That comment—
That wasn't there a second ago.
He leans closer to the screen, his eyes narrowing.
[Error: Narrative Divergence Detected]
His fingers hover above the mouse, trembling slightly. Did I misread that?
I reload.
The comment is gone.
"Tch. Great. Even the platform's messing with me now."
Still—something feels wrong.
The Hongdae Incident chapter sits open on my screen.
Not just any chapter.
Chapter 37 of Authority Failed: Seoul Under Null.
It's the web novel I'd been serializing for six months.
The one barely clinging to its readership.
The one I've been pouring my life into, even if it feels like it's pouring back out of me.
I stare at the screen longer than I should.
Too many explosions.
Too many deaths.
Too many rushed lines written at three in the morning because I just wanted the update done.
My cursor stops over a specific sentence.
A civilian casualty was reported during the chaos.
Why did I write it like that?
I highlight the text to edit it, but as I do, the words shift under my cursor.
The black ink of the digital font bleeds and reforms.
A civilian casualty is being reported.
My hand freezes.
No.
That isn't what I typed.
My eyes begin to burn. It isn't pain—it's pressure.
Like something inside my skull is pushing back against my sockets.
Then, the smell hits.
Oil. Burning plastic.
The salty, stale scent of cheap ramen.
Why would I smell that in my bedroom?
I blink.
The keyboard is gone. So is the wooden desk.
Buzzing fluorescent lights fill my vision—too bright, too close.
I'm standing upright now, my palm resting on a scratched plastic counter.
A convenience store?
My heart slams against my ribs.
No. No, no, no—
My body moves before my thoughts can catch up.
I look down at myself.
A stained green apron.
Thin, unfamiliar arms.
A plastic name tag.
[Han Jae-woo]
My stomach drops. That name... I know it.
Of course I do.
Han Jae-woo was a nobody.
A throwaway background character.
A convenience store clerk who dies off-screen during the Hongdae Incident in Authority Failed.
Memories crash into my mind without permission: Night shifts.
Minimum wage. Smiling at customers who never meet my eyes. A cramped officetel with peeling wallpaper.
Stop.
Those aren't my memories. They can't be.
The store shakes violently.
"What—?!"
Bottles rattle on the shelves. Something glass crashes in the back.
A muffled scream echoes from the street outside.
My pulse spikes.
I look at the digital clock above the register.
July 13th. 12:03 AM.
That's wrong.
In Authority Failed, the Hongdae Incident starts at 12:05.
My vision flickers, and a blue translucent window cuts through the air.
[Background Character Detected]
[Narrative Priority: Low]
[Status: Expendable]
The realization hits like ice water.
I didn't transmigrate into the protagonist. I didn't even make it into the named supporting cast.
I transmigrated into my own novel as a man who wasn't meant to survive the next two minutes.
The window vanishes.
The ground trembles again—harder this time.
Outside, the air begins to warp like heat rising off asphalt.
I recognize that distortion. I described it myself.
I wrote it in one rushed, lazy paragraph because I was behind on my upload schedule.
The front glass explodes inward.Shards slide across the floor, scraping like nails.
Han Jae-woo duck behind the counter on instinct.
Glass skitters past his shoes.
Cold air floods the store, carrying screams, sirens—
—and that pressure.
Heavy. Suffocating.
My ears ring.
Move. Move.
I drop to my knees.
The counter hides most of my body, but not all of it. My heart slams so hard it feels loud enough to give me away.
Outside, people run past the windows. Some scream. Some fall.
Something massive blocks the streetlights.
He didn't look up.
Don't look yet.
Think.
The Hongdae Incident.
Early phase.
First manifestation lasts—what, three minutes?
No, two.
The monster doesn't enter buildings right away. It targets—
A crash shakes the store. Shelves tip. Ramen spills like confetti.
—movement.
I clamp a hand over my mouth as a sob tears out of someone nearby.
Someone's still inside.
"Help—!" a woman cries near the entrance.
My chest tightens.
No.
Don't stand up.
Don't play hero.
You're not built for that.
Another tremor hits.
The lights flicker, then die.
