The Skeptic XXIII
A memory from the past.
A conversation with the Saintess.
"Mr. Undertaker, this might sound like a radical interpretation, but... you might have taken the place of Infinite Void and the Mastermind's apostles."
She laid out my powers and tried to link them to various Outer Gods, speculating on how I might connect to them.
1. Complete Memory – Infinite Void
2. Resume (Physical Strength Preservation?) – ?
3. Time Seal – ?
4. Enormous Aura – ?
The Saintess asked:
"These are your abilities, correct?"
"Yeah. Though you can probably leave Aura off that list. Other people can develop it with enough training, so it's not exclusive to me."
"Fair enough. I'll cross it out, then."
"Oh, by the way, I also have Mind Reading."
"All right," she said with a nod. "Let me revise the list."
1. Complete Memory – Infinite Void
2. Resume (Physical Strength Preservation?) – ?
3. Time Seal – ?
4. Enormous Aura – ?
5. Mind Reading – Infinite Metagame? Mastermind?
Yes.
At some point, we did have that conversation.
4. Enormous Aura – ?
...
Aura – ?
...
......
Aura - Leviathan
Let's talk epilogues.
Here's the first.
From now on, Aura is discontinued.
In another world, that shocking announcement might have sent the Regressor Alliance into chaos. Much to my surprise, though, it didn't.
"What's that... 'Aura'? Never heard of it."
In fact, everyone was actually pretty calm.
"Aha. Well, you see, Commander Noh, there's a technique where if someone musters an intense willpower, some energy stirs in their body. Over time, that fluid-like energy can be refined until it cuts through objects or Anomalies like a high-pressure water jet."
"Huh? So you just concentrate, and some intangible fluid leaks out of your body and destroys things? Like a psychic power or something...?"
"Exactly."
"What the hell, how is that any different from an Anomaly...?"
Right.
If you think about it, that reaction was natural. We were still at the very start of the 777th cycle, at the point when the so-called "Mr. Matiz" had just reunited with Yu Ji-won. Our rigorous training regimen for allies hadn't truly begun yet, and the Undertaker's advanced Aura manuals hadn't leaked on SG Net. In other words, it was too early for widespread Aura usage.
Thus, the world abruptly lost Aura.
Like it had never existed.
Some Awakeners did develop their own Aura-like skills, but those were rudimentary and nowhere close to my meticulously refined "Undertaker's Aura Method" from past cycles.
It was a reset, essentially. Like the old days, when an army of Awakeners had to risk their lives to defeat the "not-really-final-boss" Ten Legs.
'Something just isn't sitting right with me.'
It appeared no one but me even wondered about the missing Aura. People lived or died in a world that had apparently "always been this way."
Well... There was exactly one other witness who remembered what the old cycles looked like.
"A-are you sure this is okay, mister? Really? Fighting monsters without Aura—is that even possible?"
Dok-seo, who had read part of my life story in novel form, trembled and chewed her nails in terror.
"We'll do what we can," I said.
"But you're so weak, mister! At least Grandpa Schopenhauer had that 'cut-everything-down' slash power! Without Aura, you're... you're just a worthless regressor who can only go back in time!"
She was less of a devoted fan and more like a bratty kid.
"Plus, it's not just about Aura, right? If we follow your logic, other Awakened powers might also be Anomalies. So my own AT-Field is probably a suspect, right?! No, that's impossible, no way. Fighting monsters without an extra life is insane!"
I wacked her once. Dok-seo hugged her laptop and wept.
"Waaaah! The old man hit me! My dad hit me, my mom hit me, my teacher hit me, now the old man's doing it too!"
"Listen, if you keep provoking people, maybe learn how not to 'earn' a beating in the first place." Then I sighed. "Anyway, in the long run, we'll have to reduce reliance on other powers. But it won't be the same as Aura."
"Huh? Why?"
"Aura, as I said, can be trained by anyone who tries hard enough. That means the more Awakened rely on it, the more it grows, turning them into Leviathan's worshippers. But your Absolute Defense is unique to you alone."
"Oh... so no matter how much I spam my shield, Infinite Metagame's power isn't gonna skyrocket out of nowhere?"
"Exactly."
It was the difference between a universal and a personal power.
"Of course, if your absolute defense ever reached some truly absurd limit, that might change. For instance... if right now your shield can only envelop one person, maybe someday it could expand to envelop the entire planet."
"Erk..." Dok-seo winced. "Like that's possible, old man. My shield drains me dry every time I activate it..."
"Normally, yes," I said, giving her a faint smile. "But sometimes... people do push their personal abilities to ridiculous extremes."
She tilted her head, wearing an I don't get it? face.
'Like Ah-ryeon.'
Sim Ah-ryeon.
She would one day become the Saintess of the North, capable of healing not just a single patient but an entire battlefield.
'If she kept getting more experience, who's to say she couldn't eventually heal the entire planet?'
A world without death. That level of healing might mean that even if someone's head were chopped off, they still wouldn't die.
I'd never witnessed such a thing, yet the image felt oddly vivid. I could picture it now: an enormous tree—a world tree—far larger than Udumbara. Its roots would pierce Earth's crust, feeding on the core, until eventually not just humans but all living things, indeed even inanimate objects, and ultimately the entire planet or even the whole universe would be granted "eternal life."
"Guild Leader. Please, don't be sad."
At the heart of that cosmic tree, a single girl would remain, sealed away forever.
A possible "ending" for this universe.
In that timeline, even my regressor power would be moot, because I'd never die. The trigger of my regression, my death, could never occur.
'All Awakeners...'
A chill crawled down my spine.
'All Awakeners are seeds of an Outer God in the making. They might not reach that point anytime soon, but given infinite time and experience, any of them could become a monstrous god, negating my regression for good.'
Regression was neither invincible nor universal. The world was filled with potential hidden Outer Gods.
'From a different perspective... it might have been lucky for me that each cycle ended in about twenty years, or at most a few hundred. That was a blessing in disguise.'
If countless Awakened had thousands of years to grow...
'Who knows how the world would've turned out?'
No wonder the Saintess was the first to become a Corrupted in so many timelines—she had Time Stop, basically unlimited time. Good thing she was so patient and ethical. Had a regular person possessed that power, they would've become an Anomaly ages ago.
'The fact that one cycle typically ends within about twenty years... wasn't a curse. It was a blessing,' I realized. 'Around the twentieth year, Monster Wave always occurs, wiping out what remains of humanity. Because of that, Awakeners never get enough time to become unstoppable or turn monstrous, and I can safely die, triggering regression, thus escaping a total hopeless ending.'
How coincidental.
'Damn... Who would've guessed that Monster Wave was a necessary evil.'
I felt a sting of static along the back of my neck. If I pulled an example from a timeline where Monster Wave didn't show up... The 173rd cycle, that was the Great Witch's Utopia.
'Dang Seo-rin turned into a Fallen One, warping Busan into a utopia. Monster Wave recognized it as an "Anomaly domain," so it never invaded. The world nearly ended. I still don't know how we avoided the bad ending that time, since even my Complete Memory can't recall what Seo-rin did next.'
Every time Monster Wave was kept at bay, Awakened powers spiraled out of control.
Even after sending off Oh Dok-seo, my thoughts plagued me.
'...Is this all just coincidence?'
Let's think.
If my theory is correct, every Awakener is essentially a seed to become an Anomaly or Outer God. Some of them could nullify my regression, given enough time and XP.
Yet the Saintess, who alone can enjoy unlimited time + XP, is an extremely moral person. She's also my most loyal ally, so if she ever does feel herself slipping into Corruption, she consults me first.
All other Awakeners have limited time.
By the twentieth year, Monster Wave inevitably arrives and sweeps away all living humans. Hence, I nearly always get killed and forced to regress, allowing me to avoid permanent ruin. As long as I don't lose my mind, I can keep trying for a "happy ending" an infinite number of times...
My jaw locked shut.
Dok-seo's cup of coffee was empty, while mine—barely touched, a café-au-lait—still sloshed quietly on the table.
'If it's all coincidence...'
That's a pretty convenient coincidence for humanity.
"...There's no way."
I've lived in this world long enough to know it has never been gentle toward humankind, so back then, I couldn't easily accept this newly emerging "benevolent arrangement" in the 777th cycle.
It felt alien.
Deeply so.
Here's the second epilogue.
"Huh. I see, so Undertaker was Mr. Matiz all along."
We were in a café.
Oh Dok-seo nodded, but her tone and gaze were nothing like the real Oh Dok-seo. Even the espresso on the table was sipped with calm elegance.
