WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Haruto
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ A Gacha Addict's Life in Fusionpunk ◈
Chapter 15: I'm an Experienced Hire (4)
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1.
Incongruously.
A voice as pure as blue hydrangeas at dawn echoed through the underpass.
“You’re Cedric Montraven, right?”
Why?
Why the hell was that samurai bitch here?
Ceres, did you rat me out again? No. I hadn't even crossed paths with Ceres this run.
Then Isis? Probably not. She had her Commandment. Unless that Commandment itself had been a fake?
That didn't make sense either. I had checked the truth with the coin.
Then how had she found me earlier than expected?
Stop.
Thinking about that was pointless right now.
Important things first. Unimportant things later.
Survive.
That was the goal I had to achieve above all else.
But the body that needed to move right away was still frozen stiff.
To be honest, after spending a pretty great week as John Wick, I had entertained the tiniest thought.
With Laplace’s Eye and Big-Magnum Revolver Hero, maybe I could somehow at least escape...
It was a ridiculous fantasy.
“Hm? You’re with your sister? Good. This makes things easier.”
But seeing that crazy bitch again made me realize just how impossible that fantasy was.
It was impossible.
Outwit her? Improvise in the moment?
That only worked when the difference in ability was within reason.
I knew it instinctively.
The entire hundred-meter underpass was that woman’s Sword Domain.
“Huff, huff...”
Chills ran through me until my skin tingled. My breath came short, as though I were about to hyperventilate.
Just standing across from her made sticky sweat run down my chin.
It had to be trauma.
No. Stay calm. You’re John Wick.
It wasn't trauma.
Her terrifying presence was simply crushing me.
It was my avoidance mechanism, wanting to die quickly, regress, and escape somehow.
But...
Was that really so bad?
I must have made some mistake this run. I could accept this clean failure and wait for the next chance...
Then, inside my weakening mind, a black-and-white photo of Nietzsche appeared and solemnly declared:
“Hey. You left your Universal Coins in your studio apartment.”
Oh, right. Fuck!
My precious Universal Coins!
After summoning them once, they wouldn't go back into my inventory, so I had left all but four in my studio apartment.
Did I think I was going to die like this?
After rolling around in a field of dog shit and becoming the J. Gatsby of Necropolis for barely an hour?
Absolutely not! I hadn't spent a single cent yet!
Think, think, think.
Don't stop thinking. What did I have? What could I do? I would use every possible variable to break through this situation.
Right, the Universal Coins! Should I offer her half the money if she let me live?
Idiot move. There was a 58,000% chance she would kill me and take the coins anyway.
Right. I had the Wondrous Dharma Insect-Sound Sutra. An SR-rank joker for raising hell.
I wasn't sure I could control it. But this was the moment to do something, anything.
Furube yurayura. Here I go.
“Furube...”
I quietly brought up my inventory and reached inside.
No, I tried to.
“What a disappointment.”
“...What?”
A bizarre sight met my eyes.
Why was my hand over there?
My precious right hand had been cut off at the wrist and was rolling around in the mud.
Even though every nerve in my body was focused, Laplace’s Eye had detected nothing through that entire process.
The delayed agony struck my brain.
“...!”
Suppressing my scream, I tried to pull out the Wondrous Dharma Insect-Sound Sutra with my other hand.
Spurt.
My other wrist flew off too.
Ah, fuck. I couldn't take this anymore.
“Fuuuuuck! That hurts! You fucking bitch! I told you not to use Malevolent Shrine!”
As I screamed and thrashed, Arbel, who had been on my back, tumbled away.
Even from that impact, she didn't regain consciousness.
Then again, even if she had, nothing would have changed.
Even Arbel, who had raged when I kissed her, had never given off such an overwhelming presence.
An inhuman monstrosity that could crush an ordinary human, perhaps even another mage, like an ant.
That was the true nature of the death that had come for me.
“Your sister was boring... I had high expectations for you.”
Think. Think. Don't give up.
Laplace’s Eye observed and predicted the laws of physics. Did that mean her attacks lay beyond those laws?
Then what principle made them work?
Why had the underpass lights suddenly gone out? Right. It had happened during the mansion attack too. Back then, night had fallen.
What did this phenomenon mean? How could I counter it? Was it preparation for an attack?
