WeTried Translations

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ I'm an Infinite Regressor, But I've Got Stories to Tell

Chapter 409

──────

The Exhibitor III

Reminiscence.

I am always thinking about how I can be truthful to all of you.

I must confess now, there was a rather desperate reason why I hired the ‘ghostwriter’ known as Oh Dok-seo.

Was it merely to subjugate Infinite Metagame? That was part of it, but that wasn't the only reason.

I was fundamentally unsuited to writing the story of my own life.

I couldn't be any other way.

Far down the street, the back of someone you know is walking. So you quicken your pace and call their name.

“Ah.”

That person turns around.

“Undertaker. What a coincidence. Are you going somewhere?”

A daily occurrence. A normal reaction. A natural response.

However, for me, who possesses the [Complete Memory] ability, such a thing never happens.

That person.

"Ah" "Vice Guild Leader?" "Undertaker" "I knew you'd come" "Why are you so late?" "I've been curious since we first met… what is that staff?" "What a coincidence" "Hm? Oh, it was you? Sorry. I was lost in thought for a moment" "What, that outfit again? I told you not to wear it because it's so dreary" "You really are always wearing a barista uniform" "Are you going somewhere?"

They look back at me. They keep walking, as if they didn't hear. They smile brightly. They blush and grin. They snort as if it’s absurd. They playfully jab my side with their elbow. They clasp their hands behind their back.

Now, after more than 1,000 regressions.

There are over 1,000 versions of you.

“…”

Complete Memory.

The coexistence of the past and the present.

Within the scene that unfolds before my eyes like a kaleidoscope, I am like an archaeologist, brushing away the sands of the past to separate them from the present.

I snatch up ‘this cycle’.

How can I possibly convey this feeling to you all?

I select the most appropriate vision that fits the context of the present moment.

In a way, you could say that I immersed myself and ‘acted’ as the me of this regression.

It is so natural to me that there are many aspects that are, conversely, difficult to explain.

“…”

Sometime ago.

“Mister. I'm sorry, but this is… unusable.”

Oh Dok-seo said, picking up my manuscript.

Yes. Originally, I had no intention of leaving the novel's writing entirely to her. I had planned to help with a significant portion.

What Oh Dok-seo was holding was my first draft.

“What do you mean, unusable? Why?”

“Well… for a single line of dialogue, there are a thousand lines overlapping. Also, at this point in the novel, we should be telling the story of the 20th cycle, but there’s dialogue that appears much later, around the 400th cycle. If it’s like this, the readers can’t follow.”

“But Dokseo.”

I said.

“This is the truth, for me.”

“…”

Oh Dok-seo’s expression distorted.

“If my truthful world seems bizarre in your eyes. Then perhaps I really have already degenerated into an anomaly.”

“…”

A long silence followed.

Oh Dok-seo took off her hat.

“…No.”

She opened her laptop, unclasped her hands, and looked straight at me.

“That’s not it. Mister, you just became an awakener with an ability called Complete Memory. You just rolled through hundreds of regressions because you didn't give up, and the result of that is becoming an anomaly? I can never accept something like that.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“I’ll edit it for you.”

Oh Dok-seo put on her glasses.

It was a tool she only wore when writing her novel alone, saying for some reason that she didn't like showing her face with glasses to others.

“There’s no reason anywhere for you to lie to the readers, Mister. Just tell me things as they are. Instead, I’ll edit it in my own way—as much as possible, as sequentially as possible.”

“…”

“You said I’m not just the priestess of Infinite Metagame, but your priestess too, right? This is perfect. That’s originally the role of a priestess, isn't it? An intermediary. To interpret and translate the language of a god.”

I am always thinking about how I can be truthful to all of you.

“Let’s share the truth.”

“...”

“Your truth is your own, Mister. I’ll also be faithful to my truth. The friction that arises between the two, the narrative errors, I’ll take full responsibility for all of it.”

That was my editor.

That was the solution Oh Dok-seo presented.

“But… okay. I finally understand.”

“Understand what?”

“I was curious how you could tread the same path hundreds of times without getting tired. Where that mentality came from.”

A bitter smile crossed Oh Dok-seo’s lips.

“From your perspective, Mister, the same route isn’t all that bad. Why? Because it’s easier when people’s reactions are the same. It eliminates the ‘need to distinguish only this regression from the hundreds of other people’.”

“…”

“Of course, since you're human too, there must be times you get tired. At those times, you create a ‘regression that will never overlap with other regressions’. Well. Either way, there’s a common point in making the other person’s reaction into ‘one’.”

I nodded my head.

“But there is one problem.”

“Hm? What problem?”

“Didn’t we decide that I would be in charge of the descriptions of you?”

