Chapter 178
Chapter 178
Translator Penny
Chapter 178
Chapter 12
For a moment, let’s talk about bugs.
Chung (蟲). A word meaning insect. And a derogative term.
When you think about it, isn't it quite strange? Since ancient times, when people built the pyramid of life, they stacked it in the order of Plants-Animals-Humans. The lower you went, the more you were treated like a low-level newbie in the ecosystem.
However, in the history of human communities, expressions like "You plant bastard" or "You rice-seed-like guy" have never been commonly used as slang. At most, "weed" might be mentioned as a candidate, but as seen in the word Mincho (grass-roots/people), there is some admiration for its tough vitality embedded in it. If you are doubtful, just compare the nuance between:
‘Your vitality is as tough as a weed!’
and
‘Your vitality is as tough as a cockroach!’
As such, the seat for the most vulgar existence has always been assigned to ‘insects’ regardless of the era. The long history of contempt and persecution against insects is well summarized just by flipping through a dictionary.
-A guy who causes harm? Yes, a pest (Harmful Insect). -A loser who just eats and poops? Yes, a parasite (Meal Insect). -Indecisive with no backbone or opinion? A boneless worm. Mu-gol-chung (No-Bone Insect). -A psychopath like Yoo Ji-won? A worm with no blood or tears. Mu-hyeol-chung (No-Blood Insect). -An aspiring nymph of the forest who only echoes what others say? A worm that mimics words. Eung-seong-chung (Echoing Insect).
What a spectacular lineup of slang. Even the alias for a tiger was Dae-chung (Great Insect). That is, literally, ‘That big bug bastard.’ (This was a neologism created to avoid the taboo of using the character Ho (Tiger) because it was in the name of a posthumously honored Emperor of the Tang Dynasty. They really named it roughly.)
In short, the ancients simply attached Chung (Insect) to any beast with feet. However, it would be troublesome to bring up the ‘Modern Man Genius Theory’ claiming that ancient people lacked biological insight to overlook the difference between insects and mammals. The ancients knew just as well as modern people. The truth is that when you want to insult another being, simply adding a single ‘Insect’ to the end of the word is sufficient.
The lowliest existence. Contempt and scorn for life. The metaphor and symbol humans use most easily when trying to curse something else. Therefore, the most basic form of sorcery.
Anyone, anything could become an insect. With the arrival of Anomalies, humanity's status was lowered to that of insects.
Just as a dragonfly swimming in the sky could be captured for an elementary schooler's summer homework and have its wings torn off, a human strolling by the river could lose their limbs and face and degenerate into a potato at any moment. How beautifully that dragonfly knew how to fly, or how noble that human was, meant nothing to the Anomaly. What does the fate of a mere bug matter?
To treat something as an existence that ‘doesn't matter how it dies,’ one needed to first turn that existence into a ‘bug’. The Anomaly's sorcery utilizing language was this thorough.
However, the Anomalies were also somewhat too hasty. As Chairman Netero pointed out, the mistake committed by enemies trying to exterminate humanity is consistent in any world line. They underestimated the ‘bottomless malice of humanity’ too much.
Indeed. If the law of Anomalies is that when you gaze into the void, the void also gazes into you. Then the stern principle of human history is that when you treat someone like a bug, you must be prepared to be treated like a bug yourself.
Chapter 13
—Gwu҉oh҉҉oh҉oh҉҉҉oh҉oh!
Leviathan roared. Like any strongest dragon in history, Leviathan also had a transparent body. It was freaking strong, making it the strongest among dragons. However, what Leviathan was facing now was neither a god, nor a demon, nor a Balrog which couldn't be used due to copyright laws. Anyway, those guys were no different from extra minions who appear in Kamen Rider special effects shows only to be destined for defeat. The enemy of the Anomaly. That was always the slaughterer of the Earth's ecosystem: Human.
—Gwu҉҉oh҉oh҉oh҉oh҉҉҉҉҉oh҉oh҉oh҉҉҉҉҉oh!
