Do you know what an inventory is?
You know, like in games, that space where players store items or weapons and stuff.
I have one too.
Not in a game, but in the real world.
I don’t know why this ability came to me, or how, or for what reason.
I don’t particularly want to know, nor am I curious.
It’s just that one day, all of a sudden, I thought, Huh? I think I can put that in my inventory.
You know how that is.
Like a fruit hanging from a slightly tall tree.
You think, If it’s that high, I could jump and grab it, right?
That was how it felt. Huh? I think I can put this in my inventory.
If I hold an object in my hand and think about putting it in my inventory, it just disappears.
Even if it’s something I can’t hold in my hand, as long as I’m touching it, I can store it in my inventory.
At first, I was really shocked.
Because the thing in my hand just vanished with a whoosh.
I was the one who did it, but I couldn’t believe it.
If an inventory suddenly appeared one day, would you believe it?
The object in my hand disappears somewhere.
And when I want to take it out, I can take it out anywhere.
How incredible and amazing is that?
So I did some experiments.
How to use it.
How big of an object could go in.
Whether there was a limit on the number of times I could use it.
How much it could store.
To sum it up simply, there’s no limit to the number of uses.
But there is a limit on size and capacity.
Maybe around the capacity of a 28-inch suitcase?
Objects that could fit in something about that size go in regardless of weight.
Size and number don’t matter.
But volume does seem to play a pretty important role.
In other words, if it can fit into a 28-inch suitcase, I can store it in the inventory regardless of size or weight.
It’s not absolute. I’m just saying it’s roughly that size.
A long stick about one meter in length wouldn’t fit in a 28-inch suitcase, but it fits in the inventory.
I figured it was roughly that much in terms of volume.
This incredible ability given to me.
The more I tested it, the more amazing it became, and I kept thinking and thinking about how I could use it well.
And then I made up my mind.
I’d use it to eat well and get by.
Isn’t that enough?
.
.
.
.
The first time I realized I had the ability of an inventory was three months ago, during summer break.
The summer break of my second year of high school.
As for how I’d lived until then.
I literally lived like a beggar bastard.
A mother whose face I didn’t even know,
a father whose face I could barely see, and me, abandoned. Does that explain it?
My wish was to go to an orphanage.
At least if I went there, I’d be able to eat.
That much was all I could ask for.
Legally, I had a father, so I couldn’t go to an orphanage, but this person called my father was someone whose face was hard to even see.
This person called my father.
Where he was, what he did,
I didn’t even know what his job was.
Once every few months, he’d come home, do nothing for a few days but drink his ass off, beat me up for no reason, and then sleep again.
Then he’d leave the house without a word.
The electricity, water, and gas were all cut off.
We did receive basic livelihood support payments, but they didn’t come to me.
They all went to my father.
So I really was living like a beggar.
Then I discovered this ability. How do you think I felt?
I want to make money.
I want to become a chaebol.
It wasn’t anything grand like that.
I just really wanted to eat until I was full.
That was the only thought in my head.
Afraid someone might see, I went to a large mart and secretly put a pack of ramen and a can of butane gas into my inventory without anyone noticing.
In other words, I stole them.
Of course, I went to school too, so I knew that stealing was wrong.
I’m a guy with at least that much common sense.
But back then, I couldn’t help it.
I was so hungry I felt like I was going to die.
I thought that if I didn’t eat this, I’d drop dead.
When school was in session, there was at least lunch, so I could think of it as one meal a day, but once summer break started, food was cut off completely.
If I get caught, then I get caught. That was what I thought as I stole it.
Even though I’d practiced so much beforehand, when people were actually passing behind me and I tried to put things in my inventory, I was so nervous that sweat dripped down my face.
Still, maybe all that practice paid off, because I was able to put the ramen and butane gas away and come home without any major trouble.
Honestly, no one was paying any attention to me, but regardless of that, I was trembling like crazy.
As soon as I got home, I started boiling the ramen.
I cooked three at once.
I was overwhelmed by the luxury of doing that for the first time in my life.
Looking at the pot full of noodles, I felt genuinely proud.
Whenever I ate ramen, I’d always felt regretful.
It wasn’t enough. I wanted to eat a little more.
Even so, I had never once asked for more.
There was no one to ask, and no one to give me more.
Maybe because I’d grown up without eating properly, my build was extremely small.
Even so, I ate all three packs of ramen myself.
Though I did suffer a bit from indigestion that day,
after that, it became very easy.
I went around to several marts and swiftly put the things I needed into my inventory.
You get better at stealing too, once you do it.
Maybe because I went to so many marts.
Now, when I go to a mart, I can roughly tell where the CCTVs are and where the employees are.
