I Woke Up as the Villain

Kim Do-Jin planned to create a kingdom full of supporters to help him, just like he had achieved from a different dimension. He looked around the place, which seemed rather shabby and unattractive, and said, “And soon, we wouldn’t have to worry about the money.”

"What?" Baek Ah-Rin tilted her head at Do-Jin’s sudden comment.

"My friend, who will soon join our guild, has quite a lot of money."

"Your friend?" asked Ah-Rin.

Most people in the world were being deceived by Kim Do-Jin. He appeared to be quite kind, cheerful, and humble on TV and media, but Ah-Rin found him to be a very different person. She had only met him for a short time, but still.

‘He's confident, shameless, and narcissistic. He believes he is the center of the world… He’s also a little psychotic, for sure.’

Ah-Rin was surprised that such a person would actually call someone a friend. To be honest, she wondered if she had misheard Do-Jin.

“It's a name you would also know well—Choi Yu-Seong," Do-Jin said.

"Choi Yu-Seong? The new star of the Comet group?" Ah-Rin asked.

“...Isn’t it the rascal from a Comet group?” Kim Do-Jin was the one to express surprise at Baek Ah-Rin’s unexpected reaction this time.

"Oh, come to think of it, you've been stuck in a dungeon for more than a week until this morning so wouldn’t know about this. Choi Yu-Seong, broke your record from….where was it? Oh, from the Goblin Fortress dungeon racing.”

"...What?"

"It's still crazy. Why didn’t you watch the news as soon as you came out?"

"I didn't have time to watch it, since I washed up and came straight here to keep my promise.”

"I see. Anyway, it was amazing. There's a video on Newtube. You know, he’s nearly half an hour faster than your record…”

"30 minutes?" Kim Do-Jin furrowed his thick black eyebrows and hurriedly took out his cell phone. He quickly opened the NewTube app and searched Choi Yu-Seong's name. While watching the video, his facial expression changed from minute to minute.

'This is fun. What exactly is the relationship between these two?'

Baek Ah-Rin had never seen Kim Do-Jin’s anxious look before. After watching Do-Jin out of seeming appreciation, she said in a playful voice, "I saw the video and it was no joke. At this rate, wouldn’t Choi Yu-Seong be going to beat you soon?"

"...Bullshit," Do-Jin answered lightly while clicking his tongue. He continued watching the video, then said with a bright smile, "Choi Yu-Seong… So that wasn't everything you've shown me.”

"Huh? Are you angry, Kim Do-Jin?”

Do-Jin did not answer Ah-Rin's question and immediately opened the closed window wide.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to the dungeon. Wherever the boss is created."

"Suddenly? You just came out from the dungeon, didn’t you?”

“I have to prove it again.”

"Prove what?"

"That I'm the best."

"What... You crazy narcissist… Hey!"

Do-Jin lightly warmed-up before Ah-Rin finished her words and jumped to the ground from the five-story building without hesitation. Ah-Rin shouted at him while he was moving away from the window, "You crazy guy, I have to pay my guild creation registration by tomorrow-!"

Fortunately, Kim Do-Jin and Baek Ah-Rin's guild—Eclipse—were able to be established on the scheduled date.

* * *

In today's era, the most direct way to gauge one’s popularity was rather simple. It could be shown by the number of followers on social media.

Ferguson, the district's world-famous soccer coach where Choi Yu-Seong had previously lived, called watching social media a "waste of life.” In fact, many people made mistakes and wasted their time on it, but social media and the popularity game were not going away anytime.

‘It’s no different here in this world.’

In the afternoon, after finishing the morning training, Yu-Seong returned to his room for a short break. Then, he suddenly launched the Outstagram app on his cell phone. Its installation was not needed.

'I already have an account.’

Indeed, since the original Choi Yu-Seong himself was a seed of interest, it would be rather strange if he did not have such social media activities.

‘His number of followers… Only thirty? It's a lot less than I thought.’

This was Choi Yu-Seong’s first time using the social media app, but he had an idea that thirty followers was considered very few.

‘There are over tens of thousands of famous people among even some popular ordinary people.’

Although he was a rascal, it was still quite a small number of followers for the well-known Yu-Seong. After a short while, he found out the reason why.

“Oh, the account is private."

There was only one photo uploaded on Yu-Seong’s Outstagram—which was just an ordinary selfie he had taken in front of the mirror. Even his account ID was completely unrecognizable.

‘Then what did the original Choi Yu-Seong do on social media?’

If Choi Yu-Seong had installed social media, it meant that he wanted to get attention. However, his social media account was too quiet for that. Fortunately, it was not difficult to find answers. There were several direct messages, also known as DMs, that had been sent by the original Yu-Seong.

‘Kim So-Ra, Min Hye-Rin, Jung So-Young…’

They were all beautiful female entertainers or players who had been quite successful in the present or in recent times. In the past, Choi Yu-Seong had one-on-one conversations with such women and had left quite a few messages… But he clearly had no intention of meeting them ever.

