WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator/Editor: Coughing Baby
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Returned as a God ◈
Chapter 79: If You're Sorry, Then Die (4)
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Park Siyu had definitely killed Yu Chaeyoung. But only a handful of people knew that.
Yu Seyeon knew, of course, and so did Seo Jihoon.
Park Siyu didn't ask how Yu Seyeon had found out.
"Part of me was hoping you'd at least deny it."
"It's true."
"Yeah. Figured you'd answer just like that."
Seyeon's shoulders loosened.
"You don't want to fight me."
"You think you have the right to say that? What do you even know? Unni was everything to me!"
When Seo Jihoon first told her, she'd wanted it to be a lie.
Her wish for Park Siyu to deny it hadn't been fake, not for a second.
Thinking about the hand that had killed her sister, the same hand that had gone on calmly sitting in front of her afterward, made her stomach turn.
"Who's the god Seo Jihoon follows?"
"Beritaas. Yeah. The same god unni used to follow."
Park Siyu had killed Yu Chaeyoung after she broke her taboo.
There was one thing that had always nagged at him.
Or rather, it only made sense after he'd heard the explanation from Kang Hangyeol.
Gods carried taboos too.
The one who broke the taboo wasn't Yu Chaeyoung. It was the god Beritaas.
It wasn't hard to guess that Seo Jihoon, a follower of Beritaas, would have suffered Incursion.
"Hand off the summon ticket and step out of this. Just play dumb."
Boss raids usually happened in remote areas with almost nobody around.
A B-rank rift alone counted as an emergency, so summoning a boss monster on purpose was another level entirely.
"That's a four-star ticket, isn't it?"
"What are you planning?"
"Revenge. Against the ones who did this to unni."
Park Siyu clicked his tongue.
Crazy talk aside, Yu Seyeon showed no interest whatsoever in being talked out of it.
If anything, to Park Siyu's ears, it sounded like she was telling him to go ahead and run the boss raid as scheduled.
Siyu rose from his seat and looked down at Seyeon.
He had no intention of asking forgiveness.
He'd never once regretted the choice.
Call it revenge or whatever, but both of their actions had crossed a line.
"Revenge only breeds more revenge."
"Save the empty lines."
"You want to take me on?"
"God of peace. I can't sympathize with the way you do things."
"You'll die."
"Let's put an end to this."
[Moving to the space between 6 and 7.]
[Been a while, hasn't it?]
"A while, my ass. It's only been two days."
For me it really has been a while, you know.
Do you have any idea how much crap I've had to deal with out here?
And on top of that, the Transcendent Yu Jihan caused trouble the second he stepped out of the dungeon.
Seeing his face in front of me now stirred up a spite that wasn't even there before.
[Consumed 10,000 merit points to gift Yu Jihan Elixir (Special) x3.]
[Here, a present.]
"Whoa."
[What's whoa about it? You were the one screaming about how the potion tastes like wax.]
"Yeah, well, I didn't think you'd just hand this over out of nowhere."
Yu Jihan pulled the bottled elixir from his item window.
A plain glass bottle holding a red liquid.
I'd specially asked Park Siyu to source this elixir.
[That stuff's expensive.]
"Since when does a god care about cheap or expensive?"
[So what, I'm supposed to dig it out of the dirt and sell it myself?]
"What about my merit points? You think 10,000 points come from digging in the dirt?"
[And a human like you has 200,000 points sitting around?]
"You peeked?"
[Perfectly legitimate use of my rights. What were you even doing out there to rack up 200,000 points?]
Layer 5 wasn't exactly the kind of floor that handed out points like that.
Just in case, I checked the Layer 5 footage, but nothing much had happened.
He'd killed every bandit that attacked him, killed them all... then, apparently annoyed, he'd gone off script, raided the bandits' hideout, and when the lord offered compensation, he'd said, "Don't need the money, just let one Fourth-class citizen go," shameless as anything. That was about it.
Huh. Really wasn't much of anything.
Nothing at all.
[Could you please, for once, not cause trouble?]
"Didn't cause any."
[I know your sins, you know.]
[Say what?]
"Already committed the sin once, so what's the difference doing it two or three more times?"
Sir, I don't think that's quite the phrase for this situation.
I had no idea how much time had passed inside the tower, but he'd clearly adapted a lot compared to when we'd first met.
Some other parts seemed to have adjusted too, apparently.
"Let it slide, would you. You didn't used to be like this. Why'd you get so picky all of a sudden?"
[Sure, I bet.]
I couldn't bring myself to say whose fault this all was.
Whose fault, obviously. The Transcendent Yu Jihan's fault.
Now every time I looked at his face, the Transcendent Yu Jihan popped into my head.
"I met those guys."
[Which guys?]
"The ones you told me to go meet."
Ah, right, I did say something like that...
I guess I had. Forgot all about it.
[The Liberation Army?]
"That's what they call themselves, apparently."
[So what are you going to do?]
"Nothing much. One of them seemed interested in me, so we just set up a meeting. Anyway."
Yu Jihan pulled up his status window with practiced ease.
"200 healing potions, 100 mana potions, 100 painkillers, and every shower bomb you've got."
Yu Jihan glanced my way for a second, then answered.
Every time I came in, I noticed his instincts getting sharper.
I couldn't even remember where he'd said to send it all.
The merit points Yu Jihan brought in were substantial.
I hadn't met any of the other challengers, so I couldn't compare, but I doubted anyone else could earn this much no matter who they ran into.
[Consumed 2,400 merit points to gift Small healing potion x200.]
[Consumed 3,000 merit points to gift Mana potion x100.]
[Consumed 500 merit points to gift Painkiller x100.]
[Consumed 2,000 merit points to gift Shower bomb 1k.]