There was no point hiding it. She was in "V-tuber mode," so to speak—copying and pasting personalities from earlier cycles to do a kind of roleplay.
Still, it was just an act.
"Honestly, I always considered him one of the prime candidates. If my memory as a child serves, Mr. Matiz originally had a faint personal scent. Undertaker also doesn't have much of a scent. So I suspected they could be the same person."
Indeed.
"And yet you concluded they weren't the same person, right?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"If Undertaker were Mr. Matiz, then from the moment we reunited at the convenience store, he would have recognized me. More importantly, when I swung my hatchet at him, he would never have destroyed it."
"Ah."
"That hatchet was the very first gift Mr. Matiz gave me. No matter how clueless he was, he wouldn't shatter a precious memento of our bond. So at that moment, I pegged Undertaker's chance of being Mr. Matiz at less than five percent."
"...Sorry."
"No apologies needed, Your Excellency. The fault is mine for failing to recognize you."
"Roleplay Yu Ji-won" (let's call her "Dok-seo's Yu Ji-won") tilted her head in a mild bow.
"There were other factors too. Undertaker said I dumped my parents' bodies in that minari swamp at Dobongsan, or Mt. Dobong, when I was fourteen, but he never grasped the true significance of Dobong.
'Dobong' has a poetic meaning, you see."
She turned her eyes toward the real Yu Ji-won of the 777th cycle, not the ephemeral roleplay version. The genuine piece was also seated at the table.
"Do you understand it, 777th cycle me?"
"Certainly. If we parse the Chinese characters for Dobongsan (道峯山), we get 'path' (道), 'peak' (峯), and 'mountain' (山). It's a metaphor for leading me, who was lost at the time, to find a path in my heart."
"Excellent. I accept you as me."
"I don't particularly need your approval, but thanks."
While both versions of Yu Ji-won exchanged remarks, I kept silent.
'I just picked Dobongsan on a whim, honestly, because it was next to Bukhansan...'
No, wait. At times like this, I should think more like Cheon Yo-hwa, the older twin sister, does.
'Surely the me from seven years ago truly chose Dobongsan for those deep symbolic reasons. I just can't recall it now. And not remembering doesn't make it sad, because that blank slate is a canvas for the coolest possible painting!'
Lucky me.
While my own mental spin-cycle was whirling away, Dok-seo's Yu Ji-won tossed out a question.
"How is it?"
She wasn't asking me.
"What do you feel right now? The worthless promise you made to your younger self has been genuinely fulfilled by someone. Does that stir hope in you? Are you willing to accept this world more readily? Do you feel less contempt toward humanity? Is the world still just black and white to you? When you weigh the reasons to live versus the reasons to die, does the scale start looking different?"
No reply.
"Yu Ji-won." The Yu Ji-won from a past cycle asked, "Are you a little happier now?"
A sense of déjà vu struck me, a sense of remembrance from a distant past.
"Ji-won."
"Yes?"
Once, I had flung that same question at my psychopathic adjutant.
The outward form was the same question, but its substance was different.
They were rooted in different layers of the earth.
The 777th cycle's Yu Ji-won propped her chin on her hand, then reached out and clasped mine. She gently drew it up before her face, so my knuckles hovered close to her.
A soft breath.
Ever since we were reunited, my custom seven-blend fragrance had accompanied me.
Then Yu Ji-won spoke. Before my eyes, her answer overlapped with the one from the past:
"I think I can be a little happier this time."
"From now on, I believe I can become a little happier."
Tick.
A clock on the side of the table clicked forward one second.
"I see."
The Yu Ji-won from a past cycle, with hair as red as blood, nodded.
"I'm envious. Truly."
Session over.
That day, the version of Yu Ji-won whom Oh Dok-seo had summoned—an echo from a past cycle—continued calling me "Your Excellency" right to the end.
-x-X-x-
The Skeptic 24:00
And finally, the third epilogue.
As you might guess, my 777th life turned out to be extremely important for me, the regressor. If Kant had his Copernican Revolution, I, the Undertaker, had a "psychopathic revolution," so to speak.[1] Thus, I wanted to limit all epilogues to events that happened in this 777th cycle out of a purely personal desire.
But when does life ever go the way we want?
Newton probably wanted to be lauded as an SSS-rank stock genius more than a natural scientist, and back when civilization was intact, everyone probably wanted to buy Bitcoin at its rock-bottom price.
My "story" is, likewise, not from just a single cycle. It's patched together from various lives, each contributing a dish to the final feast.
So it goes, as always.
"Ah-ryeon, you can paint, right?"
"Huh? I... N-not really...?"
"Not really?"
I blinked. That was unexpected.
All my companions have some glaring personal flaw in their personality. Ji-won lacks sympathy, Seo-rin lacks self-restraint, and Ah-ryeon supposedly lacks... humility. Needless to say, I was startled to see her squirm like a frightened rabbit, twiddling her fingers together nervously.
"Right. S-s-so I can't just 'kind of paint.' I'm actually good enough to be top-five across all of humanity. I guess if humanity had f-four fingers per hand instead of five, I'd be in the top four, obviously..."
Ah, yes. There's the Ah-ryeon I know.
"Anyway," I continued pointedly, "this guild leader wants to commission some artwork from you."
"E-eh? Comm... Commission? What's that...?"
"Well..."
I delivered her the order sheet in oral form. The moment I began my rundown, Ah-ryeon's face began twitching until, eventually, she squeaked in horror.
"Th-that's insane! It's too much!"
"They don't all need to be exquisitely detailed. But they do need to be drawn with care. Sketches are enough, as long as they capture the unique traits of each subject."
"Ah— Oh? Uhhhhh. If... If it's just sketches..."
"You, dear Ah-ryeon, are a brilliant artistic prodigy who can spit in even an Outer God's face, second to none! So you can finish them all in a week, right? Your guild leader believes in you."
"Eeeeeeeeeek!"
Dozens of days later, I left behind Ah-ryeon, whose spirit and body had nearly both fled, and loaded over four hundred pictures onto a cart. Because there was so much art, I couldn't handle it alone. Instead, I enlisted the best loaders and couriers of the apocalypse era.
Do-hwa frowned. "We might as well call this a National Road Management Corps caravan..."
"That's basically what it is." Specifically from Busan to Seoul. Fortunately, in this cycle, the Inunaki Tunnel had been cleared, so we didn't spend too long traveling.
Eventually, we piled up Ah-ryeon's works on the Han riverbank.
–G̶̟͐r̸͔͗ủ̵̞u̸̱͘u̸̖͝ű̶̞h̶̢̒h̶̡̐ḧ̸̘́ỏ̴͍ô̷͕ö̶̘o̵͓̎ȓ̷̞h̸̬̏...!̶̲̉
The Road Management troops flinched and reflexively looked back, halting where they had been hauling crates off their carts. They couldn't see it, but off in the distance, a monster roared, its countless tentacles lashing the air.
Ten Legs.
In the distant past, it had driven the Korean Peninsula into ruin multiple times. In this present, murmurs spread.
"I hear it just wiped out our military..."
"They're all dead. Every last soldier."
"Did you hear? Northern cities got annihilated by that thing. Small towns too, all of them."
"Yeah. My uncle was a colonel. He died to that son of a bitch."
Ordinarily, I'd have taught them my Aura-training method so they could combine their forces here and defeat Ten Legs. But "ordinarily" was in the past.
'I have to conserve Aura from now on.'
A sort of "Aura diet," if you will. Just like in the apocalypse, when every bit of electricity was precious, now we had to limit the usage of Aura. Only a few people could wield it. In fact, aside from me, Ji-won, and maybe a handful of others, no one had it. I myself intended to avoid using Aura entirely unless absolutely necessary. We had no choice, in order to keep Leviathan dormant.
'Instead...'
Ignoring the troops' agitation, I carefully laid out Ah-ryeon's art.
Ji-won walked up to me and said, "Mr. Matiz, the monster's approaching."
"Yeah, I sense it."
"I'll have the others fall back."
Thud... THUD...
The ground shook with the heavy steps of Ten Legs, which grew fiercer as it neared. Eventually, the caravan pulled out entirely, leaving only three people: me, Yu Ji-won, Noh Do-hwa. Both were stubborn enough to outdo each other. I doubted any scolding from me would make them retreat to the Inunaki Tunnel.
'Well,' I mused with a glance behind me, 'it isa funeral, after all. A funeral needs a few mourners.'
Ah-ryeon's paintings—about four hundred portraits for the deceased—were lined up in neat rows. Between the portraits, white chrysanthemums had been placed.[2] Hard to find in these times, so we'd grown them at the farmland run by the Sword Marquess's faction.
