I must have cried my heart out for the longest time, because at some point, exhausted, I fell asleep.
My pillow was filthy, stained with tear marks, snot, and drool that had overflowed.
Was it dehydration, or had this frail body used up all its energy?
Rubbing my puffy eyes and lifting my head from the pillow, a wave of embarrassment crashed over me.
‘Haaa… Why did I act like that yesterday?’
As the sound of my shrill wailing replayed in my mind, my face burned. Thank goodness no one had heard it.
Was this what it felt like for a man’s pride of twenty-five years to crumble into dust and scatter in the wind?
I roughly wiped my face with my damp sleeve. The stinging sensation from even lightly rubbing my skin felt strange.
Having calmed down somewhat, I picked up the phone I’d tossed beside the bed.
I tried to hold it up with my right hand like I always did—whether from lack of strength or because this body was still unfamiliar—
“Ugh…!”
My wrist gave way weakly. The unfamiliar weight sent the phone crashing down, smacking me right in the face.
“Aww… It hurts….”
It hurt so much that tears swirled in my eyes. Steeling myself so it wouldn’t fall again, I gripped the phone tightly with both hands.
I slowly scrolled through my contacts with my index finger.
My finger stopped at the contact saved as ‘Mom.’ My finger trembled.
I wanted to press down hard and call her right then and there.
I wanted to explain this situation to someone, to be understood, to be saved.
But my finger only trembled, unable to press the screen.
‘…What do I even say? That I woke up and became a girl?’
They’d treat me like a madman. That their son had finally lost his mind.
Or I’d be misunderstood as a kidnapper or voice phishing scammer, or if they reported their missing son to the police….
I could see exactly how it would play out the moment I got dragged away.
‘Of course, Mom might believe me, though.’
I didn’t think Mom wouldn’t believe me. She always told me she believed in me, no matter what.
But even if she did believe me, that was still a problem.
She’d raised me all the way through university, and I was just about to enter society, only to confess, ‘Your son disappeared and became a daughter. Please raise me again.’
That would be the height of filial impiety.
Well, maybe it was already impious that I couldn’t get a job as her son and was just sponging off her….
But at least with that body, I could prepare for employment. With this current body, it was like she had to raise a child all over again.
‘What can I even do right now in this body?’
Right now, I was just an unidentified person who couldn’t prove I was me.
I couldn’t even step outside. I didn’t have clothes to wear out.
Far from preparing for a real job, I’d become someone who couldn’t even work part-time at a convenience store.
Not that I’d ever actually tried convenience store work before.
“Hmm…….”
In the end, there was only one place I could lean on. A space where anonymity was guaranteed.
I logged into a large community where I usually only lurked.
They had all sorts of weird categories, so there had to be a TS-related one.
‘Found it. As if there wouldn’t be.’
I found the ‘TS Channel’ among countless categories.
Holding onto a sliver of hope that if such an unrealistic thing had happened, there might be one more guy like me out there.
I wrote a post with trembling fingers.
[Title: I Seriously Woke Up and Became a Girl]
[Content:
Seriously, I’m a 25-year-old man, but I woke up this morning as a girl
My resident registration card is still the same, what do I do?
I haven’t told anyone, so please, I need serious advice]
Not long after posting, comments started coming in.
└Must be nice…… When’s it my turn…
└Go to the delusion channel
└Proof pls
└Imagining you getting TS’ed and biting your nails while frantically typing is kinda hot..
└[Notice] Roleplay is forbidden. Why do these fucks keep coming here with these delusions? Go to the delusion chan.
‘No, it’s real……! You bastards!’
Meanwhile, a few played along, spouting serious nonsense.
└First, look in a mirror and explore your body. Let the female hormones take over your brain and you’ll feel at ease. Yep yep.
└If you don’t have money, grab a middle-aged man nearby and call him ‘oppa.’
I wanted to smash my monitor.
The most serious problem in the world was being consumed by someone as entertainment no different from excrement.
‘Come to think of it, I think there was a comment saying to go to the delusion chan.’
When I searched for ‘delusion,’ the ‘TS Delusion Channel’ proudly appeared, and I clicked without hesitation.
The moment I saw the board list, an indescribable disgust welled up within me.
[Title: I want to get TS’ed and ██’d]
[Title: Imagining becoming a girl and getting caught by my dad]
[Title: I want to become a pretty girl and coast through life.]
“……Wow.”
