Chapter 340
Chapter 340
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 340
Chapter Title: Can One Who Has Seen the End of the World Plant an Apple Tree? (45)
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****
The iron walls tore apart, and shards from the shattered screens rained down like a storm.
Father. Father with a cold face, devoid even of the leisure he always wore like a mask.
Seeing the green fluid mixed with blood sticking to the tips of his fingers, Palkatus squeezed his eyes shut.
‘....You killed him.’
Buddy. The being who had been with him since the moment of his birth—both brother and protector.
It couldn’t speak, but it possessed exceptional cognitive abilities. It must have known from the start that a crudely piled heap of metal couldn’t halt Father’s advance.
It had known that it was included among the obstacles it spoke of—and still, it went.
Just a brief moment. Even a few seconds would do—to buy time to halt Father’s footsteps.
“We meet often, Father.”
Screeech, grind—
Clang, clang, thud, thud.
“You look exhausted. Something to drink, like always—”
“No.”
Crash!
Crunch!
“A man who came to kill you shouldn’t stay gentlemanly forever.”
Because he had known it would turn out like this the moment they met.
Upon confirming his appearance, Father strode forward, kicked the table aside, and seized his throat with one hand.
“Guh! Khk, guhuk!”
‘He must think the stage for talk has already passed....’
Businesslike. The eyes of a cold killer who performed murder not for meaning, but out of necessity.
‘But.... I can’t die yet.... Not yet.... Not until I see Father’s downfall with my own eyes.... Until I confirm this world’s persistence!’
Amid his blurring consciousness, Palkatus’s gaze shifted to the Professor’s eyes. It followed where he looked.
The screens blinking red had all switched to views of the outside.
They had pinpointed his location upon hearing the sound of him breaking through the mechanical moon.
The seat he occupied was positioned to face Father the moment he entered the room.
And behind him, screens at angles impossible to ignore if Father charged straight in to attack—each displaying different figures.
‘He has no choice but to see. With physical prowess rivaling a dragon, Father can catch the screens’ movements crystal clear even with peripheral vision alone.’
What they showed was Father’s sole weakness. His comrades.
He falters. The eyes feigning impassivity tremble, dart about, shifting from simple target to complex calculations. From ‘kill Palkatus’ to seeking new solutions, gathering data, clinging to cold reason.
‘....If he snaps my neck resolved to abandon them, it ends here. But if his conflict reaches his fingertips before my life fades.... Then. We move to the next. And the next.’
His vision blurs. The vise-like grip crushes his throat, and his oxygen-starved brain dies slowly, as if drifting to sleep.
Straining to lift his rock-heavy eyelids, Palkatus thought.
‘You once said the world is like that. Not a fight between good and evil, but good versus good, each facing their own righteousness.... Was that it?’
Palkatus hadn’t liked those words. Ultimately, it meant Father had confirmed his will and judged there to be a righteousness within him.
For the one seeking to eradicate him, his family, everything he had—to deem him righteous. What better proof of his own inadequacy?
‘To you, at least. To you, who seeks to kill us all and erase my world—you must judge me evil. Only then can I say I poured everything into this.’
Tap. Tap tap.
Palkatus’s fingers drummed the air.
[Character Sheet – ‘Holy Knight Johan’ / Input Pending]
[Character Sheet – ‘Ranger Naruka’ / Input Pending]
[Character Sheet – ‘Ottman Baudelaire’ / Input Pending]
[....Pending]
[....Pending]
[....Pending]
.
.
.
.
.
The power granted to his mental communication ability by the creation AI’s authority.
[Character Sheet Modification], limited to in-game characters.
What Father saw in his eyes was a battlefield where every life near the moon—save the dragon with transcendent authority—had frozen like stone.
‘....I can’t alter already formalized real data, but for actions not yet set, I can limit the once-world-spanning power to the moon’s vicinity, squeeze out everything I have, and restrict it to just a few minutes....’
It was possible. To force actions on those around him.
‘I can’t use much. The power already shared with the moon is starting to crumble.’
Lacking strength, he couldn’t input commands to the dragon.
How much would it drain to command a being with influence as vast as Father? Thirty seconds? All resources mobilized, maybe a minute?
He had to conserve it. Moving Father was the last resort. The moment to pour in his remaining lives.
‘He’s shaken. Definitely shaken.’
The hand gripping his throat was loosening. Being sharp, Father had surely grasped that this anomaly was his final struggle.
He drove a wedge into that hesitation.
Tap.
