WeTried Translations

Translator: ZEROSUGAR

Editor: Abstract

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◈ Regression is Too Much

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Chapter 363

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Regression (11)

"..."

My head hurt. I was irritated. Why had he been acting? Why had he behaved as naturally as possible, like someone who knew nothing at all?

Hypothesis one. He just wasn't interested in players. So whether I was strong or not didn't concern him.

Judging by everything he'd shown me so far, that didn't seem right. So, hypothesis two. He already knew from the start that I regressed, and he didn't want me to find out that he knew. So he acted.

"This one's off too."

But there was a logical flaw here as well. If Archangel Raphael had really wanted to take the stance of "I know nothing about your regression," he should have reacted differently just now. At the very least, some line like "How did you get so strong?" would have been natural.

Wasn't it far more unnatural that he hadn't mentioned it at all? And was an archangel really stupid enough not to notice that unnaturalness? Stupid enough to tell a clumsy lie and hope it wouldn't be caught?

No. I doubted that. So working backward, the archangel must have known his own behavior was unnatural. He must have known I'd catch that unnaturalness too.

This much felt right, I thought. But the mystery still wasn't solved.

"...Why?"

Why deliberately hand me that sense of unnaturalness? It was almost like sending a secret signal. But usually when someone sends a signal like that, they make it easy to read. This was so hard to decipher that it just made me more irritated.

If I tried to read it as generously as possible, the archangel knew about my regression but chose to overlook it. And he expressed that overlooking through "acting awkward."

If I tried to read it as harshly as possible, the archangel was just a complete idiot who'd done his best to deceive me but was too dumb to think it through.

Why would that be the harsh interpretation? Because the archangel was currently managing this Tower. If idiots like that were running things, I was the one who'd end up paying for it.

"...My head hurts."

Either way, I decided to stop torturing myself over it here. I'd already cleared this floor perfectly, and I'd decided not to regress in case some unknown variable came up. Even back when I'd spammed regression like crazy in earlier cycles, the archangel had never really intervened, so I decided to keep acting the same way this time.

"I don't even know why the archangels vanished in the first place, anyway."

Every angel except Raphael had left their post. Without knowing the cause, I couldn't push my speculation any further. I had no idea why "only Raphael" was still here either.

Well, enough agonizing. There was still work to do. And one of those things was.

"First, to America."

Going to America.

Why suddenly head to America instead of climbing the Tower? Some might wonder. But it was worth thinking through properly.

What's the greatest advantage a regressor has? Knowing the future. Sure, I was going to change that future, but keeping the changes as minimal as possible, bending them in my favor, that was the truly wise attitude for a regressor to take. Anyone who called themselves a regressor and then went around swaggering about "I'm going to change this woman's fate" didn't deserve the title.

So what was I getting at?

"I want to enter Floor 3 under conditions as similar as possible to before, if I can."

In the original history, I'd waited two weeks before I could join up with Choi Ji-won. I ate meals on Floor 2, got friendly with the residents, all while waiting for her.

But this cycle, I'd cleared Floor 2 incredibly fast. If I went into Floor 3 right now, even picking the hardest difficulty, I'd end up experiencing a different Floor 3 than the one I remembered. More precisely, the people in it would change.

So to enter the Floor 3 where Kang Chan, Ahn Gyeong-jun, and Dok Su-hee were, I needed to wait the same two weeks as before. There was a problem to solve there too, so waiting seemed like the better call.

That should explain the two-week wait. So why go to America right now? Obviously, because of one person there.

"Zetter."

Right now was the period when Michael Zetter had been unofficially selected as the next Player Association president, but hadn't officially taken the seat yet. I couldn't stop Michael Zetter from entering Floor 5 and losing his emotions, but I could probably stop him from getting worse than that.

-Ji-won-nim.

-You're, Jun-ho-nim, right?

-Yes, that's right. Sorry, but I have a favor to ask.

-A favor?

