See You Again Next Time
My body felt light.
It was as if the shackles on my ankles had come undone, and the cords that had seized my arms had been cut loose. As a phantom thief I had known that soaring high more than once—mind adrift, certain I could do anything—but never before had I been this full of confidence.
I had only spoken a name. Three syllables. A name anyone in this world could uncover with a little digging. And yet it felt as if I had finally given voice to a secret I had kept buried all this time, and the relief of it left me light.
Another One. I still could not believe I would win. But it felt, at last, as if I might try.
So. Was this how it was done?
"......!"
On that expressionless face, I caught a flicker of bewilderment.
A portion of his domain, the space of darkness, had vanished—like a hole punched through cheese, or a window cut into a wall. Beyond the missing stretch lay a gray world. A café. Hong Yumin stood there with a macaron between her lips, her eyes gone perfectly round.
I would have liked to admire that face a little longer, but the space sealed itself at once, the way a wound closes in skin. I set the regret aside and rolled the stolen space across my palm. I had stolen it. I did not know the theory. I did it because I could.
It was absurd.
"So... this is what it means to be a phantom thief."
Another One seemed to understand something. Even the one who had done it could not tell what those eyes had seen.
"Come to think of it, Do Kyungsoo. Have you ever stolen anything as a phantom thief?"
"You'd know that better than anyone."
If he was my number-one fan, he would know I had lived a life far removed from a thief's.
"I know. You have never once become a thief."
A destroyer of hearts, perhaps. Never a thief.
"That no longer seems to be the case."
A thief: one who seizes and steals. A phantom thief was nothing more than a subset of that idea.
"Are you aware? You just stole my space."
I knew. It was in my hand even now.
"You may be proud. No one on Earth has ever managed it."
"Proud..."
Wasn't it a little early for that?
"What is the point of doing this to you, when you are not even at full strength?"
"There is a point."
A ring formed above Another One's head. It did not stop at one. One layer, two, three... Rings of light stacked upon stacked rings, until a halo bloomed behind him like the nimbus of a saint.
"It has been a while since I felt like putting my heart into something."
The rings kept multiplying, until they could no longer be told from the sky. Only the moon remained, piercing that veil to hang there, aloof.
There were so many my eyes hurt. I ought to thin them out.
I flicked a finger. A hole opened in the sky.
Crackle! Snap!
The rings thrashed in my hand, like dozens of power lines twisted into one.
"...Ho."
Even as the rings were seized from him, Another One looked intrigued.
"Simple robbery? No. You have usurped them completely. The initiative is no longer mine."
I let the rings go. Freed from my hand, they flew at once toward Another One—like dogs running back to their master. In truth, it was the lingering grudges of the dead, turning on him.
"So it is like this."
"I have lost all control of them. I can hardly call them mine anymore."
Another One discarded the rings. Each one held power enough to burn the mortal world to ash, and he let them go without a shred of regret.
"I boasted of my wealth in front of a thief. At this rate I will be penniless in an instant."
The pressure crushing my shoulders eased. His power had diminished—by no more than the sleep in an ant's eye, but diminished all the same.
Even so, I had not touched the real thing. His strength was not something borrowed from others. Those rings were merely spoils, no different in rank from the countless mythic weapons he had thrown at me. His true power was not even visible.
Did that make it meaningless? No. The more rings I stripped away, the easier the fight to come would be.
The problem was—
"You are not coming?"
He was not going to stand there and watch.
"Then I will come to you."
The moment Another One lifted both feet, the world inverted. Sky became earth. Earth became sky. A primordial age, before heaven and earth had been divided.
Because the world had not yet settled, I—who had lived only in a settled world—could not adapt to it. Wrecked senses were the least of it. Even my organs refused to do their work.
Only my ability functioned in full. Aside from a single universe, every power I held sat in the place of a constant. They had been born of the Origin. They were unreason itself.
If the world tried to bind me, I would slip that binding and steal whatever I wanted. I was a phantom thief. That made it possible.
Heaven and earth's brief little trick was rendered useless in an instant.
I stopped in the void, between earth and sky, and beautiful stars filled my vision. I stole them. A star larger than the sun was nothing but a piece of candy in my palm.
Each star was a ring compressed beyond all measure. I tightened my grip, gave the rings their freedom, and let them go. They flew off on their own and vanished.
Every one of those stars was Another One's power.
And the powers of the people who had died by his hand.
What kind of life had he lived, to build a universe out of his own killings? History had no shortage of mass murderers, but none of them had slain tens of thousands with their own hands. Their body counts were always the work of others, killing in their name.
Another One was different. To make those stars, he would have had to stain his own hands and kill every last one of them himself. The bastard was no ordinary piece of shit.
