Towers sprang up all over the world.
These Towers spewed monsters at regular intervals, leading to countless casualties.
Even advanced nations were powerless against them.
That was when the 'Awakened' appeared.
Those who entered the Towers to conquer the 'dungeons' within.
The world began calling them 'Hunters'.
Whenever Hunters cleared a dungeon, the world grew a little safer.
The Monster Waves—where monsters poured out from the Towers—dwindled dramatically after the Hunters emerged.
The Hunters' status only continued to rise day by day.
In that tide of change, it was inevitable that some would dream of hitting the jackpot overnight.
Like with cryptocurrency.
A surge of young people awakened, desperately hoping for an S-rank skill.
I was one of them.
But in the end, I bowed to this unequal reality.
I fiddled with the looted smartphone, turning it this way and that.
On the barren home screen sat a single app: Taming App.
No other apps. Not even a store icon.
They were simply gone.
I'd turned the delivery box inside out, checking every inch.
"A USB...?"
A USB drive tumbled out.
It must have been hidden in a corner of the box.
A plain-looking one, nothing special.
I had to check this out.
It was addressed to me, after all.
Whether it was a mix-up or not, it wasn't my fault.
I had nothing to hide.
I headed straight to my computer desk.
Powered on the tower and plugged in the USB.
A unfamiliar folder contained a single unfamiliar video file.
[To the Me of Another Dimension.AVI]
"...What the hell?"
The title gave off seriously bad vibes.
Whoever sent this didn't seem all there mentally.
Still, I played the video.
— Ah, can you hear me?
In a dimly lit room, a man sat slumped in a chair, head bowed.
A grating voice blared from the speakers.
The kind of voice I remembered from when I tried recording myself practicing songs.
"Huh?"
— First, I should show my face. No time for long talks.
The man slowly lifted his head, and the moment I saw his face—my face—I jolted back and fell ass-first to the floor.
Crash—my chair toppled behind me.
"Ow..."
My legs still hadn't fully healed.
Our team's support had skimped on mana.
So I'd been relying on a Hunter's natural regeneration, recovering bit by bit...
I snapped to attention and hauled myself up.
Rushing back to the monitor to confirm—the man in the video was me.
— You're probably wondering why I'm here...
I paused the video.
Stared at his—my—face again.
Was this really me?
I'd never filmed anything like this.
Chills ran down my spine.
Some bastard's idea of a prank, probably.
I flipped the delivery box over and checked the shipping label.
Sender: blank, as always.
Recipient: my name and this address.
It was definitely meant for me.
I couldn't make sense of it, but it hadn't been misdelivered.
I resumed playback.
If the looted phone and USB were connected, the answers had to be in this video.
The guy who sent it clearly had something to tell me...
— ...right? Let me explain briefly. I'm you—from another worldline. One where humanity failed to stop the dungeons and went extinct.
Crazy bastard?
— I never knew my place. Thought I was hot shit. Even with cheat powers, I amounted to jack squat.
He's blaming his own incompetence—on my face, no less.
— Before everything ended, I wanted to leave a little gift for my other self in another worldline. No idea who'll get it... but I hope it helps.
The looted smartphone was the gift?
I scrutinized the phone again.
Nothing but the Taming App.
— No more on what the gift is. It'll turn into the item you want most. From the moment you get it, you're on your own.
The form I desire most...
Still hard to buy it.
How do you trust some guy who looks exactly like you rambling on?
Another worldline?
Another me existing there?
— Good luck. I hope you save your world.
He muttered something under his breath.
I cranked the volume and rewound ten seconds.
— Good luck. I hope you save your world.
"The sound's louder than I thought. Should be audible enough..."
— El, Psai, Congru.
"...right, crystal clear."
This guy is me.
No tricks.
This was a gift from 'me' in another world.
'I'll put it to good use, Park Sun-woo.'
The video ended there.
Humanity went extinct, so he probably didn't last long either.
Common sense says test a gift right away—Korean style.
