Chapter 1: I Received One Quadrillion Won.
Translator: ShutDoor
I liked construction simulation games.
City builders, theme park builders, games about running a country(?), that sort of thing.
I usually didn’t have much time to play them, though. I was too busy trying to make ends meet.
My parents died in a car accident when I had one month left in the military, and I had to bounce from one part-time job to another just to survive.
Of course, I hadn’t planned on working part-time jobs my whole life. It didn’t have to be some famous conglomerate. I just wanted to put my computer science studies to use and make a stable living like everyone else.
But computer science, my major, had gone completely to shit.
[Title] A Hilarious Prank (431 comments)
-Make you study for sixteen years from elementary school through college, then replace you with AI lololol
Any dumbasses here get screwed by this?
Me, for starters lololol
[Comments]
└ F U C K!!!!
└ I thought hardware jobs would be replaced first…
└ Is my school’s CS admissions cutoff for real??? It was in the grade-2 range just last year, so why’s it down to grade 4.7 this year?
└ Even Tokyo University’s computer science department only had one person land a job this year lololololol we’re so fucking screwed lolololol
In other words, we were fucked.
Of course, even in that hellscape, the monster classmates who had fought tooth and nail for good grades, won competitions, and built up impressive résumés with internships at major corporations somehow survived and found jobs.
The problem was people like me, whose parents had both died and whose mental health had gone to hell.
Starting with the funeral, there were expenses everywhere I turned. Forget graduating—I needed money right away. So I think I tried just about every job that paid decently, from loading and unloading trucks to construction work and shifts at barbecue restaurants.
“Here’s today’s pay. Good work.”
“Thanks!”
As usual, I stopped by a convenience store on my way home and used the money I’d earned sweating at a construction site to buy a scratch-off ticket.
Nothing extravagant, just one 2,000-won Speetto ticket a week. A little reward for working myself to the bone, I suppose.
Naturally, I wasn’t expecting much. Fourth prize would be plenty. In other words, I was aiming for 100,000 won…
‘Huh.’
I won.
*****
I had 733 million won.
It had originally been one billion, but after taxes, it came to about 700 million.
Even after collecting my winnings, I stood there in a daze for a long time. I think the bank employee said something about signing up for some financial product, but I could barely remember it.
‘Whoa…’
If I hadn’t suddenly felt something cold against my cheek, I might have stood there forever. I touched it with a finger and found snow.
Only then did I notice the colorful decorations hanging all along the streets.
Come to think of it, tomorrow was Christmas, wasn’t it?
‘Let’s see. With 700 million won…’
I had the house I’d inherited, so if I kept working part-time, I could probably get by somehow with just three days of work a week. I might even be able to graduate from college.
‘I can finally rest…’
Working myself ragged seven days a week had been destroying my body. Had my day in the sun finally come?
Now that things had worked out this way, maybe I could look around Seoul for the first time in ages.
[This stop is Hongik University, Hongik University Station. The doors are on your left.]
As expected for the end of the year, Hongdae was packed in every direction. Young couples dressed to the nines, cosmetics stores calling out to passersby, people dancing in flash mobs on the street…
Now that I finally had some breathing room, I began to notice the scenery around me. I didn’t think I’d ever had the presence of mind to look at things like this before.
Then something familiar entered my field of view.
It was across the street, so I couldn’t see it properly, but it was probably one of those fundraising gigs where they asked people to place stickers on a board.
They would display photographs of impoverished African children, divide the board into sections labeled with something like <Which of the following do children need most? 1. Clean drinking water, 2. Mosquito nets, 3. Medicine>, and have people place a sticker on their choice.
Naturally, I had done that job too.
The per-signup incentives were pretty good if you had a silver tongue, and they had even told me I had talent and should keep working there. But I quit because it felt like I was conning people…
Seeing it again now brought back some strange feelings.
I walked past it with those mixed emotions, then noticed something odd.
