Why My Cheats Are So Much Fun
My apartment exploded.
Not figuratively, but for real. My apartment.
The wall of my 10-floor building ripped off in an instant, and the beak of that massive monster plunged straight through my living room.
My room. My desk. My PC tower. In the blink of an eye, everything vanished into debris and dust.
“Ugh, shit—!”
I was dead.
For sure.
I’d seen the final screen a thousand times before.
But.
**[First-Strike Prevention Mode activated.]**
**[Description: A kind mode for noobs who get sniped in the back! The first hit always deals 0 damage.]**
A semi-transparent HUD flashed into view in front of my eyes.
Game UI. That familiar font.
Kwaaang—!
The monster’s roar tore through my ears along with the flying debris, and I fell together with the wall.
The apartment collapsed in seconds, plummeting. When I opened my eyes, I wasn’t on the 10th floor anymore—I was on the 6th floor rubble pile.
“…I survived?”
My whole body was buried in concrete, but I felt no pain.
No, it had to be adrenaline flooding my system. I was sure a few bones had been snapped.
But when I moved my arm to push the concrete chunk away—
Crack!
I only flexed my shoulder, and a person-sized piece of debris rolled aside.
“…Was I always this strong?”
No way.
And right after, another notification popped up.
**[Functional Muscle Mode activated.]**
**[Description: Looks completely normal on the outside. But all the muscles are fully functional. A hero isn’t supposed to show off a six-pack—it’s real muscle that can smash through a wall in one punch.]**
Another one followed immediately.
**[Diamond Body Mode activated.]**
**[Description: Dodging is a luxury! You can take the hit. 99.9% damage reduction. Hit detection is there, but you won’t die. (Health bar drops only 0.1%. Tutorial mode for freshies, cutie♥)]**
“…Whoa, shit. These are the modes I installed, right?”
I was out of breath.
Not long ago, those things were just text on my monitor. Now they were actually firing in front of my eyes.
While the giant monster hammered its beak into the apartment and tore the ground apart, another semi-transparent window opened in my vision.
First-Strike Prevention Mode. Functional Muscle Mode. Diamond Body Mode… All the modes I’d installed after my gallery hyungs recommended them.
And then the last one that popped up completely out of nowhere.
**[Reward-Generating Grind Mode activated]**
**[Description: Basically turning you into a god-tier gamer. Monsters are a grind anyway, now it’s a grind with rewards! Rewards include XP, items, fame, and sometimes useless junk.]**
I instantly understood.
—Right now I was inside the Chaos Beast game, and I was maxed out on cheats.
“…Hey, if it’s just a reincarnation, isn’t the usual way for it to send you over with a screen flashing and the transfer sound?”
My head kept muttering in that gallery-style grumbling.
But reality was different.
No warp portals. No loading screens.
Just the monster flying in to wipe out our apartment.
Then a memory popped up.
Before the game even started, I’d set the difficulty to “Realistic.”
The gallery hyungs said if you were gonna install cheats, you had to use the highest difficulty to balance it.
And the current situation matched their words perfectly.
A monster diving straight down from the sky right into the heart of Mapo-gu, Seoul.
Of course the military was there.
Within a few minutes, fighters, artillery, or special forces would roll out.
But that wasn’t a solution—it was just patching.
In this world, humanity would never beat the monsters.
Even with every modern weapon thrown at them, the result was always the same.
A handful of tank shells and air strikes barely took down one monster.
The price? An entire city block erased from the map.
So even with the military, nothing changed.
Humanity could only “hold the line” against the monsters, never actually win.
“…If I’d known, I would’ve turned on the Hero Association feature too.”
I smacked my forehead in belated regret.
I’d followed the gallery hyungs exactly, and now I was getting my head bitten off.
But the meaning of the Reward-Generating Grind Mode window was crystal clear.
There were NPCs nearby that I absolutely had to protect—event triggers tied to experience and rewards.
My heart suddenly dropped.
The monster was scary enough, but a quest activating meant someone was still alive.
Now I really had to choose.
Run and patch up, or believe in the rewards and start “heroing.”
At that moment.