Therefore, Leviathan's roar achieved nothing other than bursting the eardrums and corneas of a few Awakeners on this battlefield. Among them, speaking for Cheon Yo-hwa—who could be called the representative of Awakeners—and myself, there was zero damage. The water bugs that rushed in as if to tear off our limbs right away stopped moving and began to scream. In fact, Leviathan's roar did not burst from a mouth. It was closer to a dissonance vomited simultaneously by the infinite number of water bugs that made up its body. An agony vomited with the whole body.
“Ugh, geuk! It's loouud...!” “Don't stop! Keep reading The Metamorphosis, Yo-hwa! It's working!” “Ah, ugh. O-Okay!” “Saintess! Please recite it in the original German text, not the Korean translation!”
[Yes.]
“Yo-hwa, it doesn't matter if you don't understand, just mimic the Saintess's pronunciation as best as you can!” “Yes, yesss!”
Originally, the Saintess didn't know how to speak German. But while holding study groups with me over the past few years, she naturally completed the German Language Maestro Class. For the Saintess, who could read Kant's Critique of Pure Reason in German, Kafka was a piece of cake. She and Cheon Yo-hwa continued to chant the powerful ‘Insect Spell’.
—Krr҉҉reu҉reu҉҉҉҉҉ruk҉krr҉reu҉҉҉҉҉reu҉reuk҉҉!
Leviathan's body was crumbling. The power that aggregated the H₂O that could be spilled at any time, the swarm of bugs that could scatter at any time, into the ‘Form of a Dragon’ rapidly weakened. Cheon Yo-hwa and I were still flailing under the curtain of eyelids made of Aura, so we couldn't grasp the exact situation. However, just seeing the water bugs convulsing and having seizures, we could feel sufficiently that we had found an effective ‘Strategy’.
[Mister Undertaker! It's a success!]
Drip. It rained.
[The dragon's scales, they are falling off!]
It wasn't rain falling from the sky. The dragon's membrane, the dragon's flesh, the dragon's intestines, the dragon's cells. The water bugs that constituted all of them burst ‘drip-drip’ and flowed down like rainwater.
—Ribbit.—Ribbit ribbit ribbit ribbit.—Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit ribbit.
The water bugs struggled. The frog is the evangelist of rain. An existence that predicts and attracts rain. Therefore, the frogs loudly claimed that this rainfall was strictly their territory, and not an unexpected situation at all. But even if the sound of frogs croaking echoed enough to fill people's skulls, it was insufficient to stop the collapse that had already begun.
—Rib, bit.
Drip. Drip. I looked up. A couple of water droplets hit my cheek. As always, a drop or two of drizzle was merely a trailer for the downpour that would soon swarm in.
—Ribbit, ribbit.
Splatter-ter-ter-ter. Countless bugs burst apart. The legendary typhoon that once recorded a height of 10km and a diameter of 1,200km. The Anomaly that drove all of East Asia into a horror of water was vomiting rainfall off the coast of Busan. That rainfall was Leviathan's hemoptysis. It was the corpse of the Sea Dragon.
‘We did it.’
There was no longer a need to put the eyelid blindfold on the Anomaly. Even the dragon's eyes were crumbling like whirlpools and sinking.
‘We did it! The Great Monsoon! With this little damage, we found a strategy with truly minimal damage!’
I wasn't the only one shouting cheers. Rather, I belonged to the quieter side.
“It's falling! That bastard, it's falling!” “Save the people who fell into the sea first! If they get swept by the rain, they'll drown!” “Eu-ha-a-ack!” “We won! We won!”
The Three Thousand Worlds guild members who were constantly circling outside the typhoon on broomsticks, the Baekhwa Girls' High School guild members who were struggling while mounted on the Sea Dragon's body, and the Awakeners who had been injecting Aura inside the Arks until now. The breath they exhaled, sensing victory, reached me vividly.
“Teacher!”