For one thing, there were no pictures of African children on the board. Instead…
“Excuse me! Would you like to take a survey? It’ll only take a moment!”
A female part-timer who had been walking around in a red outfit reminiscent of the Salvation Army strode over to me. She must have been rushing around in the cold for quite a while, because her nose and cheeks were bright red.
She reminded me of my old self, and my resolve weakened despite myself.
“Sure, why not.”
Maybe that was why I readily agreed to take the survey. I had 700 million won now, so I could afford to be generous and make a recurring donation of around 30,000 won.
“Thank you! Then could you read this for a moment?”
The part-timer, who had somehow moved right beside me, pointed to the board. Instead of photographs of starving children, it bore a strange question.
「1. What do you consider most important in an apocalypse?」
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Trustworthy companions
-
Survival skills
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A safe shelter
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Personal combat strength
…Was this an advertisement for some game rather than a recurring donation?
“Once you’ve read them all, just choose one!”
Now standing beside me, she smoothly held out a touchscreen. Did people conduct surveys on touchscreens these days?
I hadn’t expected this.
After glancing around awkwardly, I thought for a moment and chose number three, a safe shelter. There was no special reason. Number three just sounded the most like the construction games I enjoyed.
The results appeared on the screen.
「15% of respondents made the same choice as you!」
That few?
Before I had much time to be surprised by the unexpected result, a cheerful notification sounded and the next question appeared.
「2. Which type of shelter do you prefer?」
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Underground bunker
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Fortified surface base
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Camouflaged shelter
After giving it some thought, I pressed number one. The next question immediately appeared along with a statistic saying that 20% had made the same choice.
‘There are more questions than I expected.’
Maybe the 700 million won in my pocket had given me the luxury of time. I seriously considered questions I normally would have clicked through without a thought. The part-timer beside me also waited quietly without rushing me once.
Building the perfect shelter and living in it during an apocalypse was something I had occasionally fantasized about even after becoming an adult.
「14. What would you do if you encountered refugees? (Assume they do not know the location of your shelter.)」
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They are a threat. Eliminate them.
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Drive them away.
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Ignore them.
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Help them secretly without being discovered.
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Help them openly.
My finger moved toward number three. Only 9% had made the same choice this time. Had everyone else pretended to be nice because they were answering in front of another person?
By this point, the survey itself had become entertaining. After answering dozens of questions like that, I was already nearing the end.
「49. Please describe the specific kind of shelter you want.」
Number forty-nine was open-ended. Since I had time to spare anyway, I began writing down a description of the shelter I had only ever designed in my head.
‘The standard approach is to build a nuclear bunker beneath granite bedrock. Dig several hundred meters underground, then install two sets of composite armored doors several meters thick. Backup power is a given, as is a shock-absorbing design capable of withstanding earthquakes, and the interior should be as large as possible. It’ll be self-sufficient, with a state-of-the-art HVAC system, an enormous hydroponic growing facility, and even recreational facilities.’
After writing that much, I stole a glance at the woman beside me. The part-timer was still smiling brightly without a word of complaint.
That meant I could keep going, right?
Since I had come this far, I decided to unleash every dream and desire I had always kept bottled up.
The entrance would be large enough for tanks to come and go. Dozens of the latest tanks would be lined up inside, just like in a secret U.S. military base.
Of course, maintaining a facility that huge would require an enormous workforce, but humans needed food and liked to complain, so ultra-high-performance AI and robots could handle most of it. I knew that was impossible with modern technology, but this was a game, wasn’t it?
I sensed something slightly odd in the way she looked at me when I wrote ‘Generate power with an SMR reactor’, but I deliberately ignored it. I had already taken this way too far.
Who cared whether the technology had been commercialized or not? It wasn’t my problem.
‘A large entrance will be easy to spot, so I’ll need to camouflage the heat vents and add an optical camouflage field too. The ventilation openings should have blast valves in case of an explosion. The water mains will be cut off during an apocalypse, so an independent water supply, reuse, and sewerage system is essential…’
By now, it felt less like I was designing a shelter and more like I was designing humanity’s final ark.
