PE Teacher: Geum Taeyang - 1

There was still plenty left unfinished, but I returned to reality.

After so much time in Solari World, my own room felt strangely unfamiliar. I'd come back now and then to rest, but my brain had grown accustomed to that other place. The disconnect between reality and another worldline wore on me in ways I didn't always notice — a quiet, lingering fatigue.

Just as I was considering settling into real life for a while, a new quest appeared. And of course it was an exhausting one: travel to a new worldline.

I had cleared every quest that had come up so far. Clear a quest, and a decent reward follows. This one wasn't even particularly difficult. Just tiring.

If I traveled to a new world without setting a checkpoint, I couldn't return to reality until I set one. That used to be a fairly serious problem, but for me now it was a minor inconvenience. I had a special title.

In other words, traveling to a new world wasn't a major risk for me.

"Alright. Quest's already here, so let's knock it out fast. Another fantasy world's a bit much, and for murim I've already got Supreme Sword Heavenly Immortal... so where's looking good?"

I went into Unix and started browsing worlds to explore.

Countless worlds slept inside Unix. Choosing which one to travel to, though, turned out to be surprisingly hard. Ideally, I wanted a world where I could grow. And more important than anything: it had to be packed with beautiful women. I had zero interest in a world full of nothing but macho men.

"Good thing I skimmed through the stuff in here whenever I had time. Definitely something modern... was it this one?"

Unix held all kinds of modern-setting works. I'd browsed through a fair number of the creations stored there — though there were so many that reading them all was impossible.

After some thought, the world I chose was Soul Community. This one was a little different from the places I'd traveled so far. Solari World was based on a game. Supreme Sword Heavenly Immortal was based on a novel. Soul Community, though, was a world of manga and animation.

To explain a bit more: Soul Community is a 4-panel comic serialized in a manga magazine. But it isn't just any comic — it's a crossover collaboration of four different manga and anime. Unlike Solari World or Supreme Sword Heavenly Immortal, which are single works, this world has multiple protagonists.

I chose Soul Community for two reasons. First, the work is full of beautiful women. Second, it's a modern setting. Solari World was medieval fantasy, Supreme Sword Heavenly Immortal was a murim world — so this time, it was modern's turn.

"Alright. This is the one. Let's go."

I moved to the Soul Community world.

"Ugh...!"

My head felt like it was splitting open, as if I'd poured down far more alcohol than my limit could take. I let out a filthy sound like a zombie's scream and barely managed to open my eyes. Naturally, an unfamiliar ceiling stared back at me.

"Where the hell is this?"

I barely sat up. My back sank into something soft — I was lying on a bed. I shook out my messy hair and looked down. A yellowed, faded bedsheet came into view. I slowly stood.

"This is a studio apartment. The room's a complete dump."

The room I was in was such a disaster you could have believed it was a pigsty. Even a pig wouldn't live this filthy. Manga volumes, snacks, and cola bottles lay scattered across the floor, and every kind of trash was piled everywhere. A room that would have suited Derick Walker.

The layout was extremely simple. A kitchen with a sink and a gas range occupied one side, and a small dining table sat in front of it. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The table was so buried in garbage I doubted it could still function as a table.

The place was so cluttered that aside from the bed I'd been lying on, there wasn't even space for a person to lie down. A relatively less-trashed path ran from the bed to the front door, as if someone had carved out a trail. This was the home of a guy who had less concept of tidying up than a chick has tears.

"So whose piece-of-shit body did I possess this time?"

First I needed to check this body. I got up. There was no mirror in the room, so I had to go to the bathroom. A vicious ammonia stench hit me the moment I stepped in. He'd clearly never cleaned the bathroom even once. What a goddamn mess.

I flipped on the bathroom light, looked in the mirror, and had to let out a hollow laugh. First possession: a pig. Second possession: a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠sect servant. And the third: a lanky delinquent with bleached-blond hair, tanned skin, and a bunch of sloppy piercings. The exact look that shows up as a regular in NTR doujinshi.

"Fuck. They really don't skip a single genre, do they?"

I pulled the piercing out of my ear. There was even a small tattoo on my right arm — easy enough to hide under a sleeve, I figured. Why did I only ever possess these pieces of shit? Was it a restriction of the ability? All kinds of thoughts crossed my mind.

"Let's look on the bright side. He's got a bit of a sharp look to him. Beats Derick Walker's mashed-in face, at least."

That much was true. Derick Walker was a freak who made you want to vomit just looking in a mirror, and Jongchil was a frail young man who'd drop dead in a heartbeat in that brutal murim world. Next to those two, this one might actually be an improvement.

"How are the stats?"

I opened the status window.

In other worlds, my stats scaled with my Synchronization Rate. A Synchronization Rate of 100% was my real-world power.

In Soul Community, my Synchronization Rate was 50%. In other words, I could put out about half of what I could in reality. The rate wasn't fixed — it rose with training. Sex was by far the most efficient method.

"Not too bad."

Fifty percent wasn't a terrible number. This body was a little bigger than my original one, and there seemed to be some correction for that. Of course, in a world like Soul Community where the strong ran rampant, I couldn't afford to get comfortable with stats like these.

"First things first — I need to figure out exactly who I am."

I thought through Soul Community and the four works it was built on. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't remember a character like this — the kind you'd only find in an erotic doujinshi — appearing in any of those series.

