The world is filled with things so beautiful they’re beyond words—and things just as hideous.
Likewise, towering happiness that seems endless, and despair so deep it feels bottomless, coexist in abundance.
If all of that were evenly divided among the population, just how much rise and ruin would each person carry?
Moon Tae-young thought that, for someone who’d drawn so much pity from others, he was perched on the gray border between happiness and misery.
Sure, he’d had more than his fair share of suffering dumped on him, but considering all the miseries in existence, his life wasn’t tragic enough to be called a true catastrophe.
“It’s not like watching your parents die in a horrific accident is common, but still, he survived—barely.”
“He later lost his last remaining guardian in a murder, but there were already many children in the orphanage who had lost or been abandoned by both parents.”
Reaching that conclusion—something that could be summarized in just two sentences—had required a grueling and chaotic path.
Still, Moon Tae-young had been fortunate enough to realize early on that self-pity did nothing to help you survive.
What had already happened couldn’t be changed, so the best thing to do—for both body and soul—was to hope for a better future. That’s what he believed. Or at least, he thought he did.
Until one day, when he woke up to find a stack of half-graded test papers lying beside him.
Moon Tae-young had traveled back twelve years. Even without checking the date, he could tell. Error messages were flashing erratically in front of his eyes, broken and scattered like glass.
[ 10??? ! ?! ? ! ]
[!!!aniyo aniyo!]
[ !10 12-yeon ? gwageo ! ]
[gwageo !!!dollyeotsseubnida?!]
A window trembled into view and then abruptly vanished. Then, a status window appeared in its place.
[Moon Tae-young (S)]
&!!##&’s Proxy
!
!!
! !
[ ! ! ]
—Black Veil (S)
—Lightning Strike (A)
—Counterattack (D)
—! !! (??)
Though he’d supposedly gone back twelve years, he could only clearly recall about four years’ worth of memories.
He just instinctively knew that the bizarre message from earlier hadn’t been a lie.
Caught in a strange, scrambled haze—like wallpaper poorly torn off and then sloppily repasted—there was only one clear piece of information that surfaced in his mind…
“Cheongseri…”
A village where a dungeon existed—one that wouldn’t have appeared unless he had opened it himself.
CRACK!
Wondering if he’d lost his mind, he clenched a water glass in his hand. The glass shattered in his grip. No blood spilled. Not even a scratch marked his skin. Even after waiting for what felt like forever, he didn’t wake up.
Resigned to the truth, Moon Tae-young began scanning the house for objects he could break, anything to test reality.
Bzzzzt—
Just then, the silence was broken by a text notification.
[Jeong Seong-hyu Clinic Appointment Notice
Moon Tae-young-nim
20XX-XX-XX, 17:20
Please contact us in advance if you need to reschedule.]
Reading the message, Moon Tae-young recognized the name and let the phone slip from his hand with a soft thunk. A sharp, high-pitched ringing buzzed in his ears.
Even now—after all this—he still hadn’t woken up. This wasn’t a dream.
He had really been thrown back into the thick of unbearable pain once more.
Accepting reality, Moon Tae-young calmly stared at the corrupted system window. And as he did, something cold and quiet began to flicker to life deep within—a spark that had been dormant for a very long time.
Three years from now, he would visit Jo Tae-jong, who was under psychiatric custody. After tying up the loose ends of his life, he would murder Jeong Seong-hyu, the psychiatrist who had been offering him free counseling sessions. He would then be arrested without resistance. Only the earliest memories from prison remained. Beyond that, he couldn’t recall what sort of life he had lived.
[ ? !! !?! ! ]
But that didn’t matter now.
What mattered was this: He had returned twelve years into the past, carrying an S-rank Awakening value—and classified knowledge about a hidden dungeon.
[Special] ! !! (??)
—Destroys a worthless world and converts it to ░░
And for some unknowable reason, born from an incomprehensible will, he had been granted a bizarre choice.
The fate of the world now rested in his hands.
***
“Then you’ve been here for just under two years?”
“Yeah, about that long.”
“What brought you to a place like this, anyway?”
Cha Eui-sung mumbled as he leaned to the side. Thunk—he rolled off the beanbag and onto the floor. The soft, trembling texture of the plush rug pressed gently against his cheek.
“You picked a good rug.”
“Glad it’s useful.”
“That’s not a ‘glad’ face, though.”
“It’s not like I laid it down so you could roll all over it.”
Despite his words, Moon Tae-young came over and sat beside him, both hands holding the drinks Cha Eui-sung had brought.
Clink. As he set the cup down on the low table, Cha Eui-sung offered some absurd excuse about jet lag and laid his head down on Moon Tae-young’s lap. Moon Tae-young flinched slightly.
“Do you need a pillow?”
“Nope.”
Was he asking that even though he already knew the answer? Out of politeness? Or to test the waters?
Cha Eui-sung closed his eyes deliberately, as if flaunting the moment, inhaling the scent of him. It was oddly fragrant—more than usual. Had he actually bathed in anticipation of someone coming over?
And yet he didn’t even look happy to see me.
