Chapter 1: The Old Man’s Inheritance Shouldn’t Have Been Touched

Since arriving in Japan, Mo Ke has been here for a whole year.
The initial thrill and excitement have long faded.
Now, he’s bored, even annoyed.
On the surface, Japan seems perfect.
But dig deeper, and it’s a hassle everywhere.
He’s fed up with the daily grind of people nagging him about that d*mn polite speech.
If he could, he’d replace all that honorific nonsense with ‘jerk.’

The day to return home is nearing.
His mood has lightened considerably.
Even when some Japanese guy makes snide remarks about his loud eating, he can generously ignore it.

No, he didn’t come to Japan for college.
At first, he thought he might casually enroll.
But now, he just wants to grab the inheritance his grandpa left and bolt back home.
He can’t delay even if he wanted to.
His funds for staying in Japan are nearly gone.

Mo Ke is an ordinary high schooler.
Well, an ordinary slacker who scored just over 200 on the college entrance exam.
Raised by his mother, he has no tragic backstory.
His family is well-off.
His mother runs a well-known company in the provincial capital.
Even without college, he’d live comfortably.
He could even snag a cushy, do-nothing job at her company.

But his mom, seeing his lazy, aimless attitude, decided to toughen him up.
She cut off his allowance and told him to get a job.
At first, Mo Ke thought, ‘If you don’t want me, I’ll find my own way.’
But after starting work, he quickly realized this life wasn’t for him.
Slaving away all day, barely sleeping, for peanuts?

He started missing school.
His mom, still soft at heart, gave him money and pulled strings to send him to Japan to study.
She also gave him a mission.
Find the inheritance his grandfather left behind.

Mo Ke has no memory of his grandpa.
The old man vanished in Japan long ago.
He wasn’t keen on this lousy job.
But his mom said if he found the inheritance, the money was all his.
That got his attention.

According to his mom, the inheritance was worth at least three million dollars.
Even without her support, that’s enough to coast for decades.
So, despite language barriers and no connections, he ditched his slacker ways.
He studied Japanese hard, reaching N2 level.
Now, he just needs to pass N1 to graduate perfectly.

But he didn’t learn Japanese to graduate.
He learned it to follow his mom’s clues to the inheritance.
The clue was a diary his grandpa mailed from Japan before disappearing.
The d*mn thing is in Japanese, heavy on kana, with sloppy handwriting.
Even now, he can’t fully read it.

He doesn’t get why his mom didn’t just hire a translator and fly to Japan to grab the inheritance herself.
But since he gets all the benefits, he doesn’t overthink it.
Maybe his mom doesn’t care about that ‘small’ sum.

“She’s so rich but gives me such a measly allowance, sent monthly… what a stingy mom…”
Mo Ke grumbles, setting his flashlight to its brightest.

The time has come.
He’s found his grandpa’s inheritance.
Deep in a mountain, through an abandoned shrine, lies a cave entrance.
It required a password.
Without cracking it, he’d have entered a month ago.

The cave is deep, not man-made.
It feels natural, with a shrine built over it later.
He’s been on edge the whole way.
Despite his materialist upbringing, this pitch-black cave sparks images of horror games in his mind.
Even if ghosts don’t exist, stumbling on a corpse would be freaky, right?

His footsteps echo in the empty space.
‘Creak, creak.’
Louder than that is his heartbeat.
He feels it might burst out of his chest.

“God, I hate haunted houses…”
He mutters, taking a few more steps.
Carefully turning a corner, he jolts at the sight of a coffin embedded with a cross.
“Holy sh*t!”

His heart races harder.
He feels dizzy.
Forcing himself to calm down, he thinks of the millions of dollars.
A free life, no nagging from his mom.
The fear fades a bit.

Mo Ke may be a rich kid, but his mom kept him on a tight leash.
His lifestyle was just above average, not extravagant.
He lives in an ordinary old neighborhood, no servants.
He doesn’t have the rich kid attitude of scoffing at small sums.
To him, a few million dollars is a fortune.

“Maybe I’ll start a company with it.
Yeah, make cute girl games… hire only cute girl artists.
No Koreans, too much plastic surgery, heh…”

His flashlight flickers, snapping him back.
He stares at the coffin.
According to the diary, the inheritance is inside.
But it’s a coffin.
He’s worried there’s a dried-up corpse in there.
Probably his grandpa.
Still creepy as h*ll.

“Whatever, open it!
The password is ‘WAHKL’…
Yup, there’s a password device on the coffin.
It’s got power.
What kinda f*cking alien tech is this…”
Desire trumps fear.
Mo Ke brushes off the dust, opens the password panel, and enters the letters.

Half a minute passes.
Nothing.
“Sh*t, no way, wrong password?
It can’t be.
I solved the riddle, didn’t I?
Did I mess up?”

Gulp.
The ground suddenly shakes.
Nervous and excited, he steadies himself against the wall.
The coffin lid slowly opens.

As he focuses, a wall beside him slides open.
A withered corpse tumbles out.
He nearly turns into a cartoon cat, clawing the wall to escape.
“F*ck!
Old man, don’t scare me like that!”
His voice trembles.

The corpse holds a leather scroll, looking important.
Mo Ke looks away, gritting his teeth.
He grabs the scroll’s edge and slowly pulls it out.
Unrolling it, he sees brown handwriting.

[My descendant, the inheritance from our ancestors lies in the coffin.
It’s something money can’t measure.
Drink it, and you’ll gain extraordinary, unimaginable power…]

Mo Ke tilts his head, eyeing the fully open coffin.
It’s empty except for a glass bottle of deep red liquid.
“All this for no cash…”
He slumps to the ground, deflated.
“Old man, are you kidding me?
Something money can’t measure?
Will drinking this turn me into Ultraman or Kamen Rider?
Come on, this is the modern world.
Be scientific!!”

Furious, he grabs the glass bottle.
Fear’s gone.
He’s so mad he wants to kick the corpse.
“It’s been f*cking years.
Even if it’s wine, it’s undrinkable, right?
Wait… maybe it is wine?
Three-hundred-year-old wine?
That’s valuable, but not priceless, right?”
He mutters, holding the bottle up.
The flashlight makes the ruby-like liquid gleam.
“Could there really be superpowers?
Drink this and get Superman strength?
Hiss…”

He hesitates.
Three minutes of thinking later, he grips the cap.
“I’m already f*cking here.
Not drinking would be a waste.
Maybe, like in superhero shows, I’ll get chased by villains if I leave.
I need power now, or I’m screwed.
Whatever, I’m drinking!”

He smashes the cap off with the flashlight.
A ‘hiss’ of escaping gas sounds.
Gulp, gulp, gulp—
He downs the red liquid, glancing at the bottle.
It’s empty.
The taste…

“Why’s it like Cola?”
He blinks, puzzled.

The ground shakes again.
Walls shift around him.
The coffin moves, revealing a glowing red magic circle beneath.
He realizes his grandpa might not have lied.

Before he can think more, the world spins.
When she wakes, a glowing mirror stands before her.
In it, a silver-haired girl in ill-fitting clothes.
She blinks her red eyes, touching the mirror.
The cold surface makes Mo Ke jump.

The girl in the mirror mimics her.
“Aaaaah—!?
Huh?”
Backing up, she looks down.
The girl in the mirror is her.

She pinches her cheek hard.
It hurts.
Not a dream.
The empty glass bottle rolls on the ground.

So…
The inheritance for superhuman power…
Was turning into a girl?!

Mo Ke lunges at the corpse, shaking it like it’ll fall apart.
“Hey!!
Old man, get up!!
What’s with this family inheritance turning me into a f*cking girl?!”