WeTried Translations
Translator: ZEROSUGAR
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Regression is Too Much
Chapter 169
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The regressor wanders (5)
"Approximately ten months from now... a crisis may befall Earth."
"...?"
"...Excuse me?"
Ji-won and I froze on the spot, unable to move. What was he talking about? Earth is in danger?
"First... let me explain how I came to learn this. If you don't mind, could I trouble you for something to drink?"
Saying that, Michael Zetter opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water without even waiting for permission. He grabbed a 1.5-liter bottle, didn't bother with a cup, and downed the entire thing in one go.
"Phew. Let me start with a question. How long has it been since you were all summoned to the Tutorial?"
"About... three months, I think."
"For me, it has been four months. You could say I was among the very first to be summoned to the Tutorial. In fact, I already cleared Floor 15 two months ago."
"...That quickly?"
"Yes. I gathered trustworthy people and moved as a team. Aside from the time it took to assemble a hundred people on Floor 4, there was no wasted time. As of now, I have cleared up to Floor 23."
Floor 23. I wasn't sure whether anyone had climbed the Tower faster than Michael, but Floor 23 was likely near the absolute peak of human progress. Floor 23 in four months. Considering the Tower had a total of sixty-six floors, that was an absurdly fast pace. If he kept this up, he could conquer the entire Tower in just one year.
"So... what does you climbing the Tower quickly have to do with a crisis hitting Earth?"
"Being on a higher floor of this Tower means you have access to that much more information. It has been three months since I assumed the position of Player Association president. It is a seat that carries great responsibility, but one that also comes with great authority. I used that authority to secretly cultivate players whose abilities were excessively dangerous."
"...Excessively dangerous?"
"Do you not remember how I teleported here?"
"What about it?"
"What if it hadn't been a person, but something like a bomb? If a person can travel from New York to Seoul, what's stopping something else from doing the same? On top of that, it leaves no evidence behind. Earth still has no means of detecting a player's abilities."
"..."
"Beyond bombs, there are biochemical weapons, wiretapping devices and fabricated evidence. All of it can be moved covertly, without leaving a single trace. This power is too dangerous for any organization to possess. It is a power that could topple the balance of human society."
Michael laced his fingers together, raised his arms, and pressed his interlocked hands against his mouth.
"When politicians discover overwhelmingly powerful abilities like the long-range teleportation I just used, their reactions generally fall into one of two categories. Either they secure the means to control it completely and wield it as their own, or..."
"They destroy it."
"Exactly. That is why I used the word 'excessively.'"
Being killed because your ability was too exceptional. A perfectly plausible scenario. And if the person's own combat strength was lacking, the danger would be even greater.
"Whenever I discover such a player, I erase their traces from the Association's database and bring them under my wing to help them grow. If their existence becomes known, their lives are at risk. I already have seven players gathered."
Michael recounted all of this in a matter-of-fact tone.
"Among them, an Indian player named Mahesh cleared Floor 15 roughly three weeks ago. Mahesh's ability is called Divination. It tells him the method that will produce the best possible outcome in whatever situation he currently finds himself in."
"So it's kind of like... a navigation system?"
"Precisely."
According to Michael, Mahesh unexpectedly approached Michael on his own initiative. After returning to reality, he used his Divination ability, and it told him to seek out the president of the Player Association.
"Mahesh cleared Floor 15 with ease, just like the two of you. The old man handed him an appropriate reward, the blue portal opened, and all that was left was to walk through and clear the floor."
But Mahesh had felt a nagging unease at that point. To put his mind at rest, he used his Divination ability.
"The Divination told him to use a Scroll of Appraisal on the dragon-shaped statue."
"...A Scroll of Appraisal?"
That was definitely a reward from Floor 12. The number had been [25], if I recalled correctly. I had one of those scrolls myself. And out of nowhere, the Divination told him to use it on a statue?
"This is the number Mahesh saw."
Michael produced a small scrap of paper from his coat. Scrawled on it in frantic, hasty penmanship was a sequence of numbers.
-325 : 11 : 24 : 41
"...A timer?"
"Yes. If we read from right to left as seconds, minutes, and hours... then the 325 at the front would be days."
Michael tapped the paper with his finger. Tap. Tap. Tap. His expression hadn't changed, but the atmosphere in the room grew noticeably heavier.
"I was not the first to clear Floor 15. However, when I entered Floor 15, the number of statues was very, very small. But from what I have been told, the number of statues has increased considerably since then. Is that true?"
