‘This… is my last memory as Pizza…’
After that, I woke up, and for some reason, I was fused with the memories of Yoon Yi-gon from the Republic of Korea.
‘Guess you could call it luck. No, since I woke up with the memories of Yoon Yi-gon from Korea because of that, is it really luck…?’
Whatever kind of life Pizza had lived until now, from this moment on, everything would be completely different.
‘Don’t worry. This Yoon Yi-gon will make you the best at whatever you want to be…’
Just then, a loud commotion came from somewhere, and a group of boys came rushing over.
“Hey, Pizza woke up!”
‘Seeing my worried friends, I’m actually a bit touched…’
They all looked like they’d been waiting for me to wake up. Arancini, Olive, and Pasta were with them.
Arancini looked at me with a serious face and asked,
“Is she pretty?”
“Uh…”
“Frana Bella, I mean…! Is she pretty?!”
I didn’t understand what he was talking about at first, but then it clicked.
‘Of course, these guys…’
Boys will be boys. They’re not worried about my well-being—they just want to know what the girl looks like.
To be honest, in my memory, all I saw was the reflection of blonde hair in the Knight’s armor.
In other words, I never actually saw her face.
At this,
“Don’t hold back, just tell us. After yesterday, I really respect you. That courage to go see her even if you might get rejected… Wow… I won’t think of you as an idiot anymore.”
Arancini was about to shed tears.
‘Seriously, stop that… And so you did think I was an idiot all along…’
He looked at me with sparkling eyes. In the end, after glancing around, I decided to brag a little.
A boy’s dream should be kept alive… I’m still a 17-year-old boy too.
“In my entire life, I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful. She looked just like an angel descended from the heavens, I’d say. And… ahem…”
Suddenly, I hiccupped. Maybe because I’d been unconscious all day, my throat was dry.
My friends misunderstood and rolled their eyes, thinking I was hinting for something.
But no one immediately offered anything. After all, the rations we each got weren’t much.
‘Besides, no way would anyone have any bread left from yesterday…’
But suddenly, Pie started rummaging through his pocket.
He pulled out a piece of nicely baked bread he’d saved from yesterday’s rations. He carefully placed it on my knee.
‘Pie the glutton is actually sharing food!’
It wasn’t just me—everyone was shocked.
Starting with Pie, several small snacks were placed on me.
Well… with this much sincerity, it’s only right to tell them.
“Hmm… Well then, Pie, for your sincerity, I’ll tell you.
As far as I remember, her face was made of gentle curves, and her eyes shone like blue jewels.
Her skin was as clear as the first light of dawn, and her lips were as soft and pink as flower petals.
Her blonde hair was soft and shimmering like threads of gold. Each lock sparkled as it caught the light, and whenever she moved, it seemed to spread a subtle fragrance.
Just her presence brightened her surroundings, and her gaze was elegant yet as warm as a mother’s embrace.”
I simply spoke as I remembered it. It was just a silhouette in my mind…
‘Was she even really blonde?’
“Ooooh…”
If I had to sum it up in one sentence…
“She’s so beautiful it’ll drive you crazy just looking at her.”
Yaaaah!
My friends let out cries of admiration. Yeah. No need for fancy words. That one sentence says it all…
After that, I proudly exaggerated my own heroic tale. In reality, all that happened was I got beat up and knocked out.
***
Satisfied with the answer to their question, my friends dispersed as quickly as they had come. Was that really all they cared about…?
Alone again, I fell into deep thought.
“Hmm… Open the curtain.”
It’s overwhelming, but this is a new life. Starting over is actually a good thing. I have knowledge of Earth that nobody else does. What should I do…?
After thinking for a long while, I organized my dreams for the future into three directions.
‘The first dream is Swordmage.’
Looking back at my memories of this World, it’s quite similar to the classic fantasy worlds I knew.
There are Magic Beasts, Mages, and Knights. The war with the Demon race ended about fifteen years ago, so it’s not even ancient history.
In short, this is a fantasy World.
When I was Yoon Yi-gon, I liked Swordmages. When I played Dungeon & Dragon 2 in the arcade as a kid, I always picked Elf.
Because I could use both swords and magic.
Even in magical girl anime, my favorite was always the character who combined the two…
‘But why do Swordmages always seem kind of in-between classes?’
They’re never the main protagonist, just a slightly ambiguous companion of the main character.
But who cares? Romance is all that matters.
To wield both sword and magic… It’s the kind of dream worth investing your youth in.
‘My second dream is to be called King…’
When I was Yoon Yi-gon, I wanted to become the Entrepreneur King. In reality, that was the only nickname you could really have.
In this fantasy World, actual kings exist. Every country has an emperor or a king.
There’s even a Poison King, Mercenary King, Sword King—people who have the title of King in their field.
It means reaching the top in some area.
‘In that case, I want to be called the Merchant King!’
‘My third dream is, of course, that…’
The thing I was best at as Yoon Yi-gon. Maybe even more than my first and second dreams combined.
I spoke it aloud.
“In this World, maybe I should try starting a Startup?”
***
Startup…
A Startup is a newly established venture company that hasn’t been around long.
It’s a term that originated in Silicon Valley, USA.
It refers to small companies that start with an idea or innovative technology and have high potential for growth.
