I Became The Leader Of A Revolution In A Romance Fantasy

< Chapter 19: The Hero from Another World Shall Save This World >

The barrage of flashes from journalists and the fuss of the staff.

After breaking through the doctors’ cries of “You need to be hospitalized!” and dealing with the shock of each family member.

I was finally able to be alone.

“Ha, it was long.”

Alcohol. I needed alcohol.

Skipping over the humble (for show) tableware, I pulled out a well-hidden crystal glass and some high-quality whiskey.

Pour.

As the rich amber liquid, poured straight without ice, swirled with viscosity, the scent of cigars, spices, oak barrels, and maple syrup mingled and rose.

I took a sip of the whiskey.

The warmth, filled with various scents, spread from my lips down to my esophagus.

“Whoo.”

I felt my body relax.

I sank into the sofa.

#

☆ Eugene and the Theater of Eugene’s Mind ☆

I muttered in a daze.

“Those bastards. Two of the top figures from the revolutionaries and royalists are buried in the explosion, and all they’re doing is crying to each other?! Is this for real?”

I summoned a giant doll in my imagination. The doll, shaped like an idiot, had “Dear Author” scrawled messily on its face.

“No, come to think of it, it’s all this bastard’s fault!”

Summoning a baseball bat instead of a whiskey glass, I whacked the root of all evil!

“Hey, you crazy bastard! Coming in here, it’s even more clear! This is a total fucking disaster! I saved your life by taking the fall for you! And you possess me?! Is this a romance fantasy? Huh? Is it?!”

In the 2020s, the key elements of romance fantasy were healing and infinite pampering.

Stories where the protagonist couple’s lives turn out well just by playing adorably from when they were babies were everywhere.

Why the hell did I get possessed into a miserable romance fantasy set in the fucking 1990s?!

Even after a few full swings, my anger did not subside.

“Arrrgh, you damn bitch!”

I screamed in frustration, covering my face.

Then, as I stayed still, I heard footsteps approaching from a corner.

An intruder in my sacred mind palace?

I turned my head to look and was dumbfounded.

“You gotta be kidding me.”

Striding confidently toward me was,

That blade-like posture and the chest adorned with medals.

A hairstyle slicked back with silver hair, making arrogance seem extinct just by imitating it for a day.

“Now I’m having hallucinations too.”

Eugene Albert Wulfric Hastings.

So that was… ‘me,’ heavily cosplaying the look of the male protagonist from part one of the original work.

Original Eugene snapped his fingers just like that.

Instead of half of humanity disappearing, a splendid sofa appeared before my eyes.

It was something that didn’t suit my taste at all.

“How feudal.”

“Just like a 20th-century commie.”

Yeah, right.

Except for a few who still think it’s the 19th century, anyone from the 21st century would be considered a commie by 20th-century standards.

Even moderate right-wingers would be called extreme leftists.

Original Eugene smacked me in the head with that fact and arrogantly crossed his legs on the sofa.

“There’s no hope, is there?”

“…Damn it.”

I summoned a Herman Miller office chair.

The third treasure of Editor Kim Yujin.

– “Producer! Thank you so, so much. Thanks to you, our daily sales hit 80 million won, wailing and buying me this chair, which was supposed to be the Chanel of the chair world, my guardian of spinal health.”

“If you’re going to possess someone, do it there.”

I sat in the chair, thinking enviously of the protagonist couple from that blockbuster work.

Original Eugene leaned forward.

And in an aggressive posture, asked me.

“So, what are you going to do now?”

“What do you mean, what am I going to do?”

“If you saw what happened today and felt nothing, then you deserve to be stuck in this shitty novel.”

“?

The Count Eugene Albert Wulfric Hastings doesn’t use that tone.

You’re breaking character, you second-rate Kim Yujin.

“Does cosplay matter now? If your mind explodes, so does mine.”

He’s right.

I leaned back into the fantastic mesh of the Herman Miller and fell into thought.

Staring at the ‘Dear Author’ still dangling from the rope, I organized the countless thoughts floating in my head.

