WeTried Translations
Translator: Coughing Baby
Editor: Coughing Baby
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 244: The Season When Roses Wither & Farewell
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#The Season When Roses Wither (7)
I pay the price.
The tyrant in the dark muttered the words, then flinched. They had not passed through his mind first. The heat boiling in his chest had simply spilled out like delirium. Once the surprise faded, anger followed. To think he had lost this much control over himself. Was this not exactly like before the transaction?
Cough, cough. The old boy was racked by a dry cough. Go Geon-cheol was exhausted. Insomnia was to blame. More precisely, the nightmares that came every time he fell asleep were to blame. In his dreams, the tyrant was always as he had been in the past. That very body the woman had mocked. A monument to defeat, made of blood and flesh.
A flower that could never be broken. That was what Han Ga-eul wanted. She wanted him to give up Han Gyeoul’s body, to take no one else’s body, and to face her as the original Go Geon-cheol. Then, at last, they could begin. As one person facing another. Technically, it was possible. His genes had been preserved. Cultivating a clone body would not take long. Was this not an age where money meant eternal life? But.
There was no way it was possible. There was no way he could be loved in that form...
Go Geon-cheol groaned without realizing it.
‘Even I found it disgusting! Why else did I have to change bodies in the first place?’
It was an impossible transaction. Because he could not pay the price.
The baby cried. The tyrant stared at his grandson with sunken eyes. Why did I tell them to bring this here? He thought about it until the baby cried itself out, but no answer came to him. A pale fog seemed to have settled over his mind. Was it lack of sleep, too many other worries, or the fact that he wanted to look away from the answer?
The answer came to him without warning.
Maybe Go Ah-young, the daughter who resembled that woman, truly loved this baby.
Until now, he had mocked it as a simple delusion, something she only believed herself. How could someone who resembled that woman love anyone? Such feelings had never existed in the first place.
Han Ga-eul had played a large part in planting that doubt. No, she was the beginning and end of all this confusion. Ever since the feeling he had believed immortal ended as something mortal, he had never imagined this kind of anguish would return. Such a dreadful time. What kind of joke was this supposed to be?
“Chairman. You look very worn down.”
A courteous, pleasant voice, yet somehow hissing. To the tyrant, the secretary was a sharp and useful knife.
“Does it show?”
“To be honest, it is very bad. You look like a dying man. Are you eating properly?”
“...”
“How about taking some medicine and sleeping, even now?”
“Forget it. That is not a problem medicine can solve.”
Go Geon-cheol felt his irregular pulse. It was fine. The body was only matter, only a tool. If this body broke down, he could make it again. He could be renewed as many times as needed. Whatever happened, he would not go back to the way he had been before.
“Cough. Ahem... Did you deliver the gift?”
At the question, the special secretary’s face twisted for an instant. The Chairman took it as natural. The man was capable and loyal, but at heart, he was a viper. He must have disliked both the situation and the task entrusted to him.
“Yes. She was pleased.”
“How pleased?”
“It was the first time I had seen her smile, even for a moment. She asked me to tell you thank you.”
“She smiled.”
His satisfaction was faint. Go Geon-cheol felt a far greater misery instead.
The gift. He had once made Han Ga-eul an offer. If she gave him her body and heart, he would save children in the same situation as Han Gyeoul. She had refused the transaction, but thinking there might still be a chance, the tyrant had ended up rescuing those little scraps. Spending money without conditions was different from paying a price. It was uneconomical, terribly foolish, and all but a denial of Go Geon-cheol himself.
“I still do not understand.”
The secretary spoke.
“Han Ga-eul is different from other women in some ways, but not enough to bind someone of your stature, Chairman. No, you are someone who should never be bound by anything.”
“And?”
“I say this out of loyalty, so please do not be angry. In the end, she is still a woman. The type whose pride rises without limit if we raise her up. Trample her once, and she will give up soon enough. Whatever she says, she will not kill herself. Not when she has younger siblings she cares about so much.”
The Chairman wore a twisted smile. For all the talk of loyalty, he knew what mattered to the secretary was not the Chairman himself, but the Chairman’s shadow. That was exactly why the man was more trustworthy. The tyrant had always paid the price.