"...It is."
"Then it would be reasonable to assume that a new statue is created each time a player enters. If we work backward from the timer on the statues, it appears to be set at one year from the point Floor 15 was cleared. Do you agree?"
"I do."
The timer had shown 325 days three weeks ago. And Michael said he had cleared Floor 15 roughly two months before that. So the most rational interpretation was that the timer had been set to one year from the moment Michael, or whoever had cleared it even earlier, had done so.
"Then... what do you think will happen the moment that timer on the statues reaches zero?"
The statues I had seen on Floor 15. Most of them had taken the form of some kind of monster. Goblins, wolves, dragons...
"Based on what my colleagues and I have theorized, we believe those statues will take physical form and appear on Earth. They could also reappear on Floor 15 itself, but that would very likely make it impossible for anyone who comes after to clear the floor at all. That is why we think it will be Earth. Earth is where they will appear. Of course, this is merely a possibility."
"..."
"It could turn out to be nothing at all. But when you consider the structure of Floors 11 and 12, I believe preparing for the worst is the right call."
Neither Ji-won nor I could utter a single word. It was not that his claim was too absurd to believe. It was that it was far too plausible for us to open our mouths. Honestly, when there is a timer attached to a statue, what other possibility could there be?
"The reason I have not appeared at official events recently was also for this purpose. To find a solution."
In the past, I had read a post Michael had uploaded to the internet. It must have been during Floor 2. The tone of what he had written back then had been lighthearted. He had not been this endlessly heavy man.
Over the past four months, what caused him to change him into this? Probably the same thing that had happened to me. He had become aware of the weight pressing down on his shoulders. The sense of responsibility that whispered, "If I fail to do my part, Earth is finished." That thought suddenly crossed my mind.
"I have been running experiments in the meantime. First of all, it is impossible to inform ordinary people about the fact that monsters will appear. No, anyone who has not reached Floor 15 cannot even perceive the information at all. I suspect it is treated as 'Tower content,' so the filter kicks in."
"Then... realistically, there is no way to prepare."
"I think so too. Perhaps if we find some loophole or phrase things with the right nuance, some degree of preparation might be possible, but it would not be nearly enough to brace against a worldwide catastrophe. We have no idea what scale the statues will take, where they will appear, or how they will manifest. The only thing we know is when."
"Hss..."
This was bad. This was really, really bad. Monsters appearing on Earth? And it was impossible to even warn people about it? This was a large-scale humanitarian disaster waiting to happen. On top of that, he had said one of the statues was shaped like a dragon, which meant stopping it with modern weaponry did not seem easy at all.
"Is there no way to get help from the Association?"
Ji-won asked cautiously, but Michael shook his head.
"The Association's senior leadership is currently preoccupied with something else. I do not know the details myself, but I do know it is a massive project in collaboration with the United States government. They probably would not even listen to what I have to say."
"So it was true that you and the Association were on bad terms."
"It was nothing more than a relationship of mutual exploitation. Let me get another drink of water."
Michael pulled another bottle from the fridge and downed it in an instant. He wiped his mouth roughly with the back of his forearm and stared up at the ceiling with his sunken eyes.
"The initial chaos... cannot be prevented. That much we have to accept. What I believe is far more important is preparing for what comes after. If monsters keep pouring out endlessly from that point on, every last human being who is not a player will perish."
He lowered his gaze from the ceiling and held up two fingers toward us.
"As I see it, there are theoretically two solutions. First, we drastically reduce the number of players who can reach Floor 15 or above."
The exact conditions were unclear, but it was presumed that one statue was created every time a single player entered Floor 15. So if no more players entered Floor 15? No more statues would be created, and Earth would eventually be safe.
"But... wouldn't that be impossible?"
"I think so too. In fact, it seems far more likely to backfire."
And it was impossible. There was no way to prevent individual players from entering the Tower in the first place, and telling people not to climb to Floor 15 would only make them want to climb even more. That was just human nature.
"Which is why the second solution is the only real solution."
Michael folded one finger down, leaving only his index finger extended, and spoke in a voice full of resolve.
"We need to increase the number of strong players who can respond to the sudden appearance of monsters to an extreme degree, far beyond what we have now. No matter when or where monsters appear, the infrastructure to respond must be in place."
"You mean..."
"Yes."
The last remaining finger folded down, forming a fist riddled with scars and steeled with conviction.
"For humanity to survive... an era of the players, by the players, and for the players must come."
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