How Can I Just Walk Past a Person Lying Among the Trash?
The situation hadn't changed at all. By the time I noticed the flush deepening on those cheeks and the twitching at the corners of that upturned mouth, I already knew.
"May 10th."
"……."
"Twelve million won, right?"
I realized there was no point in hoping for mercy. I quietly rose from my seat. I didn't even offer a greeting as I left. I had no desire to linger in front of someone who grew more excited at the sight of another person on their knees.
Thud.
I closed the door and stepped into the hallway. I retraced the path I'd taken to get here. I had to pay it back. Twelve million won a month. The exact amount would need calculating once I got home, but one thing was certain: if I didn't want to sell my body, I absolutely had to earn money.
Emotion surged up inside me like boiling oil. I wasn't sure why. Maybe it was because of that stubborn resolution that others might call foolish, but I couldn't just ignore this feeling that seemed to pickle my heart.
Step. Step.
My feet didn't stop moving. Male prostitutes who still glared at me with jealousy, and the occasional wealthy woman dressed in luxury brands, would glance my way. It was filthy. Filthy, sticky, ugly gazes. Ever since I'd been possessed into this world, those lust-filled stares felt so vivid they seemed to wrap around my entire body.
Slap!
"…!!"
"W-what the hell? Why is he doing that…"
Slap! Smack!
Left cheek. Right cheek. I struck my face with all my strength. My cheeks stung, burned, and I could feel them swelling. People's gazes shifted. Lust turned to shock, jealousy to confusion. I didn't stop this deliberate self-harm. Not until I'd crossed the hallway and reached the lobby.
By the time my hands felt more numb than my face, I ran into the employee who'd guided me earlier. I didn't avoid her eyes. I didn't speak. I simply stared hard at the woman who towered over me, putting every ounce of strength into my gaze. I didn't even know why I was doing this. Yet something inside told me I had to.
"……."
"……."
The woman guarding the entrance averted her eyes first. I walked out of the building exactly as I'd come in. It hurt. My cheeks hurt. Yet I could feel an itchy sensation spreading across them. True to my regeneration-type powers, my body was already healing. I kept walking.
After about five minutes, the stinging in my cheeks had completely vanished. When I touched them, there was no pain at all. I caught my reflection in a passing window and saw that everything had fully recovered.
And then—
Gurgle.
My stomach growled. I hadn't eaten anything since being possessed, but this wasn't simple hunger from mealtime. It felt more instinctive than that. Healing the damage to my cheeks had clearly consumed some kind of energy, like calories.
I must have walked quite a distance. As I moved through the alleyways, my eyes naturally scanned my surroundings. And then—
"…?"
Deep in a dark alley. On top of a pile of white garbage bags, I spotted someone wearing a black suit. I could have just ignored them and gone home, but they looked exactly like a drunk passed out, so curiosity got the better of me. Isn't it just common Korean decency to check on someone collapsed on the street?
As I got a little closer, the stench of the trash mixed with a strong smell of alcohol. A suited drunk. Definitely. And... beautiful. Her beauty was on another level compared to Yang Seona.
Her disheveled black hair looked like silk. Her half-lidded eyes carried a reddish tint, and between cherry-red lips, hot breath mixed with alcohol escaped in soft puffs.
"…Are you okay?"
I felt a clouded gaze on me. It was an eerily dry, emotionless stare. No answer? Then there was only one thing left for me to do.
It was a normal call. I gave appropriate answers to the officer's questions. At that moment—
Whoosh.
"…?"
My smartphone disappeared. When I blinked, I saw it was now in the hand of the collapsed woman.
"…Don't need it."
"Excuse me?"
This is exactly why people say not to bother with drunks. You try to help and this is what you get! She spat out those stiff words, but—
"…If you're okay, that is."
I slowly reached out and took my belongings back from her.
"Yes. It looks like she's come to her senses. You don't need to dispatch anyone."
I thought, You should've answered sooner, as I looked down at her with a mixture of pity and annoyance. Then, in that same dry voice, she asked me:
"Why did you help me?"
"…?"
She was asking for a reason. Honestly, there wasn't one. When you see a person lying among the trash, why wouldn't you help? I was in debt myself right now, so when I saw someone struggling, I felt the urge to lend a hand. Because I was suffering, I figured others must be too. It was such an obvious thing, but since she asked, I answered.
"How can I just walk past a person lying among the trash?"
"……."
Her mouth closed tightly.
She's really pretty.
Get a grip. I didn't have time to be thinking about romance right now. My eyes seemed to drift toward her chest without me realizing, so I deliberately turned my body away.
"As long as you've come to your senses, that's enough."
"……."
With those final words, I started walking again. She didn't try to stop me or anything. Strange. She was drunk, yet she seemed completely fine? Whatever. Time to go home. The buses would stop running soon. I needed to hurry.