When I was young, my parents died in an accident, and I grew up in an orphanage, always wanting to succeed.
Just like the comic about becoming the Bandit King that I loved to read, I wanted to become a king. But in the real World, you can’t become the Bandit King.
‘That’s just a criminal…’
But those who aim to become the Entrepreneur King are different.
They start from scratch and build giant companies, challenging the World through Startups, just like pirates challenging the seas to become Bandit King.
‘Someday, someone among them will earn the title of Entrepreneur King…’
The era of great Startups. During that time, the man closest to the Entrepreneur King, Waicrosoft’s Steve Charles, passed away, and I ended up reading his biography.
From the very first personal computer to the advent of smartphones, his life was a perfect movie.
He was adopted too. Just like me, a fellow orphan…
And he wasn’t even adopted by a rich family. He was so poor that he started his company in a garage. He was only in his twenties.
But still, he ended up building the company with the highest market value in the World. In an environment similar to mine, he achieved something unprecedented. He was my first role model.
And then his rival, Billy Gates of Waicrosoft. He also built the best company and became the richest man in the World.
What made him even greater, in my eyes, was his philanthropy.
After earning money, he donated a hundred trillion won to charity for the unfortunate. From him, I felt that thrilling entrepreneurial spirit.
‘That’s the spirit of entrepreneurship!!!’
It’s about challenging new things and creating new value to change the World.
‘To do business like Steve Charles and give to charity like Billy Gates…’
That was my motto as Yoon Yi-gon. Besides that, I learned from countless other respectable figures and set out on the path of Startups.
‘You can’t become the Bandit King in this era, but you can still be called the Entrepreneur King…’
That’s why I wanted to succeed greatly and become a beacon of hope for people like me who carry pain but want to challenge the World.
And maybe that hope is the same here on the Yuras Continent. Until now, I’d been living as a vagrant, but from now on, I’d become a new hope for this continent.
‘And besides, Startups are just plain fun…’
At first, I just admired those two men and thought about doing a Startup, but I had no idea what to do. I really started from nothing, founding a company and gaining tons of experience in the Startup World.
A company I started alone, developing technology thanks to government support.
Recruiting employees, team building, taking loans from technology guarantee funds, launching a service and getting ignored, then experiencing an explosive increase in Active Users thanks to marketing.
Knocking on office doors randomly to make sales, running out of capital and nearly failing to cross Death Valley.
Burnout came, but then I miraculously met an Angel Investor and got a small investment through the Angel Investment Matching Fund.
After countless successes and betrayals, I finally got through Series A and Series B investments, created a smash-hit service everyone knew, and was about to be named a Unicorn Company…
Every part of that process was tough but also a blast.
‘I wish I’d made it to the point of being named a Unicorn Company for the perfect ending…’
The world-renowned investor Andre Kostolany once said there are three ways to become rich.
The first is to succeed in business. It’s obvious, but succeeding in business is the fastest path to wealth.
The second is to invest in businesses with potential. If you can’t succeed in business yourself, you should invest in those with high potential.
There’s a common misunderstanding that this means stock or bond investing. Of course, you can get rich through stock investing, but once a company goes public, the value has already become too small.
For example, if I invested one million won and wanted to make a hundred million by earning a hundredfold, I’d need to be a stock market genius. But in Startups, earning a hundred times a hundred isn’t just a dream.
There’s a famous story about a Korean artist named Choi when Facebook was just a Startup.
He painted a mural for the company, not knowing what kind of company it was.
When asked, “Do you want cash or Stock Options?” he chose Stock Options and got paid in shares.
When Facebook went public, the value of the mural he painted became worth over two hundred billion won.
If you invest in the early stages like that, you can hit the jackpot.
In our country, there are also Accelerators and early-stage Startup founder systems that specialize in discovering such companies.
Companies like Premier, Boneng Angels, and Future Play are among them.
Someday, when the time comes for me to retire from Startups, I’d like to use the money I’ve earned to invest in early companies like that.
In the end, I understood that to get rich, you have to either do a Startup yourself or invest early in a Startup.
“The third way is…”
It’s a little different, but it’s marrying someone rich. It’s said to be the easiest way, and you solve both love and money, building up your wealth at the same time.
“Well… I could probably do that too. But when was the last time I even dated…?”
Suddenly, my eyes teared up. Stories like ‘The youngest son of a chaebol marries the granddaughter of a chaebol wife and becomes her pillar’ from web novels suddenly flashed through my mind.
The third way is probably just there for laughs…
In the end, the way to become rich is to succeed in business or to invest in successful entrepreneurs.
As they say, old habits die hard. What I’m best at, and what I find the most fun, is definitely Startups.
***
To do that, there’s something I want more than anything else—
A new start. Rebirth, a complete transformation. In other words, I want to be reborn.
Right now, I’m neither Yoon Yi-gon from Earth nor Pizza from the Yuras Continent. My knowledge from both is mixed.
I find myself wanting to begin with a new identity.
“I am neither Yoon Yi-gon nor Pizza. I am simply the one who will take you down… No, I will be the Merchant King in this World!”
So the first thing I need to do is this.
“I need to change my name. I don’t want to end up being called Pepperoni Pizza or Combination Pizza someday.”
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