Life Isn't Easy
Books.
They didn't make money.
More precisely, they didn't make money compared to the neighboring country.
In Japan right next door, there were multiple companies surpassing a trillion won in sales.
And even mid-sized publishers there racked up hundreds of billions in revenue.
In Korea, the top publishers couldn't hold a candle to those scrappy little outfits over there. It was an overwhelming difference in scale.
Japan had over 100 million people, sure, but what really stood out was their insane book consumption compared to Korea. If only Japan had been somewhere far off like Europe or America, it might not have stung so much—but no, it had to be right next door. You couldn't help but compare.
And on top of that, Japan and Korea had this competitive edge. Just half a century ago, they'd colonized us and done all sorts of horrific things. Relations had improved since then, but the resentment lingered. Some of the people who'd lived through that occupation era were still alive. If it had been ancient history, the wounds might have healed without souring things further.
"Publishing's doomed."
Kim Sung-ho had no choice but to say it. No matter how he thought about it, Korea's publishing market had a warped structure. It wasn't beautiful books or ones with profound lessons that sold here—it was just workbooks flying off the shelves by the truckload.
Slurp slurp!
Sora sat beside him, sucking on a chocolate milk, watching Kim Sung-ho's odd behavior.
"So? Enough lamenting—what about my book?"
"Good news: we got the green light for publication. Telling them you wrote it barely squeaked it through. If it weren't for you, Sora, they probably would've shot it down. Game fantasy's total niche right now."
"Lucky break."
Sora had finally gotten a look at the head of the publishing planning department recently. Being on the fifth floor meant they rarely crossed paths with the other floors' offices. Plus, whenever Sora came to Songi Media, she hunkered down in the department staring at her computer.
"Cover's ready, proofreading's done—everything's set. We're going straight to print."
"Thanks for handling it."
"You bet! This'll be a game-changer for genre novels!"
"Sure."
Sora smiled at department head Kim Sung-ho flailing about dramatically. His antics were kinda cute, like a kid's. She wasn't sure if an eight-year-old calling an adult cute worked, but that's how it felt.
If only Sunlight Painter had ridden that bold declaration to market dominance... but reality was brutal.
It wasn't selling.
"Why...! Why isn't it selling?!"
"Beats me."
In the Korean publishing world, selling out an initial print run of 1,500 to 2,000 copies counted as a solid first win. But Sunlight Painter hadn't even hit 1,000.
Kim Sung-ho's mind flashed back to what Lee Tae-young, the publishing planning manager, had said: game fantasy novels often got great online buzz, but they bombed as physical books.
Spot on. Considering the online reactions, Sunlight Painter was underperforming by half or more. Web serial views had easily topped 10,000, but physical sales hadn't cracked 1,000.
Still, 1,000 copies meant some royalties. Factoring in printing costs and labor, it broke even at best. Books didn't just materialize for free.
Maybe that's why novels were shifting from print to web serials.
Print books guzzled money and time to produce.
Web novels? Totally different story.
No production costs—just typing on a computer. Electricity for the PC was about it. And once written, it offered insane convenience compared to print.
Print scaled horribly: more buyers meant exponentially higher material costs. Physical objects had to be made and shipped. Web novels? Write once, accessible to anyone online forever.
Sell a million print copies, and after printing, paper, and labor, slim profits remained. Sell a million web reads? Pure profit—no printing, no paper.
Of course, smartphones weren't a thing yet, so web novels weren't booming. But as time marched on, things would change. Print couldn't match web convenience and only had downsides.
Anyway, 1,000 copies sold, so royalties came through. Thanks to Kim Sung-ho negotiating a higher rate, Sora pocketed 900,000 won.
He pulled her aside to hand it over in cash—Sora didn't have a bank account, and she'd insisted on cash anyway.
"Hide it good on the way home. Thieves spot that, you're in trouble."
"What is this, some foreign slum?"
Sora clutched the thick envelope, lost in thought.
Her first paycheck from her first work...! First paychecks always stuck in memory. Objectively, though, this wasn't her first—thanks to past-life memories, she'd collected paychecks hundreds of times. No heart-pounding excitement at this age.
But earning it with this body felt good somehow. And in this era, 900,000 won matched a mid-sized company salary.
By the future she'd known, minimum wage topped 10,000 won an hour, but now it hovered around 3,000-something. Part-timers slaving 8 hours a day all month barely scraped 1 million.
She'd expected the novel to flop. Hits didn't start strong—word of mouth built over time. And Sunlight Painter's author had planned 8 or 9 volumes originally.
Sales spiked around volumes 6 or 7, expanding the story. Classic artist plight.
Sherlock Holmes' creator tried killing off the hero to end it—readers rioted, storming his house. He wrote his parents lamenting it, and they asked why he'd killed the protagonist. It hit the news; stories abounded.
He'd meant a short run but bowed to capitalism. No need to end a bestseller—each new volume rained money. Didn't apply to Sora, though. She had tens of thousands of novels in her head.
One per day? Still over 50 years. At 8 now, she could write till retirement at 60. Not that she would.
So Sora stayed chill. If this flopped, plenty more options—her brain held the future's entire library.
"Half seasoned, half fried, please."
I bought a whole chicken to take home. First paycheck? Gotta spend it on family.
Problem was, it didn't fit my age. An adult guy with chicken? Devoted family man. Kid girl with chicken? Just hungry, probably.
The shop owner's look was weird—like, a kid buying chicken?
I grabbed the chicken and headed home, timing it for Mom and Dad's return.
Couldn't remember the last time we had it. Weekly chicken was the rule back then...