9th Grade Civil Servant In Another World Chapter 2 - This F*cking Another World (2)

Clang clang clang!

A sharp bell sound rang out.

Lost in my thoughts, lunchtime had arrived before I knew it.

I hadn’t noticed, but my stomach had been growling loudly for a while now.

“…I’m starving to death.”

This was a given.

For the first two days, I was too busy recalling and reconstructing memories to think about eating, and this morning I was frantically rushing out after belatedly realizing I had to go to work.

I had gone two and a half days without eating anything.

Thankfully, Mrs. Schmidt, the boarding house owner, had stopped me as I was rushing out and pressed a lunch box into my hands.

“You haven’t had a single meal this whole time. My goodness, look how white and cracked your lips are. You absolutely must eat this, understand?”

Ah, Mrs. Schmidt!

A person who worries about and takes care of even a crazy bastard who spouts extreme political talk during meals—she must be an angel.

When I opened the lunch box, a sandwich and a bottle of coffee emerged.

“…It’s delicious.”

I slowly chewed the sandwich packed generously with ham, lettuce, and egg.

The food in this other world wasn’t much different from Earth.

***

Knock knock!

Someone knocked on the door.

“Come in— Cough, long live the Great Supreme Leader!”

“Long live the Supreme Leader! Did you have a good weekend, Clerk Assistant Redan?”

“Of course, Chief Clerk Hoffman.”

Before I could even think about it, my body sprang up like a coiled spring.

Only then could I recognize the man smiling warmly with a good-natured face.

Emil Hoffman.

A 7th-grade civil servant in his early forties.

He wasn’t particularly competent, but for some reason seemed to favor Lucas.

Well, he was the one who had gotten that bastard the 9th-grade clerk position at the instructor’s request.

So he was the person I most needed to impress right now.

The problem was that this guy was also a nauseating Supreme Leader cult fanatic. Birds of a feather flock together, as they say.

‘I can do this. No matter how fucked up this situation is, I have sales experience. I even sweet-talked that psychopath Manager Kim. Dealing with this idiot should be a piece of cake.’

I steeled my resolve inwardly.

“Oh my, you’ve already started eating? I was hoping to eat together.”

Hoffman looked dejected as he held up his lunch box.

Damn it. I was so hungry I forgot that Lucas ate lunch with Hoffman every day.

“Not at all! There’s still plenty left. Let’s eat together.”

Acting nonchalant, I grinned and got up from my seat.

“Is that so? Then let’s go out to the plaza.”

Three days ago, I had been strolling along the East Coast beach during summer vacation when I opened my eyes to find myself here.

Strangely, the date was the same.

Today was July 24, 1900.

Unlike Korea’s summer, it wasn’t humid or swelteringly hot—it was a fantastic summer day.

‘At least this country has damn good weather.’

Hoffman and I walked to the plaza near the office.

According to my memories, their routine was to sit on a bench in the plaza, chat, and eat their lunch boxes.

I was scanning through memories when I stopped dead in my tracks.

Hoffman was already sitting on a bench, unpacking his lunch box.

In front of him.

About 50 meters from the bench, in the center of the plaza, stood a gallows lined with corpses.

How could I only remember this now?

Giggling laughter could be heard from here and there.

I could see couples out on dates, an old woman selling apples at a stall, boys having running contests, and girls picking leaves for house-playing games.

Everyone looked cheerful, paying no attention to the gallows.

They must have gotten too used to it.

‘These crazy…’

I suppressed the rising nausea and calmly sat down next to Hoffman.

“Enjoy your meal, Chief Clerk Hoffman.”

“Mm, yes. You eat well too.”

Hoffman really did look like he was enjoying himself as he began devouring meat skewers and pickled vegetables.

My appetite had seriously dropped, but I turned away from the gallows and slowly ate my sandwich.

But soon Hoffman pointed straight ahead, forcing me to look up.

