Three days after The Green Awakening…
Every major guild in Seoul had declared war over a houseplant.
"Are you telling me," Jaehyun said, arms crossed, "that someone put a bounty on me… for growing weeds?"
Across the cracked table of a half-collapsed safehouse, his friend Minho—part-time scavenger, full-time conspiracy theorist—nodded furiously.
"Not weeds, dude. Crops. Like edible stuff. The Council's gone crazy. They're offering five hundred gold cores for your head—alive."He paused. "Two hundred if it's just the hands."
Jaehyun stared blankly."Wow. I'm worth half a pair of hands. That's new."
Minho slammed his palms down. "I'm serious! The Council thinks your aura can restore farmland! Do you realize what that means?!"
"Yeah," Jaehyun replied. "That they've officially lost it."
Outside, the sirens wailed—another dungeon surge nearby. The air shimmered faintly with heat, dust swirling through the ruined street.In the distance, Awakeners were already fighting, explosions lighting up the skyline like broken fireworks.It was another day in paradise.
Jaehyun exhaled. "Look, I get that everyone's starving. But farming? In this?"He gestured at the cracked earth, gray sky, and one very confused pigeon sitting on a broken vending machine."Nothing grows here except disappointment."
Minho's voice dropped. "You don't get it. They're desperate. They'll try anything. Even you." His father was actually worried about his middle son.
Jaehyun raised an eyebrow. "Rude."
Meanwhile, at the Central Council Chamber…
"Find the boy," ordered High Councilor Seo Ji-wan, her silver hair glowing faintly with light aura. "If what the scanners show is true, he may be our last chance at food production."
One of the advisors frowned. "He's unaffiliated. A civilian. He's been living outside the main barrier."
"Then recruit him," Seo said sharply. "Or… contain him."
A faint smile tugged at her lips. "Either way, bring me the Green Awakener."
Later that night…
Jaehyun was halfway through an extremely disappointing can of preserved beans when the air outside shimmered."Ah," he muttered, "here we go again."
A squad of armored Awakeners dropped from above—six of them, each radiating power like walking nuclear reactors. Their leader stepped forward, crimson aura flaring behind him like fire given form.
"Choi Jaehyun?" the man asked. "You're under summons by the Seoul Awakener Council."
Jaehyun blinked. "For what? Littering?"
"By order of the Council," the man barked, ignoring the sarcasm, "you are to be escorted to the capital for evaluation."
Jaehyun squinted. "Evaluation sounds like what you do to cows."
"Move," snapped another soldier.
Jaehyun sighed, put down his beans, and raised his hands. "Fine. But I'm bringing dinner."
Hours later, inside the capital's inner barrier…
The difference hit him immediately: paved streets, flickering mana lamps, guards in pristine armor. Real civilization—or at least its desperate attempt to pretend everything was fine.
They led him into a vast hall of glass and steel—The Council Chamber.
And there she was.At the center of it all—elegant, radiant, and terrifyingly calm—his mother.
"Mother," Jaehyun said flatly. "Did you seriously send a hit squad after me?"
Her serene smile didn't even twitch. "Of course not, dear. I sent the recruitment team. If I sent a hit squad, you'd already be fertilizer."
"…Reassuring."
Behind her stood Choi Jinwoo, his older brother—arms crossed, flames flickering faintly around his shoulders.
"Still out here being dramatic?" Jinwoo muttered. "You look like a homeless cabbage."
"Thanks, Captain Fire Hazard," Jaehyun shot back.
"Enough," his mother said, her tone soft but absolute. The entire chamber fell silent. "Jaehyun, do you know what your aura represents?"
Jaehyun shrugged. "Bad luck?"
"Life," she said simply. "The first Life-type aura ever recorded. Do you realize what that means for humanity?"
"Yes. That you'll all start expecting me to work."
His mother's smile froze slightly.
Jinwoo pinched the bridge of his nose. "This is exactly why nobody believes he's an Awakener."
"Believe me," Jaehyun sighed, "I wish I wasn't."
The Council's head mage, an elderly man with an aura like static, stepped forward. "We've seen your scans. The mana resonance of your green field revitalizes dead matter. Even now, your presence within a hundred meters increases oxygen density by 0.3%. You could rebuild agriculture."
"Or," Jaehyun said slowly, "I could sleep."
"Choi Jaehyun," his mother said gently, "the world is starving. You might be the only one who can fix it."
Jaehyun rubbed his temples. "Oh, great. Global famine. No pressure."
[That night, the capital's headlines would read:]"THE GREEN AWAKENER DISCOVERED — HUMANITY'S LAST HOPE FOR FOOD!""MIRACLE FARMER OR FRAUD?""LOCAL MAN ARRESTED FOR GROWING ILLEGAL VEGETATION."
Jaehyun didn't read them.He was too busy lying face-down on the Council's guest bed, staring at the ceiling.
"They want me to save the world with vegetables.""Maybe if I ignore them long enough, someone else will do it."
He closed his eyes.Outside, unseen by him, the once-sterile soil in the courtyard began to stir.Tiny shoots of green pushed up through the cracks, glowing faintly under the moonlight.
The air smelled faintly—impossibly—of life.
And that was how the apocalypse's laziest man accidentally started spring