What rank was she? What was her name? Where was she from? Who did she belong to? Why had she attacked me? Was there anything I could gain through conversation? What had she expected from me?
“Still, you don't seem entirely hopeless. It would be a shame to end things here, wouldn't it?”
The woman had been softly, almost sing-song, saying whatever she pleased. Then her eyes turned toward Arbel, lying limply on the ground.
A smile touched her lips, as though she had found something interesting.
“I'm feeling generous. This is your last chance.”
My thoughts, bubbling wildly like the breath of someone drowning, came to a halt.
“I’m going to count to three.”
A coldness that seemed to freeze my stomach stopped my thoughts.
“Three.”
“...Hey, don't.”
“Two.”
“I said don't! You fucking bitch!”
Because instinctively, I knew what that bitch was about to do.
“One.”
“Fuck!”
The instant the countdown ended, I squeezed my eyes shut and threw myself toward Arbel.
But without meaning or warning, Arbel's sprawled body jolted once.
My body merely skidded across the floor and rolled away after the fact.
“What a pity, Cedric.”
Blood welled up in thick bubbles along the thin red line across the sack.
Bright-red blood spread across the shattered tiles like a spiderweb.
All I could do was lie helplessly in the mud and watch.
“...”
The woman looked down at me without the slightest remaining interest.
“...”
I crawled toward Arbel.
I'm sorry, Arbel.
I guess this was as far as I got this time too.
I bit the disordered sack in my teeth.
At least I covered the two halves of Arbel's body with it again.
I just wanted to do that much.
I stood.
Dizziness washed over me.
Blood gushed without stopping from both wrists, painting the floor with the tragic ending of this run.
“You were unlucky, Cedric.”
I would die soon.
My body would be cut in half, and I would fall into that terrible place filled with death.
But.
“Hey.”
This wouldn't be the end.
“Pray that I keep being unlucky next run.”
Maybe my head was going strange from blood loss.
Even in that terrible pain and fear, a fierce laugh leaked out.
“Next run?”
“When we meet again, if I have a common-sense rewrite app or something...”
I burned the image of the woman tilting her head in puzzlement, one hand resting on her sword hilt, into my retinas.
“...You’ll see hell.”
Instead of a middle finger, I raised my severed wrist.
With a snort, as though she had heard a pathetic joke, a silver flash burst forth.
A momentary flash.
My consciousness scattered into darkness.
Nietzsche said it.
That which does not kill me makes me stronger.
And in this godforsaken world...
“See you next time.”
Nothing could kill me.
======
『 END 1. I Do Not Know Your Name 』
Poor thing. You met death in the most banal way.
What a predictable ending, wrought by your ignorance and negligence.
Well, whether this comforts you or not...
You still have plenty of chances left to fail.
<Iteration Results>
▶ Achievements Earned: None
▶ Titles Earned: None
▶ Challenge Points: +26 pt
※ A death penalty will be applied. ※
[ Late Response ]
[ One-Armed ]
- You begin with your left arm severed.
- This remains in effect until this route ends.
The Misfortune-Warding Talisman prevents [ One-Armed ].
Uses remaining: 4.
At the end of pride and folly, may you reach transcendence.
======
#
Once again, I was cast into the heart of death.
Endless emptiness.
Whenever I came here, my thoughts spun uselessly, as though several teeth had been forcibly removed from a gear.
Deep thought was impossible. One second passed like a year, and one year like a second.
Once I left, it all felt like an instant and most of the memories vanished. It felt like I had really pressed the 500-Million-Year Button.
The 500-Million-Year Button sent you somewhere with nothing.
The difference was that this place was full of unpleasant deaths.
“Fuck...”
This was why I didn't want to come here.
Don't give me the Room of Spirit and Time and a penalty. Just give me a one-click reset!
A long, long time passed.
As I drifted for eons at the bottom of death like a garbage bag swept along by a current...
Lick.
A rough tongue licked my cheek.
“My sister won't be at the Academy.”
“...What?”
“If I go there, I can't be with my sister.”
“You, you...?”
The third run had begun.
...What had that just been?
3.
A vigorous and strong start to the third run.
Until the body, forced to begin that tedious puppet show by the [ Late Response ] death penalty, fell into Necropolis...
“AAAAAGH! Aaaagh! Aaaaaaagh!”
