The Heroine Stole My Regression

1 – Gaon (1)

I didn’t sleep a wink.

I simply couldn’t fall asleep, and so greeted the entrance ceremony with eyes wide open.

The Main Story begins here, with this entrance ceremony.

This scene is both the game’s opening and the moment the protagonist first reveals themself to the world.

I took my place in the majestic auditorium, looking around. Beneath the ornate chandeliers, brilliant minds sat in neat rows. In an atmosphere thick with mingled tension and excitement, I gazed towards the opposite end of the hall.

“So they are there.”

My gaze drifted to a far corner of the auditorium.

Silver hair, catching the light, shimmered softly. Eyes intense, yet somehow unstable.

His ranking, his skills, were currently nothing to write home about, but his appearance alone was overwhelmingly striking, even from across the room.

The protagonist of this game. He existed.

I’d worried the story might have been altered, but thankfully, the protagonist was present. A weight lifted from my shoulders.

Though that relief was fleeting.

“Ah, seriously.”

My mind snapped back to reality.

My ability, Death Regression, was gone.

For ten years after being possessed, I’d suffered and clawed, meticulously crafting a plan to clear the story through constant regression.

The basic framework was simple.

Aid the protagonist and heroines in their growth, using all the knowledge I possessed to help them.

Fortunate encounters, training regimes, I planned to utilize every method available.

And because I couldn’t die, I intended to take the lead in dangerous parts of various battles, letting the others finish things off. I had even been refining my combat style to suit that.

–

[Aptitude: Renaissance Person]

①Universal Man

ㅡPossesses exceptional aptitude in ‘all’ fields.

–

The one talent that remained to me, even without Regression, was what had made those actions possible.

Thanks to this aptitude, I’d endured the past ten years and prepared for every situation, in my own way.

But to stick to that established plan now that Regression was gone?

…I’m dead.

Truly dead.

With such an extreme approach, I’d be buried before I even left the academy within the story.

The plan had to be revised. Maintain the support for the protagonist and the main characters’ growth, but in a way that was as passive as possible…

Ah, this is driving me crazy.

Clutching my aching head, lost in thought, I felt a gentle tap on my shoulder, accompanied by an unfamiliar voice.

“Something troubling you?”

Instinctively, I turned and gasped.

She was sitting right next to me, somehow, without me even noticing when she’d arrived.

‘Too close.’

Close enough to hear her breathe. But even at this impossible proximity, not a single aspect of her appearance seemed out of place.

Her features were striking and well-defined, her eyes clear and bright, and her smile, gentle, utterly perfect.

For a heartbeat, I considered pulling back, but I froze in place, staring at her.

She didn’t retreat either.

We held each other’s gaze for a long moment in that close space, then she smiled softly and tilted her head back slightly.

‘Cheon Yeoul.’

The thin veil that neatly framed her face, a headscarf almost symbolic of faith, made her identity instantly recognizable.

Students entering the Academy were treated as something akin to celebrities. Particularly those blessed with both beauty and talent, their popularity would skyrocket. Naturally, characters like that were bound to be among the main players in the story.

She, one of the protagonist’s heroines, was standing before me, in the very image of her first appearance in the story.

Except,

Why?

It simply shouldn’t be possible for her at this stage.

Cheon Yeoul was a heroine who changed through her encounters with the protagonist.

She wasn’t designed with a personality to initiate contact with anyone. Even less so with a random ‘male’ student like me, and definitely not before engaging with the protagonist .

Cheon Yeoul tilted her head slightly and asked softly, “Won’t you tell me? You look troubled.”

“Ah, there are a few things.”

Adding you to the list.

I paused, then shook my head.

“But it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

“…Really?”

She raised one eyebrow slightly, studying me, before breaking into a playful smile.

Just then, a voice boomed from the speakers above the stage.

“This concludes the entrance ceremony. New students, please follow the guidance to your respective classes.”

A murmur rippled through the auditorium as students began to rise from their seats.

I, too, stood up quickly, turning my back on Cheon Yeoul. I didn’t want to get involved with her at this point in the timeline.

Suddenly, the watch the Academy had issued buzzed on my wrist. Glancing down, I saw my assigned class displayed on the screen.

‘Class B.’

In truth, this information alone offered nothing particularly insightful. In the game, each round assigned classes based on entirely random numbers. The novelty of the game stemmed, in part, from the shifting roster of comrades with each iteration.

The rub was this: where the game offered amusement, my reality was, well, just plain life.

