Is It Really This Bad?
Is it really this bad?
At first, I saw an unfamiliar ceiling.
It was covered in clean, white wallpaper, with a decent light fixture hanging right in the center.
Lowering my gaze to look around the room, my first impression was that it looked rather luxurious. My second was that my imagination was incredibly tacky.
If this was a dream I was having right before death, surely I could have conjured up something far grander.
Did it really have to be such an ordinary room?
I also didn't see the point of waking up to an unfamiliar ceiling like the prologue of some outdated web novel.
I suppose my imagination was just that poor.
Or maybe, this tiny room was the entirety of my final wish.
Reaching that conclusion felt a little bitter, and a little funny.
Following the unfamiliar ceiling, an unfamiliar laugh reached my ears.
The corners of my mouth, which had been twitching upward, quickly flattened.
"...?"
What was that?
What did I just hear?
"Ah. Ah. A-E-I-O-U?"
The ceiling wasn't the only unfamiliar thing.
Starting from my voice, down to my palms, legs, face, and chest.
Right now, it would be faster to list the things that were familiar, because everything else was a complete mystery.
And when I realized that I, a formerly paralyzed patient, had stood up naturally...
I couldn't hold back a scream.
"Kyaaaah!"
My scream was pointlessly pretty and delicate.
Name: Yu Nabi. Age: 18.
Gender... female.
Seeing as I wasn't waking up no matter how much time passed, it seemed I was destined to live in this body from now on.
I didn't have the power to change this situation. Nor did I have a reason to.
Even if this body didn't seem particularly robust, it was still infinitely better than my days as a quadriplegic.
Just being able to walk around on my own two feet was nothing short of a blessing.
I chose to adapt.
In that case, I needed to properly understand who I was now.
'First, let's check what I can see with my own eyes.'
The very first task was, of course, inspecting my body.
There were already a few things bothering me.
When I had briefly looked down earlier, I had noticed a massive presence.
I still couldn't bring myself to look down again.
With half dread and half anticipation, I stood in front of the mirror.
Standing before me was a girl so beautiful she took my breath away.
It went beyond mere prettiness; she was practically unreal.
Her smooth skin was a flawless, pure white.
Though she looked a bit pale due to a frail constitution, that paleness only added to her delicate, fragile charm.
And then, there was her chest, which naturally drew the eye.
I hadn't misseen it; the sheer volume of these white breasts was beyond imagination.
Despite having a body so slender it looked like it might snap at a touch, she possessed incredibly lush mounds.
When I cupped them from below, I could feel a heavy, substantial weight.
The soft, squishy flesh boasted a tempting texture against my palms.
When I reflexively squeezed them with both hands, a high-pitched squeak escaped my lips.
"H-Hic...?"
A sense of crisis shot up my spine.
No. This is dangerous.
It seemed Yu Nabi's face was very expressive.
In the mirror, I was staring back at myself with a beet-red face, looking utterly mortified.
At any rate, that was enough mirror-gazing.
Conveniently, I had discovered something while examining my changes.
'Is this a world where I was a girl from the very beginning? Something like that?'
The moment I saw Yu Nabi's face, several unfamiliar memories had flooded my mind.
Since then, I could recall them as easily as pulling books off a library shelf.
In other words, the current me possessed the memories of both Yu Garam and Yu Nabi.
My sense of self still felt stronger on the male side, but who knew how that would change in the future?
It was hard to ignore the physical reality of my new body.
Once I sorted through the memories, my surroundings no longer felt so alien.
In truth, it wasn't a very different environment to begin with.
The parents who raised me, and even my older sister who cherished me just as much.
The family I knew was still exactly the same.
The only thing that had vanished was "Yu Garam."
And the one who took his place was me, as "Yu Nabi."
For now, the best conclusion I could draw was that I had ended up in some kind of parallel universe.
As I continued to ponder, a knock sounded at the door.
Startled by the sudden noise, my heart began to thud loudly.
Only then did I realize I had one major problem.
"Nabi. Dinner's ready. Mom says to come eat."
"Y-Yes..."
Severe social anxiety.
My social skills were so abysmal it bordered on a phobia.
It was so bad that even when talking to my family, I could barely squeeze out a voice.