Inside, I was weeping tears of blood.
There were two things a man could never get used to, no matter how many times they happened. One was re-enlisting. The other was, “I shall live, I shall live, in the green mountains I shall live.”[1]
If my body had been free to move, I would have scraped myself across the floor, ripped out every hair on my head, and turned into James Bond.
“Boo hoo! Fuck! Fuck! My money... my Universal Coins... my SSR...”
How hard had I worked to pull that SSR?
I was just about to escape Necropolis and become a casino VVIP, slurping apple-mango shaved ice spoon-fed by Arbel in a reverse bunny-girl outfit[2] at an Aden resort flowing with milk and suntan oil!
My paradise had vanished like a mirage. Ah, my nostalgia.
At least Arbel came back to life.
But the Universal Coins I had left in my studio apartment? No matter what happened, they were never coming back!
Why?
Why, of all times and places, had that bitch appeared there?
And faster than in the last run.
I hadn't even met Ceres this run.
I had met Isis instead, but she had her precepts.
The only thing the two deaths had in common was this.
Less than three hours after I showed Arbel to a mage, that crazy bitch came looking for me.
Were all mages connected through some sacred Khala?
Was revealing an identity really such a careless thing to do?
There were too many variables.
This setting was too complicated!
My head was getting more complicated too.
Then let's interpret it again through simple genre conventions.
Whenever I died, I regressed to the point where I had chosen an option.
Based on the clause in [ Late Response ], stating that it remained in effect until this route ended, I could infer that the route was decided at the point I selected an option.
Could [ Death Game LV.0 ] be an ability that made me loop within a route whenever I died, until the next choice appeared?
Wait. A loop?
A dizzying hypothesis came to me.
A route, a loop, regression.
An endlessly repeating ring of fate.
Could that insane killer be a fate I couldn't shake even by repeating runs? A worldline? This route's boss, perhaps?
An inevitable encounter regardless of what I did?
And within about a week?
Possessing the body of a dissolute count's son and becoming terminally ill was one cliché, but was I terminally ill in the physical sense?
“Fuck.”
That bitch wasn't a death variable.
She was a death constant.
She was a monster who turned human arms into Zealots before I even had time to take the Wondrous Dharma Insect-Sound Sutra out of my inventory.
I didn't stand a chance without a common-sense rewrite app, and she would automatically spawn in a week?
As I chewed over those troubled thoughts, I took a forced nap in my wretched little room, where the Universal Coins no longer shone.
When I woke up...
Ding!
A notification appeared in my status window.
“What is it?”
「Dying Message from the Future」
- Rank: C
- Description: You receive a letter from your future self. It is not a love letter.
- Effect: Upon death, you receive a clue about the cause of death in the previous run, in no more than five characters.
- Note: Activates automatically upon restarting a run. Single-use.
“Oh, right.”
I had this!
The joker I had earned with the Misfortune-Warding Talisman, my death insurance!
Sorry! I had expected so little from it that I completely forgot!
Still, unlike some shady Korean insurance company, it contacted you right away when you died.
I was completely lost. I desperately needed even the thinnest clue.
If it was me from the future, I would surely have left a good hint in five characters.
I trusted you, Cedric.
I unfolded the note.
Five dark-red characters, as though written in blood, ran vertically down the old, worn slip of paper.
D
U
M
P
¤[3]
Footnotes:
[1] The quoted refrain is from Cheongsan Byeolgok, a medieval Korean lyric. “Cheongsan,” literally “green mountains,” is also a financial term for liquidation, linking the refrain to the narrator’s lost fortune.
[2] reverse bunny-girl outfit: A Japanese fanservice variation on the bunny suit that reverses ordinary coverage, covering normally exposed areas and exposing normally covered ones.
[3] “Dump ¤”: throw away the Universal Coins. The currency sign preserves the five-character limit of the original Korean hint.
“Furube Yurayura” and “Malevolent Shrine” reference Jujutsu Kaisen.
The “green mountains” refrain quotes Cheongsan Byeolgok, a medieval Korean lyric.
A reverse bunny-girl outfit reverses ordinary bunny-suit coverage, covering normally exposed areas and exposing normally covered ones.
The final clue is five Korean syllable blocks in the original, matching the system’s stated limit.
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