To be sorted into the same class as certain individuals of… interest… would prove less than a delightful experience.

With a tremulous heart, I made my way to Class B.

Upon opening the door, a cacophony of student chatter engulfed the room.

To gain admittance to ‘Gaon’ Academy, exceptional aptitude was a given. Hence, most students boasted a background steeped in elite education. Prestigious military academies, that sort of thing.

Which meant, barring yours truly, who’d been selected through, shall we say, unorthodox channels, the majority were familiar faces, acquaintances of acquaintances.

Lonely, perhaps, but inescapable.

I quietly sought out an empty seat, surveying the surroundings as I did.

Luckily, a vacant spot resided in the corner by the window. Such havens should be legally mandated for folks like myself.

‘Let’s scope the members, shall we.’

The vantage point offered a clear view of everyone, quite adequate.

The classes spanned from J to total of 10, and it was essential to know how many key figures would be in my class.

Huh?

A silver-haired beauty, the protagonist himself. Not bad. Being in the same class would make looking out for him easier.

He swung open the front door and entered with a languid stride, as if the entire lecture hall were his personal stage.

He paid absolutely no attention to the stares directed at him.

And planted himself heavily in the center seat of the front row.

… Was he always this self-assured?

It varied with player style, certainly, but he never projected this much confidence as baseline.

No matter, largely irrelevant. Personality was not the crux of the matter.

Just as I was about to scan the room, the approach of someone to my side drew my attention.

‘What in the world?’

It was Cheon Yeo-ul.

She quietly approached and sat down, smiling as she turned to me and softly inquired.

“Mind if I sit here?”

More of a declaration than a query, spoken after she’d already claimed the space.

Her voice was gentle, but held an undercurrent of subtle coercion. As if dissent were simply not an option.

This… this is truly strange. It doesn’t track.

Without returning her gaze, I tapped my fingers idly on the table.

And then, pretending it was nothing, I spoke.

“Are you alright with this?”

She tilted her head, questioning.

“Hm? With what?”

“You’re a Saintess candidate, I heard you dislike men.”

A bit blunt, maybe, but I asked anyway.

Cheon Yeo-ul paused at my words, before letting out a small laugh.

Her tone was natural, but there was a strange, almost excessive ease to it.

“Ah~ That’s probably right, isn’t it?”

Cheon Yeo-ul.

In the original story, she wasn’t just someone who didn’t like men.

Hate.

Until she met the protagonist, she wouldn’t even speak to any man.

And now, she’s talking to me. Smiling, even. She even spoke to me first.

Dragging out the end of her sentence slightly, she tilted her head, her expression playful. On the surface, it seemed charming, but it made me uneasy.

“But I’m okay now. There was someone I’m thankful for.”

She looked me straight in the eye and smiled.

“Thanks to that person, I’ve changed a bit.”

Her words froze my fingertips.

Who?

Had she already met the protagonist?

If that’s the case, it’s somewhat understandable… but the fact that a development I don’t know about has happened is giving me a headache.

“Then how about you sit next to that person.”

I gestured forward with my chin. At the front, in the center seat, the protagonist, Seong Si-woo, was still sitting with his arms crossed and eyes closed.

“…That person?”

Cheon Yeo-ul’s gaze followed the line of my chin forward.

In a fleeting instant, her expression flipped.

This is bad.

An icy glare, I definitely saw it.

The coldness that would shoot out like frost whenever she looked at men in the early parts of the original story. For a moment, it was revived as her gaze swept across Seong Si-woo.

“It’s… fixed, you said…”

The tip of her finger trembled, just so. She wore the saint’s mask, and possessed a genuinely gentle nature. But, the sharpness hidden beneath was always the most difficult aspect to navigate in the narrative.

Kind and soft on the surface, yet paradoxically the hardest heroine to truly capture in the story.

I swallowed a curse and placed my fingertips on the table.

Cheon Yeoul quickly regained her soft smile as if nothing had happened, shaking her head slightly.

“Mm… it is.”

A voice that was resolute, yet flowed with a subtle tenderness.

“This is enough, for now.”

She remained seated beside me, a serene smile playing on her lips.

There wasn’t a trace of the ‘misandry’ from her character profile in her eyes.

Instead, an unidentifiable warmth and a hint of anticipation seemed to seep from them.

“Don’t you like it?”

Her clear voice brushed past my ear.

It was an undeniably gentle question, yet a faint pressure settled in. I couldn’t explain it.

Something, somewhere, was deeply wrong.