–G̶̤̏r̵̫͗ű̵̦ù̶̪ū̷͔u̵͖͑o̷̹̚ȍ̶͔g̵̗̀r̵̹̀à̷̧u̵̠͘h̶̛̘h̶͙͐h̸̨͝!̷̳̎
Ten Legs finally appeared, crushing half-toppled buildings underfoot. It advanced—THUD—each step of dozens of thick tentacles tearing the ground. Every few steps or so, chunks of debris would fly past us. Still, neither Ji-won nor Do-hwa nor I moved from our stance.
Through hundreds of portraits, across the horizon, Ten Legs rushed forward.
I calmly brushed dust off my black suit. Then I bowed.
In the past, long ago, I used to think Ten Legs was just a standalone monster. But it wasn't.
'The Hollow.'
In this world, those who never receive a proper funeral are revived and linger forever. Ten Legs was one of them.
'When the southern half of Seoul was erased by the White Night, countless people died. Among them were many who left behind no known family or ties, they simply vanished.'
That was the core of Ten Legs.
If I were to compare the White Night to an atomic bomb, then the corpses at the very center of that "blast zone" turned into Ten Legs.
Nobody mourned them or even acknowledged them. Thus, they inevitably merged, weaving themselves into one monstrous body.
–G̶͔̉ŕ̵͈u̷̲̓ú̶͖ù̶͔k̵̥̂u̴̟͠u̷̗͝u̷͕̇ų̴̀!̵̧̓
But they weren't totally alone. Just like me back before the 4th cycle, they weren't utterly friendless. They lost their families, sure, but not every cousin's friend and friend's neighbor's aunt's nephew had died. The world hadn't fully ended yet.
By traversing the dreams of fairies, I discovered the faces of these missing people. From dream to dream, chasing those lost connections, I was able to "restore" the missing faces of hundreds of victims whose names and appearances had once been forgotten.
The rest had been straightforward enough.
"G-Guild Leader, does this look right?"
"No, the eyebrows are too thin. Make them a bit darker."
"Eek! My hands are shaking. I've already been drawing memorial portraits for six hours today! Are you going to take responsibility if my joints wear out?!"
"What do you mean? You're a healer, aren't you? If your joints hurt, just heal them and keep drawing, Ah-ryeon. No rest for you."
"D-Demon!"
Using my Complete Memory, plus Ah-ryeon's unparalleled artistry and healing, we completed more than four hundred memorial portraits over dozens of days. And it wasn't just limited to pictures. Every time I bowed, I mentally replayed one full day in the life of each of those four hundred people, just as I'd glimpsed them in their dreams.
–K̴̺̓ṛ̵͐ū̴̝ǘ̷͈ų̴̅u̸̹̓ ̸͕͠K̵̫͐r̸̡͛à̵̹a̵̖͆a̶̗̐
I knelt.
–K̷̬̈r̷̺͝r̶̩͋r̸̝̀ ̸̺͆R̴̜̾r̶̞̄r̸͚͒ā̴͕ ̴͓̈́f̵̨̈a̷̩͂h̷̺́...
When I rose from my bow, Ten Legs was still charging with savage roars to slice us apart—and it was visibly shrinking.
Yes. Shrinking.
"The corpses are..." Do-hwa muttered behind me. "Are they falling off...?"
The giant body of Ten Legs began shedding bits, like petals falling from a flower. Each piece was an arm, a head, a leg—some part of a human corpse. Having received a proper funeral, a real name, a real face, a real memory, these missing people finally returned to the earth.
–G̶r̷r̶r̸u̴h̷h̴h̶o̷o̸o̸...
Not all of Ten Legs' corpses were casualties of the White Night. Some had died in other calamities.
However, now that the core had broken, the entire mass of Ten Legs collapsed from within.
–O̷o̶o̸oooooo...
Thud. THUD!
Every time it tried to lash out with a tentacle, its outer layer crumbled. Thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of unburied corpses spilled out in all directions—lost souls turned back into wandering Lost, no longer anchored to Ten Legs.
–Ooooooo...
At last, Ten Legs reached the edge of our funeral site by the Han River, but the monstrous might that once crushed buildings had utterly vanished. It stood barely tall enough to match a three-story building.
Then two.
Then one.
–Ooo... oo...
And then there was one final person.
They were a patchwork figure made from scraps of other corpses' flesh, maybe from animals rather than humans, just imitating arms and legs. Their white hair wasn't human hair but broken piano strings, doll threads, that sort of thing.
Through and through, it was the core of Ten Legs. No one could say who she once was.
–O... oo... oo...
Thump. Thump.
Within that mismatched mass, two hearts beat. "Normally," you'd slice away both hearts with Aura to defeat Ten Legs.
But not now.
"My condolences," I said, kneeling once more, "Professor Adele."
Emit Schopenhauer's wife.
She'd come to give a lecture at a Korean university and died in the midst of the White Night.
"You lost your husband, again and again. I can only imagine how great your sorrow must be."
I extended an urn toward the deformed figure with two hearts, a porcelain jar containing Old Man Schopenhauer's remains.
"I was a longtime colleague of your husband and will remain in this world until he returns. I'm sure that someday, he'll come back to you. I'll be there too."
I bowed my head.
"Once again, my deepest condolences."
Thump. Thump.
This couple had lived sharing two hearts for centuries.
The wife's arms, barely arms at all, reached out. They melted like candle wax, bits of stringy flesh falling off, as she pressed Old Man Scho's ashes to her chest. There was no real skin to hold them, so the urn rested directly against those two hearts.
–Ee... mi... t...
Thump.
Her heart beat once more, then stopped.
With that final beat, every scrap forming Ten Legs collapsed. Piano wire, doll string, guitar strings, buttons, bird bones, animal limbs, bits of unknown flesh—all of it spilled onto the urn and scattered around it.
A lone button rolled to my knee and toppled to the ground, spinning there until finally...
Stillness.
Then there was only the sound of the Han River's flowing behind us while one warped tree overshadowed the waters, its identity twisted by the apocalypse's Void Poison.
As I picked up the button, Do-hwa murmured, "Huh. So that monster could normally have been cut down in a single slash with that Aura-power or whatever..."
"Yes."
"Then there'd be no need to pick through illusions or nightmares to find all those missing people, no need to force Ah-ryeon to paint memorial portraits for days, no need to install a funeral site by the river..."
"Correct."
"I see. That's a ridiculous waste of resources..." She lit an incense stick as she continued, saying, "Which is presumably why you placed me at the top of the National Road Management Corps, so we could shoulder these burdens..."
I didn't answer.
"I'm fine with it, Guild Leader Undertaker." She looked back at me. "I like this way better..."
It was indeed a difficult path, even for me in my 777th life. Yet it was also a path that only I, who had experienced this world 777 times, could walk. A hidden route that wouldn't open if I'd lived fewer lives.
I'd have loved to choose the easy way, but when does life ever follow our desires?
Sometimes, the road that looks longest is the real solution. This world demanded that solution of me. I needed wide strides, a precise map, and legs strong enough not to fail despite the blisters stinging my feet. Luckily, as a regressor, I had all three.
"Mr. Matiz."
That night, I was lying in a tent pitched near the funeral site when Ji-won suddenly appeared, knocking me out of sleep.
She put a finger to her lips, shushing me. "You awake?"
"...Yeah. I wake up the moment there's any hint of movement. What's up?"
She leaned in to whisper, "There's something I want to show you. Just between us."
A faint smell of damp grass wafted over me. In earlier cycles, Ji-won liked faintly strawberry-scented perfumes, thinking that was the Undertaker's preference. But not in the 777th cycle. Now, she no longer wore perfume.
"You see it?"
Stepping out of the tent, I found a small table on the riverbank, probably salvaged from a ruined convenience store. On the table lay several maps.
"Maps and chess pieces... Your Mini-Map skill. But what's left to show at this point?"
She scoffed, a light smile tugging at her lips—unnatural, as though trying to sneer but not quite managing it. "Mock me all you want. This is the end of me just being some 'one-trick navigation tool.'"
When I only stared at her in confusion, she pulled out a small device from her pocket. It was an electronic watch, useless in the apocalypse. Electronics typically lost to Anomalies.
"Yes, I see your point. Why an electronic watch? You know they're basically worthless or even hazardous these days."
"Well, by placing this antique on my Mini-Map..." Then she placed it over the Korean Peninsula area on the world map.
[■■:■■:■■:■■:■■]
Blink, blink, blink.
Even though the clock had definitely been powered off, it suddenly started flashing. What was more, the numbers it displayed were eye-catchingly odd. A normal digital clock would display something like [■■:■■], indicating hours and minutes. Even a clock that counted seconds precisely would, at most, show [■■:■■:■■]. However, the one set down on the Mini-Map flashed its digits in a random red pattern.
