Chapter 1 The Greatest Moment

“Congratulations. With this victory, the final victor of the United Grand Slam is now Team SKY. Everyone is saying that you, the director, is the greatest contributor to this achievement. What do you think about this?”

Lee Sanghyuk rejected the majority of interviews that flooded him after the victory, but he couldn’t reject the one from LGN(Live Game Net), who broadcasted most of Team SKY’s plays live.

“The victory is all thanks to the players and the coaches. I’m merely someone that just advised them in trivial matters.”

A humble answer. However, this was just for the interview. Sanghyuk himself knew that he was the one who practically lead Team SKY to victory.

The ‘Heavenly Dragon Card Deck’, used by the ‘Crash’ Choi Sangryul, the ace of Team SKY, and known to be the strongest man of EL(Eternal Life), was also created and completed by him.

He received full support from SKY Telecom to create the greatest player known as Choi Sangryul, realizing the theoretically strongest class, the ‘Card Master’. The one who received the benefits of the class was naturally Choi Sangryul.

Many other things were completed through his hands as well. In fact, Team SKY was practically created and raised to this point by Sanghyuk’s efforts alone until now.

In the first place, SKY Telecom had almost disbanded and rebuilt their team, since their team had placed last in ‘EL Master League’ for three years straight. When Sanghyuk caused an online uproar, they approached him, saying that they will support him with their full power to transform Team SKY into the greatest team in 3 years and Sanghyuk had indeed fulfilled his promise and created the perfect Team SKY within 3 years. Of course, many things happened midway, but Sanghyuk kept his part of the promise.

“You’re being too humble. The fans already know.”

“I only said the truth.”

Sanghyuk was not the hot-blooded youth in his 20s but was in his 30s. Not only that, he would be a middle-aged man in his 40s in just 4 years, so he didn’t like flashy interviews like the young directors out there.

Naturally, the interviewer didn’t like such a style. Perhaps due to that, the reporter created a surprise question on the spot.

“Then can you confirm this as well? Recently, there is a rumor that Team SKY will bid farewell to the director in several online forums. Is this true?”

“They’re baseless rumors.”

Sanghyuk kept it short. In the first place, this wasn’t a question that was on the script, so there was no need for him to speak for long. However, what he was thinking was completely in contrast to what he had said.

‘It’s true. It’s annoying..… but it’s true.’

In fact, he had actually been notified of the dissolution of the contract. However, this was news that would be announced in 3 months, so saying it now may cause legal issues.

The reporter made a slightly dissatisfied expression at Sanghyuk’s disinterested response and continued to the interview. Normally, others would at least try to give a funny answer, but Sanghyuk only repeated his stiff expression and answer as if to tell the reporter why he was called the ‘Ice Man’.

In the end, the interview ended without any twists. The reporter, who was frustrated that she couldn’t get any good content out of this interview despite knowing, threw a final question that wasn’t in the script.

“Is this the greatest moment that director Sanghyuk has dreamed of?”

Sanghyuk replayed the question in his mind.

The greatest moment……. Thinking about the meaning of that, and his own reality, he smiled slightly and opened his mouth to speak.

“Of course. Right now is my greatest moment.”

This was also a lie.

This could never be the greatest moment.

Although he reached this place by crawling up from the depths of despair…… the ‘greatest moment’ he wanted wasn’t something like this.

The interview had ended, but Sanghyuk sat still for quite a while, thinking about the last question that the reporter had asked him.

‘The greatest moment I really wanted…… It will probably never come true……. So then, this is the realistic limit I can reach, I guess?’

Sanghyuk made a bitter smile and shook his head.

What was more frustrating was that the realistic limit he had just reached was about to be taken away from him.

Although it was indeed his fault for not checking the contract properly, this was going too far. Everything was practically achieved by his efforts alone, but they were forcing him to give up everything.

It was true that there was a clash of opinion between him and the SKY Telecom side, but never did he imagine that they would strike him on the back of his head like this.

“Haa…… I’m tired.”

He sighed and muttered with a vain expression.

He had mostly lived a life where he was deprived of. And now, he was about to be deprived of something again, so it was no wonder that he felt everything was useless.

“Just where did it go all wrong?”