What else would I need?
‘Internal barriers to seal off sections in case one is breached or contaminated, robot repair stations, industrial 3D printers for producing parts, drones for scouting the surrounding area…’
Maintaining morale was also crucial to survival.
‘Sunlight-simulating LEDs whose color temperature changes with the time of day, nature-sound speakers to prevent auditory hallucinations, and an escape shaft in case the main entrance collapses. Oh, I can’t forget the waste disposal system either. I’ll want meat once in a while, so let’s add something like a cultured meat printer.’
I was nowhere near finished. Electronic warfare countermeasures were still left.
‘An EMP would render everything useless, so I’ll build a special alloy mesh that channels electromagnetic waves into the ground, and physically isolate the shelter from external networks to prevent hacking…’
I generously added remote surgery robots to handle medical care as well.
And since living in an enormous shelter without the internet would get boring, I covered that too.
‘I’ll launch hundreds of satellites like Starlink and build a community exclusively for survivors that works without cell towers. If I create a virtual economy with digital tokens, wouldn’t that encourage even more information exchange?’
I tapped the pen against my chin and racked my brain for a few more minutes before finally setting it down in satisfaction.
The result was…
「Estimating the cost of the shelter you designed.」
「Estimated price… One quadrillion won!」
「First place worldwide! A new all-time record!」
An absurd sum appeared on the screen. It easily exceeded South Korea’s annual budget.
‘That’s insane.’
The system had apparently assigned whatever prices it pleased because the design included several technologies that either had not been commercialized or were outright unrealistic.
The final question appeared on the screen to cap things off.
「50. If you could spend your entire fortune to purchase the shelter you designed, would you do so?」
This didn’t even require thought.
‘Absolutely.’
Realism didn’t matter. This was about the romance of it. Hadn’t secret bases always stirred the boyish hearts of men?
Batman proved it by choosing to run around the Batcave despite owning a penthouse worth hundreds of billions of won.
I firmly pressed the 「Yes」 button.
“That’ll be 60,000 won!”
At that moment, the part-timer who had quietly remained beside me finally spoke.
“What…?”
When I turned my head, she was holding a rectangular game case. Judging by the cover, the game was apparently called 「Shelter Builder」.
“Why not build everything you just described yourself? It’s only 60,000 won!”
That was expensive. Normally, I would have bowed my head, apologized, and left.
But who was I now? Wasn’t I a winner with the tremendous sum of 700 million won in my hands?
‘I suppose I can buy one from her.’
It didn’t feel like a waste if I considered it payment for silently listening to my over-the-top fantasies for almost an hour. It was the end of the year, and I didn’t have anything else to do anyway.
As if entranced, I opened my wallet. By a truly remarkable coincidence, it contained exactly 60,000 won in cash. Other than the balance in my bank account, it was effectively every last bit of money I had on me.
I was marveling at the coincidence and about to take the game case when…
Clench-!
For some reason, the part-timer gripped one end of the game case tightly and refused to let go.
Was she about to warn me that it only worked on a particular device or that refunds were unavailable?
But my guess missed the mark entirely.
“You can only play the demo version for exactly one month! Got it?”
“…One month?”
“The full release comes after that. So make your shelter amazing in the meantime! Ice ages, nuclear wars, natural disasters, infectious diseases… There are all kinds of apocalypses, right? It’ll be more fun if you build it while accounting for all of them!”
Overwhelmed by her intensity, I nodded as if entranced. She gave me a meaningful smile and added,
“Make sure you survive! You can do it!”
Make sure I survived? Was that the game’s catchphrase or something?
She clenched her fist in an encouraging pose, gathered up her board, and vanished into the crowd in the blink of an eye.
…What was with her?
*****
I headed straight home. I ordered boneless fried chicken with a cheese ball combo, something I normally could never have dreamed of, and installed the game on my gaming laptop.
