I Became an NPC That Rankers Are Obsessed Over

The Angelic Hand had ended.

When I woke up, the first thing I saw was Anna.

She was still sitting on top of me, staring down at me intently.

However, Anna’s face was different from the one I had seen before.

It was an expression so unfamiliar that I could never forget it.

Her murky eyes, like they were patched up with glue, shimmered with hot tears.

Soon, those tears fell and wet my lips.

It was warm.

And it hurt my chest.

Her usually emotionless doll-like face now seemed pitiful, like a little girl.

Because of that, I forgot that we were both naked, our bodies pressed together.

Soon, she slowly got off me.

Then, she staggered and leaned against the wall of the bed.

I blankly watched her as she curled her legs tightly.

Anna, trembling pitifully, covered her forehead with her hands.

“Anna…”

I mumbled at the emotions I was seeing from her for the first time in my life.

Anna spoke in a low voice.

“Why are you sisters… so desperate to torment me?”

At those words, I couldn’t respond immediately.

I just stared blankly at her, half-risen from my lying position.

“Your sister deceived me, and you dig up memories I had barely managed to forget.”

“I didn’t know. I didn’t know my sister was Sun-ye.”

“…”

I desperately tried to plead with her.

Because, at least this time, I was being sincere.

Her hair stirred faintly.

Through it, her narrowed eyes flashed coldly.

“How convenient. All you have to say is that you didn’t know.”

“…”

Her two emotional remarks left me speechless.

“I wanted to believe you.”

Her eyes, which had always been dry and indifferent, turned red.

She whimpered like a wounded woman.

“You were the first person to be kind to me.”

“Since your sister…”

“But in the end, you were just the same.”

“You read memories at will, and play with people based on them. Does it feel good?”

Anna spat out her feelings, as if vomiting all her pent-up emotions.

“Even your kindness to me, the meals you cooked, the time you spent playing claw machines with me—were they all calculated actions?”

She asked me resentfully.

I shook my head violently in response.

“Like your damn sister.”

“No… I really just…”

I wanted to keep speaking right away.

But my words got caught in my throat.

Did I really help Anna purely by chance, just out of goodwill?

No, that wasn’t it.

I was scared of her because she was a killer, and I deliberately read her memories to win her favor.

My pupils trembled.

Reading that movement, Anna’s expression turned firm with certainty.

I knew that expression.

The look of unfairness and resentment, as if her entire world had collapsed.

It was the same look Ji-soo noona had given me on the day she died.

At that moment, my chest began to ache.

I wanted to say something, anything.

But maybe it was because Anna’s expression resembled Ji-soo noona’s so closely.

My mouth hung open, unable to utter a word.

“Get out… now. Before I kill you.”

“Don’t ever. Make me hope for you. Again.”

Anna began to speak again, her tone returning to its emotionless cadence.

I responded by rising to my feet.

Since I couldn’t think of anything to say to her, I thought it would be best to simply respect her wishes and leave.

I pulled up the pajamas that had slipped down to my chest.

Anna’s scent seemed to cling all over my body.

I tried my best to ignore it and looked around for my clothes.

Where did I put them?

I glanced at Anna.

She was still sitting, curled up and bowing her head.

She looked as if she were dead.

Asking her, “Hey… where are my clothes?” in this situation felt completely out of the question.

I had no choice but to step into the hallway in my pajamas.

Even there, my clothes were nowhere to be found.

Only a crossbody bag sat there, abandoned.

Well, at least having my bag intact was something.

Thankfully, all my belongings were still inside.

I secured the bag tightly over my pajamas.

Thanks to that, the loose top was somewhat held in place.

It felt like wearing a poorly fitted school team shirt.

I pulled the front door open.

The handle that hadn’t budged when I tried to escape earlier now turned easily in the opposite direction.

“—.”

The thick door closed firmly behind me.

I stood in front of the closed officetel, dazed for a long time.

Anna had pushed my abilities to their limit.

