An Offer She Can't Refuse
The Electronic Witch.
She was a famous figure — famous for all the worst reasons.
Born with the rarest of gifts, the aptitude of a spirit caller, she had nonetheless never been able to form a contract with a single spirit. Not one. Her aptitude was simply too poor. The four great elements, and every derived attribute that branched from them — none would answer her call.
But the one who declared herself the girl's teacher never gave up on her.
Perhaps that devotion bore fruit, because in the end, she did contract with a spirit — the spirit of electrons, the one that roams the digital world.
Once she began wielding the electron spirit, her rise was nothing short of absurd. She slipped through national security systems that legions of hackers had thrown themselves against in vain, as easily as drawing breath, and gathered every scrap of information the world had to offer.
Her physical power was utterly negligible — but within the digital world, she was as good as an omnipotent god.
And perhaps because of that.
The factions circling her multiplied. Benevolent powers, neutral ones, and eventually even the demons and Villains began to hunt her.
Then, at the height of it all, her teacher — the one who had given her so much help when she first contracted with the electron spirit — was murdered.
Having lived through that, she swore vengeance. And the means she chose was assimilation with the spirit itself.
Assimilation is an extraordinarily dangerous choice. A spirit is nature itself, and the moment a human merges with one, the self dissolves — the person becomes nothing more than another fragment of the natural world.
Yet against all but impossible odds, she retained her ego, and became the witch who roams the digital world.
She set her own revenge aside, and began searching for the means to avenge her teacher instead.
Her connection with the Paewang was part of that. She wanted the raw power the Paewang commanded, and in exchange for information, he cooperated with her.
"……"
The Electronic Witch closed her eyes.
"That actually adds up. No — if anything, it only makes sense that it does."
Eyes crackling with blue electricity turned toward me.
"You really did drop straight out of the sky. Nothing in the entire digital world held a single trace of you. The only things proving your existence were an ID card and a student ID. That was it."
The first day came back to me.
The image of myself standing in a room that contained nothing but those two cards, sighing blankly at nothing.
"Sorry to say this, but I did dig into your background. The school's been churning out rumors about you that shouldn't even be possible. That you killed a monster from the edge of the Rift in a single strike. That a class's bottom ranker shot up to the middle of the pack the moment you started leading them. That students from other years — ones who'd be guaranteed the top seat anywhere else — are keeping an eye on you."
"……"
"If you can foresee the future, every single piece of the puzzle fits. You spent all this time quietly building your strength, and now, starting with Korea Hero Academy, you've been performing feats on a monstrous scale. Shouldering alone what an entire generation of heroes ought to be carrying together."
That was because I'd been hogging all the rewards, though.
"That's how it was with the Tower of Ordeals, too. I've challenged it myself, so I know. It's built so that a brand-new student can never, ever clear it in under five minutes."
"……"
"I'll believe you. You really are one who foresees the future."
Having said that much, the Electronic Witch looked at me.
"Then the alchemy you lectured on?"
"That was me, all right."
I did have some shame as a person.
"You have genuine depth in alchemy, then."
"I get by. I can make most things. A homunculus, the Philosopher's Stone — I could manage those too."
Though things like those demand an absolutely obscene budget, and devour obscene amounts of time as well.
A homunculus — which is far easier to make than the Philosopher's Stone — cost roughly 100 billion won even as a prototype, and its combat power was nothing to write home about. A proper combat model could hold the line against a Rift breach, but it devoured nearly 5 trillion won apiece. A money-devouring monster of a project.
But the flesh itself is the point.
At my words, the Electronic Witch's eyes gleamed.
"That's what you're after."
"If you get me the money and the materials, I can build you a body. One that can act in the physical world."
"……"
Disposable, of course.
Building a homunculus took me a full week even when I gave it everything I had.
But if the Electronic Witch allied with me, that one week would be worth throwing away.
I extended my hand.
"I know who killed your teacher, and I'll help you take your revenge. I'll build you a body to walk this world in, too. In exchange — will you work with me?"
"……An offer I can't refuse. Coming from a man who can see the future, no less."
The Electronic Witch flashed a grin and took my hand.
With my alliance with the Electronic Witch sealed,
I went looking for WantToEscapeTheLab.
"WantToEscapeTheLab, you there?"
"Yeah. She's next on the list."
I searched through Veritas's messages and chats to see whether she'd ever contacted me. One message had come in.
An enormously, colossally long message.
It opened with that greeting and just kept going, an endless wall of text.
"Whoa. She's no joke either."
"Told you."
To summarize: thanks to me, she had received a great boon, and she wished to repay that debt.
Well, that makes meeting her easy, at least.
I sent her a message. Let's meet up, I said — just once.
Chime.
The reply came instantly.
I sent my coordinates. A short while later, a woman with light green hair came into view.
……?
WantToEscapeTheLab's avatar had changed. I found it odd — she was a shotacon, and always favored a pretty-boy avatar.
"I-is that really you, V-Veritas?"
"It is."
I wrote a quick "yep" into a message and sent it over, just to confirm.
"You really are here."
"I am. Now, shall we get down to business?"
"We should move somewhere else first — conversations can leak in a place like this."
The Electronic Witch materialized out of thin air and clapped her hands.
Clap.
The space around us flipped in an instant, and we stood inside some kind of chamber.
"This place will do. No existence of any kind can eavesdrop on what's said here."
The Electronic Witch stated it as simple fact.
Which it was. She was the closest thing to omnipotence this world had.
"H-hkk! The, the Electronic Witch……!"
"She and I are in a cooperative relationship. More importantly — have a seat, and let's talk."
