Chapter 1 : Tutorials

I’ve lived twenty-seven years—not a particularly long life—but if someone asked me what life is, I would answer without hesitation.

It’s shit.

And in that already shitty life of mine, something so unbelievably, incomparably, utterly shittiest-of-shitty happened.

This absurd, ridiculous incident all began with something as painfully cliché as poverty.

It may sound like an excuse, but because I was born with nothing and grew up with nothing, I’ve been greedy since I was young.

Even though I wasn’t in any position to want things, I foolishly did.

I never tried climbing trees that were far out of reach, but I always went on tiptoes to stretch my hand toward the low-hanging branches underneath.

There was a time I believed that the moment my fingers brushed them, the branch would bend and I’d be able to pluck the flower or fruit at its end.

As I grew older and a bit wiser, those almost-reachable branches turned, one by one, into illusions, and in the end only a single branch remained.

The fruit hanging from it—labelled “university”—became my only hope.

I used to think someone like me couldn’t have anything, but once I realized I was just a little better at studying than others, that tiny bit of talent grew into ambition.

Being “only” hope blurred my vision and numbed my sense of reality.

After clinging and clinging to it, I finally snapped the branch free.

At twenty, at an age that felt as if I’d become something impressive, I finally held the thing I wanted most in my hands.

Just like the saying goes, it felt like from here on, nothing but a path of flowers would stretch before me.

And before long, I realized something.

A branch that fails to grow upward is destined to wither and die.

The hope I once believed in so firmly didn’t just dry up—it twisted, crumbled, and turned to dust.

Back then, just like now, the biggest problem was money.

Choosing university naturally increased my expenses.

Not only from the simple act of attending classes, but also from the responsibilities expected of me now that I’d reached the supposedly “impressive” age of twenty, and from the weight of the university’s name I had wanted so badly.

All of that clung to me like justification, swelling monstrously until even the bottomless jar I’d been patching up finally shattered completely under the weight.

I filled every free hour outside of lectures with part-time jobs to scrape together money.

I took a leave of absence to work and pay tuition.

Then I worked again to repay what no one liked to call a debt—but absolutely was a debt.

Repeating that cycle over and over, seven years slipped by.

My classmates, seniors, and juniors gradually drifted away, and my grades tanked.

I didn’t have the time to earn the language scores or certifications everyone else treated as basic.

And so, I became who I am now.

Twenty-seven, and somehow still a college student.

A broke, connectionless, credential-less student with no future.

…Fine.
That was unnecessarily long-winded.

To put it simply, I, a broke twenty-seven-year-old college student, ended up taking a part-time job to make money.

The damn part-time job that created this entire shitty situation.

Browsing through a second-hand trading app, I happened to stumble across that part-time job, and the details were unbelievably simple.

They wanted someone to clear the ending of a game in their place.

But the payment listed was so high I wondered if my eyes were playing tricks on me.

Even while thinking it was ridiculous—like some pointless prank—my fingers quickly tapped the “Send Message” button.

[Hello! I’m messaging you about the game part-time job^^]

…Well, you never know.

And that “maybe” turned out to be correct.

The other person replied almost immediately.

They said there was a game they were playing, but they just couldn’t clear one particular ending and were looking for someone to do it for them.

The message, baffling as it was, came with a long string of crying emojis.

I hesitated, wondering if this was going to turn weird—and then a photo arrived.

It was a screenshot of the game.

An image titled “Ending List” displayed dozens of empty slots, and in only one—the very last—there was a single question mark.

Even without knowing the game well, the effort put into this looked too elaborate for a simple prank.

After a short moment of deliberation, I sent a message saying I’d do it.

I wasn’t in any position to be picky, and I’d never heard of some urban legend about people stealing organs through video-game requests, so I decided to trust them.

Still, the listed payment was suspicious no matter how many times I checked it.

Had they exaggerated it just to attract attention?

[Um, the price seems like a mistake, right? What amount were you actually thinking?]

As soon as I sent that, I got a completely unrelated wall of text in return.

It felt like something they had pre-written and copy-pasted: an introduction to the game, an explanation of the ending that needed to be cleared, and even their game account ID and password typed out in a long paragraph.

Only after that did a proper reply come through, as if they’d finally read what I sent.

[It’s not a mistakeㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ If you don’t trust me, I’ll send half as a down payment first! Please give me your account number!!]

Thinking back now, I must have completely lost my mind because of that unbelievably suspicious message.

Before reason could catch up, I typed out my bank account number faster than light and sent it.

Only after sending it did I think—wait, isn’t this dangerous?

But the moment 500,000 won hit my account almost instantly, my mind went blank all over again.

Luck has finally come to my life!

Even as of last night—after clearing the game’s ending and receiving the remaining 500,000 won—I firmly believed this part-time job was the greatest stroke of luck I would ever have.

Yes… until last night.

A few years ago, a junior I worked with on a group project once made an offhand comment.

They said they played a cookie-character running game so obsessively that they dreamed of becoming a cookie and running.

And when I woke up this morning, I thought something similar had happened to me.

That I had played the game too intensely for a few days and ended up dreaming about it.

Just as I was about to close my eyes and drift back to sleep, loud music blared right next to my head.

Assuming it was my phone alarm, I reached out my hand, but no matter how much I groped around, I couldn’t feel anything.

Struggling, I lifted my eyelids open.

…Huh?

The scene in front of me looked exactly the same as when I first opened my eyes.

Was I still dreaming?

The music assaulting my ears was far too vivid to be part of a dream, but the room—transformed overnight,

completely different, and in a style I had definitely seen somewhere before—could only be explained by calling it a dream.

Thinking it was just a very realistic lucid dream, I pushed myself up.

The music that pulled me out of my dream-within-a-dream was coming from the laptop on the desk in the corner.

When I pushed the half-closed screen open, bright fireworks exploded across it before fading into black, where

sparkling letters appeared:

“Please Take Care of My Idol.”

…An idol? Did the title change just because it’s a dream?

[This game restricts the use of young people under the age of 19]

…what does this mean?

[Proceed with adult verification]

The message window that appeared where the game title disappeared displayed only incomprehensible content in succession.

Since I was over 19 years old and certified as an adult, I frowned at the absurd words, but then I something stupid like, “Ah”.

Was this a dream?

When I remembered that everything happens in my dreams, I felt embarrassed. I can’t believe I’m dreaming of turning a decent all-user game into a 19-plus game…

For some reason, I was glancing down at my lower body, and a sound came out and the content of the message changed.

[Adult verification has been completed]

[Player’s ‘Please Take Care of My Son」 Play History]

[Player’s ‘Please Take Care of My Son」 Automatically Sync First Save Slot]

[Welcome]

The flashing text faded, the animated door swung open, and the familiar game screen appeared. It looked exactly like the room I’d been staring at for days in the game—right down to the sparse furniture… and exactly like the room I was standing in now.

“But where’s the character?”

The only difference was the missing protagonist. The moment I tapped the empty screen—zap! A sharp jolt shot through my fingertip.

“Ah!”

The tingling sensation felt as if electricity rose from the screen into my fingertips, so I retracted my fingers.

But, a very common thought passed through my mind.

‘You can’t feel pain in a dream… right?’

I looked down at my finger in confusion.

The tingling sensation was still there.

Blinking slowly, I raised my finger, which I was looking at just now.

Now, the easiest way to determine whether this is a dream or not…

“Ow!”

I pinched my cheek as hard as I could. Pain—real, undeniable pain.

Which meant… it’s not a dream?

And just like that, what I thought was the luckiest break of my life twisted into its worst nightmare.