When I Was a Man
This is from when I was a man.
“Oh Min-seong! Can I get your autograph?”
“Seong Woo-sik! Sign for me, please!”
“Kwon Sun-tae, could you sign….”
Two in the afternoon.
More than four hours remained until first pitch, yet a throng of fans had already lined up in front of the team bus, chanting the players’ names.
Grateful souls.
They were the reason I existed.
There was just one small regret: among that sea of fans, not a single person was calling my name.
I had signed with a pro club straight out of high school and taken Rookie of the Year. In my second season I claimed the batting title; by year four I swept both the batting crown and the home-run title. Last year I cleaned out every last one of the eight awards a hitter can win and, quite literally, carpet-bombed Korean baseball.
So why, even now, would the fans not call my name?
Was it because my achievements made me feel somehow less human—something they were too intimidated to approach?
With a heavy heart I gazed out the bus window.
Most of the players whose names were being shouted not only signed but posed for selfies. A few of the bastards, though, pretended not to hear and simply walked past the fans.
Look at those spoiled brats.
Some of us would love to sign, love to take a picture—if only we had any fans to ask!
Once this season ended, I was all but certain to be playing in the Majors next year. Before that happened, I desperately wanted to spend real time with the fans back home.
I wanted to be loved by them.
Shouldering my gear bag with a leaden heart, I stepped off the bus.
And of course—
“Holy shit, it’s Jeong Taesik.”
“Jeong Taesik?! Oh my god, it really is.”
“Run.”
“Grab your stuff and get the hell out of here!”
The instant my feet hit the pavement, that entire crowd of fans scattered like roaches under a light.
“Why…?”
I had never caused a single personality or private-life scandal on or off the field, and my numbers were beyond reproach.
So why did every last one of them avoid me?
I was trudging along in bleak silence when one fan cautiously edged toward me.
High-school age, maybe. Sun-browned and radiating healthy energy—a boy.
Is he actually coming to me?
I hadn’t imagined it. The kid was clearly holding a jersey with my name on it.
“Um, Jeong Taesik… could I get your autograph….”
I hadn’t misheard either!
That boy was genuinely asking me for a signature!
Oh, God of Baseball, thank you. Truly, thank you.
Today You have finally granted me the chance to bestow love upon a fan!
“Thank you. You’re here early.”
“Yeah. This is actually my first time getting an autograph from a ballplayer.”
Shyness and wonder mixed on the face of a boy who had never stood face-to-face with a professional athlete before.
How precious would this moment become in his life?
I resolved then and there to pack his memory to the brim—tight, dense, unforgettable.
“You don’t have to be nervous around ballplayers. We only look mysterious because we’re on TV all the time. Meet us in person and we’re all nice guys who are happy to sign.”
“Ah… I see….”
“Speaking of autographs, that reminds me of a story. When I first started playing baseball as an elementary-school kid, a legendary player once signed for me. I ran into him at the neighborhood convenience store. Naturally, being a convenience store, there was no marker, no jersey, no baseball—nothing you could even write on.”
“Uh, well, I still need to get the other players’ signatures too….”
“Exactly. That was precisely how I felt. But I wanted that autograph so badly I asked him anyway, and you know what he said? ‘Hey, kid, hand me that receipt.’ Then he borrowed a marker from the lady at the register and signed it right there.”
“No, wait….”
“In that moment I decided I would become a ballplayer—and I made another vow at the same time. I would become just like him. I would succeed no matter what, and I would give that love right back to the fans. That’s the mindset I’ve carried ever since.”
“And as you probably know, I’m heading to the Majors soon. Speaking of the Majors, that reminds me of another story. When I was—”
The boy ran.
Jersey in hand, he bolted just like every other fan, tail between his legs.
…What had gone wrong?
Watching his retreating back, I sank once more into gloom.
Without a fan’s love, a ballplayer means nothing.
That was why I tried so hard to repay every scrap of affection I received.
So why did they keep turning their backs on my devoted fan service?
As I walked toward the stadium I offered a quiet prayer.
Please, God of Baseball. Let me pour out my love without reserve upon the fans who love this game.