“Oh my, that fellow there—I knew him. A young man, such a pity what happened to him. But he deserved it. Mm, he deserved it.”

He pointed to the leftmost man among the five corpses hanging in a row on the gallows.

With his pale complexion and tongue sticking out, just looking at him made me nauseous.

In contrast, Hoffman looked perfectly fine, so I forced a smile and played along.

“Really? What crime did he commit?”

Hoffman flinched slightly.

“Hehe, how could I say such things with my own mouth? If you’re really curious, go read it yourself.”

Speaking as if even imagining it was blasphemous, he pointed to a wooden sign hanging on the corpse’s chest. It was too far to see clearly, but something was written in red paint.

‘How would the original Lucas react when hearing something like this?’

I frowned slightly and turned the thought over in my head.

Normally, a sensible person wouldn’t even think of possession, but this was a world where magic actually existed. There was no guarantee they wouldn’t suspect something if I suddenly acted different.

I quickly finished thinking and put on an arrogant expression full of contempt. Just like that idiot Lucas.

“Ugh, I don’t want to because it’s disgusting.”

“Well, can’t be helped.”

Hoffman chuckled and brought his lips close to my ear, whispering quietly.

“Actually, that fellow was a gardener working at the Supreme Leader’s residence, and he dropped scissors on the Supreme Leader’s foot. My goodness, how blasphemous. He deserved to die.”

For a moment, my brow furrowed involuntarily.

‘Just for something like that… Ah, this country is seriously fucking awful.’

Schufaben was definitely a much more insane country than I had imagined.

But then Hoffman stared at me expressionlessly.

‘Ah!’

I quickly scowled even harder and got angry.

“Good grief! What an inexcusable grave sin. How dare he cause such trouble for the Supreme Leader!”

“Exactly.”

Only then did Hoffman laugh heartily and start eating his lunch box again.

I had already completely lost my appetite and didn’t want to eat the remaining sandwich anymore.

I just kept drinking coffee. I kindly gave the sandwich to the fat Hoffman, who was still wanting more even after finishing his entire lunch box.

“Mm, thank you. Mrs. Schmidt is your boarding house owner, right? She seems to have really good cooking skills.”

“Yes, that’s right.”

Hoffman, who had devoured the sandwich in an instant, got up from his seat.

“Well, I should go. Work hours are starting soon. But how’s that project going? The play for the 31st.”

“Pardon?”

A play? A play…

“Yes, of course! Please look forward to it.”

When I spoke with confidence, Hoffman burst into laughter.

“That’s our Redan for you!”

I gritted my teeth as I felt his thick hand pat my shoulder.

***

Schufaben is a cultural powerhouse.

It has produced many famous painters and musicians, and people visit theaters throughout the city to watch plays. The recently developing film industry was also quite popular.

However, these days the plays and movies being produced are all just propaganda.

My workplace is a small office under the city hall. In Korean terms, it would be like a district office.

The civil servants working here have the duty to supervise and manage the theaters in the area.

What plays would be staged was entirely up to the civil servants.

Sometimes the office would directly produce plays themselves, and this was exactly such a case.

“And Lucas had volunteered…”

I returned to the dim archive room after parting with Hoffman and muttered.

“Seriously not helpful at all.”

Crack!

A small creaking sound rang out.

The office periodically staged propaganda plays at nearby theaters a few times a month.

The play that had been performed until last month was considered too overused, so they decided to produce a new one, and that’s when Lucas stepped forward.

When Hoffman was decided as the chief supervisor, Lucas grabbed onto his pant leg and whined.

“Please absolutely let me handle this play! I’m begging you! I’ll make a more wonderful production than anyone!”

When Hoffman finally dumped all the actual work on him, he was incredibly happy.

The elation from that time was transmitted to me now, making my body tremble slightly.

Filled with confidence, Lucas had even bragged about it at the boarding house.

