WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Chen
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◈ Damned Transmigration ◈
Chapter 144: Kang Yu 1
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Though they stayed alert and proceeded carefully, they still found no major problems with the map.
The Rift was such a strange and mysterious place that the map was not accurate enough to call perfect. Still, it was reliable enough to navigate by.
“So…”
Haryeong let out a deep sigh.
“You are saying that we should search this vast Nakseong Cliff for traces of Myou-hee, who fell here six years ago.”
The tangled forest swarming with monsters had been ominous, but Nakseong Cliff beyond it was a chilling sight.
In the distance stood peaks covered in green forest. Something that might have been black clouds or fog drifted through the air, and several winged monsters flapped overhead.
“Hmm…”
Even Estor, usually confident in everything, could not remain composed. He stood at the edge of Nakseong Cliff, quietly gazing across it before lowering his head to look below.
The bottom was obscured by drifting black mist, and the cliff was as steep as though a giant had cleaved a mountain in half with a single stroke.
“Hmm…”
Estor leaned farther over the edge. As expected, he still could not see anything. Could someone survive a fall from here…?
He did not ponder for long.
He was confident he could.
He could probably drive his hands into the cliff and hold on. He still could not use top-tier movement arts like Walking the Void, Air-Stepping, or Celestial Emperor Steps, but he could kick off the cliff and leap back upward.
And if he could not? At the very least, he could slow his fall and land without dying, perhaps even perform a falling technique.
That was, if he fell right now.
“If someone fell from here with fatal injuries, they would probably die…?”
It was high enough that anyone unable even to support their own body would certainly die. Even a Vajra Strongman who had trained their external arts would be smashed apart and reduced to pulp after falling from here.
“I think so too.”
He had guessed from the map, but Nakseong Cliff was broad and high. It had to stretch several kilometres from one end of the cliff top to the other.
Yuri looked from one end of the cliff to the other with a helpless expression and let out a deep sigh.
“Let’s search the top first.”
“How are we supposed to search? Are we looking for bloodstains Myou-hee supposedly left here six years ago?”
“After six years, there is no way bloodstains would remain. Any traces of battle would have vanished long ago too.”
Many people came and went through the Rift. At least dozens must have set foot on Nakseong Cliff over the past six years.
“Still, we came all this way, so I want to try something. You two can rest if you want. Myou-hee is my friend, not yours.”
“Why would you say something so hurtful?”
Estor immediately frowned and smacked Yuri on the shoulder.
“Your friend may not be my friend yet, but if I meet her and speak with her, then naturally she will become my friend.”
After saying that, Estor lowered himself so far he could have crawled on all fours and began scanning the ground with wide eyes. Then he slowly moved forward.
“I do not know whether she is Myou-hee, the Black Rabbit Society Leader, USAUSAMI, or Cat Panties. Still, since Yuri wants to find her, I will help for Yuri’s sake. Therefore, Yuri must remember my goodwill and repay it later.”
Haryeong said that as she walked while inspecting the ground. She did not crouch as low as Estor, but her wide eyes were diligently sweeping over the earth.
Yuri opened his Transcendent Sight as well. He had only done so in case it revealed something different, but the Rift was not a comfortable place to view through Transcendent Sight in the first place.
This Rift was saturated with the Evil God’s divine power. Mana was chaotically entangled by that accumulated divine power.
Yuri’s Transcendent Sight saw the unseen. Even the Rift’s divine power, which he had only vaguely sensed in the past, was now clearly visible.
It felt like staring intently at one of those pictures or images that caused optical illusions. Simply looking at it made his head spin and left him feeling sick.
Yuri shook his head hard and blinked several times. There was nothing to see around here, so he decided to keep looking as they moved.
‘Of course there wouldn’t be.’
They spent an entire day combing through the top of Nakseong Cliff. Yuri endured the unpleasant dizziness and maintained his Transcendent Sight, but he found nothing that could be called a trace.
“What will you do now?”
“When daylight comes, I will climb down the cliff.”
Yuri answered while rubbing his aching eyes.
“Thanks to you, I get the rare experience of climbing down a Rift cliff with nothing but my bare hands.”
Haryeong gave a hollow laugh, but she did not say she disliked the idea.
The next morning.
“Please lend me Black Fang.”
After washing up, Haryeong confidently held out her hand.
“Why Black Fang all of a sudden?”
“I am not as confident in my footwork as Yuri, and unlike Estor, I do not have a good sword to drive into the cliff in an emergency. If I fall, should I not have something to drive into the cliff as a safety measure?”
The more Yuri listened, the more reasonable it sounded. Black Fang had originally belonged to Haryeong anyway, so he handed it over without much thought.
“Then let us go.”
Standing at the cliff edge, Haryeong gripped Twin Fangs in both hands with a serious expression. Estor beside her also looked somewhat tense.
