I watered the barley and beans and chased away the harmful birds until the sun went down. At night, I caught minnows with a disposable fishing rod made from branches I had picked up during the day.
The fishing rod broke every ti I caught a fish, but it was okay. I had filled my backpack with branches in preparation for such an occasion.
For the 30 minutes that corresponded to one day in the ga, dot-Yiwol did not rest even for a mont.
When the morning sun rose, he would run to the supermarket to sell the minnows, buy fertilizer with that money, spread it on the field, and then carry buckets of water. After watering the crops, he would pick up branches around the farm and then chase away the birds again.
There was so much to do at night, too. After realizing he could catch more expensive fish than minnows if he was lucky, dot-Yiwol couldn’t leave the riverside, like a water ghost, once the sun went down.
To buy a better fishing rod, corn seeds, and a sprinkler, dot-Yiwol worked hard without even laying his back on the bed once.
One day, after a week of this, the mayor ca to visit dot-Yiwol, who was about to harvest his first beans.
『Yiwol, how was your first week on the farm? Don’t you think it’s about ti you introduced yourself to the villagers?』
Don’t give that nonsense.
I don’t need it! I’m busy!
Get out of the way, I have to harvest the beans!
A quest window appeared, but I closed it as if to ignore it. Why should I have to give away my hard-earned minnows to the townspeople and greet them? They couldn’t even take care of a young man who had just moved to the countryside.
Don’t you feel sorry for , who has to sell minnows to buy seeds? Don’t you pity , who has to carry water with a bucket on a 100-pyeong farm while you guys are driving tractors!
I huffed and puffed and repeated the work of digging the ground and planting seeds until my fingers were about to break.
After chasing away both a crow and the mayor at the sa ti and planting barley, I heard the sound of a door opening.
“Hyung, our dinner is… hyung, you’re still playing the ga?!”
Jeong Seongbin was startled.
“It’s already been four hours! Doesn’t your head hurt?”
“It does. I don’t think I can buy a sprinkler within the second week no matter what I do.”
“I told you this is a healing ga!”
Due to Jeong Seongbin’s dissuasion, dot-Yiwol’s farm revival project ended in just one week.
At the sa ti, I ended up getting a warning that only an elentary school student would hear: that I should only play the ga for an hour a day.
I quietly watched as Jeong Seongbin saved the ga progress. With the ssage ‘Do you want to save?’, the playti and progress stage appeared on the screen in order.
“If I save it like this, I can continue from day 8 next ti, right?”
“Yes. It’s also possible to restart from the date you want. You can even replay from day 6, which has already passed.”
Jeong Seongbin pressed the calendar tab and showed the saved records. On the calendar, the pennies I had earned day by day were written down.
“The profit on day 4 was low. If I were to restart, I’d probably start there.”
“This is just ga money…”
Jeong Seongbin said in the tone he only used with Mr. Jeong Seongjun. I must look pretty pathetic right now.
“But the barley’s germination rate was bad that day too. If I restart, isn’t there a chance the germination will turn out differently?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure if the germination rate is a fixed value or a variable value.”
Saying it probably varied, Jeong Seongbin moved to press the quit button. And then, a thought flashed through my mind.
“So you an there are so elents that can be restarted, but also so that can’t?”
“Yes. For example, if you start the ga over from the beginning, the money will be reset, but the character na and design won’t be changed. Sa with the town’s geography. The playti will also be accumulated.”
“Instead, my money will go back to the beginning, and I’ll have to listen to the mayor’s explanation again.”
The more I heard, the more familiar this structure was.
A virtual world with clear lines between what I could control and what I couldn’t. NPCs issuing directives to the player.
“Did you say this was a healing ga?”
“Maybe not for you, hyung… but I heard the original intention was a mood-refreshing ga for modern people tired of urban society.”
And a clear sense of purpose.
“Seongbin.”
“Yes?”
“Then, what if…”
I carefully chose my words. Words that could be conveyed as clearly as possible.
“What happens if an error occurs in the ga? For example, if barley that should take two days to grow grows in one day, or a bug makes the store start selling the mayor, breaking the ga’s natural flow.”
“Um…”
Jeong Seongbin thought for a mont and then answered.
“Two thods would be the most representative. The ga company re-releases a version with the error fixed, or they roll back the ga.”
“Is that so?”
“Wouldn’t it be impossible to ignore it? Because bugs are fatal to the progression of the ga.”
I had never been particularly curious about a divine being in my life.
“I guess so.”
It seed the ti had co for to be curious. Very seriously.
* * *
At night, the mbers went back to their rooms one by one. I also lay in bed, pretending to be asleep, and closed my eyes. My head was busy with updates… or rather, organizing the things that had changed since I returned to the past.