Unable to find what I needed in my memory, I started ransacking the guy's room, and eventually I found something that could confirm his identity.

"There's got to be an ID around here somewhere. Oh. A wallet! Nice. ID... wait. This is a teacher's license?"

I'd found a faculty ID in the guy's wallet — the kind of identification that proved you were a teacher. It was an object that did not suit this man in the slightest.

Had he pickpocketed the wallet? That was my first thought, but the photo on the license was this guy's face.

"Name: Geum Taeyang. Jinglebell Middle School?"

How the hell was someone's name Geum Taeyang? And if it was Jinglebell Middle School...

"The middle school the magical girls attend. Ah! I remember now. This bastard's a one-shot gag character!"

I finally managed to place the guy called Geum Taeyang.

Soul Community is a crossover of four manga and anime. The genre is comedy — characters from the four works show up each episode and run sketches.

The Soul Community work itself is as light as it gets, but not all of its source material is equally lightweight.

One of those sources is Magical Girl Carol Muse. A magical-girl series so typical you could use it as a textbook example. Truth be told, I'd never properly watched a magical-girl show.

I knew the genre existed, of course, and I had a rough grasp of the concept.

The broad strokes of Magical Girl Carol Muse went like this.

The dark empire of Shadow World, using humanity's negative energy as a medium, plots to invade the magic world. The magic world dispatches mascots into the human realm, turns qualified girls into magical girls, and has them fight the monsters of Shadow World.

That's the whole story. As predictable as it gets.

The setting is Jingle Bell City. Don't ask why a Korean city is named Jingle Bell. If you ask that, you've already lost.

On the surface, Jingle Bell City looks like an ordinary city, but in truth it's a battleground where an endless war rages between the Magic Realm and the dark empire. That said, it's the kind of cute fighting that belongs in a kids' cartoon.

Until Magical Girl Carol Muse ended, not a single human died, which made this place paradise compared to Solari World or Supreme Sword Heavenly Immortal. Of the Soul Community source works, this one was the tamest of the bunch.

For the record, the anime was made for little girls, but its main viewership was adult otaku. That's why the gag 4-panel comic Soul Community is full of self-deprecating jokes about that fact. And the owner of this body, Geum Taeyang, is a character who showed up in one of those self-mocking gags.

This guy appears, specifically, in episode 56 of Soul Community. When Han Somi, one of the magical girls, boldly declares, "We're magical girls who give children dreams and hope!" the other magical girl, Yang Gain, goes, "But our real cash cows are those guys over there," and points at a gloomy pig-faced otaku and a gold-tanned delinquent. This Geum Taeyang showed up exactly once — a disposable gag character.

"But a PE teacher? Heh. If it fits, it fits."

This was fate. A blond, tanned delinquent PE teacher. What else was he supposed to do?

"Jinglebell Middle School. Since it's the protagonists' school, even the extras you trip over were beauties."

This was basically a buffet. One with a pretty big problem, though. The food was way too undercooked.

"They look like beauties in the manga, but if I actually saw a bunch of middle-school kids in real life... that's a bit off my palate."

I loved the well-endowed and the flat-chested alike, but I wasn't the kind of guy who harvested fruit that hadn't ripened yet. If it were a woman like Lina, with a mature atmosphere and an underdeveloped figure, I'd call that a unique charm. But a genuine middle schooler whose clothes and vibe screamed underripe? Yeah, I didn't know about that.

I'd eat if someone put it in front of me, but I wouldn't go out of my way. Might be better to treat it as an investment in the future and raise them to my own taste.

"Ah, right. I should check the quest reward."

My quest had been to travel to another world. I checked the reward immediately.

I almost clapped my hands ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠and burst into song. Common Sense Alteration! How sweet that sounded. A perfect item for a dirty novel or an erotic doujinshi. I read through the item description slowly.

"Hard to use against anyone with strong willpower, huh? That's why it's only B-Rank despite the broken effect."

If it worked on everyone, even S-Rank wouldn't be enough. It wasn't an item without weaknesses, but I tucked it safely into my inventory. There was no mention of it being single-use, so it looked like I could use it permanently.

The moment I accepted the quest reward, a new quest appeared.

"What the hell is this quest?"

The new quest was extremely simple. Just sit on my ass for a month and it would clear itself. I wasn't particularly planning to go there anyway.

But people always want to do whatever they're told not to.

It was the same as when your mom asks when you're going to study, and you immediately abandon the studying you were about to do. I couldn't shake the uneasy feeling that someone was watching me, deliberately handing me this quest.

Quests aren't mandatory. I don't have to clear this one.

Then again, that also meant there was no real reason not to. How stupid would it be to throw away a guaranteed reward just because of a contrary streak? Especially when I'd already experienced more than enough of how generous quest rewards could be.

I used the title's effect to check the checkpoint-setting conditions. Honestly, this was the most important thing. Without a checkpoint, I couldn't return to reality.

Once I confirmed the conditions, I snorted. Everything felt like it was clicking into place on purpose. Maybe this was Unix's will?

"Got it. Fine — I won't lay a hand on any minors."

With that decided, I opened the window to air the place out. The stale air in the room rode the breeze outside. A schoolgirl was sprinting past with a slice of bread clenched in her teeth.

"A tardy student? Wait—"

My job was teacher.

I found a smartphone on the corner of the bed. I turned it on and checked the date. Monday, 9:00 AM stared back at me. Officially late.