The White Night never ca.
The Great Void, which for thousands of regressions had without fail scorched everything south of the Han River, had vanished without a trace.
Most people would not even realize that such an event had ever been about to happen.
“Alright, everyone! Co line up and get your Udumbara shots!”
Of course, I said most people.
“You there! Too slow! Hurry it up!”
Piiiiiiiiik!
Oh Dok Seo blew her whistle. The awakened ones grumbled but still followed her lead and finished the disinfection procedure.
“Nyaang~ So if we take this, our cat ears will disappear, our magical girl costus will disappear, and the restriction that makes us end every sentence with nya-nya will disappear too, nya…”
“So what? You don’t want that?”
“No, I freaking love it, nya.”
For so long, awakening had ant power.
It was the privilege of those who ruled through the scars the world had inflicted upon them.
Even those who swore to protect humanity found it nearly impossible to willingly relinquish the power in their own hands.
“Well then, let’s start with …”
Noh Doha succeeded in doing the impossible.
While so of the awakened hesitated, she stepped forward first and rolled up her sleeve.
“Oh.”
Oh Dok Seo smirked faintly.
“You sure about this, Head of Managent? Once you take this shot, the Udumbara will bloom briefly in your stomach, then turn into a plum blossom and dissolve in a few days. It ans no more implanting bio-devices in patients ever again.”
“It’s fine…”
Noh Doha smiled faintly.
“They’ll live as they see fit, anyway…”
“As expected of our Head! Alright, here cos the little prick—!”
The great Highway Managent Chief led by example.
Next, the Saintess of the North smiled brightly and injected herself, so there was no one left who could act selfishly.
‘And even now, they still retain faint mories from the previous regressions.’
Those who had wished for peace more than anyone else.
Those who could still vaguely recall their countless deaths.
Now that the last poison of the Void remaining in this world was none other than their own powers, they were ready to return to ordinary life.
Once every awakened person had taken the vaccine, it was finally my turn.
“……”
Only, when Oh Dok Seo approached with the syringe, there was a suspicious grin on her face.
Just as I was about to ask her why, she raised her head and shouted to the others.
“Alright! I borrowed this abandoned school from Mayor Jeong Sang-guk for the whole week! Inside there’s a buffet and plenty of drinks waiting for our victors—so enjoy yourselves!”
“Woooooo!”
“As expected of Oh Dok Seo! We knew we could count on you!”
“We love you, Writer!”
The party began.
The June air was neither too hot nor too cold. When it got warm, the breeze cooled it down; when it got cool, the alcohol ward it up.
The celebration continued into the night. There was just that much to talk about, that much to share.
“Hey, before we lose our mories, let’s record what we talked about on video!”
“Oh! That’s a great idea!”
Everywhere, the awakened were busy making small ti capsules of their mories.
Even now, as laughter and alcohol mingled in the night air, the mories they’d brought back from that dream within a dream were fading bit by bit.
Just like a midsumr night’s dream.
If they could ever step into that dream again, perhaps those mories would return vividly—
but that abyss had already disappeared.
“Saintess Sim Ah-ryun! We truly owe you so much, and the thought that we’ll forget it all soon… sniff, my tears…!”
“Please, Saintess! At least rember that our devotion was real!”
“Ah… y-yes, yes…”
In one corner of the field, the holy knights of the Eastern Sacred Nation were sobbing their hearts out.
When they saw approach, they straightened up at once.
“Undertaker! Welco!”
“Please, have a drink with us!”
“H-heheh, Guildmaster, these guys’ passion is too much for … h-help…”
I smiled, taking their offered cup.
“I appreciate the welco. But are you sure you’re fine with this?”
“Hmm? What do you an?”
“The Eastern Sacred Nation, centered on Mo Kwang-seo the Christ—
was a puppet state I created from beginning to end. I deceived you all. I wouldn’t bla you for resenting .”
“Ahh.”
One of the knights nodded.
Once, when Monk Seok-hwa had offered his body in self-immolation, it was this sa knight who had guided him—a man known on SG-net as The Kind One.
“Well, we might’ve been zealots, but the Saintess who healed and cared for us—
her grace ultimately ca from you, didn’t it, Undertaker?”
“Before the Saintess ca, the North was a forsaken land of death,” another said.
He was from the North himself.