Blink, blink, blink, blink.
After blinking a few times with random red numbers, it suddenly stopped. The final numbers it displayed were these:
[00:03:41:56:79]
No movement, like a display that wasn't counting time but simply stuck on those digits.
"Any idea what the numbers mean?" Ji-won asked.
"No. I'm clueless. What is it?"
"It's simple, Mr. Matiz," she said. "It shows the population of that place, the number of 'survivors.'"
My eyes shot wide. "So, in that part of the Korean Peninsula—"
"Yes. Three hundred forty-one thousand five hundred seventy-nine... Oh, sorry, seventy-eight people."
[00:03:41:56:78]
"That's how many remain alive in Korea. And it's not limited to Korea."
She pulled out more watches, placing them over Japan, then Siberia, then Central and South America...
[00:04:91:01:12]
[00:00:93:87:94]
[00:27:54:48:31]
As she shifted the devices around the map, the digits changed on the fly.
My jaw dropped. "Impossible. Your Mini-Map never had an added function like that in any cycle."
"Aha, as I suspected."
While I was shocked, she looked unsurprised, prompting me to ask, "Got any theories as to why?"
"Sure. It's an obvious metaphor, right?"
"A metaphor?"
"Yes." Blue-purple eyes locked on me. "A metaphor that since I met you, my 'time' has started moving."
"..."
"Walter Benjamin said that beauty arises from something unspoken and hidden, from whatever simply exists as it is. He called that Aura. But I disagree."
She kept staring at me, though her hands moved. The smallest watch slid across the edge of the world to reach Seoul.
"I'm not interested in whatever 'beauty' hides beneath the surface. As you know, I don't understand concepts that someone won't take the time to explain directly. I've been that way my whole life."
The watch moved from Dobongsan to Bukhansan, crossing the Han River.
"To me, beauty means something that remains, even if we peel away the skin and expose the flesh."
The watch froze at the southern end of Jamsu Bridge...
[00:00:00:00:02]
...the exact spot where we stood.
She quietly took my hand. I flinched as a murky, bluish Aura emerged from her hand to cover mine, but she wasn't trying to hurt or threaten me.
It was comfort.
Her Aura rose higher and higher. Ceaselessly, as if it were reversing gravity. Streaming upward like rain falling in reverse from the ground. Soaring to the pitch-black night sky.
Until finally, her Aura touched the sky, then silently branched into millions, tens of millions of strands, coloring the night overhead.
"You once told me," she said, "that an Awakener's power stems from their misfortune."
The night sky lit up in a cosmic rainbow of colors: blues, yellows, reds, purples, greens... and hues beyond words.
"But it seems there's at least one counterexample that your theory can't explain, Mr. Matiz."
The aurora snaked in bright, leisurely ripples, a stark contrast to the plain transparency of Leviathan's watery rain.
Where once, this girl had sculpted a chessboard of players relegated to a vision of black and white, the array of her rain now painted the sky with every color the world had to offer.
"When I was 14, meeting you was basically a wrong answer for me."
Does the Undertaker exist?
Does Mr. Matiz, who wandered with a 14-year-old girl through a rainy summer night, truly exist?
■■■—is he real?
Or was everything just an illusion? A void?
"I figure the human heart is split in two: half for someone's correct answer, half for their wrong answer."
Yu Ji-won had crossed from her 14th summer to her 21st, existing just as Cheon Yo-hwa, the elder "twin" sister in some sense, once had.
All of that merged here, under the glow of these colors in the night sky.
"I get that you might see discarding Aura as your worst defeat."
Her silver hair, devoid of any particular hue, now refracted all the night sky's colors.
"But meeting you, Mr. Matiz, was my greatest fortune. Because even back when I had no power, you were my hero. So."
Beneath these paints, we could all be equally real or equally false. Which one was true depended on my choice. It wasn't possible to say only I existed or everyone else existed except me. Either none existed or all existed.
Void or coexistence. The ultimate choice.
"Mr. Matiz."
Ji-won had made hers.
"This time, I'd like to be your error."
I decided in that moment.
Anomaly:Leviathan
Aliases: Grand Monsoon, the Water Bug, Thales's World, the First Promise, Infrastructure, the Nation, the State, Hobbes's Monster, Aura, Aurora
Threat Level:Lv.5 Outer-God Class (Alienation)
Subjugation in progress.
Footnotes:
[1] Copernicus was the scientist to posit that the planets revolve around the sun, but also that all things in our solar system—including the sun itself—move relative to other objects in the system. Likewise, the philosopher Kant was the first to theorize that it is not just that the world imposes its environment on us, but that we ourselves actively shape and define the world around us by the very act of being within it and that we are indeed the focal point of that interaction.
[2] White chrysanthemums can symbolize mourning and grief.
-x-X-x-
The Self-Immolator I
Q: There's an old saying that "people can't be fixed once they're broken." Do you agree?
A: Yu Ji-won breaks that rule.
As shown in the previous story, throughout my long life as a regressor, there's been no one who's shown more dramatic growth as a character than Yu Ji-won.
Then again, perhaps I'm being too regressor-centric in my thinking.
"Good morning, Mr. Matiz."
In truth, Ji-won hadn't changed at all. She simply kept a landscape painting from her 14th summer, displayed deep inside her heart, exactly as always. The one who had actually changed was me, and since I had gone from being "Your Excellency the Undertaker" to "Mr. Matiz," her attitude toward me also changed.
Yes, surely nothing else has changed...
"Mr. Matiz, did you sleep well last night?"
"Uh... Yeah."
"That's a relief. I recall you used to suffer from bouts of insomnia in the old days, but it seems to have fully cleared now. Here's some chamomile tea I picked up. I'll brew you a cup at night if you're ever feeling lonely."
"O-oh. Th-thanks."
"Don't mention it."
Even putting aside the fact that I didn't realize I'd ever had insomnia, I had good reason to respond so awkwardly. After all, the location where Ji-won was speaking to me was none other than a conference room dedicated to our Regression Alliance in the National Road Management Corps main headquarters. In short, she was openly flaunting her rapport with me right in front of Noh Do-hwa, Seo Gyu, Cheon Yo-hwa, Sim Ah-ryeon, Lee Ha-yul, Oh Dok-seo, and the rest.
"Um, Teacher," Yo-hwa called with a bright smile. "I've been a little curious for a while now. Why does the Operations Team Leader over there call you 'Mr. Matiz' anyway?"
"Ah, well, you see, Yo-hwa... Actually—"
"It's nothing special." Cutting off my reply, Ji-won answered, "Doesn't the president of Baekhwa Girls' High also refrain from using the alias 'Undertaker' when addressing you, choosing to call you 'Teacher' instead?"
"Sure, but I didn't ask you."
Yo-hwa's interjection was ignored. "It's exactly the same reason."
"Eh?"
"The title the president gave you implies a sense of exclusive personal connection. It proudly displays a relationship that outsiders can never intrude upon," Ji-won reasoned calmly. "It's the same with me. You could say that in a way, I share the same sentiment as the president. Oh, though she is seven years late in forming her connection compared to me, of course. That's the only difference."
Yo-hwa smiled with her eyes. "Huh. Guess the team leader and I have similar personalities even though she's a bit older. Hey, Team Leader, should I start calling you unnie?"
"That won't be necessary. Since Awakeners no longer age anyway, you'd be stuck calling me 'unnie' forever, and that might feel a bit unfair to you."
"Aw, why? Once someone's your unnie, she's your unnie for life. Team Leader, I never thought you'd worry about something like that."
"Hmm. Actually, you have a point. You'll never bridge that seven-year gap."
The temperature in the conference room dropped. Do-hwa began wiping her glasses, Seo Gyu muttered something under his breath about SG Net being full of trolls while fiddling with his smartphone, Ha-yul suddenly started repairing her maid-doll, and Ah-ryeon had already been dozing off for a while.
"OMG! Hey, Mister! This is nuts!"
Only Dok-seo was whispering in my ear with shining eyes.
"I never imagined there'd be a rivalry angle between Yo-hwa unnie and Ji-won unnie! But now that I see it, it kinda works, huh? The two of them look like they're hogging all the darkness in the world—you know, instead of all the light. It's a real feast for the eyes."
"You... No, forget it. You're the reason I can still breathe, Dok-seo."
"Is that a compliment?"
"Of course it is. You have boundless imagination, so it's no wonder the Admin of the Infinite Metagame picked you to be its miko."
"Th-thank you?"
"Sure."
