Prologue: The Destroyer's Arrival
Youth is like a morning star, they say. It shines beautifully for the briefest moment before vanishing forever. And my own youth had just begun.
I kept refreshing the screen, staring at the two glowing characters that spelled PASSED. Over and over again.
“Mom!!!!!”
My name is Lee Siwoo. I am the shining protagonist of a brand-new youth, freshly accepted into university.
When I was little, I idolized dark heroes far more than other kids did. “Haha! I am the Destroyer of the World!” Like any child, I copied the protagonists on TV. I’d wrap a blanket around myself, grab a tree branch, and run around the neighborhood like a lunatic.
“What the hell! Get away!”
“You’re so weird! Why do you even like that stuff!”
“Idiot! Moron!”
For some reason I was never popular. I’m used to it now, but back then it hit me pretty hard. The only place I could escape to was the world of heroes inside the TV. As a kid I was glued to the screen, and inside it the dark hero was always laughing.
Time passed. On my middle school entrance ceremony, I did something I would regret for the rest of my life.
“My name is Lee Siwoo! I will destroy this school!”
Whether it was early puberty, zero friends and terrible social skills, total immersion in hero fantasies, or all of the above, that moment became one of the major turning points in my life.
Three years later I entered high school thinking I could finally shake off the reputation I’d earned in middle school… but every distant school I applied to rejected me. I ended up at the high school right next to my old middle school.
Of course I thought about transferring. But I wasn’t being bullied, my family wasn’t rich, and by then I had already grown used to this life.
“Hey! Destroyer! What are you doing!”
“Ugh, stop calling me that!”
It wasn’t like I had zero friends. Still, it was too embarrassing to explain any of this to my parents. What? You think it’s weird my parents didn’t know their son was famous as the school weirdo? There was a reason. My parents got along so well that they had a daughter ten years younger than me.
When I was fourteen, Sia was four. She needed every bit of our parents’ attention. I don’t resent her for it. Actually, I like her. She’s honestly too cute. If I had my phone I’d show you pictures. Cringe? …What kind of thing is that to say?
Anyway, that day was the day after I turned twenty. The moment I became an adult I went wild with my friends and didn’t open my eyes again until four in the afternoon.
“Ugh… my head…”
Suffering the first hangover of my life, I had no choice but to eat the dried pollack soup my mom made while listening to my dad’s lecture.
“Siwoo, what has Dad always told you?”
“Uh… don’t do anything you’ll regret—”
“Exactly! The person who knows your actions best is yourself! So live without doing things you’ll regret later.”
I slowly ate the soup while listening to the same lecture I’d heard countless times before.
“Yes…”
“What else did Dad always say? What kind of family are we?”
“Great-grandfather fought for independence—”
“Right! In this world your great-grandfather risked his life to protect, you should live with your chest out and your head held high!”
“Yes…”
The lecture continued until I finished every bite of food and the apple Mom had peeled for me. I’d heard it for over ten years so half of it went in one ear and out the other, but now I find myself missing that scolding.
On Friday, January 3rd, I was still lying at home because the hangover hadn’t completely worn off. Sprawled on the sofa with the TV as background noise, I was wasting time on my phone when something on the screen caught my ear.
“Oh.”
Before I knew it, the TV was playing the animation I had watched for half my life.
The hero on screen looked exactly the same as he had ten years ago.
“That’s a memory now too…”
While I was lost in nostalgia, the vibration in my hand snapped me back to reality.
“Hello?”
[Hey, Siwoo.]
“Mom? What’s up?”
[Nothing special. Can you pick up Sia?]
“Huh? Suddenly?”
The call was just Mom asking me to bring my little sister home from school.
[We’re eating meat tonight. Dad and I will head straight to the restaurant, so you bring her with you.]
“…Got it.”
[Thanks, son~]
She told me she loved me and hung up.
“What time does school end…”
I checked the clock and got ready to head out.
I turned off the TV, threw on some decent clothes, and stepped outside. On my way to the elevator I saw a large sheet of paper.
“Huh? Elevator under maintenance?”
A printed sign reading “Under Maintenance” was taped to the elevator doors.
“Ugh, I hate taking the stairs…”
I trudged down the staircase. Soon I noticed a woman coming up from below.
Red hair? Bold choice.