Without a second thought, I launched the Taming App.
The other me said this was the item in the form I desired most.
That piqued my interest even more.
What item did I want?
Please, not something weird.
Something massive to turn my shitty life around!
Come on, show yourself!
⚙ TAMING APP ⚙Proceeding with user registration.
"Ugh..."
The screen went pitch black the instant it launched.
Black background, stark white text.
A crudely simple design, no frills.
My Tower-like expectations plummeted.
If not for the other Park Sun-woo, I'd have closed it right then.
But because of him, I'd give it a shot.
'So how do I register as a user?'
Nothing happened.
Then a progress bar started filling on its own.
Just holding it was enough for recognition.
1%, 10%, 52%...
100% User registration complete. Park Sun-woo
The screen shifted.
A translucent cube appeared, with a single SD character breathing inside it.
"What the...?"
Clicking the character zoomed it in sharply.
Felt just like a mobile game.
Park Sun-woo
The character's name was mine, but otherwise, it was straightforward enough.
'Must be from the user registration.'
I let it slide.
I poked around the Taming App, inspecting everything.
A empty gray room. A character resembling me. His stats matched my Hunter status window perfectly.
That sent another shiver through me.
'It's from another worldline's Park Sun-woo.'
Even something transcendent made sense in that context.
Not incomprehensible.
After clicking around, I reached one conclusion.
The Taming App seemed like an idle RPG-style training app.
Train the character to grow stronger myself...
Tycoon vibes?
'Yeah, that explains why it's hooked me.'
One menu item stood out ominously.
Everything else made sense.
'Summon'—that was the issue.
⚙ SYSTEM NOTIFICATION ⚙Searching for personnel within 20m radius. Summonable list (12) Kang Min-jeong (NEW!!!) Kim Ji-hye (NEW!!!) Kim Hee-jun (NEW!!!) [...] Han Kyung-sik (NEW!!!)
I opened the summon list and checked each one.
SD characters modeled after real people, with profiles popping up.
Each had a distinct look.
'...People living nearby?'
I figured it out from Han Kyung-sik's outfit at the end.
Han Kyung-sik was the officetel security guard.
So this was a list of everyone within 20 meters right now.
Summon, summon list—trial and error it was.
=====
⚔ STATUS ⚔Name: Kim Ji-hye Age: 29 Conquest Difficulty: F
=====
Women over men.
And among them, the easiest mark.
Kim Ji-hye it was.
I summoned Kim Ji-hye immediately.
The background changed in a flash.
'This is...!'
Gray walls boxed me in on all sides.
A familiar layout—the cube room from the smartphone.
Summoning someone teleported them straight here, it seemed.
'In that case!'
I frantically searched for Kim Ji-hye.
If I'd summoned her, she had to be here.
My hunch was spot on.
"Ack...!"
Kim Ji-hye lay crumpled nearby.
She'd been sitting in a chair, dropped into a half-horse stance and slammed butt-first into the floor.
"Um, hello...?"
She rubbed her rear, looking baffled as she scanned around.
Then her gaze swung my way.
Completely defenseless.
If I approached now, she might spot me.
Time to bail, back home.
How?
Shit!
I checked the phone.
A 'Release Summon' icon hovered over Kim Ji-hye's character head.
I tapped it fast.
"Wh-who...!"
The moment I released the summon, she vanished.
Cut off mid-sentence, sent back.
I collapsed in the gray room, sighing in relief.
"Gotta prep properly before trying this again."
More experiments with the Taming App were in order.
I mashed the 'Return' icon, warping back to my officetel studio.
"Okay, so time doesn't pass here."
Before and after summoning Kim Ji-hye, the clock hadn't budged.
1. While in the Taming App's room—the Taming Room—time stops.
Memo.
I'd just grasped that, buzzing with excitement.
Then a message popped up in the Taming App interface.
✨ ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED! ✨Summon Ada Escape
— Summon to Taming Room 1 time (1/1)
+ Lowest Strength (+1) Potion awarded!