Although, after she'd handed over every ounce of her strength to being that miko, she ended up beating fans senseless at a meet-and-greet... No one, not even the Anomalies, could have predicted the sheer power of a chuunibyou otaku's imagination.
Do-hwa chose that moment to interrupt, placing her glasses back on. "All right, then. If you're all done with whatever that was, let's get back to the meeting..."
Both Yo-hwa and Ji-won quietly resumed their seats. In our alliance, disregarding Do-hwa's authority was never acceptable, no matter what the situation.
Dark circles hung under Do-hwa's eyes like weeping willow branches.
"As you all know, we recently discovered that many Anomalies, including the Ten Legs, can be eradicated via a proper funeral rite. But given that the number of Hollow roaming around out there is greater than the remaining living population, we can't take care of every single body ourselves..."
And so, she shifted her gaze.
"Awakener Seo Gyu...?"
"Oh, right!" Seo Gyu said, holding up his smartphone in his right hand. "Based on the last meeting, we've created a brand new Missing Persons Board on SG Net."
Thanks to the weight training I'd taught him, his shoulders and triceps looked especially robust. Incidentally, Seo Gyu had set up an outdoor gym on Haeundae Beach, which boasted around 40 active members. Even in the apocalypse, some folks apparently just couldn't give up the iron.
"The Missing Persons Board has memorial portraits drawn by Ah-ryeon, and we've made the search function super user-friendly, so family members can find it any time."
The delicate tension among the alliance members ebbed, and the meeting moved along.
"Oh, right. Guild Leader Undertaker..."
"Yes?"
"We've gotten another letter from that monk guy, what's his name, Seok-hwa, I think? He says he plans to lead his fellow monks and believers in a 'Trans-Korean Joint Funeral Service.' What should we do...?"
"Hmm."
"To me, it just sounds like a fancy way of committing mass suicide..."
Anyway, there it was. The "Seok-hwa" they just mentioned in passing—his Buddhist name—was the protagonist of this story. Sure, Do-hwa and I kept calling him a "dodgy monk" or a "renegade monk," but plenty of folks out there respected him as the Venerable Seok-hwa.
While his name has only just appeared in this narrative, you might already be well acquainted with who he is. Where did he first show up, you ask?
"This is the might of the New Buddha!"
"If you believe in the New Buddha, you'll be freed from every affliction and suffering, and granted a new body to live on in a brand-new world!"
It all goes back to the Udumbara story. He was the main instigator behind that pseudo-religion worshiping the Anomaly virus as a savior, aka the New Buddha Church.
"Immortal life through living flame! Eternal life in the floral realm!"
That man was none other than the renegade monk Seok-hwa.
The existence of a regressor in this world was not a blessing for everyone. While fortunes bloomed for Ji-won, there would always be others whose destiny was twisted beyond repair. The renegade monk Seok-hwa was one of those cases.
Up until around my 10th run, this ex-monk practically reigned with unlimited power. If you have a good memory, you might recall a conversation between Seo-rin and me in a very early cycle.
"Hah. These 'flower guys' are driving us to our wits' end."
"Right? In a world as hellish as this, it's not surprising that people cling to a cult. The Neo Budhha Rebellion didn't happen for no reason."
We both sighed.
Even back then, Seo-rin enjoyed absolute dominance over Busan, yet not even she could get a handle on the New Buddha Church. The best she could do was avoid conflict by offering them massive gifts.
Still, let's be honest: In an apocalypse, "donations" are basically bribes or tributes. We offered them valuables to purchase peace. In other words, if someone like Seo-rin, the ruler of Busan, had to deliver tributes under the guise of "offerings," that should show how enormous the New Buddha Church's influence used to be.
"Oh, come on now, dear Ms. Dang Seo-rin. Although you don't yet enjoy the Buddha's grace, you devote yourself to saving the Middle Ages. Why would We of the Flowers treat you poorly?"
Back then, Seok-hwa would smirk slyly, savoring the hierarchy of power between us.
He had every reason to be so cocky. After all, while we only controlled Busan, the New Buddha Church had extended its reach across the Korean Peninsula, the Japanese archipelago, and even mainland China. Even the dispatch of volunteer troops from Japan depended on the New Buddha Church, or more precisely, on Seok-hwa's approval.
Whenever Seok-hwa held a rally, even in that mad apocalypse, tens of thousands of believers gathered, cheering wildly.
"People! What does "your overlord" mean? It is the flower blossoming on your very heads!"
"Waaaaaah!"
"Immortal life! Eternal flowering!"
However, all that changed drastically in the 41st run.
"Undertaker."
The first impact.
"I found it."
"In South Chungcheong Province, Asan. The Onyang region."
That's right. Everything shifted the moment the Saintess discovered the source of the Udumbara virus. From that point on, the downfall of renegade monk Seok-hwa, who had once ruled the Korean Peninsula, became inevitable.
Now then, do you remember how the New Buddha Church spread so quickly in the first place? Because people believed that if you had a flower blooming on your head, you could survive even if your limbs were cut off. Problem was, once the source of the Udumbara virus was eliminated, it became obvious that the New Buddha Church was just a cult with flashy speeches and decent organizational skills—nothing more, nothing less. And in the cutthroat world of apocalypse-era cults, that didn't stand out much at all.
This land was like a poison jar for pseudo-religions. Only those that survived the infinite competition in hell had any shot at going global.
"Everyone! Seek your salvation in Paradise! The Buddha originally declared that this world is Hell itself."
Even so, Seok-hwa refused to give up.
"It is because we live in Hell without realizing it that the Maitreya Buddha has bestowed upon us renewed suffering. As in earlier times, if we train ourselves and find enlightenment, only then can we enjoy glory in the afterlife. Namu Amida Butsu. A crisis is truly an opportunity. Attain enlightenment, my friends!"
"Namu Amida Butsu. Namu Amida Butsu."
He had about 500 to 800 followers left. Compared to the prime days when he dominated East Asia, it was pitiful. He was hardly a bottom-of-the-barrel case, though. In actuality, 500 believers might even seem mountainous to a self-identified cult leader who barely had ten. In the cutthroat cult scene, hundreds of zealots was still no small feat.
In another world, Seok-hwa might have been content with that. Sadly, it turned out that he just wasn't destined to stay on top.
"Brothers and sisters! I, your shepherd, shall forge the way for you!"
"Our president is the best!"
"Mo Gwang-seo! Mo Gwang-seo!"
Then came the second impact.
Mo Gwang-seo Jesus Christ descended upon the "Eastern Jerusalem."
"The president has resurrected!"
"It's the Second Coming, a miracle of rebirth!"
In a land where other cults mostly boasted "miracles" in name only, Mo Gwang-seo literally performed showstopping miracles hundreds or thousands of times. It was no wonder a huge shift in the pseudo-religion power scene took place.
"Hey, they say that Jesus guy, Mo Gwang-seo, was it? He just keeps shining and reviving no matter how many times you kill him."
"Doesn't our monk have anything flashy like that?"
"Nothing, other than that shiny head of his."
That day, Seok-hwa lost four-fifths of his faithful. Yet he pressed on.
"No! Do not be fooled by something as heretical and absurd as resurrection! The truth we must focus on is cultivating our own minds, not indulging in flashy supernatural nonsense! Attain enlightenment! Enlightenment!"
"Namu Amida Butsu. Namu Amida Butsu."
Still, Seok-hwa retained a die-hard core of about 100 to 150 followers.
He was now well and truly in the mid-tier bracket, but in the world of apocalypse cults, having a hundred people was nothing to scoff at. Again, there were plenty of pitiful wannabe cult leaders out there who didn't even have ten. Maybe he'd even become the king of the mid-tiers.
But even so, it seemed Seok-hwa was not fated for a royal path.
"Saintess. So that's the Saintess..."
"They say Jesus has called upon Santa Maria!"
And the third impact was none other than our unstoppable superstar, Sim Ah-ryeon.
"Uwooooooh!"
"Hallelujah! The Lord beckons!"
Ah-ryeon was basically a "walking Udumbara"—the perfect upper-tier replacement for the New Buddha Church. Everywhere she went, flowers bloomed, and the injured were healed. She was even gorgeous (provided she kept quiet, washed her hair regularly, avoided using her smartphone, and wore something nice).
Seok-hwa's last remaining 100 followers took a good, long look back at their monk.
"What about our monk...?"
"He doesn't really have a sparkly anything, aside from that shiny head."
"He can't even heal people who are on the verge of death."
"So what can he actually do?"
