Chapter 214
Chapter 214
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 214
Chapter Title: The Loser's End
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Gong Yi-su suddenly smacks his own head.
*Clang—clang—clang—clang—clang—*
“Ugh, what are you doing?”
“No... I just started hearing voices all of a sudden.”
“You know the keystone relieves delirium but doesn’t eliminate the madness itself, right?”
“...I know. But something’s coming. I feel like something’s coming.”
With that, Gong Yi-su smacks his head again.
*Clang—clang—*
We hadn’t even talked much yet, but he was already looking unstable.
‘How long does he have left?’
Delirium is just a symptom. As long as the madness remains, it’ll come back.
To gauge how much madness had taken root in his mind, I scanned him from bottom to top once more.
Barefoot.
A ragged green patient gown draped over his body.
Not unusual for someone locked away long-term in a secure ward.
But the normalcy ends below his shoulders.
“Why are you wearing that helmet?”
“Why are you wearing that mask?”
“...”
No response to that.
Just like me covering my face with a mask, Gong Yi-su was hiding his.
‘Iron mask? No, it’s more accurate to call it a helmet.’
Atop Gong Yi-su’s shoulders.
Where his head should be sat a cylindrical metal helmet, like an upside-down bucket.
They called that a great helm, right?
‘Bubblehead...’
Why Bubblehead as a nickname? If you’re nicknaming, Ironhead fits better.
‘He’s hiding his face like me, but...’
Beyond that, Gong Yi-su and I shared many similarities.
Feast’s Offering, beings from another time and space, powers this world’s people couldn’t replicate, knowledge of this world’s truths.
But in this brief meeting, I’d noticed more differences.
‘Like height, for instance.’
His file said 1.6m. But what sat 1.6m from the floor wasn’t his head—it was his shoulders.
Factoring in where his head should be...
‘Around 1.9m?’
Even accounting for the helmet, he was mid-180s cm.
His build was different too.
Despite years of confinement, Gong Yi-su had a remarkably developed physique. The opposite of my health-struggling body.
Abilities, circumstances—all different.
“Hey. Kim Shin-hwa.”
“Yes.”
“I can guess what you’re thinking, but I’m not you.”
“I know. I was just weighing the possibilities—”
Before I could finish, Gong Yi-su stepped forward, cutting me off.
“I’m absolutely not you.”
“I said I know.”
“I’m absolutely, absolutely, absolutely not connected to you. I’ve never seen or met anyone like you.”
That’s a bit much.
“Why say it so obsessively?”
“Because I don’t want to be linked to you. No, not you—the Feast’s Offering.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know how much our info differs, but anyone tangled with the Feast’s Offering...”
“Ends up miserable?”
“Ha! Miserable? Must be nice to put it so lightly. Misery would be a mercy.”
“What are you getting at?”
“How many people have you met? And how’d they change?”
“...”
Jang Hyun-deok, the secure taxi driver, gained unwanted medium powers and became a target for cultists and stray spirits.
Cheong-ho didn’t just die—he lost his form to something from beyond. Jeong Hyun-ah lost her father because of me.
Faces of others driven mad or to death by me flash by.
“Because of me?”
“Exactly. That’s the Feast’s Offering. The abyssal beings don’t just watch you—they eye the places you go, the people you meet.”
“That observation and depiction stuff you mentioned?”
“Yeah. They’ll ruin, twist, torment everyone around you. Just to toy with you comfortably.”
“I get the picture.”
“No, you don’t! You don’t know the feeling of everything you touch crumbling, breaking, shattering! In the end, you’ll give up everything too!”
Gong Yi-su was nearly screaming now. Was the delirium I feared kicking in again?
“This is that kind of game. The Feast’s Offering either bows to those hated abyssal beings and submits, or gets obsessed with merging with a mighty one—win by embracing that madness.”
“Win. From the abyssal beings’ perspective.”
“Of course. They’re the players. We’re just pawns on the board. Squirming changes nothing.”
Not wrong.
I’d thwarted their schemes or refused offers a few times, but only because they stuck to the rules—a miracle.
‘If they’d flipped the board or crushed the pawn, I couldn’t have resisted.’
As if reading my thoughts, Gong Yi-su continued.
“Don’t know if it’s rules or their twisted aesthetic, but they rarely flex raw power. Instead, they bait, influence, turn you into their avatar. So you know you’re in a dangerous spot yourself?”
The likes of [Yellow King] or [Living Flame] being lenient with me—that’s why.
