This Is My Reality

"Calvin Doyle."

"Congratulations on your survival. Here is the remainder of your payment."

The man took ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the money from an old servant dressed like the butler of a noble house, then turned and walked back to the group waiting for him. Before long they were moving off somewhere, dragging bodies worn down by combat with the monsters.

Once he was gone, it was my turn.

"Uh… Alan Han."

"Alan Han, Alan Han, Alan Han…"

The moment I gave him the name written on my status window, the old man started scanning a roster of names. Watching him hunt for mine set ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my nerves on edge.

What if I got in the wrong line?

If I had, I needed to bolt for Bison Trilly's side right now. Earth or this world, it didn't matter — you couldn't live without money in either one.

I had no idea why I — why this body — had been standing in the middle of a battlefield during a monster flood. What I did know was that the original owner of this flesh had picked a side. He'd fought for either Bison Trilly or Prisia Lily. Which meant I was owed a paycheck.

The problem is I don't know which side I fought for.

In the end I had to pick one, and I picked Prisia Lily. Given the choice between a scrawny guy and a sexy woman, who wouldn't take the woman?

Prisia Lily was a beauty rare even back on Earth. Skin white and fine as porcelain, golden hair that fell like silk, and a melancholy gaze that held some unknown magic capable of setting a man's insides on fire. Instead of armor she wore something close to a riding suit, painted onto her body, every curve on full display. She had the kind of figure that went in where it should and came out where it should, and she stood nearly a hundred and seventy centimeters — tall, and devastatingly sexy.

Just looking at her was enough to get me hard. I wanted to throw her down right then and there, but that rapier fixed at her hip would have punched more holes in me than I could count. I'd settle for looking. Some things were meant to stay out of reach.

"Ah, here you are. Alan Han. Congratulations on your survival. Please, take the remainder of your payment."

"Thank you."

By some miracle, I really had been a volunteer under Prisia Lily. The old man found my name on the list and handed me a pouch, calling it the rest of my pay. It was decently heavy.

Whew… thank god.

I let out a silent breath of relief, stepped out of line, and checked the pouch. It was packed with glittering gold coins.

Holy shit. How much is this?

I fished one out. The face of the coin was stamped with the number 10,000.

The gold in Fairy Masters had looked something like this too, I thought… though I couldn't quite remember the details.

Huh? Inventory?

A window — a prompt, maybe — materialized in front of me. I tilted my head, then nodded.

Right. If I really got dumped into the game, of course there'd be an inventory.

That went without saying. Fairy Masters had an inventory too. What kind of game doesn't?

Let's see… how do I even check the inventory… wait. There it is.

The second I thought about wanting to see it, a new window opened in front of my eyes. It was the same inventory screen I'd stared at a thousand times in the game.

What the hell is this? Why are only five slots unlocked? Where did the other ninety-five go?

The inventory in Fairy Masters started at a hundred slots, and you could expand it by spending gems. Of the slots in front of me now, a grand total of five were active.

You fucking… ah, whatever. Better than nothing.

I swallowed the rest of the curse. I couldn't file a complaint with the developers, and getting pissed about it wasn't going to magically unlock more slots. Five was still five.

Let's see… store.

The instant I thought about putting the gold into my inventory, the coins in the pouch vanished. The amount sitting in the inventory jumped from 501,000 to 1,001,000.

Can I store the sword too?

I looked down at the blade in my left hand. It was a damn fine sword — it had saved my life twice in the fight against those monsters, and the weight of it in my grip felt right, so I'd brought it with me. Besides, who was going to claim ownership? Something on the ground belongs to whoever picks it up.

The moment I thought about putting the sword away, the prompt appeared again.

Aha. So that's how it works.

That was enough to give me a rough sense of how to use the system. Think about the function you want, and the system answers. I'd need to test the finer points, but the fact that I could operate it with thought alone suited me just fine.

At the very least, this is definitely the world of Fairy Masters.

Bison Trilly and Prisia Lily, the bosses of Chapter 1, and the status windows of their Fairies — I'd seen all of it with my own two eyes. That was all the proof I needed that this was the world of the game I'd been hopelessly addicted to.

Character status windows straight out of Fairy Masters. The existence of Fairies. The Chapter 1 bosses in the flesh. At that point, wondering whether this might be some other world would have been the stranger reaction.

A world where the story of Fairy Masters is actually unfolding…

Something out of a novel had happened to me. And the price of a chance to live in this world had been my life.

This is so fucked.

I'd spent a fair bit of money on Fairy Masters, but I'd had a stable job. I knew ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠an enormous amount about this world, and I could use that knowledge to succeed here — but succeeding meant putting my life on the line.

Monsters. Grotesque things packed tight with malice and murderous intent. The one that had tried to split my skull with an axe was a goblin, the kind of fodder that showed up in every fantasy story ever written. And goblins were the weakest monsters there were.

I was going to have to face monsters strong enough to slaughter goblins by the dozen without breaking a sweat — and the humans who owned them, and the Fairies those humans commanded.

