Tutorial

Call center work is fucking miserable. Absolutely goddamn miserable. People who've never done it have no idea.

"—You piece of shit! How long has it been since I told you to cancel this? Why the hell hasn't it been done yet?!"

Korean boomers think that if they just yell loud enough, they've already won. They think you're obligated to sit there and take every insult.

"Sir, if you continue to use that kind of language, it becomes difficult for me to assist you."

"Fuck you! Put yourself in my shoes! You think I wouldn't swear?! Must be real nice sitting there with the AC blasting on a hot day, just flapping your mouth!"

Still, with a political party that loves to bang on about human rights in power, the industry has gotten slightly better. At least they felt enough pressure to put on a show of doing something.

"If you continue with the verbal abuse, I will be forced to end this call."

The result was a new clause: after three warnings, if the customer keeps going, I am allowed to hang up first.

"Aren't you a counselor?! A counselor, and you're just gonna fucking hang up on me?! You piece of—"

In other words, I still have to sit through three rounds of pure abuse no matter what.

"You have used abusive language three times, so I will be ending the call from my end."

Having to grit my teeth and stay polite through all of that is already a joke, but in every other situation I am absolutely not allowed to hang up first. Not if I want to keep my job.

Human rights, my ass.

In the end it's just window dressing.

Honestly, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the ones who just swear are the easy ones.

"So, how exactly are you going to fix this for me?"

"That's not something I have the authority to handle myself, so I'll escalate it to the relevant department as quickly as—"

"And how long am I supposed to wait for that? Just put your superior on the line."

I glance over and suddenly my team leader is pretending to be extremely busy. Translation: handle it yourself.

"This is a call center, so we don't have separate ranks here, sir."

"What kind of nonsense is that? I'm not hanging up until this is fixed, so fix it. You get off at six, right? Guess you're not going home until this is resolved."

He knows exactly how call centers work. Classic repeat offender.

He picks apart every word and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠knows precisely how to twist the knife so the agent takes maximum damage.

There are way too many people in this country who can kill someone with nothing but their mouth.

"Why won't you transfer me? I said put your superior on! You think this is a joke?"

"Sir, as I've already explained, this is a call center, so—"

The company is the one that made the shitty product and delivered the shitty service, yet I'm the one who has to eat the shit sandwich.

If I could just grovel a little right now, maybe I'd feel a bit better. But they even ban us from saying "I'm sorry." Ruins the corporate image, apparently.

And if I fail to resolve this, a complaint comes in and my incentive evaporates.

This is the tragedy of subcontracting.

Oh, and who held a knife to my throat and forced me to take this job?

Yeah, I've got nothing to say to that.

But the truth is, almost no other place hires just anyone the way call centers do.

"Damn. That's some real variety right there."

I don't usually like talking about work over drinks, but this friend of mine always loved hearing my stories.

Apparently my storytelling skills are next-level.

It wasn't just him either—I'd been getting that compliment for years. So I actually believed I had talent.

Trusted that bullshit, decided to write web novels, and completely wrecked my life.

Three whole years. Three years of slowly burning through my savings and throwing away most of my twenties.

That's why a guy with no real certifications and no career ended up in a call center.

"Anyway, my contract's almost up, fuck. Once this one's over, I'm never coming back to this shit."

I was planning to coast on unemployment for a while, then maybe go do construction work.

"Still, working that job must've made your talking game pretty solid, right?"

"Talking game my ass. All I learned was how to kiss ass. There's a demon living inside me. Why are you asking all of a sudden?"

"I've been into something lately. AI chat."

AI chat?

"Oh, like those chatbots? I heard they're replacing half the call center agents these days."

"No, no, not that. More like… how do I put it? Kind of a game."

My friend launched into an enthusiastic explanation of what AI chat actually was.

"So there's a scenario and characters, and you become the protagonist of the scenario…"

After listening, I reached my conclusion.

"Isn't that just a dating sim? I used to play those all the time as a kid."

"Hey! It's different, you idiot! You wrote web novels and you don't even know this?"

"Why are you getting so worked up? How different can it really be?"

But after hearing the rest of the explanation, I had to admit he had every right to get worked up.

"Holy shit. The story just generates itself based on whatever I type?"

Dating sims only give you a handful of choices leading to fixed endings. AI chat, on the other hand, builds the algorithm in real time and can produce dozens or hundreds of completely different situations.