“Ah. Um. In that case, just try to follow the way I wrote the novel.”

Oh Dok-seo shrugged her shoulders.

“It doesn’t really matter if you lie a little to the readers about me, right? I’m just an editor, anyway. Originally, I’m a presence that shouldn’t even be revealed at the forefront of the novel.”

“Hmm.”

“In the Regression Alliance, I’m a bit of a clown anyway. I don’t really have any desire to show my true self to the readers.”

“Will you be okay with that?”

“Yes. That’s what I want.”

And so it was.

“I will never let you be treated like an anomaly, Mister.”

Oh Dok-seo’s eyes shone with a red light.

“I’ve decided. In the novel I’m going to write, all the story titles will end with ‘Ja’.”

“Ja?”

“Yes. The character for person, 者. In the end, this will be a story of a person, a story of a person meeting another person.”

“…”

I held back a smile at that grandiose declaration.

“For something like that, it seems you haven't followed it very well.”

“Huh?”

“Like ‘The Monad’ (單子). Or ‘The Potato’ (감자). In the first case, it’s the character for son (子), and in the second case, it’s just pure Hangeul.”

Oh Dok-seo’s head tilted.

And her lips parted.

“What are you talking about?” “Ah, jeez. That was like a short story collection! Make an exception!” “I never wrote a chapter like that?” “Potato (Gamja) was a title that omitted the ‘si’ from Gamsija (Watcher). And it was a pun that meant potato at the same time. In reality it’s Potato, so I wasn’t wrong anyway” “The character for son is similar to the character for person, so shouldn’t it be fine?” “Sorry, mister” “I didn't understand what you just said” “What did you mean?”

“…”

I smiled.

“It’s nothing.”

“Honestly, Mister. As if it’s not enough that you have the protagonist attribute, you’re always muttering nonsense or talking to yourself.”

“…”

Reminiscence.

To me, a reminiscence was the same as the present.

Life was always an epilogue.

――Every time I faced the Ten Legs.

There, I saw not only the teeming tentacles but also the figures of my comrades.

There was Dang Seo-rin, her head severed. There was Old Man Scho, his chest pierced. There was Yu Ji-won, who had pushed me aside and died in my place. In all sorts of ways, my comrades who had died in each cycle were collapsed at the tips of the tentacles, under the grasp of the Ten Legs.

“Undertaker…” “Doc!” “Your Excellency,” “Run” “At least you” “I’ll cover the back!” “Please, my last words” “We’ve been annihilated” “Vice Guild Leader!” “Sorry” “For getting you caught up in this” “Another failure” “The defense line,” “…” “I’m sorry” “Will you tell the next me?”

This world hated humanity.

The anomalies were insulting humans.

They were even desecrating the deaths of humans.

I could not forget.

I could not run away.

I simply could not forgive.

I had been seen through by Sim Ah-ryeon.

A secret that only Oh Dok-seo had known. A truth that I had even told Oh Dok-seo myself first, Sim Ah-ryeon had figured it out entirely on her own.

It was a surprising thing.

But for some reason. In a corner of my heart, there was also a feeling that it was ‘natural’.

Sim Ah-ryeon ate human emotions. As a joke, I had described her a few times as ‘the bird that drinks poison’, but in truth, she was closer to ‘the bird that drinks emotions’.

Before Sim Ah-ryeon, every human could not help but reveal their true, bare face.

For example.

– Can I take a picture? Miss artist?

That visitor’s request, which sounded perfectly ordinary on the surface, might have sounded completely different to Sim Ah-ryeon’s ears.

Because the color changed depending on what kind of emotion was held.

Was it pure fan adoration? Did they want to brag to someone? Was it to spread her personal information on SG Net by pretending it was a mistake. Was it lust?

Whatever it was, Sim Ah-ryeon ‘felt’ it.

Since Sim Ah-ryeon’s intelligence was by no means low, she could also guess the events that would follow based on the emotions she felt.

So she answered.

– Pardon? No. I absolutely hate the idea…

– Eh.

– Eh.

The reaction was misaligned.

A frictional sound. Noise was generated.

An irreparable gap had opened up between the world Sim Ah-ryeon perceived and the world people walked in.

It was the same when having a conversation.

– Hahh, i-it was really tight. It reminded me of the deadline for the graduation exhibition for the first time in a while. I don’t have those dreams much these days, but before, whenever my condition got a little bad, I always had, had nightmares about the graduation exhibition…

Even when the other person was quietly listening to her story, Sim Ah-ryeon could actually see the other person’s emotions ‘reacting in real time’.

So from Sim Ah-ryeon’s perspective, a ‘person who quietly listens without a word’ in the truest sense did not exist.

