Chapter 1
Chapter 1
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 1
Chapter Title: Saved the Kaiser
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"You have a promising face."
"Pardon?"
My life must truly be cursed with bad luck.
Twenty minutes until shift change.
Just a little longer, and I'd finally get off from the shift I'd been dying to end. But no, I had to run into a nightmare customer—a foreigner, an old man, and a cultist all rolled into one unholy trifecta that would make even Satan flinch.
"Haha, I get that a lot. What can I help you find?"
"I do need something. But first, young man—what's your birthday?"
I plastered on my best customer-service smile and tried to steer the conversation, but the old man was tougher than he'd seemed.
Forget his fluent Korean that didn't sound foreign at all—his sheer audacity was off the charts.
"Come on now, out with it. I won't bite."
The old man was nagging me like he was in a huge rush.
Should I just ditch the elder-respect nonsense and call the cops?
But that'd delay my shift change...
I could endure anything else, but not that.
Besides, telling him my birthday wouldn't cause any real harm.
I opened my mouth, pouring all my desire for him to leave into my words.
"Sigh... January 18th."
"January 18th... I see. Very good."
The old man's lips curved up—he seemed pleased with my birthday.
I had no idea why it mattered, but at least it didn't seem bad.
"As you can see, I'm German."
"Ah, yes."
I said that, but honestly, I hadn't noticed.
He just looked like a generic Westerner—how was I supposed to tell German from British or French?
"And January 18th holds special, monumental meaning for us Germans. Do you know why?"
A monumental day for Germany?
I might know Korean holidays, but some far-off foreign one? No way.
Still, it rang a faint bell.
"Is it the day the German Empire was founded?"
"Oh? You know your history."
"I've always been interested in it."
I'd once dreamed of becoming a historian.
But parental opposition and the cold, hungry reality of academic life killed that dream.
Our family wasn't well-off anyway.
So I shelved my dreams, got into a decent university, picked a safe major—and ended up here, slinging drinks at a convenience store.
A harsh life for a lit major, made worse by record-breaking recessions and that pandemic nightmare called COVID, turning the already brutal job market into a gauntlet.
Your standard, miserably ordinary young man in 21st-century Korea.
That was me.
"Yes. January 18, 1871. A glorious day in Versailles."
Of course, the old man couldn't know my wistful thoughts.
Instead, he was lost in his own world, his face nostalgic as he continued.
"The moment we Germans truly became one."
It was Germany's first unification after centuries as scattered petty states.
After victory in the Franco-Prussian War, the Kingdom of Prussia crowned King Wilhelm I as the first Emperor of the German Empire in the Hall of Mirrors at France's Versailles Palace, proclaiming the birth of the Empire.
The famous painting of that scene even made it into history textbooks.
Ironically, less than fifty years later, France repaid the humiliation in the same room with the Treaty of Versailles.
"The Empire was magnificent."
The old man smiled faintly, reminiscing about the good old days.
"Lavish banquets at Sanssouci Palace. The Kaiser's army marching through the Brandenburg Gate. Everyone admired and envied us."
"From the Maas to Memel, from Etsch to Belt."
"Yes, yes. Old phrases hardly used these days."
The places I'd named were from the first stanza of Deutschlandlied, the anthem of modern Germany.
Maas meant the Meuse River basin—Luxembourg, or broadly Alsace-Lorraine.
Memel was Prussia's northeastern tip, now Klaipėda in Lithuania.
Etsch was the Adige River in northern Italy, South Tyrol under Austria-Hungary.
Belt referred to the Little Belt strait, Schleswig-Holstein and nearby waters.
These four regions symbolized the German Empire's greatest extent and glory.
And territories forever lost to Germans.
But they'd lost them all through their own doing.
World War.
Germany started humanity's worst conflict—not once, but twice.
And lost both times, ceding vast lands and splitting into West and East Germany like a double-edged sword.
As the saying goes: Live by the sword, die by the sword.
But isn't dwelling on lost territories taboo in modern Germany?
That's why they don't sing their national anthem's first verse.
The second one's skipped too, for being sexist.
Anyway, suspicions about the old man started bubbling up.
Is this geezer a Nazi...?
"Sir. You're not a Nazi, are you...?"
"Tch!"
His kindly smile twisted into a demonic scowl as an angry bellow assaulted my ears.
"Do I look like one of those scum? I'm just an old man who misses the old Empire of the Kaiser."
"No, no, no. Even if you're old, you weren't born back then, right?"