[Character Sheet – ‘Holy Knight Johan’]
[Command: Standby]
Tap tap.
[Command: Sta]
On the blue translucent window, a small cursor blinked, and on the now-liberated battlefield, the Holy Knight named Johan panicked briefly.
[Command: -]
[Command: Nearest target. Weapon attack]
...Tap.
The new command input,
....Splat!
Johan’s mace smashed the head of the knight beside him.
The blood-soaked helm caved in, and from the stone-still knight’s nose, brain-mixed blood flowed as he crumpled like rotten straw.
Tap. Tap tap.
“N-No! Stop, stop, please! By the Light!”
Thud!
Contrary to the screaming knight’s mouth, his mace swung mercilessly toward the next target.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Indiscriminate against knights and mutants alike. Solely toward the ‘nearest target.’
The image of the knight weeping blood-tears, howling like a beast, burned into the Professor’s retinas.
“If you.... kill me.... they’ll end up like.... input commands are.... eternal....”
A hissing voice like a snake from his drowsy throat. And then.
....Crunch!
A furious sound like shattering teeth.
Boom!
“Shaaa, shaaaak! Hahk, guhuk!”
His body hurled away. Sweet air.
A reprieve from death, and a small victory.
“What have you done to them.... Palkatus!”
“....Something bad.”
He could see undisguisable fury finally settling on the face feigning calm.
Someone once said it. Anger is the gateway to despair.
‘Break.’
Viciously. So that your nauseating goodness resents me, forever haunted by this moment.
‘Break.’
Tap. Tap tap.
[Character Sheet – ‘Ottman Baudelaire’ ‘Notum’ ‘Ydrasil’ ‘Rakshasha’]
[Command: Halt cognition. Move. To character ‘Professor.’ Standby for further commands after arrival.]
“I merely.... cough! Invited Father and his companions to my funeral....”
‘Shatter so you can never rise again.’
Thus, as the bedrock for the world where my family lives, remain forever as a mindless shell.
Gazing at Father’s shaken eyes, Palkatus’s hoarse voice mingled with laughter.
****
‘....This isn’t just a death throes pattern.’
Facing Palkatus had revealed one thing: the more cornered he was pushed to the brink, the fiercer his resistance.
He’d felt it when smashing the moon and seeing that ‘Buddy’ mutant he rode holding out. And upon confronting him at the moon’s core, he was certain.
‘He plans to die.’
Eyes fueled by malice. The gaze of one leaping onto the fuse as their own life’s flame.
He wouldn’t just die meekly. His ultimate goal was species survival. Preserving his family, and beyond that, blocking my clear at any cost—that was his stance.
Considering his abilities and the precedent of exploiting my weakness once before, he’d vaguely anticipated what form it might take.
But this? Overwriting character data with direct commands, like a programmer editing code.
The knight on the screen had just smashed his fifth comrade’s head before barely biting his tongue. Only after killing eight more knights and three mutants did he close his eyes from blood loss.
His tear-streaked death was steeped in regret and agony.
‘Likely a preview of what’s to come for me.’
The meaning of showing this, then summoning comrades here—not to the moon’s core, but right before me. The intent to force it into my view, no matter what, was evident.
‘....He said he checked my info on the community.’
I’m famous in the Dome, and a celebrity’s info is practically public. Plenty in the Dome know my tale, so high chance he knew my trauma from outside.
‘He’s inputting commands directly.’
The translucent window before Palkatus was visible to me too. Like the player system, but unbound—freely typing commands, truly befitting a developer tool.
Direct input. The sole vulnerability.
....Can I do it?
Just as he prepared and waited for me, I’d finished my own arrangements before entering. Not ‘can I’—I must.
So...
“What have you done to them.... Palkatus!”
Feign turmoil.
Let him believe everything bends to his will.
Pretend fury as I hurl his frail body—bones shattered, flesh mangled, pain scattering thoughts, blood dulling the mind.
‘He knows my weaknesses too, so proceed flawlessly to block him from thinking of them.’
Those who stake their lives—like terrorists or zealots—see the blaze they ignite as life’s pinnacle, intoxicated by the ecstasy.
Let him too succumb to his life’s flame. Advance toward the finale.
“Hah.... Haha.... Always, but I’m dying to know what Father’s thinking right now.”
Thud—thud—thunk—thud—
“Do you hear that? Your companions walking your path, into the dead moon’s remains.”
“....What do you want.”
Tension thick in his voice, Palkatus’s face visibly brightened.
“....Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“As you said, the stage for requests has passed.”