Thump. Cheon Yo-hwa, seemingly convinced it was over, hugged me with her fatigue-soaked body.
“We survived!”
Since Cheon Yo-hwa had considered double suicide—even if it was half-joking—it wasn't strange for dopamine to spew out at the current victory. I also patted Cheon Yo-hwa's back vigorously.
“You really did well! Things went well thanks to you striking the eye of the typhoon!” “Euat, at, at-. Eu-hehe. Yes!”
Cheon Yo-hwa laughed kya-ruru at my back smash. Even a single strand of wet orange hair sticking to this child's cheek looked lovely.
It would be nice if I could simply say—And so, we entered the epilogue of a happy ending.
In fact, there was one scenery left to describe before entering the epilogue.
And I had never told anyone about this scenery. A secret revealed only in this story.
At this time, excluding myself, and also excluding O Dok-seo who would eavesdrop on my secret in the future, everyone assumed the Great Monsoon had been subjugated. Noah's Ark. Lee Ha-yul's puppet strings. The Awakeners' Aura assistance. Cheon Yo-hwa's support. Finally, that Leviathan fell due to the sorcery utilizing ‘The Finishing Touch’ and ‘The Metamorphosis’ that I, the Undertaker, miraculously thought of.
However, I saw it.
Step-.
In my eyes, which were watching the Sea Dragon's end while being hugged by Cheon Yo-hwa, a truly strange sight was captured. Go Yo-ri was walking toward Leviathan, who was just about to collapse into the sea. No one noticed this fact. That was because, as if time had stopped, no one was moving.
“...”
I couldn't even move my lips. A sensation that made it difficult to distinguish whether this was a dream or reality wrapped around my consciousness.
Step. Step-.
In a world where only my gaze remained as the sole witness, Go Yo-ri was moving her steps modestly. Stepping on the water surface as if it were natural. With every step she took, Go Yo-ri's lips moved slightly.
“You shouldn't do that.”
A low whisper. Strangely, to me, that voice felt not like it came from far away, but right next to my ear, or perhaps ringing inside my head. However, it wasn't a whisper directed at me. Go Yo-ri was smiling brightly at Leviathan, which was scattering into raindrops.
“We respect each other's territories. Mr. Dragon. Wasn't that our promise? At least that is how I understood it...”
Then, a surprising thing happened. The stopped world. No, rather, in the air that was like an illusion isolated from the real world, the Sea Dragon reacted.
—Gwu҉oh҉҉҉҉oh҉oh҉oh҉҉҉҉҉҉҉oh.
Leviathan responded not with human language but with the gesture of an Anomaly. The scales of the Sea Dragon, which had been crumbling helplessly until now, suddenly stood on edge again.
Blink-blink-blink. Countless scales turned into the shape of ‘Eyes’.
“......!”
I gasped soundlessly. Leviathan's body was no longer made of beautiful and transparent scales. Like Argus in Greek mythology, every scale, from head to toe, was covered in ‘Pupils’. As if to say, if humans attempted subjugation by covering their own eyes, it would just create hundreds, tens of millions of pupils.
Yes. Traditionally, a boss could transform through several stages. The Typhoon form was Phase 1. The Sea Dragon form was Phase 2. The Great Monsoon Anomaly was intending to initiate Phase 3 from now on.
‘You mean we have to subjugate that again?’
A distant shock pulled at the edge of my consciousness. Go Yo-ri was smiling as if she was a little troubled.
“Really. I said no.”
While tens of millions of pupils watched her right in front of her nose, Go Yo-ri rather closed one eye gently. And, Shh-. She put her finger to her lips.
“It will only take a little more time here, but you failed your gamble. You couldn't accept everyone. Then shouldn't you also accept the result? No, there's no reason to even call you ‘you’ anymore.” —Gwu҉oh҉҉҉҉oh҉gwu҉҉҉҉oh҉oh҉҉҉oh. “Quietly.”
