WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS x FLAME COMICS

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint ◈

Chapter 656: Episode 19: Person from Long Ago (8)

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「The soundless blade moved, and no one could see it.」

My intensely compressed sense of time slowly returned, and faint sparks flew from the right hand gripping my sword.

[A Constellation who has yet to reveal its modifier watches you.]

I could no longer hear the Incarnations screaming or weapons clashing.

[The Constellation Prisoner of the Golden Headband has opened his mouth.]

[The Constellation Abyssal Black Flame Dragon's eyes gleam as he asks if you had been hiding your strength.]

[The Constellation Demonic Judge of Fire feels deep sorrow in your single stroke.]

As dull thuds echoed across the floor one after another, no one stood on the same level as me.

I was alone.

Perhaps Junghyeok had always been this way.

[The Constellation Naval Warfare God is astonished by your martial arts.]

[The Constellation Goryeo's Top Swordsman...]

[Some Constellations have sponsored 1,000 Coins for your martial prowess.]

The boundless sense of omnipotence and superiority dwelling in my body.

This was Junghyeok.

[A veiled Constellation glares at you.]

I snapped my head up at the unfamiliar hostility, but the gaze had already vanished.

Numbing fatigue swept through me.

I had already experienced the side effects of [Sentence Enhancement] through [Incitement]. If I dragged this out any longer, [Incitement] would consume me like it had last time.

[Incitement has been deactivated.]

A terrible recoil struck my body, and blood trickled from my mouth.

It was truly an awful experience. This was only Junghyeok from the very beginning, and only a moment of [Incitement], yet it was still this bad.

Even after the Skill was deactivated, it felt as if something left behind by Junghyeok was lingering in my mind.

I casually wiped my lips with one hand, then looked down.

"U-uaaahhh!"

The scream rang out a beat later.

Gu Taeseong was lucky. His severed legs rolled across the floor as he staunched the pouring blood, looking up at me with bloodshot eyes.

The emotion in his eyes quickly changed to fear, then terror.

Perhaps he had even forgotten the pain as Taeseong began to beg pathetically.

"P-please spare me! Please, spare me!"

I walked toward him.

Seeing his terrified face made me think of Uncle Dansu.

「This is all because of these bastards.」

These bastards had made Uncle Dansu that way. They had ruined the life of an innocent man who had only wandered this world looking for his daughter.

Something left behind by Junghyeok spoke within me.

「Kill him.」

"A-are you an Apostle?"

Taeseong suddenly looked up and grabbed the hem of my pants.

"Please spare me. Please, please spare me! We came from the same world!"

Looking at his trembling face, I realized anew who this man was.

This man wasn't Gu Taeseong.

"I read that Revelation too. I enjoyed it so much."

"..."

"It's all a misunderstanding... a misunderstanding! I'm different from the others! I didn't read everything illegally. There were lots of works I paid for too!"

Like a prisoner confessing his sins one last time before execution, he kept rambling.

"I want to live. I want to live. Please. I want to go home. I didn't want to come to a place like this either."

As he spoke, something seemed to overwhelm him, and tears streamed down his face.

"I-I miss my mom and dad. Fuck. I didn't want to do this either. I was just, just trying to survive somehow..."

How old was this man?

Where had he lived, and what had he done there?

I didn't know. Then or now, this man was completely anonymous to me.

「So perhaps this was my last chance to kill him.」

Just as I finished making up my mind and gripped Broken Faith again, Shin Yuseong brushed past me.

"I'll do it."

"I need to practice too."

Practice.

"If I want to survive."

Yuseong's voice sounded unfamiliar. I couldn't see the child's face, but somehow, I knew her eyes would be golden right now.

"You don't want to do it, Mister."

Was it my imagination? In Yuseong's small back, I sensed years I knew nothing about. She had only lived a dozen or so years.

I grabbed Yuseong's shoulder.

"I'll do it, so step back."

Meanwhile, Taeseong was dragging himself backward toward the edge. There was nowhere for him to run.

[Rearrangement will begin in 1 minute.]

After all, if he left this safe zone, he would burn to death in the flames.

Perhaps realizing his Fate, Taeseong began begging again.

"Please spare me. I really didn't want to do this either. I was told they'd send me home if I just performed my role well..."

"What do you mean by that?"

The one possessing Taeseong now was a member of the Readers' Association.

Yet I didn't know how the Readers' Association had come to this world.

They weren't readers who had bought and read Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint, nor were they attendees of Kim Dokja's Banquet.

Then how had they come to possess people in this world?

Taeseong gulped at the sharp blade pressed against his Adam's apple.

"Who brought you here?"

"Th-that..."

As if he had made up his mind, Taeseong opened his mouth again.

"Kim Dok..."

Tzzzzzt!

His whole body suddenly jerked like an electrocuted fish. His lips were burning black.

Something was controlling what he could say.

[Rearrangement will begin in 30 seconds.]

Taeseong twisted in pain before barely managing to part his lips.

"I-I'm sorry. I can't tell you that. But I'll do anything else. Anything I can do..."

I silently looked down at him.

What remained of Junghyeok circling in my head no longer spoke to me.

Was it because my heart had softened a little?

Instead, I remembered Uncle Dansu.

「Even if it's inside a novel, I don't want to kill anyone.」

Since the Scenario began, Uncle Dansu hadn't killed anyone.

Even now, after losing his reason and becoming a monster, he only repeated, "I won't kill you."

Surely, the Kim Dokja fragment within him was Dokja's kindest and purest fragment.

「Because it's a novel my daughter liked.」

I slowly withdrew the sword pointed at Taeseong.

