I Returned, and Now I See Strange Things-Chapter 1: The Pretty Girl Whose Return Failed ()
She had a dream.
A dream about the day she returned to Earth.
It wasn’t a particularly pleasant memory.
No—by all accounts, it should have been. So why did it turn out like this?
When she rubbed her stiff, tired eyes and opened them, what she saw was a pale, slender arm. The firm, decently muscular arm she used to have was gone without a trace.
And her hair?
She tried to get it cut, but they asked for tens of thousands of won just for a trim, so she ended up doing it herself.
Thinking about it again only stirred up the chaos in her mind.
This body.
She didn’t know the reason, but at least she had an identity. Her gender and appearance had changed.
Still, it was better than having nothing—so she accepted it with reluctant gratitude.
The problem was... her appearance looked far too young.
Even when she tried to get a part-time job, she was constantly rejected.
And as for physical labor, like loading docks or construction?
She wasn’t complete trash, but her weak strength always held her back.
What she had left was a single °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° shabby room—presumably the same place she’d opened her eyes after returning—and a bank account balance that demanded tightening her belt. And... a smartphone that was unnecessarily heavy?
Even that barely worked once she stepped outside.
Because there was no Wi-Fi.
Thank you, neighbor guy.
–Growl
And yet, despite everything, her body whined loudly when it was time to eat.
“...Guess I’ll just eat some ramen.”
She slipped out of the blanket and tidied up her bedding.
A bed? As if she could afford something like that.
She folded the blanket neatly and shoved it into the corner.
Dragging her feet, she walked over to the sink. She stepped up onto the footstool like it was routine and opened the cupboard.
Inside were a few packs of ramen, a salt container, a bag of sugar—and a pot.
The ambitious spices she’d bought in hopes of learning to cook were still buried and untouched in the cupboard.
What good are seasonings when there are no ingredients?
She still didn’t know how much rent this place was, so she couldn’t risk spending recklessly. She didn’t even know what the landlord looked like. She was just assuming they’d show up to collect eventually...
Still, she really ought to find a job or something before then... Not that it would be this hard if that were so easy.
She pulled out the pot and the ramen pack, then closed the cupboard.
She filled the pot with tap water and placed it on the gas burner.
She stared at the locked gas valve for a moment before reaching into her pocket.
There were a few things left to her, despite her failed return. She fished through the inside of her pocket... and pulled out a stone.
A smooth, vividly red stone that left an impression.
It looked so beautiful that she half-wondered if she could sell it to a stone collector for good money.
Not that she knew if such a collector existed.
Anyway.
Without hesitation, she shoved the red stone onto the burner—right beneath the pot.
In the world she came from, Entera, she was... something like a summoner. Kind of like those anime where characters summon creatures from cards and fight.
Except, instead of cards, she used something like stones.
Well, technically they weren’t stones, but something more special... but on Earth, they were just stones. Nothing more, nothing less.
...Stones that could catch fire, maybe.
“Light the fire. I want to eat ramen.”
Not long after, a sulky woman’s voice came from the stone.
[...Were you just thinking something unpleasant?]
“...Nope.”
Her perception was annoyingly sharp.
[I’d really prefer not to be used in place of a campfire...]
“It’s the only thing you’re good for now.”
[Did I really follow you just to end up like this...? The shame... the pain...]
“You’re the one who chose me as your master, remember? Just suck it up.”
The red stone, grumbling about how she kept picking up weird phrases from the smartphone, was the fire spirit Ignis, who soon sparked a flame from within herself.
Playing coy when she was going to do it anyway.
As she waited for the bubbling water to boil, the girl opened the ramen pack and tossed in the veggie powder with a plop plop.
Once it started boiling, she dumped in the bright red seasoning powder, gave it a quick stir, then broke the noodles and dropped them in to cook.
That alone completed a bowl of nutritionally balanced ramen.
That’s what the internet said, so it was probably true.
Adding an egg would make it even better, but... she couldn’t afford that. Unless it went on sale, why the hell were eggs so expensive?
Still, at least she didn’t have to worry about poison like back in Entera.
When the noodles were cooked through, she stirred the ramen and lifted the pot. The flame from Ignis quietly died down.
Not long ago, she’d deliberately let the water boil over because Ignis kept trying to drink the ramen broth, and since then, the spirit had been behaving herself. That was nice.
She didn’t even have a table to put the pot on, so she ate it right at the sink.
It made cleanup easier anyway.
There wasn’t even a scrap of kimchi to go with it, but it was still tasty.
The umami from the seasonings—something she could never experience in Entera.
She wished she had rice to mix in at the end, but unfortunately, her room didn’t have such a luxury.
She scraped up every last drop of broth and dumped the empty pot into the sink.
Was she really eating ramen again today? The nagging voice that should have been scolding her was oddly quiet—but since the silence was nice, she decided to let it go.
It wasn’t like she used that one much anyway, since it never shut up.
There’d been so many times she wanted to chuck it into a church.
Of course, if she did that here on Earth, she’d probably just end up breaking a window, so she didn’t.
...And then she’d have to pay for that window, wouldn’t she?
To ventilate the room now filled with ramen smell, she opened the window.
For some reason, the sky was turning red.
She thought it was morning—so why was the sun setting?