Not just Anna’s, but Sun-ye’s memories, too, had surfaced, revealing all her secrets to me.

The fact that she was an artificially created human.

The betrayal of the one companion she had trusted.

And… regret.

At first, I had only been afraid of Anna.

A psychopathic killer who murdered people as she pleased.

I thought that was all there was to her.

But after learning the truth, all her actions seemed pitiful to me.

In some ways, she was a victim.

“Regret, huh.”

Ji-soo noona, who had always been kind and smiled at me, had felt the same.

She said she regretted the time she spent with me.

Of course, she hadn’t deceived me like Sun-ye had.

I was the one who misunderstood everything.

But…

Did she really have to say that to me, even at the very end?

My chest ached.

I repeated the word “regret” in my mind as I descended into the elevator.

The first-floor lobby was very dark.

A bright light poured in from the main gate, so I headed toward it without thinking.

But I stopped abruptly.

“…”

When I stepped out of the officetel, I found myself in a completely unfamiliar street.

Chinese signs and unfamiliar people were everywhere.

Was there such a place in Korea?

I quickly searched for a signpost.

Fortunately, a blue street sign on a utility pole displayed the name of this place.

And then I realized why this place felt so strange despite being in Korea.

「Daerim 2-dong」

A neighborhood where many Chinese people had lived even before the gates opened.

It was notorious for its poor public safety even in the past.

After the era of anarchy began, Chinese illegal immigrants had gathered here to create their own kingdom.

Despite being in Seoul, it was the most dangerous shadowed area that even the Association couldn’t reach.

This was Daerim 2-dong.

And I was standing in the middle of this dangerous area, dressed in pajamas.

“This is bad.”

It was the perfect place for wanted criminals to hide.

And also the perfect place for someone weak like me to die miserably.

The loud honk of a car horn jolted my chest.

Was it the pressure of this atmosphere? I quickly pulled out my phone.

The phone I had bought after my possession only had a few contacts.

There were only three people in my contact list.

Ji-wook sunbae.

No, that incompetent hyung wouldn’t be of any help here.

Jae-hee?

She’s probably busy with her schedule right now.

Then, that leaves only one other person…

I hesitated for a long time before dialing that number.

Loud shouts from Chinese voices echoed nearby.

Startled by the noise, I ended up pressing the call button.

“—.”

“—.”

The owner of the contact didn’t pick up right away.

The repeated dial tone made my chest pound.

The more it rang, the more disheartened I felt.

It was ridiculous to be this desperate just because I had no one to call.

Even after possessing this body, I was still alone.

I felt pathetic… so pathetic.

When the call wasn’t connected after 10 seconds, I almost hit the end button.

But at that moment, the phone displayed “00:01.”

“Si-ho…?”

It was a voice I had become somewhat familiar with by now.

When I first met her, I was terrified, yet I also found her voice captivating.

Now, I had directly reached out to her myself.

But as I tried to speak to her, something caught in my throat, as if blocking my words.

So much had happened to me all at once.

And my battered body felt cold and achy.

“…”

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

Even as I stayed silent, Executor asked with concern.

“Help me… please…”

I finally managed to force the words out through the lump in my throat.

She then asked me in a very serious tone.

“Where are you? Take a deep breath and tell me calmly.”

“Daerim 2-dong.”

“That dangerous place? Why are you there?”

“I don’t know… I don’t know why I’m here…”

Before I realized it, my throat had tightened again.

I didn’t want her to notice, but this young body of mine had already begun to stammer.

“Wait. I’m coming right now.”

I heard the sound of a chair crashing to the ground through the phone.

And then, the call abruptly ended.

I wiped at my tear-streaked eyes.

Why am I… suddenly like this?

I’d been through countless raids and endured so much scorn without shedding a tear…

I sniffled quietly.

Something is wrong with me.

It feels like I’m turning into someone else, and it’s terrifying.

Maybe it’s because of that fear.

