Regression is Too Much - Chapter 330

WeTried Translations

Translator: ZEROSUGAR

Editor: Abstract

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 330: The past (9)

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"We should leave him alone?"

"The regressor?"

"Wait."

Zetter cut off his murmuring teammates.

"Before you hear what Su-hee or I have to say, I want to ask first. What do you all want to do?"

"You mean us?"

"Yes. Now you all know a regressor with transcendent power exists. What's your opinion?"

"You're asking us all of a sudden..."

"This is just a reference point before you hear Su-hee's opinion, so don't feel too much pressure."

If Dok Su-hee hadn't lied, Zetter would have led with this exact question. If he asked the same question after hearing her out now, their opinions would obviously get contaminated. So if he wanted their honest opinions, now was the time. That was the right order, and the efficient one too.

"Well... I think."

Mahesh spoke up first.

"Even if we don't make direct contact... I think we should at least keep him under surveillance."

"Why is that?"

"It's too... it's an excessively dangerous power. The human mind is unstable. He might be fine now, but if that man loses his mind down the line... we might have to worry about the survival of the entire human race."

An opinion that the power was too dangerous, and needed to be watched.

"Wouldn't it be better to win him over to our side? I mean, if we ask him to join Team Alpha..."

"If he wanted to join, he would've joined already."

"But we won't know until we offer, right?"

An opinion in favor of recruiting him.

"For starters, how about we just keep sending him gifts?"

"Gifts?"

"Yeah. Since this person is basically a god or whatever... if we leave a good impression early on, maybe some crumbs will fall our way too."

An opinion in favor of leaving a good impression.

Most of the opinions leaned positive, probably because Michael Zetter had mentioned earlier that they were "good people." And that happened to be true.

"Good. But my opinion is different."

Zetter's own opinion wasn't all that far off from theirs, either.

"I've talked before about why I hold the position of Player Association president."

"Yes, I remember."

"The reason I remain the leader of players is that it's the most efficient arrangement. It's because I'm the most capable, and because I can carry the most weight. So if there's someone better than me, someone more capable, I'm ready to step aside at any time. Do you remember that?"

This was one hundred percent Zetter's genuine belief. The reason Zetter currently held the Association presidency was that, looked at objectively, he really was the most suited for it. He didn't spend a single second of personal time — he handled the presidency, attended public events, climbed the Tower, and managed other players, all at once. Zetter was truly grinding his own life down for the sake of the world, and if you asked anyone else to do the same job, no one would do it better. That wasn't arrogance. It was plain fact.

"I thought that if anyone was going to conquer the Tower, it would be me. And if I failed, I thought it might be the Empress."

"..."

"But I've seen the man named Kim Jun-ho with my own eyes. He really is an excellent person. I can't call him perfect, but he seemed like someone moving toward the right answer. I only met him once, but I could tell that much."

"Don't tell me."

"That's right."

Zetter nodded.

"If there's a human who conquers the Tower, I think it'll be one of the two — Choi Ji-won and Kim Jun-ho. A large part of Choi Ji-won's fame probably comes from Regression too."

"T-the two of them are involved with each other?"

"Presumably in a romantic relationship, yes."

"So there was a regressor behind Hero Choi Ji-won all along..."

Contrary to what the other teammates had been worrying about, Zetter kept pouring out positive things about the regressor.

"The details will need a thorough investigation, but if this man named Kim Jun-ho has both talent and character, I believe the entire planet Earth should help him."

So Zetter's position was simple. With power this broken, Kim Jun-ho was, without question, the one with the highest chance of conquering the Tower.

That being the case, rather than wasting strength and resources on other players, it made more sense to funnel every resource into the regressor with the best odds. From an efficiency standpoint, this was correct.

"That doesn't sound wrong..."

"Yeah. If the power's that broken, and you throw every elixir, potion, and piece of gear his way, won't he just clean up everything by himself?"

"Sounds right to me. The regressor would probably like that too, wouldn't he?"

Even to the other teammates, who had ordinary sensibilities, this seemed to make plenty of sense. Better to pour everything into the most promising prospect than waste it scattered across other people. If he was a regressor, he'd probably use every resource he had in the most efficient way, in exactly the right place.

"But..."

That was when Mahesh spoke up again. His expression suggested something was bothering him, something he wanted to say.

"No. I already know what you're about to say. Let's hear Su-hee out first."

But Zetter cut him off, and everyone's eyes naturally turned toward Dok Su-hee.

"So why do you think we should just leave the regressor alone?"

"I..."

Dok Su-hee hesitated, bit her lip for a moment, then opened her mouth.

"First of all, the regressor himself won't want that."

"You've never even asked him."

"You don't need to ask to know. If he wanted fame, he would've become famous a long time ago. The fact that nobody here even knows the name 'Kim Jun-ho' is proof of that."

Dok Su-hee's goal was to become Kim Jun-ho's regression companion. She'd betrayed him once, but he'd let her keep her memories anyway, so she figured she'd been forgiven (Kim Jun-ho hadn't done it on purpose). She was planning to become a better woman and go find Kim Jun-ho again someday. Naturally enough, Dok Su-hee had done some digging into his background.

The result was that plenty of rumors existed about Kim Jun-ho, but no one knew that he was the man behind them. Kim Jun-ho didn't want to be exposed.

"Why not just ask him directly?"

