Chapter 1
Translator: True Detective
Chapter 1. Is there... Hope? (1)
Whether it's a stroke of luck or a misfortune that the end of life isn't simply death, I do not know.
Either way, as someone who was terrified of dying, I thought it was closer to luck.
Because I usually thought it would be better if there was at least a heaven or a hell.
If the entity known as 'me' could continue to exist after death, wouldn't that be better? Better than just becoming nothingness and scattering at the final moment.
Yeah, it's better to be born again as a different person. Yes, absolutely.
Besides,
My past self wasn't particularly good-looking either. If I had to evaluate my level of appearance, it would have been below average. I tried not to care about exactly how far below average it was. Because even if I already knew, I'd still be hurt if it was completely confirmed.
But, you see.
"Hehe."
My current appearance is, how should I put it.
It shows incredible promise.
Yes. I'm still young. I'm a kindergartener. I don't know if I was reincarnated directly as a kindergartener, or if I had actually been living all along and only just reached the age where my brain could actually 'think' to recall these memories, but anyway, it shows promise.
The promise of becoming a beauty!
You know, they say all kids are cute, but that doesn't mean every single one has the face of a child actor. No matter what, simply saying 'this kid is cute' and admiring a child actor in a commercial by exclaiming 'Wow, they are really cute' are two completely different things.
That's me right now.
Large, round eyes. Eyelashes that are already long. Sparkling pupils.
A nose that is sharp but not too high, yet not a snub nose either, situated truly perfectly.
And a small, cute mouth. Soft lips with great color.
Even though I'm still just a little pipsqueak, this is truly magnificent. It's definitely a face that will be tremendously popular ten years from now.
In fact, I'm already popular right now!
"Lua, Lua."
As I was twirling around in front of the mirror, a friend next to me tugged on my sleeve.
"What are you doing? What are you up to?"
"I was looking in the mirror."
"The mirror?"
"Yeah."
The me in the mirror smiled majestically. My goodness, so cute. Even though the kid is making a boastful expression, it's not obnoxious, it's cute!
Of course, I had hoped to be born as a handsome man if I were to be reincarnated. I figured if I was going to be popular with girls anyway, wouldn't it have been better to be born a boy?
Well, it's not like you can pick and choose what you want to be when you're born into the world anyway. It's not like I possessed someone. Still, isn't it a relief I wasn't born exactly the same as my past life?
I struck a pose toward the pink-haired kid standing next to me and lifted my head.
"How is it?"
"Oh."
Sparkle, sparkle.
At my pose, her eyes sparkled and she clapped her hands.
"Cool."
"Do I look like I'd be popular?"
"You look like you'd be popular!"
Yes, yes.
That's exactly it, exactly it.
Before I knew it, other kids had gathered around me. Naturally, the one with the most outstanding appearance among them was me, of course. Even pushing aside entirely subjective interpretations, objectively, it was still me.
Well, I do wonder what good being popular with little kids does.
Who knows if I might gain a decent childhood friend out of this later on in the distant future?
Anyway, the more friends, the better.
It's not like I'm craving it in this life specifically because I lived an unpopular life in my past one. I'm just stating objective facts.
Anyway, say what you will, but this life feels good right from the start.
There is the misfortune of not having parents in this life, but let's just consider that a bearable trade-off.
By the way.
I mentioned pink hair and all, but...
It makes me think that this life might not be an ordinary one after all.
What orphanage in the world would dye their kids' hair like that?
I watched for a few months wondering if perhaps the dye from before they were abandoned hadn't faded yet, but that didn't seem to be the case. If it was dyed hair, the color would have grown out from the roots as the hair grew back, but it didn't.
Actually, it's not just pink hair.
There's green, blue, red, and silver too. Blond isn't even considered unusual.
Of course, the most common color among them was black, though.
Could the laws of this world operate a bit differently from my previous life's world?
And as soon as I had that thought, one word immediately popped into my head.
Possession.
Right!
I knew it!
Wasn't I born with memories of my past life? Doesn't that mean there will be a moment to put this knowledge to use?
You know, it's practically common sense nowadays. You criticize a web novel you were reading, you possess it. You rightfully critique it, you possess it. You praise it, you possess it. You read it to the end, you possess it. You only hear the title, you possess it. Sometimes you possess it without having even heard of it.
So, it's common sense. Common sense. Well, if the names weren't Korean style, I might have deliberated a bit more. Since there are plenty of possession and reincarnation stories in other countries too. But looking only at the development so far, isn't it incredibly textbook?
Goodness, if that was the case, they should have told me in advance.
Immediately after realizing that, I ran various experiments. When I was alone, I secretly and quietly called out for a status window, pressed my hands together in prayer, and wondering if I had some innate ability, I swung a stick around or tried doing somersaults only to flop flat on the floor.
And there was nothing.
No status window popped up, no voice was heard from the sky, I couldn't produce sword aura with a wooden stick or do thirteen consecutive mid-air spins. I just learned that I was nothing more than a pretty little kid.
"Hmm."
Is it not possession?
Strange, that shouldn't be the case.
Did I possess a work I've never even seen? Or, since I used to binge all sorts of web novels while commuting every day, could it be buried somewhere deep in my memories?
"Lua, Lua."
"Yeah?"
Just as I, whose only reward after all those attempts was a single band-aid stuck to my forehead, was seriously contemplating this life, a certain kid interrupted me.
"What are you doing?"
The pink-haired kid I mentioned just before.