The walk home was a continuous stream of anxiety. How the hell was I supposed to earn twelve million won in one month?
"I'm hungry…"
I was starving. That self-harm had been pointless. It had cleared my head and strengthened my resolve, but not knowing whether there was any food at home made me uneasy. Still, I made up my mind to stay strong. In this world, I was completely alone. In my previous life it might have been different, but having become someone else overnight, I was truly on my own.
The moment I got home, the first thing I did was look for food. Most of the side dishes were covered in mold. The kimchi was at least somewhat edible? It reeked of sourness, but it was better than the alternatives. And the rice cooker that showed 150 hours of use—when I opened it, the rice inside was a yellowish color.
"No rice…?"
That crazy bastard Lee Seha. Did he seriously order delivery for every single meal? Is that even possible? With no other choice, I started eating what was there. The rice wasn't exactly hard, but every bite brought up a strange, musty smell. It was disgusting. Still, my body craved energy, so I forced it down.
Plain rice with kimchi. And soy sauce. In my previous life, I wouldn't have even looked at such a combination. Yet my starving body somehow managed to choke it all down.
Next, I looked up secondhand listings. The best option would have been making money through internet broadcasting. However…
"Ugh."
I nearly threw up what I'd just eaten. Was it because this was a world with heroes? Movies featuring heroes using their powers had developed even further than high-quality CG films. Internet broadcasting was the same. When men streamed, most of them took their clothes off. Or they wore suggestive outfits and danced in a way that showed off their bodies. From my perspective, it felt worse than being bombarded with repulsive images.
Even so, I endured and kept looking. Hadn't that bearded magician uncle who uploaded reaction videos to funny community posts said he watched every stream from rank 1 to 100 before starting his own broadcast to analyze their strengths and weaknesses? No matter what you do, you should at least put in that much effort.
Which was why…
"Ughhh…"
I couldn't take it anymore. Why wasn't there a single gaming streamer? There were some, but they were almost all women. For some bizarre reason, every male internet broadcaster had converged on donation reaction content.
"Should I just try it anyway?"
Most of the setup was already done. When I checked the messenger, that crazy bastard Lee Seha had apparently spent a million won on a dual PC setup and sound equipment. Seriously, what the hell am I supposed to do? It was honestly impressive that he'd managed to burn through everything in just a few days. Spending twelve million won in a single day? I had to give him credit for his execution speed, at least.
I immediately started preparing for the broadcast. I copied the kind of content that female game streamers usually did. Since donations wouldn't be settled until next month even if I received them now, I started the stream with my account number displayed prominently at the top of the screen.
"Ah, can you hear me?"
I turned on the camera too. I knew my face and body were on the cute side. Even if game streaming had zero supply and zero demand in this world, maybe my looks could create some demand?
And then.
Four hours into the broadcast.
"Why isn't anyone watching…?"
No one had entered the stream. My face was clearly visible on the preview screen. A few viewers had come in, but…
"Ah, I don't dance. I'm sorry. Would you like to watch me play games instead?"
"Fuck…"
It was the same thing on repeat. Even the so-called major games all featured male characters stripping. I tried my hardest to hypnotize myself that the feminine-looking character was a girl, but… hearing the voice acting that clearly belonged to a male voice actor…
"Ugh."
The most I could do was hold back the nausea. I wasn't gay.
"It wasn't like this in 'The Man Who Games Well'…"
The Man Who Games Well. It was the very first gender-reversal web novel I'd ever read. The protagonist was a former pro gamer who got transported to a gender-reversed world and became insanely popular. So why did the world I got possessed into turn out like this?
In the end, I gave up on streaming. There was no way I could earn twelve million won in a month doing this. If I stuck with it longer, maybe I'd see results, but right now time was literally money. I had zero intention of selling my body. And even less intention of catching some woman and becoming her house husband.
"Ha, shit…"
That idiot Lee Seha. What the hell am I supposed to do?
After abandoning the stream, I immediately started calculating. I had no intention of mindlessly doing physical labor. Construction work, warehouse jobs, and the like—I figured my regeneration ability would let me adapt quickly. But first, I needed to make a plan for exactly how much I had to earn to pay everything back.
"Let's sell the main PC, the monitor… and the figurines too."
If I sold them urgently, I'd get about seven million won. If I took my time selling over the course of a month, maybe 8.5 million. Thanks to the purchase receipts, the twelve million won debt had instantly shrunk to eight million. Assuming I sold everything secondhand, that was roughly how much money I'd have in hand. Which meant the amount I still needed to earn was… four million won.
Pure earnings with no expense calculations. Thirty days remaining. A life-or-death mission to earn four million won in that time. It had begun.