Swish—
A gust of wind swept through, tousling his hair. A system window that clearly wasn’t ordinary appeared before his eyes, but Cha Eui-sung couldn’t tear his gaze away.
In the midsummer heat, under the bright daylight, that so-called “Demon King” had just passed by, his face veiled in a guise of normalcy.
“…Sir.”
For a split second, almost in a trance, he nearly pointed out the other’s non-prescription glasses. It was only after noticing a subtle twitch of the man’s eyebrow that he snapped back to reality.
Cha Eui-sung quietly shut his mouth and swiftly averted his gaze elsewhere.
“…Yes, I’ll be careful.”
He felt that if he kept staring into those eyes, something about him would be exposed.
With a slightly crumpled expression, as if thinking what a weirdo, Moon Tae-young looked him up and down once before walking past.
Cha Eui-sung brushed the dust off his wrinkled pants and cautiously turned to glance behind him, moving his feet again as he listened to the thundering beat of his own heart.
It was him. He really was the Demon King. Even if he ignored his own instincts, the system had just confirmed it moments ago. And once again, he was roleplaying some ridiculous King in a cliché Hero vs. Demon King scenario.
At the same time, it seemed the system had rewarded him with something—though it was cryptically redacted and made no sense. He had no time to look deeper. There’s nothing weirder than someone standing in the middle of the street staring blankly into space.
Cha Eui-sung headed straight for the outskirts of the village. A dust-covered car shimmered in the scorching sunlight, the air above it rippling in waves of heat. He calmly opened the car door, got in, and locked it. Only then did the tension finally release.
‘What the hell… is it even legal to hire someone like a Demon King as a teacher?’
Would the disobedient students start disappearing one by one starting tomorrow?
He reflexively tried to search recent missing person cases in the area, then stopped and lowered his phone again. If multiple incidents had occurred in a small countryside village like this, it would’ve made the news.
‘So that means… he’s actually lived here quietly without causing trouble?’
If Cha Eui-sung, who had complete control of the Hunter Association, hadn’t heard anything about this place for the past ten years, then it meant practically nothing had happened.
‘Did the Demon King seriously commit himself to playing the role of a countryside teacher?’
He didn’t know what the deal was—but what mattered was that, for the first time in his life, his gauge had gone up.
[SAVIOR GAUGE]
■□□□□□□□□□
□□□□□□□□□□
5%
A whole 5%! Just from meeting him once!
If things kept going like this, wouldn’t he only need to run into the guy 19 more times to hit 100% and wrap up this bizarre world-saving mission?
Rather than feeling hopeful about how easy the mission might be, Cha Eui-sung was filled with suspicion. Missions where you bust someone’s head open never turned out this easy.
If this could be resolved just by casually running into the guy, there’s no way the system would’ve gone to such absurd lengths to hand out rewards.
[Passive] Faded Photograph Fragment
—░░░’s memory ░░░░%%&—
—The weight of the collected memories adds burden to the law.
Could this even be called a reward?
‘Why the hell is that part censored…?’
It felt ominous. The fact that the system was pretending this was some kind of game and handed him an S-rank passive skill only made it more suspicious.
After all, a passive skill meant it was active at all times, but Cha Eui-sung hadn’t felt any kind of change since he received it.
And “memory”? The supposed explanation had huge chunks erased—he had no clue whose memory this was or what it even did.
The system had even sneakily hinted that there was a restriction. From the looks of it, the so-called “burden of the law” was the problem—whatever the hell that meant.
Narrowing his eyes, Cha Eui-sung stared silently at the mysterious “gift” he couldn’t make heads or tails of. He’d just been given an S-rank skill, but instead of euphoria or excitement, all he felt was a strange sensation creeping in.
His chest felt queasy. His temples prickled from the inside, almost like an itch he couldn’t scratch…
“Hoo!”
He took a deep breath, hoping to blow away the weird feeling. His eyes briefly flicked toward the direction of the school.
‘Still, if it’s a gift, it probably won’t harm me. Right? Unless the system’s gone completely off the rails.’
Cha Eui-sung muttered to himself internally. Believing that made it a little easier to breathe.
***
“What’s a young man doing coming down to a place like this? It’s not even a resort.”
“That’s what I’m saying……”
Cha Eui-sung signed a lease on a house right away. Not too small, not too big, nothing flashy, but not shabby either—a home that blended in.
He hadn’t wanted a yard or anything, but apparently land was plentiful here, and so a rather sizable plot held a solitary house plopped right in the center.