She wore a black leather coat and had long, vivid crimson hair that fluttered with every step. The sharp click of her heels echoed in my ears each time she climbed. I glanced at her face, but she wore a black mask and sunglasses, completely hiding her features.
Kinda creepy… Whatever, just a stranger.
I decided to ignore her and walk past. The moment we crossed, the sound of her heels stopped.
Huh?
I spun around, but her hand reached my back first.
“What?”
She gave me a light push. I lost my balance. My body was already half-turned, so it was obvious I would land on the back of my head.
“Fuck!”
All I could do was swear and throw my hands forward. I desperately tried to grab her clothes, but my arm couldn’t reach. My body tilted further. The woman who had pushed me lowered her mask with one hand and smiled.
“It’s a promise.”
“What—”
“Promises must be kept.”
Whatever she said after that never reached my ears. My vision flooded with pure white.
“■■■, ■■ ■■■.”
“Ugh…”
“■■ ■■■, ■■■.”
“What is that sound…”
I slowly opened my eyes and looked around. The entire space was blinding white. I was floating in the middle of it.
“Where am I?”
“■■ ■■■■, ■■■.”
A voice suddenly rang inside my head.
“Wh-what? What is that?”
“■ ■■ ■■■ ■■■■■?”
I couldn’t understand a single word.
“■■, ■■■ ■■ ■■■···”
The voice sounded like someone sighing, desperately trying to convey something to me.
“■■■ ■■■ ■■■■■, ■■■ ■■■ ■■■■■.”
After another string of unintelligible words, light suddenly exploded from every direction.
“Uwaaaaaagh! Help me!”
I flailed in terror, but the light only grew stronger until it swallowed me whole.
“■■ ■■■ ■■■ ■■■ ■■■■···”
With those final words, I lost consciousness again.
When I regained consciousness, I was on solid ground that definitely had gravity.
“Uwaaaaaaaaagh!!!!!”
I screamed in the most pathetic way possible and collapsed, legs giving out beneath me.
“Um… are you all right?”
In front of me stood an incredibly beautiful woman dressed in pure white. Long golden hair flowed behind her as she slowly approached.
“Here, take my hand and stand, Hero.”
“Ah… yes.”
I took the hand she offered and rose. It was impossibly white and soft.
“Um, Hero…”
“Y-yes?”
“You can let go of my hand now…”
“Ah! S-sorry!”
I hurriedly released her hand, turned my head, and looked around. The place I had awakened in was a vast hall. Men fully encased in white armor and helmets stood silently around us, gripping white spears and forming a circle.
“This is…”
As I stared around with a dumb expression, the blonde woman seemed amused and gave a small smile.
“This is the Goddess Church Sanctuary, Hero.”
“Goddess… Church?”
The walls and ceiling were covered with paintings of a goddess-like woman and various holy symbols.
“The sanctuary of the Goddess Church is not a place just anyone may enter, you know?”
Goddess Church?
The woman—who looked around my age and had been calling me “Hero” since the beginning—took several steps back and pulled something from her robe.
“Now then, Hero, I must ask you to introduce yourself.”
She held up a circular pendant with both hands.
“Well… first, where am I? Why am I here…”
“…Pardon? Did you not receive the explanation?”
“What explanation…?”
When I asked that, I felt her expression darken. The armored men around us shifted as if ready to move, but—
“No, wait.”
She raised one hand slightly. She must be someone important. With a single gesture she stopped every knight.
“…I am the Saintess of the Goddess Church.”
“Saintess of the Goddess Church?”
She really was beautiful enough to be one.
“This place is a different world from the one you came from.”
“Another world?”
“Yes. And you have been summoned as the Hero to save our world.”
“Hero? Summoned?”
A hero summoned to another world? What the hell was this? The current trend was regression, not summoning! That was popular ten years ago—no, what ten years? That was a 90s trope!
“Yes, Hero. Please introduce yourself.”
The Saintess held out the pendant once more.
“Introduce myself…”
I fell into deep thought. The situation was so sudden it felt like a dream. There was no sense of reality at all. It was as if I had become the main character of a novel or manga.
Anyone would have imagined leaving reality behind for another world at least once. Especially someone like me who had always preferred fantasy to real life. And now that fantasy was becoming reality.
“Um… Hero?”