Darkness swallows the store.
For half a second, silence.
Then—
A thud.
Closer.
Footsteps?
No.
Too heavy.
Each impact vibrates through my bones.
The thing sniffs.
He freezes.
It uses sound. Early-stage behavior. I wrote that.
My breath comes shallow.
Too loud.
I force it slower.
In the darkness, a faint glow pulses outside—purple, warped, wrong. Shadows crawl across the floor, stretching toward the counter.
The woman screams again.
Something answers.
A wet, grinding sound.
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Don't think about it.
Don't imagine it.
Glass crunches.
The pressure spikes.
My vision blurs at the edges.
Then—
A bang.
Light floods the store.
Not white.
Blue.
Clean.
Sharp.
The pressure snaps like a cord pulled too tight.
A voice cuts through the chaos.
"Evacuation team—move!"
Another voice, closer. Calm.
Annoyingly calm.
"Barrier up. Civilians inside."
The air shifts.
The weight lifts just enough for me to breathe.
I crack one eye open.
A translucent wall shimmers across the broken entrance, sealing the store.
Symbols ripple across it—hexagonal patterns, precise and artificial.
An awakened.
Already?
That's early.
Too early.
Boots hit the floor.
Someone vaults over the shattered entrance like gravity means nothing to them.
A woman lands inside the store.
Short hair.
Black jacket with a government insignia stitched on the sleeve. Her eyes glow faintly blue as they sweep the room.
They stop on me.
"You," she says.
"Behind the counter. Stay down."
Her gaze sharpens.
"…You're still conscious?"
I nod. My throat locks up.
That wasn't supposed to happen.
In the novel, most civilians black out from mana pressure.
She frowns, like she's noticed something she shouldn't have.
Before she can speak again, a sharp ping flashes in my vision.
[Observation Logged]
[Anomaly Detected: Background Character Response Exceeds Threshold]
My blood runs cold.
The woman turns away, already issuing orders into her comm.
I stay frozen behind the counter, heart racing.
Anomaly?
No.
No no no—
I grip the edge of the counter until my fingers hurt.
The story didn't notice civilians.
Not like this.
Which means—
Something shifts outside the barrier. The ground trembles again, heavier than before.
The awakened woman stiffens.
"—It's adapting," she mutters.
My stomach drops.
That line wasn't in the novel.
And suddenly, I understand.
This world isn't just playing my story.
It's reading me back.The barrier hums.
Not loud—just enough to feel, a vibration crawling up my teeth and settling behind my eyes. The blue glow ripples as something heavy brushes against it from outside.
Once.
Twice.
The awakened woman swears under her breath.
"Pressure spike," someone says over comms. "It's testing the edge."
Of course it is.
In the novel, the first monster was stupid. Pure instinct. Slam, roar, retreat. That was the excuse I used for bad pacing.
But now—
"It's adapting," she'd said.
My fingers twitch.
I know what comes next.
The woman inside the store crouches near the barrier, palm pressed against the shimmering surface. Symbols flare brighter beneath her hand, reacting to her mana. Her jaw tightens.
"Evac ETA?" she asks.
"Four minutes," the comm crackles back. "Maybe five."
She exhales sharply. "Too long."
My stomach twists.
Four minutes is an eternity.
Outside, the shadow shifts. The warped purple glow pulses, slower now. Deliberate. Like breathing.
No—like listening.
I swallow hard and force myself to think.
The monster changes targets after sustained resistance. That was a throwaway line I'd added to justify the next set piece. It stops brute force and—
—and tries something else.
Sound.
My gaze snaps to the store interior.
Loose shelves. Fallen bottles. A hanging promotional sign swaying gently from the ceiling, its thin metal hook creaking with each movement.
The woman near the entrance hasn't stopped crying. She's curled against a shelf, hands over her ears, rocking.
If she screams again—
"Hey," I whisper before I can stop myself.
My voice sounds wrong. Too loud in my own ears.
The awakened woman's head whips around.
"Did I tell you to speak?"
I flinch. "S-sorry. But—listen. It's—"
A low vibration rolls through the floor.
