A Silver Lining?
Rrrriiiing! Rrrriiiing!
“Ugh, please...”
With my face buried deep into the pillow and both hands clamped over my ears, a sudden regret washed over me. Maybe I should have paid closer attention whenever Mom nagged me to wake up on time.
Just how desperate had she been to dig up an antique mechanical alarm that made such an ear-splitting racket, then plant it right beside my bed? Then again, sleeping through four consecutive mornings was pretty bad even by my standards. What an unfilial bastard I was.
“My phone... Where’s my pho—ne...?”
To check the time, I blindly reached out for my phone as I always did. Yet no matter how much I flailed my hand across the nightstand, my fingers met only empty air.
“What the hell? Where’d it go?”
A missing phone was an existential crisis. I peeled my face off the pillow, flipped it over, flapped the duvet, and dropped onto all fours to peer beneath the frame. Still, not a trace of it. Wait. More importantly...
“Where the hell am I?”
When I lifted my head, what met my eyes wasn't my bedroom at all, but a place straight out of an unfamiliar world. Come to think of it, waking up on an actual bed was already bizarre. I had shattered my own bed frame just a few days ago after attempting an overly ambitious swan dive onto it, and I'd been sleeping on a bare mattress ever since.
Yet right now, my body rested atop an undeniably luxurious, antique bed that looked like something out of an illustrated novel. A single glance around the room made it glaringly obvious: this wasn't anywhere I had ever lived.
“Wait, no, no, no...?”
Bewildered by the absurd situation, I muttered to myself—only to freeze. Something was far more foreign than this strange room. My voice.
“Holy shit. No way.”
Desperately praying that reality wasn't about to hand me the exact nightmare I imagined, I scrambled around the room in a frantic search for a mirror.
“Mirror... Where is it? A mirror!”
Because of the unfamiliar layout, it took some bumbling around before I finally burst into the adjoining bathroom and lunged toward the vanity mirror.
“Ah...”
There, reflected in the glass, stood the very reality I had been desperately trying to deny.
“Fuck...”
My original face was nowhere to be seen.
Vibrant green eyes.
Long hair tied back, falling all the way past the waist.
A sharp, imposing gaze.
A stature noticeably shorter than my old self.
...And unmistakable curves that had never existed on my body before.
Every single clue pointed toward one inescapable truth.
“It’s that. It really is that.”
I had transmigrated. Possessed someone whose identity I didn't even know. And worse—as a girl.
“I should have just read web novels instead.”
That was a line from a story I used to read back when web novels consumed my life. The world had ended, falling in step with the exact plot of the novel the protagonist had been reading. Fortunately, having read and memorized the unpopular work out of sheer devotion, the protagonist used his encyclopedic knowledge to navigate the apocalypse. In the middle of it all, an acquaintance—someone celebrated as an elite before society collapsed—uttered those exact words.
When I first read that scene, my honest reaction was:
Are they taking the piss?
I had genuinely felt that way. After busting your ass surviving through hell, who in their right mind says, 'Guess I should’ve just read web novels~'? Deep down, I probably just felt guilty because reading novels was essentially slacking off. But standing here now, I finally understood. That person wasn't making a flippant joke. It had come from the very depths of their heart.
“Haa...”
And so, back to the present, right here and now. Surprisingly enough, I wasn't having a full-blown meltdown.
“Never in my life did I think I’d actually be glad I read web novels.”
Whenever I picked up a transmigration story, one recurring thought always crossed my mind: Aren't these protagonists way too calm?
Yet now that I found myself in their shoes, I could somewhat empathize. Strangely enough, my mind felt remarkably intact. Or rather, while I vaguely registered that I was utterly screwed, some optimistic part of me whispered that things would work out somehow.
There was just one glaring issue.
“Who the hell is this, anyway?”
I had no idea which novel this body belonged to, let alone who she was supposed to be.
After checking the mirror, I decided to rummage through the room, thoroughly scouring the desk, the bed, the shelves, and whatever else I could find. Fortunately, unlike moments ago when I was completely in the dark, I managed to unearth a few vital clues.