That day, Seok-hwa lost nine-tenths of his last faithful, ending up with barely a dozen left. Those final dozen were truly devoted, because in a world where an "un-killable fake Jesus" and a "(fake) saintess who can heal people for free" were walking around, anyone who still chose Seok-hwa had to be at least a little fanatical.
Thus, at last, Seok-hwa truly hit rock bottom. Even though later runs saw humanity with higher survival rates and better quality of life overall, ironically, the renegade monk's fate just got more and more miserable.
"Ahhh! Look who's here!"
Perhaps that was why when I stopped by his place in the 802nd cycle, the sight of him running out barefoot to greet me had a strange feeling welling up in my chest.
"Well, if it isn't the esteemed Guild Leader Undertaker! Oh ho ho! It's such an honor to have a noble guest in this humble abode!"
Back in his heyday, he lived in a luxurious temple as grand as a palace. But here, in the 802nd cycle, Seok-hwa was occupying a shabby hermitage. No more throngs of envoys delivering tributes from every guild leader. Now he just had an empty yard where dust blew around.
His behavior toward me reflected that gap in status. In the old days, he would never have bowed and scrambled like this.
"I heard you're planning some sort of cross-country funeral procession," I said. "I came to discuss it."
"Ohhh, yes indeed! That's exactly right! Actually—come in, come in! I can't let an honored guest stand outside! Right this way, Undertaker! Please, follow me. Oh ho ho."
What can I say?
In front of me stood the man whose life had plummeted to rock bottom purely because of me—because of the existence of a regressor.
-x-X-x-
The Self-Immolator II
Once a former major powerhouse falls to being a small fry, they generally choose one of two paths:
1. "Well, I've already basked in more than enough love and glory. Let's just relax. I'll still manage somehow."
2. "You must respect me. I once conquered all of East Asia. Whenever I held a dharma assembly, tens of thousands gathered. Even the top guild leaders were terrified of me..."
Naturally, our small-fry renegade monk Seok-hwa belonged to the second category. He refused to abandon the glory of his prime (despite not actually remembering the previous cycles) and was willing to do anything to regain it.
There was one particular cycle, for example.
"Everyone! Our nation faces an unprecedented crisis. In such a time, how should we Buddhists across the land respond?"
"That's right. Whenever calamity befell the country, we did not hide away in the mountains. Instead, we took up hatchets and rose to action!"
"Didn't the Great Masters Seosan and Samyeong lead righteous monk armies to defend Joseon? This is the Buddha's will, telling us to save humankind!"
"Let us rise! We must carry on the cause of our ancestors, sages, and the Buddha!"
"All ten million Buddhists of the Three Kingdoms—unite through faith! Let us gather into a monk army, aaaaaah!"
In short, Seok-hwa wanted the Imjin War: Season 2.[1] No drama starring monk-warriors before nor after came close to the era's roaring success.
What Seok-hwa failed to consider, however, was that there was a far larger gap between a Joseon Dynasty-era monk and a modern-day monk than one might think.
For one thing, monks of the Joseon Dynasty often lived in mountain valleys. That wasn't so different from present times, but in those days, those mountains had tigers (size XXXL) lurking around, the literal big cats.
On top of that, in the Joseon Dynasty, monks were regularly conscripted for forced labor whenever the government felt like it. This was partly because Buddhism had accumulated some negative history back in the Goryeo Dynasty, and the logic of not atoning for the sins of one's forefathers didn't really fly in Buddhist circles. They saw it as a form of karma.
Hence, Confucius's quote that "a tyrannical government is more fearsome than a tiger" didn't resonate much with Joseon monks. After all, those monks had to fight both the government and real tigers.
Because of that, they grew strong. Monks of that age lived by the principle that if one saw a fellow monk in the mountains of Joseon, just think, He has survived. Indeed, they had to walk the thin line between life and death every day of their lives.
Meanwhile, what of monks of the modern era?
For starters, the "dungeon" of the forest no longer had giant tigers in it. Most temples had paved roads and stairways leading right up to them. Sure, modern monks did get a bit more protein in their diets than Joseon monks did, but that alone doesn't necessarily develop combat-ready muscle.
Like a popular meme featuring a certain Shiba Inu dog comparing the past to the present went, if the so-called great masters back in Joseon might have said, "Now that we have returned alive from the war, let us rebuild the villages and the city walls alongside the peasants!" the modern monk might well say, "Ugh... The plane ticket to India is just too expensive..."
Such phenomena weren't limited to Buddhist circles. Across all sectors, the human drive for survival and real combat experience had grown weaker with time. It was in such a climate as this that Seok-hwa dreamed of reviving the glory of Imjin War monk armies, shouting, "Make Buddha Great Again!"
The result?
"Eek! D-demons— Demons are coming!"
"Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu!"
"Master! Help us, Masterrr!"
"Huh... Uhhh...?!"
The new-era monk-warrior movement failed spectacularly.
Up north, the Resurrection Church led by Mo Gwang-seo was pushing its congregation into a suicidal Crusade, and down south, Seok-hwa was dragging his own cultists into ruin. Thus, the pseudo-religions ended up in "harmony" by collectively making things worse in what could only be described as a double catastrophe.
In the end, I, the regressor, had to step in.
"Noh Do-hwa, Commander of the National Road Management Corps. Keep an eye on these people. They're dangerous. Always keep them on your radar."
"Sure, yeah. Got it..."
They were promptly blacklisted.
As for Mo Gwang-seo's Resurrection Church, we sent in our alliance's secret weapon, Sim Ah-ryeon, to brainwash them. Success.
Dealing with Seok-hwa was even simpler. We planted an undercover agent nearby, and whenever Seok-hwa tried something suspicious, we quietly sabotaged him. We even enlisted the greatest villain among the pseudo-religious Taoist sects, Cheon Yo-hwa of Baekhwa Girls' High, into our ranks.
Christian, Buddhist, Taoist. All three major heretical factions on the Korean Peninsula were subdued. At least as far as pseudo-religious troublemakers were concerned, peace finally arrived in Korea.
"Er, do you think we'll get many people at tomorrow's dharma assembly?"
"I'm not sure, Monk. Maybe twenty if we're lucky?"
Now the renegade monk Seok-hwa was truly abandoned, like an egg adrift in the Nakdong River.
In truth, his head had always resembled an egg, but now every aspect of his life mirrored one.
"Look at that! Guild Leader Undertaker has come all this way! How can I not serve him some fine tea? This here is a barley tea I've been cherishing. Oh ho ho. I even went to China and bought some Pu'er tea before the devils took over. Please enjoy, Undertaker. Oh ho! It's all sincerity, you see!"
Thus ends the history of how a once EX-tier cult leader ended up groveling in front of me.
"Ah, so! Undertaker, if we unite in one great spirit of faith, I have no doubt even those wandering Hollow will find peace and attain Buddhahood! That is what I firmly believe!" Seok-hwa argued passionately.
Watching him struggle not to remain a small-fry cult leader was almost pitiful.
"...So you're saying that with no real Awakeners at your side, just about ten believers, you plan to travel from Busan to Sinuiju in a grand journey across the peninsula?"
"Yes, indeed. It's extremely dangerous, I know that well. But how can we fear danger when the Great Merciful Buddha is protecting us?"
Countless Hollow still roamed the peninsula. Essentially, Seok-hwa proposed a "pilgrimage," heading north while comforting as many Hollow as possible with funeral rites along the way.
From a certain angle, it was admirable.
'He used the Udumbara virus to expand his following, then tried to start a monk-warrior movement after that failed, and now he's on to cross-country funeral rites.'
He was the genuine embodiment of an iron will to seize power. It was almost awe-inspiring how, despite his utterly shabby appearance, he could stay so unwaveringly driven. Nevertheless, as Do-hwa pointed out, it sounded like a suicide mission.
'Would this renegade monk be able to carry out proper funerals for all those wandering souls?'
And that was before mentioning the other Anomalies and Voids that infested the land. How could he and his tiny band possibly handle them?
Sure, maybe it didn't really matter. The deaths of ten random citizens didn't even qualify as big news anymore. But there was one detail that weighed on my mind...
I glanced at the ten believers gathered outside the temple, humming in thought. Even after his downfall, these stalwart souls still stood by Seok-hwa. Most of them were frail, elderly folks. Among them was one old man who used a piece of medical equipment, built and maintained by Do-hwa, for support.
"Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu..."
That patient's name was Shin Su-bin. He was a grandfather who'd worried about Do-hwa's well-being up until the very moment the world collapsed.
When our eyes met, Su-bin and the other Buddhists clutched their malas and bowed multiple times from the waist.
"Buddha... Maitreya Buddha..."
"May Undertaker bestow mercy upon us..."