I felt an urge to hide somewhere.

That thought led me back toward the officetel in a hurry.

I hid in the shadows, gasping for breath.

Have I been overthinking too much lately?

My mood is terrible.

The fact that I’m in pajamas doesn’t help—it’s freezing, and my whole body is trembling.

It’s only May.

There’s still a long time until summer, so it’s no wonder I’m cold dressed like this.

I stared blankly at the road.

On the street, countless Chinese people were heading somewhere.

From kids hitting graffiti-covered walls with metal pipes found at construction sites,

to middle-aged women leaning against telephone poles selling unidentified vegetables.

But the most eye-catching sight was a man smoking in a shady corner.

The man in a black dress shirt had tattoos on both arms.

He spat on the ground, glancing around.

Don’t make eye contact.

If I do, I might get hit just for being an outsider.

I quickly turned my gaze to the side.

“…?”

But as I turned my head, I locked eyes with a Chinese man I had never seen before.

A bald head, smooth as a hippo.

A stretched-out t-shirt clinging tightly to his chest and belly.

And chest hair peeking out faintly from in between.

Just looking at him made it hard to breathe.

The man, dragging his slippers, began walking toward me.

The closer he got, the stronger the unfamiliar scent of spices filled the air.

“You’re a face I’ve never seen before.”

He asked me in fluent Korean.

“Which shop are you from?”

“A shop? Ah, I work in Sindorim.”

At the word “shop,” I immediately thought of the Moment Inn.

“Sindorim? I didn’t know there was a business over there.”

He scratched his belly while staring at my face.

His black eyes scanned me up and down quickly.

“Not bad.”

“…Excuse me?”

“For your height, you’ve got decent volume. And your face has a distinctive charm with a bit of attitude.”

He rubbed his eye as if pointing at the beauty mark under mine, evaluating me like a chef judging a dish.

Uncomfortable with his gaze, I shrank back.

Clutching my crossbody bag tightly, I asked,

“What exactly are you talking about?”

“Ah, my apologies. I run several businesses around here too. So, what’s a Sindorim kid doing here?”

“I’m waiting for someone.”

“A customer?”

The man kept saying strange things.

I sighed deeply in frustration and replied,

“Not a customer…”

I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I should explain who Executor was to me.

What came out instead was,

“She’s an older sister I know.”

“Sister…?”

He tilted his head at the word.

Then, as if understanding something, he smirked.

“Ah, I see. With those pajamas and short hair, I guess your ‘customer’ has that kind of taste.”

I frowned at his words.

Taste?

“Well then, how about this? Instead of waiting for that ‘sister,’ why not spend the day with me?”

“What? Why would I spend time with you?”

“Don’t be so hard to get. I’ll pay you ten times what she’s paying. You’ll have to go through me to work in this area anyway.”

He laughed heartily.

As I grimaced at him, he waved to someone.

I recognized the person he waved at immediately.

It was the gangster I had feared locking eyes with earlier.

The gangster, seeing him, bowed 90 degrees from a distance.

Then he began striding across the busy road, indifferent to the cars.

Soon, several henchmen emerged from the alleys to follow him.

Four burly Chinese men.

The cars all stopped as they marched, but not a single horn sounded.

It was as if the drivers knew exactly who they were dealing with.

As they approached, I felt something ominous about the situation.

Instinctively, my body warned me.

I needed to get out of here.

I began stepping back slowly.

But soon, I bumped into something thick behind me.

When I looked up, I saw the chin of a burly Chinese man.

What I had bumped into was his round belly.

The man grabbed both my shoulders.

Then, as if presenting me like a prize, he shoved me toward the smelly man.

“Don’t worry. I’m very kind. Why else would I run this whole operation here?”

His lips curled into a wide grin.

Drool dripped from his yellowed gold tooth.

“I’ll teach you all sorts of techniques. Ones so thrilling you couldn’t even imagine them in Sindorim.”

The man’s massive shadow loomed over me.