He had experienced many things in life, and while staying on Uicheon Mountain, he had faced life-threatening danger every day…
But voluntarily jumping off a cliff was a rare experience in one’s life.
“Who goes first?”
“I will.”
Yuri had never gone bungee jumping or skydiving either.
The Yuri in the dream Agwi had shown him had gone to an amusement park with friends in an imaginary high school. But the real Lee Su-hyeok had only been dragged to amusement parks for school events and had never even ridden a thrilling attraction.
Still, Haryeong and Estor were going through trouble that had nothing to do with them because of him. The least he could do was jump first. Yuri steadied his breathing and looked down the cliff.
The flying monsters shrieking overhead were one thing, but that black cloud or fog looked horrifying.
‘Still, I won’t die.’
Yuri could not yet use top-tier movement arts either, but beyond footwork, he also knew levitation magic. He swallowed hard and leapt off the cliff.
The sensation of floating passed in an instant, followed by the fall. Yuri frantically kicked his legs to slow his descent.
Glancing up, he saw Estor and Haryeong falling as well. They kept close to the cliff, preparing to react immediately if necessary.
‘Fuck.’
The more the sensation of falling pressed down on him, the more he thought that he would definitely die if this continued. He also began wondering whether Myou-hee and the Black Rabbit Society Leader might really be different people.
Yuri threw open his Transcendent Sight and glared at the cliff rushing past.
At that moment.
Something inside his clothes began vibrating. It was the map he had bought from the Black Rabbit Society. Yuri flinched and pulled it out.
‘What is this?’
He had already examined the magic on the map. There had been nothing special or suspicious about it.
This vibration was not caused by the magic used to create the map. The paper itself was responding to something and shaking.
Why now? He did not need to think about the reason. The Black Rabbit Society had not been selling this map here without cause after all.
“Yuri?”
When Yuri, who had fallen first, began accelerating downward instead of slowing down, Haryeong cried out his name in alarm.
“Follow me!”
The farther he fell, the stronger the vibration became. Yuri shouted that and focused on the map’s trembling, searching for the direction in which it grew stronger.
Then he broke through the drifting black fog. It had looked terrifying from above, but once he passed through it, it was merely fog with an odd colour.
“Aaargh!”
Estor screamed from above. Yuri glanced over and saw Estor descending through the fog with both arms flailing.
Yuri twisted his body in the air and kicked his feet. He repeated that several times, following the source of the map’s growing vibration. It was close.
Yuri stared at the cliff with wide eyes.
He spotted a tiny hole that had not been visible from above. It was barely large enough for one person to enter. The map’s trembling grew stronger whenever he came closer to it.
‘Found it.’
Whoosh! Levitation magic caught Yuri’s body. He floated in the air and reached out to Haryeong and Estor.
“Can this damned magic only be used on yourself?”
“I haven’t learned any more magic.”
Yuri answered with a bitter smile and slowly approached the hole. The entrance was barely large enough for one person, but it was spacious inside.
“A… a fortuitous encounter.”
Estor muttered. A hidden cave in a mountain or cliff. Could there be anything more obvious than that?
“In the novels I read as a child, there was always a fortuitous encounter like this. Inside this cave, there will be an eccentric expert of the previous generation who died while meditating, along with martial arts manuals, spiritual elixirs, or perhaps a map showing where they were hidden.”
“If there was, it was probably looted six years ago.”
The map clearly pointed deeper into the hole. Yuri slowly entered.
The farther they walked past the narrow entrance, the wider it became, though the cave was not very deep. After walking a little, they saw its end.
There was a chest.
“A… a fortuitous encounter.”
Estor muttered again. He swallowed hard and looked around the cave.
He wondered whether there might be an eccentric expert of the previous generation left behind as a mummy or skeleton, but nothing of the sort was visible no matter how carefully he looked.
Leaving Estor to reminisce about the novels he had read as a child, Yuri approached the chest.
There was magic placed on it. He did not know what might happen to the contents if he tried to force it open, so he first examined its surface.
“What is this now?”
[If you are a traitor who rebelled against this Myou-hee and have come to pay for your sins, place your hand upon this chest and state your name.]
[If you have only arrived here by chance, quietly leave. This chest is not for you. Should you ignore this Myou-hee’s words and attempt to force open the chest, great calamity will befall you.]
[If you are… this Myou-hee’s friend, who heard of the tragedy of Rabbit Star from those traitors and came here with a grieving heart, place your hand upon this chest and answer the question. What was the name of the chat room where we held secret conversations on Earth in the past?]
Yuri silently stared down at the chest. He did not need to think about the first two questions.
The final question.
The tragedy of Rabbit Star? She really was not in her right mind. Just as with Chuk-sin-doo, Myou-hee must have lived in this world for too long and lost her mind.
