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Summer.

The season where sweltering heat arrives hand-in-hand with rampant swarms of vermin.

Back in the Republic of Korea, the quintessential culprit was the mosquito.

Calling them "rampant" felt like a gross understatement; they were creatures tailored solely to provoke human wrath. One bite brought maddening itches, their droning whine pierced your eardrums the moment your head touched the pillow, and swatting them was an exercise in pure futility. If cockroaches inspired primal revulsion, mosquitoes elicited pure, unadulterated aggravation. It was bad enough that whole online threads were dedicated to inventing increasingly "creative" ways to torture and kill them.

Granted, global warming had made recent Korean summers so brutally scorching that mosquitoes had practically disappeared during the peak heat. You might only catch a stray one or two buzzing around in the late summer or early autumn.

The bugs in the Forest of the Four Seasons, however, were on an entirely different scale. Words failed to do them justice.

Winter brought blizzards, spring unleashed pollen storms, and summer brought swarms of pests. As if heralding the advent of summer itself, a grotesque, apocalyptic cloud of insects erupted, blotting out the sky and smothering all visibility.

Where in the world do this many bugs even come from?

I hastily shoved Ggobongi back into the cave, his body already thoroughly chewed, shredded, tasted, and savored by the horde. The moment he tumbled inside, I slathered bug repellent all over him. Sure enough, the insects ceased their assault and hovered away.

The repellent had solid reviews on the market, but its actual performance far exceeded my expectations.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzt—!

After rescuing Ggobongi, I peered out past the cave's entrance. A horrifying multitude of vermin swarmed in thick, roiling eddies, blanketing the entire canopy of the Four Seasons Forest. Not only did they occlude the horizon, but their deafening drone rattled my teeth. It sounded like an army of helicopters hovering just above the treetops.

When I first started surviving here, it must have been mid-to-late summer at the latest. Even back then, there was never anything like this.

Was this a phenomenon unique to early summer? Or was this year simply an anomaly? I wondered if Lyse Kraone had noted anything similar in his journal. Question after question gnawed at my mind.

Is the raccoon family doing alright? I'm worried about them.

If this was an extraordinary event, they were in serious jeopardy. Without the repellent, Ggobongi would still be rolling on the dirt trying to scrape the bloodsuckers off his hide. A family of raccoons would have an even harder time coping. I could only thank my lucky stars that these things weren't locusts; if they had been flesh-eating locusts, they would have stripped our bones clean within minutes.

...Come to think of it, if this were an actual locust plague, we'd be completely screwed, wouldn't we?

Locust swarms possessed an infamous historical reputation. In Korea, cold winters kept bug populations somewhat manageable, but tropical zones that stayed warm all year were entirely different beasts. A single locust storm could obliterate an entire region's agriculture in hours. While Korean grasshoppers were merely annoying pests, warm-climate locust swarms were an existential calamity.

At least the seasons here shift dramatically.

If this forest remained hot year-round, we'd be dealing with these hellish swarms on a regular basis. The mere thought made ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my stomach churn.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Regardless, nothing could be done outside until the swarm cleared out, so I settled for smoked meat to pass the morning. As for Ggobongi's meal? I looked to Bbarmbo for guidance.

The giant beast slowly, deliberately shook his head from side to side.

He was telling me not to feed him. It seemed Bbarmbo was determined to drill discipline into the ape's thick skull. In any case, Ggobongi was so out of it from the insect stings that he hardly had an appetite anyway.

The fish are still outside in the water troughs... Will the bugs get to them?

Had I known this was coming, I would have thrown lids over the containers. If luck wasn't on our side, my entire gathered stock of fish might end up ruined. We had plenty of meat after bringing down that wild boar yesterday, but waste was still waste.

I have to protect the inner cores at all costs.

Losing valuable resources would sting, but the uncertainty of the consequences was far worse. What if an insect munched on a spirit beast's inner core and mutated into a giant monster? That would be a true nightmare. The looming winter might cull them eventually, but I couldn't afford to take that gamble.

Watching the roiling black carpet churn endlessly outside while refusing to cross the cave's perimeter, I opened the Auction House.

I had bought the bug repellent with the highest ratings I could find and smeared it along the cave entrance just in case, but seeing a swarm of this magnitude actively avoid the cavern felt unnatural.

Is this balm really that potent?

Time to test it out. I picked up a fist-sized stone and slathered it with a thick, sticky coating of the repellent, making sure it was thoroughly drenched.

Whoosh!

I lobbed the stone in a high arc out into the open air. The insect cloud instantly parted along its trajectory like a school of fish dodging a shark. The stone struck the dirt and tumbled a few times before coming to a rest.

Bzzzzzzzzzzt!

Within seconds, every single bug within a wide radius veered violently away from the rock. The exclusion zone continued to expand as the scent diffused through the muggy air.

Man, this stuff is crazy effective.

Those five-star ratings were well deserved. An ointment that actually repelled the monstrous wildlife of the Four Seasons Forest was pure gold. Incidentally, the snake repellent I used was manufactured by the very same fixed handle.

I pulled up the Auction House to buy more stock, then decided to throw a post onto the board. I wasn't trying to advertise; I just wanted to share the current nightmare I was looking at.

That was reassuring to hear, but it raised another question.

How on earth did a swarm this massive just "disperse"? Unless some titanic vacuum cleaner descended from the heavens to suck them all up, I found it hard to believe they would vanish so quickly.

Somehow, my post had turned into an unintentional advertisement. Still, it was nothing more than an honest review from an active user, so I figured there was no harm done and let it be.

I killed some time browsing through the Gallery threads, but ultimately, the conclusion remained the same: all I could do was wait until the swarm cleared out.

