Chapter 1: This is not superpower …

A single-player story game based on a famous superhero series was released.

Noble Heroes: Beginning.

In truth, it was from a different perspective than the original work, so it could simply be seen as a spin-off.

Like that game which swept the world, where you could freely explore the original world as the original protagonist in a magic school, this game was also released with similar expectations.

It was said to be very fun to progress through the game with high freedom and superpowers received randomly each time you started a new game.

However, there was a problem.

‘I heard this was ridiculously hard.’

They said the difficulty was insane.

Saving was possible, but since the game genre was roguelike, if you died, your save file would be deleted.

Players who weren’t good at games couldn’t even properly see the original story.

Given it was like this from the start, what do you think people’s reactions were?

Naturally, users were filled with complaints.

It had already become fully content, with countless streamers desperately trying to clear the game in one sitting.

Users pleaded for the roguelike elements to be removed so they could just progress through the story normally, but the developers did not grant their request.

In the end, users themselves developed a mod that prevented save files from being deleted upon death.

However…

“What’s with a difficult roguelike game in this day and age…”

This game, a roguelike, was so difficult it was called Souls-like.

For an old and ailing gamer like me, it couldn’t be anything but an unwelcome type of game.

In the end, my decision was to turn on cheats.

“I’ll just see the story and then delete it.”

Stat cheats.

There were also cheats to obtain desired superpowers, but this one was more reliable than the superpower cheat.

Still, shouldn’t it feel like a game to some extent?

If I just instantly got the superpowers I wanted, the fun of rolling the gacha would disappear.

Anyway, with just this cheat, I’d become overwhelmingly strong enough that there would be no reason to die, so there was no need to add other cheats…

Perhaps it was my remaining will as a gamer, not wanting to put in excessive cheats.

For someone playing without cheats, this would probably sound ridiculous.

That was the moment I applied the cheats and turned on the game.

“Hmm.”

I had entered the game.

No, it felt like I had entered.

– A-rank Hero, Blast. B-rank Villain Viper, who appeared in Songpa-gu, arrested… This year alone, he’s been arrested 37 times.

– B-rank Hero Blossom is now even appearing in dramas. Is this okay for heroes?

– S-rank Hero Thunder Emperor, drawing attention by declaring participation in the World Exchange Match… “I will definitely win,” he declared.

“What are these news reports…”

Since the news was broadcasting strange things, I couldn’t help but notice.

I had clearly been sitting in my chair just a moment ago, about to play a game, so why was I watching the news?

With the news broadcasting things like that, I couldn’t possibly not know.

“I’ve entered the game world.”

… That fact, to be precise.

‘Did I perhaps turn into a character?’

It didn’t seem so.

The place I was currently in was my original home.

Still, just in case, I stood in front of the mirror to check what had happened to me.

“Oh.”

I had indeed changed.

My height had increased overall, and while my face didn’t seem much different from before, my features were much more defined.

More than anything…

“What’s wrong with my body?”

At the sight of distinct muscles visible even through my clothes, I threw off my top.

Then, handsome yet powerful muscles were revealed.

At a glance, it was enough to make one think, “Ah, this person must have worked out really hard.”

Without exaggeration, it was at a level where it wouldn’t be strange to enter a bodybuilding competition right away.

‘But I’ve never worked out that hard?’

At first, I wondered if I had entered the body of someone who exercised diligently, but seeing my face wasn’t much different from my old one, it seemed that wasn’t the case either.

Of course, I hadn’t completely neglected exercise, but even so, this was a bit strange.

After staring at myself in the mirror for a long time, I suddenly felt the urge to pee.

‘Should I just go to the bathroom…’

If push came to shove, I could check in the bathroom.

Mumbling to myself, I moved towards the bathroom.

The moment I placed my hand on the doorknob,

*Crack.*

“Huh.”

The doorknob broke off.

What the hell.

“The doorknob shouldn’t have been broken…”

I had only applied the usual force to grasp and turn the knob to open the door.

But contrary to what I expected, the doorknob seemed unable to withstand my strength and twisted off completely.

‘Ah… I can fix this, right?’