How had the author ever planned for Dan Chuyeon to beat him? Even if Dan Chuyeon aged for as long as the universe had existed, he could not defeat Another One. In the original he grew strong enough to look down on gods, and still, to Another One, he was less than an ant at the roadside. Which was probably why the author had killed Another One off so absurdly.
It would have been nice if he had gone the same way. Nothing ever went easily.
The stars flared. In the brief moment my attention was bought, they began their attack. White light filled everything. The stars poured out their full strength for me alone—a storm of light that would grind planets to dust without effort. There seemed to be no way out.
"Check."
From somewhere, Another One seemed to say it.
"Check."
I gave it right back.
I swung my arm. The light died, and between my fingers the stars spun like balls. I toyed with them in my palm the way a child plays jacks, then hurled them toward wherever Another One was likely to be.
Crack-crack-crack-crack!!!
Space folded hundreds of layers deep shattered without resistance. The balls flew, and at the end of their flight stood Another One, posed like a guard staring at a bank of monitors.
Before he could catch the stars and crush them, the follow-up. One, two, thwee.
Crunch.
Another One destroyed every star. I had not expected it to work. Seeing his face was enough.
I drove power into my back foot and launched.
Boom!
The instant I came within a breath of him, Another One's fist buried itself in my gut. The impact ran the length of my body. I was flung back the way I had come—and Another One came with me.
"Caught."
He said it as if he had not expected this.
"That hurts."
A fist flew at my face. I felt the flesh crush, slowly, as I was driven into the ground. I pushed myself up from the sky that had become the earth. All I held was the coat I had peeled off him.
"You steal anything worth money."
"I wasn't planning to steal it."
I tossed the coat aside without care. It broke down into dust and vanished.
"Do you have any idea what that coat cost?"
"Nope."
"Truth be told, neither do I. Anastasia prepared it. I simply put it on and came."
........
"Ah. That was a joke?"
"For my part, it was meant to be rather a fine one..."
"You could've just hit me again in that time."
"I did prepare for that."
Crunch.
Agony lanced through my ankle. It felt as if a sharp blade had been driven in. My body jerked upward, and I turned my gaze down. A serpent had its jaws locked around my ankle, its eyes burning with a vicious light.
"A hydra?"
"It could also be Yamata no Orochi."
Hanging upside down, I studied the monster out of myth.
"It's neither."
"I mixed them a little."
A little, my ass.
Venom dripped from the thing's mouth. Nine serpent heads on a single body—look at that alone, and it was a hydra. And yet there was also dragon, horse, boar, bird, lion, tiger, cat, dog, monkey, angel, demon... I had no idea what to call a creature with all of that mashed together.
"How could a mere hydra ever face you? You ought to be grateful it is not steeping you for snake wine."
He had put a little strength into it.
"Let us simply call it a chimera."
Kyaaaaaah!!!
The chimera roared. The head clamped on my ankle hurled me into the air, and hundreds of heads lunged at me where I hung, utterly exposed.
Watching those heads drift closer, I searched for something to steal. There was almost no time. If I had had as long as it took to steal a star, I could have torn every head off. Now I had time for a single breath.
Before the inhale had even left me, I decided what to take. Before the first fang could touch me, I stole it, fast.
"Mm!"
Another One was where I had been.
"Hoo."
And I was where Another One had been.
"Our places have been swapp—"
BOOM!
The chimera ate the rest of his sentence. The heads, no longer under control, began to devour one another. Blood fountained into the air.
I steadied my breath. For the first time, I had room to breathe.
I can't stay like this for long.
I had taken off the mask, spoken my name, and struck every pose there was to strike, but I was nearing my limit. I had no idea how much longer I could hold.
"Hmm."
While I was wondering how to end this, Another One disposed of the chimera and walked over. He had been submerged in a sea of blood, and yet he was as clean as if he had just stepped out of a bath.
"The losses are considerable."
He rolled his shoulders, easy and unhurried.
"That last exchange nearly emptied my stock. The monsters are all spent. All I have left are useless weapons."
He recited the losses without inflection, and his feelings remained perfectly calm.
"Can you do more?"
"Of course."
"No."
I flinched.
Another One saw through my condition at a glance.
"This would be my chance to kill you here..."
He looked down at his own hand and gave a bitter smile.
"It seems this is as far as I go as well."
His hand crackled and jittered, as if static had crawled across it.
"So the outing ends here. I had best return before the troublemaker starts something."
A portal opened behind him.
"See you again next time."
"Bring a present."
"I will bring one you will find satisfactory."
The portal closed, and Another One was gone.
"Hah. Hah."
I had pulled it off. I had held my own against Another One.
I never wanted to see him again.
And yet, ironically, I had the feeling I would be seeing him again before long.