...No. It was morning when she woke up. What did the sun have to do with anything?
Just then, a loud and exaggerated voice rang out somewhere nearby. It was the kind of shrill voice that pierced the ears and quickly wore down the nerves.
Turning her head toward the source, she saw a man chattering energetically into a smartphone mounted on a selfie stick.
“Today’s content~ is a haunted location exploration, voted most popular in the poll! Of course it had to be an abandoned house, right? Huh? Too bright, you say? Well, before we start—don’t forget to Like, Subscribe, and hit the bell!”
Judging by what he was saying, he was probably one of those trendy ‘Newtube’ streamers or whatever. Nearby, two people—presumably his crew—were rustling around, unpacking equipment.
...She was annoyed.
A horror experience, seriously? If anything, her bank balance was the real horror show.
Maybe it was because her plan to quietly reflect while ventilating the room had been interrupted, but her mood was foul.
She pulled out her smartphone to figure out who the hell this guy was.
It worked thanks to the Wi-Fi connection.
Now then... was this how you did it?
After filtering a few keywords from the man’s loud rambling and fumbling for a while, she finally tracked down what looked like his stream.
“...Not rusty at all, huh.”
Praising her own adaptability, she tapped into the broadcast—and was immediately shocked.
[If you enter after midnight, 50,000 won]
Was she hallucinating? Just entering some ruin at night earned you fifty, sixty... seventy thousand won?
Even as she blinked, the amount labeled as “mission reward” was slowly increasing.
Shit. Some people couldn’t even find part-time jobs or manual labor gigs and had to worry about their future. The world really was going to hell.
She opened the chat and started typing, each keystroke loaded with frustration.
[Stop disturbing the neighborhood and go home quietly...]
Then she hit send.
But her fury didn’t reach him.
[Subscribers-only chat]
Then fine, she’d subscribe.
Her finger hovered over the subscribe button—then froze.
“This bastard’s playing dirty.”
A shameless trick to increase his subscriber count.
In that case, there was another way.
She grabbed the window frame and shouted:
“Stop disturbing the neighborhood and go home quietly!!!”
The guy’s face twisted in surprise. Their eyes met for a brief moment—then he looked away and chuckled awkwardly.
“Haha, must be some kid—no, a young student, I guess—just craving attention. Let’s be generous and forgive them, shall we?”
His voice echoed out from the smartphone.
She couldn’t stand the insult.
“What? Hey! You wait right there!”
She decided to go confront him directly.
It definitely wasn’t because she was jealous of how easily he was making money.
She shoved the quiet stone and the red one from the stove into her pocket, then unlocked the front door.
Click went the lock, and the door creaked open with a squeal.
Should I ask the landlord to fix this when I see them...?
They’d probably fix it, right? Since she was paying rent?
They’d probably reach out first... right?
She hurried down the stairs, and a young man—likely the neighbor—was staring at her with a strange expression.
She didn’t have time to think about it.
But by the time she got outside, they were already gone.
The alley was filled with golden sunset light and scattered trash, but no people.
She still had Wi-Fi, so she could’ve tried to track them down... but for some reason, she felt drained. Maybe because she hadn’t eaten any meat.
She decided to just give up.
“...Lucky bastard.”
Muttering that, she started walking again.
Since she was already out, she figured she might as well look for a part-time job.
But... it’s not like anything that didn’t work yesterday was going to suddenly work today.
After another round of rejections, she ended up back at the now-familiar neighborhood bakery.
This was the only time she felt grateful for her new body.
The bakery’s owner, a kindly woman, gave her the crust ends of sliced bread. As she stepped out, she spotted some rusks made from the same crusts she was holding.
They were neatly packaged with price tags, which left a strange, uneasy feeling.
But hey... it’s not like she held a knife to demand those crusts.
To cheer herself up, she sat on a park bench and nibbled at the bread crusts.
It was tasty—but she still really wanted meat.
“I want to eat meat.”
As she muttered that, the stone that had been silent until now—
The voice of the Death Knight Aslan echoed out.
[My master... then why not go hunting? There are plump ones right over there.]
She looked up at Aslan’s words—and saw a bunch of chubby pigeons.
...They did look pretty meaty.
“Aslan, don’t talk nonsense.”
[Didn’t you just lick your lips?]
“That was your imagination.”
Maybe in Entera that would’ve flown. But now that she was back on Earth, she couldn’t pull something like that.
...Though if she really ran out of money, who knew?
Somehow her appetite disappeared, and she tossed the leftover bread crusts to the pigeons.
As if their survival instinct had been dulled, the birds didn’t even flinch and just stared blankly at her.
The moment the bread touched the ground, their sharp beaks descended in a flurry of pecking that reeked of desperation.
“...Eat well and grow strong.”
You never knew, right?
As she watched the pigeons with a strangely warm gaze, a chill ran down her spine.
The park was dim, lit only by a flickering streetlamp.
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It should’ve been empty—but an old woman’s voice rang out.
“Dear, go home before it gets any later.”
“....”
She sighed inwardly but said nothing and stood up.
The voice didn’t call again, as if it didn’t care she hadn’t replied.
She, too, left the park without a word.
When she glanced back, a shadowy black figure with an unrecognizable face was watching her.
“....”
It didn’t look like it was going to follow her.
