The Beginning

"Nanda kore?"

I woke up to something bizarre hanging in my field of vision. The shock of it was so complete that it took me a moment to notice how wrong the voice spilling from my own throat sounded.

Never mind how thin it was—wasn't the content itself weird? Sure, I'd watched a lot of anime, but I wasn't so far gone that I'd start muttering in Japanese. I wasn't even the type to talk to myself.

It didn't take long to realize the answer to whatever this was sat right there in the status window. Plenty of lines jumped out, but the one that mattered most was, of course—

If this window was, as I suspected, about the me of right now, then that meant...

"Watashi... I've become a woman?!"

I shouted it without meaning to, then startled myself. Good lord. Had I really just said that?

I plunged into a deep, spinning confusion. What on earth was going on? Even for someone who'd spent years watching anime, this wasn't a little hiccup I could shake off and walk away from. If this really was the kind of situation I thought it was, they could at least tell me why I'd become a woman. Waking up transformed, just like that—and with my nationality swapped on top of it!

"Sonna... This isn't the time! Hayaku!"

I bolted for the bathroom and checked the mirror. A complete stranger stared back from the place where I was supposed to be—a woman I had never seen in my life. The girl in the glass mumbled in a daze, her face a portrait of despair.

"Uso... Kore wa a lie! Watashi... what even..."

That hideous mash of Japanese and Korean drilled into my ears. Then a thought flashed through my head. Maybe this was a dream? Yes. That was it. This was all a dream. I'd secretly nursed a wish to become a woman, and now that wish had followed me into sleep.

"Mo yamerunda... I have to wake up."

Ba-ba-ba-bam~!

A fanfare blared, and the status window bloomed across my vision again.

"E, nani?"

I read the windows that had popped up in a flurry. Apparently I had to keep clearing quests to stretch the Transformation Duration—and that duration clearly meant this female state I was stuck in. It was a ruthlessly tidy system. Precise enough, honestly, that calling it a dream was getting harder by the second.

Following the oldest cliché in the book, I pinched my cheek.

"Itai!"

I rubbed the spot that had flushed red, but admitting this was real still didn't come easily.

"Status window, hidoi..."

So I was supposed to accept it. Overnight, my gender and nationality had both changed, and even my way of speaking had gone with them. Looked at in a certain light, maybe it wasn't entirely a bad thing.

I leaned in and studied the face in the mirror again.

"Watashi... I'm pretty."

Who could argue? The girl living in that glass was breathtaking. Until now ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I'd been sure Sea was the most beautiful person in the world, and this was enough to make that conviction wobble. Long black hair, brown eyes—not the loud, candy-colored look of an anime heroine, but a classic East Asian face. That did not mean average. If anything, she could stand next to most celebrities and not merely hold her own; she might even outshine them. Skin so white it showed not a single blemish, and huge, glistening eyes you could fall into—I could have stared forever and never gotten tired of them.

How hard was it to be born looking like this? On that count alone, I couldn't honestly call this a loss. The gender swap was a serious problem, of course—but I'd wanted to be a woman in the first place. Maybe that was a problem I could live with.

"This is... watashi."

If I just accepted it... could I spend the rest of my life like this? Erase the pathetic loser I'd been and exist as someone entirely new—different nationality, different gender, a different self.

There was one thing I couldn't simply step over, though.

"A look like this... how am I supposed to explain it..."

I didn't have friends to speak of, so that part I could skip. I did have a family. We lived apart now, but family is the sort of thing you eventually have to face. It wouldn't even be strange if someone called today. They weren't going to let this slide. It might be harder than coming out, harder than confessing I'd had gender-affirming surgery. Who would look at me now and think of the person I used to be? They were more likely to believe some unhinged woman had done something to me and was walking around in my name.

"Impossible desu after all..."

"Et? Muri!"

That was too much! Tell her right away? I wasn't ready. If I was truly going to live like this, I'd have to do it someday—but still. They say it's better to take the beating first. Was trying the right call? It was only an indirect question. I didn't have to spill the truth immediately, right? The status window didn't answer, but I decided to believe that anyway.

I went back to my room and picked up my phone. The friend count on KakaoTalk was a sad little joke. An elite force of ten names greeted me. Mother, Step-father, Sea—that was three. The other seven were army buddies and the high-school classmates I'd actually spoken to now and then. Needless to say, none of them counted as people I still talked to.

"Watashi... hikikomori desu ne..."

I'd always shrugged that off. Why did it sting today? Maybe becoming a woman had made me more emotional. I patted my cheeks to knock myself out of it and started composing a message to Sea. I agonized for nearly an hour over how to put it. The sentence I finally produced was this:

"Dame!!!"

I wailed. And I cursed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my fingers. It wasn't just the words coming out of my throat—my entire being had been swallowed by the bit. No matter how hard I tried to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠write like a normal person, that was all that would come out. Worse, I'd tapped send so naturally there was no taking it back.

"Ah! Delete it! Hayaku! Hayaku!"

I remembered the unsend function a beat too late and lunged for it.

"Sonna!!! The 1 disappeared!"

The 1 vanishing meant Sea had already read it. Faced with that irreversible fact, I could only squeeze my eyes shut and tremble.

Ka-tok!

The notification alone set my heart hammering. How had Sea reacted? With contempt, obviously. Something like, what is this kuso oppa—no, not like that. Were even my thoughts getting contaminated now?

This wasn't the time. I had to look. I was terrified of what might be waiting in the chat, but I cracked my eyes open and checked the phone with trembling care.

"I knew it..."

She'd tacked on a laugh, but I could see her face as clearly as if she were standing there. That look of contempt, then the forced decision to treat it like a cheerful joke and move on. The thought made a tear slip out.

"Et...? Honto?"

Sea said she was fine with it. She'd accepted me! I checked the chat again and again. Her I'm fine with it didn't vanish, because this wasn't a dream or a delusion. It was real.

"Heh heh. Heheheh."

I couldn't stop the laughter leaking out of me. Did I even need to?

The status window agreed! Sea would accept me like this too—I was sure of it. The thought brought a wave of relief so huge it almost knocked me over. Deep down, I'd been welcoming this. I'd only been lying to myself because I was so afraid of how my family would react. Having someone accept you... it was an enormous comfort. It was like that line from the poem.

One message from Sea, and I had become a flower. She'd told me it was all right to live like this. A single tear ran down my cheek. That day, for the first time in my life, I cried tears of joy.