Surviving a Shounen Manga - Chapter 206
***
“An interview? Again?”
“Yes, it’s JN Comics······.”
“I’ve never heard of it. Is it new?”
“Yes, it’s only a two-year-old magazine, but it’s getting a lot of attention these days for its trendy articles······.”
“I don’t have time.”
The man added a loud remark as if to emphasize his point.
“······How many times do I have to tell you the same thing?”
“The head of that company used to be on the N Platform’s Global Distribution Team. I think it’s a good opportunity for our manhwa······.”
“Oh, come on, didn’t we do that before? When I did an interview with a major company. What was it called again?”
“······M Comics?”
“Yeah, that’s it. Just tell them to refer to that content and write something similar.”
The man turned his back.
Of course, he didn’t forget to add a remark.
“I’m dying from work, and people keep coming and going······.”
Then, just as the man was about to leave the office,
“But······ writer-nim?”
The PD quietly called out to the man again.
“What is it now?”
“I thought of it because of the M Comics interview······ I received a message related to that.”
“A message? Who sent it?”
“That······ It’s from the reader writer-nim mentioned before.”
At that moment,
“······Huh.”
The man was speechless as he felt a sense of absurdity creeping up on him.
“That troll? What do you want me to do about it? Didn’t you block them? No, what did they say this time?”
“I think they were curious about the content of this interview. They wanted to talk about using the characters······.”
“Another story about the fallen knight? Ha······ Okay, just block them all, regardless of who they are. Don’t they ever get tired? Why don’t they live their own lives? It’s annoying.”
Then,
“But I already replied.”
“······Huh?”
The PD suddenly spoke up.
“Writer-nim. I think this person actually likes you? They respond right away, and they seem to know the story well.”
“······What are you talking about? So what······.”
“They’ve also given you a lot of advice whenever you’ve messed up the plot. I’ve even given you advice before, and I’ve mentioned their opinions?”
“No, wait······ wait, PD Kim. What are you saying······.”
“How about meeting them in person? It might not be a bad idea······ It could lead to a better story?”
“······Huh?”
What? What is this person talking about?
The man was beyond absurdity and into bewilderment.
“What the······.”
At that moment,
“Would you like to try it?”
Beep-.
The man’s vision went black, and soon darkness enveloped him.
*
Gulp-.
The man opened his eyes with a start and blinked a few times.
“······What was that.”
He was confused.
Did I faint? Did I just faint?
This had never happened to him before. Fainting all of a sudden.
Anyway,
“Ha······ Did they just leave me here?”
It was a very strange situation.
Suddenly, the plot went to hell, and they wanted me to meet a troll and do what······ And after all that weird talk, they just left me unconscious and went away?
“······Did I do something wrong?”
In any case, it was the PD’s behavior that was incomprehensible.
It’s not like the serialization is ongoing, it’s all over.
So, as he was getting up slowly, feeling bewildered,
At that moment,
“What, what the······.”
The man opened his mouth in surprise at the sight before him.
The office scenery was strange.
First of all, there were fewer desks. It was also old and dirty.
There was a computer with an apple logo on it, but the glass window was completely gone, and there was a fan instead of an air conditioner.
This wasn’t the place he had been before. It was a completely different place.
‘Could I have been moved while I was unconscious?’
And while he was wondering,
“······Huh?”
He noticed something a little strange.
Somehow, the office scenery felt familiar. The smell that wafted through it was somehow familiar.
It was like the smell that used to come from the old office······.
“No way······ No, that’s ridiculous.”
But his bewilderment didn’t end there.
The man’s eyes, which had been darting around, caught sight of something strange.
[Writer]
His reflection in the mirror. And above his head.
There was a strange hologram-like thing floating there.
“What, what is this?”
Just then,
Ding-.
A long hologram window was created in front of his eyes as soon as the chime rang.
The man’s eyes naturally went to the text in it.
[Mission: Achieve sales that are more than 10 times higher than the original work through work revision]
※ Death upon failure
“What the······.”
The text didn’t end there.
When he looked below,
[Current Status]
-Current sales: 0
-Revenue compared to original work: 0%
-Chapter suitability: 0
-Story development satisfaction: 0
-Reader displeasure index: 0
-Character popularity index (search)
-Character evaluation index (search)
It was full of incomprehensible texts.
“Huh······.”
For a moment, the man wondered if he had gone crazy.
No, it must be so.
Just then.
“Writer-nim?”
A youthful voice was heard from behind.
He turned around in surprise and there,
“······Wh, what are you doing, PD Kim?”
It was her. The PD in charge who had left after telling him something strange.
But,
“What are you doing here? Haven’t you gone home yet? Haven’t you finished writing the contract?”
She looked strangely young. No, she looked noticeably younger.
As if it was 10 years ago when they first met.
The man felt all his strength drain from his body at this unbelievable reality.
Thud-.
“W, writer-nim?”
Looking at her running towards him with surprised eyes, the man realized two things.
He had now traveled back to the past.
