Chapter 1

Heathrow Airport Terminal 2, Gate 36 felt like the prosecutor’s interrogation room that had made me tremble last year.

The cold glare of the fluorescent lights, even the expressionless face of the person sitting across the table.

Fear of a different kind—the lingering worry that something might be wrong even though I had done nothing—crept up on me in this completely unfamiliar space.

“What is the purpose of your visit to the UK?”

I swallowed down my fear and spoke carefully, word by word.

Just like I had in the interrogation room, using sheer willpower to steady my trembling voice.

“…Harry Potter?”

“Oh!”

When I pointed to the scarf mixed with red and gold, a smile bloomed on the immigration officer’s face, who looked remarkably like the Sorting Hat assigning school dormitories.

“Gryffindor! You may go through.”

“…Thank you.”

Just like that, the face-to-face immigration check ended almost anticlimactically. Both hands were soaked in cold sweat—proof that I had conquered my fear, yet at the same time carrying a mixture of triumph and shame, as if they were evidence that I had needed to be afraid despite doing nothing wrong.

Feeling a bit unfairly treated, I asked on my way out, and they told me it was simply a recognition error with the passport chip.

“It happens sometimes. Have a wonderful trip! Bye-bye!”

With that, they even waved goodbye with a bright smile.

‘I really stressed myself out for nothing.’

To think I had gone through face-to-face screening instead of the automated gates that everyone else used smoothly, all while dredging up bad memories. A hollow chuckle escaped me.

‘I didn’t do anything wrong, yet I was shaking in my boots for no reason…’

Now that I thought about it, it was frustrating.

Why did I have to cower when I hadn’t done anything wrong?

Was the company really that displeased just because I pointed out that such an accident must never happen again?

Sigh.

It was pathetic of me to come all the way to England only to dwell on things from back then.

‘And yet I came all this way to the UK…’

I shook my head.

Right. Why on earth did I get on a plane and come here?

I needed to forget everything that happened last year and focus on the trip right now.

“Let’s go!”

Platform 3/4 at King’s Cross Station, which I had seen in my stained guidebook, was already flickering before my eyes.

Ordinary.

If I had to summarize my life in two words, that would be it.

A harmonious family, an education without shortcomings, one dog, and even a cat.

I could introduce myself to anyone by saying, “Ah, my family is just totally normal.”

Ah, if there was one notable thing, it was that I had blown the whistle on my own company.

But there was a good reason for that.

No… It didn’t make any sense to run a production line at a food manufacturing plant while turning off the interlock, which was the safety device for the mixing machine, right?

Right after a major accident occurred, I reported to the media that the company had intentionally ordered the interlock to be turned off and tried to cover it up when the incident happened. In response, the company hit back with a lawsuit alleging the infringement of trade secrets.

I spent nearly a year darting in and out of prosecutors’ offices and courts.

I was acquitted, and conversely, the company nearly disintegrated, but the court ruling didn’t magically set my life back to the way it was. My body and mind were exhausted, and the pointing fingers of my colleagues followed me wherever I went.

Kim Ah-young is a traitor. Kim Ah-young is a backstabber.

I had become someone a little too far removed from the word “ordinary.”

“…Isn’t that being brave rather than ordinary?”

“Pardon?”

“Whistleblowing isn’t an easy thing to do at all, you know.”

Across the bar, the pub owner gave me a thumbs-up, cleared away my completely empty beer glass, and handed me a fresh one.

Logs were burning in the fireplace. The flames flickered and died down repeatedly, making snapping, crackling, and popping sounds. For some reason, in front of the hearth, I wanted to honestly spill words I had never once opened up about under the fluorescent lights.

“…Brave, sure. Or foolish, depending on how you look at it. Especially in our country.”

“Well, whistleblowers aren’t treated well in most places. That’s why people can’t hold out, too. But seeing you, I think I understand how you managed to pull through.”

He shrugged as he looked at the two Guinness glasses in front of me, then pulled out a rag from behind the bar and wiped down the glasses.

“Still, Britain is a developed country, right? A place where whistleblowers can walk around with their heads held high.”

At my words, the pub owner burst into a hearty laugh.

“A developed country, you say… People in the world call Britain a developed country. But being a developed country doesn’t mean everything is perfect.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just look at this very pub, the Anchor Tap, which has been in business since the Victorian era. It was divided into several rooms—gaming rooms, dining rooms… do you know why?”

“Weren’t they just built that way from the beginning?”

“That’s right. They were built that way from the start. And why is that, you ask? Because the rooms were separated so that people could use them according to their social class.”