Instead, it was like this.

– Hahh, (Why is she moaning) i-it was really tight. (What was tight) It reminded me of the deadline for the graduation exhibition for the first time in a while. (Graduation exhibition?) I don’t have those dreams much these days, but before, whenever my condition got a little bad, I always had (Condition?) ha-had nightmares about the graduation exhibition…

Therefore, she couldn't help but stutter.

Because the other people were constantly questioning her back with their emotions. Reacting. Too quickly.

Matching that tempo, Sim Ah-ryeon was swayed this way and that by the ever-changing context, repeating her words as if rambling.

Now, a certain contradiction would be understood.

Q. Why does Sim Ah-ryeon not stutter at all when she is playing the part of the Saintess of the North?

A. Because she does not need to answer the other person sincerely. Without needing to have a ‘conversation’, she just needs to perform the role given to her.

It was similar in essence.

The me with Complete Memory, and Sim Ah-ryeon who lived by drinking emotions, we were both detached from the world.

…People might blame Sim Ah-ryeon, asking why she doesn't wash her hair, why she walks around so messily.

But Sim Ah-ryeon herself would probably want to ask the complete opposite.

‘You all are leaking emotions everywhere, you know?’

Washing one’s hair and dressing neatly.

That was, in essence, the act of covering up one’s appearance because you ‘want to look good’ to others, because you ‘don’t want to be criticized’.

But before Sim Ah-ryeon, there was no use in covering anything up. Everyone was, in a sense, walking around stark naked.

Our values were different.

Our perspectives were different.

So, it was perhaps natural that my most secret truth was seen through by Sim Ah-ryeon of all people.

Because we were two of a kind.

“Ehehe…”

Rustle.

While I was combing her hair, Sim Ah-ryeon, with her back turned to me, laughed softly.

“I-it’s nice…”

I didn't ask, what is?

Sim Ah-ryeon was responding ‘it’s nice’ to my own feeling of seeing her as a kindred spirit.

Unlike people who live bound by words and sentences, between the two of us, language was always nothing more than a secondary tool.

“When did you notice?”

“Ah. Uum. Th-that, Guild Leader… You don’t feel lust under any circumstances.”

“?”

This time, an unexpected answer came back.

“Lust?”

“Yeees… I-it’s strange, isn’t it. So I thought about it. I mean, every time you see people, you see piles and piles of corpses layered on top of them… There’s no way something like lust would arise.”

“…”

“Because you are a normal person, Guild Leader.”

A bitter smile formed on my face.

It was truly difficult to hide anything in front of this child.

With this, not only my attribute of ‘monologuing’, which I had disguised under the pretext of the conventions of genre fiction, but even the cliché of the ‘asexual protagonist’ had been seen through.

“People… are really strange, aren’t they.”

“Please try to understand them.”

“Yes. But, it’s a problem you can solve by just imagining it simply, isn't it? You remember everything perfectly. Then how would the world look. You drink emotions. Then what would happen… I-it’s so easy.”

Sim Ah-ryeon leaned the back of her head against my chest.

“O-only you did it, Guild Leader. That.”

“…For me too, only you have been like this. They are truly wonderful paintings. Thank you.”

“Ehehe.”

“Still, Ah-ryeon-ah. There are many times when people don't know unless you tell them.”

“Even though you knew, Guild Leader?”

“That is…”

“I don’t really need other people.”

Sim Ah-ryeon looked up at me.

“I am… happy. Guild Leader.”

“...”

“The exhibition. It was nice to hold it after a long time. But those people just revere me after seeing my paintings, right? Uum. I mean, Guild Leader… it wouldn’t matter if I could never paint for the rest of my life, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Yes.”

The combing stopped.

It wasn't me who stopped. Sim Ah-ryeon had leaned completely against me, so I could no longer comb her hair.

“You don’t have to try to fill the hole in my heart, i-it’s okay, Guild Leader.”

From under my chin.

Sim Ah-ryeon was looking up at me.

“It’s not because I have a deficiency in my heart… or because I have a memory of losing someone. Th-that’s not why I like you, Guild Leader.”

“…”

“I like you because you are you, Guild Leader. Whether I can’t draw, or I cause trouble… it doesn't matter. Just like how I am still me to you, Guild Leader.”

Sim Ah-ryeon raised both her arms and wrapped them around my neck. And she buried her head in my chest.

“Aside from the two of us, h-honestly, no one will understand this exhibition but…”

In the quiet night of the exhibition hall.

Beneath all the frames stained with anomalies. In the middle of a gallery where the thousands upon thousands of deaths I had witnessed were all listed.

Sim Ah-ryeon smiled.

“I think it’s truly… beautiful.”

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