WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
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Chapter 452: That Woman S VI
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* * *
Kuung.
Yu Ji-won left. Her gait so graceful that no one would have guessed she was running away. But run away she had, all the same.
"..."
"..."
"Heheheh."
Now only three remained in the office at the top of the Tower of Babel.
The Undertaker, Noh Do-hwa, and Sim Ah-ryeon.
Even a castaway who had lived alone on a deserted island for twenty-eight years, aching with longing for human warmth, would have mashed the second button without hesitation if offered the choice, "Want to hang out with those three? Or want to extend your stay on the island?" That was the kind of company this was.
"So..."
To be specific, that was pretty much what Noh Do-hwa was feeling right now.
Noh Do-hwa had spent her whole life building deserted islands inside crowds of people. It would not be unfair to call her nature closer to a beaver's than a human's.
Which was exactly why she wanted the two pups embracing right in front of her face (it was mostly Sim Ah-ryeon driving it, but as far as Noh Do-hwa was concerned that changed nothing) to clear off, and quickly. As far away as possible. For life, if she could swing it.
"Let's talk practicalities. Undertaker, awakener. What exactly do you intend to do from here...?"
"Intend to do? What do you mean?"
"I mean the arrangement. The torture horror show. From the looks of it, you've gone and developed feelings for that Necromancer trash over there, haven't you. Do you plan to keep running this daily quest where her flesh gets torn open and her limbs get mangled in front of people who don't know any better...?"
"..."
The Undertaker pressed his lips shut. His face was more bearable shut than open, so Noh Do-hwa let the corners of her mouth curl up.
"Whatever. If you can stand it anyway, it's no business of mine. Sure, I suppose a pervert who gets off on watching his own lover tortured could exist in this world. I'd just like you out of my sight, urgently, but..."
"I, I don't mind, though?"
Sim Ah-ryeon said.
"Don't mind, or rather. Oh, I'd actually prefer it kept going."
"Hoh. May I ask why that is, Miss Necromancer...?"
"Hm? Th, that's because. While you're watching me suffer, Guild Leader will be suffering too."
After a slight pause, Sim Ah-ryeon went on.
"Today. Tomorrow. The day after that too. He'll be thinking about nothing but me, all of it, won't he?"
"..."
Noh Do-hwa stared at Sim Ah-ryeon. A blink. Sim Ah-ryeon was looking right back at her.
"Hmmm?"
A tilt. Sim Ah-ryeon cocked her head. She had leapt up to paint the moment she woke at dawn, so she still hadn't washed, and the stale strands of hair slid down across her face.
Sim Ah-ryeon seized the Undertaker's hand.
"Ah-ryeon?"
The Undertaker's voice came flustered. But Sim Ah-ryeon only curled her fingers tighter, squeezing.
Her gaze stayed fixed on Noh Do-hwa.
"..."
"Hm? Hmm? Mm-mm-mm?"
Sim Ah-ryeon wrapped her other arm around the Undertaker's waist. She didn't stop there. Rising onto her toes, she pressed her lips to his neck.
Naturally, the Undertaker grew more flustered.
"No. Ah-ryeon. What are you doing all of a sudden, again. In front of everyone, no less."
"Kiss me, please."
"What?"
"The moment I woke up you left me all alone and ran out of nowhere. The truth is, I was hurt so, so badly. If you kiss me, I'll forgive you."
"Now?"
"Yes!"
The Undertaker glanced around.
Around, for all that meant, was nothing but a silent desk and papers. And Noh Do-hwa, who was keeping just as silent. That was all.
"Here?"
"Yes."
"No. Look, Ah-ryeon. Later. Let's do it later. There's a time and a place for everything. You've been strange this whole time."
"I love, you."
"..."
Quietly, still up on her toes, Sim Ah-ryeon took the Undertaker's cheek in her hand.
Flustered, he reflexively grabbed her shoulder and tried to push her away, but, "Owww!" a scream far sharper than the grip warranted, a groan stained with far too much pain, burst out of her.
"Ah."
At the sound, the Undertaker's hand froze and went stiff.
It was something the Undertaker himself did not yet know, but already a kind of trauma had grown in his heart around "any act of inflicting pain on Sim Ah-ryeon."
A trauma freshly grown only yesterday. With no time to scab over, the raw red wound was still bleeding. Sim Ah-ryeon grinned ear to ear.
Grinning. Pushing the angle of her tiptoes higher and higher, sweeping her sidelong glance over someone other than the Undertaker.
Blood spurted.
"Ow."
A groan slipped out too. But compared to when the Undertaker had grabbed her shoulder, it was a cute little groan.