Breaking out in a cold sweat, I checked if the doorknob had completely shattered down to its base.

Fortunately, it seemed only the knob itself had twisted off.

‘If it’s like this, I can fix it…’

If the doorknob had been completely ripped out, I would have had to replace the entire door, so this was a relief.

“I’m already broke, and I almost spent money on something useless.”

First, I should finish my business and then think about it.

****

Putting aside the minor blunder of almost breaking the toilet handle while trying to do my business as usual, I pondered what to do next.

First, I decided to take time to figure out what had happened to my body, including how to properly control my strength.

It didn’t seem like the world I originally lived in, yet aside from the entire world being full of people with superpowers, nothing else had changed, including my home.

My money was still there, and my house was still the same.

Looking at my contacts, my relationships also seemed unchanged.

‘So, did I gain a superpower too?’

It wasn’t impossible.

Of course, there were people without superpowers in this world, but I’d heard they were a very small minority.

These were the so-called ‘Powerless’ individuals.

In the original story, most people had superpowers, and the treatment of the Powerless was so terrible that even villains emerged from their ranks.

Of course, that particular villain developed their own tools and used them to commit villainous acts.

There was even another villain who researched forcibly granting superpowers to the Powerless…

Experiments were probably still ongoing somewhere in the world even now.

If this truly was the Noble Heroes universe…

I let out a deep sigh.

“My head hurts…”

Since I had mostly only watched the movies, I honestly didn’t know much.

I only knew general information about the world.

Since original stories often involve parallel worlds, knowing about the original wouldn’t help me understand what kind of world I was in, unless I was a fan who knew the original exceptionally well, so interfering was out of the question.

More than anything…

‘Noble Heroes is set in America, so Korea only appears very occasionally…’

Since I was in Korea, which had little to no connection to the original story, knowing about the original was largely meaningless unless I lived in America.

So, I decided to just accept it.

After all, nothing would change even if I stepped up.

“Hmm.”

Ultimately, I decided to check what my superpower was.

‘Why does my body feel so light?’

Even as I walked here, my body felt incredibly light.

Honestly, I felt a strange sense of omnipotence, like if I exerted a lot of force and jumped, I could leap over a building.

‘It must be my imagination, right?’

I hadn’t checked yet, so I didn’t know.

And checking it right now felt a bit awkward with people around.

Arriving in front of the hospital, I raised my head and looked up.

I’d heard that superpower examinations were done at hospitals.

It was free, which was a relief.

‘Still, I’ve come to a world where most people have superpowers, so I should at least have a decent one, right?’

With that thought, I walked into the hospital.

I almost pulled and knocked over the number ticket machine when trying to get a ticket, a minor mistake, but I brushed it off.

After telling the counter staff the purpose of my visit, I made an appointment for the examination.

Fortunately, there was no one else waiting for an examination, so I could get tested quickly.

After meeting with the doctor in charge and talking for a bit, I headed to the examination room.

I had worried if I’d need to exert force for anything, but thankfully, that wasn’t the case.

It was a simple examination: just enter the machine as instructed, get scanned, and it was over.

As I came out after the examination, a nurse immediately approached me.

“Mr. Ha Doyoon, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Yes, your test results are out, so you can go directly to the doctor in charge.”

The nurse’s expression, as she said that, was somehow strange.

It was a look as if she was gazing at something pitiful.

“Oh dear… He’s handsome and looks healthy, but how could…”

“It’s a pity…”

I could hear everything the other nurses were muttering to each other.

They probably thought I couldn’t hear them…

But I heard everything.

‘The distance is quite far, so why can I hear so clearly?’

Surely not, right?

With a somewhat complex and subtle feeling, I sat in front of the doctor.

The doctor, who had been intently staring at the screen, glanced over at me.

“Ah, are you Mr. Ha Doyoon?”

“Yes.”

“Well… please try not to be surprised. The test results are…”

Ah.

Right, that.

“… The test result is negative. Uh, that means… you are Powerless.”

The doctor said that in a mournful voice.

Of course, damn it.

It seems I’m destined not to live an easy life in this one either.