[Rearrangement will begin in 20 seconds.]

Taeseong's face brightened.

"Th-thank you! Thank you!"

Taeseong wept tears of relief and reached into his clothes.

"I-I don't have much, but at least take this..."

Just as I was about to say I didn't need it, the hairs all over my body stood on end.

Something was approaching at incredible speed.

Yuseong grabbed me, having sensed something strange, and I shielded her protectively.

Whoosh!

A wave of Mana flew toward us.

The moment I instinctively gripped Broken Faith, I realized something.

「This isn't an attack aimed at us.」

The wave of Mana passed Yuseong and me, then severed Taeseong's neck.

The tragedy occurred before I could intervene.

A figure that had entered the safe zone in an instant sent Taeseong's head flying beyond the green circle.

"You're still softhearted."

A familiar voice.

A man wearing a black coat stood there.

He had a rather handsome face for an extra.

A manner of speaking that distinctly imitated Junghyeok.

"The Supreme King doesn't act like that. Why hesitate to kill an evildoer?"

Beside him stood a woman who gave me a small bow with a troubled expression.

I remembered the last conversation I had shared with her.

A quiet ripple spread through my heart.

[The safe zone has activated.]

[Available capacity: 4/4]

[Rearrangement has begun.]

The Apostle siblings.

Second Apostle Killer King and Literary Girl 64 had joined the Absolute Throne War.

* * *

Rearrangement lasted exactly one minute.

Flames suddenly flared up and burned everything outside the safe zone, while the maze walls moved and changed the layout of the passages.

As soon as Rearrangement ended, Killer King searched Gu Taeseong's corpse, which lay nearby.

"Look. This bastard had other intentions."

Killer King held a Virulent Poison Bomb.

I recalled Taeseong's expression when he had reached into his clothes at the end.

Had the bomb really been what Taeseong was trying to take out?

Perhaps reading my expression, Killer King added, "Don't feel guilty. Just think of it as one stranger dying. You don't mourn every single person who dies on the other side of Earth."

He certainly had been a stranger to me. I didn't know his name, face, or where he lived.

"They're the sort of bastards who committed crimes under the cover of anonymity. You don't need to sympathize with them."

Could I really just say that and move on?

What would Uncle Dansu have said?

My lips moved several times as I searched for something to say, but I didn't know what I should say.

Maybe it was because I didn't have a fragment of the kindhearted Dokja within me.

"Has everything been well with you?"

"Mm."

Killer King gathered the items from Taeseong's clothes and stood up.

A flag was tied around his arm like an armband.

A black flag.

As expected, Killer King had cleared every part of the King's Path Scenario.

It was only natural.

He was the Second Apostle who had read Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint more than a hundred times. His Patron constellation was none other than the Archangel Jophiel.

"There was a lot going on."

As expected, Killer King checked my flag before turning his gaze to Yuseong.

"It seems a lot happened on your side as well."

We briefly shared what had happened to us after clearing the Theater Dungeon and scattering from Chungmuro.

Killer King's route included places I knew nothing about and Hidden Pieces I had never considered.

I also briefly explained what had happened to me, from going to Seoul Station and meeting the Beggar's Sect to coming to Gwanghwamun and entering the dungeon.

When I finally mentioned Uncle Dansu, Killer King let out a short sigh.

"Lee Dansu? The man who was looking for his daughter?"

"That's right."

"This is troublesome. The Scenario has changed too much from the original work."

"..."

"You need seven Star Gems to obtain the Four-Tiger Evil-Cutting Sword. Yet that man has five of them..."

After bringing it up, I wondered if I had made a mistake.

I recalled the way Killer King had killed Taeseong without hesitation.

"I should say this in advance, but if you attack Uncle Dansu..."

"Why do you think I would?"

Killer King frowned slightly, as if offended.

"The Seven Apostles' Council's enemy is only the Readers' Association. We won't harm anyone else."

"Is that so?"

"In any case, at this rate, that man is likely to collect all seven Star Gems."

I thought so too.

Even now, Readers' Association members scattered throughout the maze would be waiting for a chance to feed Uncle Dansu the remaining Star Gems.

"The Readers' Association bastards are probably planning to summon the Four-Tiger Evil-Cutting Sword by using that man as a Sacrifice, then steal the item."

"We need to find Uncle Dansu before they do."

[2 hours and 58 minutes remain until the maze's Rearrangement.]

There was still plenty of time before the next Rearrangement.

The problem was that the entire maze had reset, so we no longer knew Uncle Dansu's location.

"We need a guide. Do you have a related Skill or Attribute?"

We glanced at Literary Girl 64 and Yuseong, who were pacing a few steps away.

Killer King didn't say anything, but it was immediately apparent that our party had no guide.

"This party lineup is terrible. This is when we should've had Yu Sangah or Lee Gilyeong."

He was right.

Kim Dokja Company had two Incarnations who could find their way through a maze. Yet Yu Sangah and Lee Gilyeong were not here.

Uncle Dansu, who could at least have filled Gilyeong's role, had become a monster and was wandering the maze.

We had to find a way.

A way to find Uncle Dansu before the Readers' Association did.

I thought.

「What would Kim Dokja have done?」

That was when a message rang out in my head.

[The Attribute Record Mender has completed its repairs.]

At last, Record Mender had finished its repairs.

I didn't expect much.

The person I was possessing now was Inho Cheon, and I didn't think repairing Inho Cheon's records would bring about any major change.

But then.

[Record Mender has repaired an inactive Skill.]

A message I had never expected rang out.

[The Exclusive Skill Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint has been activated.]

Footnotes:

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