WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS x FLAME COMICS

Translator: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint ◈

Chapter 731: Episode 28: Home (9)

──────

Hey guys, quick announcement before the chapter! We're hosting an original webnovel contest with a $1000 prize pool, a chance to publish your novel on WeTried, and lifetime free reading access for the top two winners!

There's also a participation prize of 500 coins for everyone participating.

If you've got a story sitting in a folder somewhere, or have been wanting to try writing one, we'd love to read it. You only need your first 10 chapters, and you have until 1st January 2027 to submit. New writers are welcome too!

Full details, rules, and how to enter here! https://wetriedtls.com/announcements/webnovel-contest

Feel free to send this to anyone you know who writes. Enjoy the chapter!

If you have any questions, please join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried

──────

The wolf Constellation shouted with its face twisted into a grimace.

[What nonsense...]

Even I thought it sounded insane.

Saying I would steal the fable "The Three Little Pigs" would sound strange. But if this Star Stream was truly a world that operated as I thought it did, as Dokja had read it, then it wasn't an impossible story.

"Shut up and listen to me."

The temperature in my voice was unfamiliar. Was this really my voice, or the lingering trace of the fable that the Demon King of Salvation had left within me?

[The fable Heir to an Eternal Name listens to your story.]

Either way, it didn't matter.

If Dokja was reading this story too, if my Patron somewhere in this world was watching as well.

[One Constellation that has yet to reveal its modifier watches you.]

At the very least, I wanted to tell a story I wouldn't be ashamed to show him.

"But you can't summon just any Outer God."

I took in a deep breath before speaking. What came next was important.

"The Outer God you'll summon is..."

The wind around us was growing stronger again. I desperately raised my voice. I couldn't tell whether the wolf had heard me.

[The Constellation First Pig to Die is furious!]

Sparks bursting from the wolf's entire body sent me flying. Something short caught me as my vision spun wildly.

It was little Yu Junghyeok.

He lifted me up and dashed toward the Brick House. Gyeong Sein hurried out to meet us, shoved little Junghyeok and me inside the Brick House, then shut the door.

The beastfolk hiding in the Brick House looked up at me one by one from between the tables. Some looked at me resentfully, while others looked at me in awe.

There were people worried about me, too.

"Wha-what are you thinking? You'll die! You'll really die!"

Sein was crying.

"Have you lost your mind? Don't tell me you really think you've become Kim Dokja!"

Little Junghyeok sharply turned to look up at Sein. But Sein no longer seemed to have the strength to keep up the act.

"Please, please hide here! If you hide, you'll be safe."

The Sein I knew was a cowardly person. Someone who feared Ground Rats. Someone who hid behind Huiwon.

But I remembered another side of her, too.

Someone who endured Junghyeok's hellish training.

Someone who threw herself in front of monsters to save the characters in a novel.

Someone who risked her life over and over to protect me and the others.

"This fable has nothing to do with us. We can just stay still. It'll pass if we do."

She was never the kind of person to say something like that.

"It does concern us."

"What?"

"Those bastards are the ones who turned you into beastfolk."

I looked at my companions standing behind her. Hyunwoo, Uncle Dansu, and Yerim.

"You all arrived here before I did. You know better than I do what kind of place Area 13 is."

Resolving the Event Scenario was important. But that alone wasn't enough.

My companions had already had their masks taken and failed the Scenario.

To save them, there was no choice but to break the rules of Area 13.

And to do that.

「I must stand against the Twelve Zodiacs.」

Sein stared at me blankly. Her eyebrows trembled.

"Aren't you afraid of the Constellations?"

"I am."

I was afraid. Truly afraid.

I had run all the way here because they frightened me.

"But I've seen things far more frightening than them."

It was different from what I had imagined. The power of the stars was beyond anything I had expected.

The power to literally split mountains and cleave seas.

Even now, when I closed my eyes, I could clearly see Ares fighting the Demon King of Salvation. I had no confidence at all that I could face a monster like that.