“Do not touch her. Not yet.”
One sentence was enough. The secretary bowed in silence.
When the secretary visited Han Ga-eul with the gift, she was among foreign workers, wearing work clothes as a site supervisor. The sight of her soaked with summer heat was peculiar, and the secretary watched her for quite some time. Among the gray workers whose muscles were caked with grime and dust, she seemed strangely not out of place.
After receiving the children’s video letters, Gaeul let out a sigh with a fleeting smile.
“I did not think Chairman would do this... Please tell him I am grateful.”
“Is that all?”
“If I say more, I think it will only upset him.”
The secretary found Gaeul’s words unpleasant, because the Chairman he knew would certainly react that way.
“Is it not about time to end the bargaining?”
“Bargaining?”
“I mean the price for your body.”
The sunlight was hot enough to be irritating. The secretary covered the back of his neck with his hand. Even a suit with heating and cooling functions could do nothing for exposed skin. He was not one of those verminous foreign bastards. How long had it been since he had needed to walk around a plant like this in weather like this?
His displeasure only grew because Gaeul did not waver.
“Do not misunderstand. This is just me speaking. Your price is at its peak right now. It is practically the same as Chairman declaring surrender. So stop making demands you know will never work, and sell yourself while you can. Whether it is a body or a stock, failing to sell when the price was high leaves the same regret.”
“...”
“I suppose it feels good, acting noble as an expensive body among cheap lives?”
The secretary pointed at those cheap lives.
“Have you never thought something was strange while doing this work? Why are there still so many humans who have not been replaced by machines? Work that simple could be handled by the Control AI as much as anyone wanted.”
“Because they are still needed, I suppose. Companies do not do things that lose money.”
“Wrong.”
The secretary thought, How stupid. In an age like this, did she really believe humans could be more useful than machines? In this country, of all places, which possessed the most complete artificial intelligence, the Trinity Engine? For lowly, pathetic labor like that?
Yes, there could be some. But there could not be that many. There was no need for that many...
“Should I tell you why? Because humans are the finest commodity.”
That was right. Comparing their price to machines was meaningless. Because the ones who paid the price were always humans. Machines did not desire. Something without desire could not replace the person another person wanted.
“I realized it all over again while serving Chairman. Money is power. A means of domination. It has no meaning if you cannot dominate humans. Those useless cheap things gathered over there are only swarming around so they can become even cheaper. The work they are given is just a way to tame them.”
Gaeul calmly assessed him.
“I do not know. To me, that sounds like even people like you cannot live without other people.”
The secretary smiled coldly.
“Yes... In a sense, you are right. The satisfaction of buying people with money... There really is no replacing it with anything else.”
“...”
“The day will come when machines replace humans even in that area, but at least not yet.”
“That was long-winded. What are you trying to say?”
“Sell.”
His tone had grown colder and harder than before.
“Chairman is a person who receives as much as the price he has paid. If he ever neglected you, that would violate his principles. It would mean denying the value he paid himself. So throw away that ridiculous aversion and sell yourself already, in moderation. You will have nothing to regret for the rest of your life.”
Gaeul nodded.
“I heard you. If you have nothing more to say, I will be going now.”
“Hey.”
The secretary irritably swept back his hair.
“If Chairman loses interest, you will not stay safe either. Truth is, I have wanted to see you cry since the first time we met. Well, consider this advice for your own sake too.”
His confidence that it would not matter even if these words reached the Chairman’s ears was obvious.
Gaeul thought, Gyeoul, the world is full of adults younger than us.
#Farewell (1)
“Look at this, Captain! It is you! The strongest super rare character! I am the only one in the Company who has you!”
An excited Han-byul held out a Net Warrior terminal to Gyeoul. Since it was basically a smartphone, it could run commercial applications too, including mobile games the Department of Defense had approved to boost soldiers’ morale. Granted, the game was about building a base, expanding it, raising troops, and beating up mutants. A line stating that it had received support from the Army scrolled across the loading screen.
“I am telling you, your combat power is completely broken. You are not even fully leveled, and your weapon is normal, but you clear most missions all by yourself! It reflects reality, sure, but I do not know if the balance is okay.”
“Haha...”