And the one who did it was not the person in front of him, but······ an unknown ‘something’. This was not something a human could do.
His heart pounded for a moment.
“······Whew.”
He couldn’t help but curse.
He wanted to get out of here for now. Out of this space.
So he pushed the PD away and was about to run out the door when,
Suddenly,
Cling-.
[The serialization of Adventure King begins]
[Saved manuscript Chapter 1-Prelude to Adventure is loading]
[Main character: Leo]
[Expected chapter duration: 20 minutes]
A text was displayed on the hologram window.
And then,
“W, what is this?”
A video began to play.
It was a video of a European countryside reminiscent of a sunset.
And at the bottom of the screen, there was a meaningful text written.
[Main character: Leo]
It was the name of the protagonist of Adventure King.
“······Huh.”
He didn’t have the energy to be surprised anymore.
“Writer-nim? Writer-nim? What’s wrong?”
“······Oh, no.”
The PD didn’t seem to see the hologram.
“I’ll be right back······ I need to go to the bathroom.”
“Yes? Are you sure you’re okay?”
“······I don’t know either.”
The man who went to the bathroom turned his eyes to the screen as if possessed.
Familiar yet unfamiliar scenes were being shown on the screen.
A small and cozy village with twilight descending. Smoke rising from each chimney, and the sunset slowly setting between the colorful buildings······
After watching this for a while, the man was soon able to confirm the identity of this video.
This is Adventure King.
The Adventure King he had drawn had become a live-action······ no, it had become reality. This video was broadcasting it in real time.
The video seemed to be showing the point of view of the character who was currently the main focus.
Leo.
“······.”
The man then noticed the list on the left side of the hologram.
There,
-Load saved manuscript
-Change plot
-Change main character
-Create character
-Insert character
⁝
At a glance, there were menus to intervene in this video.
Perhaps this is how he could ‘revise the work’.
By then, the man had come to understand the series of systems applied to him.
He didn’t know why it was done this way, but it seemed that his goal was to revise this cartoon that had become a reality in a more interesting and smooth way.
It was ridiculous.
‘I’m trying to understand this situation, and I even understand it a little, but I don’t understand it.’
But strangely enough, his mind began to calm down.
He felt a sense of stability as soon as he understood the situation.
It was a moment when he realized that humans are creatures of adaptation.
Just then.
Cling-.
[An attempt to change the preceding plot has been detected]
[Character: Villain 3]
[Action: Attempting dialogue]
[Current penalty: 10 seconds of forced silence]
Red texts appeared in the center of the video.
It seemed to be a warning phrase.
‘Change the preceding plot?’
Looking at the video,
“What is that?”
One of the characters he had clearly created, but had no memory of, was doing something strange that was not in the plan.
Wasn’t he trying to talk to Leo? Or was he not taking his turn with the others?
A character like that doesn’t appear in Chapter 1.
He was distracting attention that should have gone to the main character.
The man took another good look at the character in question.
He was a guy with a big chin.
*
The man admitted that the events currently unfolding were definitely real.
That the world had returned to 10 years ago, that he had been placed in an incomprehensible, surreal situation.
Well, he couldn’t deny it. That was the reality he saw before his eyes.
Therefore,
“10 times the original sales…”
The man decided to respond to the mission he had been given. To try to achieve it once.
Anyway, there was no choice but to do it, given the absurd condition that failure would result in death.
Fortunately, it didn’t seem like it would be that difficult.
The system was a bit complicated, but he had more or less figured it out. All he had to do was make this story interesting.
And above all, the content it was based on was none other than ‘The Adventure King’.
It was a manhwa he had been drawing for the past 10 years. If he couldn’t do it, wouldn’t that be even stranger?
Even,
“Let’s see… Wow, is this really the complete ending?”
There was even a saved manuscript.
That meant he just had to load it. He just had to modify the necessary parts.
How hard could it be?
Furthermore, it was a stroke of luck that time in the work flowed at the same rate as time in reality.
The time it took for Leo to become the Adventure King in the work was about 2 years.
That meant it wouldn’t even take 10 years.
If he had had to draw 10 years from the beginning again, he probably would have killed himself.
“Wait… Come to think of it, should I focus on the manhwa or start investing in stocks?”
Since it didn’t seem particularly difficult, he even had thoughts like that.
Thinking about money even in this surreal situation.
The man chuckled.
Of course, there was just one thing that bothered him.
It was that he couldn’t make the modifications he wanted as he pleased.
If he wanted to make revisions to the work, such as changing the plot or adding characters, he had to purchase the authority to do so within the system.
Purchases were made using a currency called ‘points’ within the system, which could be obtained through the sales settled at the end of each chapter and the popularity with readers.
In other words, he had to get a reaction from the readers in order to earn points, and based on that, he could modify the work.
But even so, the man was not worried.
Through the serialization over the past 10 years, he had already mastered what the readers were crazy about.
He just had to prevent the plot from going too far off track, and that would be enough to achieve his goal.
“Alright, let’s give it a try.”