Sanghyuk wanted to return everything to the start. If he really could do that, he wanted to live a life that takes from others instead of being deprived of. However, as always, this was all his delusion.

‘If I could be reborn, no, if I could go back to that time…….’

He thought such things tens and hundreds of times, each day.

However, this wasn’t something that would be granted no matter how dearly he wished for it to happen. He knew this very well, but he could only think like that because he had so many regrets in his life.

His earnest wishes piled on and on.

Again, and again.

Chapter 2 Return (1)

It was an ordinary day like any other. Although he did gain victory in an important competition a few days back, nothing much had changed.

He only came back home after the interview and fell asleep after drinking a lot.

But opening his eyes, everything had changed.

He couldn’t believe his eyes and lay there for quite a while. After barely coming to himself, Sanghyuk first looked for a mirror and looked at the reflection.

“N, no way……”

When he checked his figure in the mirror, he knew that this absurd change was not a lie.

Inside the mirror was not a veteran director that put his team to the highest place, but the young, 18-year-old Sanghyuk that was living in an orphanage.

‘This doesn’t make sense no matter how I think about it.’

This wasn’t something like a dream. No matter how many times he checked, this was all vivid reality. No one would think that they would return just because they dearly wanted to, right?

Sanghyuk was the same. That was just his own delusion. But now, that delusion had become real. Naturally, he was very confused.

“Fuu, calm down first, and let’s check what situation I’m in.”

He woke up during the night and still couldn’t adapt to the situation even after 5 hours. However, he couldn’t stay like this forever.

He was a very cool-headed man, to the point that he was nicknamed the ‘Ice Man’ in his past life. So he started to look around him and grasp his current situation while calming his heart down.

‘One thing is for sure. Either I came back to the past, or I had a very long and vivid dream about the future.’

They were both absurd hypotheses, but he could only come up with such things in his current situation.

‘The more likely scenario is that I came back to the past, right? Whatever happened, the important thing is that the future may proceed as I know it. If it’s like that, then I was just given the chance to live again as I wanted.’

It was very confusing, but he felt strange after his thoughts traveled there.

‘Was I so desperate that God gave me another chance?’

No matter how he thought about it, this kind of supernatural phenomenon couldn’t be explained through normal means. That was why he, as an atheist, brought in God to make himself accept.

“If you can’t avoid it, then enjoy it.”

Muttering his life’s motto, Sanghyuk looked at the mirror. This motto was something he saw when he was at the deepest pits of his life. Of course, this had become something of the future right now, but in any case, Sanghyuk was a 36-year-old man with an 18-year-old body so his thoughts were very different from his peers.

Something unbelievable had happened, but he couldn’t stay still just because he couldn’t believe it. Since the extremes of illogic, going back in time, had happened, he could only accept everything as it is now.

***

It took a few days for Sanghyuk to admit everything and accept reality as it is. He could confirm that this wasn’t something like a dream through meeting others he could barely remember as well as classmates, and he was convinced that he came back to the past.

Honestly, it wasn’t easy to accept such an absurd situation, but this was the 36-year-old Sanghyuk and not the 18-year-old, so he could come to a decision quickly.

When he accepted everything, he started seeing his surroundings. First, Sanghyuk knew that this was the year 2026, in other words, when he was 18 years old (2nd year of high school). The date written on the ‘old’ phone he had was exactly December 22nd, 2026.

‘The event that changed my life before the winter holidays of 3rd year will happen in exactly 11 months.’

After the event that made his life fall to the depths of the abyss that happens in just 11 months, Sanghyuk had to roll around in those pits for 5 more years.

It was slightly strange to remember the future as though reminiscing the past, but in any case, that would happen if the future went as he knew it.

Of course, Sanghyuk did not plan to make the same mistake again.

‘There isn’t as much time as I think. If I want to live this newly-gained life without regrets…… I need to change many things.’

The orphanage would kick him out if he didn’t go to university at 19 years old. Sanghyuk could stay in the orphanage until February of 2028.

Sanghyuk naturally didn’t have the grades to go to university and had to look for another option, and as a result, he could only make such a choice in his past life.

The outcome was the worst possible one, but at that time, he thought that that was for the best.