-Lend me some money.

-...

I was short on cash, so I borrowed some from Choi Ji-won on short notice, then hopped straight on a plane to America. The moment I landed at the airport, I took a train to Michael Zetter's house, the one I'd heard about before regressing, but he wasn't home. Didn't look like he'd started Association activities yet either... probably still inside the Tower.

"Guess I'll wait."

I had no choice but to crash at Zetter's place. I grabbed some pasta at a nearby restaurant to fill my stomach, and I was sprawled out watching TV when.

-Click.

"Hands up. Get up slowly, exactly like that."

The cold sensation of metal against the back of my head. Michael Zetter had returned at some point and was pointing a gun at me. Why a gun?

"Ah."

He didn't know who I was. Since there was a chance I was just a regular person, he'd chosen to threaten me with a gun rather than subdue me with brute strength from his ability. Terrifyingly efficient choice, as always.

"Get up."

"The reason I'm here is."

"I'll shoot."

"Zetter-ssi, it's because I have something to tell you."

-Tick.

When I stayed seated on the couch and kept talking, ignoring him, Zetter actually pulled the trigger. And of course, no bullet came out. I'd frozen it with mana.

"..."

"Have a seat."

He stared at me for a moment, then quietly sat down on the couch. On the TV, a cheerful family show poured out bursts of laughter, but neither of our faces looked anywhere close to amused.

No point hesitating.

"I'm a regressor. More precisely, I suppose you'd call me a time traveler."

"...So?"

"In the future, you find out my identity and spread it to the whole world. That put me in a seriously difficult position. You decide I'm more capable and dump everything on me, and the American President plasters my face all over the news... anyway, the two of you pulled a lot of crazy stunts together."

I carefully explained to Zetter everything that had happened in the future, and everything he himself had done. A lot had happened, so the explanation took a while, but Zetter didn't interrupt, just listened quietly.

"That's how it went."

Once the whole story was done.

Zetter's expression didn't change. That man's emotions had gone that thin. But the twitch of his eyebrows made it clear he was half convinced. No matter how I looked at it, I didn't seem to be lying, after all.

"If you need proof, my strength is the proof. You can feel it roughly, can't you?"

"..."

No answer came back, but the gun he'd tossed aside seemed to answer for him. He'd realized that guns didn't work on me, that I was extremely, extremely strong even among players.

There's a saying that what's meant to happen will happen. If I didn't take some kind of action now, Michael Zetter could intervene through the Book again in the future. He'd probably already carved his mark into it, which would only make it easier for him to be certain.

So I'd strike first, before he could. Michael Zetter had come around to being cooperative with me after learning the full truth, so I figured that if I laid it all out ahead of time like this, I could persuade him now too.

"Telling me this ahead of time, is that meant as a warning not to interfere?"

"That's right."

"...Understood. In that case."

Just as I'd expected, Zetter accepted it cleanly. Now that he'd confirmed I could grow strong on my own, he acknowledged that his own involvement wasn't needed.

"Anything else you'd like to say?"

"...Not really."

Zetter looked at me as if to ask whether I had more to say, and I just nodded and left. There were things I wanted to say, but those were words meant for the Zetter of the past, not the Zetter standing in front of me now.

Something this simple, ruined only because he was such a self-righteous person. All I could do was sigh.

Anyway, with Zetter's business settled, I returned to Korea. I checked whether the rumors about Choi Ji-won were spreading well, checked whether firefighter Park Cheol-jin's wife had recovered, and gave Choi Ji-won advance notice to sync up the timing.

Laying that groundwork took another week. It was about time now. If I entered Floor 3 now, the timing would roughly match the original history.

"Phew."

Next was Floor 3. Clearing Floor 3 itself came with plenty of things to think through, but the biggest concern was, of course.

"Dok Su-hee."

If my guess was right, the moment I stepped onto Floor 3, Dok Su-hee would probably already have her "memories."

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