HRB 2

Name: Eddie.

Occupation: Owner of “Eddie’s Inn,” located in the central square of the capital.

The inn, with its remarkably uninspired name, was merely a fleeting location in the original work. It was described in a single line:

[Eddie’s Inn, located in the central square of the capital, was a quiet inn with meager income despite its prime location and cleanliness.]

The end.

Naturally, there was no description of the innkeeper, Eddie, nor any explanation as to why the inn’s income was so meager despite its prime location.

And Eddie, or rather, the man who used to be Lee Jeong-hoon, a convenience store owner, suddenly found himself possessing the body of that innkeeper, Eddie.

From a convenience store owner stuck in the corner of an apartment complex, he had been transferred to an innkeeper whose inn was well-located but somehow always empty.

Should he be happy about this, or sad?

“Well, I appreciate the second chance at life, but…”

Eddie muttered in a barely audible voice.

It took exactly two days for the former Lee Jeong-hoon, now Eddie, to adjust to this absurd possession. During that time, Eddie was holed up in his room, not even thinking about the original work.

What he primarily accepted was his own death.

Death.

Sometimes his friends would jokingly say, “You’re working too hard, you’ll die young.”

But he never thought he would actually die that way.

“Haa.”

Eddie sighed deeply. He remembered the last moment clearly. A burning pain digging into his stomach. No, it wasn’t even pain. It was just hot. A terrible sensation, so much so that he thought it was a blessing that he didn’t suffer for long and quickly passed away.

When he decided to become a convenience store owner in his twenties, his parents tried to dissuade him. He thumped his chest, promising his parents, who wanted him to become a civil servant for stability, that he would create his own store and succeed.

He made sure to pay his part-time workers the minimum wage and holiday pay, and in return, he worked even harder. On weekdays, he worked full-time during the day, excluding the night shift, and handled all the logistics and refrigeration himself.

He thought that once things were on track, he would expand the store and have more free time. He endured, thinking he should suffer while he was young.

“…”

Ha. A sigh of helplessness escaped him without him realizing it.

If he had known that everything would end so futilely, he would have listened to his parents and prepared for the civil service exam. If he had, he might not have lost his life so meaninglessly, and he might not have been possessed into this world.

“Ugh…”

Finally, the tears he had been holding back burst forth.

What should he do? His mom must be shocked and devastated. He hoped she wouldn’t be too sad.

The greatest act of filial impiety was to die before one’s parents, and he had gone and done it.

Eddie cried for a long time. For two days after the possession, he just kept shedding tears. He didn’t have time to marvel at being possessed into a fantasy world, nor did he have the leisure to look around and see what kind of world it was. He was just so sad about everything that he cried and cried.

And on the third day, he shook it off and got up.

Crying wouldn’t change anything. He had grieved enough, so it was time to move on, for that simple reason. Lee Jeong-hoon, or rather, Eddie, was too proactive and positive a person to be consumed by emotion.

“Eddie, are you alright?”

Gerold, the only employee of the inn, had perfectly managed the inn even while the owner was locked in his room, consumed by grief. Eddie smiled brightly at the loyal employee, who looked worried to death.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

He didn’t know what the original Eddie was like. It seemed this possession had no benefits, as it didn’t even pass on the memories that the original Eddie had.

He only learned Gerold’s name when Gerold said, “Eddie, are you still hungover? It’s me, Gerold,” when Eddie seemed not to recognize him on the first day.

He should be grateful that he got a language patch and was possessed into a handsome and physically fit body.

Even though his role in the original work was practically nonexistent.

“Sorry for making you work alone, Gerold.”

Eddie said cheerfully. Gerold shook his head.

“It’s nothing. It’s not like you ever helped before.”

There wasn’t a hint of resentment towards Eddie in his voice. It was as if it was only natural.

“…”

Eddie pursed his lips, afraid of looking suspicious. He felt strangely wronged. He used to be a diligent store owner who took care of all sorts of odd jobs.

In any case, since the person he possessed was an innkeeper, he ended up in self-employment again in this life.

In his previous life, he had thought, “I’ll definitely succeed and become a store owner who runs multiple businesses!” But in this life, his mindset was, “I’ll just own a clean, well-located inn and make enough to get by.” There was a big difference.

“You’ll die young?”

As his friends had often joked, he seemed to have really died young from working too hard.

He didn’t want to die young again, so his goal in life became “long and thin.”

However, that resolution became somewhat blurred as he checked the books of Eddie’s Inn.

“Gerold?”

“Yes?”

“Is this really our inn’s monthly income?”

Gerold glanced at the ledger Eddie was looking at. Unfortunately, the ledger, which was automatically recorded by Sorcery, couldn’t be manipulated.

“Yes.”

“…”

Good heavens.

What was this tiny, insignificant income? Even if a squirrel sold the acorns it had collected, it would make more than this!

Of course, that was a bit of an exaggeration, but the income was far too shabby compared to the location.

Moreover, even though the first floor was clearly a restaurant and bar, most of the income came from the inn guests who stayed overnight, and the restaurant and bar practically had no income.

No wonder the first floor, which operated as a restaurant during the day, was always empty.

“The menu!”

Eddie shouted urgently, and Gerold quickly brought him the menu.

The menu at Eddie’s Inn was just a single sheet.

It was supposed to be a restaurant and a bar, but the menu was so thin that Eddie was a little embarrassed.

[Menu]

French Fries

Fried Fish

Fruit Platter

[Drinks]

Beer

“…”

That was it. The menu, without any pictures or descriptions, was practically telling customers, “There’s nothing you’re looking for here, so get out.”

