
Oh crap, did my 29-year-old male ego slip out too much?
"What? How do you know that?!"
"Huh?"
"Ha-rang... don't tell me."
"Tell you what?"
"You secretly got a boyfriend?!"
"No, what boyfriend? Nothing like that."
"A spinster with no boyfriend knows men's hearts?!"
"No, I..."
"Who is it? Which bastard? Spill it!"
Panicking, my excuses tangled up.
"Seriously, no! I just... online these days, there's stuff about spotting guys—uh, not that, just filtering creeps."
"Online?"
"Yeah. Learned from that. Their tricks. All the same."
Hitting send on that made regret crash in.
Saying that word...
Like spitting in my own face, but in this girl's voice, it stuck weirdly well. Maddening.
Caught between dude forums and girl ones, identity whiplash.
But Mom eyed me suspiciously and said,
"Anyway, if anyone asks you to drink, say no flat-out!"
"Mom, college classmates might grab a drink. It's not a big deal."
"You're talking big disaster."
She clutched her neck, then shook my shoulders hard.
"If someone lures you to drink, shut it down. Got it?"
"Say what?"
"'My mom's GPS-tracking me if I'm not home by 10.'"
"Mom... that's creepy. I'll just say I don't drink."
"No! That won't faze them!"
"Then?"
"Make 'em think messing with this house is trouble!"
She snatched my phone.
"Change your wallpaper too! Ha-jin pic!"
"Ha-jin Seo?"
The screen showed my little brother, Ha-jin Seo.
Why him all of a sudden?
In my past life, we barely exchanged three words a day—model siblings.
"Show it off if anyone hits on you. Pretend he's your boyfriend. Ha-jin's all buff from sports, right?"
"..."
Screen Ha-jin posed in his basketball uniform.
The same smug face I'd smacked from behind plenty.
Pretend he's my boyfriend?
Made me want to hurl.
This went beyond gender identity.
"Mom, this is too much."
"Why?"
"He's still in high school sophomore year! And siblings pretending...? Gross."
"Siblings?"
"Brother or sister, whatever!"
"What nonsense! Ha-jin's prime boyfriend material—everyone'd buy it!"
"No thanks!"
"Should I change your contacts to Ha-jin♥?"
"Please! Stop! I won't! Never!"
I jammed my feet into shoes and kicked open the front door instead of answering.
And it wasn't just Mom whose attitude had shifted—I realized that right away.
The security guard who'd yell about improper recycling.
Today, he spotted me from afar and trotted over.
Opened the gate himself.
"Heh, off to school? Watch the road."
A kind smile I'd never seen before lit his face.
"Ah... yes. Thank you."
I mumbled awkwardly; he waved me off warmly for ages.
That wasn't all.
Dashing for the bus, the driver—who'd been closing the doors—saw me and reopened them.
With the gentlest smile.
"Miss. Take it slow! Don't trip."
"Huff... huff... thank you."
As I tapped my card, he glanced back in the mirror and added,
"Next time, stroll on over. Uncle'll wait."
"Ah... okay."
I ducked my head and shuffled inside.
He didn't start driving till I sat down.
Was he always this nice?
The stares on the bus clung like honey.
Guys stole obvious glances; the uncle next to me lowered his arm from the window and scooted over.
What was with all this undue kindness?
One shell change, and the world parted like the Red Sea.
This warm world temperature—never felt before—creeped me out with its strangeness.
"..."
But was it okay to just live on as parallel-world girl Ha-rang Seo?
Sure, my old life was pathetic and cringy, but it was my true self.
Twenty-nine years as male Ha-rang Seo, erased wholesale.
Left a strange emptiness in my chest.
That's why I'd briefly considered retaking exams for engineering school.
Maybe build a dimension portal back to my original male world.
But I snapped out of it.
I was the classic humanities-brain type who'd blue-screen at the quadratic formula in high school.
Forget portals—I'd drop out before page one of Halliday's physics.
Better stick to what I knew.
In my past life, I'd barely missed passing the CPA second round.
Meaning, at twenty now, I could ace the first round easy—and I'd mastered most second-round subjects too.
Hell, the questions would be the exact past ones I remembered.
Guaranteed pass?
CPA final pass at twenty.
The youngest record—only in success stories before—now mine?
Tempting as hell.
...Not that I had grand ambitions.
Just no more wrongful scandals like before. Live normally like others...
Or maybe one notch above normal. Comfortably well-off.
Sketching my modest second-life roadmap, my hair kept flopping onto my lips.
Ptoo, I tossed it back—fingertips hit silk-soft strands. Shiver city again.
"Sigh... how the hell do I live from here?"