Only thirty minutes had passed since arriving in Cheongseri. Cha Eui-sung hadn’t even dropped by his own house—he came straight to Moon Tae-young. Just seeing the roof made him feel unexpectedly relieved. People really were creatures of habit.
The moment he walked through the door, he’d dropped onto the beanbag and started babbling whatever came to mind. Moon Tae-young kept reading his book, treating the chatter like background noise. They were almost two meters apart. No one would guess they were lovers reunited after days apart.
Still, the fact that Moon Tae-young eventually came over and sat next to him again meant he wasn’t completely indifferent. Besides, Cha Eui-sung had been the one who fell first.
“Oh right. I brought something good.”
He spoke with his eyes still closed, and Moon Tae-young felt a light touch through his hair.
“What’d you bring?”
“Me.”
“……”
“Kidding. Just some chocolates.”
The joke fell flat again. But by now, he was so used to being brushed off, he barely felt it. Time with Moon Tae-young was always quiet, so lately Cha Eui-sung had started trying out bits of humor he’d picked up here and there. Still, nope. They didn’t land. Maybe it was time to raise the gauge a bit.
[SAVIOR GAUGE]
■■■■■■■■■■
□□□□□□□□□□
48%
Even now, with his head resting on the guy’s lap, they were “close enough” for this… and still only at 48%. Incredible. At this rate, even after seeing everything there is to see, he’d be lucky to hit 80%.
What kind of intense, stubborn connection had he shared with the lover in that Faded Photograph Fragment, anyway? Was it one of those movie-worthy romances, where someone sacrifices their life for love? If the end of the world hinged on that kind of love, maybe it was that serious.
“It’s got whiskey in it.”
“You’re not gonna get drunk.”
“I know. I just bought it ’cause it was the most expensive one.”
“Because the packaging looked cool?”
“No… You already saw it. Why’re you even asking?”
His eyes shot open, locking onto Moon Tae-young’s. At some point, the man had put down his book and was watching him. Surprisingly, his lips curved ever so slightly. Cha Eui-sung, dazed, reached out and gently tapped the corner of his mouth.
“Was it really that comfortable?”
He asked without any buildup. Moon Tae-young raised one brow.
“What answer would you like to hear?”
“Kinda cruel to ask that, don’t you think?”
Whether he grumbled or not, Moon Tae-young caught his hand, lowered it from his lips, and held it down briefly. When he let go, a faint soap scent clung to Cha Eui-sung’s fingers.
Then, out of nowhere, a low voice posed a question.
“What’ve you been doing?”
“Hm?”
It was the first time Moon Tae-young had shown any interest in his outings. Ever since the day Cha Eui-sung had left a decorative medicine packet on the table, the man had stopped asking altogether—as if he’d already figured it out.
Cha Eui-sung closed his eyes again, recalling the tightly packed schedule he’d been on. When he thought about Jeong Seong-hyu, now tangled up with the Demon King, he couldn’t help but chuckle.
There’s no way this guy would ever know what he’d really been up to. That thought gave him a strange sense of victory.
“Just… this and that. Didn’t feel great, though.”
He turned his head, cheek pressing into the cushion, which made his voice come out a bit muffled. Staring at the shadow beneath the table, Cha Eui-sung mulled something over.
With the gauge nearly at 50%, he’d already come pretty far. He still couldn’t interfere directly with Moon Tae-young’s affairs, but it was about time he started nudging closer to the problems that could trigger the world’s destruction.
Like his family issues, which Cha Eui-sung already knew. Or the revenge he suspected was brewing.
Love mattered, sure—but the ultimate goal was to stop the apocalypse. And more than anything, Moon Tae-young’s previous lover had probably shared conversations like this with him too.
So eventually, Cha Eui-sung carefully brought it up.
“Why did you come here, Moon Tae-young?”
“That’s sudden.”
“Mm… I’m just curious. My hyung told me this village doesn’t suit me, but honestly, I don’t think you fit it either.”
“Hm.”
He gave the briefest indication that he was listening, though it was impossible to tell what he was thinking. Cha Eui-sung turned his head again to look up at him.
“I mean, at your age, it’s rare for someone to move to some middle-of-nowhere village—especially one where even the convenience store is long gone.”
“True.”
“So yeah, I’m curious about your reasons.”
“You’re asking pretty early, don’t you think?”
“Would you have told me if I’d asked back then?”
The exchange felt like a game of ping-pong—no one yielding an inch. Still, at the last question, Moon Tae-young rubbed his chin for a moment. Then, what he said next was oddly funny.
“If you’d asked then, I probably would’ve given a different answer.”
He admitted, outright, that he would’ve lied. Boldly, even. Not that Cha Eui-sung had expected any less.
The problem was, even the new, “evolved” version of the answer he’d give now probably wouldn’t be much closer to the truth either.
Cha Eui-sung let out a quiet, hollow laugh and asked again.
“Then what if I ask later? Not now.”
“Later as in when?”
He stared into his eyes, slow and deliberate.
“That later.”
You get it, right? The “someday” you’re thinking of.
At some point, Moon Tae-young had stopped playing with his hair, his hand frozen mid-motion.