To be honest, even when I was a guy, I wasn't exactly a social butterfly.
But it certainly hadn't been this extreme. It seemed Yu Nabi's social anxiety was so severe she couldn't even attend school properly.
As a result, she had been living as a shut-in for several years now, without a single friend.
Ah, what am I supposed to do?
I don't think this is something that can be easily cured just by going to a hospital.
Still, maybe it would get better if I took medication and went to therapy?
Hmm, no. If I go to a clinic, I'll have to talk to the doctor.
Talk to a complete stranger?
Just thinking about it makes me shudder. Therapy is out of the question.
Wait.
Back when I was a guy, I had been hospitalized with total paralysis since around the age of ten.
It wasn't because of some tragic car accident; I had just contracted a strange, rare disease.
I heard later that the disease was named after me.
It probably became something like Garam Syndrome, or Garam's Disease.
Since Yu Garam doesn't exist in this world, that disease probably doesn't have a name yet.
Fortunately, my illness wasn't the type to cause unnecessary physical pain.
I simply lived as a quadriplegic until I died one day from a sudden seizure.
Since my body didn't hurt, the main struggle of my life was simply finding ways to pass the time.
Luckily, I had a way to alleviate that boredom.
I could still mumble a few words.
And I had a patient-care AI that could understand me and operate a screen.
In my hospital room, I would read novels, watch webtoons and movies, follow pro-gamer matches, or solve number puzzles when I had absolutely nothing else to do.
I was pretty good with numbers.
It wasn't because I had some lofty academic interest.
It was just that when I wanted to fill my head so completely that I couldn't think of anything else—to keep my thoughts from spiraling into dark places—nothing worked better.
In any case, even though I lived my entire life in a hospital room, I grew up seeing and experiencing plenty of media.
Right now, I absolutely had to go to a convenience store.
This was like a sacred covenant forged between authors and readers across countless novels.
As a reader of those stories, I wanted to experience it at least once.
"Welcome."
"..."
And the moment I stepped inside, I deeply regretted it.
A single, emotionless greeting was enough to freeze my entire body.
Seriously? It's this bad?
Is it really this severe?
I didn't even have to say anything. I just received a greeting, and yet goosebumps broke out all over my back as I froze up?
The saving grace was that real-life convenience store part-timers were different from the ones in novels.
The employee gave a perfunctory greeting and never looked my way again.
Since I was using my phone screen as a shield, I probably didn't look too strange.
To the employee, I was just someone who had paused for a moment to look at their phone.
If I just moved, grabbed what I needed, and paid, nothing would happen.
Right now, she was too busy texting someone to care about me.
Right. The employee wasn't a guy.
Come to think of it, there are only two genders, so there was no reason for every convenience store worker to be male.
It took me several minutes to calm myself down before I could move again.
'Chocolate. Where is the chocolate... Ah, it's right in front of me.'
Overjoyed, I swept up two of every kind of chocolate.
I was buying quite a lot, but a smile naturally spread across my face.
I hadn't been allowed to eat chocolate in the hospital.
After I had a seizure around the age of twelve, it was banned because some ingredient in it was deemed dangerous.
Since then, eating chocolate had been at the top of my bucket list.
Forcing my heavy feet to move...
And deceiving myself with excuses about the novels I'd read... It was all because I desperately wanted to eat chocolate.
I didn't even want to wait the few hours it would take for an online delivery.
Now, I just needed to summon my courage one last time.
I placed my precious chocolates on the counter, and as expected, the employee scanned them in silence. *Beep. Beep.*
Fearing she might say something, I handed over my allowance card in advance.
Please. Don't say a word.
You have nothing to say to me anyway. Just keep texting your friend or boyfriend or whoever.
I'll just pay and disappear. Please.
My wish was not granted.
It seemed God decided that granting me one wish was more than enough.
"Do you have a discount or rewards card?"
"..."
"Excuse me? No rewards?"
"..."
"You're not even wearing earbuds. Can you not hear me? Wow, you're really pretty, though. What middle school do you go to?"
"..."
The checkout took five minutes.
Fortunately, the chocolate was sweet enough to bring tears to my eyes.
A single tear actually escaped.