The more their magic coats me, the stronger I get, but the closer I become to them.
“You say squirming’s pointless, so how’d you escape?”
“Me? Heh heh heh—sure, as your senior, I can share a great escape method.”
*Clang clang clang clang—*
Gong Yi-su thrashes his head wildly. The metal helmet atop his shoulders wobbles unstably.
“Can’t you see? Drop out.”
“Drop out?”
“Yeah, drop out. Heh heh heh—heh heh heuk—heh hee hee hee!”
Gong Yi-su clutches himself, bursting into manic laughter before speaking.
“Give up struggling, cut all ties, abandon changing or achieving or doing anything. Become so boring and uninteresting they lose interest. Then they’ll lift the Feast’s Offering curse.”
“That’s...”
I get it. Dropout, as he said.
“So you chose the game over with the least damage.”
“Right. I escaped my timeline, changed my name, my backstory, my face. Gave up friends I protected, abandoned the precious, ignored my past mistakes. The observation vanished, and I got this peace.”
Cosmic-scale foe. Conspiracy spanning cosmic time.
The ending for one overwhelmed: stop thinking, challenging, moving.
“Better than pointless goals. I recommend my choice.”
I pressed my forehead, mulling his words. Ran some calculations based on possibilities.
“...No. Not giving up yet. And even in the worst case, I won’t end up admitted here.”
“Don’t like my look? That’s pointless hope. Anyway, my research was time-related—won’t help you.”
“Seems so.”
We share similarities, sure, but we’re strangers in different spots.
“Hahaha—my neighbor room’s empty. Give up anytime. Lee Ha-seo and the friendly smart perverts will care for you.”
“...”
An inexplicable disgust rises.
‘Not the first time seeing this.’
Not just [Cthulhu World] characters—real life too. Despair. Pessimism. Self-deprecating jokes. Forced cheer.
Still, seeing him fallen sours my mood.
“Sorry I couldn’t help. But one tip.”
“Tip?”
“Tabula Rasa device is trash. Won’t cure madness.”
“...”
“How do I know? Obvious—I drilled my head with one. Useless.”
“I see.”
“I remember how to use it. Want to try? Drill your skull now?”
“No. I’m good.”
“Fine. I’m done for, but I hope you go further. Now—”
[System: Feast’s Offering effect activates.]
*Groooarrrrr—*
The whole building shakes like an earthquake.
Not everyday level. Hard to stay balanced.
Plus a *crack crack crack*—something bursting or twisting?
[Invisible Hand]
I reflexively cast a spell to avoid falling, but Gong Yi-su...
“Nooo!”
Despite his better physique, he shrieks, flails, and crashes down with a *thud*.
*Clang—clatter clatter clatter—*
His metal helmet rolls across the floor.
“Argh, damn it, my head!”
Gong Yi-su scrambles, snatching the rolling helmet. He freezes, clutching it.
Then slowly turns toward me.
“You saw...”
Now I knew why he was Bubblehead.
‘File said 1.6m, right?’
Gong Yi-su hid his face for a totally different reason. No—hiding his face wasn’t it.
He had no head.
Where his neck should be was a clean-severed stump. One hole in it writhes, producing his voice.
“Hahaha! You saw! You saw it! Now you know? This is one end for the Feast’s Offering! Toys of the abyssal beings end up like this! Got it? Got it?!”
[System: Feast’s Offering effect activates.]
Another vision-blocking system window.
*BOOOOM!!*
Not shaking now—explosion.
“That quake! That impact! That noise! Feel it? You dragged disaster here!”
As his hysterical scream ends, new changes.
*Weeeooo weeeooo weeeooo—*
Alarm. Different from before.
“Level 1 alert. Something crawled in, like you said, senior.”
For patient escapes or external intrusions.
Damn—called Yang Seo-ho risking danger, but breached anyway?
“Yeah! The ones observing you crawled in! To disrupt our talk! Kill me! Drag my peaceful life into the mess!”
The headless madman wails grotesquely.
The dropout who accepted defeat.
‘Wasted time hearing this crap?’
Listening sours my stomach with revulsion.
“Got it. I won’t bother you anymore, as you want.”
“I don’t want to move. Don’t want observation. Let me be like a plant, as if I never existed—quiet, outside attention, no incidents.”
“Fine. Keep living like a plant. I still have strength to move.”
“Yeah. Keep moving, Kim Shin-hwa. But don’t forget—misery and ruin will spread like plague in your wake.”
I left without replying.