The level of the cause itself was the exact opposite. A fountain pen stood driven into the back of Sim Ah-ryeon's hand.
"Ow, owww... It, it hurts, you know. Management Captain, um. Is that what I should call you?"
"..."
Noh Do-hwa.
With eyes colder than perpetual snow and hotter than lava, the fountain pen still driven into the other woman's hand, she was looking at Sim Ah-ryeon.
The Undertaker was startled, but more than startled, he was unsettled. The instant he tried to part his lips to stop Noh Do-hwa, an instinct that he must not do so prickled coldly at the back of his neck.
Thanks to that, Noh Do-hwa could focus entirely on the person before her. She spoke.
"Where did this rootless little bone fragment come rolling in from."
"Ah. Um... Th, that's. I'm sorry. But going by the order of time, I met Guild Leader first, and... Hmmm. So, even across all the cycles. I, I'm from the Busan Station concourse, you see. So... I, I don't think this is something you get to say to me. Management Captain."
"I'll kill you."
"You can't kill me... I, I have healing ability!"
"I'll dig out your eyeballs and bore through your ear holes. I'll cut out your tongue too. Shall I throw you into a pitch-black cell where you see nothing and make you crawl like a bug for the rest of your life?"
"Ah. That one... um. That works."
Sim Ah-ryeon plucked the fountain pen out with a pop. The wound that had dug all the way to the bone slid shut, healing far too easily.
Sim Ah-ryeon's eyes sank down, forlorn.
"S, sorry. It was delicious. I'll stop."
"Shut up."
"But... are you really going to fight me? Th, things would be unfavorable for you..."
"I won't bother with where you go or what the hell you do, do as you damn well please."
"Ah."
"Just don't spout a single word where I am. And don't even look my way."
"..."
"This isn't a deal. It's a final warning. If you're going to treat people like toys, then you'd best be prepared for your own goddamn body to become a scrap of one too, wouldn't you?"
Sim Ah-ryeon pressed her lips shut. Her gaze turned away too.
"Don't even step into my field of view. Because I'll want to kill you."
At that, Sim Ah-ryeon went trotting off and plopped herself snugly down on the sofa in the corner of the office.
Noh Do-hwa clenched and unclenched her fingers three or four times.
A black glove smeared with blood. Beneath it, an anger she hadn't quite tucked away was stretching itself awake.
"Fine."
Noh Do-hwa muttered, in a tone that was anything but.
"You damn bastard."
"..."
"Even when you date, you go and date some idiot with a mad-dog disease. Is there really nothing but lunatics around you?"
Mm, the Undertaker groaned.
There was a lot he wanted to say. A lot he could say. But none of it was the conversation Noh Do-hwa wanted.
Noh Do-hwa preferred language that had a correct answer. All the more so the more answerless the life and the world were.
"Anyway, you're not the one doing the pouncing, you're the one getting pounced on. I understand that's true. So, back to the first question. What do you intend to do from here...?"
"I'm aware it's already too late to undo the situation."
The Undertaker said.
"Even if I explained that the Necromancer was a false boss, and that the grudge and vengeance everyone holds was all fabricated too, there's no way people would believe it. And it'd be a problem even if they did."
"Yes. Because the reason they've clawed their way through life all this time was that goddamn hatred. In Manyo Neko's case, well, it's plain as day she'd kill herself..."
"Even so, watching Sim Ah-ryeon tortured over and over... my heart probably won't be able to bear it. I'm sorry. I didn't know I still had a heart like this left in me."
"..."
Noh Do-hwa made a curious face. A curiousness neither she nor the Undertaker could explain.
"...Whatever. If you can't get the people to understand and you can't make yourself understand either, is there any other way?"
"I'm going to run."
"Haa...?"
"Together with Sim Ah-ryeon, I'm going to run away."
The Undertaker meant it.
"The Necromancer worked some manner of sorcery and bewitched me. And so I, the Undertaker, a man once called humanity's guardian, abducted the Necromancer and fled. Framed that way, people will accept it."
"...No. If you vanish, doesn't that cut our fighting strength in half?"
"I'll stay in contact through the Saintess. I just have to work in secret, alone, and quietly take out the anomalies. When you get right down to it, it's not all that different from now."
"Hoh? Hmm. Hmmm..."
"The only thing that takes a hit is my honor. The acquaintances who don't know the inner workings of the Regression Alliance might be a bit heartbroken, but their hatred for the Necromancer will only grow larger than that sense of loss. So it's fine."
"Not bad..."
Noh Do-hwa nodded.
"Above all, the fact that that revolting thing vanishes from my field of view forever is satisfying..."