I avoided them well and stored the things I needed in my inventory from several different marts.
I especially stole a lot from large marts.
Large marts are definitely a bit less strict about monitoring theft and things like that.
They have lots of goods too.
In any case, thanks to this incredible and amazing ability that appeared for me, I no longer had to starve.
That really was nice.
Even so, my life didn’t change much.
Before, I’d lived without even being able to eat, but now I just went around eating.
Before, I was a beggar bastard who couldn’t even eat, and now I was a beggar bastard who could eat.
I needed money.
At least if I wanted to use electricity, water, and gas at home.
I did have one part-time job.
I worked at a convenience store, but apparently minors aren’t allowed to work past 10 p.m.
So I only worked four hours, from 6 to 10.
Three days a week.
Honestly, convenience stores don’t usually hire part-timers like that.
It’s a hassle when a part-timer works such short hours. Inconvenient.
The owner hired me because he felt sorry for me.
He said he’d rest during that time.
He knew my situation.
Sometimes he gave me food that was going to be thrown out too.
But I couldn’t live on just that.
It was far from enough.
I thought it wasn’t enough, but even that disappeared.
The building owner sold the building, and they decided to tear it down and rebuild it.
Of course, the owner closed the convenience store,
and I quit my part-time job too,
and anyway, I needed money.
My ability is the ability to store objects in my inventory, not an ability to create money.
If someone gave me money, I’d be able to whisk it into my inventory faster than anyone.
But no one hands me money.
I had no opportunity to touch money in the first place.
On top of that, these days everyone uses cards.
So I thought about it the other way around.
Instead of putting money into the inventory, wasn’t there a way to make money with the inventory?
No matter how much I thought about it, the only thing I could do was use the inventory to steal things.
This time, I headed not to a mart, but to a stationery store.
I went in and put expensive pens and a few good-looking items into my inventory.
At first, I tried to sell them to classmates at school.
But the more I thought about it, the more selling them at school seemed like a bad idea.
First of all, I had no friends,
and if a beggar bastard suddenly showed up with brand-new stuff and asked, “You want to buy this?” I felt like the first thing they’d say would be, “You stole this, didn’t you?”
So I used Karrot.
At least those people wouldn’t know who I was.
The people using Karrot wouldn’t know that I was a parentless orphan bastard
getting bullied at school.
So I used Karrot.
But my stuff didn’t sell as well on Karrot as I thought it would.
I thought if I listed expensive pens at half price, they’d sell right away, but that wasn’t the case either.
Different people preferred different things.
If it wasn’t popular or trendy, even if it was new and half price, it didn’t sell well.
And I didn’t have the ability to tell those things apart.
How would I know? It’s not like I’d ever bought anything.
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.
.
A pretty large food supplies mart opened in the neighborhood.
I’d already been feeling nervous because I’d been going to large marts too often lately, so the timing was perfect.
The mart was spacious, had lots of goods, and was nice.
As soon as I arrived, I checked the locations of the CCTVs first. The employees’ faces too.
And since I felt like I’d been lacking protein lately.
And lacking iron too, I started taking several packs of beef.
When I grilled it at home, it tasted so good.
So this is Hanwoo, huh?
It melted in my mouth.
After going a few times, I could feel the way they looked at me changing.
I wondered if I needed to switch marts again.
Then I thought, Huh? What if I use this instead?
Settlement money.
If they suspected me and searched me, but nothing came out, couldn’t I say I’d been wronged and get some money out of them as a settlement?
I searched it up and made a plan.
It’s true that I stole a little more meat over the past few days.
The owner had to realize items were disappearing.
He had to suspect me.
I deliberately lingered for a long time in front of the butcher’s section, and I stole more expensive beef.
Sure enough, the owner snapped up the bait.
He accused me of being a thief and growled that he was going to open my bag.
Outwardly, I pretended I wasn’t, pretended I was scared, pretended I was wronged, but inside I was happy.
Especially when that old man grabbed my wrist and dragged me away, I felt a thrill.
For a moment, I even wished he would hit me.
That spot was in a place where the CCTV could see everything very clearly.
The mart customers gathered like an audience, and just in time, the police arrived.
Wow—could it be any more perfect?
There, I opened my bag and dropped the food I’d prepared beforehand.
Do you really think my school nutritionist would have packed food for me?
She probably doesn’t even know who I am.
If she gave me food for no reason and I got food poisoning, her job would be at risk, so would she really take that danger and give me food?
I prepared all of it myself before going.
In the end, the old man who couldn’t prove my theft was taken away by the police, and I went along too to be questioned.
