[00:08:55]
I had less than nine minutes to prepare for hell.
My apartment was a small studio in Seoul's Gangnam district—expensive as hell, but my parents had insisted on the location for job hunting purposes. In my past life, I'd cursed that decision. The higher population density in this area meant more competition, more death, more chaos in those first critical hours.
Now, I thanked whatever gods were listening.
High population meant more initial casualties, yes. But it also meant more resources, more supplies, and most importantly—more potential allies who'd survived the Tutorial in the original timeline.
I yanked open my closet, grabbing the metal baseball bat I'd kept from my university days. It was cheap aluminum, dented from a single season of recreational league play. In my previous life, I'd used this bat to kill my first monster.
I still remembered the way it had felt when it connected with the goblin's skull.
Shaking off the memory, I moved to the kitchen. Grabbed the largest knife I owned—a meat cleaver my mom had given me that I'd barely used. Wrapped the handle in duct tape for better grip. Filled my backpack with two water bottles, energy bars, and my phone charger.
[00:06:12]
My hands moved on autopilot, muscle memory from ten years of survival kicking in despite my weaker body. I changed into gym clothes—flexible, easy to move in. Tied my shoes double-tight. In my previous life, I'd lost a shoe during the Tutorial and nearly died because of it.
Small details. Small mistakes. They all mattered.
[00:04:33]
I stood by my apartment door, bat in one hand, knife tucked into my belt. My reflection in the mirror showed a twenty-four-year-old recent college graduate, thin and unassuming. Soft hands that had never seen real combat. Eyes that hadn't yet witnessed the apocalypse.
But those eyes held the weight of ten years of hell.
"Ready or not," I muttered.
[00:02:17]
The wait was agonizing. I knew what was coming, but knowing and experiencing were two different things. My heart hammered against my ribs. Sweat beaded on my forehead despite the apartment's cool air.
I used the time to center myself, to remember the key facts about Scenario #1:
--The Tutorial: Survive--
- Duration: 1 hour
- Objective: Kill at least one monster
- Failure Penalty: Death
- Hidden Objective: Kill 10+ monsters for bonus rewards
In my first life, I'd barely managed to kill two goblins, hiding in my apartment for fifty-eight minutes before desperation forced me outside. I'd received the standard reward: a Basic Summoning Scroll that gave me a random low-tier summon.
That's how I'd met Ash—a Fenrir pup, weak and small, considered one of the worst possible first summons because of how resource-intensive he was to raise.
Everyone had told me to dismiss him and try for something better.
I'd kept him anyway, mostly out of stubbornness and loneliness.
It was the best decision I'd ever made.
This time, though, I knew something nobody else did: the Tutorial had a secret reward tier. Kill 50 monsters in one hour, and you'd receive a Customizable Summoning Contract—an item that let you specify parameters for your first summon.
In my previous timeline, only three people worldwide had achieved this. I'd met one of them in Scenario 87, shortly before they'd died.
[00:00:47]
The countdown was almost up.
I gripped my bat tighter, positioning myself by the door. My apartment was on the third floor. In the original timeline, I'd stayed inside, but that was a mistake. The real rewards were outside, in the chaos.
[00:00:15]
My phone buzzed. Messages flooding in from friends, family, colleagues—all seeing the same countdown, the same impossible system windows.
Mom: Woo-seok, what's happening? Are you seeing this?
Dad: Son, call us immediately.
Ji-hye (college friend): wtf is this some kind of prank?
I silenced my phone. I'd answer them later. If I survived. If they survived.
In my previous life, Mom and Dad had died in Scenario #4. Ji-hye had made it to Scenario 12 before a betrayal from her own party.
This time would be different.
[00:00:03]
[00:00:02]
[00:00:01]
[SCENARIO #1: THE TUTORIAL]
[OBJECTIVE: SURVIVE FOR 1 HOUR]
[SECONDARY OBJECTIVE: KILL AT LEAST 1 MONSTER]
[PARTICIPANTS: 4,782,394,127]
The world shuddered.
It wasn't an earthquake—nothing so mundane. Reality itself seemed to ripple, like someone had dropped a stone into still water. The lights in my apartment flickered. My coffee mug vibrated off the table and shattered.
Then came the screaming.