A bizarre sound echoed in this world that felt like an illusion. It sounded like the cry of a beast, resembled the growling of a tiger, and also sounded like the countless laughter of innocent children. All sounds mixed together to create a dreary echo.
‘This is...’
Déjà vu washed over me. A regression from long ago. In that regression where I executed the ‘experiment’ of pitting Yoo Ji-won and Go Yo-ri against each other, wasn't this the exact same sound from that night when all citizens of Daejeon evaporated? Go Yo-ri whispered.
“Become one.”
At that moment. Leviathan's tens of millions of pupils melted down. No rhetoric was necessary. Leviathan, revealing its true form for the last time, could not struggle even once and melted away as if it had been nothing more than a water droplet from the beginning. The melted pupils mixed into the rain that had already been falling for a while and disappeared. It was dead.
“......?”
Suddenly, Go Yo-ri looked back this way. When her eyes met mine, she widened them as if surprised. Her footsteps moved to head towards me. But immediately, the tips of her feet hesitated.
“.......”
Go Yo-ri looked down at her instep for a long time. I don't know if it was just my feeling, but I sensed an emotion of slight perplexity. A moment later, a fresh smile stained her lips like paint.
“Indeed. This is also each other's territory.”
What did she mean? Go Yo-ri lightly grasped the side hem of her long skirt and lifted it. And she bowed elegantly like an aristocrat in high society.
“Please be at ease.” “.......” “I will not touch you.”
Patter-patter-patter-. Simultaneously as Go Yo-ri finished those words, the rain that had paused in the air poured down completely. The last rain of the Great Monsoon was excessively thick, so even Go Yo-ri's figure was covered in mist and disappeared. The stopped time, the world that had been overlaid with illusion, began to flow again.
“――Uwaaaaaa!” “It, it really died!” “We killed it!”
The shouts of the Awakeners, which had been paused for a moment, swirled off the coast of Busan. In their view, Leviathan never entered Phase 3, nor did tens of millions of pupils bloom. The Sea Dragon simply became ordinary rain and poured down, and thus, it all poured out. No strange phenomenon occurred in between.
“Long live Baekhwa Girls' High! Long live Cheon Yo-hwa!” “Long live Dang Seo-rin-eeeeek!” “Constellations, thank you!” “Undertaker! Undertaker! Undertaker!” “.......”
While each person praised the distinguished service of this operation, I silently looked beyond the water mist. The rain, which seemed like it would continue forever, subsided. The water mist also settled. The coast after the Sea Dragon's corpse had all been water-buried (Su-jang). Go Yo-ri was not seen there.
“Saintess.” [Yes.] “Did you perhaps see that just now?” [Pardon? By ‘that’, you mean?] “...It is nothing. You worked really hard this time as well.”
I firmly stroked the back of the head of Cheon Yo-hwa, who was still clinging to my body like a koala. As the deck of the Ark opened, people who had been accommodated for nearly the last ten days were coming out. The cheers of the sea became even louder. However, at the tip of my nose, rather than the salty smell of the sea, the scent of an apple lingered for quite a while.
Anomaly: Great MonsoonAliases: Leviathan, Water Bug, Sea Dragon, White Dragon, Frog Dragon (Wa-ryong), Frog Rain, Jörmungandr, Eye of the Typhoon, Argus Danger Level: Lv.4 Ocean-class (Five Oceans) Patterns: Phase 1 ‘Typhoon’, Phase 2 ‘Sea Dragon’, Phase 3 ‘Inverted Scale Eye Opening’ Estimated Damage if Unsubjugated: Sinking of Japanese Archipelago, Submersion of Korean Peninsula, Flooding of Mainland China Subjugation Complete.
Chapter 14
There is an epilogue. Since we found the strategy for the Great Monsoon by crashing our bodies against it in many ways, I finished preparations more precisely and thoroughly in the summer of the next regression.
“From now on, your name is Noah.” “Is this real life...?”
