Prologue
There was a painting on the ceiling. A picture of a dog and a wolf sleeping side by side.
It felt strange.
That painting seemed somehow familiar.
Where was this place? Lying in bed, I turned my head to look around.
An exotic-looking bedroom.
Drawers that had been ransacked as if by bandits.
A blanket thick with dust, as though it hadn’t been washed in ages.
No matter where I looked, it was hard to believe this was the room I usually stayed in. But I had no memory at all of how I’d gotten here. It wasn’t so much frightening as it was bewildering. I wanted to ask someone about this situation, but I couldn’t sense even the slightest presence of another person.
I sat up in bed and thought:
This might be a dream.
But the moment I opened the door and stepped out, that thought was immediately discarded. The reality felt far too vivid against my skin for it to be a dream.
A desolate wind whistled past—whooosh—rustling my bangs slightly. It was coming from the right side of the corridor.
I walked in the direction the wind was blowing from. I figured there might be an exit or a window that way.
Soon, what appeared before me was the second-floor veranda of the mansion. I grabbed the railing and gazed at the view beyond.
It was night.
A rural night street with not a single streetlamp.
Scattered lights wandered through the alleys. Those weren’t flashlights—they were torches. And the people carrying them shared one peculiar trait.
Each of them was leading a single wolf on a leash.
A throbbing headache came, and with it, fragments of memory began to awaken bit by bit.
I had seen this scene before.
“This is…”
I tilted my head back to look up at the pitch-black sky. The countless stars floating there were a sight almost never seen in the night sky of a 21st-century city.
And among those innumerable stars was the proof that explained exactly where this place was.
Three moons of varying sizes and brightnesses.
The empty spaces in my memory began to fill in slowly.
Only then could I recall where I had seen this landscape.
This was the scenery from a game.
A game that had never been released to the world.
The name of that game slipped from my lips.
“The Savior from Another World…”
My voice sounded hoarse. It felt bizarre, wondrous, astonishing, and absurd all at once. The world inside the game was unfolding right in front of my eyes.
With three moons hanging in the sky, I cast three shadows. I stared blankly down at my feet, gathering the memories that were gradually rising to the surface of my consciousness.
And then I realized why I knew about this game that had never even been launched.
Because I was the developer of this game.
A game developer armed with stubborn determination.
“Haa…”
In the quiet mansion, the sound of my exhale echoed unusually loudly.
And now I knew for certain where this place was.
This mansion was the starting point of <The Savior from Another World>. Though it existed in three dimensions now, the structure of the corridors and the decorations placed here and there matched exactly what I had designed.
I confirmed it throughout the mansion.
Animal heads were hung sporadically on the corridor walls—trophies of rare game hunted by this family. And the places where sections of the wall had been torn out symbolized that this family had fallen into ruin.
In the third drawer in the kitchen, there were still two bottles of wine with their corks intact. In the shoe cabinet by the mansion’s entrance were beginner leather boots that fit my feet perfectly. And under the pillow of the bed where I had first awakened was a ring engraved with a dog and a wolf.
All of them were items obtainable right at the beginning of this game.
Memories came rushing in like fragments of a shipwreck carried on gentle waves. No matter how much I tried to reassemble those pieces, they could never form a complete vessel.
Because the character who should have served as the key to that ship had not appeared.
The person who was supposed to be here without fail at this starting point in the game.
Yohan Esperts.
The very protagonist of <The Savior from Another World>.
And I found that protagonist in an unexpected place.
The bathroom, where I had gone to wash my face.
It was in the crude mirror above the washbasin.
“…”
My thoughts came to a complete halt. Perhaps, unconsciously, I had been avoiding this crucial confirmation all along.
The reason I had stared at my shadow under the moonlight for so long.
It was because my height seemed subtly different. Because the length of the hand gripping the railing felt awkward. Because the stride that carried my steps had changed.
“S-so… in other words…”
Even my voice didn’t sound like my own. Standing in front of the mirror, I looked down at both hands. Even the palm lines were unfamiliar. When I reached out with those trembling hands to touch my face, the ‘protagonist’ in the mirror perfectly mirrored my movements.
“I’m… the protagonist…?”
A dull ache throbbed at the back of my head. As if I’d been struck by something.
It probably took about half a day.
To accept that this wasn’t a dream.
It took a full month.
To accept that I could never return to my original world.
And exactly on the one-month mark, while drinking wine alone in broad daylight, it suddenly came to me.
There had been a woman who used to clink beer glasses with me every night.
I recited her name.
“Jeong Mi-ri…”
The woman who had spent long hours with me, building the game together. The woman who had shared every joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure of creation with me.
