WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS x FLAME COMICS

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint ◈

Chapter 509: Episode 98: Have you protected everything you wanted to protect? (2)

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The Dokkaebi King's brow twitched.

The fables of the 999th round unfurled before him. Fables abandoned by the Star Stream were beginning their stories one by one, awakening Yu Junghyeok from his deep regressor's depression.

The Dokkaebi King frowned.

[Why have you come here? You made a contract with me. You have no reason to help him.]

As if to reinforce his words, a sentence appeared on the Final Wall.

「We made a promise with the Dokkaebi King, too. He said he'd send us back to that time if we destroyed this worldline. He said he'd contact the Oldest Dream, our leader's Patron...」

They were the words of the 999th-round Lee Jihye.

The Dokkaebi King spoke again.

[I brought you into this world. Do you wish to be abandoned by your worldline again? Do you want to wander those terrible gaps between dimensions and taste eternal suffering?]

The Dokkaebi King's threats continued.

[That Junghyeok is the enemy you sought. He destroyed your worldline and cast your fables into ruin.]

The Outer Gods' expressions wavered slightly.

The Dokkaebi King was right. Like Junghyeok, they had come all this way to avenge the world they had lived in.

Then someone spoke.

【What bullshit are you talking about? You're the one who dragged us into this game. If the Scenarios hadn't started in the first place, do you think I'd be pulling this shit here?】

The Great Lord of the Abyss, the 999th-round Kim Namwoon, spoke with swaggering insolence.

Perhaps he had already made up his mind. The power of chaos poured from his entire body.

[The Great Fable Delusion Design begins its story!]

【Heh, it's been a long time since we all fought together.】

Namwoon snickered as he unwrapped the bandages around his hand.

He was a monster who had surpassed even his former Patron, the Abyssal Black Flame Dragon. His hand, black as obsidian and brimming with an aura far denser and more wicked than Han Suyeong's, swallowed the night of the Star Stream.

[The Great Fable Heart That Sealed Sorrow begins its story!]

A man rose behind him, his massive body looming over them. It was the 999th-round Lee Hyeongseong, the King of the Silver Heart. Armor brimming with fable metal covered his entire body.

【Dokkaebi King. I never made a contract with you, so this doesn't apply to me.】

The Owner of the Sunken Island, the 999th-round Jihye, followed, floating her enormous warship in the sky.

[The Great Fable Wanderer of the Eternal Horizon begins its story.]

The spirit of the great sea emanated from her Twin Dragon Swords.

【...】

Without a word, she drew her swords and guarded Junghyeok's right side.

That made the kings' choice clear.

[The Exclusive Skill Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint has forcibly activated!]

Their thoughts and resolve flowed into me completely.

They all hated Secretive Plotter. Yet that hatred ultimately stemmed from a deep-rooted longing.

「In no universe were there people who cherished the existence called Yu Junghyeok more than they did.」

They had all come this far because of Junghyeok.

To send them here, the Yu Junghyeok of the 999th round had sacrificed everything.

His arm had been severed, his leg cut off, both eyes lost, and in the end, he had even given up his life.

「Yu Junghyeok was the one who saved them, and the one who killed them.」

They had lived thinking only of Junghyeok. How could people like them forget him?

The anger that could only be endured by locking oneself away on a sunken island, the sorrow that could only be endured by covering one's heart in steel, the pain that could only be forgotten by throwing oneself into the abyss.

[The Great Fable Flame of Eternity begins its story!]

And the pain that could only be atoned for by burning oneself. They joined together a film that seemed ready to snap but never did, again and again, until they finally reached the final chapter of their story.

【Move aside, Dokkaebi King. There is only one thing we want.】

The Living Flame, the 999th-round Uriel, spoke.

【To see here the “end” we couldn't confirm in our worldline.】

Her Flame of Karma moved. [hellfire inferno], which had reduced the Forest of Ngai to ruins, burned the interior of the wall. Almost at the same time, the 999th-round Namwoon's right hand tore through the Dokkaebi King's thigh.

【Hahaha! Let's kill a dokkaebi!】

Namwoon's mad Stigma shot forward as if folding space, destroying fables as it targeted the Dokkaebi King's torso. They traded precisely measured amounts of fables. Weapons formed from delusion sprouted from Namwoon's right arm, while constellation artifacts summoned by the Dokkaebi King appeared throughout the wall to block them.

The Final Wall was where the Dokkaebi King's fables could exert their greatest power.

This was his stage, so the battle was turning against Namwoon.

「O spear that tears the sea and draws the boundary of the coastline」

「O arrow that shot down the sun's eye」

The sentences flowing out from all over the wall soon took form.

Shushushushuk!

At the Dokkaebi King's hand signal, constellation artifacts flew in and turned the Great Lord of the Abyss's body into a beehive. A spear pierced his thigh, and an arrow lodged in his forearm.

Black fables dripped from Namwoon as he laughed.

【Go! Taekwondo Hyeongseong!】

At Namwoon's shout, someone seized the Dokkaebi King from behind. It was the 999th-round Hyeongseong. Steel that occupied the surrounding space grew from the body of the man holding the Dokkaebi King in his sturdy arms. Amid enormous sparks, the steel bound the Dokkaebi King's arms and legs.

【Jihye!】

At the 999th-round Hyeongseong's signal, the Owner of the Sunken Island moved.

【Load.】

Through the gap created by the Ark's impact, an enormous warship floated in the night sky. Something swirled as it was loaded at the ship's prow. It possessed enough Status to blow away an entire planet.

Looking closely, what was being loaded into the huge barrel wasn't a shell.