Thud thud thud thud—
Rustle.
At the end of the nearing footsteps, someone’s toes crossed the gap.
Rakshasha, barefoot perhaps to cross wires, stepped onto glass shards atop the torn metal passage, her feet already lacerated.
Crunch!
Glass fragments dug into the torn wounds.
‘Staging. To imprint the power he wields on me....!’
Behind Rakshasha, walking barefoot over glass shards like a doll, came Ottman, Notum, and Ydrasil in turn.
“....All the mourners have arrived.”
[Character Sheet – ‘Professor’ / Input Pending]
Ssshh—
With the translucent window manifesting before Palkatus, a chill climbed from my toes, freezing my body.
Palkatus, sprawled on the ground, grew noticeably paler.
“Gasp, I.... I saw your wounds. So deep, like the ocean depths.... That scar.... I saw it.”
Tap. Tap tap.
Trembling with excitement for what was to come, Palkatus steadied his hand and typed toward the plan’s completion.
“With your own hands, you will tear apart everyone here. Gruesomely. So thoroughly that even the finest undertaker couldn’t piece their corpses together....”
Tap.
“Then feed them to you. So you feel their presence eternally in your heart.”
[Character Sheet: ‘Professor’ / Attack all characters with high affinity. Repeat rapidly until forms are indistinguishable. Then, consume targets.]
[Character Sheet – ‘Ottman Baudelaire’ ‘Notum’ ‘Ydrasil’ ‘Rakshasha’]
[Command: Mutual Slaughter]
‘....It’s over.’
Now they’ll rampage to kill each other, and Father will dismantle them one by one with his own hands.
The end and completion of all. Having finalized the command to bind Father—the man called Professor—eternally to this moment, Palkatus stretched trembling fingers toward input, toward Enter.
A fatal strike piercing his weakest point.
For one with the sturdiest mind above all. Once broken, it won’t mend.
Father’s shattered soul will forever bind to my world, sustaining it.
My death will be the fertilizer saving Mother, family, my kind.
Cough!
Clear blood gushed from his mouth. Painful, yet utterly blissful.
“Victory.... At last, perfectly.... I’ve won. I surpassed you.... I saved my world!”
Palkatus reached for the pinnacle of the tower he’d built.
****
Squelch—!
“....Huh?”
With sharp pain, Palkatus’s small body crumpled.
Drenched in blood, a jagged glass shard protruded from his chest.
Palkatus watched, as his body weakly collapsed, the illusory tower before his eyes—the tower built from his brief life reaching world salvation—crumble futilely.
Father and the assassin looking down at him flailing in the blood puddle like a worm.
That gaze dividing victor from vanquished—how viciously humiliating.
“How.... Even a dragon couldn’t.... the input command....”
“Embarrassingly, desert women bear two names, and mine is not permitted to you.”
“An alias....? Then all this time’s actions....”
“Surveying surroundings and blending in is assassin basics.”
“Acting....?”
“Yes. From the moment everyone froze, save Aldarshaks-nim and the six-armed monster, right on through.”
“....Touch and go.”
The Professor looked down at Palkatus gaping in disbelief and reflected.
The [Input Pending] likely hit when he’d just breached the moon. Midway through smashing, the battle noise suddenly dropped, leaving him puzzled.
That’s when Rakshasha’s voice via telepathy arrived.
--------
[Professor? Something’s off outside.]
[It got quiet all sudden. Did Aldarshaks lose to Termakian?]
[No. Everyone froze like cursed—except the dragon and six-armed monster. Me too.]
[....Palkatus. The one holed up inside pulled something again.]
[How, join up?]
[....No. First, act like the others.]
---------
“Didn’t realize then, but seeing you input commands clued me in. Ah, he didn’t prep this from the start—improvised. No time to pull and read each character’s data; just typing from his head knowledge.”
The moon seemed to record most desert incidents, so with time, he could’ve dug her real name from Rakshasha’s action logs.
But as I rushed here urgently, Palkatus lacked time too. Thus, he erred by inputting the world-known Rakshasha— the name my party called her.
Pretending control, Rakshasha avoided arousing suspicion—no wires or daggers.
Instead, she secretly pocketed a glass shard at her feet, and in his final moment fixated on me, beyond his gaze, pierced his heart.
[With just that? That absurd reason, all this crumbles?]
‘....Telepathy. Too weak for voice.’
Telepathy rang clearer. His panic. Injustice. Raging fury and futility.