I lowered my head and looked at my body. My wiggling toes caught my eye.
Trampling on my pride, I tapped at the keyboard again.
Pretending it was a desired fantasy, I tried to write like the other posts.
[Title: Realistically, what happens if you get TS’ed?]
[Content: Setting aside sexual desire, what do you actually do if you get TS’ed?
Woke up in my studio and became a girl.
Resident registration card is the same. Doesn’t this mean I’m completely fucked in Korea?]
└Masturbate
└Get fucked
└What’s fucked about it, being a woman in Korea is life on easy mode
The comments were completely devoid of nutritional value.
I leaned back against the chair in a daze. My short legs dangled in my vision.
‘Crazy bastards…. What the hell am I trying to gain by doing this right now.’
Among the continuously incoming comments, one particularly caught my eye.
└If it were me, I’d become a VTuber. You just need a model, after all.
‘VTuber.’
Making money while hiding behind a character without showing your face.
Plus, I could just receive the earnings in my bank account under my original name.
‘Isn’t this perfect? This is it…!’
* * *
After much deliberation, I took only ‘Baek-eun’ from my original name ‘Baek Eunhae’ and named myself ‘Shirogane.’
After naming myself, I clutched my head in self-loathing. But I had to endure this self-loathing.
I already had a mic; the problem was the model.
I had no income right now, but I had some money I’d originally saved.
Since the model was important too, after much deliberation, I purchased a fairly expensive, immediately usable premade model.
The numbers in my account dwindled in an instant, but I forcibly looked away.
I ambitiously posted a debut announcement on the community and even set up a ‘30 Syaburgers’ event to draw in viewers.
Because an investment for the future was nothing to regret…!
* * *
First broadcast day.
For something thought up spontaneously in a short time, I’d prepared quite thoroughly with a script, settings, and everything else.
[Broadcast Start - This is Shirogane’s debut.]
When I pressed the broadcast start button, a red ‘LIVE’ sign appeared on screen.
With a standby screen on, 1 minute, 2 minutes…… viewers gradually entered the room where no one had been coming in.
Once enough viewers had gathered, the promised time arrived.
I looked at the script.
I’d tested the mic over a hundred times, yet my lips wouldn’t actually open.
The model couldn’t follow my nervous expression and was blinking incessantly like someone with a magnesium deficiency.
Silence flowed. A ‘?’ appeared in the chat window.
I couldn’t open my mouth. My heart pounded.
“Uh…… Um…… I am…… Shirogane……”
My palms were drenched in cold sweat, as if a flood had occurred.
The script I’d written beforehand was on the side of the screen, but the letters were dancing around on their own, making it impossible to read.
“S-sorry… I’ll do it again, I’ll do it again…!”
In the chat window, besides ‘?’, there were occasionally messages like ‘lol’ that could be seen as somewhat positive.
But my mind alternated between going blank and darkening. The viewer count I glanced at was gradually dropping.
It happened in just 5 minutes.
With a tearful voice, I somehow continued the broadcast, but I couldn’t even remember the rest due to the shame.
I think I roughly picked the Syaburger winners and pressed the end button like I was fleeing.
It was all over in just an hour.
The moment I pressed the broadcast end button, I collapsed onto the desk.
Talking to utter strangers was so hard. Even if it was through a screen.
‘What kind of VTuber is a guy who couldn’t even do in-game voice chat and always just typed….’
Schools I attended because everyone else did; the military I was forcibly dragged to because everyone else went.
When I was discharged, I’d had a little confidence that I was just like everyone else now.
I’d tried clubs and extracurriculars, but after a day or two, I ultimately drifted apart and quit.
My essence hadn’t changed: the moment the semester ended, I cut off all college connections and cooped myself up in this cramped studio apartment.
‘Not that I had any connections to cut…’
With trembling hands, I sent the 30 Syaburger coupons to the winners one by one.
And with a blank expression, I opened my banking app.
“…….”
The balance drained by the VTuber model and the Syaburger giveaway was miserable.
[Balance: 14,460 won]
‘Huh?’
The remaining money was so little that I couldn’t even worry about next week’s food—I had to worry about tomorrow’s.
“Ah, the bathroom…….”
With everything done, perhaps because the tension had released, I felt strong pressure in my lower abdomen.
I naturally stood in the bathroom to—
Splish—
‘Ah, right……’
I felt like wailing again, so I cleaned myself up and crawled into the corner of my bed.