According to the student ID card left on the desk, the owner of this body was named 'Jeonghye.' Grade: Second Year.
The existence of a student ID strongly suggested an Academy setting. Considering characters in academy novels usually sported Western-style names, having an Eastern name like Jeonghye was quite unusual. That alone gave me a solid lead to narrow down the genre: definitely an Academy novel. Yet no matter how hard I racked my brain, the name 'Jeonghye' rang no bells.
I had devoured countless academy stories, but I couldn't recall a single character by that name.
“Seriously, no matter how much I think about it, I’ve never heard of anyone named Jeonghye.”
Still, I had extracted virtually all the information this room could offer. The top priority now was figuring out which novel I had landed in. And to do that, whether I liked it or not, I had to step outside.
“Phew...”
First, I needed to make myself presentable. Since I was in a girl's body, walking around looking like a complete slob felt wrong. Keeping my eyes shut as much as possible, I straightened up my clothes. Having no idea how to tie a proper ponytail, I simply let the long hair fall loose over my shoulders.
Standing before the door, I froze.
“......”
I was trembling. My heart hammered wildly against my ribs. It felt as though I had been marooned alone on an uncharted island without a single soul to rely on. But staying shut inside wouldn't teach me anything. Gritting my teeth, I turned the handle and pushed the door open.
The vista that greeted my eyes—
“Oh.”
—was more than enough to reveal exactly which world I had been dropped into.
“...Could be worse, right?”
Figuring out that I was inside The Regressed Dunce Walks the Path of Revenge wasn't difficult in the slightest.
The moment I stepped into the dormitory hallway, I was treated to a live 3D view of students who looked identical to the character illustrations the author had commissioned by the dozens. And once I navigated the hall and exited the dorms, the breathtaking, magnificent main building of the Academy filled my vision—the very same architectural spectacle from the novel's cover art.
Staring up at that majestic edifice, a heavy lump formed in my throat, leaving me speechless.
What the actual fuck...
Experiencing it firsthand drove home just how absurd it was to be transmigrated into a novel. Possession stories had practically conquered the fantasy web novel market, turning the trope of a reader getting sucked into a book into an everyday cliché.
Usually, though, people were dragged in under specific circumstances: screaming at a sudden trash ending in the comment section and brawling with the author until the enraged creator forced them in; aggressively nitpicking setting plotholes; or harboring intense, bitter resentment toward the story's trajectory.
In that sense, this felt wildly unfair. I had been reading this novel completely casually, without an ounce of emotional baggage! I hadn't even posted a single comment. Not out of some childish paranoia about being transmigrated, but simply because the progression in Regression Dunce had been utterly smooth and uncontroversial.
Having lost his family, friends, lover, and even the world in his first life, the protagonist enters his second regression, nips every bud of evil in the advance, and uses his future knowledge to grow exponentially stronger than before. He lives a life entirely divorced from his past as a dunce. Along the way, he gathers more heroines than his arms can carry, pockets lined with mountains of gold. After exacting absolute revenge, he stands at the pinnacle of power and wealth, letting not a single heroine slip away in a glorious harem happy ending.
The reason I had read through it so breezily was precisely because of that trademark refreshing satisfaction. It was pure, unfiltered catharsis from start to finish.
Which was why, the moment I realized I had transmigrated into Regression Dunce, a quiet wave of relief washed over me. My precious (and now lethal) library of favorite novels was packed with worlds I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.
Novels where civilians were slaughtered by the millions; novels where you had to manage eldritch monstrosities to harvest energy; apocalypse scenarios where you had to desperately conceal your shelter; or settings where a gate tore open above the National Assembly, Thanos-snapping half the South Korean population into dust... My library had been teeming with nightmares like that.
I wasn't just saying things could be worse for the sake of it. Compared to the sheer horrors in my reading history, this place was practically a vacation.
“Still, could be a lot worse.”
Letting out a breath of genuine relief, I took my first firm step out of the dormitory.