It used a system where entering the serial key packaged separately from the CD allowed me to download it. Including a physical CD in this day and age? The game company seemed to have a romantic streak.
The download didn’t take very long. Ten minutes at most.
While I waited, something the part-timer had said suddenly crossed my mind.
―You can only play the demo version for exactly one month!
Maybe those words acted as a trigger, because a scenario straight out of a web novel flashed through my head.
An apocalypse would erupt in one month, the shelter I built in the game would become real, and I would have to survive inside it.
I snickered, picked up a piece of freshly delivered chicken, and put it in my mouth. The rich, savory taste filling my mouth mingled with the reality of having 700 million won and put me at ease. With money, even fantasies like this became an enjoyable diversion.
‘Let’s give it a try.’
I started the game without much thought.
「Please select a location for your shelter.」
「※ We recommend using the Map function or surveying the location in person.」
「Initial funds: 1,000,000,000,000,000 KRW」 [TL Note: 1,000 trillion won is roughly US$750 billion.]
“That is a lot…”
Counting the zeroes displayed on the screen nearly made my eyes blur. The sheer weight of the number made it difficult to dismiss as mere game money.
The game was a typical top-down simulation viewed from above. It was similar to the games I usually played, so I quickly got the hang of the controls.
‘It looks like Google satellite maps.’
On the off chance it worked, I searched for my home address. The game screen instantly moved and displayed an aerial view of the surrounding neighborhood.
It actually shows up?
Everything was identical, from the aging residential complex where I lived to the names of my regular convenience store and the nearby businesses.
The game imported real-world locations wholesale to use as its map. Apocalypse survival games had often used the technique when they were popular a few years ago.
Was it OpenStreetMap (OSM)?
My time getting knocked around in a computer science program had at least left me with some basic knowledge.
‘Why is the UI so complicated?’
Starting with the 「Map」 tab, which resembled a detailed satellite map, there were 「Geological and environmental analysis」, 「Structural excavation and concrete pouring」, 「Equipment and basic construction」, 「Energy and HVAC systems」, 「Food and ecosystems」, 「Water supply and waste」, 「Supplies and strategic assets」, 「Research and technological development」, 「Defense and security」, 「Housing and personnel management」, and more…
“This is insane…”
Just looking at the categories listed in tiny text was enough to make me dizzy. This was clearly not some shallow game that merely looked impressive.
This was a game for full-on autists, wasn’t it?
The term referred to games with an almost fetishistic fixation on detail. Tactical war games and various other simulations fell into that category. 「Shelter Builder」 appeared to be one of them.
A densely packed UI was a barrier to entry in itself, but for users who went crazy for this sort of thing, meaning people like me, it was practically heaven.
The downside was that these games consumed an overwhelming amount of time.
Since I had needed to spend most of my time working part-time jobs, I had usually settled for watching streamers play instead of playing such games myself.
Of course, I had no intention of doing that anymore.
I had nothing but time now.
I sipped zero-sugar cola while fiddling with the UI. Fortunately, there was at least a basic tutorial.
「Select a location for your shelter.」
※ We recommend using the Map function or surveying the location in person.
※ [Warning] Once you designate the shelter’s location, it cannot be changed!
Oh, I couldn’t change the location once I chose it? Was this some kind of built-in hardcore mode?
I liked extremely difficult games, so I didn’t mind, but I wondered whether other users would feel the same.
But this game…
「Recommended locations」
⦁1. Changsu Township, Pocheon, Gyeonggi Province: Deep in the mountains. Optimal bedrock strength. Numerous nearby military facilities provide advantages for supply and defense.
⦁2. Inje-Yangyang border, Gangwon Province: Inside a rugged granite mountain range. Located in a Daebo granite formation and highly resistant to external impacts.
⦁3. Gayasan area, Geochang County and Hapcheon County, South Gyeongsang Province: Geological stability verified. Safe from natural disasters.
“…?”
This was far more serious than I had expected.
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