"Y-yes, of course!"
WantToEscapeTheLab sat down in the chair. Extremely stiffly. Like a private meeting a four-star general face to face.
Then again, given my position, maybe that's not far off.
The vast majority of the alchemists revered me.
That alone would have been fine, but a certain number of them had gone so far as to outright found a religion in my name.
To the point that there were those who claimed every word from Veritas's mouth was truth, and that it would guide us all.
"I messaged you because I saw talent in you."
"T-talent?"
WantToEscapeTheLab jolted upright.
"I-I have talent?"
"Yeah. The way you build recipes, the way you're even now tuning your mana to refine your materials — the talent is obvious."
I had never actually seen WantToEscapeTheLab tune her mana.
But I knew she would grow into the finest member of the alchemy guild. I knew that of every alchemist, past and future, she would be the one whose mana control was supreme.
"That's why I want to invest in you."
"A-are you saying — y-you'll — t-take me as your d-disciple?!"
WantToEscapeTheLab wheezed the words out, on the verge of hyperventilating.
I felt like some part of the image had shattered a little.
No — if I'm honest, the shotacon thing had already shattered it beyond repair.
"……Sure."
"I-I'm still so lacking, though……"
WantToEscapeTheLab started to say something, then stopped and looked at me. Eyes brimming with tears, expression hardening into resolve, she spoke.
"If Veritas himself says so, then I cannot possibly be lacking. Sh-should I kneel and prostrate myself?"
"……Nothing that dramatic. If you ever hit a wall, just message me here. I'll teach you."
"Y-yes! Understood!"
WantToEscapeTheLab bowed deeply at the waist. Deeper than ninety degrees. One more degree and her head would have touched the floor.
I was still processing the absurdity of it when my eyes drifted to the emblem pinned at her chest.
"……And that?"
"Ah — so you do recognize it! It's an emblem made in the image of Veritas's mask. It's also the new symbol of the alchemy guild."
The Electronic Witch slipped a private message to me.
That's an emblem the alchemy guild hands out only to registered members of the official fan club. And that particular design? Only the people in the very first digit of the membership roster get one.
The Electronic Witch smirked.
Turns out she's your closest fanatic.
Looks like it.
Half incredulous, I walked WantToEscapeTheLab through this and that.
I stepped back outside.
Thankfully, nothing had gone wrong.
When I opened my phone, a whole stack of files had been saved to it.
"First, I threw together the materials you'll need, in a hurry. If you need ingredients, tell me anytime — anything at all, and I'll get it."
I looked over the files the Electronic Witch had given me.
Not bad.
Most of what I knew was the broad strokes. There were fine details I didn't know, or had glossed over. These files filled a good chunk of those gaps.
I combed through the material and listed a few ingredients that would be hard for me to acquire on my own.
"……Nothing but nightmare materials, huh. I'll have them all within a week."
With that, the Electronic Witch vanished somewhere.
Phone in hand, I headed straight for the company.
I'd found myself a place to live, more or less, but I still had no training ground.
I scanned my work card at the entrance and made for the training hall. It was empty. Everyone was probably still reeling from the Tak Yoonil incident.
I finished my training there, showered, and left the building.
A deep indigo sky.
I walked home beneath it — and in the distance, I spotted Kim Seohyun.
"Heading out now?"
"Yeah. Your wounds…… look fine."
"I just pushed my internal energy harder than I should have. You and Unhyeok were the ones who took the real damage."
I hadn't been hurt as badly as it might have looked, either. Park Unhyeok had thrown himself into the line deliberately, to carve out the opening I needed to attack.
……Maybe I should hit them up for more Biyak ingredients while I'm at it.
I'd have to swing by the school again soon and strip the place of Biyak materials.
"Hey. Aren't you curious?"
"Hm? About what?"
Kim Seohyun looked at me steadily for a moment. And then I remembered.
Before the battle with Tak Yoonil — what Kim Seohyun had said.
Casually, in passing, she'd promised to tell me her secret.
"Your secret, you mean?"
"Yeah."
"Well, it's a secret. When the time's right, I'll tell you myself, obviously."
Even if I hadn't known Kim Seohyun was a woman,
I would have said the same thing.
Secrets are kept because people want them kept. That's all a secret is.
And that secret is probably that she's a woman.
Judging by Tak Yoonil's phrasing and the reactions of the people around her, her gender was the kind of secret only her absolute inner circle knew.
……What kind of gender even needs hiding?
I turned over her talent, her arts, her origins — and I couldn't find a single reason she would need to conceal being a woman. No talent with that kind of penalty attached even existed in the first place.
"Is…… that so?"
"Yeah. It's not like you're secretly a demon or anything."
"Right."
If anything — when humanity stood on the edge of annihilation, Kim Seohyun had fought on alone. Killing the enemies from beyond, and killing, and killing, until at the end of a dead world she closed her eyes with nothing left in them.
Because that is precisely how a first playthrough of Epic World ends.
"Actually, I'm a woman."
"……Oh. Got it."
I said it with a properly surprised face.
"I wasn't expecting a huge reaction, but that's a little too mild, isn't it?"
"Well, it did explain a lot."
"I-it did?"
Kim Seohyun's voice wavered.
She'd probably been convinced her disguise was flawless.
"It's hard to believe someone as pretty as you was a guy."
"Uh……?"
"If you'd messed up back there, I might've actually fallen for you."
I gave Kim Seohyun's shoulder a couple of light pats.
"Come on, let's go. People will start rumors."
But at my words, Kim Seohyun didn't move an inch. She just stood there, face flooding crimson, staring at me blankly.