I had lost a stable life and been handed one where I had to bet my neck. I could, in theory, do what I'd done in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my previous life: settle in a city, find a quiet job, and live small.

But.

I can't just give that up.

I knew far too much about this world to settle for a quiet life. Even now, I was going out of my mind wanting to use what I knew.

"…Hell if I know."

Fine. Admit it. The man I was in my previous life was dead, and it was time to live this one with my life on the line.

From this moment on, this was my world.

I turned, intending to head home.

"This is so fucking stupid."

I muttered it under my breath as I looked around.

After getting through the monster flood — or, to borrow the local phrase, the Monster Defense Battle — and collecting the rest of my pay, I'd meant to drag my exhausted body home.

Fairy Masters had something called a Waiting Room.

If you wanted to grow fast, you had to clear a lot of dungeons. But the game had a Fatigue system, which meant there was a hard limit on how many you could run in a day. Push into a dungeon with Fatigue too high and a Fairy's stats would drop, along with the accuracy of their attacks and skills. Managing that Fatigue was critical, and the system built to recover it quickly was the Waiting Room.

You spent Gold or gems to raise its level and decorate it, and the better appointed it was — and the higher its level — the faster Fatigue came back. The way a worn-out office worker went home to rest, the Waiting Room was home for a Fairy.

I'd been dropped into the world of Fairy Masters, so of course I should have a home — a Waiting Room — of my own. I wanted to get back there and sleep.

There was just one problem.

"Where the hell is my house?"

I had no idea where I lived. I muttered things like Waiting Room transfer and home transfer under my breath and wandered the streets, but I couldn't find it. I even opened the door of a nearby tavern on the off chance that any old door would dump me into my Waiting Room. Nothing happened.

Either be a game or be reality. Pick one. Why did this part have to be realistic?

"Don't tell me… I'm homeless?"

I'd been sitting there thinking a million Gold was a sweet haul, and I didn't even have a house. On top of that the streets were a maze, and I had no idea where I was. No matter how hard I looked, there wasn't an inn or a motel in sight.

"God, this sucks."

My first day, and I was going to sleep on the street. And that wasn't even the whole of it. I hadn't eaten a single meal since coming back to Indigo. My stomach was staging a protest, demanding food now.

No restaurants either.

I scanned the area. Not a single place that looked like it served food.

"Haaah…"

Stuck on every front. I sighed, then got to my feet. If I started walking, something would turn up eventually.

That was when it happened.

"Alan Han."

"…"

"Hey. Alan Han."

…Oh. He's talking to me.

Someone had called my name from behind. If it had been Han Ki-woong — my name in my previous life — or Gibung-i, my in-game handle, I would have turned around immediately. Being called Alan Han was a first, so I'd assumed they were talking to someone else.

"Who… huh?"

I turned around and froze. I knew that face.

This guy…

A black-haired man about my height — a hundred and eighty-three centimeters — was looking at me with a face handsome enough to debut as an actor on the spot.

A Fairy?

He'd put on a conspicuous performance during the Monster Defense Battle. He was the Fairy of Prisia Lily, one of the dual bosses of Chapter 1.

I want to see this bastard's status window.

The second I thought it, his status window bloomed in front of my eyes.

Oho?

I couldn't help a quiet note of admiration as I looked over Kyle's status — Prisia Lily's Fairy.

Two traits at 1-Star was already impressive. One of them was Dark Warrior, a Rare-grade trait that raised every stat by a point at night. On top of that he was sitting at level 20, the cap for 1-Star, and his primary stats were crowding the 20-point ceiling.

Decent enough, but…

Assuming he hadn't used any Growth Stones to pad the numbers, Kyle was a Fairy with solid stats. His total came to 101 points. Of those, 19 had come from level-up rewards and 9 from class level-ups — 28 points of growth. Subtract that from 101 and you got 73: the stat total he'd possessed at the moment of his summoning.

That was identical to a player character's base. Raised properly, a Fairy like that could carry you comfortably into the mid-to-late game.

Of course, that math assumed he hadn't touched a Growth Stone. Factor those in and his initial total was probably 70 or lower.

Looks like he took a bit of a stat loss.

When a class leveled up, its primary stat increased by one. For a Mage that was Magic; for Kyle's Warrior class, it was Strength. As I'd said, at 1-Star the level cap was 20 and the stat cap was 20. Once you hit the ceiling, nothing moved until you raised the star rank.

Meaning that until Kyle hit 2-Star, no amount of Growth Stones would raise his Strength or Vitality any further. For reference, the stats you got from leveling up were assigned at random.

Anyway. That's neither here nor there…

Why the hell was this guy calling me?

"My Master wishes to see you."

"…Me?"

"That's right. I'll be borrowing you for a moment."

"Pardon? Borrow me for wha— ghhk?!"

Without the slightest warning, Kyle drove his fist into my solar plexus. With my current stats, there was no world in which I tanked that punch.

You… son of a bitch…

The lights went out.