*
“This guy… What is he?”
The sense of dissonance came after Chapter 2 had ended and Chapter 3 was being prepared.
Something strange had been captured on the screen showing the area of the upcoming chapter.
There was some guy present at every major location where events took place.
He was at Madam Rosemary’s shop, and he was also at the mafia’s building.
The man realized his identity right away.
It was him. That chin guy who had acted strangely in the first chapter.
The guy had even entered the mafia’s building, caused a scene, and even crossed paths with Kiriko.
“…What the hell is this guy?”
The man decided to keep an eye on this chin guy.
*
It was the first time.
That the guy had done something he liked.
“…”
The man stared blankly at the chin guy reflected on the screen.
1 on 5 poker.
It was the most unfair game among those that appeared in the Gold City chapter, a game that was made so that Leo could never win.
That much had gone according to plan. After all, Leo had to be put through trials as well.
The problem lay in how to overcome it.
The man remembered the countless insults he had received while serializing this episode at the time.
Whether it was plausible or not, whether the character settings were this or that.
Therefore, he had also intended to change the plot.
However, because he had made the game too difficult, he hadn’t been able to get a sense of what to modify or how until the chapter was already in progress.
But,
“…I have to admit it.”
To use a cheating potion to arrange things so that Leo could win.
The chin guy had taken a load off his mind by acting the way he had.
The readers’ reactions would probably be pretty good too. At the very least, it would definitely be better than in the original work.
“The chin guy…”
By that time, he was somewhat convinced. That the guy also had the idea of making this story interesting.
Of course, it wasn’t clear whether he had received the same mission as himself.
Continuing on,
“······I guess I have to admit it.”
For the first time, the man gave the guy a favorable score on his writer’s favorability scale.
100 points.
However, he couldn’t let his guard down.
This guy wasn’t just any ordinary character.
The man remembered what the PD had said before he came here.
“How about meeting him in person? It might make for a better work.”
Maybe that guy was him.
The malicious commenter who had been nitpicking at the contents of The King of Adventures.
“······.”
The man then turned his gaze to the photo of the chin-jutting character on page 2 of the [Character Evaluation Sheet]. This guy would probably move up to page 1 soon. After all, the order of this was indicative of the readers’ attention.
“Let’s just watch for now.”
*
“Writer-nim, the reactions have been good lately?”
“Yes? Oh, yes. Thank you.”
“Especially that chin-jutting character! The last scene was great.”
“······The last one?”
“After he knocked Ian out in the ring and declared himself the King of Adventures! Are you perhaps······ setting up a rivalry with Leo?”
So that was it.
“······Yeah, something like that.”
“I’m looking forward to it. The future developments.”
“······Thank you.”
Looking forward to it.
It was the first time that he had felt burdened by those words.
Because it wasn’t something he had done.
The man remembered the inexplicable trembling of his body at that time. Not only the content of the declaration, but also the showthat gave him a drastic change in appearance.
For a moment, he felt like making the guy the real protagonist of the story.
‘······He’s grown quite a bit.’
But that’s why he needed to be held back even more.
Already, the guy’s part had grown so large that there had been countless deviations in the story. At this rate, he might end up throwing away the entire saved manuscript.
He had to stop that.
“Oh right, you know? We’re going to have a character popularity poll soon.”
“Popularity poll?”
“Yes, I was asked to do it in line with the Adventurer Qualification Exam episode.”
“Ah······ Yes. That’s right.”
Then,
“Who do you think will be number 1?”
The PD asked with a smile.
It was a strange smile with an unknown intention.
“Well, of course, Leo······.”
And at that moment,
“Oh, is that what you think.”
The PD’s smile grew even wider.
Seeing this, the man realized that her thoughts were different from his own.
······That much?
However,
“It’s certainly something to look forward to.”
The man was not nervous.
After all, the Adventurer Qualification Exam episode was coming up soon.
The guy wouldn’t be able to run wild here. There was something he had prepared, and also······ there was an unbeatable opponent.
‘Let’s give it a shot.’
The man then smiled at the PD.
“Then why don’t we make a bet?”
“A bet?”
“Yes, on who will be number 1. I’ll bet on Leo.”
“Hmm, then I’ll······ bet on the chin-jutting character. No, should I say Hiro?”
“······As you wish.”
“Yes, that sounds fun. Then, let’s do our best today!”
To the PD who was about to turn and leave,
“I’ll give a present to the character who gets first place.”
The man added.
“Wow, really? What is it?”
Of course, the contents would vary depending on who got first place.
If Leo got first place, he would be given a power befitting him. The same went for Kiriko and the others.
However, if the chin-jutting character got first place······.
‘Well, let’s have some fun with it.’
What the guy would be given would be an overseas trip to the east.
To the dark world where he wouldn’t be given a single chapter.
“You’ll see when the time comes.”
The man turned around.
And then he smiled, imagining that time.
‘If, by some chance, the guy survives even after that······.’
Then······ then he would properly acknowledge him.
That you, too, have the qualities of a protagonist.