Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint - Chapter 345

WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS x FLAME COMICS

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

◈ Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint ◈

Chapter 345: Episode 64: The Road That Isn’t a Road (5)

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Feeding Sangah's soul to [The Fourth Wall].

I'd gotten the idea from the incident when my mother was eaten by [The Fourth Wall] during her bloody battle with "The One Who Devours Dreams."

At the time, my mother had been swallowed by the wall while her soul form was damaged. Yet when she was spat back out, part of her soul had actually been restored.

Besides, considering that there was a zone called the "Library" inside [The Fourth Wall], this was a risk worth taking.

「I do n't wa nt to.」

But [The Fourth Wall], having read my intentions, refused to listen.

It reacted violently as it watched Sangah scatter away.

「I wo n't eat th at.」

"Eat it."

A numbing shock ran through my entire body. Still, I didn't back down.

"If you don't, I'll turn off the Skill."

This was my final threat.

[The Fourth Wall] was a Skill, after all. If I hardened my heart, I could turn it off whenever I wanted.

And judging from several incidents, [The Fourth Wall] truly hated that. So this time too...

「Tr y it if you ca n.」

Its tone made it clear that it was certain I couldn't do it.

「If you turn me o ff, that wo man won't sur vive any way.」

I bit my lip.

「A nd if you turn me o ff, the Con stellations will see your infor mation.」

[Many Constellations are paying attention to you!]

[A few Constellations have doubts about the existence of the wall you possess.]

[The Fourth Wall] knew well how much I hated having my information exposed. In reality, I had no mental barrier worth mentioning besides [The Fourth Wall].

If a high-Status Constellation took advantage of the instant the wall disappeared to peer into me, I might become as helpless as a naked baby.

I glared at the wall for a moment before speaking.

"Then I'll break it."

「What?」

"I'll break part of the wall and force you to eat her."

Originally, [The Fourth Wall] had no physical form. But right now, I could strike the "wall."

Clenching my fist, I spewed my Status toward the wall before me.

The entire hospital room shook from the heavy impact. I heard my Allies rushing over outside, accompanied by brief screams.

I swung my fist again.

Booooom!

The wall still didn't have so much as a scratch.

「It's use less, Kim Dok ja.」

"..."

「Sav ing Yu Sang ah would be too great a vio lation of Plausi bility.」

I thought about it.

As I'd said before, [The Fourth Wall] wasn't a physical object. It was only a "Skill" I had manifested.

In that case...

Tzzzzzt!

I focused my gaze on one spot of the "wall." Sparks flooded the entire hospital room, and I saw Jihye get thrown back after she opened the hospital-room door and stepped through.

「No!」

A small crack was forming at the corner of [The Fourth Wall].

My guess had been right.

Until now, I'd only thought about turning Skills on or off. But perhaps even a "Skill" had an appropriate intermediate state.

In other words, what if I could turn off only part of a Skill?

Craaaack.

For an instant, a tiny gap opened as the wall rapidly split apart.

An abyss that seemed capable of swallowing anything.

Soon, the gap began sucking in the surrounding fables like a black hole. Sangah's fables formed a small whirlpool and were sucked beyond the wall in an instant.

「St op...!」

An enormous burst of sparks struck my entire body, and I let out a terrible groan.

A Plausibility Backlash was raging through the hospital room.

I heard my Allies calling as they rushed toward me, and soon my vision turned white.

* * *

Sangah regained consciousness in the darkness.

When she opened her eyes, all she could see was pitch-black darkness. In that lifeless scene, which didn't permit even a speck of light, she suddenly realized something.

Am I... dead?

The last scene she had seen briefly flashed through her mind. Dokja's cry as he tried to save her, the Plausibility Backlash, and the memory of being sucked somewhere.

There was nothing she could be sure of.

From head to toe, Sangah checked her senses. Eyes, lips, tongue, ears, hands, feet, knees... There wasn't a single place where she could feel anything. It was as though her entire body had been paralyzed, her senses completely extinguished within her.

Had only her soul remained?

Sangah tried to accept the situation calmly. In Haruki's novels, people often became concepts, so this was certainly possible. A dead person becoming a soul was nothing unusual...

This is scary.

Still, being alone in the darkness was frightening. And she couldn't feel anything at all. At this rate, she couldn't even know whether she existed or not.

Trying not to fall into a trap of thought, Sangah recalled an old proposition from philosophy.

「I think, therefore I am.」

It was a saying by René Descartes. It had become so famous that quoting it somehow felt embarrassing.

Yet to Sangah, that saying was hope. At least as long as she continued thinking, she could say, "I exist." Before long, though, that thought frightened her.

Then do people who don't think simply not exist?

What if even her thoughts stopped in this darkness?

So Sangah thought desperately.

To avoid vanishing, to avoid being erased, she desperately recalled the things that had happened.

「"Sangah."」

Then a voice came to mind, followed by faces. They were familiar faces.

Her family, who had been with her since before Scenarios descended upon the world.

Her father, a judge, and her older brothers, doctors. Her mother, born into a wealthy family.

「"Don't do anything that draws other people's attention."」

「"People will look at what you have, not you."」

「"What do you need four languages for? You only need to be the cute youngest daughter."」

Sangah smiled bitterly as she watched the words flow past.

More precisely, she thought she did.

「"You want to join a game company? We'd stop you even if you said you wanted to marry the president of a game company."」

Maybe she had been living through a Scenario even before the Scenarios began. No one had called it a Scenario, but to her, it had been one.

If the dokkaebis had given that Scenario a name, it might have been something like <Declaration of Independence>.

「"I'm Yu Sangah, a new employee."」

Her life changed a little after she joined the game company and became independent from her family.