I stifled a sigh. Whatever level of Buddhist teaching they might have absorbed, these elderly believers were sincerely praying for our safety, purely out of goodwill.
When I politely nodded in return, they lowered their heads even deeper, looking touched and honored.
"They're who Do-hwa is worried about..." I mused to myself.
She never breathed a word about her patients during our last meeting, but I understood her mindset. Frankly, I couldn't care less if a random renegade monk like Seok-hwa lived or died, but if Su-bin died, it would weigh on Do-hwa's heart. That was what concerned me.
I set down the Pu'er tea and rose to my feet.
"Huh? Wait, Undertaker? Where are you going...?"
Ignoring Seok-hwa calling after me in a fluster, I approached Su-bin, standing across from him. Leaning in slightly, I spoke louder so the elderly man with poor hearing could understand.
"Excuse me, sir."
"Huh?"
"Are you absolutely sure you must join this cross-country journey? I get where you're coming from, but Ms. Noh Do-hwa is really worried about you." When he didn't respond, I continued, "You know her better than anyone. She's not at all like her public image—she cares deeply for her patients. If anything happens to you, she'll be up all night worrying. Can't you just stay in Bansong-dong?"
Su-bin pursed his lips. His eyes, or rather the hollows where his eyes once were, looked as though they had seen enough of the world to have no need for any more barriers between himself and reality.
"My..."
"Yes?"
"My foot hurts, see. It's been giving me trouble. And it feels like I'm burdening Ms. Noh by making her fix it all the time... I feel bad about that..."
"No, she would never think that way."
"Oh, I know. I do know that. But... Ms. Noh is busy handling affairs for the entire nation. I'm an old man who doesn't have much time left anyway. Why keep hogging her attention? That wouldn't be right."
I shut my mouth.
"In half a year, my ankle brace might snap and I'll need her to fix it again, you know? I'd rather go now, while I can still walk around. At least do something meaningful with the little time I have left. Why keep troubling her? So I'm sorry. I have to go."
A fitted protective brace was wrapped snugly around Su-bin's right ankle. Back in the 53rd cycle, when I was assisting Do-hwa in her workshop, I remember seeing a support brace identical to that one.
'This is my own karma, isn't it?'
In the distant past, before Do-hwa had come to command the National Road Management Corps, her workshop was frequently visited by elderly patients like these. To this day, she still juggled her positions as both the Corps commander and an assistive-device technician, accepting patients by appointment.
Yet over time, the number of patients had decreased, however slightly. Because she was the apparent "exalted Commander of the National Road Management Corps," people felt guilty, like it was a nuisance or a risk to take up her time for personal repairs.
And so, I'd swallowed up part of her reason for living.
"I see," I said. "Well, sir, please don't push yourself too hard on that journey. If you're making a trip around the peninsula, be sure to come back home safe."
"Oh no, that might not—"
"Trust me. Meeting you and helping you out is more like therapy for her. She's... Well, she's a bit eccentric about that. She hates politics and much prefers tinkering for her patients. You get it, right?"
"Yes, yes... Thank you. Well, then..."
I looked around, counting a total of eleven old men gathered in the temple. Banners waved in bright colors above their shoulders, painstakingly made with their limited funds, reading things like "Let Our Buddha-Hearts Unite," "Nationwide Funeral Tour," "Namu Amida Butsu," "Gwanseeum-bosal," "Paradise Pure Land."
It was a world too harsh on the elderly.
In an apocalypse that worshipped efficiency, these people were thinking hard about how to exit the stage quietly. Unlike the renegade monk who wanted to exploit these old believers' last moments for his own big "comeback"...
I turned away from the elderly and walked back to Seok-hwa, whose anxious expression lit up in relief upon seeing that I wasn't leaving just yet.
"Oh ho, Undertaker! I was worried you might be heading out. Since you came all this way, why not stay for a meal of temple fare before you go?"
"I'm fine. If you've got the resources, please use them to feed those seniors well, at least once."
"Oh dear. But they've cultivated their minds so deeply, they're already shrouded in the Buddha's compassion—"
My finger pressed into his shoulder, firm and unwavering. "Venerable Seok-hwa."
His eyes went round. His mouth gaped soundlessly, letting a ragged gasp escape. He couldn't even scream properly.
No Aura was needed. Simply pressing a key pressure point was enough to rob this renegade monk of his voice.
"I know all about people like you. Don't go believing you're special. In this world, if you walk around enough, you'll trip over a dime-a-dozen people just like you."
"U-uh, huh... Mmph..."
"You're not the one 'bringing salvation' to others. If anything, you're barely surviving thanks to the people around you. Because for someone out there, you're still one of the few companions they have left... Don't fool yourself into thinking you're blessing others. It's the other way around. Got it?"
"Ugh... Ugh—"
"Do you get it?"
His terrified face went pale as he bobbed his head in a feeble nod. At last, I loosened my grip on his pressure point, preventing him from uttering any audible scream.
"Hhk... Gngh... Hah..."
"Please try to live a quiet life."
Seok-hwa nodded again, fear etched on his face.
The very next day, the "Unite in Buddha-Heart, Cross-Country Funeral Tour Squad" consisting of one renegade monk and eleven elderly believers, departed from Busan.
Footnotes:
[1] Over 8,000 Buddhist monks acted as warriors in the Imjin War against the Japanese invasion, some acting out of Korean patriotism and others to improve the standing of Buddhism with respect to Confucian ideology.
-x-X-x-
The Self-Immolator III
"Sorry about that, Mr. Matiz."
"Hmm? About what?"
"It's about Seok-hwa."
That day, Ji-won had shaken hands with every single member of the funeral procession. Immediately after the ragtag funeral procession led by that bald monk left Busan, she spoke up.
"I should've handled such a socially harmful force myself, taken care of everything discreetly. But they were such small fry that I completely overlooked them. Next time, I'll make sure to crush any loach slipping out of the net."
Our Ji-won has always been unwaveringly devoted to the business of knocking people down. It was kind of admirable...
Admirable...
Is that really a good thing?
We locked eyes. Her gaze was as steady as ever, shining with the same murderous glint.
I did my best to dissuade her.
"There's no need for you to prove your worth time and time again anymore," and "You know better than anyone that you're not going to be abandoned or shunned by the regressor now," and "It'd be strange for the operations team leader of the National Road Management Corps to intervene in some little group of barely ten people," and so on...
"Hmm."
Perhaps my desperate plea got through to her. The quasi-psychopath nodded.
"Still, Mr. Matiz, you must secretly wish for me to quietly kill those folks you can't be bothered to keep an eye on, and do so without leaving any trace―"
"No."
"And then I could just say 'I killed them because I wanted to, so what can you do about it, Mr. Matiz?' and you still wouldn't abandon me, so obviously killing them is the right―"
"No! That's not it."
"Are you certain?"
"I'm certain!"
"Are you absolutely certain?"
"Yes! You psycho!"
Ji-won stared at me silently with a stony face, then left. Even as she departed, her face kept that puzzled look of This is odd. If I kill those small fry, it'd definitely be convenient for you, why do you keep refusing me like some tsundere? all the way until she was out of sight.
Meanwhile, around that same time...
– [BusanAgentno.1] ChiefOh: O wandering souls of worldly tribulations, let us console you. All ye Buddhist faithful of the Korean Peninsula, unite!
SG Net was flooded with advertisements.
– [BusanAgentTower] BotongDaily: Master Monk Seok-hwa steps forward to save the masses! A vow to console wandering souls across the peninsula!
There were no Awakeners among the faithful following Seok-hwa. Naturally, they had no way to advertise their project on SG Net. And that was precisely what "agency services" were for.
These agencies were typically run by small fry with weaker abilities. They took money from ordinary people to post "ads" on SG Net on their behalf, scraping by to survive. They did more than just ads, though. They'd copy the novels serialized on SG Net's Novel Serialization Board into text files and distribute them to regular folks.
(Some of the readers who would later be ambushed by Dok-seo were funneled in through these channels.)
Seok-hwa also used an agency.
– [BusanAgentGold] GeumMi-young: "Even ordinary people can perform exorcisms for the dead?!" Exclusive interview with Seok-hwa, master of funerary rites for the departed!
– [BusanAgentLegacy] sambaekwon: Seok-hwa says, "Reincarnation of Buddha? Nonsense. I am simply a Buddhist disciple, just like all of you."
– [DaejeonAgentNo1] choice: The midway stop for the National Buddhist Pilgrimage Mass Funeral Procession! Daejeon! One hundred thousand believers exclaim: "We await Monk Seok-hwa!"
– [BusanAgentOriginal] Capital: Seok-hwa: "My compassion toward the dead is in no way inferior to an Awakener's." The Great Funeral Procession displays remarkable resolve... Donations pouring in.