**[No other people’s gazes nearby. Numerous civilian auras to protect detected]**
**[Combat Mode – ‘Shaman Mode’ activated]**
**[Description: “It’s not like you’re weak~.” Shamans are creatures hiding in society’s shadows. Cognitive Dampening activates automatically to conceal identity, and damage is absorbed, converted, and repurposed into attack, defense, and healing. The hidden hero path that even monsters and humans can’t detect.]**
“Ha… it’s on.”
This was the core mode I’d always planned to install the second I set up Chaos Beast.
Not just a strong idiot, but a dark hero who hid his identity in society’s darkness while fighting.
And at the exact same time, black shadows erupted like reality itself, wrapping my body in a coat, and a skull mask slid over my face.
Looking at myself in the mirror, I muttered on autopilot.
“So this… is me? What a sight.”
My silhouette with a gashira mask in this monster world.
This was the cherry, this was the hero.
And since I couldn’t leave it to the world, I had no choice.
There was that old saying. “With great power comes great responsibility.”
I wasn’t some half-and-half human with just enough power—I’d grabbed true “great power.”
So the answer was obvious.
Heroing. There was no other option.
At the same time, the quest window popped up.
**[Quest: Rescue all civilians trapped inside the current apartment! (0/64)]**
“Perfect. Game time starts now.”
As the only hero, I turned the system on.
“X-ray Vision Mode ON.”
**[X-ray Vision Mode activated]**
**[Description: Anti-grind. Citizens hiding under wardrobes, beds, or rubble are all detectable. Pro tip: Combine with the 19+ mode and you can see right through clothes.]**
“Whoever made this mode definitely didn’t have pure intentions.”
But the effect was overwhelming.
The dark apartment interior unfolded like a thermal scanner.
Beyond the walls, beyond the floors, the faint traces of life glowed sharp and clear.
“12th floor… four people. Low body temperature, slow movement… elderly couple and two middle-schoolers?”
“17th floor, solo. Small build, irregular heartbeat… I’m in danger.”
“8th floor, three people. High body temperature, lively movement… young couple and a baby? Wait, baby crying too.”
I slowly curled the corners of my mouth up.
If this mode hadn’t existed?
I would have had to search floor by floor through the wreckage.
While the monster was still devouring the apartment’s outer wall.
“But even if I know the locations… the moment I climb the stairs or take the elevator, half of them would get eaten by the monster.”
The only priority that flashed in my head was one thing.
Zero casualties.
How?
Stairs. Elevator. No way.
I opened my skill window and pulled out one particularly dark item.
Shadow Crossing.
The description was short.
**[Shamanic technique. Ignore boundaries by crossing shadows.]**
But the detailed section was different.
Beginner Shadow Crossing: Just follow the shadow at your feet to increase movement speed. Similar to flight.
Intermediate Shadow Crossing: Traverse short distances by linking shadows on walls and floors. Stealth and mobility possible.
Advanced Shadow Crossing: Recognize “gaps” at the molecular level—concrete, steel, glass, even living bodies. By linking those gaps with shadows and leaping, movement approaches instant teleportation.
And right now, I was nothing more than a beginner shaman who had just awakened Shadow Crossing.
…Except.
**[Max-Level Newbie Mode activated]**
**[Description: Don’t grind the skill tree, dumbass. The second the game starts, just go max level and use it. All mastered skills instantly upgrade to “Advanced.”]**
A chill raced through my brain.
My vision changed.
The walls looked like a collection of thousands of thin veils split into gaps instead of solid concrete.
Each shadow had its own grain, and flowing darkness shaped paths along its flow.
I unconsciously pressed my palm against the wall.
The moment my skin touched it, a cold, damp energy flowed into my fingertips.
Not the wall anymore, but an endless river of darkness.
My body began folding into the river like origami.
“Shadow Crossing… activate.”
Space twisted.
Sounds faded. Light reversed.
My body lost form, and only a pure silhouette slid through the shadows.
Gravity itself lost meaning.
I was nothing more than a being flowing toward another shadow drawn on the destination point.
Shhhrrrk.
The next instant, another floor of the ruined apartment.
The body heat of a human curled up and sobbing shone clearly like a thermal image.
My body erupted from the shadow like it was leaving it, regaining human form.
“…So this is Advanced Shadow Crossing.”
My breathing came rough, but at the same time the corners of my mouth curled up on their own.
Stairs? Elevator? No more of that grind.
I was a hero who crossed darkness.
Shadow Crossing