Convergence?

My fingers stopped.

Ten chapters.

What I had was a single prologue. What I needed was nine more. The window was one week.

There was a reason for the meat.

No—for the deadline.

"Oppa?"

"I'm calculating."

Meat.

"I have to write more than one chapter a day."

Meat.

"You're not just thinking about meat right now, are you?"

"Meat… of course not."

Stay calm. Be rational.

The meat would obviously be beef.

"Done calculating."

More than one chapter a day. Honestly, it didn't seem entirely impossible. I wasn't building a new story from scratch. The spine of The Regressed Avenger Reclaims was already locked in place inside my head.

What Leon had been stripped of. Who he had to take back. Which enemies he would collide with along the way. All of it was there. All I needed was the time to pull it out of my skull and put it into sentences.

If I did nothing but write, minus the hours for eating and sleeping, I could pull it off… right?

The conversation ended, and I opened a new document before the window had even closed.

There was no time.

The curse that had been shackling my body all this while—the dreaded I'm-full-I'm-sleepy-I'd-rather-die-than-write disease—finally seemed to have lifted. My mind snapped taut and started turning again.

After the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠contract had been signed, I'd skimmed a handful of this world's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠novels using the materials the Keeper of the Hundred-Year Library had given me. And in the process, I'd stumbled onto one critical fact.

The writers here were dead serious about torturing their readers.

A single conflict would erupt. Resolving it would take ten chapters. If the author was feeling particularly cruel, several dozen. In some works, the original enemy from chapter one was still alive and breathing well past chapter one hundred. Even when a chance to kill them arrived, they didn't take it. They missed. The enemy escaped. Circumstances intervened. A new mastermind popped out of the woodwork. And then they promised to meet again.

Why are you working so hard to keep them alive. Are you dating them?

I couldn't understand it. My brain had already been thoroughly pickled in the high-octane stimulation of Korean web novels. To someone like me, the fiction over here was no different from being force-fed ten sweet potatoes in a row without a single sip of water.

Your throat seizes up. Your chest goes tight. And the moment you go looking for water, they hand you another sweet potato.

It was enough to drive you insane.

Did these people even know what Korean cider tasted like? That ice-cold, throat-clearing rush of payoff? Of course they didn't.

I'd only browsed their novels for a little while and I was already suffocating. So shouldn't things be fair? It was my turn to give it back. As much as I'd felt—no. In the opposite sense.

I'll make them breathless.

My fingers started moving fast.

From the moment he refused the prince's offer, Leon's advance was relentless. The sworn friend he'd lost in his previous life. The comrade who had fought at his side until the very end. And the one who had betrayed him. There was no need to debate who came first. Leon already had every answer.

Who would stand with him. Who would remain until the end. And who would drive a blade into his back at the decisive moment. In his previous life, he'd lost far too much before he'd learned those answers. Not this time. There was no reason to hesitate. Knowing the future and still letting the same things happen to you wasn't being a victim. It was being a fool.

Sentences stacked up fast. He reclaimed the friend he'd lost in his previous life. He called back the comrade who had fought beside him to the last. And the one who had betrayed him once before—Leon took that head before the betrayal could even happen.

The moment one problem was solved, he moved to the next. No time for the readers to collect themselves. No room to catch a breath before something even bigger detonated.

But speed alone wouldn't cut it. If Leon knew everything and took everything he wanted, that would get stale just as fast. It had to be unpredictable. Now it was the enemy's turn to move.

If Leon monopolized the future, the tension would die. The man who would become Emperor had been a formidable human being even without knowing what was coming. The reason someone furthest from the throne had been able to build a force to rival the other princes was simple: an eye for people. The ability to recognize talent that could compensate for his own shortcomings, and to gather it faster than anyone else. In the previous life, Leon had been one of those talents.

Not this time.

The prince realized that a card which should have fallen into his hand had vanished. One. Then another. People who should have become his were gathering, one by one, at Leon's side. Of course he wasn't going to sit still and watch.

Leon changed the future. And his opponent moved to match. That was the development I'd wanted.

He reclaims it. They come to stop him. He crushes them. And then he goes to reclaim the next thing. Even when he's blocked, there's no need to drag it out. By the time the reader starts to feel frustrated, Leon should already be drawing his sword.

Next was the fight. Who to throw at him. An ordinary knight wouldn't be enough. This was the first proper battle of the story. I needed an opponent who could show, all at once, that Leon was changing the future—and that the prince had begun to react to that change.

The Knight Commander. The Imperial Hound who, once he bit down, never let go.

Steel Hauer.

The moment I wrote the name, a burning city unfurled behind my eyes. And in that same instant, my hands hammered the keys.

