I Will Stage A Coup D’état - Chapter 1



Only Noblemtl

EP.1 I’m going to stage a coup (1)

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“Ha. My head is spinning.”

I was staring blankly at the monitor, but my fingers wouldn’t move at all.

I still had a lot of translation work to send in by tomorrow, but I couldn’t think of a suitable phrase.

Translation from a foreign language can easily become a failed task if the author’s intentions and subtle nuances are not preserved.

Last time, I got cursed at enough for it to kill me.

“Mr. Kim. Did you translate it while reading it? Yes?”

That’s why my confidence and motivation were both quite low.

Of course, as a professional who gets paid to work, I couldn’t delay my schedule using my condition as an excuse.

I felt like I was just putting cigarette butts in an ashtray, so I decided to surf the web for a bit.

Click click.

After a few mouse movements, a comic appeared in a familiar blue window.

When my head is spinning, I like to take my time by reading webtoons that provide intuitive information.

‘There have been a lot of new serials lately.’

If Japanese and American paper comics dominated the 20th century comics market, the 21st century was a time of webtoons.

As webtoons are huge, they contain works that cover a wide range of topics, satisfying the needs of diverse readers.

‘Is this… a new work? An alternative history of the Korean Empire?’

Today, I came in without thinking much, and a piece of work that looked quite interesting caught my eye.

It was a work depicting a world in which Korea had become an imperialist country.

The introduction, in which Korea, which had been acting like a great power, provokes a war that it cannot afford and meets the same fate as Japan, was exciting.

“He threw a lot of changeup balls at me for being a patriot.”

The fate of the surrounding countries changed according to the twisted settings, which was also exciting.

As I was watching an interesting piece of work, I found myself watching over 50 episodes before I knew it.

‘It’s already two o’clock?’

Come to think of it, I had so much work piling up that I felt like I was going crazy.

It’s a shame, but it wasn’t the time to spend time focusing on the work.

Clap clap.

‘Whew. Come to your senses, Seongjun.’

I rubbed my tired eyes and closed the web window.

The work went smoother than expected.

The phrase that I had been at a loss for how to express came out smoothly as if it had never happened.

It felt as if the god of inspiration had descended.

‘I wish it were like this all the time.’

After fourteen hours of frantic keyboard tapping, I finally got my work done.

“Team Leader Lee. Please check the manuscript.”

After I sent the organized manuscript to the editor’s email, I yawned.

If I think about it, it was normal for me to feel sleepy after not sleeping for almost two days.

Now there was no phone or anything.

As soon as I turned off the computer and laid down on the bed, a heavy weight came over me.

‘Let’s rest tomorrow and watch the drama we’ve been catching up on.’

And a sweet cup of coffee.

I couldn’t ask for anything more.

I buried my face in the pillow and slowly closed my eyelids.

*

“Your Majesty. Are you of sound mind? Your Majesty!”

Your Majesty? Your Majesty?

What kind of joke is this?

Your Excellency is a title given only to high-ranking officials, generals, and the president.

And these days, people call the president “Mr. President” instead of “Your Excellency.”

In such a post-authoritarian era, how can you call me a freeloader?

When I opened my eyes, a stranger I had never seen before was standing in front of me.

He looked to be in his early 30s, and his long beard was impressive.

By the way, who are you?

How did you get into my room?

Just as I was about to pour out my words.

‘Uh huh.’

I figured out who the man was and where I was.

The man was my assistant, and this was my official residence.

I brought up the man’s name to confirm the information that had come to my mind.

“Captain Kim Jeong-gil?”

“Yes, General.”

As soon as I thought about it, the right answer popped into my head.

As if there was a ‘memory’ in my head.

I asked Kim Jeong-gil, embarrassed.

“How did I fall down?”

“We found him suddenly collapsed while he was reading a newspaper in the official’s office, and brought him to bed.”

No way.

My last memory was of falling asleep in bed.

Wait a minute. Who am I now?

Suddenly my mind became confused.

“Mirror, bring me a mirror.”

Kim Jeong-gil brought a hand mirror from a nearby desk.

I took the mirror and was shocked.

It was definitely not my face.

But it was a familiar face in my memory.

‘My name is.’

When I tried to remember my name, two names came to mind.

Kim Seong-jun and Lee Seong-jun.

The former seemed to be the name of the Earth, and the latter seemed to be the name of this body.

Lee Seong-jun.

As I pondered the name, I felt it sounded somewhat familiar.

