I Said Harem, Not Reverse Harem
Who the hell are you?
Did I just…
Get slapped by a guy?
Why?
Don't tell me it was because of the underwear?
Did I seriously just take a slap to the face because I saw a guy's underwear?
For real?
The sheer absurdity of the situation locked my body up on pure autopilot. Even so, my eyes stayed fixed on the skirt-wearing man who'd just hit me.
The boy turned away with a faintly flushed, pouting face.
"I-I made breakfast, so get out here and eat!"
Bang!
He spat the words in a tsundere huff, yanked the door open hard, and stormed out.
Even after he was gone, my brain still hadn't come back online.
What kind of garbage situation is this? What the hell is going on?
What sequence of events could possibly lead to a skirt-wearing cross-dressing guy climbing onto my bed, flashing his underwear, and then cracking me across the face?
"If you don't come out right now, you're not getting any food! Hurry up!"
A sharp, fiery shout from outside.
Why would I…
Why would I eat the food you made…
Who even are you…
Where did my wife(?) go, and why is there some cross-dressing pretty-boy standing in her place?
I ignored the yelling and pulled the blanket over my head, waiting it out.
A moment later—
Creeeak…
The door cracked open just enough for that same guy to poke his face through.
"…I made the kimchi stew you like, so get out here already…"
"…"
"Sorry for hitting you earlier… Just come eat. You've got school, you know… Okay?"
One second he was slapping me across the face, and the next the boy was looking up at me with the most pitiful eyes, like he was the one who'd been hit.
I can't just keep sitting here like this… Might as well figure out what the hell is going on.
At this rate we'd just keep staring each other down forever.
Fine. I'd play along for now.
"Alright, I'm coming. But I'm only wearing a T-shirt, so could you step out for a second?"
As far as I could tell, the only things on me were underwear and what felt like a cotton T-shirt. I'd been too panicked to actually look, so I couldn't be sure—but it felt exactly like the kind of comfortable sleepwear you'd crash in.
"Ah—ah… H-hurry up and change and come out. The food's g-getting cold!"
Flustered, the boy slammed the door and fled.
Good. Bought myself some time.
Which meant it was time for a conversation—with the one responsible for making me wake up to something huge and hideous first thing in the morning.
I patted my chest.
The cross… still there.
Thankfully, the cross hanging around my neck—the divine artifact that linked me to the goddess—was still with me.
"Hoo…"
I took a deep breath before calling her. Better calm down first, or I was going to start cussing her out the second she appeared—
"You goddamn bitch! Get your ass out here right now!!"
I couldn't hold it in. The swearing just exploded out of me.
The deep breath had cooled my head, and that only made the rage burn hotter.
"{Hwaaang? Did you… call for me?}"
"Yes! You! You absolute bitch, what the hell kind of job did you do?!"
"{Eeeh… Why are you yelling at me~}"
"A-are you crying?"
"Wuuuuh…"
Pearl-like tears spilled from the goddess's eyes. She was wearing an oversized outfit that looked like she'd stolen her dad's clothes, and she wiped her face with the drooping sleeves.
One single curse and the goddess was bawling her eyes out.
I'd once had my guts ripped out through a split-open stomach and hadn't cried—and she was sobbing over a little swearing. Unbelievable.
"What the hell did you even do right that you're cryi—"
I opened my mouth to tell her she had nothing to cry about.
KRA-BOOM!!!
"…?"
Rumble-rumble-rumble…
Thunder so massive the whole house shook. This wasn't some otherworld stone-walled hut. This was a modern building engineered to survive earthquakes—and it was still rattling like it might collapse under the storm.
"Waaaaah…"
KUUUUUUUNG!
KRAAAAAASH!!
Every time the goddess kept crying, the thunder got louder.
"…"
The thunder was getting closer. The roar was coming from right behind me, just outside the window, and I—
"Aigoo… I got a little worked up and my language got a bit rough, okay?!"
—immediately clapped both hands together and started begging for my life.