The barrier flares.
The woman grimaces. "Damn it."
Outside, something scrapes along the glass. Not claws—too smooth. Like bone dragging across reinforced polymer.
Testing.
I force the words out, fast and quiet. "It reacts to sound. Not just loud—sudden. Sharp noises. If something falls—"
She stares at me.
Really looks this time.
"…How do you know that?"
I freeze.
Wrong answer, and I'm done.
A civilian shouldn't know monster behavior. Not this early. Not this specific.
My vision flickers.
[Warning: Information Disclosure Risk]
I grit my teeth.
Think. Lie—but not too much.
"I—I heard reports," I say. "Online. Before—before everything went down."
She doesn't buy it. I can tell by the way her eyes narrow, glow intensifying. Mana pressure brushes against me, light but probing.
It doesn't knock me out.
Her frown deepens.
"Strange," she murmurs.
The barrier shudders violently.
The crying woman screams.
A sharp, panicked sound—high and desperate.
The monster answers immediately.
The purple glow flares bright.
Something slams into the barrier—not with brute force, but precision. A focused strike. The symbols ripple chaotically, several fracturing before snapping back into place.
The awakened woman staggers. "—Tch!"
"That was targeted," someone shouts over comms. "It learned the frequency!"
My heart pounds.
This didn't happen in the novel.
I push myself fully behind the counter, crawling closer to the crying woman. Glass crunches under my knees. I ignore it.
"Hey," I whisper again, softer. "Please. You have to stay quiet."
She looks at me with wild eyes, tears streaking her face. "I—I can't—"
"I know," I say, and it's not acting. "I know. But if it hears you—"
Another impact. The barrier flashes, dimmer this time.
The awakened woman snaps orders. "Reinforce the lower sigils! Rotate mana flow—now!"
A hairline crack of light spiders across the barrier.
My chest tightens.
Two more hits like that, and—
I grab a fallen jacket from the floor and press it gently over the woman's mouth, wrapping my arms around her shoulders from behind. She jerks in surprise.
"Shh," I breathe. "Just breathe with me. Slow. Like this."
In.
Out.
She trembles, but she follows.
The pressure in the room shifts—not lighter, but steadier. The monster hesitates. The purple glow dims, its rhythm disrupted.
The awakened woman notices.
Her gaze snaps to me again.
"What did you just do?"
I don't answer.
I can't.
Because the system does it for me.
[Behavioral Influence Confirmed]
[Threat Mitigation Contribution: Minor]
[Background Character Status: Re-evaluating]
The words burn into my vision.
Re-evaluating.
That's bad.
That's very bad.
The ground outside cracks with a sound like splitting stone. The monster pulls back, gathering itself.
Charging.
The awakened woman swears. "Brace!"
The barrier flares one last time as the creature lunges—
—and then a new pressure slams down from above.
Clean. Overwhelming. Controlled.
A beam of pale gold light spears into the street, pinning the warped shape to the asphalt. The monster shrieks—a sound so wrong my vision whites out at the edges.
A new voice cuts in, amplified and sharp.
"Authority override. Target secured."
The pressure vanishes as suddenly as it came.
Silence crashes down.
I gasp, lungs burning.
Outside, the purple glow gutters and dies.
The barrier dissolves into sparks.
Boots hit the ground—many this time. Heavier. More confident.
The awakened woman straightens, relief and tension warring on her face. "About damn time."
A figure steps into the ruined entrance.
Tall. Broad-shouldered. A long coat fluttering with residual mana. His eyes glow gold as they sweep the store—calculating, distant.
They stop on me.
Not curious.
Interested.
A new window opens in my vision.
[Key Observer Identified]
[Attention Level: Elevated]
[Recommendation: Limit Further Deviations]
My hands shake.
The man tilts his head slightly, like he's found something unexpected.
"…That civilian," he says calmly. "Bring him in for questioning."
My stomach drops.
Questioning?
No.
In the novel, civilians were released. Forgotten.
But I already know the truth.
I'm not a civilian anymore.
And the story—
It's already adjusted for that.