‘A chat room would be… a messaging room.’
It was not difficult to remember.
The chat feature offered by the Seronis fan community only allowed one-on-one conversations.
At first, he had no one worth speaking to, so he had not found it inconvenient. But once he had begun exchanging messages with several people, including Chuk-sin-doo, one-on-one chat rooms had inevitably become inconvenient.
It was Cat Panties who had created a group chat room then.
After clicking the link they had suddenly sent through chat, Yuri had stopped using the site’s one-on-one messaging.
“Hmm…”
Yuri hesitated briefly before placing his hand on the chest.
“Cat Fan Club.”
He did not know whether it meant a fan club for cats or a fan club for Cat Panties. But that had been the chat room’s name.
The moment he spoke the name, the chest shone. Yuri flinched, but he did not remove his hand.
Creak, creak. A sound rang out from within, and the magic inscribed on the chest was released.
Click!
The locked chest opened. Yuri had worried he had answered incorrectly, and he swallowed a sigh of relief.
The only chat room Yuri knew was Cat Fan Club, but what if… truly, what if there had been another chat room that excluded only Yuri?
What if the name of the chat room this chest sought was not Cat Fan Club, but something completely different?
If that were the case, his heart might have broken a little…
‘No, I still don’t know…’
He could not let down his guard. He prepared even his protective force aura in case a trap activated as payment for an incorrect answer, then opened the chest.
Flash!
The moment he opened it, hazy smoke surged upward. A trap? Yuri recoiled in surprise, but the smoke did not attack. Instead, someone’s figure appeared within the billowing smoke.
They wore a pitch-black robe and a rabbit mask with tall ears.
[Aah, aaaaaah!]
Judging by the voice, it was a woman. She trembled at the shoulders and raised both clenched fists high.
[Have you come seeking this Myou-hee?!]
“What the fuck is this?”
[Who are you?! Chuk-sin-doo? FUCKINGSEXY? Cat Panties? UrMumSpammer?!]
“Myou-hee… are you USAUSAMI?”
[Did you hear of this Myou-hee’s tragedy from the traitors of Rabbit Star who dared rebel?! Ah, if only this Myou-hee had captured every last one of them and beaten them senseless. That regret shall remain with me for eternity.]
The conversation was not connecting. This was not communication. At some unknown time, Myou-hee, who had survived after entering this cave, had left behind a recording.
[I do not know exactly who you are, but I firmly believed that someone would certainly find this Myou-hee! If this Myou-hee fell upon this mountain, then you would surely! Miss this Myou-hee and throw yourselves off the cliff…!]
It was a hole that could not be found without falling off the cliff.
[I know not how much time has passed since the tragedy, but this Myou-hee suffered terrible things here… The subjects to whom this Myou-hee showed mercy, whom this Myou-hee took in and cared for, dared attempt rebellion against this Myou-hee. This Myou-hee fell from the cliff in pain and grief, barely entered this cave, and preserved her life.]
It was already what Yuri had expected. He quietly listened to Myou-hee’s story.
[But the injuries were severe… Surviving alone was a miracle, but during the process of recovering from those injuries, this Myou-hee was left with wounds and aftereffects that could never be erased. Perhaps, perhaps by the time you see this recording, this Myou-hee may no longer be in this world…]
“No way.”
Yuri muttered, swallowing hard. They had gone through all this trouble to find her, only for her to possibly be dead?
[Of course, this Myou-hee shall not die so easily! This Myou-hee barely escaped that hellish world and came to such a wonderful one. How could this Myou-hee die in vain?!]
Myou-hee in the mist declared, her shoulders trembling.
[In any case, this Myou-hee has her own circumstances and cannot move freely, so she cannot immediately reveal her name to you. Instead, let us arrange to meet. If this Myou-hee is alive, she will certainly know how this chest was opened.]
“So when are we meeting?”
[There is an inn called Full Moon Pavilion in Jeongro. Meet at Bright Moon Hall in Full Moon Pavilion during this year’s Bright Moon Festival. If the Bright Moon Festival has already passed, meet there next year. If, if this Myou-hee does not come, then she is no longer in this world… You must become Myou-hee, or Rabbit Lord, in this Myou-hee’s place and turn this world into Rabbit Star…]
With those final words, Myou-hee’s figure disappeared and the smoke scattered. Yuri immediately looked down at the bottom of the chest where the smoke had poured from.
He had hoped there might be a martial arts manual or something similar, but all that lay at the bottom was a dull black object that looked like a fragment of metal.
“What is this?”
Yuri tilted his head and picked up the metal fragment.
Looking closer, it did not feel like metal. It was light, and when he turned it slightly, it was somewhat transparent.
“Is it not a scale?”
Haryeong, who had been peeking from behind, spoke.
Now that she mentioned it, it did look like a scale rather than a fragment of metal.
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