"Then we'd be announcing that we've already figured out he's the regressor."

"...True."

While the other teammates murmured among themselves, Dok Su-hee pressed on, growing more confident.

"And you've probably noticed by now, but the man who saved everyone on Floor 4, that's this Kim Jun-ho. He's the one behind everyone surviving the Tutorial too. Probably the one who helped Choi Ji-won on Floor 11 as well. And on Floor 12, there were rumors about a mysterious man breathing out cold, right? That was probably Kim Jun-ho too."

"What's your point?"

"My point is, he's already moving in the right direction without us needing to touch anything. He's walking a path close to the right answer, one where people get hurt as little as possible while he himself grows stronger. Even if we don't intervene at all, I believe he'll climb the Tower to the top eventually."

"...That."

"That is fairly persuasive."

Dok Su-hee's argument was correct. Kim Jun-ho was already doing well without anyone telling him what to do, and he'd keep doing well going forward. His past backed up his future. Even without intervention, the regressor looked like he'd be fine.

The reason Dok Su-hee was so desperate to block any intervention with Kim Jun-ho was partly because she believed he wouldn't want it, and partly because she was laying groundwork to become his companion later on. Still just a high school girl, she hadn't given up her ambition of becoming the regressor's companion.

"Mahesh."

Zetter spoke quietly.

"Say what you were about to say earlier."

"Ah. Understood."

Clearing his throat, Mahesh looked Dok Su-hee straight in the eye.

"I understand that Kim Jun-ho-ssi is an impressive person. I understand he's done well so far too."

"Yes. He really is impressive."

"But will that hold true going forward?"

"...?"

"Regression means having to live through far more time than anyone else. We don't know how often he regresses, or how, but I'd guess there's bound to be some kind of penalty."

"..."

"Right now, Kim Jun-ho-ssi is good. Excellent, even. But far into the future... can you be certain that the man climbing the Tower will still be just as excellent then? The Tower is exactly the kind of place that drives people insane."

Zetter stepped forward again, right on cue.

"I'm not arguing that we need to intervene immediately. I think we should investigate thoroughly, look into Kim Jun-ho-ssi's character, and only then carefully decide whether to intervene."

"But...!"

"You might be right. Kim Jun-ho-ssi might clear the Tower even if we do nothing at all."

Zetter raised his index finger and held it in front of Dok Su-hee's mouth.

"But if we intervene. If we give Kim Jun-ho-ssi, who is completely sane right now, sufficient support to help him climb the Tower..."

"..."

"We could dramatically raise humanity's odds of conquering the Tower. The variables would drop dramatically. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

To summarize what Zetter meant:

People change. So he needs to climb the Tower before he changes, and doing that requires our support.

"Do you think I'm wrong?"

"..."

"Seems like something's bothering you too."

Dok Su-hee couldn't answer easily either. She had betrayed Kim Jun-ho once before, and paid for it with an entire arm. She had no complaints about losing the arm. The problem was Kim Jun-ho's state at the time.

When he'd blown off her arm, Kim Jun-ho had looked utterly exhausted, and in pain. Simply put, he hadn't looked sane.

The cause had been an enormous number of repeated regressions to break through the arrow trap, but Dok Su-hee didn't know that, and it left her unable to confidently refute the idea that regressors were unstable.

"...So then. How exactly are you planning to go about this intervention thing?"

"We'll need to look into the conditions first, but for starters..."

Just as Dok Su-hee, worn down and persuaded by Zetter, was about to lower her head—

"..."

Dok Su-hee and Michael Zetter's eyes met. It had been a long time since the two of them had made eye contact like that. No, actually, no one had made eye contact with Zetter recently at all. He was an overwhelming superior and an overwhelming strength, and there was an aura that quietly bled off him because of it, one that made everyone unconsciously avoid his eyes.

"...!"

But Dok Su-hee — an Inventory ability holder, and also, though she'd never told Zetter, a Synthesis ability holder — for one brief instant, saw the look in Zetter's eyes with perfect clarity. Only possible because she was arguably the strongest among the Alpha team members.

And in that same instant, a chill ran down her spine. That wasn't a human gaze. It was closer to a machine's. Perfectly inorganic, without a single fragment of feeling in it. He was looking at Dok Su-hee the way you'd look at a slab of meat.

In that moment, Dok Su-hee understood instinctively. Michael Zetter could not be left as he was. If things kept going like this, a bad future was waiting, not just for Kim Jun-ho, but for Dok Su-hee too.

Zetter's opinion, one that excluded other people's emotions to an excessive degree. Emotion. Emotion. Emotion.

Only then did the true shape of the unease she'd been feeling all along reveal itself. According to rumors, the Association president used to be quite playful in the past, and there had been all sorts of speculation about why the president they knew now was so consistently blunt and cold. Maybe the cause wasn't simply that the work was exhausting.

"Well then, Su-hee. You'll be suspended from duty for the time being—"

"...President."

"I'll announce the disciplinary measures later."

"I won't make excuses for lying. Instead, let me ask just one thing."

"Enough with the pointless talk, and quietly go into suspension..."

"By any chance, is your brain broken right now?"

"..."

"I can't feel any emotion in your eyes."

Zetter's body, which had been rising from the table somewhat abruptly, froze in place.

Michael Zetter—

"...Su-hee."

—had been hiding from everyone the fact that he'd lost his emotions.