This World Is a Game
The hotel suite.
A man lay sprawled across the bed.
“This world is a game.”
A sharp suit. A luxury watch worth an entire house. From head to toe, the man was draped in designer brands, wearing an innocent expression while spouting absolute nonsense.
His name was Lee Shin.
The infamous third-generation chaebol screw-up of the Lee Do Group.
“A game, huh…”
The doctor adjusted his glasses and continued the consultation.
“Is it the same game again?”
“Yes. ‘GM’… That is my one and only sanctuary…”
“Very well. So it’s that GM game.”
“The genre is a nurturing simulation. A game where you manage a guild…”
“Perfect. Exactly the same. That’s good. Consistent answers are a positive sign.”
“Don’t you have any questions at all, Doctor?”
“About what?”
“About this world where magic actually exists. Where humans fly through the sky, shoot flames from their bare hands, run faster than cars, and catch bullets with their palms. Doesn’t this seem… genuinely insane to you?”
“Why do you think it doesn’t make sense?”
“Why does the sun rise in the east?”
“Because that’s how it is.”
“Right! Exactly!”
“I see.”
Even as Lee Shin continued his rambling, the doctor maintained a consistently gentle expression. Internally, however, he thought:
Then how the hell does it make sense that you fried your brain on drugs and got amnesia?
It had been one month since Lee Shin was carried into this place by men in black suits.
They claimed he had collapsed from overwork. But anyone with eyes could see the glazed look and the way he kept shouting things like “Whoa, a bunny! Boing boing!”—it was clearly drug addiction.
Normally, the protocol would be to report it to the police immediately… but the doctor was also a self-employed medical professional.
The stack of cash sitting in front of him was far too thick to follow protocol. After three grueling days, Lee Shin finally regained consciousness.
—Amnesia.
He remembered nothing.
Lee Shin clasped his hands neatly and continued the session.
“When I opened my eyes, I saw an unfamiliar ceiling. My arms and legs were tied down. If you hadn’t shown up, Doctor, I probably would’ve thought I’d been abducted by aliens. Do you remember the first thing I said?”
“Of course.”
He remembered it vividly.
The sight of Lee Shin with bloodshot eyes, tears streaming down his face, screaming, “Fuuuuck! My character! My save files!” At the time, the doctor had wondered if the drugs were still in his system.
“Everything was so confusing back then. No memories, restrained, and every channel on TV had my face plastered all over it. Drug addict. Good-for-nothing. Horny bastard. Scum of the earth. My name—well, two characters of it—had so many filthy adjectives attached to it. Honestly, I felt wronged. I swear I have zero memory of doing any of that garbage!”
“I’m sure you do.”
“If I had done it, at least I wouldn’t feel so wronged.”
The doctor was mildly curious about what exactly had happened at that wild party…
As Lee Shin muttered to himself, the doctor wrote on his chart with a benevolent smile.
— Reality Escapism —
“My memories are a mess, some grandfather I’ve never seen before starts cursing at me and slapping me, my so-called parents aren’t on my side, and my relatives offer empty words of comfort while clearly laughing at me behind my back. I seriously thought I’d woken up in some kind of black market.”
“Hahaha…”
“The character was just poorly made. This game really is trash when it comes to luck.”
“We’ve come full circle back to the game again.”
“Heh. Because that is the one and only truth. The truth is, I’ve been possessed. Into the game. The setup was perfect too. Record-breaking torrential rain, I’m running while hugging my laptop, get struck by lightning, and when I open my eyes—ta-da, I’m inside the game?!”
“Sounds like a web novel. ‘I Became the Useless Third-Gen Chaebol in a Game.’”
“Whoa! You even came up with a title! Doctor, you know about web novels too?”
“My son told me about them. Good for clearing your head.”
“Heh… the new generation.”
The doctor watched as Lee Shin neatly clasped his hands and gave a cheeky thumbs-up, then picked up his pen again.
— Delusions of Grandeur —
“Well, what can you do? Since it’s come to this, I might as well look on the bright side.”
“A positive attitude is always a good answer.”
“Exactly. I’m quite the positive guy. So what if I’m a good-for-nothing, a bastard, or an idiot? I’m still the eldest grandson of a chaebol family. While others are stuck in depressing hospital rooms, I get to receive treatment in a hotel suite like this. Not a bad life at all.”