And if my memory was correct, she had left some trace in this world.
“I have to go there…”
Fortunately, I already knew how to get there. Because I was Jeong Yo-han—the developer who created this game.
After a moment’s hesitation, I gathered the few minor items obtainable in the mansion, packed a backpack, and headed to the carriage station of this territory.
***
Clack-clack. Clack-clack.
Inside the luxurious four-horse carriage I had managed to board, a single beautiful girl sat across from me as my fellow passenger.
The scene could have been one perfect illustration. A golden-haired woman turning her head toward the carriage window.
Even though the carriage was in motion, her posture remained perfectly upright without the slightest sway. Only the yellow strands of her hair rippled backward with inertia.
Between those flowing golden locks, the delicate profile of the girl was revealed.
Sensing my gaze, she spoke without even turning her head.
“Why are you looking at me like that, Yohan?”
“…How exactly am I looking at you?”
“Like… an avatar— no, like a father looking at his daughter?”
An unexpectedly sharp observation. But of course—she was also a character born from my fingertips.
Princess Adrinne.
A character entangled with the protagonist’s path right from the beginning. That was why I had put special effort into designing her.
In reality, the gaze I directed at her probably did resemble paternal affection.
“I’ve been rude.”
I turned my head the other way.
Everything visible had been born from my own hands. If the girl inside this carriage was a character I designed, then the scenery outside the carriage was the very world I had designed.
A city that never sleeps.
Frantimo.
Even though it was late at night, light leaked from every corner—proof of the vitality this territory held.
Clock towers rising high enough to be seen from anywhere within the domain.
Castle walls that rose and fell like waves along the ridgelines.
Merchants standing beside torches, noisily hawking their wares.
And long lines of slaves walking completely naked, each wearing a collar around their neck.
Workers carrying various goods, shops, advertising flyers fluttering in the wind…
After a long pause, Adrinne spoke again.
“Do you believe it, Yohan? That this place is the front line.”
Of course, I knew every detail of this game’s setting. The vitality of this city was comparable to that of the capital.
“It’s a bit different from a true front line.”
“How so?”
“Frantimo serves as both the garrison for reserve subjugation forces and the departure point for supply convoys.”
“Oh, is that right?”
“That’s why, paradoxically, it’s the safest place in the entire empire.”
Adrinne nodded as if to say, ‘I see.’
Exactly as I said. This wasn’t just a place where military supplies came and went. The empire’s so-called “money-devouring hippopotamus”—the Academy—was located here.
The Imperial Academy.
In other words, the cradle that trained the swordsmen and mages who would be sent to the battlefield.
Clop-clop—clop-clop—clop-clop—clop-clop—
The sound of horses’ hooves pushed the scenery outside the window farther behind us. The carriage rolled comfortably along the well-maintained road. Before long, we were passing through the entrance of our destination: the Academy.
A massive semicircular arch stood at the entrance. Engraved upon it was the Academy’s slogan.
— “If you wish to enter the Empire, you must first step over our corpses.”
Gulp—
I heard the sound of someone swallowing hard. It was Adrinne. Her soft, gentle voice continued.
“Um, Yohan—”
When I glanced over, her cheeks were faintly flushed. She went on in a voice laced with tension.
“…Right now, if someone confessed to me, I feel like I might actually accept.”
Along with the [Smell of Death] notification, a wry laugh escaped me. She really was exactly as I had written her character.
A line thrown out after knowing each other for a mere seven hours could not possibly be her true feelings. This was something the anxious girl had said for practical, self-serving reasons. At the same time, this dialogue was the foreshadowing line in the game scenario that signaled the player could enter the [Adrinne Route].
Of course, I could not accept.
If I mistakenly took that route, I might very well end up facing the blade of some guardian knight tonight.
I snuffed out that dangerous spark.
“I’m the complete opposite.”
“…Opposite?”
“I don’t think I’d date anyone no matter who confessed to me.”
“Ah… R-really? …Why?”
Why, indeed.
After thinking for a moment, I recited words I didn’t even mean.
“We could be assigned to the reserve forces at any time, couldn’t we? We might be sent to the front lines to die. Dating in a situation like that? It’s absurd.”
“…I suppose so.”
Adrinne gave a powerless smile.
Even at a glance, the expression looked forced, but there was nothing I could do about her disappointment.
“I ended up whining about being anxious for no reason.”
I subtly turned my gaze away from her.
There was no need to reply.
She was not my goal—she was merely a means.
A means to get here.
And her temptation was not a choice; it was a hazard. One that led the protagonist straight to death.
<The Savior from Another World>
In this game, every single romance route ends in a bad ending.