Naturally, in this regression too, No Do-ha renamed herself to Noah. The Arks became sturdier. This time, without even needing to attempt free diving in the typhoon with Lee Ha-yul, we tied the fleet of Arks firmly with puppet strings from the very beginning. I even made the Saintess and Cheon Yo-hwa memorize the original German text of The Metamorphosis. Truly, a perfect readiness posture.
‘This time I'll subjugate you in a day! Now, come! Great Monsoon!’
It didn't come.
“......?”
No matter how much we waited, let alone the Great Monsoon, even a normal monsoon did not make landfall. The sea off Busan was peaceful with the arias of seagulls.
“Huh?”
Scowls poured down on me. No Do-ha who invested budget and manpower to build Arks on Geumjeongsan Mountain, the passengers who boarded the Arks with grim determination, Cheon Yo-hwa who suffered to memorize German, etc. Everyone looked at me as if looking at the Korean Meteorological Administration. In their eyes, the Regressor Coin was facing a bear market crash.
“Uh... Let's wait just a few more days?”
Still, it didn't come.
“.......” “Hey. Mister Regressor. Wanna die...?”
No Do-ha ripped off the nameplate that said ‘Noah’ and threw it at me. Strike to my heart.
‘No, this can't be?’
However, the Great Monsoon truly went missing without a trace. I personally took an airship to the North Pacific, but I couldn't find any signs of the Anomaly's typhoon forming. Not only in this regression but also in the future, the Great Monsoon did not appear. The event of Busan being swept away by a tsunami and commencing reconstruction projects never happened again. It was truly bewitching enough for a ghost to wail.
[Mister Undertaker.]
However. Instead, every summer, another being appeared in the sea off Busan.
[The ‘Pink Entity’ that you warned to be careful of last time has appeared in Haeundae right now.] “What?” [Do not worry. I didn't use Clairvoyance on that entity. I am observing carefully by borrowing the eyes of another Awakener in Haeundae.]
Go Yo-ri. Whenever the time for the monsoon approached, she appeared at the Busan sea without fail.
“No, what is she doing there?” [Outwardly, no peculiar signs are found. She took off her shoes and is splashing in the water, walking alone on the beach.] [Ah, now she is squatting down and playing with sand.]
I furrowed my brows.
“...Playing with sand?” [Yes. You know the song ‘Toad, Toad, I'll give you an old house, give me a new house’. She is singing that while making sand houses and destroying them repeatedly. She looks extremely happy.] [What shall we do, Mister Undertaker? Shall we leave her be? Or shall we interfere using other Awakeners?] “.......”
I stayed silent for a long time. The mark on my neck where No Do-ha strangled me still throbbed.
“...No. Leave her alone.” [Really?] “Yes. As there is no need to poke a sleeping tiger.”
According to the Saintess's report, Go Yo-ri spent about 60 minutes on the Haeundae sandy beach like that and then abruptly returned to Daejeon. After waiting for the Pink Entity to completely distance herself from Busan, I immediately visited Haeundae. I checked the exact spot where Go Yo-ri was said to have played with sand. The boundary between sea and land where waves were perilously close to hitting. On the sand that was completely wet and turned soil-colored, these characters were written.
-E-heung! (Roar!)
No. What on earth did it mean? Just as I shook my head side to side thinking—perhaps she knew I would come and played this prank—it happened. Suddenly, my gaze was also caught by the beach under the waves. There were ‘writings’ written there.
Tiger (虎). The character meaning tiger.
“.......”
Even if she wrote something there, the sand grains should have been washed away by the waves long ago. However, somehow, the bottom of the water was densely engraved with writing. It wasn't simply that a few characters coincidentally withstood the waves. Characters small as bugs continued endlessly beyond the horizon.
Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger Tiger.
“.......”
As I barely tried to open my mouth, a transparent wave brushed past the beach once. Then, the characters that had clearly covered the seabed far into the distance just a moment ago vanished without a trace.
-E-heung!
Only that onomatopoeia Go Yo-ri playfully drew remained at my feet.
“.......”
Hm. ...It was autumn.
—Diver. End.