"The enemies we need to defeat stand so much higher than these Twelve Zodiacs that they can't even be compared."

Even Ares was only one of Olympus's twelve gods.

The sky of the Star Stream was far too distant.

"We can't lose to the stars. We can't see the world the way they see it. We..."

No matter how hard I struggled, I couldn't defeat a Constellation as I was now.

I could tell just by looking at their symbolic forms. But even if I couldn't defeat them, I couldn't obediently accept their rules.

"We're readers."

My companions either raised their heads or looked down at the ground, each lost in thought. In the brief silence, the fierce winds outside the house steadily intensified.

Yerim spoke first.

"How?"

"My little sister is asking how she can help."

"From now on, we're going to change the fable."

The core of this Event Scenario was changing the original fable of "The Three Little Pigs."

Even if we succeeded, the change to the fable would be little more than a speck.

But I desperately needed even that one speck right now.

"Just like Dokja did."

"「Stage Transformation」 has already been activated for this fable. You know it won't be easy to change."

"That's right. But it isn't impossible."

The power of an activated 「Stage Transformation」 was absolute. It was the authority of the stage, capable of overturning even differences in strength.

At least while "The Three Little Pigs" remained in effect, the wolf could never destroy the Brick House.

"I've already laid the foreshadowing."

That was, of course, if it was an ordinary wolf.

Rumbblee!

This was a gamble.

Just as Dokja had always risked his life, I would have to risk mine this time as well.

Fortunately, we had this Brick House.

It wasn't as dependable as Dokja's [The Fourth Wall], but as long as this Brick House remained...

[The Fable Fragment Brick House has become sturdier.]

We would surely have a chance to turn this situation around.

The sound of the wind abruptly stopped then.

The wolf Constellation's form swayed beyond the window. Its lengthening shadow had finally reached the heavens.

[The Constellation First Pig to Die is greatly shocked!]

[The Constellation Pig Who Builds a House of Wood is furious at the wolf's decision!]

[The Constellation Rabbit Without a Liver is startled by the wolf's choice!]

[Some Constellations of the nebula Twelve Zodiacs condemn the wolf's atrocities!]

Judging by the Constellations' reactions,

[The Constellation Wolf Who Loves Little Red Riding Hood laughs maniacally.]

it seemed things were about to proceed as planned.

"This..."

Uncle Dansu sensed the disturbing shift in the air and slowly backed away.

"Did it summon an Outer God?"

A small Great Hole had opened in the sky amid the black dust. It was smaller than the Great Hole I had seen before, but it was unquestionably a Great Hole.

"Dear god."

"Ah, ahhh..."

"It's over! We're all finished!"

The beastfolk who had entered the inn with us seemed to know about Great Holes as well. They held their breath with their heads buried beneath the tables.

Well, they must have once been Incarnations in Scenarios too.

Tsstststst!

The Plausibility Backlash raging around the Great Hole was weaker than usual.

I had heard that the Recycling Center's boundary with other worlds was thin, so perhaps that was why.

If not...

[The Outer God is preparing for Descent.]

"W-what do we do, Dokja-ssi?"

Sein, who had regained a little composure, had started calling me Dokja-ssi.

"If a Great Old One appears..."

Then it was time for me to live up to my name.

"Not every Outer God is Great Old One-grade. You know that."

Most Outer Gods were closer to the Nameless Ones. Deformed monsters that had lost their sense of self and wandered worldlines.

"It's still a problem! If something like the One Who Devours Dreams appears, Area 13 is finished!"

"It'll be lower in Status than that."

In Dark Castle in the main story, the One Who Devours Dreams had descended.

But the One Who Devours Dreams had been summoned using the shadow of a fabled-grade Constellation as a Sacrifice.

This time, the Sacrifice was the shadow of a Historical Constellation that had lost most of its fable.