Clackclackclackclackclackclack—

The documents multiplied, one after another. Sunlight crawled along the wall of the room. Harin paced behind me, then leaned in to peer over the screen. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I had no idea how long she'd been watching. I didn't have the bandwidth to care. The story was pouring out of my head.

Steel sang. Flames swallowed the collapsed buildings. The superheated air was a thick mix of blood and iron. And in the heart of it, two men stood facing each other.

I wrote Steel's question and stopped.

Behind Leon lay a man collapsed in his own blood. This was a critical fork. I had to show the readers, properly, what Leon was willing to throw away in order to fight. Originally, by the plan, he should already have slipped out of the city—identity concealed, no clash with the Imperial Guard, every ounce of strength preserved for what came next.

He hadn't.

Steel drove his blade forward.

He wasn't wrong. To the Leon of this life, that man was a stranger. Stake your life here and you'd lose more than you'd gain. It ran against every move Leon had made so far.

But Leon had a previous life. How many times that man had raised a sword to keep him alive. Whose side he had stayed on in the final moment, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠when everyone else had turned their backs. And what kind of ending Leon had given that faith in return.

The important thing was this: all of it was still a future that hadn't happened yet.

The question readers would naturally ask. The man in this life had never raised a sword for Leon. Had never sworn loyalty. Might never do so. In the changed future, it might be a day that never came at all.

And still, Leon had drawn his sword.

I had to hit this question here, head-on. If I didn't, there would be no difference between Leon and the Emperor. The Emperor gathered people too. He found value in those who had accomplished nothing yet, and claimed the ones who would become his strength later before anyone else could. If Leon, just because he knew the future, only picked the people who were useful—he wouldn't be any different.

The Emperor had an eye for people. Leon had memories of the future. That wasn't where the difference lay.

"…Conviction."

The word slipped out of my mouth.

There was something Leon would never betray. A person who had entrusted him with a sword, he protected to the end. Faith received was always returned. Someone who had once been his—even if they no longer remembered it—he would not abandon. That was Leon's conviction.

It came before efficiency. It came before the advantage of knowing the future. It was something that could overturn even his own plans.

If the Emperor moved according to a person's value, Leon moved according to his own conviction. So it didn't matter how strong the man Leon was trying to save would become someday. He didn't need to be useful. He didn't need to be loyal in this life. The fact that the man didn't remember was no reason for Leon to forget too.

To Leon, this wasn't a kindness. It wasn't a choice. It was an answer to faith he had already received, and the act of taking back something that had once been his.

I had Steel ask the last question.

The reason for taking on all this risk. The reason for drawing a sword even if it wrecked the plan. There was nothing left to debate. I borrowed Leon's mouth and wrote a single sentence.

Neither waited for the other. Both men kicked off the ground. Two blades tore through the fire toward each other. The inferno was about to sweep the plaza. There, as their swords met, so did their eyes.

The last sentence unspooled from my fingertips as if it had always been waiting.

Hah—

The breath I'd been holding burst out all at once. Sweat had run down my spine and soaked my T-shirt through. The tips of my fingers were a little numb. I looked at the document I'd just finished.

Light flared from the last sentence. The faint glow climbed the lines, spreading upward, until it had dyed the entire finished manuscript.

Seven chapters.

The corner of my mouth went up before I could stop it. At this rate—

That was when a hand pretending to hold a bottle, holding nothing at all, reached toward me. I only then noticed how parched the inside of my throat was. My tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth. Harin mimed lifting a water bottle with both hands.

"Drink before my arm falls off."

"You're not even holding it."

"It feels heavy."

"Then you can put that down."

Harin's eyes narrowed. I obediently picked up the water bottle sitting on the floor. Lukewarm water slid down my throat. One swallow. Two. I was about to keep going, then set the bottle down. I'd checked what was left first.

One-third.

Becoming a writer hadn't magically made water infinite. The payment hadn't even come in yet.

"Drink more."

"I have to save it."

"You said the water's coming today."

"It isn't here yet."

They'd said they'd send the advance as soon as it was ready. Saying they'd send it and having it in your hand were two different things. Harin knew that too, so she didn't push. Instead she crouched down beside me and pointed at my wrist.

"Rest."

"I'm fine."

"Your hands are shaking."

I opened my hand. The fingertips trembled, a little. Just a little. Not enough that I couldn't write. Counting the prologue, that made eight. Two left until ten. I wouldn't need a week. I could finish them today.

For now, I sent what I had.

Send complete. Now I just had to write two more. I reached to open a new document.

And in that instant, a sentence I'd never seen before rose in front of my eyes.

My hands stopped.

Converge?

This message hadn't been there when I wrote the prologue. A new sentence surfaced right after.

And then, slowly, one last line revealed itself.