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  Under the gentle autumn sun, in a secluded corner of a small village, on the eastern side, there stood an old wooden cabin surrounded by two hectares of land shaped like an inverted “L.” The land was completely filled with crops, but there was only one kind planted across that vast field. Pumpkins. Round, large, and intensely orange.

  In the middle of those fields, almost hidden among the trees, a somewhat skinny young man with no athletic build moved his large, old scythe, cutting the stems that connected the pumpkins to the vines. Every movement was precise and almost mechanical; each swing made the blade whistle sharply as it sliced through the air. He moved between the pumpkins not like a farmer, but like an executioner cutting off heads.

  Shiing!

  Shiing!

  The young pumpkin executioner paused for a moment. His lips twitched in irritation as he muttered to himself.

  “It’s not the same…” His grip on the scythe tightened as he thought.

  “It’s very different,” he sighed. “How I wish I could experience it again…” he said with a gloomy yet nostalgic look in his eyes.

  But his thoughts were interrupted by an annoying sound, one that made his lips twitch again as he turned toward its source. His eyes were black like an abyss, yet within that abyss there was a small orange glimmer—the only light in those dark, hollow eyes. Both eyes fixed on the small nuisance.

  “Crazy!” shrieked a boy leaning over the wooden fence that surrounded the crops. The boy sat on top of the fence while shouting toward the young pumpkin executioner.

  “Sing, crazy! Sing!” he yelled as if speaking to his personal jester.

  But the annoying boy was not alone. Two other children stood beside him. A sweet blonde girl played with a cloth doll, moving it along the wooden fence as if it could walk. The other boy had an indifferent, almost cold gaze—the typical look of a child trying to seem mature in front of others. He wasn’t watching Jack’s actions nor paying attention to his brother’s shouting; instead, he leaned against the fence with his back to the pumpkin field.

  “Terry, you have to listen to this crazy guy’s songs. They don’t make sense, but his voice is really good. What do you think, Phoebe?”

  “Yes, Jack sings very well,” Phoebe replied with a bright smile that could make anyone’s heart tremble at the cuteness of her face. “Though, Tomy, you shouldn’t tease him so much. He might get ang—”

  “Terry! Terry, what do you think?” Interrupting Phoebe, the younger boy insisted on his older brother’s approval. He moved his hands and tried to shake his brother’s shoulder, hoping to get his attention.

  “Why are we here? We should be with Dad helping with the crops, not here listening to this crazy guy sing,” Terry grumbled with his arms crossed.

  “Come on, Terry, it’s fun. He has a good voice. It’s just a shame he’s crazy. If only he sang something that made sense…” The boy looked back toward the pumpkin field. “Huh? Where did he go?”

  Tomy’s eyes darted from side to side, unable to find the crazy singer. He was nowhere in sight. Only his scythe remained, stuck upright in the soil.

  “Phoebe, did you see where the crazy guy went?” Tomy asked while scanning the field. The only things he saw were the three scarecrows placed among the pumpkins.

  One was too far away to see clearly, but the other two were within sight. Both were ugly, yet the one standing at the corner of the field was the worst. It looked as if it were about to fall, yet it didn’t—almost as if some supernatural force was holding it upright. Its terrifying gaze seemed fixed on him. Maybe he hadn’t noticed before, but it felt as though it had been watching him for quite some time.

  Tomy’s heart began to pound nervously.

  “Crazy! Where are you, crazy?!” Tomy shouted.

  Clouds covered the intense autumn sun. Everything seemed to turn gray for a moment. The shadows deepened, and Tomy’s breathing grew faster. Terry, beside him, also felt uneasy.

  Tomy looked around with growing urgency. The shadows stretched longer, and the distant scarecrow’s gaze seemed more real each time the darkness deepened.

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  Tomy took a deep breath and shouted again.

  “Crazy, that’s enough!” He let out a nervous laugh while glancing around, but there was no answer—only a chilling silence.

  Tomy looked back at Phoebe, who stared forward with a gentle smile on her face, as if none of this bothered her.

  Tomy trembled slightly, and when he turned forward again, a terrifying cloth figure was staring right at him.

  “Boo,” said the young farmer dressed in rags.

  “Ah!” Tomy screamed, falling backward and hitting the ground. But the terror in his heart did not end there. Without wasting a second, he ran off with tears in his eyes, screaming at the top of his lungs, “Mom!”

