Chapter 11
Chapter 11
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Translator: Silver Dragon
Chapter: 11
Chapter Title: The Final Day on Earth
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Still a dark morning.
I had just woken up in the inn's bed and was slowly trying to sit up.
I peered out through the window at the center of the room. The village streets were medieval, yet they had streetlamps.
Thanks to them, it wasn't pitch-black darkness but a street faintly illuminated by lights.
Since arriving here, I had started to miss mornings bathed in bright sunlight just a little.
There was no morning sun to wake me, no alarm clock—my only way to rise early was to simply go to bed early.
'What if I sleep too deeply and wake up past noon?'
I blinked my still-sleepy eyes, entertaining the idiotic notion of somehow failing to respawn in my sleep.
I stretched my body and mentally ran through the day's events in advance.
Zone 2's opening, new monsters, people to respawn-kill...
Mouth full of bread, I gulped down some bottled water from the inn as I slowly formulated my plans.
Suddenly, my thoughts drifted to just before coming to the Transcendence World—my final moments on Earth.
The events right before the transfer.
...
But before those thoughts could continue, I decided to focus on the present.
From now on, my reality was here.
Not Earth.
"Hey, Hyuk! There's a shit ton of rebar today, so keep your head on straight!"
At the site foreman's bellow, Kim Hyuk adjusted his sweat-drenched hard hat and gave a curt reply.
"Got it."
His response was brief, but his voice carried a deep rumble that cut through the din.
The laborers around him shot him quick glances.
A young guy in his late twenties, thriving in this brutal construction site where even grizzled veterans in their forties and fifties were left speechless—he never backed down, pulling his weight and then some. Their eyes held a mix of surprise and admiration.
Without a word, Kim Hyuk caught the cement pouring from the mixer truck in his cart and hauled it away.
It was a load most would split into two trips, but he climbed the hillside with steady strides, not a single stumble.
His arms, back, and thighs rippled under his thin work clothes, flexing with coiled power.
His body had always been like that since childhood—tougher and stronger than others'.
It was a blessing, but in the one moment it wrecked his life, it became a curse.
Poverty. That single word summed up Kim Hyuk's childhood.
A moldy semi-basement one-room shack.
Rain turning the place into a flood was commonplace.
And my sole family.
A father drunk more often than not, yet occasionally pressing a battered soccer ball into his son's hands.
That was the entirety of the world in young Kim Hyuk's memory.
He hated taking losses with a vengeance.
Even shorted a single side dish at school lunch, he'd fight tooth and nail for his share. Bigger kids picking fights? He never yielded an inch.
By upper elementary school, his physique had far outstripped his peers, of course.
Thanks to that standout build, no one dared mess with him lightly.
His exceptional physique became his ultimate weapon for guarding what was his.
Around age eleven, he'd drawn a blank at the neighborhood stationery's lottery.
His own mistake, plain as day, but he marched up to the owner grandma with the dud ticket in hand, demanding answers.
Why only blanks? This a scam or what?
She shooed him off in disbelief, but Kim Hyuk wouldn't quit.
Day after day, he planted himself in front of the store, railing at her.
Finally, one day, she spoke up in an exhausted voice.
"...Enough already. Huh? That do it? Go on home now."
After days of it, the grandma threw up her hands and shoved a 500-won toy knife into his grip.
That day, Kim Hyuk learned for the first time how his bullheaded grit could turn a loss into a win.
His father watched the scene and gave a wry smile.
"Hyuk-ah, the world's full of losses if you just play it straight. You've gotta claim your own share."
"But carrying on like that just brings more trouble. Especially with gambling—you've gotta know when to cut your losses."
His father seemed lost in reminiscence as he spoke.
Kim Hyuk didn't grasp it all perfectly, but one phrase sank deep into his heart: 'Claim my own share myself.'
A father who, despite the poverty, tried his best for his son. A childhood laced with humiliating want but dotted with laughs.
That fragile balance, seeming eternal, shattered when he was thirteen, in sixth grade.
That day, his father was drunk again.
And strangers showed up at the house.
Private loan collectors his father had borrowed from. The place was always stacked with papers full of intimidating words—all tied to money.
Men with harsh faces started slapping red seizure tags on the family's meager belongings.
As one went for the last piece of furniture, his father grabbed the man's hand.
On his knees, the father begged.
Just one more chance, please—not in front of the boy.
But they just laughed mockingly.
One of them backhanded his father's cheek.
A sharp crack, and his father's body crumpled limply.
In that instant, something snapped in Kim Hyuk's mind.
He lost all reason and lunged at the man.
A thirteen-year-old kid's assault.
The man shoved him aside irritably, but Kim Hyuk came back like a demon, kicking the man's shin.
Even then, his physique was on par with a high schooler's.
He slammed his fist into the fallen man's face.
Once, twice, three times... ignoring the agony of his own knuckles shattering, his sole focus was obliterating the enemy before him.
"What the hell is this punk?!"
The other three men stared in shock and rushed at Kim Hyuk.
Panicked movements—they hadn't expected a kid to trash one of them so fast.
Three grown men's merciless kicks and punches poured down on young Kim Hyuk's body.
The all-out adult beatdown from every direction turned into the worst pain he'd ever known.
As his breath choked off and bones felt like they were crunching, his consciousness began to fade.
"You fucking bastards!!!!"
It was his father's voice.
But not the powerless slur of the drunkard Kim Hyuk knew.
A primal scream laced with beastly fury.
In his blurring vision, Kim Hyuk saw it.
His fallen father springing up like a coiled spring, headbutting one of the men trampling him.
A dull rupture echoed as the man collapsed.
The father didn't stop.
He elbow-smashing a turning man's jaw, kneeing the last one's gut.