She also met one interesting person.

「"Yu Sangah-ssi, do you happen to have a phone charger?"」

A pale-faced person who borrowed her charger.

「"I have an important appointment at seven, but my battery is running out."」

Someone who'd interviewed with her as a new hire and was uncooperative about everything at the company.

「"I'll attend the company dinner, but I need to leave at seven."」

A person who said whatever he wanted, yet always left work first as soon as the day ended.

「"I'm not joining the company outing. Hiking is what I hate most."」

A man who drifted around like a ghost, as though no one else's gaze mattered, looking only at his smartphone.

「"That bastard Yu Junghyeok is going to die again."」

Maybe that was why she began doing strange things too.

Making trouble for a superior who stole a subordinate's project, or mixing pepper into the coffee of department heads who sent her on coffee runs.

「"Blegh! What is this? Why does this coffee taste like this?"」

That was how the historic incident at Mino Soft, later named the "Pantry Incident," came to be. As she poured pepper into the finely ground beans again and again, Sangah felt an unfamiliar sense of liberation.

The company was turned upside down. There had even been an employee keeping watch, yet the culprit was never caught.

「Yu Sangah still remembered it.」

The company after everyone had gone home.

The faint glow of a smartphone shining between the pantry cabinets.

「Kim Dokja had definitely been there.」

Whether she mixed in pepper or salt, that light simply remained there and tacitly condoned what she did, as if whatever happened outside those cabinets was none of his concern.

「Perhaps she should have spoken to him then.」

Why had you remained silent inside that cabinet?

Why did you say, "There was no one there," even after seeing what I did?

Why did you turn the CCTV camera facing the pantry away?

Why did you... always make so many different expressions only when you were looking at your smartphone?

The area around her brightened, and her senses gradually began to return.

[A powerful being's Status does not permit your fable to scatter.]

[Someone who likes things orderly is displeased with your fable.]

Voices were coming from somewhere.

「(See? This is obviously what they call "romantic tension.")」

「(No. Based on my experience watching nearly every movie on Earth...)」

「(In the end, isn't it all a desire to become one?)」

When she slowly opened her eyes, Sangah discovered three beings surrounding her.

A squid-like creature wearing glasses.

A hunchbacked old man with grayish-white hair.

And a beautiful person with an unusual aura whose gender she couldn't determine.

The moment she saw the last being, Sangah startled awake.

「(You are...?)」

「(You're awake, new librarian.)」

Nirvana, the androgynous beauty, smiled faintly.

Sangah couldn't make sense of anything.

Why was this person here?

Nirvana looked her over with a hum, then spoke.

「(It would take too long to explain. You'll understand soon enough. You're quite fortunate. You're the first being to enter this "Library" after living only as long as you have.)」

Combinations of letters rippled in the air behind the three beings.

[Welcome, new librarian Yu Sangah.]

Sangah looked around.

Dim candlelight illuminated patches of darkness throughout the area.

A library...

There were an enormous number of books and bookshelves that stretched beyond sight. It had been a very long time since she had entered a library this large.

Dokja's words came to mind.

He'd asked whether, if she came back to life, she would be willing to read books other than those by the authors she used to read.

Was this what he'd meant?

She didn't know what this place was. Nor did she know how Dokja had sent her here, or what he wanted from her.

Still, she had a feeling.

A feeling that if she read those books now, she would be able to answer the countless questions she'd had.

「(Will you read them?)」

「(Pardon?)」

「(You may regret it if you do. It could be a truth you can't bear.)」

Sangah's fingertips halted as they reached toward the collection. It wasn't because of Nirvana's words. It was because someone she knew well emerged from the darkness.

"She won't become a librarian."

Dokja was there.

* * *

「(Dokja-ssi?)」

The moment I saw Sangah staring at me with a dazed expression, profound relief washed over me.

I'd succeeded. Somehow, I'd succeeded in preserving Sangah's soul.

Her soul form was still damaged in several places, but the Library's faintly flowing power was restoring her soul.

I gave Sangah a slight bow and said, "I'm sorry for bringing you to such a shabby place. Please endure it a little longer. I'll get you out soon."

「(A shabby place? This foolish human does not know the spirituality of truth.)」

"It's been a while, Nirvana."

「(How did you enter this place? The "wall" shouldn't have allowed it.)」

"I found a loophole."

Nirvana looked displeased.

「(I don't know what you're thinking, but that was a very bad decision. When the "wall" says no, there is always a reason.)」

"Probably."

[The Fourth Wall] seemed deeply angry with me over what had happened earlier and wouldn't even speak to me. I could feel its emotions from the sharp air prickling against my skin.

But this wasn't the time to worry about that.

「(If that one puts its mind to it, it could turn a librarian or two into story dust.)」

"I told you. I won't make her a librarian."

「(What nonsense is that? If you brought her in here, then of course...)」

"I'm taking her back outside."

Nirvana frowned as if they had heard something completely absurd.

「(Do you think the "wall" will allow that? And even if it were possible, that woman's body is already dead. Once the body is dead, there is nowhere for her to return to.)」

I silently looked at Nirvana. Then Nirvana's expression changed strangely.

「(Don't tell me, you...)」

Perhaps Nirvana had read my thoughts, now that they too had become part of [The Fourth Wall].

Nirvana's lips trembled as they shouted.

「(No! Even if the "wall" allows it, you can't do that.)」

"Nirvana."

Nirvana must have known. There were countless kinds of Attributes in the world, but only two Attributes of perfect immortality existed.

One was the regressor Yu Junghyeok, and the other was...

"Where is your Patron, Mandala's Protector, right now?"

First Reincarnator.

It was time to meet the third protagonist of this story.

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