Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Only I Could Not Regress

I turned my gaze toward the sunlight filtering in.

An unobstructed, wide-open view.

Far below, I could see Jamsil Tower, once the tallest building in Korea.

That was how high up this place was.

The headquarters building of Kronos, the company ranked first in the world by market capitalization.

‘I hope it goes bankrupt.’

If the sky collapsed along with it while it was going bankrupt, I would have nothing more to wish for.

Someone might look at me and ask.

Why was I so negative?

Then I would want to ask in return.

When the world itself insisted on treating me unjustly, how could I not be?

“Assistant Manager? Assistant Manager Ryu Jin?”

I returned my gaze to its original position.

When our eyes met, HR Team Leader Kim Se-yun smiled brightly at me.

She was frightening.

The fact that she could smile like that while informing me that I had been sucked dry for three years and then thrown away.

“Could you please focus? You need to sign the consent form related to legal restrictions after resignation only after you have fully understood it, Assistant Manager.”

I nodded and leaned back in my chair.

Even if I was leaving, I still had to receive my severance pay.

“Assistant Manager Ryu Jin, the only non-regressor announced by the System.”

Kim Se-yun emphasized the word non-regressor.

It was exactly as she said.

I had failed to regress.

Only me, in the entire world.

Even now, I still remembered that day three years ago vividly.

It had been a day like any other.

I woke up at the same time as usual, took the same subway, and went to work at the same seat.

The atmosphere at the company had been no different from usual either.

The team members on both sides of me had also been the same people as yesterday.

However, exactly three hours later, everything changed.

The company was the first to be thrown into chaos.

Because of people claiming they had regressed ten years into the past.

At first, I thought it was a hidden-camera prank.

But it did not take long for me to realize that it was not.

The company was not the only thing turned upside down.

The country, and then the entire world, was turned upside down.

While I was standing there dumbfounded by a situation that could not be understood through common sense.

[The first and final regression has been activated.]

An unidentified message appeared before my eyes.

Everyone was shocked, but what shocked them was different from what shocked me.

People were not surprised by the phenomenon itself.

They were merely surprised by the content that had been released.

They were familiar with this phenomenon.

As if they had experienced it for a very long time.

“There were quite a variety of rumors going around inside the company, were there not? Ariadne, the labyrinth exploration and clearing system that Kronos is currently supplying all over the world. Absurd rumors that you were the one who developed it before the regression, and that after the regression, our CEO, who had been in charge of the development division, stole it from you.”

I had heard many stories in passing, but I had never paid much attention to them.

I did not know what the pre-regression version of me had been like, but the current me had never thought of or developed anything like that.

However, now that three years had passed, and only after the project I had newly planned and developed had been stolen wholesale from me, I recalled the rumors from that day again.

And I became certain.

All of it had been true.

If I had heard something like that, I should have changed jobs and developed it somewhere else, so was I an idiot?

I acknowledged that to some extent, but there had been several circumstances behind it.

First, the idea that had struck me like a eureka moment required the patents for Ariadne held by Kronos.

Moreover, Kronos, after hearing my idea, had promised an absurd level of support.

Even though it was an idea that another company would have rejected outright because its chance of success was far too low compared to the resources required.

It was an enormous favor, to the point that I had wondered if they were treating me so well because they had really stolen Ariadne from me, just as the rumors said.

So did I simply lose myself in development without any caution? Of course not.

Since I had heard those stories, I used every possible means available to prepare for the worst.

In the end, though, it all became meaningless in front of the world’s number one company after it decided to stab me in the back.

“Assistant Manager Ryu Jin? You are not angry, are you?”

As if that were a real question.

My anger was not merely rising; my insides felt ready to burst.

However, I did not shout.

By the time I reached this seat, I had already tried everything I could, and thanks to that, I had realized that no matter what I did, it would be like throwing an egg against a boulder.

I shrugged and listened to the explanation that followed.

In short, she was telling me to acknowledge that I had done nothing and sign.

Scratch.

I quickly finished signing and stood up from my seat.

This damned company.

I wanted to leave as quickly as possible, even a second sooner.

Kim Se-yun stood up after me and held out her hand.

“You have worked very hard during this time. I will say this one last time. I trust that you will not do anything reckless. You are a rational person, Assistant Manager Ryu Jin. Then, I hope everything goes well for you from now on.”

“I feel a little embarrassed hearing such kind words. I was praying for Kronos to go bankrupt.”

“Kronos?”

Kim Se-yun let out a small laugh.

“You know it as well, do you not, Assistant Manager? Even if the sky collapses, Kronos will never fall.”

“Is that what you think?”

Kim Se-yun shook her head and lowered her voice.

“Come to your senses, Assistant Manager. That is reality. Look, you cannot do anything right now either.”

“That is right. I cannot. It is not that I am choosing not to. There is simply no method right now.”

Kim Se-yun curled her lips in a sneer that carried the nuance of, I am sure that is the case.

Perhaps deciding that I was not even worth answering anymore, she gave me a light nod.

“Please take care on your way out. And I hope you live well, while yearning for a method that will never appear.”

“Yes. I will also hope that everything you do fails, Team Leader. Then, I will be leaving.”

After leaving her with a childish blessing, I exited the meeting room.

I knew it was unrealistic, but I sincerely hoped that something would drop from somewhere.

A method to destroy this damned company, that was.

---

Two months after I resigned.

While folding a paper crane, I checked the email that had arrived.

As expected, I had failed at the document screening stage again this time.

To think I would get a result like this even from a company where I should not have been rejected based on my qualifications.