‘Wow, that wallpaper…’
They’d boasted about redoing the place because the owner’s son and his wife were supposed to move in. But the vintage vibe, with giant red flowers stamped across the walls, clashed violently with Cha Eui-sung’s sense of aesthetics.
Sure, in his first life he would’ve slept anywhere with a roof. But in his second life—right up until his return—he’d been living in a luxurious penthouse with a scenic view.
He barely used it for more than sleeping because of work, but still, the soothing feel of a well-designed, fragrant, high-ceilinged home was undeniable.
And yet…
‘It smells.’
This new house gave off an odd scent—something like dirt, maybe mustiness. The ceilings were low, the rooms all awkwardly small.
But the real kicker was the bathroom. Aqua-green tiles embedded into cement walls paired with a purplish toilet—just looking at it was enough to kill any urge to go.
He could manage to live here, sure. But it was far from satisfying.
He considered moving into the town proper. Maybe the wide farmlands were the reason the available houses were all so off-grid. If he expanded his search range, there might be way better options.
But if he wanted to bump into the Demon King by chance, playing the part of a local, this location was the best possible base.
Right. It’s not like he hadn’t endured worse. He just didn’t like the countryside in the dead heat of summer, that’s all.
As soon as the sun set, the high-pitched chirring of bugs echoed from every direction. Cha Eui-sung lay on a wooden platform in place of a porch, blankly staring up at the night sky.
A few stars dotted the darkness, but none of them registered. All he could see in his mind was the Demon King—first from before his death, then again from their encounter in front of the school.
‘Those glasses… are they an item?’
He remembered hearing about masks or robes that blurred a person’s presence. Some obscure foreign loot, if memory served. Maybe the glasses the Demon King wore were something like that.
Or maybe the glasses were just a decoy, and the real trick was a skill.
Either way, what really piqued Cha Eui-sung’s curiosity wasn’t the Demon King’s presence—it was something deeper.
Why would someone who looked so completely normal wish for the end of the world?
If Cha Eui-sung had that kind of power, he would’ve used it for himself—to live well, to thrive. Even if it had to be used to destroy the world, he would’ve found a loophole. The outcome would’ve been the same.
He couldn’t say it aloud anywhere, but even after working at the Hunter Association for years, he had no real interest in things like justice. What mattered to him was a happy life. In his second life, he’d even convinced himself he’d regressed just to chase that happiness.
‘Better than suffocating through this summer heat in some dumpy countryside village with an F-grade body…’
That uncomfortable memory kept bubbling up.
Once he realized it, even the insects’ chorus began to grate on him.
“Goddamn it.”
He picked up a small rock and hurled it into the buzzing grass as hard as he could.
POP!
It sounded like a BB gun went off, and the noise in every direction cut out in an instant. In the sudden silence, he slumped back onto the wooden platform.
As soon as he made up his mind to look, it appeared—a faintly glowing system window against the dark.
SAVE THE WORLD
—Protect the Earth!
“You son of a bitch!”
Screw it. If it’s come to this, he was definitely going to be happy. He would be happy. To do that, he’d stop the end of the world. Starting tomorrow, he was going to stick to the Demon King like glue.
He’d figure out what raised the gauge, what he had to do to dig into the Demon King’s secrets—everything.
Until then, he would keep pretending to be this ridiculous “Savior of Earth.”
***
His vision blurred, then returned.
He didn’t know why he was breathing so heavily. A large, pale hand reached toward him.
“It’s okay. I get it.”
He didn’t even know what the voice was talking about, but that gentle, soothing tone—it felt oddly comforting.
Suppressing the emotion that surged in his chest, he lowered his head. A strong arm wrapped around him and pulled him in.
“It’s okay. I…”
A soft whisper began at his ear.
“I think I can fix this.”
His heart suddenly plummeted. The dream began to dissolve into mist.
Right at that moment—when his consciousness started to rise back toward the surface of wakefulness—
That voice. It felt familiar. Like he’d heard it before. Was that just his imagination?
***
Chirr— Chirp—
The sound of insects faded. The edge of the sky turned pale. Night ended, and morning began.
Cha Eui-sung lay there half-sprawled across the porch like a corpse, blankly staring at the scene. His hair was a mess, like it had survived a war.
“Fuck.”
The curse slipped out in a groggy mumble. Even with his S-grade body that rarely felt fatigue, he was completely burnt out.
The night had been way too long.
He’d only slept for two hours, then woken from a strange dream—and since then, he’d just been lying there, staring at the sky.
As he blankly watched the empty night sky, old memories began to slowly creep in, consuming his mind.