“Not bad? It’s an incredible luxury.”
“So, Doctor… lump sum payment?”
“Lump sum plus a little extra.”
“Sweet deal.”
At Lee Shin’s reply, the doctor nodded positively.
— Reality Perception: Normal —
After listening to a sufficient amount of the story, the doctor finally spoke first.
“Excellent. Your progress is very good. May I ask one last question?”
“Two. No, three is fine too.”
“Then…”
The vice chairman—Lee Shin’s father—had ordered, “Get that bastard out of there as fast as possible!” So the doctor focused more on management than on a perfect cure.
That was why he asked:
“A dream, or perhaps a goal. What is the goal you’re aiming for, Mr. Lee Shin?”
A person with a clear destination may wander, but they will still walk forward. At those words, Lee Shin grinned as if he had been waiting for this exact moment.
“I should do what I’m best at.”
“And what would that be?”
“What else? GM. I have to create a guild.”
First, recruit famous hunters to raise the guild’s reputation. Then, use that reputation to sweep up all the promising prospects.
Once his perfect squad was assembled, he would shatter every record, build up fame, and use that elevated value to expand beyond Korea and into the global market—
“—To create the world’s greatest guild.”
I really am cool as hell.
Lee Shin closed his eyes and smirked to himself.
The doctor maintained his usual benevolent smile while thinking:
…Can I really discharge this guy?
His name was Lee Shin—using the character for “trust” from the Gyeongju Lee clan.
Gender: Male. The kind of guy whose curiosity gets him killed quickly.
Age: 32. He thought he had tasted every bitter and shitty flavor life had to offer, but in reality, he still didn’t know shit.
Occupation: IT developer. Sounds fancy, but he was actually a coding slave. Or a firefly in the valley of death.
Home: 18-pyeong apartment, owned. The fact that 80% of it was mortgaged was a secret. He was currently sweating over the skyrocketing interest rates.
What he liked: Lounging around all weekend in nothing but underwear, playing games.
What he hated: That damn department head dying.
Motto: Let’s live doing what we want and have fun.
That was the profile of Lee Shin, an utterly ordinary young man of this era.
Why past tense? That’s what this story is about.
The day in question was a cloudy weekend.
“Haaaam. Slept well.”
It was a peaceful weekend morning where the alarm that usually went off every ten minutes starting at 6:40 AM didn’t ring at all.
Lee Shin lazed around and finally got up around ten.
Weekend Lee Shin was different. At the office he was fairly diligent, but on weekends, time belonged entirely to him. No one could stop him.
“Auntie, one special beef soup, please.”
He devoured the bowl in no time, then, as always, ordered three Americanos to go and sat down in front of his computer.
He logged into his one and only sanctuary.
Guild Manager.
Abbreviated as GM.
Become the representative of a guild and recruit Hunters—superhumans who wield magic! Raise the characters you like with the traits you want, in your own unique style!
Complete your dream guild with your own squad and conquer the world!
—It was a nurturing simulation game with exactly that concept.
It had been twenty years since he and his older brother had played it together in their tiny room, heads pressed together. From age twelve until now, Lee Shin had never once lost interest. It was his first love and his last.
With that level of experience, he was a named veteran in the GM community and even served as a teacher to 300,000 users.
Some people seriously asked if he had any plans to stream, but he always firmly refused.
Share my one and only sanctuary with others for a few bucks? No way in hell.
“Alright, how should I enjoy myself today~”
A squad that looked more like an idol girl group than an actual girl group?
Or maybe it was time for some concept play again? Like hiding the fact that their representative was a Sword Master.
A full summoner squad also sounded tempting. Sweeping a gate in one go with a million-strong army would be a sight to behold. Or the classic super team made of World Class talents with maximum potential (200/200) had its own kind of addictive charm.
As expected of a long-running game that had been serviced for over twenty years, GM had an enormous pool of characters and development methods. There were insanely many ways to enjoy it.
The only problem was that Lee Shin had become a fossil.
He had already enjoyed every normal(?) form of gameplay. To feel any new stimulation, the only routes left were the slightly extreme, perverted ones.
“Something new… difficulty on hard… okay. Let’s try this.”
He began creating a new manager.
Mental, Technology, Physical, Combat.
Perfectly adjusted so he could never step onto the field himself.