It was a show of sheer quantity.
Realistically, for an ordinary person, paying these agencies was no small burden. Normally, thirty to a hundred people would pool their money to hire an agency, piece by piece. But for this particular project, Monk Seok-hwa was going all-in. It was as if all the hidden funds he'd been stashing away in his cult's secret coffers were reserved for precisely this moment. He poured everything, without hesitation, into ad fees, all in the hope of escaping the humiliating label of a "nobody streamer."
The result?
– Anonymous: Is there anyone who wants to meet up regularly at a café for coffee? Mid-thirties since Awakening. Looking for casual friendship. My depth is 700m. (comments: 2)
– [Samcheon] WitchJudge: Couldn't sleep last night, so I made a new song out of my late-night muse. Thoughts? (comments: 1,131)
– Anonymous: I'm with the National Road Management Corps but using Anonymous mode for a moment. If I quit my job now, can I leverage my experience to get recognized in a bigger guild? (comments: 41)
– [BusanAgentGold] GeumMi-young: "Even ordinary people can perform exorcisms for the dead?!" Exclusive interview with Seok-hwa, master of funerary rites for the departed! (comments: 1)
– [AtelierSalt] JustIncense: Regulars' EVENT! Personalized custom fragrance design for you. First 5 people only. No proxy requests. Depth under 200m. (comments: 27)
– Anonymous: Wow, the Grand Witch's new song is lit (comments: 3)
– Anonymous: I listened to the Great Witch's new track... (comments: 1)
Astonishingly, no one cared at all.
Well, they were exactly fated to only zero comments. Every ad post got one comment each.
– OldManGoryeo: Ad spammer GTFO
A comment that, if anything, was worse than having none.
Incidentally, Ah-ryeon typically left comments on nearly any new post that came up on SG Net. That netizen-turned-resident ghost was essentially fused with the community. Could it be she was a real Anomaly?
Anyway.
Effectively zero comments. Effectively zero interest.
Even Ji-won's unfeeling remark about "killing them all" was probably the biggest chunk of attention bestowed upon this so-called "National Buddhist Pilgrimage Mass Funeral Procession."
The days went by.
As mentioned, no one in Monk Seok-hwa and his ragtag band of eleven was an Awakener, meaning I couldn't simply track them down with the cheat code from the Saintess's Clairvoyance, specially designed for me.
Still, that was no problem.
"Hey, Ji-won. By now, that funeral group should've arrived in Daejeon. How's it look?"
"Ah, yes. They left Daejeon this morning. There are now only eight of them left."
Some had gotten sick of it and dropped out, apparently.
"Is Mr. Shin Su-bin still there?"
"He's alive. And so is Seok-hwa."
"...Good news, and also bad news."
The further they traveled, the more pathetic this so-called funeral procession became, and it wasn't just the group's size that was diminishing. The cult leader's wallet was taking a direct hit, in real time.
– [DaejeonAgentNo1] choice: A fervent send-off from Daejeon's Buddhist faithful for the National Buddhist Pilgrimage Funeral Procession! (Photo)
– [DaejeonAgentGalaxy] Team Leader Seo: An open sermon for the homeless... "Enlightenment transcends any literal sense of 'Awakening,' caring for oneself and others alike." Monk Seok-hwa ties the bonds.
The number of ads dropped.
When they had first departed from Busan, they hired dozens of agencies for a full-blown PR blitz, but by the time they passed Changwon, Suncheon, Jeonju, and Daejeon, the ads kept decreasing in frequency.
Finally, upon arriving in Seoul...
– [NorthSeoulAgentOrigin] DongdaemunMarket: The Mass Funeral Procession arrives at the old capital city of the peninsula, Seoul! "Many sacrifices, many souls comforted." Monk Seok-hwa's sermon! A heartfelt resonance for those worn out by life.
Only one agency post remained on SG Net.
I chuckled wryly.
'It was a gamble from the start.'
Jackpot or bust.
Had it been proven successful that "even ordinary people can track down and handle the dead through my teachings," they'd have raked in a fair share of donations by the time they reached Seoul, for sure.
'They were only counting on having enough budget to hold out until they hit Seoul.'
No looking back, just go. However, to their dismay, the project that had sounded somewhat plausible to them at the start backfired spectacularly.
The reason was simple.
"Mr. Matiz. You're already taking enough—no, more than enough—requests from ordinary people and holding funerals for the dead as you travel," Ji-won concluded. "For normal folk, anytime they want, they can submit a missing-person report to any city guild. If they don't trust the guild, they can wait for a National Road Management Corps caravan to pass by and file it there, right?"
They gather all that data and post it on the SG Net's missing-person board.
"Once a decent number of requests have accumulated, you choose the perfect time to personally go out there to conduct the funerals. Meanwhile, the fee is practically free or at least minimal, so it's all the reporters need to do."
She tilted her head.
"It's practically a no-cost funeral service performed by the world's top professional. No sane person would hand over their deceased loved one or friend's funeral to some random bald monk they've never heard of, not when someone like you is around."
"Mm."
"Trying to stir conflict by painting it as 'Awakeners vs. ordinary people' used to be a valid tactic, but with you dominating that 'funeral market,' there's no angle left for them. Reliability, price, convenience, accessibility—there's no area where they can overpower you."
The phrasing aside, that was essentially how things were.
Times had changed. In a distant past, when Monk Seok-hwa had riled up anti-Awakener sentiments, people had rallied behind him in droves. But now, it was the 802nd cycle. Unlike back then, the Korean Peninsula was filled with the forces I had spread across the land.
Just look at Yo-hwa of Sejong City or Ah-ryeon of Pyongyang. Have you ever once witnessed them acting like Awakeners reign supreme and normal humans are trash? (If anything, in Ah-ryeon's case, we might wonder if she's even a person at all. She's basically an Anomaly, after all.)
The Korean Peninsula in the 5th cycle and in the 802nd cycle might as well be two different worlds. Whether there existed an immortal Udumbara virus or not, people had simply changed.
Only Seok-hwa. Only his boundless lust for power and prestige remained the same.
"Mr. Matiz, the group arrived in Pyongyang this morning."
Despite running out of money back in Seoul, they still dragged themselves north.
"How many survivors?"
"Just three, counting Seok-hwa. Some parted ways along the route and settled in the cities."
But, ah, Ji-won added.
"Mr. Shin Su-bin is still accompanying him."
A few days later, a post appeared on SG Net:
– [Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Guys, there's a monk here who says he's going to self-immolate at the upcoming Monster Wave?
I clicked the link immediately.
I'm just some random person who travels between Pyongyang and Sinuiju. Yesterday, I ran into this monk and one other person.
Honestly, at first I thought they were beggars lol. Their clothes were so dirty lol
But we ended up talking. I told them I was going up to Sinuiju, and they asked if they could come along. I asked why, because they're normal folk, right?
He said he's going to show "the demon army" the heart of the Buddha or something, by self-immolating in front of them, talking about compassion and whatnot.
Demon army" = Monster Wave lol
Self-immolation = pouring oil on yourself and lighting yourself on fire, basically killing yourself lol
It sounds like total nonsense, but I've never met an ordinary person who wants a ride north just to do that, so it's kinda fire. I'm thinking of going with them, haha
I scrolled down to see a few comments.
– Anonymous: Nice checks out lol
– Anonymous: Letting some random normal person wander into Sinuiju is basically a death sentence
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Eh what can I do if they're determined to crawl into a place that's basically hell coz they claim it's heaven? lolol
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: So yeah I'm going with them, whatever
– [Eastern Holy State] LowlyPerson: Oh, I think I saw that monk today too. Isn't their party all walking around with canes?
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Yep that's them. Brother or sister in faith.
└[Eastern Holy State] LowlyPerson: Surprising that they tolerated someone from another religion. They could've been hostile.
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Must be thanks to the grace of the Saintess in the North.
└[Eastern Holy State] LowlyPerson: Amen.
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Amen.
– OldManGoryeo: Isn't this the same so-and-so big-whatever group that set out from Busan?
└[Eastern Holy State] KindPerson: Psh, a troll. The Saintess up north would just shake her head at scum like you. Ugh, so pitiful
└OldManGoryeo: ?
My brow furrowed. And no, it wasn't because of Ah-ryeon making my facial muscles twitch. I ran out of that centuries ago.
It was about Seok-hwa.
'Self-immolation.'
Just as the post said, it meant setting one's body on fire as a form of offering.
'Who would've thought a bald monk like Seok-hwa would do that?'
Not once in any previous cycle had I heard something so bizarre.