The Dice in This Crappy Game Are a Cheat

I died.

Well, technically I was hit by a truck and then died. The classic isekai starter pack. One moment I was crossing the street while staring at my phone, the next I was staring at a blinding white light and a floating blue window.

Yeah. Real original.

The game The World of Astria was infamous. A trash-tier nurturing game where every single stat, skill, and even your starting equipment was decided by rolling dice. No save-scumming, no rerolls, no mercy. The community called it Mangem—a ruined game—for a reason. The drop rates were demonic, the balance was nonexistent, and the developers had apparently coded it while drunk on soju and spite.

I'd poured ten miserable years into that game. Ten years of my actual life, grinding the same starter zone because my stats were dogshit. My final reward for all that suffering?

A single skill called Dice of Fate.

It sounded cool until you realized it literally just let you reroll one random thing per day. One. And the cooldown was twenty-four real-world hours. In a game where death was permanent, that skill was basically a participation trophy.

So when the system asked me to choose my transfer bonus, I didn't hesitate.

I blinked.

Wait. What?

Before I could process that absolute nonsense, the world around me dissolved into pixels and light. When the dizziness finally stopped, I was standing in the middle of a familiar forest.

The beginner zone of Astria. Trees that looked like they'd been copy-pasted from every fantasy game ever. The faint smell of damp earth. And in the distance, the tutorial village where new players—sorry, transferees—usually spawned.

I looked down at my hands. They were smaller than I remembered. Younger. I was in the body of my game avatar, a plain-looking guy with messy black hair and the default starter clothes that screamed "background NPC."

A new window popped up.

My jaw dropped. Luck 99? In a game where the stat cap for beginners was supposed to be 10? And the other stats were still garbage, but that Luck...

I immediately opened my skill window.

Unlimited.

I stared at the window for a long time. Then I started laughing. Not the polite kind of laugh. The ugly, slightly unhinged kind that makes birds fly away in terror.

"This is broken. This is actually fucking broken."

In the original game, even the best players had to pray to RNGesus every single day. Boss ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drops? Pure luck. Skill acquisition? Pure luck. Romance flags with the heroines? Also pure luck, and most of them required stats I could never get.

But now?

I cracked my neck and grinned at the sky.

"Alright, you shitty game. Let's see how much you can cry."

I took one step toward the village before freezing.

Because that's when I remembered the real problem with Astria.

The heroines.

They weren't just characters. They were terrifying.

The obsessive knight who would literally cut down anyone who looked at me the wrong way. The saintess who smiled like an angel while slowly driving me insane with her yandere tendencies. The demon princess who kept trying to kidnap me "for my own safety." And the list went on.

In my previous playthrough, I'd avoided them like the plague. Mostly because my stats were too low to even trigger their interest events.

But with Luck at 99 and a skill that basically told the system to go fuck itself...

I swallowed hard.

"...I'm screwed, aren't I?"

A new notification appeared, almost like it was mocking me.

I read it twice. Then three times.

"You've got to be kidding me."

My inner monologue was screaming. This is a death flag. This is the biggest death flag in gaming history.

Because in Astria, when a heroine's affection hit MAX...

They stopped being cute.

They became dangerous.

I looked at my status window again. That ridiculous 99 Luck stared back at me like it was personally offended by my hesitation.

I sighed deeply.

"Fine. Let's do this."

I started walking toward the village, already feeling the weight of future headaches approaching at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠mach speed.

Somewhere in the distance, I could have sworn I heard the system laughing at me.

You think this is going to be easy just because you broke the dice?

Cute.

Let's see how long you last when every single woman in this world starts looking at you like you're their personal salvation.

I shivered.

This was going to be a long, long life.