You have to be alive to argue. At this rate I was going to get struck by divine punishment from a crying goddess and die on the spot.
I'd survived a one-on-one deathmatch with the Demon King. Getting killed by a thunderbolt was not how I wanted to go out.
I'd rather have died to the Demon King, honestly.
Her face was a mess of tears and snot.
Goddammit…
Of course there wasn't even a tissue—a man's best late-night friend—anywhere nearby.
"There, there, our cute little goddess~"
In the end, I had no choice but to lift my shirt and wipe her face with it.
"Th… there…"
"Aww, that's a good girl, our goddess…"
I cooed at her like she was a toddler until the crying settled. Even so, the aftershocks of the sobs kept making her hiccup.
"I wasn't mad at you, Goddess~ I just saw something really nasty a second ago and kind of lost my mind for a bit… I'm sorry…"
"I-hic… I was so scared…"
"Yeah, I know… My voice got way too loud, didn't it? I'm sorry. So please forgive me…"
"Hic… Okay…"
Where the hell did the girl who watched the Demon King's head explode without blinking go, and who was this little brat crying over a few swear words?
If you're going to be scared of something, be scared of a pulverized Demon King skull. Why are you crying over getting cussed out?
I was going to lose it.
"There, there, there…"
And so I sat the goddess on my lap and soothed her until she calmed down.
Once she'd settled enough and the approaching thunder had faded, I carefully opened my mouth.
"I called you because something seemed… wrong…"
"Wrong?"
"Yes. The thing is…"
I explained everything that had just happened.
When I finished, the goddess tilted her head with a look that, in a comic, would have had a giant question mark floating over it.
"It seems perfectly correct to me?"
"…?"
"You said you wanted a harem. That's exactly what you got. So what's the problem?"
"…I said I wanted a harem. I never asked for a reverse harem."
The boy who'd just been in here might have looked like a girl, but he was unmistakably a guy—complete with a thoroughly hideous and thoroughly impressive piece of equipment.
I wanted a harem. Not a reverse harem.
"One woman, multiple men. That's a harem, isn't it?"
"What kind of bullshit is—ah, no, no, you've got it completely backwards. A harem is one man and multiple women."
Ah. So the concepts were flipped and she'd just made a mistake.
That made sense once I thought about it.
Sure, a goddess who ruled over countless worlds might have a slightly different set of definitions. I could be understanding about that.
If something was wrong, you just fixed it.
Picking a fight with a goddess and getting wrecked for it was not on the agenda.
"Um…"
"You're right. Under normal circumstances, that would be the definition of a harem."
"…? So you weren't mistaken?"
"I know exactly what I'm talking about. Do you have any idea how many years of goddess seniority I've got?"
She thumped her nonexistent chest with a fist, looking proud of herself.
"I gave you a harem tailored to your situation, Seonghyeon."
The goddess spread her hands wide.
Woooooom!
On each of her small, soft-looking palms, a holographic Earth took shape.
"The left one is the original world you came from. The right one is the Reverse World. You went from being a man to being a woman, right? Correct?"
"…Right?"
"Then your mind aligns more with the women of the Reverse World than with the people of your original world. So I built you a harem that fits the Reverse World. It's only bound by fate for now—not fully complete—but I did weave the destinies together for you."
Pop!
She crushed the Earth representing the original world in her left hand.
Then she held out the remaining Earth in her right hand and continued.
"In this Reverse World, women have the minds of men from the original world, and men have the minds of women from the original world. Every concept related to gender is flipped. You haven't been reborn, but otherwise it's basically the same situation you're in, isn't it?"
"…"
"So in this world, one woman and multiple men is the correct definition of a harem!"
The goddess beamed at me with a sunny, I didn't do anything wrong smile.
Technically, nothing she'd said was wrong.
But why the hell was she just arbitrarily applying the opposite concept?
That wasn't okay.
If you don't know, you ask. You don't just do whatever you want.
So what she was saying was that the people bound to me right now weren't women—they were men?