Injust indeed. Character Sheet mods—what I’d guessed as time-stop like the World Tree. Dragging out unimaginable authority with his life and all, only for a trivial slip to ruin it. Injust.
But no reason to pity him.
Even now, the translucent window before fallen Palkatus blinked with the uninput cursor.
Unsure how much he knew of me.
‘If he knew “that incident” and did this, he deserves tearing apart; if not, even creepier.’
‘The World Tree’s mantra— what happens, happens.... Something like that.’
Anyway. This should truly end it.
[If I die, I die! Last command failed, but ‘Input Pending’ persists! Mages, trolls, elves! All your companions save the assassin, plus the knights outside—they’ll wither like statues, untouched by water! You lose them all! All dead!]
Palkatus’s frantic mental scream echoed.
“....Used my last scraps of holy power to contact the Church. Worked like holy magic somehow. They’ll care for them till a fix. Then, ask the World Tree, dragon, Five Archons.”
[Paltry self-generated sub-authority can’t rewrite core program data—]
“Can. Creator authority seems clogged, but flexible enough dragons won’t scrap it. Confident. World’s foundation is these people’s faith—data souls. I’m the great hero. Worst case, prayer marathons with the Archbishop to rally faith.”
“Even after Sun and Moon AIs vanished, the world rolled fine. Means GG’s world perfected self-sustainment without them. Bugs? Existed with them too.”
[....Won’t let it. Here, I’ll kill everyone! No women, so nigmi freed; knights frozen, just release mutants—]
“Look there. Screen to my right. Eyes closed? I’ll describe.”
Rampaging mutants snared in nets, immobile; some moving ones struck by wind blades and lightning from above.
“Airship, gold-compressed top-tier. Probably a tub of House Aedran’s tears in it.”
Onscreen, a majestic vessel floated heavenly, myriad wind mages posing victoriously atop.
Precision storm nets snared surviving mutants, rescuing knights.
“Not just the Archbishop. Via Radiant Temple in Teldrat, urgent to House Aedran head; same for Storm Hills. Borrowed from Aedran via three-year grain deal through Goldizer and nagging Roman; Storm Hills.... Dropped a hint, they swarmed out wordless.”
One whisper to wind mage elders:
‘I’ll ride you to uncharted skies, windless zone. Help me.’
Roman and airship crew, tense on maiden voyage, ambushed by wind mage horde—delayed arrival, but knights’ field cleared by them.
[....Brother, Termakian-brother’s power doesn’t wane ‘til battle ends. Child dragon tiring, but escalation extends it! Even, perhaps, part of my authority flows to brother with my death....]
“World Tree’s got that.”
Softly glowing green World Tree seal. And,
Craaaack—
Purple rift tore over Aldarshaks and Termakian’s fierce battlefield.
Zzzzap—
Clang!
Rift shattered wide. From it, a scale-clad arm dragon-sized slammed Termakian.
Not shaman-made dragon, nor dragonkin inheritor, nor newborn—true dragon.
Atop innate might, history layered legends, tail stubby from trials.
Great Ancient.
Surviving Red Dragon.
Na Hyeon-ryong, Atlahheva.
The dragon pinning Termakian gazed lazily, intrigued, at the crushed being below.
[This.... Cheat! World, whole world moves for you! Because you’re player—world made for you!]
“As you poured all to break me. I squeezed all, poured every accumulated thing here.”
[That! Ancient Dragon’s no tie to you!]
“You summoned it. Mid-manager, observer. System intervention.”
[Sis....tem?]
“No need look far. Why don’t players bring tech innovation? In char gen, dump ceiling for three-year-old bear-slayer, five-year-old sword aura wielder—why not?”
Player ally: World Tree.
Counter: Closest to players, monitors them. System.
“You crossed game char bounds. Seized Creator AI authority, projected wildly on others, wrecked GG’s ‘natural state.’ Backlash. For balance, hard-to-intervene entity appears—because you touched it first.”
[No, can’t be. My plan, surpassing you at last—save me, family—no.... NO!!!!]
Rustle.
Professor stepped toward fallen Palkatus, his voice looping meaningless, mind lost.
“Nothing achieved here, Palkatus. Ends here.”
[I just.... wanted to live! Save them! Like you!]
[Mom, Mom—spare her! You’re kind, have that mercy! Life only, please, PLEASE!!!]
“....Give and take. That’s enemies.”
Crunch!
The calmly lifted foot dropped onto Palkatus’s small head.
Prime culprit of an incident weaving a world’s foundations. A pathetic, ephemeral end for the finale.
****