A hundred people would get a hundred different stories. The progress of science was suddenly a little terrifying.

"In the end you're still just trying to fuck the female characters, though."

"Well, yeah. But it's basically a kind of virtual reality. Nothing beats it for vicarious satisfaction. Women are going crazy for it too."

Women too?

I tilted my head.

"They're obsessed with chatting with the male leads from romance novels. It's blowing up right now."

"Insane."

"Why don't you try it too? You're under a mountain of stress. Blow off some steam with this."

That was the real reason my friend had brought it up.

"You've written stuff and you do counseling, so this should be a piece of cake for you. Unlock some scenarios and share the walkthroughs with me."

I'd taken a lot from this guy over the years.

I wasn't particularly interested, but if this was a way to pay him back even a little, it was the right thing to do.

"How does it work?"

He asked for my phone, installed an app, and handed it back.

Simple, but intuitive name.

"Give it a shot."

"…Right now?"

"If you go home you'll get lazy and never do it, dumbass."

"I still want to drink more."

"Just hurry up."

In the end I couldn't fight off his pressure and launched the app.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

No matter how good the AI is, how impressive can it really—

Ding!

The second I opened it, the screen was plastered with photos of beautiful women.

And they were moving—so lifelike they might as well have been real people.

"Dude, are these actually the characters?"

"That's what I said. Generated with AI images."

Holy shit. They look insanely real.

"…Yeah, I can't open this in public."

"You'll get fucked if you do."

Every single one of the beauties was either in her underwear trying to seduce me, or fully dressed but striking some filthy pose that went straight for the lower half. Damn.

"Make a character first and run the tutorial."

"I have to make a character too?"

"Yeah. You can set up what kind of loser you are in a few simple steps."

"Immersion's gonna be off the charts, you loser."

"Right? Loser. And the tutorial scenario gets generated to match whatever you put in."

Pretty slick.

But I was busy, so I just went with the default settings from my linked social account. Once you fall down the customization rabbit hole, hours disappear.

"Sometimes it gives you points too. You can do all kinds of stuff with those."

"Points?"

"You'll get the tips later. Just jump into the tutorial scenario already."

I did.

Ding!

The information on the scenario screen went, in order: scenario title, character name, related tags, and the opening.

Never mind the fact that the one crying was a girl, yet somehow I was the one getting "comforted."

"Look at that illustration. This is ridiculous. A girl this pretty just starts talking to me out of nowhere?"

"That's the point. It generates based on the settings you put in."

Ah. Right.

"You must've been pent up as hell. The tutorial scenario is a one-night stand?"

"Come on. Even so, where the hell does a woman like this exist? This would never happen in real life."

"That's exactly why people go crazy for it. Reality already sucks—who wants to get stressed out in a game too?"

He had a point.

Obsessing over excessive realism. That compulsion was also the decisive reason I'd failed as a writer.

I'd even been less popular than the metallic, soulless crap AI spat out, so I'd quit.

Fine. Let's see how entertaining AI writing actually is.

Feeling a complicated mix of mild inferiority and curiosity, I hit start on the scenario.

The text stopped and the choices appeared. I couldn't help snorting.

"Dude, is this a written driver's license test? If it's this easy, every guy would be fucking girls left and right."

"Look at this cocky bastard getting full of himself over a tutorial. Let's see if you can still talk like that when the difficulty ramps up."

"Whatever. I get the idea. Let's just finish drinking."

"All of a sudden? I can tell you just want to go home and jerk off."

"That obvious? Then hurry up and drink already."

I hadn't actually done anything yet, but the moment I entered the opening I knew this was something else.

The reason was the first-person AI-generated image that appeared beyond the text—it felt terrifyingly real.

This is the real deal.

Looks like I won't need porn anymore.

Yeah. This is sex. This is virtual reality.

Thinking that, I drained the rest of the bottle in one go.

"Ugh, fuck. I keep seeing her floating in front of my eyes."

Park Yerin, was it?

I was dying to pick up where I'd left off, but I decided to hold out until I got home.

Like I said earlier, this was not an app you could just casually open outside.

Anyway, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠thanks to walking hard, it didn't take long to reach the one-room village where my studio was.

But then.

Sniff… sniff…

Suddenly, from somewhere, I heard a girl crying.

Goosebumps shot up my entire body.

…It's not a ghost, right?