I was still wronged, frustrated, poor, and penniless, and I played the role of a pitiful boy treated like a thief because he was poor incredibly well,
and it seemed my small build made my acting stand out even more.
See?
The call’s coming.
“I’ll give you a 100,000-won coupon you can use at our mart. Isn’t that enough?”
“Haaah. This is seriously unbelievable. I’m hanging up.”
A 100,000-won coupon?
I told you, I don’t need that.
I can bring out as many goods as I want.
From the food supplies mart you run, too.
What I need is money.
Money, I said. Money. Money. Money.
The phone rings again.
I answer and just stay quiet without saying anything.
I can feel the other person hesitating too.
“A 500,000-won coupon. I can’t do more than that.”
The potbellied owner spoke in a fairly firm voice, as if making a decision after wavering, like he was delivering his final ultimatum,
and without needing to hear any more, I just hung up.
The call came again immediately.
“Why do you keep hanging up?”
“If there’s nothing to say, am I supposed to just hold the phone?”
“You have to tell me yes or no so I know.”
“Why do you think I hung up? Because you’re saying ridiculous things.”
“What would make it not ridiculous, then?”
“Sir. I’m at a very sensitive age right now. You know, right? The storm-and-stress period of adolescence. But among the customers watching us at the mart earlier, there was a girl I liked. In front of her, I was falsely accused of being a thief, had to reveal that I was on basic livelihood support, and had to reveal that I’ve been eating what other kids leave behind. Why? Because you treated me like a thief. In front of all those people, I almost became a thief, and in order to not become a thief, I had to reveal that I’m a beggar bastard. Even now, whenever I think about that moment, I break out in a cold sweat and my hands and feet tremble. I think I’ll have to go to the hospital, and I might even need psychiatric treatment, but a 500,000-won coupon? Do they take food supplies mart coupons as payment at the psychiatrist’s office?”
“Ahem, ahem. Well, you see. There was just a bit of a misunderstanding between us. Then I’ll give you 500,000 won in cash. Will you settle for that?”
“Five hundred thousand is a bit much of a stretch. Give me three million and I’ll settle, nice and cool.”
“What? Three million? Are you joking?”
“Three million is me being really considerate. I honestly think I should be getting at least five million won. I should be getting more than five million, but I’ll have to keep using that food mart from now on, and if things are awkward between us every time I go, it’ll be uncomfortable for both of us. So I’m saying I’ll take exactly three million won, just the hospital fees.”
“Still, three million is too much.”
“If you can’t do it, then I don’t really need to persuade you, sir. I’ve already filed criminal complaints for insult, assault, defamation, and even child abuse, so if you get fined for that, I’ll file a civil suit then.”
“What???”
“You didn’t know? Did you think it would end with just paying a fine? There’s still the civil suit after that.”
“Who would even defend you over something like this?”
“For a business owner, you really don’t know how the world works, do you? Who takes on something like this for money? They’ll market themselves as a righteous person who saved a minor from being branded a thief at a mart. And to show that justice is alive in society, they plan to proceed with a civil lawsuit as well. Wouldn’t it be enough to put out a few articles like that? Reporters in our country seem to love gossip like this. And that wouldn’t be very good for your food mart either, sir. A few searches online and people will find out exactly where it is.”
With the student speaking so sharply and leaving him no room to escape, Min Baeho grew angry first.
“Why are you doing this to me?”
“I’m not the one who did anything. Things turned out this way because you suspected me, sir. If you hadn’t treated me like a thief and assaulted me, why would any of this have happened? Why are you forgetting what you did?”
“Haa… Three million is too much. I’ll give you one million won. That should be enough.”
“Sir. If you add up the fine, the civil suit, and the attorney’s fees, how much do you think it’ll be? Do you think it won’t go over three million won? Why are you trying so hard to block with a shovel what you could stop with a hoe? The CCTV footage is so clear that there’s no way out anyway.”
“No, it’s because the amount you’re asking for is so absurd.”
“Sir, if I go to civil court, I’m going to start at ten million won. I’m planning not to go to school starting tomorrow, you see. My PTSD has flared up, so outside life is impossible. I keep imagining people pointing at me and calling me a thief. I can’t live a proper life. The court will decide how much of that ten million to award, but once it goes to court, I’ll be asking for ten million won.”
“So you’re saying you won’t adjust the amount?”
“Yes. I won’t knock off even one won. Three million won in cash. In exchange, once I receive the money, I’ll go straight to the police station and withdraw the complaint.”
A brief silence.
Then a long sigh.
“Haa… Fine. Stop by the store later.”
“Yes.”
After hanging up, the student took a large bite of the perfectly grilled beef.
The savory flavor—this was Korean beef, all right.
It melted gently in his mouth.