In the end, I opened my mouth.

“Actually, nothing has changed from the beginning. My goal is-”

“‘Our’ goal, right?”

“…Harsh setup. Fine, ‘our’ goal from the beginning, and still now, has only been ‘survival.'”

Original Eugene nodded.

“At first, it was to survive the madness of the revolution. Then, the enormous funds and even greater popularity were to survive the plummeting economy. But that’s not the end.”

“Whew. To summarize the situation in part two of the original work, first, the Great Depression. Next, the split of the revolutionary government, political terrorism, the militarization of political forces leading to a ‘virtual civil war.’ And then…”

Yeah.

The synopsis of part two of the original work that I fiercely tried to dissuade.

It didn’t simply end as a tragedy for the main couple; it led to a complete collapse of the absurd worldview, leaving one to wonder why such a narrative even exists in a romance fantasy.

Original Eugene spoke meaningfully.

“The Great War. An unprecedented world war brought about by the idiots of the entire continent pressing the acceleration button in the aftermath of the Great Depression. The shattered republic couldn’t even muster the minimum strength to defend itself, becoming a battlefield for foreign powers and exploding to death.”

“……Damn it.”

Just hearing it again gave me a headache.

Damn it! Why the hell!

I got reincarnated into a romance fantasy, and this kind of event was waiting for me!

What kind of crazy romance fantasy author ends part one and then suddenly loads an event ripped off from World War II in part two?

“If you say it’s sudden, the war from five years ago was already inspired by World War I, wasn’t it? Right now, we’re in the Weimar Republic era of interwar Germany.”

“Then for God’s sake, use a different setting… Who the hell pretends to be the French Revolution and then drifts into World War II?”

“Haven’t we said that about 20 times?”

“……We should have said it 200 times. Damn it.”

Surprisingly, there are proper historical romances in women’s fiction. But why on earth would you want to recreate the dark periods of human history in a romance fantasy! And crammed with all kinds of absurdities!

I covered my face.

But then, the original Eugene bastard suddenly summoned a water cannon and fired it.

“Argh!”

I tumbled down along with my cute Herman Miller.

As I rolled on the floor like a drowned rat, original Eugene crossed his legs in front of me.

“Just being angry won’t solve anything. We’ve changed a lot within the ‘Republic,’ but in just one year, it’s impossible to intervene in the future on a continental scale. The war will start.”

Damn bastard.

“……We have to survive alongside idiots and fools who can’t even resolve to ‘clear the debris and save people.’ Ha. Can’t I just commit suicide and not reincarnate?”

“Isn’t one reincarnation enough fantasy to experience in a lifetime? Are you really going to experiment to see if you can reincarnate again?”

His words made sense, which made me even more angry.

‘Ah! This is why the author reincarnated me!’

A sudden realization followed.

When life is crap, and someone beside you keeps making valid points, you’d want to reincarnate someone into a crappy novel too!

……Shit.

“Okay, let’s sort this out step by step. From the beginning, our objective has never changed. It’s survival. Although we reviewed this issue from the first day of reincarnation, the simplest way to avoid the Great War is to just quit everything and run away.”

“Rejected.”

I dismissed that option with the same words I used back then.

“The Great Depression and the Great War will literally sweep across the entire world. You can’t escape the damage and aftermath just by leaving this country.”

Pressing on my temples,

I added further explanation.

“In that case, it’s relatively better to stay in the Republic, which is detailed in the original work and where I know all the information. Here, I can use that information to do something.”

“Is it the practical second-best over the possible ideal somewhere out there? How democratic. You sound like a ghost from the 21st century.”

I wished he wouldn’t compare my practical survival plan to something like democracy. It pissed me off.

Democracy doesn’t guarantee the second-best; it only ensures the lesser evil. It means ‘not totally screwed,’ not some second-best nonsense.

“So, everything we’ve tried so far is our asset. Let’s sum it up.”

Original Eugene began extending his fingers one by one.