Gyeoul produced a suitable smile. The illustration felt like looking into a mirror.
“Is this game popular?”
“Of course! They said it has more than ten million users! I bet there is nobody in our Company who does not play!”
At those words, several people looked depressed. Why?
At any rate, the mood was not bad. Han-byul’s friendliness, which surpassed even Yura’s, helped Gyeoul ease the tension among Company members unfamiliar to him. The executive officer, Captain Singh, had informed him that the report would be delayed. Since they had met again after so long, catching up should come first, Singh said. The Captain personally went out to patrol the encampment’s security net. From the start, the officer gave Gyeoul a good impression.
Buoyed by the gentle atmosphere, Private Victor Cook hesitantly raised his hand. He was one of the adoptees Amalia Flemens had brought over because he had no nationality.
“Cap... Company Commander. Do you receive side income from things like this?”
“Things like this? What do you mean?”
“I mean, uh, you appear in advertisements often, and now you are in games too, so I wondered whether you receive something like a guarantee? Or a fee.”
His Korean was clumsy, but grammatically correct. As a U.S. Company, English should actually have taken priority, but this seemed to be the result of his constant effort to adapt to the community.
Gyeoul shook his head.
“No.”
“Why...?”
“We are soldiers. We are treated the same as federal employees, so income outside our duties is prohibited. That does not mean my name or image can be used however they want, but if the authorities gave permission for public reasons, they probably do not need to pay a guarantee fee.”
“I see...”
He knew this because, even if not to the same degree as in this world setting, he had become famous enough to appear in recruitment ads several times before. Of course, he did not know every related regulation. He had heard that while income outside salary was restricted, a certain percentage was allowed, and practical penalties for exceeding it only applied starting from colonel. In other words, even if Gyeoul had a side job, a lawsuit from the Department of Justice would not come flying in.
‘There was that issue with the gifts before.’
It had been so unusual that they had drawn up a trust agreement.
Come to think of it, how had that turned out? Even if there had been a lot of items, they should have finished disposing of them by now. Gyeoul grew curious about the mail piled up in the Fort Roberts P.O. box. There would surely be account information from the bank among it.
============================ Author’s Note ============================
#Q&A
Q. Calpis: @KILL’s life and death are inside Author’s childlike innocence. Is KILL going to die?
A. I cannot answer anything about future developments, even if you tag it with @. T_T
Q. UnlimitedOne: @The gap between ideals and reality when it comes to the death penalty is definitely flame war material (...) Is the Control AI the only one feeling the effect Gyeoul has on viewers by insisting on his own path?
A. This is also a difficult comment to answer. I ask for your understanding.
Q. -Anonymous: @I read it nonstop for a week. The story keeps rushing forward without a break, so I got tired while reading, but it was the most convincing internet novel I have read so far. Thank you for your hard work, Author. I will keep following it ^^
A. Thank you for viewing it kindly. I tried to build a convincing sense of plausibility.
Q. StarlightSlash: @Please just keep writing steadily. If you maintain the quality, I believe even Noble will be worth buying. I want to give you something, anything. Yeah. @Even my remaining manuscript fee coupon
A. Thank you for caring. The view count is the same, but seeing how the overall view share on Noblesse has gone up, it seems Joara users have been decreasing lately.
Q. Dawn Walk: Really... Is there no way to buy only the chat window parts separately...? I want to read them once in a while whenever they come to mind.
A. ATK: Dawn Walk// Naver sells by chapter, so check the chapters you want and buy them.
Q. OneChance: @I look forward to the chat window every time. It gives me chills!
A. As an author who grows more worried every time I write the chat window, this is a welcome comment. :)
Q. Asadal and Pureumir2: @Happy pig! Oink oink!
A. I am trying not to become an unhappy pig. Haha.
Q. Soriham: I searched HalfHome and it says Lord of Darkness... a gay porn actor, director, and photographer lol Well... I guess he is famous on the internet... Author, you do use some kind of community site, right?
A. I do not participate in communities for the same reason I do not use SNS. Even when I was serializing Seal Breaker on Moonnet, I did not participate in the boards. The chat is the result of observation. I did observe some communities, but I did not reflect them because I did not think I could handle the reaction.
Footnotes:
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