WeTried Translations

Translator: ZEROSUGAR

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Regression is Too Much

________________

Chapter 289

──────

The regressor fights (8)

I like animals. I like dogs, I like cats, I like red pandas, honestly I like every cute animal there is.

Humans have plenty of reasons for liking animals, but one of mine is that they're simple. That might sound a little psychopathic, but hear me out.

Animals are simple. They don't hide anything. If they like something, they like it. If they don't, they don't. Their intentions are always clear. They stay true to their own hearts.

That's why animals can be trusted. You never have to worry about some hidden agenda buried deep in their minds, never have to wonder if they're secretly faking it when they don't actually like you. And as a bonus, on top of being cute, you get to run your hands through all that fluffy fur as much as you want.

"What, a rookie?"

Looking at it that way, liking beastmen isn't quite the same as liking ordinary animals. They're not just bigger, smarter versions of animals.

Beastmen have reason. They're individuals with personalities. So you can't trust them completely, and you can't take every expression at face value. Even if beastmen tend to be fairly honest, there's still a gap between being fully trustworthy and being relatively trustworthy.

Their looks, too. Sure, you could call them cute, but there was a stronger case for calling them terrifying. Maybe that changed depending on the beastman species as a whole, but at least the ones who showed up at the Colosseum were all fierce-looking, every one of them. Sharp eyes, plenty of scars, built like tanks. This wasn't only true of beastmen, but I wanted to say I felt a bit of distance from them regardless. Oh, and the fact that I couldn't just touch them however I wanted was an added downside.

"Cute."

"?"

But right now, I was a beastman enthusiast. A beastman lover. Love and peace. A true philanthropist. With a warm heart, I took the hand of the furry beastman staring at me and held it tight. Mmm, that fragrant beastman scent.

"Wh-what?"

The beastman flinched, thoroughly flustered. I gave it a bright, refreshing smile and said,

"I love animals."

"...What?"

"Maybe that's why I disliked beastmen at first. There's a difference between beastmen and animals, after all. But not anymore. You're actually smarter than ordinary animals, stronger, more magnificent... captivating beings. I sincerely wish to 'cherish' you."

"..."

"Would you call me... a beastman enthusiast?"

The drone was watching me. Something I'd learned in an earlier cycle: those drones recorded my every move. They had all kinds of sensors built in, and could measure body temperature, heart rate, even Mana levels.

So lying was pointless. I had to act with genuine feeling. After living through so many cycles, I'd become a master of acting. But acting alone wasn't enough. I needed sincerity behind it. I liked animals. Beastmen were big animals. So I liked beastmen too. Sure, they were built like tanks, but there was something subtly adorable about that. Lovable. Fluffy. I wanted to touch them.

Pat, pat.

"Soft."

"...!"

I rose up on my toes and stroked the big beastman's head, and it flinched back, retreating two steps. Its companions did the same. Even the bald bearded one looked away, wearing an expression of pure disgust. Success.

I wasn't doing this because I'd lost my mind. There were two clear goals behind this.

First, image building.

In the previous cycle, I'd hidden my Strength. Acted as much as I could. Pretended to be weak, pretended to struggle, pretended it was tough.

But my record had always been a hundred percent win rate, and the Colosseum had already caught onto the fact that I was hiding my strength ages ago. Acting was useless.

Top-tier rankers wouldn't fight me because they cared about their placement. Mid-tier rankers wouldn't fight me because they knew I was hiding strength. And the money-obsessed idiots wouldn't fight me because there was no money in it.

Strength couldn't stay hidden forever anyway. To fight the top-tier rankers, I needed to climb the rankings. But since everyone avoided fighting me, there was no way to climb. The method I landed on was the money-obsessed idiots. That way, I could also scrape together the funds to buy information on the human slaughterer.

So my goal became getting famous. Fame brought money along naturally. More people would want to fight me. With enough of a reputation, most of the problems I was struggling with would resolve themselves in one shot. The method I chose for that was the "beastman enthusiast" concept.

In this world, opinions on beastmen were split hard. Some people found them cute enough to like. Plenty of others found them repulsive enough to hate. And in the middle of that, a human who loved beastmen? Who also happened to be genuinely strong? That was bound to draw attention.

Like I said with the human slaughterer, negative attention is still attention. And attention means money. I was going to get rich off this "beastman enthusiast" concept.

