There was life before mana.
It was mostly boring.
Rent, cold convenience store rice balls, job rejection emails, my mom asking if I still wanted to study for the civil service exam (answer: I never did). My greatest skill at the time? Heating leftover kimchi stew without drying out the tofu.
Then five years ago, the sky cracked.
THE GRAND RESETTING (A.K.A. Year One of Everyone Losing Their Minds)
No one knew what to call it at first.
One day, the world was normal.
Then — boom. Mana.
Glowing tears in the sky. Floating rocks. People screaming because their cats suddenly started talking in Latin.
A tower appeared in Busan. Trees in Jeju started attacking tourists. Entire subway lines in Seoul turned into mini-dungeons overnight.
The news called it a "reality shift."
Scientists called it a dimensional vibration event.
And the internet?
They called it the Grand Resetting.
Because reality felt like it hit CTRL+ALT+DELETE.
A few days after the Reset, people started awakening.
They could shoot fire. Teleport. Punch through brick walls. Talk to birds. Cook rice without a pot.
They were called Awakeners, but Koreans preferred the flashier term: "Hunters."
Guilds formed within months.
The Hunter Association was born in a hurry.
Suddenly, the guy who sat next to you in math class was front page news for solo-clearing a rift in Gangnam.
I wasn't one of them.
I was still jobless, ramen-powered, and trying to write webnovels with titles like My Fiance Is a Dungeon Boss and Also My Dad's Boss?
Then came year five.
Just when the world was adjusting — monster-hunter contracts, rift insurance, dungeon-rated real estate — it happened.
A voice.
Every screen in the world lit up, even analog TVs no one plugged in.
>>>SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT – >>>ATTENTION, ZONE 16-B: EARTH
MERGE INCOMING
>>>DAYS UNTIL EVENT: 266
People froze.
Hunters panicked.
The government issued another pamphlet.
That same day, while everyone was freaking out, I was in the middle of eating microwaved pork cutlet when time stopped.
Literally.
The world froze.
Even the katsu steam paused mid-air.
And in front of me, a blue window appeared:
>>>CONGRATULATIONS: YOU HAVE BEEN SELECTED AS THE FIRST AWAKENER OF ZONE 16-B (EARTH)
>>>INITIATING COSMIC SEED…
I choked.
"Me?! Why me?!"
I was nobody. I hadn't even registered for a dungeon entrance before.
The System glitched. I could feel it.
Because what followed wasn't fanfare or power surges — it was a buffering screen and the faint sound of Windows 98 errors.
>>>ERROR: SOUL LOOP CONDITION DETECTED
>>>ADJUSTING FOR STABILITY…
>>>PASSIVE SKILL UNLOCKED: Loop Memory Retention
>>>You may now remember every death.
>>>Welcome to your nightmare.
I DIED. A LOT.
Remember how in Chapter 1 I told you I died 999 times?
Yeah. That all started here.
First life: poisoned by a glowing herb I cooked with.
Second life: exploded by a relic clearly marked "FORBIDDEN."
Third life: eaten by a dungeon beast because I took a nap in its nose.
Each time, I'd return to the day of the System announcement — 266 days before the Merge.
Each time, I'd remember everything.
WHAT LIFE WAS LIKE BEFORE THE RESET???
Before all that? I was just Han Jiwon.
Son of a supermarket cashier who worked night shifts.
Failed university student who dropped out mid-semester.
A boy who spent more time in manhwa cafés than anywhere else because it was warmer than home.
My dad disappeared before I turned 12.(He didn't comeback after buying some milk)
My mom raised me alone, then got injured during a mana storm cleanup in Year 2 after the Reset. She's been in long-term care ever since.
My guilt? Immeasurable.
I've seen her die in four different timelines.
Loop 43, I tried becoming an S-Rank hunter to afford her medical bills. I died from slipping on a slime puddle.
Loop 184, I tried working for a guild. Died to a backstab.
Loop 299, I locked myself in a mountain to "train." Died to boredom and a raccoon.
By Loop 600, I stopped trying to be brave.
WHAT'S THE REASON YOU CHOSE A RESTAURANT???
You know what stayed the same in every loop?
People were always hungry.
Hunters, refugees, lost children, even monsters.
Once, in Loop 727, I made stew for a crying C-Rank mercenary who failed a raid. He ate in silence, then left me a mana crystal the size of a bowling ball.
Loop 830, I served a blind goblin that just wanted to taste warm food. It didn't even attack me. It bowed.
Loop 998, I fed a dying child his last meal. Just plain rice with anchovies.
Cooking wasn't just survival.
It was sanity.
It was the one thing that kept me from losing myself.
So when Loop 1000 began?
I put down the sword.
And picked up the pot.