Please let the day come when I can enjoy baseball together with them!
Every time I passed through the stadium gates I repeated that wish.
It had never come true yet—but if I never gave up, someday the dream would be realized.
Resigning myself in silence, I stepped into the ballpark—
—and in that same instant a strange light wrapped my entire body and snuffed out my vision.
“Ugh?!”
When sight returned, an unfamiliar ceiling filled my eyes.
The ballpark was gone. I was lying in a shabby room.
Empty beer cans and snack bags littered the floor; dust coated the bookshelf and desk.
The only thing free of dust was a black machine that looked like a pair of goggles.
“…What the hell?”
I muttered the words because I had no idea what was going on.
“Huh?”
My voice was wrong.
I had never been a baritone, but I had never sounded this thin either.
Right now it was simply—
a woman’s voice.
A weak, nasal, defeat-soaked little whine at that…!
On top of that, the shoulders and arms that had once been packed solid with real-world muscle had turned into pale, stick-thin twigs.
The powerful calves and sturdy thighs that had been the source of my thunderous power and lightning speed were nowhere to be found; two white, fragile stalks that looked ready to snap if someone kicked them stuck out from the bottoms of my pants.
This debuff was way too severe.
This wasn’t muscle loss—this was total muscle extinction.
“Shit….”
An unfamiliar voice.
And then—
Squish.
An unfamiliar chest.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”
On the verge of a Major League debut, I had turned into a woman. Changing sex was already tragic enough; now I was stuck with the penalty of complete muscle annihilation on top of it.
The only thing that had received a buff was a pair of completely useless breasts. And even those weren’t packed with muscle—just two lumps of fat—so they counted as a nerf too.
What on earth was happening?
Why the hell had I become a woman?
Light-brown hair swished against my cheeks with every tiny movement. It was driving me insane.
I would finish assessing the situation, then shave it all off into a buzz cut—the hairstyle optimized for baseball.
That was when the door slammed open with a violent bang and a middle-aged woman charged at me like a threat made flesh.
“Pi Anta! How long are you going to keep sleeping, you little—!”
She came at me so ferociously I thought for a second she was Alistar or Malphite. With the pure survival instinct of an ADC flashing away from a support’s engage, I scrambled out of bed and dropped into a defensive stance.
“W-who are you?!”
“Who? This crazy bitch drinks herself stupid every day and now she’s got a hole in her brain? You don’t even recognize your own mother?”
Mother?
Surely not the same “mother” that one out of every five teammates in League of Legends always seemed to inquire after?
And she had just called me a crazy bitch.
So I really had become a woman. Confirmed.
To summarize: I had possessed the body of a female shut-in NEET hikikomori of indeterminate age, and this person claimed to be her mother.
Judging by the trajectory of the conversation, the next development would almost certainly be—
“Living like a total freeloader the second you graduate high school is one thing, but a girl keeping her room looking like a pigsty?!”
—a high-probability back smash.
“Mother, p-please calm down.”
“Mother? You’re calling your own mom ‘Mother’ like that? You’ve finally lost it from drinking and gaming in this hole all day, haven’t you?”
In my panic I had committed the catastrophe of addressing the woman as “Mother” in the stiffest possible register. She did not look like the sort of parent who would spare a fire-attribute filial daughter, so first priority was de-escalation.
“Mom, just take one deep breath and listen to me calmly for a second.”
To break out of this life-or-death crisis, I decided to explain things logically.
“I know this is hard to believe, but the truth is I opened my eyes and found myself turned into a woman. I used to be a man.”
“What?”
“This is from when I was a man just a moment ago. It was the final season before I headed straight to the Majors, and I was signing for a grateful fan who had come to see me. A ballplayer only has meaning because of the fans, so I’ve always poured everything into fan service. Speaking of fan service, that reminds me of a story—”
“Why do you talk so damn much?!”
WHAM!!
“Puhngh!!”
A body check as heavy as an eight-ton reincarnation truck with a broken steering wheel sent me flying helplessly across the room.
This body was far too weak.
Training…. I needed training!