Yu-Seong's face immediately turned red, because he didn't do it himself. Still, it was practically the same as he did.

‘What the heck has this crazy guy been doing?’

At this moment, Yu-Seong was almost envious of the original world, which had many loopholes in the setting.

‘Why is there such a detailed setting for the villain who was thrown away by the main character in the beginning?’

Although he had been driven to the point of madness, it was fortunate that there had only been a few replies.

‘So, about three of them replied.’

Surprisingly, about three out of twenty women had responded. Of course, the replies were not flattering at all.

"Crazy, asshole, freak..."

There were even cases where dozens of unfinished letters ‘ㅗ’[1] had been attached in the replies.

"The only reason he hasn’t been used is thanks to the influence of his family.” Yu-Seong felt that the original one had been quite the garbage.

'And now this shame is on me. By the way, this guy even sent a message to Jo Yu-Ri. In a different sense, he's really fearless.'

Jo Yu-Ri was a famous curse-type hunter of the S-rank, who became a guild master of the Black Magic Society which was one of the top ten guilds in Korea as a woman. She wore quite thick makeup and was famous for having a toxic personality. There were quite a few rumors that some male hunters who flirted with her had become crippled for the rest of their life.

'And one of them was even one of the top ten guild masters.’

Anyway, Choi Yu-Seong had sent a message to Jo Yu-Ri asking if she would like to meet him seriously. There had been no reply, which made the entire experience even scarier.

Find the original at bit.ly/3iBfjkV.

'I'm glad at least I know it now. I should run away if I see Jo Yu-Ri from afar.’

For some reason, Yu-Seong felt a part of his lower body going numb for no reason. He closed the message window with a dry cough.

It was naturally meaningless to send a message to explain the old story and make an excuse for his past actions.

‘Now, there’s more reason for me to become strong.’

After giving one more definite motivation toward his goal, Yu-Seong headed for the original purpose of turning on the social media application.

"Let's see. This is the search box and the ID is..."

While Yu-Seong was focused on the morning training, Jin Yu-Ri—who was looking at her cell phone next to him—suddenly burst into a big laugh. Yu-Seong was curious about her reaction and asked her why.

Yu-Ri tried to show her cell phone right away, but then she changed her mind and wrote an ID on a piece of paper. She told him to find out for himself.

Yu-Seong opened the white paper that he had folded in his pocket and searched for the Outstagram account "@H_Mohammed." Then, he entered the person’s account and smiled after checking the profile picture.

‘Huh? He seems like an Arab prince who’s interested in such popularity. But what about this person?’

While he was thinking, Yu-Seong entered the opponent's account details. Surprisingly, the photo at the top of Muhammad's account was none other than Choi Yu-Seong’s own. He stuttered, "...Me?"

Choi Yu-Seong clicked on the picture out of curiosity, and then coughed at Muhammad's writing in English. He spat out the water that he was drinking. "Hmmm..."

「@H_Mohammmed

He is a favorite hunter.

That's why I'm thinking about it.

How much do I have to call to have him? Hmm...」 [2]

Fortunately, Muhammad didn’t have the dangerous tastes that Yu-Seong had been worried about. He was just very rich (probably more than Choi Woo-Jae) since he was Saudi Arabia's prince. He also enjoyed making quite a variety of investments as a hobby. For example, he would buy one of the major league teams in the United States and then spend a lot of money to rebuild the team.

‘He's like Mansour on Earth where I lived.’

As he learned about Muhammad little by little, Yu-Seong understood why he wanted him.

‘He’s setting up a team of hunters for dungeon racing. Well, there are a lot of noblemen who think of this as a sport these days.’

Yu-Seong now knew the intention, but there was no reason for him to panic.

'Not as much as Muhammad, but I already have quite a lot of money.’

By then, a new message was posted on Muhammad's social media feed.

「@H_Mohammmed

About $1,000,000,000?」

One billion dollars was more than 1.1 trillion won. If Choi Yu-Seong could have that much money at his disposal, there would be a considerable increase in what he could do.

"I will. I want to join the team, my prince." Stating that aloud, Yu-Seong tried to start a DM conversation with Muhammad.

「@H_Mohammmed

Only if he's an S-rank hunter. :) 」

"...This wicked gentleman is making fun of me.”

Choi Yu-Seong was somewhat distressed. He closed the Outstagram app and checked the time. It has already been an hour, which meant that his break time had come to an end.

"This is certainly a time-consuming ghost. I shouldn't turn it on unless I really have to."

For the first time, Yu-Seong could feel the danger of social media.

1. It is one of the Korean vowels. If you send 'ㅗ' over text to somebody, you are showing the middle finger to him/her. ☜

2. The English was left as it was written in the raws ☜