“Instead…”
Politics, Negotiation, Charm, Wealth, Lobbying, Charisma… He dumped everything into the ‘Society’ stats that influenced others.
This would have been enough, but stopping here wouldn’t be like the fossil Lee Shin.
“Let’s take the knife to it one more time.”
He fine-tuned the Society stats even further.
Hundreds of detailed values appeared.
Due to the nature of GM, if the set values were too low or too high, character creation would fail. Most users sweated blood trying to customize their own, and it was common to just copy presets from the community.
But for veteran teacher Lee Shin, it was child’s play.
“It was too easy last time, so let’s tank the reputation and make a ton of enemies. Dump all the negative stats into ‘Wealth’…”
If he drastically increased the Charm-related stats within Society and the Wealth side…
“A character with zero actual ability but overflowing charm and money.”
He would have as many enemies as he had money. With a reputation in the gutter, he would be drowning in disputes.
He could already see the flood of events coming from the very beginning.
“Huuup…!”
Just imagining it made his mouth water.
“Hehe. That’s at least a month’s worth of content.”
Alright. Time to chew, rip, and enjoy.
Just as he was about to dive into the game—
The incident began.
Vrrrr— Vrrrr—
“Ugh… what the hell.”
The name displayed on his phone screen.
[That Damn Department Head]
“Argh, what is it this time?”
There were many types of bosses.
Capable and diligent. Capable but lazy. Incompetent and lazy. Incompetent but diligent.
The worst of them all was the incompetent but pointlessly diligent boss. And if that boss also lacked any sense?
…That was exactly this department head.
“Hello…”
— “Lee Shin, get your ass to the office right now.”
“…Sir, it’s the weekend.”
— “Kid, I landed a big one. Remember that accounting software project that came up in the meeting the other day? I snatched it for our team.”
“What? Project? Sir! Wasn’t that decided to go to Team 3?!”
— “I know, I know. It was supposed to be Team 3. But the more I thought about it, the more I wanted it. So I went and buttered up the president. Your hyung’s pretty capable, right? Pretty cool, huh?”
He had snatched a project that every team had been subtly trying to pass off to someone else, and now he was asking if it was cool?
He didn’t need blood pressure medicine. This guy was the blood pressure medicine.
His only joy in life was spending the weekend with his hand down his underwear playing GM… but he had no choice.
Lee Shin stared longingly at his monitor, then packed his laptop with the intention of working on the game at the office. He could give up the underwear, but he could never give up the game.
But to get to the conclusion first—he never even got to open the laptop.
That damn department head was worse than anything he could have imagined. No foundation, no plan, not even a direction. He had simply swallowed the entire project.
In the end, he didn’t get to see even the letter ‘G’ from GM. After spending the whole day getting cursed out and becoming a wreck, he got on the bus at 10 p.m.
This sucks.
As if to comfort him, the sky was pouring down rain without end.
Lee Shin used the sky’s consolation as a lullaby and closed his eyes.
Twenty minutes later.
The sky he had trusted stabbed him in the back.
Excuse me, Mr. Sky? Your comfort is a bit excessive.
Before the exhausted Lee Shin’s eyes was a road completely flooded by an unprecedented downpour.
He stared blankly at the cars floating along the road for a moment, then burst into mad laughter.
“Haha… hahaha…”
But what could he do? Reality was reality.
He first tried to shield himself from the rain with his backpack, but soon clutched it to his chest in panic.
The laptop!
Yes.
Inside the backpack was his laptop, which contained videos perfectly matching his tastes and records of characters that were like his other half—his companions for half a lifetime.
“Haha, nothing’s going right today.”
Lee Shin was usually positive, but this was too much.
Wasn’t this straight-up malicious?
So Lee Shin hugged the backpack to his chest like a mother protecting her egg, terrified that even a drop of water might touch the laptop inside, and pushed through the rain.
That was when the lightning struck.
Kwaaaaaang—!
With a probability lower than winning the lottery, he was struck by lightning!
When Lee Shin opened his eyes again, he found himself inside the very game that had taken up most of his memories—the one his laptop had been running.
He had awakened inside GM.
As the character he had personally customized that very morning.
[Lee Shin. You caused another scandal. ‘The Wild Party!’]
[A party attended by numerous famous celebrities. Is this really okay?]
[Assault, adultery, violence, gambling… At least there was no fraud. That’s a relief, right?]