‘I can’t put my trust in the crappy amount of resettlement support fund. There’s no way those rotten bastards would give proper resettlement funds anyway when they sold us out to that trash. I definitely need to look for a way I could live by myself.’

Since he already had an experience crawling to the top from the abyss with his bare hands, this didn’t feel like much to him.

The most important fact right now…… was that Sanghyuk was completely healthy.

“With the talent I have, I can achieve the things I really wanted!”

His talent still wasn’t taken away by that trash – this remained with him, and if he had that, he had the confidence in doing everything.

Actually, he had crawled back up from the bottom even after losing that talent. That was why he was currently nodding his head with a confident expression right now.

He couldn’t remember a lot of the things, but there weren’t many inconveniences despite that. His personality was originally a quiet one, and he also had the matured wits of a 36-year-old, so he could blend in without popping out.

Like that, he adapted to reality in just a few days, then he started planning for the future.

He couldn’t be sure that the information of the future was 100% accurate, but from the past few days, the future he knew, and the flow of reality was extremely similar.

In such a situation, it would be foolish to not use the information he knew.

‘The first thing I need…… is probably money, right?’

Since he was going to be kicked out into society in just one year, money could only be very important to him.

‘Then what can I do to earn money?’

Realistically, he was only in his 2nd year of high school right now, so he didn’t have many choices through which he could earn money. The only work he could do was slaving away at his part-time job with below minimum wage.

“I can’t earn enough money through a part-time job. Then…… I guess it comes down to earning money through DN(Dream Network)?”

DN was a kind of huge world that was created in 2020 when VR(Virtual Reality) technology had developed rapidly.

DN had developed rapidly like the internet of the past, and by now, it had absorbed most of the fields where the internet was dominant; it was accepted as the world within a world.

‘There’s still 1 year to DN’s revolution, EL(Eternal Life)’s release, isn’t there?’

EL, released in March 2028, became the greatest virtual reality game in the world in mere 4 months after its release. And it did not give its position away for over 15 years.

“I need to make the foundation through which I can undividedly focus on EL before it gets released.”

Since the only thing he had was his body, there wasn’t much he could do even though he had returned to the past.

Sanghyuk knew exactly what kind of special talent he had. That was why he was planning to use that talent to become the best of the best.

“What was the most popular VR game right now?”

Ever since he had come to the past, he was making notes on the important pieces of information he knew on his phone.

Looking through the notes, Sanghyuk could find ‘Sword and Magic’ and remembered that this was a popular hit before EL was released.

“Yes. This one was popular for a while.”

Although not much, he did play Sword and Magic for around 6 months.

‘Although I played it against my will, at least that will help me right now.’

Sanghyuk would subconsciously become angry every time he thought of that time, but anyhow, that experience could help him right now.

‘I guess it’s fortunate that capsule VR devices haven’t been released yet.’

Capsule VR devices were things that became popular along with EL. To be exact, capsule VR devices were required to enjoy EL properly.

Sword and Magic was a game that could be enjoyed with the headset VR devices, and these headset VR devices could be bought for 400 thousand won (400 USD) if he bought it second hand.

“The problem is that I don’t have 400 thousand won right now.”

VR devices were a must to earn money through DN. This meant that the money required to buy a VR device should be earned through part-time jobs.

***

Working part-time as an 18-year-old with a 36-year-old mind was a lot tougher than he thought. The job he went with was the convenience store that he found easy and done a lot in the past but…… he could see several injustices that he might have overlooked when he was young, but that wasn’t what made him tired, it was that he had to overlook them as well.

This wasn’t something that would be changed just because he stepped up, and his priority right now was to gather minimum funds, so he endured it through.

Like that, he made 600 thousand won (600 USD) through one month at the convenience store and bought a second-hand VR headset that he could use.

Since he had expert knowledge regarding VR devices, no scammers could scam him through the second-hand trade websites.

What was unfortunate was that it was impossible to use this VR headset at the orphanage. Due to various reasons, he could only keep quiet about the fact that he bought a VR device.

Sanghyuk was in a position where he could only play games in secret, so he talked to the owner of an old VR room near the orphanage and paid 100 thousand won (100 USD) to hog one corner of the VR room for 2 months.