“Money accumulated by becoming the embodiment of corruption. Influence gathered through media plays with no ideology whatsoever. And the private soldiers we’ve blatantly built up.”

This guy’s description was really annoying.

“At least we managed to hold back the country from being wrecked by the revolution. The problem is, not only are the revolutionary forces half-baked, but the old noble class is also a bunch of idiots. This country still lacks the capacity to engage in parliamentary politics.”

“Trying to imitate the 20th century in a world that seems stuck in the 18th-19th centuries was too much…”

But what could I do when that’s all I knew!

Original Eugene waggled his finger.

“Get your head straight. We need to wrap this up. First, I’ve ensured that I live well. As long as I avoid the life-ruining events leading up to the war, that is.”

I nodded.

1. Minimize the chaos of the revolution. Check.

2. Withstand the Great Depression. In progress.

3. The era of political gangsters will begin. Hmm.

“…Today’s bombing is surely the starting point of number three, right?”

“Definitely. Whether it’s a white terror by the far-right or a red terror by the far-left, extreme underground organizations have inevitably emerged in this country, and soon active politicians will ally with them, leading to the formation of military factions. There will also be those who use private soldiers.”

But haven’t we prepared Stormtroopers for this very day?

Thinking of our veteran comrades who are currently arming themselves with small amounts of diverted Republic military supplies made my heart swell.

And one more thing.

We’ve also been steadily building up grounds to accuse the Revolutionary Committee of corruption and decapitate them.

By the way, the Revolutionary Committee in the original work was a kind of concentration camp concept gathering the extreme leftists.

“Would I have foolishly left the ‘Revolutionary Committee’ intact when we had a functioning parliament?

I gathered all the filth in one place to eventually wipe them out with one blow, declaring, ‘The vested interests that failed to take social responsibility are corrupt and must disappear!'”

“And finally, the last stage: the world war. Your ultimate dream, fueled by hope and delusion, was that the Republic would somehow evolve into Omega-Republic through the power of courage and friendship, as long as we managed to contain stages one to three.”

This bastard was saying “we” earlier, and now he’s drawing a line with “you”?

I admit it. You are me.

“But looking at this situation, it doesn’t seem like we can achieve that evolution. The so-called members of parliament in this country are not MetalGarurumon but twisted hellhounds. Evolution is screwed.”

“……Damn it.”

I covered my face.

Silence followed.

How much time passed?

Original Eugene spoke in a desolate voice.

“Hey, web novel editor. From ancient times, there have been other power-up clichés besides fusion.”

“……”

“Let’s face it. We might manage up to stage three somehow, but there’s no answer for the world war.”

“……Damn it.”

“We have to either unify this nation of idiots and fools somehow or hope that there’s a Korea even in this twisted romance fantasy world and try to escape on a small boat.”

#

The imaginary play ended.

I got up from the sofa.

As I clenched and unclenched my fists, it still felt like I could feel the debris I had smashed.

‘Idiots and fools who can’t even clear the rubble.’

Taking these bastards into a world war…

“Haha, this damn Republic.”

No matter how much I thought about it, there was no answer as it stood.

And no matter how much I thought about it, there seemed to be no reason for me to cling to this ‘Republic’ any longer.

In the first place, wasn’t this Republic something that was born as a twisted chimera after the revolution, squirming until it would have naturally died, which I, Eugene, the great healer, forcibly kept alive?

‘I had modern ethics, and since it was the result of my efforts, I had some affection for it…’

Original Eugene was right.

If the fusion evolution route is ruined, we need to look for another power-up event.

An event with as long a history as fusion, which might bring about even greater combat power enhancement than fusion.

“Corruption.”

The whiskey glass I was holding had warmed up to body temperature, becoming lukewarm.

I downed the remaining drink in one gulp.

From now on, this fragmented Republic is shutting down.

This country must become one.

And no matter how I think about it,

there is only one person who can unify these idiots and fools, carry them, and leave with a casual, ‘It was dirty meeting you bastards, let’s never see each other again!’