"I'm sorry. I'll leave explaining things to Yu Ji-won and the others to you, Management Captain Noh Do-hwa."
"I've gotten sick-to-death used to cleaning up after you, so do as you please..."
"Then."
The Undertaker drew his sword from its sheath.
"Excuse me."
The next instant, the Management Captain's office was half-destroyed.
A roar rang out. Even the innermost depths of the Tower of Babel, slathered in every kind of security device and incantation, crumbled before a single stroke of the Undertaker's blade.
Even though the sword strike had blown past right beside her like a storm, Noh Do-hwa stayed calm. The wind rushing in through the gaping outer wall set her hair fluttering.
"Hup."
The Undertaker scooped Sim Ah-ryeon up. A princess carry. Then he set one foot on the outer wall he'd torn down and looked back.
"The world will know me as having fled, but I'll come to see you now and then, slipping in during the night hours. Management Captain Noh Do-hwa. Take care."
Noh Do-hwa silently raised her middle finger. The Undertaker, for the first time in a long while, a truly long while, snorted out a laugh and leapt off the Tower of Babel.
The tower was already in an uproar. From the corps members' standpoint, they could only conclude that anomalies had suddenly come attacking.
Cutting through the commotion and clamor, treading roof to roof, the Undertaker sprinted.
"Hmmm..."
Only then did Sim Ah-ryeon speak again.
"I really, truly don't mind being t, tortured by people forever, you know..."
"And while you're at it you're trying to provoke the people around me."
Dak-kong! The Undertaker moved his aura and lightly flicked Sim Ah-ryeon on the forehead.
"Hiek."
"Tormenting me is fine. You have the right to do that. But messing with the people around me on top of it, that I can't sit back and watch."
"You, you didn't even really treasure them, though."
"You're the one who made me realize what treasuring is. To be precise, wasn't it your doing that tore the wrapping over my heart to shreds, so I could no longer ignore it?"
"Hmmm..."
"Maybe somewhere along the way, without even knowing it, I stepped onto a wrong path."
He had that strange feeling.
Last night, when Sim Ah-ryeon had laid him bare with all sorts of words.
The Undertaker had shed tears, but they had not been drawn out by sorrow and self-reproach alone.
In them welled not only "the life I've lived so far was wrong" but also "what must I do to keep from being wrong going forward."
'Right. It isn't too late yet.'
The Undertaker felt that too.
'Thankfully, I was born bearing the fate of a regressor. Anything can be undone. Even when it's already too late, I can promise myself a next time.'
That it wasn't too late yet.
For some reason, though he didn't know why, the Undertaker seemed to carry a sense of something that had "truly become too late."
That sense whispered to him. Your life can still be undone, and rich blood still flows through your heart.
"G, Guild Leader."
"Hm?"
"Still, promise me one thing. Even when the next cycle comes. And the cycle after that. And the cycle after that one too... You have to tell me what happened just now. You have to."
"..."
"You, you'll promise, won't you? Guild Leader?"
"Yes. I promise."
"Eheheh..."
Cradled in his arms, Sim Ah-ryeon laughed softly.
'Where should I find a secret hideout?'
While crossing Busan, the Undertaker turned to slightly more practical worries.
'A deserted island would be best after all. If I use the Inunaki Tunnel[1] I might be able to open a portal. Ah, Tsushima Island. How about Tsushima? It might be just right.'
"Huh."
But.
His pondering couldn't go on for long.
"Where are you off to in such a hurry? Guild Leader."
A halt. The Undertaker's stride stopped.
It happened just at the junction where Busan ended. On a road of crumbled asphalt, empty of any trace of people because it was the caravan's day off, a single figure stood alone.
It used the address "Guild Leader," but it wasn't Sim Ah-ryeon's voice. Nor did the hair resemble green.
A pink hue.
With the summer sunlight baking the abandoned road, a woman draped in pink hair smiled demurely.
The Undertaker spoke, still holding Sim Ah-ryeon.
"...Go Yuri."
"Yes. It's Go Yuri."
"Why have you appeared before me now?"
"To resolve the irreversible while it can still be reversed, of course. Guild Leader."
The cry of cicadas blanketed the gaunt leaves of the undergrowth that had crept even onto the asphalt road.
Go Yuri spoke. With a bright smile.
"I'm sorry, but Sim Ah-ryeon will have to die here and now."
Footnotes:
[1] The Inunaki Tunnel in Fukuoka, Japan, is one of the country's most famous haunted and urban-legend sites, tied to the lost "Inunaki Village" myth and treated in horror lore as a gateway to another, cut-off place, which is why it is invoked here as a means of reaching an isolated hideout.
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