This might sound slightly expensive considering a regular membership fee was 150 thousand won (150 USD) per month, but right now, it was more important to start the game as soon as possible. (T/N: I’m guessing regular membership comes with a headset rent as well then.)

Since he was already thinking of dropping out of school, he was planning to attend just enough that the school won’t call the orphanage. Since the high school was filled with problem children, it wouldn’t matter even if he showed up once every few days.

Like that, Sanghyuk started his first step in his second opportunity in an old VR room.

The nausea unique to accessing the Dream Network through a VR device made a lot of people feel unpleasant. This was improved a lot when technology developed and VR capsules made their debut, but they weren’t completely gone.

However, Sanghyuk didn’t feel this nauseous feeling at all. This wasn’t something that happened because he was used to VR in his past life or anything.

The talent he was born with – thanks to that, he could feel no nausea at all.

With the development of virtual reality technology and the appearance of a virtual world known as the Dream Network, a new kind of talent that wasn’t discovered until now received the spotlight.

It was a quality that not only measured people’s reactions in virtual reality but also what people saw in virtual reality as well.

In real life, these people usually became professional sports players, but in the Dream Network, they naturally became professional gamers.

In any case, this quality was called the VRA(Virtual Reality Ability) and at first, this was considered something abstract, but after enough research from many researchers in the field, the exact measuring method had appeared.

VRA measurement was naturally done within the Dream Network, and the absolute majority of the world possessed VRAs of around 100~150.

The ones that didn’t adapt to virtual reality had around 70~100, and vice versa, the ones with great adaptability possessed VRAs around 200.

The special ones referred to as VR pro gamers had an average VRA of 250.

A VRA of 250 was equivalent to the motor abilities of professional sports players in real life.

Naturally, Sanghyuk also had a VRA that was far from normal. In his memory, the highest VRA he recorded in his past life was a whopping 350.

A value that vastly exceeds even the professional gamers……. This wasn’t confirmed, but he also heard that his VRA was a world record.

Of course, he was crippled in exactly 4 years after he recorded that, and was evaluated to have a VRA of 40, but at least right now, Sanghyuk possessed a tremendous level of VRA.

“In this half a year…… I’ll earn enough money to become independent from the orphanage!”

Muttered Sanghyuk in resolve before accessing the Dream Network. He was thinking of earning money through Sword and Magic and become independent.

It wasn’t easy to earn money through Sword and Magic when it was nearly at the end of its life. However, Sanghyuk believed that he would be able to achieve what he wanted to as long as he had his special talent and a few pieces of information.

Chapter 3 Return (2)

After browsing through his memories, Sanghyuk concluded that he remembered the Sword and Magic of 2027 too well. This couldn’t be helped since Sword and Magic committed a huge mistake and showed signs of giving its position as the top game to Eternal Life.

Although this hadn’t happened yet, Sword and Magic would undergo its 4th large-scale patch in September of 2027…… and this made Sword and Magic into Shit and Magic.

Of course, a few other mistakes were committed on top of this large-scale patch, and as the so-called revolution of VR, EL appeared, it completely collapsed.

However, this hadn’t happened yet, and Sword and Magic was indeed the greatest game in existence right now.

The point Sanghyuk paid his attention to was one of the changes that occurred in Sword and Magic’s 4th large-scale patch that made Sword and Magic into Shit and Magic.

This change was so sudden, that the game was insanely ‘shit on’ by the users. But for Sanghyuk, this was a very good piece of information.

Sanghyuk, who had his VR headset on, called the Dream Network’s interface very proficiently. In fact, many first time Dream Network users couldn’t do this very well.

The white space he was currently standing in right now was something called the D-room. To simplify Dream Network, it was a large intranet that connected the existing virtual reality services.

Normal users could access various virtual reality services in personal D-rooms like the one Sanghyuk was in right now. Naturally, Sword and Magic could also be accessed from here as well.

Of course, Sword and Magic required a pretty large fee of 70 thousand won (70 USD) per month to play. Many virtual reality services were free, but they also had ads or other real-money shops, so it was instead natural to use paid services in Dream Network.