That explanation sobered me up a little and sparked my curiosity.

“People drank in different rooms depending on their social class?”

“Indeed. Right from the beginning, to ensure different social strata didn’t mix, they separated the spaces with names like public bar, saloon, and lounge, and even made separate entrances.”

A pub with different entrances depending on your social standing?

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“Ta-da, it was entirely legal back in the Victorian era when this pub was first established!”

Hearing that, it felt a bit absurd.

If someone tried that in 21st-century South Korea, they’d probably be dragged through the mud on public shaming right away.

With that, the pub owner noticed my empty glass and offered me another pint of Guinness.

“Do you know how much heartache is packed into this single glass of Guinness?”

“I only know it’s made in Ireland.”

“Ireland! Exactly. Over the past few centuries, our country of Britain treated Ireland as a colony and did things too terrible to even put into words. You’ve heard of the Great Famine of Ireland, haven’t you?”

It felt like I had heard of it before. The story of millions starving to death because there was nothing to eat.

“That’s not all. What about the wars launched against China to sell opium? Thanks to doing those kinds of things in the past and hoarding lots of gold and silver for the nation, Britain is still doing well today.”

Then, letting out a short sigh as if he felt a tinge of regret, he continued.

“Sometimes I think like this. Wasn’t there ever a chance to right the many wrongdoings Britain committed in the past?”

A chance to set things right.

At those words, my voice spoke up before I could stop it.

“…If people with a conscience had raised their voices louder, maybe things would have been better.”

“Pardon?”

“If more whistleblowers had spoken up… maybe I wouldn’t have had to hand in my resignation. Conversely, if people with a conscience in Britain had banded together back then and raised their voices… wouldn’t a lot of things have changed?”

It was my honest sentiment.

I didn’t think fighting against injustice required extraordinary courage.

You just needed that exact amount of courage: stepping forward first when others were afraid, opening your mouth, and letting people know about the unfairness.

“Conscience and justice. Of course, you can’t strictly define what conscience is and what justice is, but at least things like this shouldn’t be done…. If perceptions like that had spread through society, if people who knew about them had stepped up to society to inform others, I mean.”

“Hmm…”

After listening in silence for a long time, the pub owner let out a soft murmur and stood up.

“Come to think of it, Ah-young, you said you majored in political science and diplomacy, didn’t you? If you wanted to make that kind of awareness spread back in the Victorian era, how would you have gone about it?”

“Who knows? In a politician’s perspective, I haven’t actually lived through that era myself, but…. Well, if it was someone like the Queen, could she have somehow pulled it off?”

I almost chuckled, trying to mix in a few geopolitical terms from a class I had taken back in college—memories that already felt hazy. What was a mere office worker—no, I wasn’t even an office worker anymore—a political science major turned unemployed freeloader, thinking they were doing?

Suddenly, the face of the pub owner, who had been listening to me, brightened up radiantly.

“Her Majesty the Queen! Ah, yes! That might just be possible!”

Watching him smile like a young child, a sense of bewilderment washed over me.

Was there really any need to go this far with joy over mere hypothetical “what-ifs”…?

Just as that doubt arose, the pub owner looked at me with sorrowful eyes.

“…Ah-young! Please protect the conscience of Britain. If conscience disappears, everyone will perish. Do not run away. Do not compromise, and do not give up. Good luck.”

Pardon?

I wanted to ask, “What do you mean by wishing me good luck?”, but at that exact moment, my head spun and everything in front of my eyes started whirling around like a tornado.

Ah… landing at Heathrow, heading straight to King’s Cross Station, stopping by Baker Street 221B… did I live my life a bit too intensely?

The alcohol buzz combined with the warmth of the fireplace.

For a second, my vision went completely black… before I hastily forced my eyes open.

‘…?’

A canopy embroidered with golden patterns shimmered in the reflection of the moonlight.

Was this velvet? And why did the texture against my fingertips feel so soft?

Where… on earth am I?

A faint scent of perfume lingering in the room, a slightly fishy taste in the air, the humid air of a summer night drifting through the cracked window, and the sound of the wind.

‘Ugh, it’s so muggy. Do they not even run a dehumidifier here?’

Sitting up on the bed and turning my head, I saw the room was packed with antique furniture.

When I stretched out my hands and feet, thankfully my body parts were still attached, so I got straight up and approached the mirror gleaming softly under the moonlight.

The sound of a thin dressing gown rustling and dragging across the floor felt unusually loud.

Standing inside the mirror was a young girl with an unblossomed face.