“The mories are faint now, but I still recall it. That winter was so cold. I’d never been so hungry before…”
“It was hell. Maybe others feel differently, but we could never be angry at the Saintess or at you, Undertaker!”
I hesitated for a mont, then silently raised my glass. The knights clinked theirs against mine.
“Cheers!”
“H-heheh… G-Guildmaster, save , these guys have been drinking since noon—blurghhh!”
“The Saintess just threw up!”
“Get water! Hurry!”
Panic erupted.
I wasn’t about to develop a fetish for vomit-covered heroines, so I quickly fled elsewhere.
“Ah. Undertaker.”
“Oh—? Teacher!”
No paradise awaits those who flee, it seems.
The ones I ran into were Dang Seo Rin and Cheon Yo Hwa—
the girls from Three Thousand Worlds and Baekhwa Girls’ High School.
It was a scene of utter devastation.
Not one or two, but over a dozen of them were sprawled across the floor like wreckage.
“What the hell are you all doing?”
“Us? Uh, competing.”
Dang Seo Rin replied casually. Hic.
The lighting was dim, so I hadn’t noticed, but her face was flushed and reeking of alcohol.
“Competing? Out of nowhere?”
“It’s not out of nowhere, teeeacher~ hic! Once the mories fade, the rivalry we’ve had for tens of thousands of years disappears toooo! And that’s, that’s—”
“Regrettable?”
“No! We have to get the last hit!”
Cheon Yo Hwa’s eyes flashed.
“The capital of the Korean Peninsula is Sejong City! That’s just fact! What, Busan? Think you can compare to us? Huh? No wayyy!”
“Hah? If you count all the regressions combined, Busan’s been the capital longer than any city in Korean history, hiccup!”
“……”
Truly the most aningless argunt of their lives.
“Teacher, between the two of us, which—”
“Oh, right, Oh Dok Seo called for earlier. I forgot about that. I’d better go now.”
“Teacher?!”
If I stayed another minute, I’d surely be dragged into hell by their drunken bickering, so I ran for my life.
Their shouting and crashing followed from behind, but I ignored it.
No doubt Three Thousand Worlds and Baekhwa High were at it again.
Of course they were.
“Hmm?”
At least the part about eting Oh Dok Seo was true.
However, on the way up to the roof—the very Otaku-esque location she’d chosen—
I encountered soone unexpected.
Yoo Ji Won.
“My, Mr. Matiz. I thought you’d be enjoying the wild party down on the field. Where are you off to in such a hurry?”
“Ji Won, what about you? The highway managent team’s drinking over there.”
“I’m enjoying so ti alone.”
Chalak.
She swirled the paper cup in her hand.
“Though, just a while ago, I wasn’t alone. There were two of us.”
When I looked, there was another cup on the windowsill beside her—empty, abandoned.
“You were drinking with soone? Just the two of you?”
“Yes.”
“That’s unusual. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you drink with anyone but . Who was it?”
“Ji Soo.”
“……”
“Yes. My adopted daughter.”
Yoo Ji Won shook the wine bottle gently.
“How about it? A drink?”
“Gladly.”
She poured for . We toasted without a word—
not so much clinking as softly brushing our cups together.
“Ji Soo also took part in the final subjugation battle, though she didn’t fight directly. She only observed , the whole ti.”
“...I see.”
“Yes. And just before the mories of our past lives faded completely, she ca to .”
I stayed silent.
Whatever existed between Yoo Ji Won and Kim Ji Soo was theirs alone to resolve.
My role had long since ended. I had no right to interfere.
Whether their story had found closure—or whether it still lingered unresolved—was no longer up to .
So I waited.
For her words. Or for her silence.
“……”
Perhaps sensing my thought, Yoo Ji Won smiled faintly.
That faint curve of her lips made the air between us feel not like June 17th,
but a sumr from long ago.
“She thanked .”
“Thanked… you?”
I couldn’t believe it.
Kim Ji Soo’s life had been all but destroyed by Yoo Ji Won—yet she thanked her?
“In the regressions where I didn’t run the Factory of Misfortune, Ji Soo always died quietly. Killed by monstrosities. The mory of that death, it seems, resurfaced in the depths of that dream within a dream.”
“……”
“But her gratitude contained half sincerity, half resolve. Do you know what kind of resolve?”
After a pause, I said,
“She wanted to show sincerity first. Before demanding your apology, she thanked you—to show she wasn’t deceiving you.”