When I remained frozen, the Saintess began to worry. I took a slow, deep breath and closed my eyes.
At that moment, an incredibly powerful impulse surged inside me. It spread through my entire body until I was completely wrapped in it. I couldn’t resist. My whole body trembled. Blood raced through my veins and slammed into my brain. I could feel my heart pounding. I couldn’t refuse it. I must not refuse it. I don’t want to refuse it. I can’t refuse it. My mind grew distant, on the verge of snapping.
Barely holding onto my sanity, I spoke the words I had repeated countless times in my imagination.
I opened my eyes and shouted confidently, facing the Saintess directly.
“…”
The Saintess stared at me with wide green eyes, clearly shocked.
“Um… Saintess? If you don’t react it’s kind of embarrassing…”
“Sigh. So one time really wasn’t enough?”
She tucked the pendant back into her robe and glanced to my right. A faint light had appeared on the pendant, but no one noticed. There, a man in white armor had his hand resting on a lever.
“Pull it.”
At her command the knight pressed down. The lever descended with a rusty groan. Devices connected to it began to move all around us.
“W-wait, waaaaaaaaait!”
The floor beneath me opened. I fell straight down.
“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!”
I screamed as I plummeted into an endless abyss.
“All right, prepare for the next summoning.”
While Lee Siwoo fell into the depths, the Saintess and holy knights closed the floor and cleaned up the area. The Saintess sighed as she watched them operate the mechanism.
“Haah… why did this trial have to come at a time like this…”
The current situation was extremely irregular. Ignoring the usual one-hundred-year cycle since the first hero’s advent, only ten years after the previous hero had returned home, the Goddess had sent down a new oracle. Both the Goddess Church and the handful of high-ranking officials—including the imperial palace—were in an uproar.
Ah, shit. Why did it have to be me…
The Saintess, who was supposed to become the hero’s first companion barring extreme exceptions, felt nothing but chaos in her heart.
I finally became a Saintess, yet…!
Becoming a hero’s companion was not exactly a blessing. It meant leaving the main headquarters in the imperial capital and traveling across the entire continent with the hero, crossing countless battlefields. No matter how noble the cause, it was undeniably an extreme job compared to what other saintesses did. Especially after the saintess who accompanied the second hero died during their journey, nearly every candidate refused the position whenever a new hero was about to be summoned.
Why, why! Why the hell did the oracle come so suddenly!!!
“Saintess, preparations are complete.”
“Ah, understood.”
The senior holy knight informed her. The Saintess, lost in thought, began reciting the summoning incantation once again. It had been ten years since the ninth hero’s journey ended. Ilusia, newly appointed as Saintess, was already reciting the summoning spell for the second time—something that should never have been part of her fate.
Intense light flared. A human silhouette appeared at the center of the magic circle.
“Now, Hero, please introduce yourself.”
Unlike the idiot from before, this man calmly observed his surroundings. The Saintess held out the pendant and asked for his name.
“Uh… my name is Kim Chulsoo…”
“Welcome to this world, Hero.”
No light appeared on the pendant, but neither the Saintess nor anyone else noticed.
When I regained consciousness, I was surrounded by pitch-black darkness.
“Ugh… my head…”
Fortunately—or maybe not—I seemed unharmed despite falling from such a height. Something must have cushioned the impact. The moment I looked around and realized where I was, I couldn’t help but scream.
“Are you fucking kidding me!!!!!!”
I had landed in the middle of a massive pile of bones.
It had been only five minutes since I arrived in this other world.
“So that’s how it is.”
I told Wilson everything that had happened to me since arriving. “What do you think?”
No answer came.
“Wilson?”
Still nothing.
“Wilson, when someone asks you a question, you’re supposed to answer.”
I crossed my arms and glared, but Wilson didn’t even blink.
“Answer me!!!”
I finally snapped and shouted. Wilson remained silent.
“Answer!!!!!”
I picked Wilson up and slammed the skull into the ground. “Ans!!!!!wer!!!!! me!!!!!”
Wilson shattered into pieces. I panted with rage.
“Please! Send! Me! Back!!!!!”
I stepped on the broken skull that had been Wilson and climbed down the pile of bones.
“Ha… I really shouldn’t have said that…”
Ten minutes after arriving in this other world, I experienced my first regret.