New Beginning
The beep of the computer turning on echoed through the quiet room, and I found myself flashing back to that life-or-death moment once more.
The netizens had tightened their noose around me bit by bit. I had been in a panic.
So I reached out to Lee Naeun.
Please… testify for me.
Explain to the world what Kim Juho did to me.
But the reply that came from her had left my head spinning white.
-I’m sorry. I don’t remember.
Even Naeun…
Back when I was in elementary school, I had been nothing special—just an ordinary student with a few casual friends.
But the moment I entered middle school, everything changed.
A group of boys began harassing a pretty girl.
That was when I, watching Lee Naeun, fell head over heels in love in an instant.
So I stepped in to stop it.
The boy who had been bothering her that day was Kim Juho.
Because of that incident, I endured nonstop bullying throughout my entire third year of middle school.
“Hah… At that time, I thought I was the protagonist.”
The cool guy who saved the pretty girl, who later dated her, married her, and even had adorable kids…
“Idiot… When I called Naeun for help, they were already dating…”
And they got married.
Kim Juho went on to become a flashy national soccer star, then moved on to variety TV, and eventually even starred in a parenting show with Naeun.
If this world were a novel, the main characters would have been Kim Juho and Lee Naeun.
Meanwhile, the extra character I was—the one who had tried to intervene—had ruined everything.
Of course, back in middle school Naeun had disliked Kim Juho.
He had definitely been annoying her at times, and occasionally it looked like he was going too far.
“This life, I should’ve stayed out of it and not helped anyone.”
What had my choice at that moment done to my life?
I had spent my entire life wrapped in anger, inferiority, and unfairness.
All while failing to protect the one person who truly mattered—my family.
While I was lost in memories of the past, the computer had already finished booting.
I had transferred the voice recording onto the computer.
How exactly was I supposed to use this recording?
Should I take it straight to the police station tomorrow?
Or…
Should I wait?
I had thought that just having the recording of Juho bullying me would be enough, but it wasn’t.
I needed to figure out how to use this file in the most perfect way possible.
“Right now… right now, we’re still tolerant of school violence…”
Some people might say “tolerant” isn’t right, but at the very least, after a few years, people will become much stricter about school violence than they are today.
“If I just expose it now…”
The biggest fear was that the matter would be swept under the rug.
What if the adults pressured Juho into apologizing, and that was that?
Of course, I had zero intention of accepting any apology.
Then wouldn’t another wave of accusations come flying my way?
As the “mean student who wouldn’t even accept a sincere apology from a friend”?
Wouldn’t people then accuse me of fabricating the whole school-violence claim?
“Maybe it’s better to report it now that school violence has become a major social issue…”
My thoughts kept turning, and the plan slowly took shape.
“Yeah. The moment Kim Juho succeeds, I’ll release the recording.”
By the time I enter university, my perspective on school issues will have changed.
And at that exact moment, Juho will be joining a professional soccer club.
The instant he succeeds, I’ll be able to send him straight to hell.
“Good… good…”
Imagining the recording being released to the media the moment Juho joins a pro soccer club sent a pleasant shiver running down my entire body.
Is this what they call catharsis?
I played the voice recording on loop and analyzed every detail.
“I need more evidence.”
No matter how much his fans surround him, I would gather proof that could never be protected—no matter how hard they tried.
For his complete destruction.
Once I finished thinking, I stopped the looped recording.
I leaned back deep in my chair.
The catharsis that had flooded my body while I imagined revenge against Kim Juho vanished in an instant.
The drug-like feeling of satisfaction disappeared, and reality came crashing back in.
“As for Juho… what am I going to do with my life?”
This time, revenge cannot be my top priority.
I had already been blinded by revenge once and ruined my own life—hadn’t I?
More important than revenge was family.
The happiness of those around me came first.
For that, I needed a legitimate job as a member of society.
Should I go back to dying myself over studying to enter a chaebol like before?
The dream of joining a chaebol that had haunted me in my youth resurfaced.
It was the exact company I had wanted to join during my university years.
I had spent three years working hard after military service and finally succeeded in getting in.
“No more regrets.”
The instant the netizens revealed my real identity, the company had fired me without mercy.
I had protested that school violence had actually happened, but it was useless.
Truth had never mattered to the company in the first place.
They had simply been worried that keeping me would damage their image, whether I was telling the truth or not.
“Well… it’s unfair, but what could they do? I guess it was out of their hands…”
I suddenly remembered the message posted on their company website back then.
-Fire the staff immediately who is slandering soccer star Kim Juho!
-Boycott! Boycott! Boycott!
-I thought the company was fine, but this can’t stay. Isn’t that why fake news spreading slander against Kim Juho is circulating?
“Yeah… I don’t want to live like I did back then anymore.”
Let’s play the game.
Of course, this wasn’t just for my own amusement.
My life’s goal wasn’t personal happiness—it was the happiness of my mother and younger sister.
In my previous life, I had owed them an enormous debt.
This second chance was a gift.
I would definitely repay it.
12:30 PM.
Even though it was past noon, I had no intention of shutting down the computer.
I searched the internet for “Looking for a Hero.”
The game window for Looking for a Hero appeared.
“There it is…”
This proved everything.
The thirty-five years I had lived had not been a mere dream.
If it had been, I would never have learned about this game.
This game would later become a global hit.
It was not an ordinary game.
Looking for a Hero would become the most popular game among Earthlings.
Installing… 70%…
I shortened the name to just “Hero Game.”
Back in the old days—that is, in my previous life—I had played Looking for a Hero.
I had quit after about a week because the character would permanently delete the moment they died.
Installing… 100%…
Once installation finished and I clicked to create a character, the survey appeared.