Blue eyes and delicate, dainty facial features.

…Excuse me, who are you?

The “me” who was supposed to be in the mirror had vanished without a trace, and a deer-like foreigner was staring back from the glass.

No way.

This can’t be.

Seriously… that girl is me?

‘Water.’

“Wota.”

The moment I thought of water, British-accented English automatically popped out of my mouth.

‘Status window.’

“Staa… tus… windoh?”

Ah, right.

Of course things like that wouldn’t work.

I was a fool for even expecting it.

Finding it completely unbelievable, I stretched out my hands in front of the mirror, made bizarre facial expressions, and even tried dancing.

I reached a conclusion.

She was me, and I was her.

“Ha….”

I had a drink at a London pub and became a British person?

This wasn’t even some cliché web novel plot about getting hit by a truck of reincarnation and turning into a romance-fantasy duke’s daughter.

Besides, didn’t things like that only happen in fiction?

“Why on earth is this happening to me?!”

I shouted out, but nothing changed.

Just then, a neatly folded scrap of paper slipped out from my sleeve and dropped softly onto the floor.

What on earth is that?

Bending down at the waist, I picked up the scrap of paper and unfolded it.

[This lucky letter was written for a traveler who has fallen into the Victorian era. The passion and conviction you showed last night at our Anchor Tap made my frozen heart start beating again.]

…What? What kind of letter is this?

[Ah-young, do you think we can make a world where conscience and justice live and breathe, just like you said? I dare to hope that our Britain becomes such a country. So please travel to the Victorian era, make Britain a nation where conscience and justice breathe, and turn it into a great country where universal moral values are realized. I’m sure someone like you can pull it off just fine!]

Conscience and justice… along with moral values… what is this nonsense?

As I read further down the note, something else was scribbled in small handwriting at the bottom.

[P.S. I’m sending Queen Victoria’s lifelong personal diary along with this, so I hope it helps. (You can only open it once a day for 30 minutes!)]

“What kind of utter bullshit is this…?”

So right now… they want me to become Queen Victoria and turn the British Empire into a country where conscience and justice breathe? And if I can’t do it, I can’t return to my original world… isn’t that just telling me to die right here?

Did I say something earlier about getting hit by a reincarnation truck and becoming a romance-fantasy noble lady?

…Maybe that would’ve been better after all.

I could have just muddled through with some so-called Northern Grand Duke while selling soap and gunpowder to live comfortably.

Yet here I was in the 19th-century Victorian era.

In a place where justice and conscience couldn’t be found anywhere, I had to become Queen Victoria and turn Britain into a conscientious country?!

“Is this difficulty level for real…?”

Guarding a treacherous mountain gorge wouldn’t be harder than this.

Ah, come to think of it, didn’t they say they were giving me something at the end?

“A-a diary?”

At that moment, a book bound in sheepskin cover dropped right off the bookshelf next to me and landed on the floor with a thud.

A diary that falls on its own the moment you speak of it, like calling out a tiger?

“…Who knows? There might be some sort of tutorial guide inside.”

No matter how notoriously difficult a game was, it was common sense to give the player a basic tutorial at the start so they could get the hang of things.

Right.

Surely nobody would hand someone a rusty dagger right off the bat and tell them to go fight a boss monster.

With that thought, I opened the first page of the fallen diary.

[June 20, 1837, early morning.]

[I was awakened at 6 AM by my mother, who told me that the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Conyngham, were here and wished to see me. I got out of bed and entered the sitting room. Lord Conyngham then informed me that my poor uncle, the King, was no longer in this world, having passed away at 2:12 AM this morning, and that as a result, I had become Queen…… (omitted below)]

This meant that in just a few hours, I would officially become the Queen.

Queen?

Me?

Really?

Everything felt absurd and ridiculous.

This muggy room, the smell, the clothes, this body, all of it.

June 20, 1837, early morning? What do I care?

“Send me back right now!!!”

‘You are going to live for decades without a smartphone, without your favorite celebrity, without spicy chicken feet and tteokbokki. Instead, I’ll let you be Queen, so make Britain a conscientious country :)’—who on earth would agree to terms like that?

“Send! Me! Back!!!”

Just then, new handwriting began to appear on one side of the open diary page.

<Objective: Make the British Empire a great, just nation where moral values are realized.>

<Conditions: You must resolve internal British issues, including the historical events listed below, in a moral and conscientious manner.>

-The Opium War: 1840
-The Great Famine of Ireland: 1845
-Suppression of the Indian Rebellion (Sepoy Mutiny): 1857