Chapter 1
– I Became the Sickly Younger Brother of the Grand Duke of the North
<Do Not Make Contracts Carelessly>
It seemed like I had fallen into a deep sleep.
“Ugh…”
My hazy consciousness gradually began to surface. It wasn’t a pleasant awakening. My entire body was terribly painful and uncomfortable. My head was spinning, perhaps from a fever. Involuntary groans were leaking out.
The moment Kwon Ja-yun barely opened his eyes, he realized something was wrong.
“Huk, huk…! Ugh, huk…. Huuk…”
He gasped for breath like someone who had been submerged in seawater for a long time. It felt like someone was burning his throat with a hot iron rod.
“Young… young master…!”
He couldn’t breathe. While coughing and tears streaming down uncontrollably, he heard several people hurriedly approaching with thundering footsteps.
What’s going on?
Unfamiliar people, unfamiliar environment, strange walls and ceilings like a 19th-century movie set – his tear-blurred vision was spinning. But that wasn’t the problem right now.
He tried to get up in confusion, but his body wouldn’t move well.
This feeling was new. He’d worried about breaking furniture when swinging his arms carelessly before, but he’d never been this powerless and groaning. It felt like being trapped in the middle of the deep sea wearing a diving suit.
Unconsciously, a voice searching for someone who should always be by his side came out.
“Uh, hy-hyung…”
The small voice, hoarse as if scraping against an iron plate, made him doubt if it was really his.
The moment he raised his upper body with people’s help, something hot bubbling inside him surged up.
“Huk, huk… ugh… uwek…”
His vision was blurry from tears of pain. The white blanket was being stained red. Translucent red liquid trickled down his chin.
Shxt, what is this?
Why, why…. Am I coughing up blood?
***
“Do Not Make Contracts Carelessly.”
It’s one of the iron rules that must be etched into your mind regardless of time period or world setting. Honestly, I think this is a truth that should be taught from middle and high school. Since schools only teach useless subjects like Korean, English, and Math, young people enter society only to be scammed under the name of contracts, holding their stinging heads while swallowing bitter lessons.
This truth applied everywhere – in school, in society, in conversations with systems, and even in dealings between gods.
You shouldn’t trust anyone. Especially those who immediately bring up contracts and make persuasive speeches.
Even if an “Operator” suddenly appears one day with glowing red eyes, looking like an adorable cat mixed with a rabbit. Whether they appear as a cute child or as a system window, you shouldn’t trust them carelessly.
That’s what I thought, but….
[‘Universe Operator greets the Administrator of ‘Blank Star”]
Ja-yun clutched his chest in pain at the sight of the Operator that appeared before him.
D-damn… How can I refuse like this?
Ja-yun recalled that truth he had reminded himself countless times, but ultimately lowered his mental walls.
That’s because the form the Operator took when appearing before him was too, too… too cute.
[“Hello. I am ###, one of the many hands of the Will of the World, /Abraxas/.”]
The name it spoke was composed in divine language. ordinary humans wouldn’t have understood it. But since Kwon Ja-yun was also an administrator with divine status, he could understand.
Ja-yun almost fell to his knees before the Operator spoke those words. When he didn’t answer immediately, the small child reaching out its hand to him had a somehow familiar and nostalgic appearance.
The Operator approached closer with a puzzled look and called out to him again.
[“Administrator?”]
Inside, he was already mentally destroying an apartment building somewhere because of its cuteness. But Ja-yun held onto his reason and spoke as coldly as possible.
“What are you? Why do you look like that?”
Though he frowned in disgust, his hands were already trembling.
[“Oh? You don’t like my appearance? That’s strange. I set it to automatically appear in the form most appealing to the Administrator for smooth communication….”]
Indeed. As it said, the current appearance of the ‘Operator’ was perfectly suited to break down Ja-yun, the administrator of this world.
A child who looked around eleven or twelve. Black hair, black eyes, handsome enough to turn heads despite his youth, and an impression of being very gentle and kind before being tainted by time – it was exactly like his brother from his memories.
The ‘Operator’ had taken the form of Ja-yun’s ‘brother’ from his childhood.
Kwon Ja-yun had a brother. Someone who was affectionate, deep-hearted, and very kind – who had embraced him when he had nowhere to go as a child. Someone who had practically raised him. Despite not being related by blood, he treated Ja-yun like a real brother, making Ja-yun wish they could become a real family. And now they have actually become a family.
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