"If something like that had appeared, the Constellations would have all run away first. But look. They're still watching."

[Few Constellations are frightened by the presence of the Outer God.]

[Constellations of the nebula Twelve Zodiacs are shocked by the Outer God that has appeared in the Scenario!]

[The Constellation Abyssal Black Flame Dragon looks interested.]

They were frightened, but they remained in place. That meant the thing that had appeared was at least lower in Status than the One Who Devours Dreams.

The next moment, I heard something strike the roof.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

The house that had withstood the wolf's winds until now shook dangerously.

So whatever had been used to summon it, an Outer God was still an Outer God.

[The Fable Fragment Brick House groans.]

I placed a hand against the wall.

"Don't worry. Even an Outer God isn't entirely free from 「Stage Transformation」."

Outer Gods.

Beings rejected by Scenarios, wandering beyond the edges of the Star Stream.

Yet they weren't completely free from fables. The moment they intervened in a Scenario, they too became bound by that Scenario's rules.

The problem was what kind of creature had appeared.

I glared into the darkness outside the window. The dust filling it was too thick for me to see the descended Outer God's form.

It had likely taken over the wolf Constellation's body. And carrying out the wolf's will, it would try to destroy this Brick House.

Rumbblee!

The ground shook ominously.

This was a clear sign that things were different from before.

"Dokja."

Little Junghyeok's expression was grave as well.

"The wind is different."

I could feel it too. The wind blowing from beyond this wall was on an entirely different level from the wolf Constellation's earlier gusts.

It felt as if a god of storms had descended.

"What kind of divine being could have appeared..."

"It isn't something like the Wolf of Destruction, is it?"

Hyunwoo answered Sein's question.

"The Wolf of Destruction isn't an Outer God. It's a Constellation of Asgard."

"Hyunwoo-ssi, you could speak normally?"

"That Seventh Apostle only responds at times like this."

The house began shaking violently.

I pressed myself against the wall, pretending to stay calm. This certainly wasn't a situation where we could relax.

"Everyone, press against the wall and supply it with Mana."

Little Junghyeok moved first, and the other companions followed one by one, clinging to the wall.

As they felt the wall tremble, their faces turned pale.

"Dokja-ssi, I don't think it can hold out much longer. At this rate..."

"Don't worry. It won't break."

"But our Mana alone won't be enough."

That was right. Maintaining a Brick House this large would require an enormous amount of Mana.

And more than anything...

"The Brick House is only a Fable Fragment."

Little Junghyeok was right.

The Brick House's fable had far too low a Status.

A Fable Fragment that hadn't even become a fable.

And it was low-grade, at that.

"Even so, it'll be fine. The Brick House won't collapse. Because..."

I stared into the darkness beyond the sky and added with a grin.

"If this Brick House breaks, there are those who'll lose something far greater than we will."

[The fable The Three Little Pigs stumbles over its story.]

[The Constellation First Pig to Die urgently supports the fable!]

[The Constellation Pig Who Builds a House of Wood requests reinforcements from the other Constellations!]

Killer King, tied to a chair, finally seemed to realize my intention and groaned.

"Don't tell me, Kim Dokja, you..."

"Yes. That's right."

"So that's why you summoned the Outer God..."

Hyunwoo nodded as if he understood the situation.

"I see. If the wolf wins here..."

"History will change. That's why the stars can never give up."

[The fable The Three Little Pigs continues its story.]

[The Fable Fragment Brick House has been strengthened!]

"Because this is their origin fable."

My plan was simple.

「To make the Constellations of the Twelve Zodiacs and the Outer God destroy each other.」

I couldn't see the stars hidden in the darkness.

But I could feel their anger and fear.

"They can never give up. So..."

I wouldn't end this 「stage」 until all those stars fell.

[Your synchronization rate with your Patron has greatly increased!]

"Let's create a fable that will continue forever."

[The fable Heir to an Eternal Name smiles mysteriously.]

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried