Chapter 0 : Prologue

I was an orphan, abandoned to the world.

From my earliest memories, I grew up in an orphanage.
Even after becoming an adult and striking out on my own, I was always alone.

That’s why my heart longed for just one thing.
A family.

Of course, the bonds I formed in the orphanage were something akin to family.
But the other kids were more like friends than siblings.
And the director, kind as she was, felt more like a teacher than a parent.

What I craved was a real family.
I dreamed of myself smiling brightly in a warm, harmonious family photo.

But could a family that never existed suddenly appear overnight?

The only realistic path was to meet a woman I loved, marry, and build a home together.
Yet, in a world where I could barely feed myself, marriage felt like a distant fairy tale.

To me, a family was like a star shining brightly in the night sky.
Too far to touch, too distant to approach.
All I could do was gaze up each night, reaching out with empty hands.

Then, one day, my life changed after reading a novel.
It was just a random web novel I picked up to kill time.

At first, I was drawn to it simply because of its genre.
Not the usual modern or fantasy settings, but a cyberpunk story set in the near future—an SF subgenre.
It felt fresh, especially since it’s a niche genre in Korea, one that’s hard to pull off through text alone.

As I read, I marveled at the intricately crafted world and its detailed setting.
But what truly stole my heart was the protagonist.

He lost his parents at a young age to a brutal terrorist attack by a psychopathic villain.
His only sister was left paralyzed from the waist down.
Yet, despite the tragedy, he overcame adversity, becoming a fixer and living for his sister, relying on each other to survive.
It was a heavy story, in a way.

The novel depicted familial love—especially sibling love—so poignantly it pierced my soul.

In the highlight of the story, the tear-jerking reunion scene between the siblings, I broke down sobbing.

“Sob… Waaah…”

It took a while to calm down, but as I lingered in the afterglow, envy consumed me.

I’d always vaguely wished for a family, but after reading this, I desperately wanted a little sister.
The longing swelled beyond control.

I was insanely jealous of the protagonist, Ellen.

I want a little sister like Irene.

How happy would that make me?
For a sister like that, I’d give everything I have.

Of course, it was an impossible future.
As an adult, the only way I’d get a little sister was through reincarnation or possessing someone else’s body.

“Sigh. Time to sleep.”

My cramped, one-room apartment felt especially lonely tonight.
I turned off the light, lay in bed, and stared at the pitch-black ceiling, lost in thought.

If it’s impossible in reality, at least let me have a little sister in my dreams.
A sweet, kind sister like Irene.

With a prayer to no one in particular, I closed my eyes.

That was my last memory.

The problem is, only half my wish came true.

I did get a little sister.
And I was thrust into the world of the novel I’d been reading.

But my sister wasn’t Irene.
My sister was the psychopathic villain who killed the protagonist’s parents and left Irene paralyzed.

“Big sister?”

Oh, I forgot to mention— we’re not brother and sister.
We’re sisters.

Not an older brother, but an older sister…
This isn’t what I wished for at all.