The kids here are all without families. But if you wonder if we're particularly poor, it doesn't really feel like it.
How should I put it, it feels like we just stay, eat, and sleep at a kindergarten. To be honest, I hardly have any memories of my own kindergarten days either, but if I had to describe it, that's what it's like.
Most of the teachers are nice. Though they sometimes get a little annoyed or something, they are basically people devoted to their profession as teachers, so no child is abused.
However, even so, since the teachers are surrounded by countless children, they inevitably can't pour a parent's love into every single child individually.
Young children are starved for attention, but a teacher only has one body. Even though there isn't just one teacher here, there is no ironman in this world who can stand in as a parent for countless kids every single day without rest.
Therefore, the children's attention inevitably shifts to a child who acts even a little bit more mature.
"Haa, it can't be helped."
"Huh?"
Even the teachers told me I act mature, so I suppose it's only natural. After all, there's a mental age gap of twenty years.
Even if I try to act like a kid, it's not easy.
"Chaeyi, have a seat."
"Huh? Okay."
As I spoke and flopped down onto the floor, the pink-haired pipsqueak—meaning Chaeyi—plopped down in front of me in the exact same way.
Chaeyi is shy around strangers.
I don't know if it's just her nature, or if it's because she has some kind of past.
She plays passably well when she's with the other kids, but she gets intensely shy in front of the teachers, so I have no choice but to look after her like this.
"I was thinking about my future life."
"What's life?"
"Uh."
Wow, the conversation got blocked right at the very first word.
Chaeyi was obviously just asking for the meaning of the word, but kids' words naturally carry hidden weight sometimes.
"...I mean, I was thinking about how we're going to live from now on."
"Where are you trying to go?"
"Uh."
Of course, since I phrased it that way, Chaeyi must have asked out of anxiety, thinking I was actually going somewhere. But because the question right before it was 'What's life?', it felt like a weirdly profound follow-up question.
"I know, right?"
I tilted my head.
Exactly.
How on earth was I reborn while remembering my past life?
Since my memories are vivid, I think it really is a past life, but then there must be a reason for it. Even if a god or some entity wasn't particularly involved, shouldn't there be a cause for this phenomenon?
"Well, wouldn't it come to mind if I just keep living?"
It was a shabby answer considering how I had postured when bringing it up, but what could I do?
Even if I have memories, I'm only about the age of a kindergartener. If I started making life plans right here, that would be funny in its own right.
If this is truly a possessed world, I might remember better if I give it a bit more time and observe.
I've never read a work where the protagonist was a kindergartener, so wouldn't I have to wait at least ten years for the 'main story' to begin anyway?
"Is that so?"
"Probably?"
Even as I answered Chaeyi's question again, I was honestly quite unsure.
Well, at least among the novels I've read, there weren't many with a female protagonist, so I'm probably not the main character.
However, possessing a supporting character in a possession genre isn't necessarily a problem.
Because in possession stories, the possessed supporting character is actually the true protagonist.
Exactly.
Eventually, as time passes, I'll naturally rise to the protagonist's position, so what's the issue? There'll be no problem even if I just think about it after bumping into the main story's protagonist a bit later.
Until then, my job is to study hard, eat well, and grow up well. While I'm at it, I should take care of my appearance a bit too.
Right. I was born like this, what could possibly go wrong?
Who knows. I might be one of the heroines. Though I have absolutely no intention of becoming a heroine.
"Let's take it easy."
"Take it easy?"
"Yeah. Relax."
To reiterate, we're still just at the age to attend kindergarten.
It's not like the orphanage is going to provide some incredible gifted education, so maybe I should just kick back and relax until elementary school—
—I shouldn't have done that.
There was something I hadn't realized.
That even if the novel has a starting point, the 'starting point of the background setting' could be long before the main story begins.
That a protagonist naturally has a past, and of course, an important supporting character also has a past.
And that past could be bottomlessly, overwhelmingly depressing.
"Ghhk."
I had heard a sound like that before.
It was the sound made by a dying person in the bed next to mine in a shared hospital ward I was once admitted to by chance.
Like something was caught in their throat. I don't know if it was phlegm or a clot of blood, but anyway, it was a sound like something bubbling up from deep within the throat.
"Ghhk."
The mister shielding me was continuously coughing up blood from his mouth, yet he was looking down at me, trying to say something.
Pathetically, I couldn't do anything.
I was too scared. I was terrified of the mister's blood dripping onto my body. Even though my actual age was twenty years older than the kids around me.
"I's..."
The mister barely managed to spit out the blood in his mouth and spoke. He forced a smile. His skin-tight uniform, which might have looked a bit tacky, was tattered and torn all over.
Something strange was protruding right through the middle of his chest. It looked like... a piece of iron.
Only then did I finally remember one thing.
My name.
And Chaeyi's name.
They aren't common names. Why did I only just think of it?
And this mister's name too.
"It's okay."
That was what the mister barely managed to open his mouth to say.
"It's okay. The others will be here soon."
Shhhk, the piece of iron that had protruded from his chest was pulled back out. A gaping hole was left behind. Crimson blood gushed profusely from that hole, soaking my body. Human blood was much warmer than I had ever imagined.
"...I'm sorry."
The mister said that to me.
And then again, shhhk, thwack.
The piece of iron sprouted from his chest. And blood.
Only after my vision was dyed red once again, was I belatedly able to recall exactly what kind of world I had been born into.
Though it seemed much too late.