Prologue: Becoming an Adélie Penguin
I love penguins.
To be precise, I love Adélie penguins.
My obsession started the day I stumbled across a single photo online: three Adélie penguins ganging up on a fourth, giving it absolute hell. The second I saw that picture, I was gone. Hooked for life.
From then on, I collected everything Adélie-related I could get my hands on. If a game featured them, I bought it and played it. I went full unhinged fan mode.
The one real regret was that no facility in Korea kept Adélie penguins. Sure, Korean zoos had penguins—mostly gentoos, chinstraps, and Humboldts. Just not my guys.
Haah… I really want to see one in person just once…
Then, one ordinary day, as my affection for penguins kept deepening—
"Huh…? Wait—!!!"
I hit second place on the lottery.
The prize was a full hundred million won. After taxes, seventy-eight million landed in my hands. I handed ten million of it to my parents with a thank-you, and then I started researching the trip I had dreamed of for years: Antarctica.
Prices ran anywhere from fifteen million to forty million won. At the time, all I could see were penguins. So of course I booked the most expensive Antarctic cruise package on the list.
And now—
"Haah… I really lost my mind…"
—I was standing in Ushuaia, waiting to board the ship to Antarctica.
"¡Ahora comenzaremos el embarque para el crucero a la Antártida!"
Boarding for the Antarctic cruise will now begin…
The announcement rolled through the port terminal.
"Right. Time to go."
I dragged my suitcase toward the terminal, checked my luggage, finished check-in, and walked the gangway onto the cruise ship.
"My cabin is…"
I matched the number on the door and pushed it open. The room I'd booked was an ocean-view suite with the sea laid out below in one unbroken sweep.
"Whoa… this is actually insane."
Outside the window, a rising sun painted the horizon red, and distant icebergs glowed gold in the light.
"Guess you really do get what you pay for."
The days at sea were pure heaven. Gourmet meals, expedition guides walking us through Antarctic ecosystems and wildlife—everything first-class. But I had come for only one reason.
To see my favorite with my own eyes.
And that dream—
"Kak! Kak!"
—came true soon enough.
"Holy shit! They're so fucking cute!!"
"Hey! Jim, look at that!"
"So cute, I want to take you home."
We had reached an Adélie penguin breeding colony on the Antarctic Peninsula. The guide addressed the group.
"Everyone, please keep at least five meters away from the penguins. Do not touch them, feed them, or approach them."
I already knew the rules. I kept a careful distance and hammered the camera shutter like a man possessed.
Then it happened.
While a parent bird left the nest for a moment to gather stones, a curious chick started waddling straight toward me.
"Peep… peep…"
"Huh? Hey—don't come this way."
Afraid of getting too close, I eased slowly backward.
In that instant—
Whump.
The snow under my feet gave way with a wrong, soft sink.
"…Huh?"
Crrrack—crack-crack!
An ear-splitting tear ripped through the ice. The guide's voice tore across the wind.
"Fuck! Snow bridge! Get away from there!!"
Only then did I understand. What I'd been standing on wasn't solid ground—it was a thin snow bridge draped over a crevasse.
But it was already too late.
KRAAASH!!
The bridge collapsed. Snow and ice and I all poured downward together.
"AAAAAH—!!"
Falling snow wrapped around me and soaked some of the impact, but my head slammed hard into an ice wall.
"Ghk—!"
My vision went black in an instant.
…
How much time passed, I couldn't say.
"Ugh…"
I pressed a hand to my head and forced myself upright. Endless ice walls stretched in every direction.
"…Where…"
Then—
"Peep! Peep!"
A familiar cry. I turned my head, and there it was: the same Adélie chick that had been waddling toward me moments before. It must have fallen with me.
I looked up.
Whooooooosh—!!
A savage blizzard howled overhead. The opening was completely buried behind white fury.
"…Haah…"
A cold breath slipped out of me.
"…First priority: stay alive."
I opened the backpack still strapped to me. Luckily, most of what was inside had survived. I pulled out an emergency space blanket and wrapped it around my body—but Antarctic cold doesn't care about a thermal sheet.
I lost track of time. No rescue calls reached me. Every exhale bloomed into white fog, and sensation drained from my fingertips one degree at a time.
"Cold…"
Then—
"Peep…"
I turned. The chick was curled into a tight ball, shivering hard.
"…You're cold too, huh."
I hesitated. Never touch the penguins—the guide's warning flashed through my mind. But this was different. There was no one here to enforce a rule.
"…Sorry."
I carefully gathered the chick into my arms. It struggled for a second, then settled and trusted its weight to me. I loosened the space blanket a little and tucked it against my chest.
"It's okay."
That small body was warmer than I'd expected. Its heat seeped into my chest; mine flowed back into it. After a while, the trembling eased. The chick buried its head against me and quietly closed its eyes.
"Thank god…"
A smile escaped me without permission. In a lifetime of dreaming about Adélie penguins, I never imagined I'd hold one this close. Not that I had wished for this situation.
But as the minutes stretched, my body grew heavier. Feeling in my fingers and toes was nearly gone; even speaking took effort. Strangely, the cold itself began to fade.
"…No way."
Hypothermia. Every documentary symptom I'd ever heard lined up one after another. I had no idea how long I'd held on—an hour, two, more. I slapped my own cheeks again and again, fighting to keep consciousness, but even my arms had no strength left.
My vision swam. The blizzard's roar drifted farther and farther away.
"…Not yet…"
In my arms, the chick breathed calmly, as if it had found its warmth again.
"…Good."
A faint smile touched my face.
At least you… you should make it.
My head tipped slowly forward. Through the thinning haze of awareness, I thought I heard voices shouting from somewhere high above—hallucination or real, I couldn't tell.
And then my consciousness sank into a pure white dark.
When I opened my eyes again—
"Kak? (Fuck?)"
I had become an Adélie penguin.