The second goal was to build some kind of connection with the "human slaughterer."

For whatever reason, that thing despised the entire human race. It was slaughtering humans in a Colosseum where killing wasn't even necessary.

A regressor facing an enemy needs information. I needed some way, any way, to meet the slaughterer. So what if I became a beastman enthusiast? A meeting between a beastman enthusiast and a human slaughterer? The odds of getting tangled up with it would rise sharply. And getting tangled up meant information. And like I said, money was just a bonus on top.

"Fluffy, fluffy."

"..."

I wasn't crazy. This was all carefully engineered. Plus, beastmen really were cute. The texture of their fur felt almost addictive. Aside from the strong smell, I'd call it downright therapeutic.

"..."

"..."

"How about I scratch under your chin, hm? Feel good?"

I remembered petting a friend's dog and kept stroking the beastman for a good long while, until.

"Kim. Jun. Ho.-nim's turn has arrived."

"See you later."

When the drone came to collect me after that, I left coolly. At the time, I figured rumors would spread of me being some "lunatic who thinks beastmen are pets." I was even a little curious whether I'd end up known as someone who discriminated against beastmen, or as someone who liked them in a twisted way.

"Hey, you all right?"

"...There goes any hope of marriage for me. Touching my chin that roughly, right where everyone could see... I was so flustered I couldn't even move. To think a human would..."

And as I found out later, that beastman had apparently been female. People in this world seemed to be able to tell somehow, but I was just a climber, so I had no clue. The thick fur made it impossible to tell from appearance alone. The drones had already been watching my every move. And it turned out that among beastmen, touching someone's chin carried a very specific meaning.

Completely oblivious to all of this, I rejoined Choi Ji-won and kept insisting, over and over, "I want to fight beastmen. I love beastmen." And the rumors developed in a... somewhat distorted direction.

"That's him?"

"Yeah. The one who likes female beastmen."

"Apparently he mauled her chin and didn't even pretend to take responsibility."

"They say he can't be satisfied with human females anymore, so now he's targeting female beastmen."

"I heard he got a noble lady pregnant and ran off to the Colosseum."

"And on top of all that, he's got a woman hanging off his arm too."

It was probably inevitable that the rumors would spread in a direction slightly different from what I'd intended.

"...Jun-ho?"

"..."

"That's not true, right?"

"It's not true!!!"

The result was a success. Even before the slaughterer showed up, I'd already built up plenty of fame. In just three days I'd made a fortune and climbed the rankings fast.

"So... hello?"

"..."

Other players avoided my gaze. Aliens whispered to each other whenever I walked down the hallway. Aside from constantly feeling eyes on me.

Aside from my dignity taking a considerable hit...

It was a success...

There are different kinds of crazy. Some crazy people repel you. Some crazy people, somehow, you can't help but like. And to the beastmen, apparently, I was clearly the latter.

"I... lost."

"Good match. Here, have a drink. Oh, mind if I touch your fur?"

"...Do as you like. I'll gladly take the drink, though."

I never once actually harmed the beastmen I fought. I showed a clear gap in skill, and after winning, I'd hand over drinks or snacks. It was a gimmick Choi Ji-won came up with, and it hit the mark, apparently boosting my image even further.

"Hey, fight me next."

"Bring it on, enthusiast."

Maybe thanks to that, beastmen who wanted to fight me were lining up. Oh, and members of other races who wanted to teach me a lesson were lining up too.

"Hey, furball. Quit embarrassing humanity."

In those cases, I didn't hold back. I just poured my whole soul into wrecking them. That fed my reputation too. This guy's only nice to beastmen, they said. I ended up far more famous, and far richer, than I'd originally planned. I reinvested the money I made back into the beastmen, earning even more fame, and the cycle kept feeding itself. A positive loop, rolling along.

"This is... sudden, I know... but I want to... make a proposal..."

There was a small hiccup partway through, when the angel Jake showed up and avoided my gaze, but overall the situation was overwhelmingly positive.

So how much time had passed by then?

"Jun-ho."

"Is he dead?"

"Yeah."

The Brazilian player had died. The slaughterer never approached me.

It just appeared out of nowhere like before, pointed at the Brazilian player, and killed him. Like it was some chore that had to be done.

But there was one thing different from the previous cycle.

"I'm going to go buy some information."

This time, I had a lot of money.

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