The German Empire fell in 1918—over a century ago.
No matter how ancient he looked, he couldn't be over a hundred.
"What's age got to do with it? If your heart loves the Empire, that's enough."
He placed a hand on his chest.
Was I imagining that internet meme where a kid points to his heart instead of a map when asked where his country is?
A hardcore Imperial Germany fanboy, huh.
I'd heard Germans suppress patriotism due to WWII trauma, but this guy proved that wrong.
Sure, Nazi Germany—the trashiest creation of any isekai author—was worse than the Empire.
But the Empire was still a classic imperialist power, guilty of atrocities like the Herero genocide.
To me, they were all the same.
"Even mighty Germany fell in the end."
Noticing my lukewarm reaction, the old man glanced at me and sighed.
"Wilhelm II. He led the Empire to ruin."
Wilhelm II.
The last Kaiser, who doomed the German Empire with his disastrous diplomacy and judgment.
The old man's face darkened at the name.
Anger?
No, more like regret and sorrow.
"If a fellow like you had been by the Kaiser's side, things might not have gone that far. Such a pity."
"Pfft! Me? You're a riot, sir. Someone might think I'm Bismarck."
"Who knows? You have talent, in my eyes."
"Aw, come on—not this physiognomy nonsense again. It's all superstition."
I'd heard German humor was lethally dry, but apparently that was a stereotype.
Comparing a convenience store clerk to the Iron Chancellor who built the Empire? What a joke.
And even that genius Bismarck got sacked by Wilhelm II.
No matter how talented I was, a leader like that would ruin everything.
"Heh, think what you will. It's up to you to believe it."
Thud.
"Ring these up for me."
With a carefree chuckle, he plunked two cans of soda on the counter.
"Fanta?"
"A taste of nostalgia."
Nostalgia, huh.
Come to think of it, Fanta was invented by Coca-Cola's German branch during WWII when US sanctions cut off syrup supplies—a makeshift cola substitute.
It had deep roots in Germany, so the old man calling it that made sense.
But I didn't see him grab them from the fridge. When did he...?
I must've zoned out chatting.
"Have one yourself. Thanks for humoring an old man's ramblings."
"Oh, you didn't have to~"
"Take care."
"Yes sir! Goodbye!"
Ding-a-ling~
"Nicest old guy after all."
I'd pegged him as a con artist who'd learned all the wrong things in Korea, but nope—misjudged him.
Chatty, sure, but how many buy drinks for a lowly clerk?
Especially in this cutthroat world.
Click!
Hiss——
Pulling the tab released that crisp carbonated fizz, bubbles spilling slightly.
Gulp.
Gulp.
Gulp.
I chugged it down; the orange tang of Fanta filled my mouth.
Hadn't had soda in ages—my throat tingled pleasantly.
"Ahh——that's the stuff."
Swipe——
As I wiped my mouth after setting the can down...
"Ugh?!"
Thud!
What the—?
My body went limp, pitching forward.
Pain so intense I couldn't even scream.
Like my whole body was being pummeled wildly.
Did the Fanta go bad?
But it scanned fine.
And even expired soda doesn't kill you this fast.
"Urk... guh...!"
My throat was closing; I couldn't breathe.
I fought to stay conscious, but it was futile.
Seconds ticked by, vision blurring to gray.
Am I dying? Over some Fanta?
More absurd than embarrassing.
All my struggles felt pointless now.
'Someone might think I'm Bismarck.'
'Who knows? You have talent.'
The old German's words echoed oddly.
I hoped they were true.
If there's a next life, I didn't want to die this pathetically without achieving anything.
Back when I was just a kid.
Mom dragged me to church half against my will, and the pastor often said this:
'Hansu, live righteously and you'll go to heaven; live wickedly, and it's hell!'
Looking back, the pastor wasn't so saintly himself, but those words stuck with me.
So, is this heaven... or hell?
"Good, you're finally awake."
Doesn't seem like heaven.
"Uh......"
"Too shocked to speak?"
Shocked? More confused and dazed.
When I came to and opened my eyes, relief flooded me—I was alive! Tears welled up inside.
"Hm, understandable."
Until this man appeared, trying to look all stern.
"Thanks, anyway."
He fiddled with the ends of his signature W-shaped mustache, looking sheepish after praising himself. His name? The infamous Wilhelm II.
"You saved my life."
The last Kaiser of the German Empire.
What did he just say?
Who saved who?
Author's Note
Hello.
I'll do my best to write entertaining stories.
Please look forward to more.