Chapter 2: The Brain Washer is too kind(2)
I am a brainwasher. A deceiver who twists and controls minds. With this vile power…
[Brainwashing Activated]
[Target: Mom]
[Command: Don’t hit your children]
I stopped my stepmother’s child abuse. Such magic doesn’t exist on Earth. This is another world—a game turned reality. It’s why I, who would’ve died from domestic violence, survived.
“You ruined my life!” my stepmother snarled, drowning her rage in alcohol. The abuser became a drunkard, redirecting her unvented fury to her liver since she couldn’t harm her children.
The protagonist had every reason to run away.
The game’s protagonist, , controlled by the player, is forgotten by all. A brainwasher abandons family, shedding their old name for a new to start anew. The drunken mother is just a test for brainwashing, not a parent to rely on.
[Command: Live with guilt for abusing your children.]
Some players punished her with brainwashing.
[Command: I am your husband.]
Others, driven by lust, used it to violate her.
As a player, before being isekai’d, I didn’t care much. I skipped the tedious prologue like a cutscene, eager to move on.
[Command: Forget your children.]
I used this often. Even for a throwaway prologue parent, I didn’t want to cause pain. So, I granted her wish to live as if her life wasn’t ruined by kids. But no matter the brainwashing, the tutorial’s abuser meets the same end.
- “Want to join the adventurer’s guild as staff?”
- “Your face is perfect for charming women. Work as our clerk.”
- “Kid, wanna talk to pretty ladies and earn money?”
Not an adventurer, but a guild clerk. A charming shota, hired instantly to woo women.
Title: Run an Adventurer’s Guild
Genre:育成, Management, Revenge, Politics
But Ian’s mother—ex-abuser, now drunkard—doesn’t see this life. The day the protagonist joins the guild, the main story begins, and she dies at the hands of local thugs.
Quest Objective: Eliminate the thugs who killed Mom.
Quest Guide: Train capable adventurers to take on assassination contracts.
The first enemy to brainwash and eliminate: a thug with powerful backers, untouchable to ordinary adventurers. You train and, if needed, brainwash adventurers to cooperate. Mom’s role is to be sacrificed for the story’s start—her only purpose.
“Waaa, big brother!”
The little sister? Good players send her to a nun’s orphanage, unable to afford her upkeep. Cruel ones sell her or worse.
Either way, she follows Mom’s fate.
As the story progresses, she dies—killed by the thugs’ backers to warn adventurers against crossing them.
Quest Objective: Avenge your sister.
Quest Guide: Recruit strong adventurers or train many to destroy the organization.
That’s family in this game. I don’t know if it’s better or worse than my real-world family.
Maybe reality was worse.
In reality, I lost my parents. A lease scam bankrupted my newlywed parents. Dad, after the divorce, paid child support briefly before joining a gate conquest team to “start anew,” escaping debts to another dimension. Mom, offered survival by a factory boss in exchange for her body, despaired and took her life. Orphaned, I was scammed by a friend from the orphanage, losing everything. The woman I thought I’d marry swindled me too. Beyond money, losing those bonds—parents, friends, lover—hurt most. No sister, unlike Ian. Is that better? One person suffering this hell is enough.
Maybe dying early is kinder.
Living longer just shows more ugliness. Without money, hearts break. I didn’t want to see bankruptcy of spirit. People lose kindness and margin, changing for the worse. A game’s no different.
But this isn’t a game anymore.
A guild clerk, a brainwasher toying with minds, a shota with impure player desires. That’s the protagonist, but not the life I wanted.
I’m done running.
Dad fled to another world. Mom to the afterlife. Friends to greed. My lover to stability. They chose happiness over others, hurting me. I hid in my room, gaming, brainwashing to betray before being betrayed. I cleared the hardest ending, only to be isekai’d.
I fled into the game.
I know how to play efficiently. Abandon Mom and sister, and the future’s bright. But now, in this real game world, Mom’s face haunts me. My sister’s cries echo.
How’s that different from Dad abandoning us? Mom abandoning her kids? My friend or ex betraying me?
So, I decided.
“Kid, wanna talk to pretty ladies and earn money? Work hard, and you’ll trade rags for fine clothes, move from slums to a safe city center,” the recruiter said.
Time to take your first step in adventurer育成.
Join the adventurer’s guild as staff and achieve your first success.
Reward: Enhanced Brainwashing Ability
A golden chance to boost my weak brainwashing. An easy tutorial showering newbies with rewards. A fine city life, thriving as a guild clerk—the game’s purpose, what its creator, god or devil, intended.
“Sorry,” I said.
I gave it all up. No, I chose something more precious.
“Think again. Opportunities like this are rare,” the recruiter pressed.
“I have a mother and sister to care for.”
“Earn big, and they’ll be happy too, right?”
Work for you, and Mom dies day one. Success piles up, and my sister dies too. Knowing that, how could I?
I’m done running.
Living as a brainwasher, betraying first, wouldn’t erase the emptiness within. That’s not the life I want. A prosperous life means nothing without family to share it.
The world betrayed me. I dreamed of family reunions despite our collapse, of success with my friend despite society’s harshness, of a cozy future with my lover despite her callousness. I always dreamed of a happy life with loved ones. Now, a way to make it real appeared.
[Brainwashing Ability]
[Basic: This ability twists and controls minds.]
I have a choice. Don’t join the guild, and Mom lives. Brainwash her, and she’s not an abuser or drunkard but an ideal mother.
Change. Just you.
[Brainwashing Activated]
[Target: Mom]
[Command: You cherish your children above all.]
Brainwashing isn’t guaranteed. The less desired, the lower the success rate. Strong minds resist. If she truly hates her kids, forgetting them would take easily, but this command wouldn’t. Yet, time is long. Without starting the tutorial, we have plenty to spend together.
“You cherish your children above all.”
Unlike the game, no success notification appears. No success or failure rates. No certainty it’ll work. But I won’t stop. Fail today, try tomorrow. Fail tomorrow, try the next day. Three days, a week, a month, a year—unlike reality, I can seize this chance.
“You cherish your children above all.”
“You cherish your children above all.”
“You cherish your children above all.”
Each day’s start and end, I repeat it like a mantra.
I am a brainwasher. A deceiver twisting minds. With this vile power…
Like a rain dance praying endlessly for rain, I began a brainwashing ritual, repeating until it succeeds.