It started distant, muffled through walls and floors, but rapidly grew louder. Dozens of voices. Hundreds. The entire apartment building erupting into chaos as people looked out their windows and saw what I already knew was there.
Monsters.
I yanked open my door and ran for the stairwell. Already, I could hear the sounds of combat—shrieks, crashes, the wet sounds of flesh tearing. Someone on the fourth floor was crying. Someone on the second was shouting about calling the police.
The police weren't coming.
Nobody was coming to save us.
I burst through the stairwell door to the ground floor and nearly collided with the first monster.
[GOBLIN SCOUT - LEVEL 3]
It was exactly as I remembered—three feet tall, green skin, yellow eyes, wearing tattered leather armor. It wielded a rusted short sword that was nonetheless sharp enough to kill.
The goblin turned toward me, lips pulling back to reveal needle-sharp teeth.
In my previous life, I'd frozen. Terror had locked my limbs. The goblin had nearly killed me before survival instinct finally kicked in.
This time, I swung first.
The bat connected with the goblin's temple with a satisfying crack. The monster stumbled, more surprised than hurt. I didn't give it time to recover. Ten years of combat experience guided my movements as I followed up with a downward strike, this time aiming for the knee.
The joint shattered. The goblin shrieked and fell.
I brought the bat down on its skull three more times until it stopped moving.
[YOU HAVE SLAIN: GOBLIN SCOUT]
[+30 EXP]
[KILLS: 1/1]
The blue window appeared, cheerful and bright against the backdrop of spreading chaos. Around me, the apartment complex's courtyard had become a battlefield. Goblins poured from dimensional rifts that hung in the air like wounds in reality. Residents fled in every direction, some fighting, most running.
I spotted Mrs. Kim from 4B trying to fend off a goblin with a frying pan. Mr. Park, the building security guard, was already dead, his body sprawled near the front gate.
No time to mourn. No time for anything except survival.
I ran toward the courtyard's center, where I knew the highest concentration of monsters would be. Each goblin I killed was 30 EXP, and I needed to hit Level 5 before the hidden quest would unlock.
A goblin lunged at me from the left. I sidestepped—my current body was slower than I wanted, weaker, but my mind knew exactly how goblins moved. Bat to the ribs, knife to the throat as it staggered. Dead.
[+30 EXP]
[KILLS: 2/1]
Another one. This time I ducked under its wild swing and brought my bat up into its chin. Followed through with a downward strike. Dead.
[+30 EXP]
[KILLS: 3/1]
The kills came easier now, muscle memory syncing with conscious thought. I fell into the rhythm of combat like an old song—dodge, strike, confirm the kill, move to the next target.
Four. Five. Six.
[LEVEL UP!]
[YOU ARE NOW LEVEL 2]
[+5 TO ALL STATS]
The sudden rush of energy was intoxicating. My muscles felt stronger, my reactions faster. The System's level-up bonus redistributing my physical parameters to superhuman standards. It wasn't much—not yet—but it was enough to make the difference between life and death.
Seven. Eight. Nine.
I was vaguely aware of others watching me now. Survivors who'd managed to kill their first monster huddling near the building, staring at the madman in the courtyard who was actively hunting the creatures that had appeared to end the world.
Let them stare.
Ten.
[LEVEL UP!]
[YOU ARE NOW LEVEL 3]
Fifteen.
Twenty.
My arms burned. My lungs screamed for air. The bat had dented beyond recognition, and I'd switched primarily to the knife. Blood soaked my clothes—mostly goblin, some mine from glancing blows I hadn't quite dodged in time.
[LEVEL UP!]
[YOU ARE NOW LEVEL 4]
Twenty-five.
[TIME REMAINING: 42:17]
I'd cleared most of the courtyard now. The dimensional rifts had stopped spawning new goblins, which meant the Tutorial was entering its second phase—the emergence of the elite monsters.
Right on cue, reality tore open near the fountain, and something much larger stepped through.
[HOBGOBLIN WARRIOR - LEVEL 8]
[WARNING: BOSS-TYPE MONSTER]
Six feet tall, heavily muscled, wearing actual armor and wielding a battle axe that looked like it could split me in half. In my previous timeline, the Hobgoblin had killed seventeen people before someone finally brought it down.