Starting with the cancellation of my university admission and the acceptance of UA’s casting offer, when I traced back the tiline of the incidents, I could reach the scar on my back and my unfamiliar real na.
Seeing the size of the scar, I had thought that my noona’s existence might be uncertain, but I had tried to deny it. But now, I had to accept it.
‘Even things from before I was born could have changed.’
The age difference between my noona and , or her personal information.
Even the small traces of my noona that remained only faintly in my mory.
How far the system had interfered with surrounding circumstances, I couldn’t tell. That was why I needed to constantly doubt my mories even more.
Even if I managed to extract information about my noona from the mory data, there was no guarantee it would still be valid. The reasons to follow the system’s words had increased.
On the other hand, what hadn’t changed were my grades and college entrance records, the 15 million won deposit, so human relationships including the class president, and the high school I attended.
‘Is there any common thread here?’
The most likely candidate was whether or not outside interference existed. The high school I had chosen and the grades I had earned through my own studying hadn’t changed in the slightest.
It ant that the system did not intervene in the parts that I had decided and put effort into ‘from start to finish.’
This was also similar to the nature of the behavioral guidelines the system gave .
The system, if anything, urged to do sothing, but it never told not to do sothing or to avoid it. Even if it gave vague instructions, it clearly wanted ‘’ to move.
It was clear just by looking at the fact that it didn’t leave room for to use tricks behind the scenes or rely on the power of others.
Talking about work ethics or giving a self-PR score, and giving a penalty when I violated it, clearly contained the aning that I should take the lead and act.
‘But then there’s the 15 million won.’
The 15 million won was not money I had asked for. It was what my noona had lent . This part was what made unable to be certain.
But since I had no further clues, I decided I would sort things out gradually as more ca to mind.
Next, I speculated on how far the system’s intervention was possible.
A developer could guide a player’s actions. At the sa ti, they could raise or lower the player’s freedom.
The system, too, was guiding my actions with KPIs and final rewards. It adjusted my freedom with rewards and penalties, and had the authority to provide a record of ‘failed to normalize,’ which was no longer exposed to general users, as a reward.
And yet, while it wanted to prevent my death, it couldn’t fully protect . When beings like Yoo Hansoo and Hong Unseob appear, it could give a warning, but it couldn’t control the unspecified incidents they might cause.
To summarize, the system was ‘omnipotent in areas that transcend the human realm but cannot control individual humans.’ Just as it could insert or turn off specific functions but couldn’t change the basic settings of a ga.
It could drop my reputation to the bottom or make the company atmosphere grim, but it couldn’t make people like Song Minil suddenly like .
The only one this system could control like a puppet was . I was the only one whose mory could be erased, whose emotions could be controlled one by one. I was also the only one who could read others’ inner thoughts and use inhuman recovery abilities.
At this point, I had to ask. Why , of all people?
And the hint for this part…
‘Wouldn’t it be impossible to ignore it? Because bugs are fatal to the progression of the ga.’
…I had already received it from Jeong Seongbin.
Why, or what mistake I had made, I didn’t know.
I had touched sothing in the damn system’s world, and the system had rolled back my nine years because it wanted to resolve this situation. That much, at least, was certain.
Damn it, it must have treated like a parasite living in its utopia.
My head grew hot with anger. Right on cue, the system responded.
[SYSTEM] A work instruction from ‘Superior’ has arrived.
▶ Assistant Manager Kim, you’re finally showing so company life experience? You’re starting to understand how the company works, right? Keep it up like this. But don’t neglect your main job. Rember, this is all to help you adapt well to the company. Got it?
[SYSTEM] The ‘mber Resu Viewing Function’ is notified to ‘Subordinate.’
▷ As partial access to company secrets is granted, an opportunity to view the ‘mber Resu’ is provided to ‘Subordinate.’
▷ The ‘mber Resu’ can be viewed at any ti, but since it is information corresponding to a ‘Confidentiality Clause,’ external disclosure is prohibited.
▷ In case of direct or indirect disclosure of the ‘mber Resu’ information, ‘Subordinate’ may be subject to disciplinary action in accordance with the regulations for ‘Violation of Confidentiality Clause.’
Right, this is how you manage personnel information.
No wonder they hadn’t shown the résumés freely. For this, at least, I’d give them so praise.
I wanted to tear open the resus right away, but I held it in. Sudden rewards like this weren’t part of my priorities.
Instead, I stayed up all night, reflecting on whether I had made a mistake in my 29 years of life that was great enough to turn back the flow of ti, which no one could defy.
The only thing that ca to mind was the fight with my parents at my noona’s funeral. But even if that really had been the trigger, I knew that, in the sa circumstances, I would’ve made the sa choice again. So I decided not to dwell on it.
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