It wasn't a fight.
It was one-sided annihilation.
Kim Hyuk's father looked like a different person.
The drunken haze in his eyes was gone, replaced by the feral glare of a beast intent on ripping apart those who'd harmed his son.
He smashed the downed men's heads against the walls, the floor—without mercy.
The gentle father was nowhere to be seen.
In his place stood pure violence incarnate, having crossed the line.
In the end, the three men were reduced to bloody pulps and stopped breathing.
Later, police arrived on a belated report and burst in. The blood-soaked father offered no resistance.
As they dragged him away, he turned back to his son just once. His eyes were utterly vacant.
Not love, not rage, not sorrow—but the hollow gaze of one who'd abandoned everything.
That look seared into Kim Hyuk's mind like an indelible brand.
His father was sentenced to life for murder, and Kim Hyuk was sent to an orphanage.
From that day, recalling his father's final gaze, he vowed never to cross the line.
He learned bone-deep the destructive force of overwhelming violence—and that it led only to ruin.
Yet at the same time, he couldn't deny it.
In the peak of his father's rampage.
The three men howling as their heads were bashed into walls.
Amid the terror, Kim Hyuk felt a strange reverence.
His always-hunched father's back loomed like a mountain.
The pathetic drunk loafer was nowhere in sight.
The father before him was a ferocious beast staking everything to protect his family—a true man.
That image of violence absolute remained his mind's most vivid, most badass moment.
Violence had been part of his life, twisting his worldview from that day.
Or perhaps he'd only realized it then.
He feared violence's emptiness, yet craved it too.
Even in the orphanage, Kim Hyuk's physique held strong.
He'd dominate kids who underestimated him just enough with force to protect his turf—but never crossed his father's line.
Fists only to the point they'd never dare again.
That measured violence became his way of survival.
By his own reckoning, Kim Hyuk wasn't a total bad guy.
He couldn't ignore a weaker kid getting bullied, and he'd silently haul heavy loads for the orphanage staff.
But when someone encroached on his territory or tried to steal his due unjustly, his fist would clench on instinct—an unbreakable habit.
Adulthood was an endless grind of manual labor.
Construction sites, logistics loading/unloading, furniture delivery... his natural build was tailor-made for the brutality.
Money was decent enough, but no future in sight.
Daily earnings ground from his body vanished into evening booze and next-day hangover cures.
Early twenties, in the thick of logistics part-time gigs.
An uncle noticed his tireless pace—even veterans were impressed—and approached.
"Kid, you've got a solid frame... ever thought about sports?"
Claiming old ties to the sports world, the man dangled an intro to an acquaintance: owner of an MMA gym.
"My eye for talent's still sharp. A physique like yours comes once a decade. Train right, and champ's no dream."
His heart pounded.
This could be his ticket out of the dead-end labor life.
But he shook his head.
In the ring, he'd cross the line for sure.
Victory hunger, opponent rage—it'd unleash the violence.
A couple glories, then assault charges, plummeting to the abyss like his father. The vision was crystal clear.
Recalling his father's last gaze, he turned it down.
But now in his late twenties, Kim Hyuk sometimes regretted it.
'Abyss, so what? Should've cashed in big first.'
Cynicism gnawed at his mind like poison.
Body crumbling bit by bit from labor, future fuzzing from booze.
No sign of improvement anywhere.
He didn't want his father's path, yet he was drifting toward the same life from his childhood memories.
That day was no different. Work wrapped early; he stepped off the site into the scorching 11 a.m. sun.
Brushing dust from his grimy work clothes, he fished out his battered phone from his pocket.
Been a while—call up a buddy for some cheap pork belly and soju?
As he scrolled with that in mind—
A shrill beep pierced his ears like tinnitus, and every sound in the world cut out in an instant.
Kim Hyuk froze without realizing it.
Everyone around him did the same, staring blankly into space.
Car horns, chatter—every sound vanished into an eerie silence.
Only the system's voice ruled the world.
When the message ended, the world's noise flooded back.
The surroundings erupted into pandemonium in seconds.
Most faces twisted in confusion.
Some screamed and scattered; shouts and sobs exploded everywhere.
In the chaos's heart, Kim Hyuk stood rigid, fists clenched tight.
One thought dominated his mind.
'A trial...?'
Kim Hyuk's life had been one trial after another.
The trial of poverty, of violence's temptation, of helplessness.
He'd fled or compromised through them all.
But this was different.
The most primal, fairest trial ever given to all humanity.
No cheats, no connections, no family wealth. A stage where only personal strength proved your worth.
In his heart, something hot and long-forgotten began to boil.
Life's cynicism, future's dread—all devoured by an overwhelming zest for existence.
"Haha..."
A low chuckle escaped his lips.
It was utterly unrealistic thinking.
The system had only just revealed itself to the world minutes ago.
Yet Kim Hyuk bet against that absurdity.
He chose to believe the system unconditionally.
The evidence suggested low odds it was real—could be a stunt, hidden camera, mass hallucination, auditory delusion from a breakdown.
But...
Kim Hyuk believed.
Every word felt like a pivotal turn in his life.
He resolved to run no more.
The first genuine shot at something real in this wretched world.
Even if it led to the abyss, this time it was worth staking everything.
As Kim Hyuk walked onward lost in thought, things began emerging one by one from the skyscrapers of his city.
Wooden dolls studded with razor-sharp blades.
People hadn't spotted them yet—or those who had were fleeing into buildings or screaming.
Kim Hyuk shook off every chain binding his life and strode toward the dolls.
His eyes gleamed with the fierce spark of the boy facing down the schoolyard bully.
Amid hundreds, he was the only one advancing on them.