I'd been hiding in my apartment when it happened.
The Hobgoblin's eyes found me, and it smiled—a grotesque expression that showed too many teeth.
It charged.
I didn't run. Couldn't run. If I wanted to hit 50 kills, I needed the bonus experience from elite monsters.
The axe came down in a vertical slash meant to split me from crown to groin. I threw myself sideways, feeling the wind of its passage. The weapon buried itself in the concrete, sending up a spray of debris.
While it was recovering, I darted in, aiming for the gaps in its armor—behind the knee, under the arm, any weak point I could find. The knife bit deep into exposed flesh. The Hobgoblin roared and backhanded me.
I flew six feet and hit the ground hard enough to see stars. Pain exploded through my ribs—at least two of them cracked.
[HP: 47/120]
Shit. Even with my levels, I was still too weak. My current body couldn't handle the kind of sustained combat I was used to.
The Hobgoblin advanced, pulling its axe from the concrete. I struggled to my feet, each breath sending lances of agony through my chest.
This was it. The moment where I'd either prove the regression was worth it, or die stupidly in the first scenario.
Then I heard it—a voice from near the building entrance.
"Hey, ugly! Over here!"
A girl, maybe twenty years old, with short black hair and wild eyes. She held a fire extinguisher like a club. More importantly, she'd just thrown a rock that bounced off the Hobgoblin's helmet.
The monster turned toward her, and I saw my opening.
I ran. Ignored the pain. Channeled every ounce of experience from ten years of combat into one desperate gambit.
The Hobgoblin raised its axe toward the girl. I leaped onto its back, knife gripped in both hands, and drove the blade down into the gap between its helmet and chest armor.
The steel sank deep into its neck.
The Hobgoblin thrashed. Its hand found my arm and squeezed, bones grinding together. I screamed but held on, twisting the knife deeper, feeling for the spine—
The monster fell to its knees.
Then forward.
Then stopped moving.
[YOU HAVE SLAIN: HOBGOBLIN WARRIOR]
[+500 EXP]
[BONUS: FIRST BOSS KILL]
[+1000 EXP]
[LEVEL UP!]
[YOU ARE NOW LEVEL 7]
The rush of energy was overwhelming. My cracked ribs healed. My HP restored. Strength flooded through my limbs.
I lay on top of the dead Hobgoblin, gasping, laughing, maybe crying a little.
I'd done it. I'd actually done it.
The girl ran over, eyes wide. "Holy shit. HOLY SHIT. You just—that thing was—are you okay?!"
I rolled off the corpse and extended a hand. She pulled me up.
"I'm fine," I said, still catching my breath. "Thanks for the distraction."
"Are you insane? You're covered in blood! You've been killing these things like—like—" She gestured helplessly at the field of goblin corpses surrounding us.
"Like my life depends on it?" I smiled grimly. "It does."
[TIME REMAINING: 38:42]
Thirty-eight minutes left. Twenty-six kills so far. I needed twenty-four more.
The girl stared at me like I'd grown a second head. "You're going back out there. You're actually going back out there."
"Yes."
"Why?!"
I looked at her—really looked. Short hair, athletic build, a scar on her left eyebrow. Recognition clicked into place.
Han Yuri. Scenario 45. She'd died covering a retreat, buying time for her party to escape. I'd found her body three days later.
She didn't know me. Didn't know what I knew. Didn't know she had less than two months to live if I didn't change things.
"Because," I said simply, "this is just the beginning."
I turned back toward the rifts, where new monsters were starting to emerge. Twenty-four more. I could do this.
I would do this.
And then, when the Tutorial ended and I received my customizable contract, I'd summon Ash exactly as I intended—not as a random pull, but as a partner I'd choose deliberately.
This time, I'd do everything right.
"Wait!" Yuri grabbed my shoulder. "At least tell me your name. If you're going to get yourself killed being a crazy person, I should know who to tell people about."
I glanced back, offering a tired smile.
"Jin Woo-seok. Remember it."
"Woo-seok," she repeated. "Fine. Just... try not to die, okay? We've got enough bodies already."
I nodded and ran back toward the chaos, bat in hand, twenty-four kills standing between me and changing everything.
The Tutorial had only just begun.