Wait... what if I coat my whole body in the repellent and go outside?

The thought struck me like lightning. Why stay cooped up if the stuff worked this well? Without hesitation, I lathered my exposed skin and clothes in the thick balm, then gingerly stuck an arm past the cave threshold to test the waters.

Bzzzzzzzt!

Not a single insect dared come near my sleeve. Emboldened, I stepped out completely. The result was identical; even when I lunged my arm forward trying to swat at them, the entire cloud shifted as a single collective organism, actively warping around me to avoid the smell.

The efficacy was frankly staggering. I made a mental note to rely exclusively on this brand moving forward.

Let's see. What about the fish...?

Splish! Splash! Flap!

The moment I checked the storage troughs, I realized my worries had been utterly baseless. The fish were having the absolute time of their lives, leaping and thrashing about in a glorious bug-eating frenzy. They looked like miniature whales cruising with their jaws unhinged, vacuuming up krill. The fish were clearly thriving; they could be left alone. That just left the raccoon family.

Crack! Snap! Crackle!

Jogging toward the hollow tree where the raccoons lived, I was greeted by a peculiar sight. Father Raccoon was furiously tending a smoky bonfire at the base of the trunk. Thick columns of white smoke rose into the branches, creating a barrier that kept the biting insects at bay.

"Keeeng! Khe! *Cough, cough!*"

The poor guy was choking on his own smoke, desperately fanning the flames to protect his den. Taking pity on his coughing fit, I stepped in and smeared a generous layer of repellent along the trunk and around the raccoon himself. To ensure they'd be safe for the rest of the day, I handed over an entire jar of the ointment.

With my tasks wrapped up, I turned back toward the cavern. Walking through a parted sea of buzzing monsters that bent around me like a magical shield was an undeniably surreal experience.

I should buy about ten more jars right now.

Knowing how vital this would be for the rest of the summer, I brought up the Auction House immediately. I even considered writing an enthusiastic five-star review for the seller while I was at it, but...

"...?"

I blinked at the glaring red notice, dumbfounded.

"What the hell?"

Where did all my stock go?

The Gallery's Auction House levied extortionate transaction fees, but its dimensional delivery system—completely bypassing conventional logistics—more than compensated for the cost. However, currency earned through the Gallery could never be withdrawn into physical, worldly coin. That was its most glaring shortcoming.

Because of this, most merchants only listed small quantities of goods on the platform, treating their postings as low-cost promotional billboards rather than serious retail channels. For a prominent merchant guild, it was a negligible novelty—neither particularly profitable nor worth substantial investment.

"Guildmaster! Supply requests for the bug repellent are pouring in from all quarters!"

"Wh-what...? Excuse me?"

"Guildmaster! The Adventurer's Guild has submitted an urgent bulk order for the repellent...!"

"Wait, what...?"

Marshall, leader of the Icon Merchant Guild, sat behind his desk in sheer bewilderment. He had spent his morning working diligently toward the guild's future prosperity, just as he always did, only to be ambushed by madness. Out of nowhere, orders for their modest insect balm surged violently, completely draining every scrap of inventory across their warehouses.

An avalanche of demand had buried them. In all his years of commerce, he had never seen an ordinary pest repellent trigger an international frenzy.

"W-why on earth is this selling? What did we even do?! The listing on the Gallery was just a token advertisement!"

"Well, sir... have you checked the Gallery forums recently?"

"Not in recent days, no. Why?"

"Someone surviving inside the Forest of the Four Seasons posted a detailed review."

"The Four Seasons Forest?"

Marshall cocked his head, his brow furrowing. He was certainly aware of the famous fixed handle clawing for survival in that mythical wilderness. But that was as far as his interest went. His daily worldly affairs kept him far too busy, and since one couldn't exactly import raw materials from the Four Seasons Forest, he had long filed the topic away in the back of his mind.

"Yes, sir. The Four Seasons Forest. That legendary demonic realm where no living soul knows what terrors lurk."

"I know full well that someone is scraping by out there. But what does that have to do with a product review?"

"He uploaded footage proving that even the monstrous insects of that cursed forest violently avoid our ointment. Do you realize what that implies, Guildmaster?"

Of course he did. The gears in Marshall's head spun at frantic speed.

This was an opportunity—an unprecedented, once-in-a-lifetime goldmine. Yet, an immediate complication reared its head: the formulation's ingredients.

...That recipe was something my father concocted to help me get on my feet.

The balm had been crafted using his father's personal wisdom and alchemical expertise. To ramp up production to meet this absurd scale, they would have to scramble across regions to secure the rare components. The repellent had never been intended as the guild's flagship product; insect repellents were dime-a-dozen, and the market was brutally saturated with cheap alternatives.

Marshall wrestled with the numbers before turning to his secretary with crisp, decisive commands. First, put out the immediate fire.

"Sort every incoming order by priority and determine our total required volume immediately. With demand spiking this abruptly, we cannot guarantee adequate stockpiles."

"Understood, sir."

"Furthermore, carve out a dedicated reserve and ensure that survivalist receives a steady, uninterrupted supply. That must remain our highest priority."

Marshall was a cautious businessman, but he was no fool to kick away fortune when it knocked on his door.

"Perhaps... we should sponsor him with care packages from our guild's catalog?"

"Sponsorship... sir?"

"Indeed. Anything an isolated man might require to survive out in the wild."

While the wheels of industry turned frantically in the outside world...

"See if I ever leave a five-star review again."

Deep inside the Four Seasons Forest, Grylls ground his teeth in fury as scalpers slapped a massive premium tag onto his favorite bug repellent in real time.