It was a menu that shattered the natural structure of this fantasy world, where restaurant customers became bar customers, and bar customers became inn guests.

Eddie’s Inn had the fraudulent advantage of being in a good location, but it wasn’t like there were no other inns nearby, and that alone wasn’t enough to make it competitive as a restaurant and bar compared to other inns.

So that’s why he could only earn this much with such good conditions.

Had the Eddie he possessed not noticed any problems with this inn? How could he have neglected this?

“…Haa.”

Eddie fell into thought. How should he overcome this?

Gerold was an all-rounder who was good at everything from cooking to cleaning, but it seemed like he would need to think long and hard about what menus to add and what key business items to focus on for the inn to make a fresh start.

“I need to promote it too… Augh.”

The fact that he didn’t have the memories of the Eddie he possessed, so he didn’t know what the tastes of the empire’s people were or what they liked, was also contributing to Eddie’s worries.

He needed to know what they liked to prepare.

Or should he develop and introduce a menu that didn’t exist in this world at all? If so, what should he put out that people would like?

It was exactly a week after Eddie’s possession, and five days after Eddie started worrying about his business, that Gerold, who had been quietly watching Eddie staring at the menu for days, brought up the story for the first time.

That day, too, Eddie had brought out the shabby menu and a sheet of parchment and was lost in thought for a long time, wondering what menu to add and how to promote it.

It was a matter of his second life, so he couldn’t help but be cautious. Even though he couldn’t come up with an answer, he was still holding on to the menu and groaning.

“By the way, Eddie.”

“…Huh?”

“About that basement I mentioned before.”

Basement?

He didn’t know what he was talking about, but Eddie, a possessor who hadn’t received the memory benefits, pretended to know.

“Oh, that basement. What about it?”

“The door still won’t open. Even my Sorcery can’t budge it. You said you’d check it out last time, didn’t you?”

It was the first time Eddie had heard that there was a basement in his inn. No, in the first place, there was only one line of description about this inn in the original work, so all the information was unfamiliar.

Even that was only because he was the type of reader who considered missing a single letter a sin, so he remembered it. If someone had read it casually, they probably wouldn’t even remember it.

A basement, if Sorcery couldn’t open it, what would change if he went? But if he had said he would check it out in the past, there must have been a reason, so it seemed better to go and see.

“But Gerold.”

Eddie opened his mouth without realizing it and was about to ask Gerold something, but he soon closed his mouth. Seeing Gerold looking at him with a puzzled expression, Eddie awkwardly smiled and mumbled.

“…It’s nothing.”

There are two ways to make people angry, and one of them is to stop talking in the middle of a sentence… However, even in such a frustrating situation, the loyal Gerold didn’t scold Eddie for stopping in the middle of his sentence. He was always such a loyal employee.

…But, no matter how he thought about it, it was strange.

What Eddie was about to ask Gerold just now was, “But Gerold, how do you use Sorcery?” He was afraid of looking suspicious if he didn’t know, so he tried to ask but stopped.

In this world of 〈The Hero Doesn’t Hide His Too Well〉, Sorcerers were very rare.

Not only did they have to be born with an affinity for Mana, but even if they were born with that ability, Sorcery was the exclusive property of the nobility, so commoners usually didn’t even get the chance to learn it.

Even Wizard Boram, one of the Hero’s party, was born with talent, but wasn’t she a hero from a noble family?

But Gerold, who was just an employee of this insignificant Eddie’s Inn, could use Sorcery?

He didn’t know the extent of his abilities, but in a world where just being able to use Sorcery made him a valuable asset, it was strange that Gerold, a lower-class person working at an inn, could use Sorcery.

“Hmm.”

Well, he could find out about that slowly. Haste makes waste. Especially for someone who had been possessed with nothing like him.

Eddie decided to go to the basement that Gerold had mentioned first. It wasn’t like he would come up with any clues about the menu just by holding on to it, so he could also change his mood.

Usually, the basement of such a building would be used as a basement storage or a wine cellar, but Eddie had already given up on expecting anything from this damn inn, so he didn’t expect a fancy wine cellar or a warehouse full of plausible items.

He descended to the basement with only the humble hope that the locked door would simply open.

And Eddie, having descended into the basement via the stairs, was confronted with an entrance that was wide open, or rather, had no door at all, contrary to Gerold’s statement that ‘the door wouldn’t open.’

Moreover, it was illuminated by an incredibly intense light, the likes of which he had never seen since being possessed into this world.

“…Huh?”

The lighting in this world consisted of either candles or Magic Lanterns created with Sorcery. Even expensive Magic Lanterns couldn’t produce such intense light, so something was amiss.

The illumination was so intense that the otherwise dark basement stairs were quite bright, bathed in indirect light.

Eddie, startled for a moment, slowly began to descend into the basement. What unfolded before Eddie’s eyes as he made his way down the old, creaking stairs was a sight he could never have imagined.

“…”

What is this?

Eddie rubbed his eyes once. But even so, the scene before him did not disappear.

Intense and bright lighting that did not belong in this world. The music he always played wasn’t on, but the neat and quiet interior was subtly filled with the sounds of refrigerators and freezers running, and displays packed full of goods without a single empty space caught his eye.

This was a space all too familiar to Eddie.

More precisely, to Lee Jeong-hoon, the convenience store owner.

“…Why is my convenience store here?”

Exactly as he said.

Eddie’s own humble convenience store, which he had tried so hard to keep clean throughout his life, was sitting squarely in the basement of Eddie’s inn.