And honestly, the monthly fee did look quite expensive in his current situation, but this was nothing compared to the 120 thousand won monthly fee (120 USD) required to play EL.

Sanghyuk had bought a gift card to charge his account beforehand, so he paid the fee right away and entered the game.

Games in Dream Network, especially RPGs like Sword and Magic had long and complex tutorials. However, such tutorials were meaningless to him.

He lightly skipped the tutorial and entered Sword and Magic right away.

At its base, Sword and Magic was a well-made game.

That was the reason it maintained its top position in Dream Network for 3 years now. However, that made it just as difficult for new users to catch up to the old.

Naturally, Sanghyuk wasn’t planning to catch up to the original players by leveling up.

In the first place, his original objective in playing Sword and Magic was to earn cash. That was why Sanghyuk chose not only the starting spot but his jobs as well and not through a random generator.

Ironically, this was done with his experience he got in the ‘workshop’ where he slaved away for 5 years in his past life.

Having selected archer as his job since they had the highest basic strength and agility, and ‘Penwood’, a middle-grade city within a mountain range that people didn’t select a lot as the starting point, Sanghyuk made a bitter smile as soon as he entered.

“At that time, all of this felt like hell…… but now that I see it, the scenery is quite decent.”

All memories of Sword and Magic in his past life weren’t good at all. This was natural since, at that time, Sanghyuk wasn’t playing this game for fun, but was forced to.

To talk about this, an event that happens around 10 months later in the orphanage had to be mentioned.

In his past life, when Sanghyuk was in his 3rd year of high school, some strangers came to the orphanage. In Sanghyuk’s memory, they had a really long title on their business cards,

“Supporter for the Independency of Children Requiring Protection”.

Of course, it was later that he realized how empty their business card was, but at that time they were quite popular with the children who had bleak futures.

Saying they would help the independence of the children who need to be protected, they underwent one test against the children who would have to leave the orphanage in one year.

That was the VRA measuring test. They put out a contract to the children saying that there was a splendid working place for them where they could earn money through enjoying games.

Naturally, that contract was an absurd slave contract, but at that time, the young Sanghyuk was tempted by their sugarcoating and signed the contract without thinking much about it.

The related people in the orphanage had also recommended him and the others to sign so he didn’t doubt much about it.

Thinking about it now, they were all bad adults, but it wasn’t something frustrating for him considering that he had met more bad people than good in his past life.

Naturally, Sanghyuk scored an absurdly high number and surprised the ‘Supporters of Independence of Children Requiring Protection’, no, that trash that operated the DN workshop.

At that time, Sanghyuk got overly excited when other people praised him for the test and signed the contract they held out.

And per their offer, he did not finish the three years of high school and moved his residence to their workshop under the pretense of ‘employment’.

There was nothing to talk about after that matter.

From then, Sanghyuk had slaved away for exactly five years without even being able to go outside properly. If the police hadn’t attacked the workshop after being informed that children were being treated like abducted slaves in there, he might have had to spend even longer in that life.

He was dragged at 19 years old and was freed at 24. Since Sanghyuk’s talent was very high, the workshop guys made him work for even longer than the others. And eventually, an accident happened.

It could be said that his life became easier because of that accident, but as a result, Sanghyuk had to lose his shining talent.

In any case, Sanghyuk had to restart everything at the age of 24 because of his hellish experience.

The 5 years he spent in the workshop was a nightmarish memory in his mind, but he at least remembered the things he had learned there.

Since he had learned them in order to survive, he couldn’t forget it even if he wanted to.

“The herb I dug like mad in order to avoid beatings and get food…… now I have to dig them to earn money?”

What Sanghyuk had to do in the first 6 months in Sword and Magic was to dig herbs. Different workshops had different ways to earn money, and the workshop that took Sanghyuk knew all of the respawn points for Sword and Magic’s herbs.

With that information, Sanghyuk went around digging those out like mad.

The areas where the herbs spawned were mostly areas where players over level 30 and 2nd jobs could walk around, but Sanghyuk went around those fields after hitting level 10.

This was only possible with his special talent.

Sword and Magic, like any other RPGs, had a fast initial level up speed. Sanghyuk became level 10 with just 5 hours of playtime. Unlike the other users who were busy adapting to their movements in virtual reality, Sanghyuk proficiently hunted monsters.