Three skirt-wearing guys who acted like girls?
And on top of that, they all had different personalities—childhood friend, school upperclassman, little brother type?
"Ah… aagh…"
BEEEEEP—
A siren went off inside my skull.
A headache worse than the time a demon spear put a hole through my forehead tore through my head and started butchering it from the inside.
"…The harem I wanted was based on me being turned back into a man."
"You never actually asked me to turn you back into a man…"
"There's such a thing as a yuri harem! Why did it have to be a Reverse World harem?!"
"Ah… a yuri harem… I honestly never even thought of that."
"Aaaagh…"
I clutched my head.
It hurt so badly I genuinely wondered if my skull was cracking open.
Was I the one who died to a war hammer instead of the Demon King?
Maybe…
If this nightmare was actually just that bastard laughing at me, I'd almost prefer it.
What even was this…
Was this the price for this world?
I hated it so much.
If I'd known it would turn out like this, I would have just… back then…
Grit…
The pain was so bad it felt like my head would split, and I kept holding it while lying there.
Even though I'd fallen backward, the goddess was still sitting on my lap. I glared up at her and asked, desperate:
"…Could you please just change it to a normal harem even now?"
"There are already people bound to you by fate, so…"
"Haaah…"
I really should have taken that other offer back then—
"I didn't think you'd hate it this much… It's not that there's no way…"
Twitch!
My ears perked straight up.
There was a way?
I shot upright immediately.
"Aah?!"
The sudden motion nearly sent the goddess tumbling forward. I pulled her into a tight hug and asked,
"A way? There's a way?"
"Um…"
"What is it?! Stop dragging it out and tell me!"
I shook her back and forth while still holding her.
"Eughhh… I'm getting dizzyyy…"
"Tell me already, hurry!"
"You just have to sever the fates that are binding you! Stooop!!"
Chomp!
When I wouldn't stop shaking her, the goddess bit down on my arm.
That tickles…
Her bite force was weaker than a neighborhood mutt's. It didn't even hurt.
"Honestly, there's no such thing as a fixed destiny. You can guide things in a certain direction, but at the end of the day, the choice belongs entirely to the individual."
Swoosh…
The goddess slipped out of my arms, walked a few steps ahead, and turned halfway back toward me.
"The destinies have already been set in motion, so I can't undo that now—but choice is still possible."
"…"
"For now, follow the path I've guided you onto. And at the very end, overturn it. When you're free, I'll grant your wish one more time."
She said it with a childlike smile.
A pure, innocent goddess smile.
What is this… something about it…
For some reason, it felt off.
That manufactured eye-smile looked a little too much like a snake's.
No way.
I shook my head.
She was a goddess, not some random person. Why would a goddess be a snake?
I'd spent too long in the other world. Getting betrayed over and over had left me unable to trust anyone.
What would a goddess even gain from tricking a human?
If she wanted something, she'd just demand it outright.
It was a stupid thought.
"Alright! I'm going out there right now to flip the whole damn table!"
"…Huh?"
"You said destiny is something you choose yourself, right? I'll make that childhood-friend guy lose every scrap of affection for me—storm out there, yell 'What the hell is this food?!', and flip the breakfast table!"
I'd show him.
The me who was born in the Joseon Dynasty.
I'd hammer a display of pure masculine energy into that childhood friend's skull so hard that whatever fondness he had left would evaporate overnight.
I was going to go nuclear.
I'd show him something worse than that Japanese "walk three steps behind" nonsense.
I got off the bed and strode straight for the door.
"No! No! That's not what I meant by ending it!"
"Don't worry! I'll handle it cleanly with no loose ends! Oh—and if he talks back, can I hit him?"
"No! You absolutely cannot! You have to treat them kindly all the way to the end! You have to follow the guided destiny!"
The goddess threw herself in front of me as I tried to go out and demonstrate what a real patriarch looked like.
With the goddess clinging to my pant leg and desperately holding me back, my glorious regression into Joseon-era patriarchal mindset ended in failure.