  Terry also jumped in fright at the simple sound made by the farmer. He ran even faster than his brother, forgetting about him entirely and leaving him behind.

  Both boys ran in terror. Tomy’s screams echoed in the distance as they disappeared from sight. Neither of them noticed who they had left behind.

  “Hello, Jack,” the young girl greeted him, her eyes smiling as if nothing in the world could scare her.

  “Phoebe, it’s good to see you well,” Jack said as he leaned casually against the fence. A wide smile spread across his face as he brushed the sweat-soaked hair away from his forehead.

  “Likewise. Would you like me to ask my mother to prepare the usual?” Phoebe asked.

  “Yes, please,” he replied. “Potato stew with meat. No pumpkin and no pumpkin seasoning. No pumpkin at all.” He emphasized the last sentence strongly.

  “All right! See you later! Take care, Mr. O’Lantern!” she replied, heading back without the slightest fear that anything might happen to her.

  Jack watched her until she disappeared from view.

  Then he let out a laugh and shook his head.

  “Those little devils are a bad influence on that girl.”

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  Jack’s smile was extremely bright; his amusement at the small scare he had given the poor boys was obvious. His gaze drifted toward the road, but as he looked into the distance, that bright smile slowly faded.

  Jack let out a sigh as he looked at the pumpkins he disliked so much.

  ‘It’s already been five years… that’s quite a long time.’ The shadows beneath his eyes deepened as memories of his life surfaced.

  Before living in this medieval world, he had lived in the modern world. What now seemed like magic had once been reality. Screens full of light capable of illuminating even the skies themselves. Instant communication with people on the other side of the world. Vibrant music capable of changing your mood—and best of all, being able to listen to that music anytime.

  “And one day you left~ Without saying goodbye~” Jack hummed as he kept working.

  Even with so many wonderful things in the modern era, what he enjoyed most—besides music—were video games. For him, and for all those who had experienced that beautiful art, video games were not just games. They were a way to escape the world. Not fleeting entertainment like the playground games of childhood.

  “Now~ I don’t matter to you, you don’t miss me~”

  Video games were a way to forget stress, to experience emotions, to live stories and adventures that could never be lived in real life.

  But even within that beautiful art form, there were games lacking their most essential element: entertainment.

  Still, Jack had tried more than once to play games that lacked the true essence of video games.

  The greatest example was the game that changed his life—the one that condemned him to live in this ancient world, stripped of everything he once enjoyed.

  “I didn’t know what I was losing~ And I punish myself every day~ For not having you~”

  — Whispers of a Village — Developed by B.W.

  A supposed horror game that was also meant to be fun, with 2D pixel art graphics. From day one, it was released as a so-called version 1.0—that is, supposedly complete. But as the first person to buy and finish it, Jack could confidently say it was not a game worthy of being called 1.0.

  The game wasn’t just amateur—it was unfinished in its mechanics.

  You were supposed to play as a mischievous boy pulling pranks in the village. Instead, all you could do was eavesdrop on the townsfolk. Jack believed the rumors would serve as clues to discover how to scare them properly—but they were nothing more than gossip.

  Although the game had a farming mechanic—which might have been the only fun part, along with the gossip—it was disappointing to never actually pull a prank or create a scare. Jack had many ideas, but he could never carry them out in the game.

  In the end, when the game finally had an event—the only event in the entire game, “Halloween Night,” a unique festival in the village that attracted visitors from many places—Jack participated. But while running through the pumpkin field, the protagonist tripped and died. In the blink of an eye, Jack appeared here, with memories of a life he had never lived, a new body similar to his own, new parents, and a new home. It was instantaneous. There were many mysteries about how he arrived. He didn’t know whether he had died at some point or made some divine deal to transmigrate.

  Strange and uncomfortable, he didn’t receive a golden finger on his first day—nor in the five years that followed. But he didn’t need one. He adapted to his new life and enjoyed it. He formed bonds with his new parents, his neighbors, and the village. In this normal world, he didn’t need a golden finger…

  “So tired…” Jack muttered as he looked at the pumpkins piled onto a handcart.

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  Autor note: The warning says that I use an AI assistant, just to clarify and so that no one worries. I only use it to translate the chapters.

  I know English, but I'm not yet at the level to write something as complex as a novel, but I'm still practicing. I hope that in the next few chapters I can remove the label and write it myself. Even so, I will try to translate several excerpts from the novel without help (otherwise I will never improve). I hope you like this first chapter.