‘I’ve heard that somewhere.’

ah!

After thinking deeply for a while, an idea suddenly occurred to me.

‘Webtoon.’

The name Lee Seong-jun appears in a webtoon I read.

As a lead role, too.

Is this a coincidence?

But the first thing that caught my attention was the fact that the person named Lee Seong-jun was in the position of ‘Army Major General’.

I sat up from my seat.

I was feeling a little dizzy a little while ago, but now I’m fine.

“General, please lie down a little longer.”

“no.”

I was a little surprised when I responded to Kim Jeong-gil with a short answer.

When I asked for a mirror, I consciously used the command, but this time I said it without thinking.

But still, the tone of voice was overbearing.

It was as if I had become one with this body.

I opened the Korea Daily on my desk.

The front page of the newspaper had the date of publication written on it.

‘January 1, 1936 in the Western calendar?’

It was a sure thing.

This place was clearly the world in the webtoon I read, ‘The End of the Empire’.

All circumstantial evidence told me that my deduction was correct.

What the hell, does that make any sense?

What if a writer becomes possessed by the comic he was reading?

And that too with the most hellish worldview?

Ugh.

I let out a short groan and fell down.

“Your Majesty! Your Majesty!”

*

Once I was shocked, my receptive capacity increased significantly.

I accepted the fact that I was a character in a world that was going to be a mess.

But I couldn’t help but feel my hands and feet tremble and my heart sink.

Because the future of the Republic of Korea, or rather the Korean Empire, that I know was by no means rosy.

After the end of World War II, the Korean Empire suffered a fourth death following the atomic bombing, a tragedy worse than that of the Korean Peninsula.

It means becoming a great empire.

‘Fuck.’

I had no idea what to do with this.

‘Let’s start by organizing the information.’

I mustered up my limited memory and briefly summarized the current situation.

Lee Seong-jun is a major general in the Korean Empire Army and a member of the Korean Empire’s imperial family.

In the Korean military, where there is no rank of ‘brigadier general’, a major general is the lowest-ranking general, but a star is a star.

Moreover, this is Korea, an army country that is no different from Prussia.

It could be said that there were more things an army major general with royal status could do than things he could not do.

Status was a positive factor.

It’s true that a lord is better than a servant.

2. The current time is 1936.

It was a year before Korea started a war with China.

This part corresponds to the prologue in terms of the development of the webtoon’s content.

In other words, the main development of events in the webtoon was just beginning.

3. The Korean Empire’s diplomacy is in a state of X-scratching, like Germany’s eight-legged idiot.

Britain, a traditional ally, had turned into a potential enemy, and the great power across the Pacific, the United States, recognized the empire as its ‘main enemy.’

Here, there are border disputes with the Soviet Union and China.

However, this does not mean that relations with the remaining major countries are good.

Italy and France, as powers with vested interests in China, were uneasy about the Empire’s progress.

There is one country that is at least friendly, and that is Hitler’s Nazi Germany.

I can’t express it any other way than to say that diplomacy is a mess.

4. The empire attempted to disarm in the aftermath of the Great Depression, but a coup occurred and a military regime took power.

As a result, the economy is being turned around by paying back Hitler-style debts that were poured into military spending, as befitting a country whose brains have been eaten away by the military.

Unfortunately, if we stop the economy now and repay it, the economic structure of the empire, which is being reorganized based on a military economy, will collapse.

If we stop waging wars of aggression, we will collapse internally, and if we start a domino game starting with an invasion of China, we will open the way to self-destruction.

‘Is this my country…?’

The more I thought about it, the more astonishing it was.

If it were up to me, I would have wanted to go into exile somewhere in the US or South America.

But that was an impossible choice.

Considering that one of the imperial aristocrats who renounced his citizenship and immigrated to the United States was treated as a “traitor to the nation” and assassinated by an extreme nationalist, exile was a life-threatening act.

Even if there had been no nationalist threat, my position would have made it difficult.

If a high-ranking imperial general were to suddenly defect, would this militaristic Korean government just sit back and do nothing?

I will instigate the assassination.

Western society will also show contempt for me for abandoning my ‘duty’ as a leader in society, so I cannot blend in with them.

I didn’t have any real options to begin with.

We cannot seek asylum, and we cannot be dragged down the path to destruction of an empire that is rushing toward militarism.

So, I’m going to choose the answer that doesn’t seem to be there.

‘I will overthrow this country with my own hands.’

The answer I came to was ‘coup d’état’.