Chapter 1
[You have passed the final trial.]
I lowered the blood-soaked sword.
When I raised my head, a notification announcing the end was blinking before my eyes.
'It's over?'
[Congratulations on passing the trial.]
'I see. It's finally over.'
The news that all the trials were over sent fatigue rushing over me.
I wanted to hurl this heavy lump of metal onto the ground, but ten years of ingrained habits would not allow me to discard my sword.
[As promised, player 'Kang Minjun' has been granted the right to cross over to another world.]
[Settlement for 'Destruction Dragon Galegos' begins.]
[Top contributor among survivors: Kang Minjun]
I silently watched the holograms appear one after another before my eyes and update themselves.
[As promised, top contributor 'Kang Minjun' has been given the opportunity to make one wish.]
A wish, huh.
[What wish would you like to make.]
I looked up at the sky filled with dark clouds.
"What a fucking pain."
That was the quiet thought I muttered at the end of ten years of trials.
***
Kang Minjun.
That's my name.
In some ways, it's a common and ordinary name.
I spent every day living as dully and ordinarily as this ordinary name of mine.
"Ugh, so boring. When the hell does this school day end?"
I had been practically forced to live at school from elementary school through high school.
『★Military Manpower Administration Notice』
After graduating, I became an ordinary college student facing the prospect of being drafted into the military like everyone else.
"Hey, Black Dick. Where are you going?"
Every now and then, an old high school classmate would grab me, mock me, and torment me—a thoroughly unremarkable life.
That ordinary life of mine vanished one day when an unwelcome guest came knocking.
[We have an announcement.]
No, the ordinary lives of all humanity vanished that day.
[As of this moment, Earth's lifespan has ended. Unfortunately, there is no plan to revive Earth, and exactly five hours from now, Earth will undergo the extinction process.]
"Huh? What's this?"
"What asshole is pulling a prank?"
A bizarre hologram had appeared before my eyes.
I still can't forget that moment.
Everyone walking through downtown Seoul stopped dead in their tracks and stared blankly into the air.
'Earth is going extinct?'
Was it because the method of notification was so bizarre?
Or because it was so completely out of the blue?
"Yeah, right."
People denied it, refusing to believe it.
"Pfft, what the fuck is this supposed to mean?"
"I think I know what this is. Isn't it one of those web novels where fiction becomes reality and an apocalypse breaks out?"
"What a cringe thing to say. That's just fiction writers dumping their delusions. How about living in the real world?"
"Hey, hey, how about rock-paper-scissors? The loser takes one for the team and yells status window as loudly as they can. Hehehe."
Some people took it as a joke.
The world was far too peaceful for anyone to seriously accept that Earth would disappear in two hours.
[From this moment, migration to other worlds will be possible.]
But the march toward destruction was steadily progressing.
[However, residents who wish to migrate must undergo an evaluation. Through the selection process, you must prove that you are useful bugs.]
Even at this point, no one was taking it seriously.
But then a blinding light flashed across the sky.
Fwoooosh-
As a veil of darkness descended and lifted, an extraordinary tremor shook the ground, and people's expressions began to change subtly.
Rumble...
[An asteroid has collided. Earth will be destroyed in 4 hours, 53 minutes, and 21 seconds.]
"……."
Silence settled over the city.
Though countless people were out in the streets, not a single person moved at that moment, as if time itself had stopped.
Once again, it was a notification that roused the frozen world.
Ding.
[Will you participate in the selection process?]
"W-What the hell is this saying!"
"Is it real? Is Earth really going to be destroyed?"
Everyone could feel that the air current brushing against their skin had changed.
They knew it was too strange to dismiss as a prank.
As time passed, that sense of wrongness took shape, and one piece of news quickly spread through the online communities.
-They say communications with Africa, the Middle East, and Europe are down.
-Bullshit.
-No trolling;;
The unsettling news that all communication with certain regions had suddenly been cut off.
Naturally, everyone's attention focused on one place.
-Anyone gone into the selection process?
-I'm in right now, but there's nothing special.
-Really?
-Dumbass, you actually believe that? I saw someone go in, and they just poofed away in midair;; They went in wearing clothes, but apparently electronics don't work—their smartphone just dropped to the ground with a clunk.
People began to accept reality.
More than grand reasons like asteroids or communication blackouts, the sight of people disappearing one by one before their eyes proved that all of this was real.
[Will you participate in the selection process?]
The selection process, also called the trials, began just like that.
The madcap spectacle of more than four billion people scrambling to cross over to another world and survive.
And I was among them.
…I glared at the cloud-covered sky, then slowly lowered my gaze to the hologram still floating in the air.
[What wish would you like to make.]
