Among the handful of titles Kakao Entertainment has flagged as enduring 2026 “steady sellers” — works that maintain top rankings well past their initial release buzz — the modern-fantasy web novel “괴담에 떨어져도 출근을 해야 하는구나” (“Even If I Fall Into a Scary Story, I Still Have to Go to Work”) stands out for both its distinctive premise and its sustained cross-genre chart performance on Kakao Page.
The novel’s premise blends horror-adjacent supernatural elements with a workplace-comedy framing device — a protagonist who finds themselves pulled into various urban-legend “scary story” scenarios but must still navigate them with the practical, deadline-driven mindset of someone who ultimately has to show up for their job — a genre-blending approach that has resonated strongly with Korean web fiction readers accustomed to more straightforwardly categorized fantasy or horror titles.
Kakao Entertainment’s steady-seller designation carries real commercial significance within the platform’s ecosystem: titles earning the label have demonstrated an ability to maintain reader engagement and paid-chapter purchases over an extended period rather than generating a short initial spike followed by rapid decline, a durability the platform’s algorithm and promotional placement increasingly favor when surfacing content to readers.
The novel’s continued strong performance places it alongside other Kakao steady-sellers spanning fantasy, action, and contemporary-fantasy genres, part of a broader 2026 trend within Korean web fiction toward genre-hybrid premises that blend traditionally separate categories — horror and workplace comedy, in this case — rather than adhering strictly to single-genre conventions that have defined much of the format’s earlier commercial history.
With the title’s popularity showing no clear signs of fading, industry watchers consider it a strong candidate for eventual adaptation into webtoon or drama format, following the well-established pipeline that has turned numerous successful Korean web novels into cross-media franchises in recent years.
Source: Kakao Entertainment 2026 steady-seller web novel rankings, Korean web fiction industry press.