"That's a lot."
[You said give you a lot, didn't you?]
Even a pigheaded contrarian had nothing on this kid.
Yu Jihan cleared out his item window.
He looked like he had more to say.
"Anything else? Skills, or, you know, skills, that kind of thing. Doesn't have to be a skill, but a skill would be even better. Ah, not that I'm forcing you to give me a skill because I specifically need one, absolutely not. Ab.so.lute.ly. Doesn't have to be a skill, so no pressure or anything."
He said the word skill so many times I felt like my eyes were going to catch fire.
Just say you want a skill!
You scary kid.
Even after gifting all this stuff, Yu Jihan's merit points still had plenty of room to spare.
If he'd just hand it over as a sponsorship, wouldn't that kill two birds with one stone?
Feels like the meaning of that phrase got a little twisted somewhere, but let's not worry about it.
- Gift-eligible skills: <Wind Fang> <Moonlight Slash>
[I can give you the skill, but whether you can actually use it depends on you.]
"What's that supposed to mean?"
[Just because you gained a skill doesn't mean you can use it right away.]
Yu Jihan tilted his head, clearly not following.
[Knowing something in your head and pulling it off in real combat are different things. Getting a skill doesn't mean you can suddenly drop meteors out of the sky or whatever.]
"Wasn't expecting that much anyway... So what were the two you taught me before?"
[You learned them, sure, but I'm the one who taught you how to use them.]
Line was the most basic skill I had, nothing especially difficult about it.
As for Mana Detection, that kid was just a natural talent who didn't even realize it himself.
[A little practice between floors isn't enough.]
"Fine, geez, you nag a lot. You're like my parent... no, wait..."
The words slipped out without thinking, and Jihan trailed off mid-sentence.
Staring blankly ahead, Jihan's eyes suddenly went red.
Looking around, he ducked down and buried his face against the desk.
Seemed like, unsure exactly where I was, he'd just decided to hide altogether.
A word tossed out without a second thought had apparently hit some kind of nerve.
Well, I guess that makes sense...
I kept overlapping this kid with the Transcendent Yu Jihan, which felt off, but the two of them, same face or not, were completely different people on the inside.
That other one looked like he'd been through every kind of hell there was.
If you put me from ten years ago and me from ten years from now side by side, could you really call them the same person?
Sure, they'd look alike. Same body, after all.
What I mean is, the time lived, the experiences, the thoughts, all different.
There are worries only certain ages can have, things only people who've lived through certain experiences can understand.
In that sense, it was actually strange that this kid hadn't thought about his family even once until now.
[Consumed 100k merit points to gift Guardian Yu Jihan <Wind Fang> <Moonlight Slash>.]
"My 100,000 points!!"
[Seeing 100,000 points vanish in a flash snap you back to reality?]
Jihan, who'd been slumped over the desk, shot up.
His eyes looked a little red, though.
[Done crying?]
"Hgh, wasn't crying. Wasn't crying. I wasn't crying!"
[Said it once, my ears work fine.]
"Wasn't crying, who's crying? Why would I cry? What kind of lunatic goes bawling their eyes out like some..."
[Cut it out already, you lunatic! You weren't crying!]
"Wasn't crying."
[Sure, sure.]
"I'm serious."
Wipe your tears first, then talk.
Maybe it was because of the Transcendent Yu Jihan, who'd looked like he wouldn't bleed a single drop even if you stabbed him with a knife, but seeing the Jihan in front of me cry felt deeply strange.
If you asked me to name the hardest thing in the world, I'd say, without hesitation, calming down someone who's crying.
[Done now?]
"Wasn't cry... ugh, forget it."
[If you're gonna cry, just cry it out here. Nobody's watching but me anyway.]
Jihan, wearing a sulky expression, nodded without a word.
Once he'd calmed down, I wrapped up the conversation about Layer 6 and the skills with him.
[Moving to the space between 7 and 8.]
[Back again?]
"What are you talking about. It's been a week."
[Moving to the space between 8 and 9.]
[Oh, been a while?]
"I saw you yesterday!"
[Moving to the space between 10 and 11.]
[Hey there.]
"Hey there my ass, how do you even keep track of time, what is wrong with you! Just hand over the items already!"
... Sheesh. End of days, I swear.
[Leaving the Tower of Trials.]
"Ugh, my head."
I came to on the hotel bed and pressed my throbbing forehead.
After clearing the Cockatrice Farm dungeon, Park Siyu had given me some time off.
Things were about to get busy, so this was probably my only window to climb the tower for a while.
I rolled around on a bed big enough to fit four grown men lying side by side.
I opened the community's free board.
Since noona Eunyoung's prank post, number 01, there'd been another post up.
[02. Noona Eunyoung!! 4 days ago]
Views: 1
Author: Unknown
Where are you, comment when you wake up.
└ Song Eunyoung (Follower) O.M.O!!! Hangyeol?? Hangyeol-ah T_T T_T 21 hours ago
"Huh...? Wait, what?"
There was a message from noona Eunyoung.
Judging by how startled the comment sounded, she seemed to be fine.
I left a reply asking what was going on, then called Choi Suhyun.
"Song Eunyoung left a comment?"
"Yeah, 21 hours ago."
"Hey! What am I supposed to do with a comment you check 21 hours later?"
"Ah, ha ha ha. Been kind of busy."
Sitting in the middle of the bed, I scratched at my hazy head.
"So what are you doing today?"
"No plans, really."
If noona Eunyoung hadn't reached out, I'd have planned to eat and head back into the tower.
"Then get down to the Association."
"The Association?"
Why all of a sudden? Did something happen to noona Eunyoung?
Before I could even ask, Choi Suhyun spoke first.
"Come get your aptitude test done."
Footnotes:
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