It seemed Kim Se-yun had not been joking when she told me to look into another industry.

I turned my head toward one side of the desk.

A heap of utility bills and loan repayment notices had piled up there.

It was a loan I had never even touched, but I was still in a situation where I had no choice but to pay it back.

That was also the reason why all I had left was debt, despite having worked at a major corporation with a high salary.

I raised my head and stared at the monitor.

The main page of NewTube.

Eating chicken on the fifth underground floor of the labyrinth.

Clearing the seventh underground floor of the labyrinth as a healer.

Building a perpetual-motion car with magic stones.

The labyrinth here, the labyrinth there.

No matter what kind of content it was, the labyrinth was never absent.

That was the kind of world it was now.

The labyrinth appeared together with the System three years ago, or thirteen years ago by the regressors’ standards.

No one knew when, where, or how it had occurred.

It had simply come into existence all of a sudden.

Across the entire range from the Earth’s crust to its outer core, as if it had always been there.

And not long after, it was said to have spoken through the System.

An existence called the Constellation, which referred to itself as the master of the labyrinth.

The words left by the Constellation were brief.

[Everything you desire lies within the labyrinth. Enter.]

It had been fired.

The signal flare announcing the beginning of the Great Labyrinth Era.

Of course, not just anyone could enter.

There was a minimum entry requirement called Awakening.

And because of this Awakening.

[You have completed a paper crane! Completed paper cranes: 9,998. Two paper cranes remain until the Awakening condition is fulfilled.]

I had been folding ten thousand paper cranes for two full months.

Why was I doing this only after almost three years had passed?

It had been humanly impossible.

Folding paper cranes while working an average of fourteen hours a day for three years, including weekends.

On top of that, I had unintentionally been spoiled about the utterly worthless class that the pre-regression version of me had awakened to, one no one would take even if it were handed to them.

Prioritizing my immediate salary and loan repayment over Awakening had been the wise choice.

Until today, when I had been kicked out of the company and the only money-making option left was restarting in another field.

How I Made Ten Million Won a Month Cash-Farming in the Labyrinth.

Guaranteed Two Million Won a Month! The Basics of Labyrinth Cash-Farming!

Cash farming.

It was the act of collecting and selling magic stones, aggregates of natural energy, on relatively stable floors where clearing strategies had already been perfected.

In the past, it had been something people did in online games, but these days, the trend was the labyrinth.

[Completed paper cranes: 9,999. One paper crane remains until the Awakening condition is fulfilled.]

Since I knew I was going to get a worthless class, I was not planning to do it seriously.

No matter how badly I needed money, I could not throw my life away.

I merely wanted to try it out lightly before challenging myself in a new line of work.

At last, I placed the final completed paper crane into the glass jar.

Ding!

[Completed paper cranes: 10,000! The Awakening condition has been fulfilled!]

“Wow, seriously.”

I leaned back in my chair.

It had been brutally exhausting.

I meant it.

After closing my eyes and catching my breath for a moment.

With another cheerful sound, a rectangular box appeared before my eyes.

[A class will be assigned!]

Various class symbols rotated inside it.

Just in case, I quietly clasped my hands together.

And I prayed.

It would never happen, but please, may it defy all the spoilers and give me a class different from the one before the regression.

Ding!

At last, the rotating symbol stopped.

A very clear playing-card symbol.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

Was it because I had not usually held any faith?

My prayer did not work.

Damn it!

It came out exactly the same as I had been spoiled.

[You have awakened as the class ‘Gambler’!]

[You have acquired the unique trait ‘Draw Box – Weapon’!]

[A Gambler is a competitor who stakes everything on probability! You may draw a dud, but you may also draw a jackpot!]

[The road to a jackpot is long and arduous! The higher the grade of the card, the more drastically its draw rate decreases!]

The coworkers who had spoiled it for me had burst into laughter and added something else.

Most of the weapons I drew in the labyrinth were meaningless things like fountain pens, mechanical pencils, or, if they were a little better, carving knives or pinking shears.

Then had I never drawn a proper weapon even once?

Apparently, that was not the case.

They said weapon-like things did come out from time to time.

When I needed a blunt weapon because I had to break a golem, an épée, a sharp thrusting weapon, appeared.
When I needed a light-attribute weapon because I had to catch a darkness-attribute monster, an inverted cross that strengthened darkness appeared.

Rather than improving the situation, I had only drawn things that made it worse.

Thanks to that, they said I had almost died more than once or twice.

For that reason, the pre-regression version of me had ended up never entering the labyrinth at all.

‘There really is no answer.’

I had to risk my life fighting the monsters of the labyrinth, and yet I would have pinking shears.

Absolutely not.

“Haaah.”

I let out a deep sigh and tilted my head back.

What labyrinth?

First, I should find a part-time job at a nearby convenience store.

After playing around for two months, things had truly become precarious.

I looked at the jar filled with ten thousand paper cranes.

Those wretched paper cranes.

I would burn them all and forget about them.

The moment I stood up from my seat and lifted the jar.

Ding!

[You are the only player who failed to regress!]

[You failed to regress due to a critical error! Not knowing the ten years that everyone else knows is terrible misfortune! Losing everything you should have enjoyed because of this is also tremendous misfortune! You may truly be called the greatest unfortunate soul in the world, unprecedented in all history!]

Unfortunate soul?

Was that not a little harsh?

[This is misfortune caused by a clear error! The misfortune the player had to endure will be converted into compensation!]

[The Non-Regressor Special Benefit will be granted!]

No sooner had the message ended.

Three boxes appeared before my eyes.