【Fire!】

With a deafening roar, a meteor shot out from the warship.

A falling star with a dazzling tail. The Living Flame.

She had turned herself into a bullet and was charging toward the Dokkaebi King. Melting everything in her path, the 999th-round Uriel rushed forward at terrifying speed. The fables of the 999th round, concentrated on the edge of her sword, blazed fiercely.

【The Supreme King isn't the only one who has killed you.】

「That was how the people of the 999th round had cleared the final chapter.」

A white-hot sun charged forward, tearing away the wall's outer shell. The fables clinging to the Final Wall writhed in agony from the heat.

It was a strike that no one in this worldline could stop.

「The Dokkaebi King was blocking that strike.」

Grrrrrrrrk!

The Dokkaebi King's bright eyes shone within the hellish heat.

Aaaaaaah!

Countless Stigmas carved across his body howled. They were letters that seemed to have been transferred from the Final Wall. Great Fables bowed before them.

My own fables were wavering.

「The modifier King of Stories wasn't an empty title.」

The King of Stories, who stood at the peak of the Star Stream.

His face was noble, wicked, beautiful, and sorrowful.

「He had once been human.」

Weapons pouring out from the Final Wall collided with the Flame of Karma.

「He had been a demon.」

Ash-gray fables flowing from the Dokkaebi King's horns wrapped around Uriel's approaching feet.

「He had been a savior.」

Holy light extending from white wings restored the Dokkaebi King's Constitution.

「In the end, he had become a dokkaebi.」

Unending fables surrounded him.

As if this world couldn't end here.

「This wasn't the 999th round.」

I felt the people of the 999th round turn toward me all at once.

「Move.」

「You have to finish it.」

「You haven't forgotten your promise with us, have you?」

But I couldn't move.

[The Great Fable Guardian of the World begins its story!]

[The Great Fable Guardian of the World looks toward its next guardian!]

The Dokkaebi King's fables were looking at me, too.

[Kim Dokja!]

The Dokkaebi King shouted at me.

[Do not defy the Fate set for you. You are a being who loves fables more than anyone in this world. I was the same. More than anyone in this world, I understand how you feel about this world!]

Fables stretching from his body approached me.

Suyeong, who stood beside me, covered my ears and growled.

"Don't listen. It's not even a story you need to hear."

Huiwon and Hyeongseong stepped in front of me. Sangah, Yuseong, and Gilyeong stood guard around me, while the sound of Jihye's sword rang out behind me.

[All the Constellations of the nebula Kim Dokja Company shine brightly!]

Yet there were things that came more clearly into view the more they were blocked.

Words grew more vivid the more they were concealed.

[The Exclusive Skill Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint is running rampant!]

「[Black Flame Dragon! Black Flame Dragon! Won't you open your eyes?]」

「[Kim Yushin! Pull yourself together! Our Hwangsanbeol is still...]」

「[Great Sage Equaling Heaven!]」

Fables flowed across the Final Wall.

Constellations were dying on battlefields where fights far worse than this one were taking place. Fables continuously leaked from the Great Sage Equaling Heaven's body, torn to rags. He seemed to have lost both eyes, and the light of his dazzling Fiery Eyes and Golden Pupils had gone out.

「[I can't see the youngest.]」

Uriel supported him. The Archangel, with both wings torn apart, held his hand and stroked the scenery of the night.

「[He's safe. He's shining over there.]」

Constellations that had stubbornly survived flew toward them through the night sky of utter chaos.

When the scene changed, I saw Persephone holding the fallen Hades. As Hades tried to say something, Persephone shook her head.

「[Don't worry, my old night.]」

The sun of Olympus was setting above her.

All those endings raced across the wall as dreadful sentences. They were sentences written only to bring about their end.

[Don't you want to save those stars?]

A wave of nausea rose from deep within me.

The Dokkaebi King shouted.

[You can't save them as you are now. A being who loves a story can never change that story.]

Because I loved it, I couldn't change it.

[Only a being outside that story, one who understands the insignificance of all things, can escape the oppression of Plausibility.]

With a grinding sound, the backlash around us grew fiercer. Little by little, the power of the Dokkaebi King's fables overwhelmed that of the people from the 999th round.

The Dokkaebi King tore apart Hyeongseong's fable metal and reached one hand toward me.

[The fable you have built, A Single Fable, is enough to inherit the Star Stream's place. Take my hand. What I want is the same as what you want. I don't want the stories of those stars to disappear.]

The Dokkaebi King's voice was almost desperate. His eyes, fables, and words told me that he was sincere.

The Star Stream's fables shone brightly from his entire body.

「A story read for a very long time eventually becomes a part of him.」

He was the Star Stream itself.

He truly didn't want this story to end.

[Continue... Continue this story. Become the protagonist of a new worldline, and continue the Oldest Dream's banquet with the fables you created. You were born for that. Only for that could you have come this far!]

As I listened to him, the good fortune I had received until now came to mind.

[The Star Stream looks upon you.]

Why had the Star Stream's Plausibility been so generous to me?

The Dokkaebi King's fables told me the reason.

Flashes exploded one after another before my eyes.

[Don't forget what you truly want. You aren't the Final Chapter. You are eternity!]

The fables of the Constellations flowed behind the Dokkaebi King.

That was right. I didn't want that story to end.

「Watching a falling meteorite, the Great Sage Equaling Heaven sensed his own death.」

When I slowly turned my head, I saw Yu Junghyeok, almost free from his regressor's depression. Junghyeok's empty eyes looked at me.

「But there are stories that must end.」

Footnotes:

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