“Correct.”
A breeze ca through the window. Yoo Ji Won brushed her hair back.
“So I told her I was sorry.”
“……”
“Not because of guilt. Not even because I thought apologizing would make feel better.”
Her words flowed softly.
“I simply realized—I hadn’t been able to do for Ji Soo what you once did for , Mr. Matiz. And that, I was sorry for.”
“……”
“I thought I’d handled things perfectly. Just as Ji Soo said, I picked only those children who would otherwise die tragically,
and ran the Factory of Misfortune to ensure they beca awakened instead.”
Yoo Ji Won said,
“I told myself that if their suffering gave them the strength to awaken, if it saved them from aningless deaths, that was enough.”
And indeed, her logic had been airtight.
Even her failures had been calculated, guarded, controlled.
“But when I think about it… it wasn’t so different from what the world once did to as a child.”
“……”
“That part… I could apologize for, truly. It was a painful mistake. So I did.”
“I see.”
“Yes.”
“What did Ji Soo say?”
“She said she understood. She bowed, thanked again, and left.”
“……”
“She’s strong. Righteous. Even if her mories fade, her spirit will endure.”
“Yeah. I’m sure it will.”
The wind blew again.
Every story until now had unfolded wherever I stood.
No—stories had unfolded because I was there.
For I was the regressor who had lived countless lives.
‘Now, new stories will begin—stories I don’t know.’
If defining others—saying “You are this”—was the story and the regressor’s privilege and power,
then finally, the days had co when that power let go of its grip.
‘But still…’
There are stories not told alone, but shared together.
I patted Yoo Ji Won’s shoulder.
She blinked, then quietly rested her head on my shoulder.
“Mm.”
“What are you thinking about?”
“I think… the na ‘Mr. Matiz’ still suits best.”
She looked up at .
“Thank you for always waiting for to make my mistakes, Mr. Matiz.”
“...Sorry for making you play the role of the Priestess of Leviathan every ti.”
“No.”
She shook her head softly.
“That was the second blessing of my life.”
“The second? What was the first?”
“Being born.”
She smiled.
A smile just for .
“I’m happy to have been born into a world where you exist, Mr. Matiz.”
Hình dạng
3.
After talking with Yoo Ji Won and saying goodbye, I climbed the stairs.
When I opened the door to the rooftop—
“Ohh~ Uncle, good evening, co on up.”
Oh Dok Seo had the whole wide rooftop to herself.
No—just like with Yoo Ji Won earlier, calling it hers alone wasn’t entirely accurate.
“...Why’s there a beer can in front of your laptop? That avatar of yours, All-World-Play, can’t even drink.”
“Hmm? No, she’s drinking.”
“What?”
Oh Dok Seo turned the laptop screen toward .
And sure enough—
on the pixelated screen, a white-haired girl made of dots was holding a beer can.
“—What? Sothing wrong?”
The cheap speakers crackled.
“—I can’t drink alcohol now?”
“...No. That’s… fine.”
“—Your face is annoying , you know.”
“As long as you’re happy.”
If calling pixelated 2D beer “alcohol” made her feel better, I had no complaints.
“Hu-cha!”
Oh Dok Seo leapt from the flower bed, spinning twice midair before landing gracefully like a gymnast.
I clapped instinctively.
“Wow, Dok Seo, you’ve seriously leveled up since the old days.”
“I know, right? Anyway… can you guess why I called you up here this late at night?”
“Well, half of it’s probably just because you wanted to have a secret rooftop talk at a school.”
“Oh, that’s an important reason, yeah.”
She chuckled.
“And the other half?”
“...You and the others developed that Udumbara–Plum Blossom Vaccine with Sword Queen and Ah-ryun. If I took it, I should be losing my awakening power, my perfect mory fading away.”
“Yeah.”
“But I can still clearly see your dead forms, even now at midnight. Everyone else’s powers and mories are already fading.”
“Right.”
“……”
“What you’re thinking is right too.”
I fell silent.
Moonlight and clouds played hide-and-seek across the rooftop.
Slowly, I spoke.
“The injection you gave during the day—it was fake.”
“Yep.”
Oh Dok Seo nodded lightly.
“To be exact, only you and the core mbers of the Regression Alliance got fake shots.”
“……”
“Do you get it, Uncle?”
Oh Dok Seo smiled.
“In this world now—
the only awakened ones left are us.
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