The screen blinked repeatedly, as if impatiently urging me to speak.
'I cleared the trials all the way to the end.'
I was the only one who survived.
I was the only one who could cross over to another world, Elysia.
'Then what's the point?'
What would I do alone in a foreign land where I had no connections?
What the hell would I do by myself in a place without a single person from my homeland?
So I had only one wish.
"I'll regress. I'll return to ten years ago with my memories intact and play this fucking game all over again from the beginning."
[You mean to repeat that arduous journey all over again?]
"Yeah."
A grand journey spanning ten years.
I had reached this place after crossing countless battlefields and hellish front lines.
And if I regressed with this knowledge and experience, I was confident I could do better than before and save even one more person.
[Wonderful. I have heard your noble intentions. However, such an altruistic choice is by no means wise. Why not end the trials here and begin a new life in a new home?]
"No."
I wasn't sacrificing myself to save more people.
I simply hated being alone, and I hated going alone to a foreign land.
If there had been even one.
Even if a single Earthling besides me had survived, I wouldn't have made this decision.
"I will go back solely for my own sake."
For the sake of my comfortable future.
"So I will regress to the past."
[I understand what you mean. You utterly selfish person! To satisfy that ugly desire, I will initiate your regression. I hope you enjoy the trials you face again.]
***
I've read a novel about a regressor wreaking havoc.
How light must the footsteps be of someone walking a future they've already experienced once?
[Your wish has been granted.]
[Error. An abnormal interference with the world has been attempted.]
[Checking for errors….]
[Access from a higher dimension confirmed. Correcting the error in accordance with the modifications.]
A pure white light enveloped my vision.
The light soon subsided, but my body grew heavy, as if I were submerged in water.
I frowned at the suffocating sensation and opened my eyes.
'Where am I? Judging by how heavy my body is, I guess I really did return to the past.'
But the air was too warm for this to be the tutorial zone.
Once my vision cleared, I was somewhat bewildered.
'A university?'
The scene behind the university's main building, now a hazy memory, came into view.
Leaves and flowers were in full bloom in the unmistakable warmth of spring.
'I really did come back? Ten years into the past?'
I was bewildered.
The moment I wanted to return to was the tutorial, not Earth.
I soon realized that I had made a serious mistake.
'I asked to be sent back ten years, and they really sent me back exactly ten years.'
As soon as I grasped the situation, I moved my hand to check the exact date.
Maybe it was because I hadn't touched a smartphone in ten years?
My hand moved awkwardly.
The feel of the device in my hand after ten years was both familiar and strange.
『May 27』
Worried that I might have read it wrong, I repeatedly turned the screen off and on. The numbers did not change.
'Everything began on May 30. That means I have three days left.'
The regression point I wanted was the tutorial, but this wasn't bad either.
No, it was actually better.
It was far more advantageous to go in with even a little preparation than to charge in empty-handed.
'I just need to prepare over the next three days. And make a plan for what to do next.'
My heart raced.
Honestly, I hadn't known whether regressing with my memories was even possible. I'd made the request half as a childish whim.
But my wish had become reality, and I'd been given an even better start than I'd expected. So I was grinning happily when—
"Is this bastard crazy?"
Whack.
"?"
Along with a stinging pain at the back of my head, I heard a woman's voice.
Yet her voice was strangely familiar.
"Black Dick. Before you get the shit beaten out of you, put every penny you have in front of Big Sis."
When I turned my head, a beautiful short-haired woman was glaring daggers at me.
"…Shin Seoyeon?"
"Have you seriously lost it? Now you're just calling me by my name?"
Shin Seoyeon.
She was in my class during my senior year of high school—a girl I'd been stuck with from elementary school through college, an ill-fated connection.
We got along okay in elementary school, but starting in ninth grade she went down a bad path and became a complete thug, school bully, and delinquent.
"Fuck, what are you staring at? Do you need another beating to knock some sense into you?"
But the real reason I was shocked to see her was something else.
Feeling the numb ache at the back of my head, I recalled a forgotten memory.
'Come to think of it, Seoyeon at this point was a bitch who'd thrown image management to the dogs.'
When I closed my eyes, I immediately recalled Seoyeon as I'd seen her a few days earlier, along with the voices gossiping about her.
-Look, it's Shin Seoyeon.
-Her figure is insane. How can someone with wrists and ankles that thin be ranked nineteenth?
The Witch of Crimson Flames, Shin Seoyeon.
Ranked 19th.
At least among fire mages, no one could match her.
When I opened my eyes again, the beauty who would become an S-rank mage stood at an angle, glaring up through her pretty eyes.
She supported her ample breasts with both arms, making them stand out all the more.