“You’re doing this again.”
The Hero Game was very unique.
While creating a character, you answered a survey.
Based on your answers, your DNA was determined.
This was a crucial factor in character growth.
“Back then the DNA was ‘inferiority complex’…”
The survey.
Even in the future, the Hero Game’s survey would remain a mystery.
Just the rumor that the company was investigating user personal information was enough to make people uneasy.
Even if two different people answered the survey exactly the same, their characters’ DNA would be set differently.
And even if the same person answered the survey differently, the DNA would be set the same.
Of course, even for the same person, if they answered with enough time between responses, the DNA could turn out different.
After completing about ten minutes of the survey, only one open-ended question remained.
Q. Close your eyes for one minute, concentrate on the thoughts that arise, and write the content in the blank.
[Game. Gambling. Death. Family.]
I wrote the strongest word that had surged up at that moment.
Character creation complete.
Name: Cain
Level: 1
Class: None
DNA: Gambler
Strength 10 Agility 10 Vitality 10 Intelligence 10
“Gambler?”
The sudden appearance of “Gambler” DNA was shocking.
The “inferiority complex” DNA from before had been absurd, but “Gambler” was even more unexpected.
“Nothing good about it. Nothing good at all.”
Even if I created a new character now, I would still get Gambler DNA.
It didn’t matter.
I logged into the game.
Ordinary 3D graphics greeted me.
“Wow… So this is how the old Hero Game looked…”
It was not the virtual-reality game I remembered.
Now it simply displayed normal graphics that could be found in any ordinary game.
On the monitor screen.
Dark night.
An empty night street with no people in sight.
Someone was approaching.
[Stranger. Are you looking for work?]
The NPC voice sounded completely mechanical—no dubbing, just raw output.
“Whoa… Where did the AI that could distinguish between humans and machines go?”
1) Acquire animal hides.
2) Clean the house.
I chose option 2 without hesitation.
In an ordinary online game, option 1 would have been fine.
But in the Hero Game, the character deleted permanently the moment they died.
There was no need to take on dangerous quests from the start.
I moved to the quest location and entered the small house.
I clicked on every item inside and cleaned the house one by one.
“This is convenient.”
If this had been the old Hero Game…
No, if it had been the future Hero Game, I would have had to physically move and clean using my own body.
It was a virtual-reality system that felt so perfect it would have been suspected of being alien technology.
“I never imagined I’d be doing Hero quests just by clicking the mouse… I really didn’t think of that.”
After clicking dozens of items, the quest finally completed.
[Quest Completed]
Accept reward from the homeowner.
“It’s the same as usual…”
In normal games, completing a quest would instantly trigger the system to give the reward.
But the Hero Game was different.
Because it was an ultra-realistic game, the reward had to be received from the NPC themselves.
I moved in front of the homeowner, and he handed me 10 Copper Coins as the reward.
10 Copper Coins.
One Copper Coin was roughly worth 1,000 KRW in real-world purchasing power.
The compensation I had received after cleaning the house for an hour was ten thousand won.
“Is it okay that I got ten thousand won for just an hour of questing?”
Normal gamers would never think this way.
If someone worked for over an hour in real time and earned ten thousand game currency, they would all say it was not enough.
I didn’t feel that way at all.
The currency in the Hero Game had equivalent value to real money.
Even though it wasn’t possible right now, countless people would be trying to exchange it for real money once ten Copper Coins could be turned into ten thousand won in the future.
Of course, this would only become possible after the game company launched its cashout service for in-game currency.
I continued to the next quest and checked the time.
4:00 AM.
“That’s how they made the game. No players.”
Two quests completed, yet more than three hours had passed.
The character hadn’t leveled up, and the only thing in the item window was the 20 Copper Coins I had earned.
“Oppa, wake up!”
“Ugh…”
Forcing myself awake, I headed to school.
The moment I sat at my desk, I prepared to sleep again.
I covered the front of the desk with several books, propped my chin on them to maintain balance, held a pen in one hand, and rested my other hand against my face while closing my eyes.
The posture was uncomfortable, but my body was desperately craving sleep.
Soon I slipped into a deep sleep.
.
.
Thud!
“Ouch…”
I woke up from a stinging pain at the back of my head.
“Sleeping during class? You’re enjoying school life? Come with me.”
His question about my school life made me momentarily speechless.
Still, I silently followed Kim Juho to the rooftop.
Thud!
“Hmph.”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Why is he hitting me today?
Normally he would create some excuse to hit me—whether I had looked him in the eye, or blocked his path, or anything else.
But today there was no such excuse.
I had never even faced him directly.
Then why…?
“Juho, you got rejected by Naeun, so you’re taking it out on me? Hehe.”
“It’s all this bastard’s fault.”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
“Hmph.”
After getting hit a few times recently, I no longer made a pathetic face like on the first day.
If this scene were a movie, I wasn’t just a background extra anymore—I had reached the level of a supporting actor with a name.
While getting hit, I was still maintaining at least a minimal posture.
Well… Kim Juho was still the protagonist.
“Hah… Hah… Hah… Stop it.”
That was the sound of him holding back after beating me for a while.
After saying that, Kim Juho headed down the stairs.
Other students followed, and only I remained on the rooftop.
The empty rooftop.
I leaned against the wall, sat down, and pulled out the voice recorder to play the recording.
It had been clear.
This time the conversation where they continued to bully me was also recorded.
“This is more than enough…”
Ding. Ding.
The bell rang, and I stood up and brushed off the dust.
At that moment.
A female student appeared from behind the water tank.
“Sorry…”
The girl apologized to me, then quickly ran down the stairs.
“Huh? That’s… the Ice Empress?”