“I’m going to write the script and direct and do everything! Of course, officially my superior’s name will be on it! But anyway, this is my chance to spread the Supreme Leader’s virtue to the world!”

But when I coldly reflected on it with my experience of rolling around in the harsh industry…

‘It’s just dumping the grunt work on someone.’

Hoffman simply didn’t want to personally run around doing footwork.

That’s how trivial this job was. Just handling the practical work for a small-scale play that was put on ceremonially.

There wouldn’t be many people coming to watch, and even if it succeeded, there would be no honor.

I laughed at Lucas for voluntarily taking on work that required a lot of effort with little reward.

‘But I’m the one who has to do it.’

Since Lucas’s soul had gone somewhere, I had to finish this job.

“Hahaha, haha.”

An empty laugh burst out.

Seven days remaining.

Damn it, I really hate this.

For now, I calmly sat down and searched through my memories to see how far Lucas had gotten with the work.

Fortunately or unfortunately, all the planning was complete. It seemed the enthusiastic Lucas had worked through the night.

The script, music, and even stage equipment production were almost finished.

“All that’s left is casting the lead actors?”

The supporting actors were already under contract, and he had agonized endlessly over just the actors to play Kruger and his mother.

“Well, it’ll work out somehow.”

I decided to look into actors tomorrow.

***

6 PM.

Following the civil servant virtue of leaving work right on time, I returned to the boarding house, and as soon as I entered, a delicious smell wafted over.

“I’m back.”

“Welcome back, are you feeling better now?”

“Yes, thanks to your concern, I’m feeling a little bit better.”

I greeted Mrs. Schmidt and went up to my room.

As I remembered earlier, I opened the locked desk drawer and saw the script Lucas had written.

He had put it in what he considered the most secret place, claiming it was classified documents.

In the drawer was also a book so worn and tattered from reading that it was covered in fingerprints.

<Revolution> (by Friedrich Kruger).

The autobiography of that crazy dictator bastard.

Here, “revolution” didn’t refer to the republican revolution 30 years ago, but to the coup he staged 18 years ago. Shameless bastard.

While earning meager wages, Lucas seemed to have supported Supreme Leader Kruger even more due to his resentment about reality.

I sighed, pushed the book aside, and began reading the script. Anyway, to cast actors, I needed to review the detailed content.

The script was as disgusting as expected.

And better than I thought.

The writing in the thick notebook was extremely messy.

The handwriting itself was neat and pleasant to look at, but it was confusing with many corrections, deletions, and annotations throughout.

You could see at a glance how much Lucas had agonized and burned with passion through sleepless nights. I was somewhat surprised that the content was deeper than I had imagined.

Of course, it was all dictator glorification, so the more I read, the more nauseous I became, but there were definitely parts that touched people’s hearts.

The countless propaganda plays and movies in Lucas’s memory had illuminated Kruger after he had already seized power.

That made sense, since they had to show how excellent the Supreme Leader’s policies were and what a person of strong benevolence he was.

They would have expressed Kruger surrounded by the Supreme Leader’s dignity and radiance.

But Lucas’s script was different.

It was a story that started from Kruger’s childhood, went through his youth involved in the revolution, and ended at the moment he ascended to the position of Supreme Leader.

Unlike countless works that depicted the superhuman, flawless image of the Supreme Leader, this tried to appeal to the Supreme Leader’s human side.

Certainly, this bastard had outstanding talent for agitation.

“Crazy bastard, if you were born with such talent, you should use it for good things.”

I sighed and rolled around in my mouth the large letters written on the very first page of the script.

Revolution.

A title taken from Kruger’s autobiography.

For the first time, I felt pity and sympathy for Lucas, while this insanely spinning country became even more cursed to me.

To make such a talented young person go astray and pour passion into such strange places.

“Cough! Cough! Cough!”

The moment a fit of coughing burst out, all sympathy disappeared.

“Hey, Lucas? Are you okay?”

Someone knocked on the door from outside.