Starting from level 10, the time required to level up would rise quite rapidly, so Sanghyuk didn’t plan to level up anymore. Having reached the bare minimum level required to collect the herbs, Sanghyuk moved to the Penwood Cliffs, which was called one of the spectacles of Sword and Magic.

Penwood Cliffs was currently an area that even users over level 70, the top rankers, couldn’t walk around easily. It wasn’t an area that spawned monsters. To be exact, the terrain was so rough that one mistake would lead to falling to death, so not even monsters could live here.

In fact, a few high-level users came here and showed off with faith in their avatar’s ability and fell to their deaths quite a few times.

Since this was the case with users over level 70, this was considered a forbidden zone for the low-level users.

The reason Penwood was one of the least popular starting spots in the game was also that there were so many similar cliffs around. But Sanghyuk had headed for those cliffs even though he was just level 10.

Normally, this would be considered insane, but this wasn’t anything insane, at least not to Sanghyuk. He even had experience roaming these cliffs when he was level 10 in his past life.

“I can definitely remember things more clearly now that I’m here.”

Swooosh, tap!

Leaping over to the other side of the cliff lightly, Sanghyuk tightly held onto a protrusion in the cliff with his fingers.

He got onto the cliff so easily as though he had put some adhesive on the tip of his fingers. Normal users would have fallen to their deaths already, but he was climbing the cliff very proficiently.

The reason this was possible because he had an extremely sensitive control that could transfer all of his strength into the tip of his fingers, unlike other users.

This was the grandeur of 350 VRA.

“There, and there too…….”

As he had expected, he started remembering the respawn points of the herbs that he couldn’t remember before. This place was somewhere Sanghyuk had pioneered himself later in the workshop and not the points that the workshop had given him, so there was no risk of his spots being stolen.

Of course, the terrain was just as dangerous, but the dangerous terrain wasn’t a problem for Sanghyuk. Even if he made a mistake and fell to his death, he had almost nothing to lose.

Since he was ‘below or equal to’ level 10, he wouldn’t receive any level downs nor would he drop any items. Since he had nothing to lose, Sanghyuk could be more daring in his climb.

Then why did the other users under level 10 not come here? That was simple as well. They couldn’t even move a few steps in this area before falling.

In the first place, a VRA of 350 wasn’t a common value.

Even if someone else did have such a value, there was no way such a person would be digging herbs in this place.

In other words, what Sanghyuk was doing right now could only be done by him.

Sanghyuk climbed the cliff with his bare hands and moved around nimbly. Since the herbs he was looking for were very rare, he should be able to earn quite some gold once he sold them.

Of course, turning them into cash would earn him much more than working part-time at a convenience store. However, Sanghyuk wasn’t aiming for such a low amount of cash when he was digging these herbs.

He was planning to do one thing with the gold he would get after selling these herbs.

He was planning to strike it big through this.

A jackpot that no one else could hit.

There was a jackpot that only he, who knew the future, could strike.

When he thought up of Sword and Magic, this was the first thing he remembered, and digging herbs came later when he was looking for a way to gather enough money for this.

A single change that occurs in the 4th large-scale patch happens in 8 months. Sanghyuk knew of this change, so he knew exactly what he had to do right now.

He climbed up a high cliff and scavenged 2 sprouts of Nineleaf Redgrass, which would go for 100 gold each.

“Oh yeah…… this feeling…… is what I wanted.”

Sanghyuk knew very well what kind of dangerous things he was doing right now. However, the stuffy feeling that he got when he lost his talent and became unable to do what he had wanted to, almost made him crazy.

“However, this is child’s play compared to EL.”

Sword and Magic was indeed a very well-made game, but it was incomparable to Eternal Life(EL).

EL was the last boss of virtual reality games.

‘8 months until the patch…… I’ll gather as many of that as possible!’

Taking a short rest while looking at the scenery, Sanghyuk put the Nineleaf Redgrass into his bag and started climbing again.

If the past Sanghyuk climbed cliffs like crazy against his will, the current Sanghyuk climbed cliffs like crazy on his own will.

He had grasped a new opportunity. His life would begin for real now.