Chapter 208
Chapter 208
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 208
Chapter Title: Kidnapping
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9
Kidnapping.
Naturally, being kidnapped by humans and being kidnapped by yokai were quite different.
If you were kidnapped by a human, your honor, wealth, and life would primarily be at risk.
But if kidnapped by a yokai?
Surprisingly, the chances of all those things remaining intact were high.
Yokai don't commit unnecessary acts.
If they were interested in your life, they would have used a goodbye spell right when you met, instead of going through the trouble of staging a kidnapping.
What yokai aim for when kidnapping you is one thing only.
Your 'humanity.'
Here, humanity includes not just ethics and morals, but also the logical structure fundamentally built into the Homo sapiens brain.
Q. What is 1 plus 1?
A. Obviously 2.
Even people exchanging such normal Q&A, after being kidnapped by a yokai,
Q. What is 1 plus 1?
A. The flesh (肉) of six hundred sixty (六百六十) has been slaughtered, leaving only the flesh (肉) of one hundred ten (百十). Ten (十) is the form of 1 and 1 crossing, and when gathered into a hundred (百), it becomes like lining up a hundred human forearms crossed side by side, I humbly report.
They would give that answer, then kill 100 people including themselves and display 100 pairs of arms.
Even if you rage here, 'How could you commit such a monstrous act!' it would be useless to the other party.
A. Why are you suddenly angry?
Because, from the responder's perspective, answering 1+1=2 or slaughtering 100 people carries exactly the same weight.
The responder butchered 100 people with the exact same feeling as doing simple arithmetic.
They merely stated 1+1=2, and look at you with eyes that cannot comprehend why you're angry or making such a sad face.
Hard to see as human.
Impossible to converse with as a human.
Thus, the kidnapping of humanity (神隠し).
This was exactly the situation I commonly described as being 'bewitched' by yokai.
The tutorial fairy must have meant precisely that.
"If everyone infected in reality has been kidnapped... how many humans exist in this shadow world?"
"Hoe! At least 2 million! And it's increasing massively in real time right now!"
I furrowed my brows.
"Wait. Then it'll surpass the actual population of the Korean Peninsula?"
"Exactly! Not only those infected by the virus in reality, but even dream characters have been dragged here, so it'll easily exceed 10 million! Population reversal world!"
"Huh."
A whopping 10 million.
I looked around the vast void sprawling from Seoul Station at its center.
When places bewitched by yokai are defined as voids, this place was already worthy of being called a great void.
Great voids of this scale were truly rare.
For example, an 'apartment trapping 400 souls' could be handled by a single apartment yokai, but for a '40,000 souls trapped apartment' to form, additional concepts were needed.
Like 'the aspirations of Koreans for apartments materializing concretely' or 'based on an actual apartment with that many subscription applications' or actually being an apartment complex yokai rather than a single building.
Such joints were necessary for a great void to expand its scale.
The largest void on Earth was concentrated in the west of the Eurasian continent, trapping hundreds of millions through the joints of 'World War I' and 'World War II.'
"What method drew in hundreds of millions, tens of millions of humans? Did they define this place as hell by any chance?"
"Hoe, not at all. If anything, it's the complete opposite..."
That was when it happened.
-Everyone!
Someone at Seoul Station plaza grabbed a megaphone and bellowed.
It was an uncle who looked like he would've done street preaching even before civilization collapsed. Just the writing on the front and back of his outer coat was a bit different.
[Goddess Heaven 女神天國]
[Nonbeliever Hell 不信地獄]
The vest patched with stickers exuded an indescribable sense of realism.
-Everyone! Sorry for interrupting your busy daily lives! I had no choice but to grab this mic for your proper living and true faith!
The middle-aged man shouted hoarsely into the red megaphone.
-As you all know, even now beyond there in hell, countless people! Poor souls unlike us who haven't been saved yet, groaning in lives repeating every day, regressions repeating every day, pain repeating every day! Everyone!
At this point, the realism that had filled the air volume flipped drastically.
-…….
-…….
Pedestrians strolling through Seoul Station plaza halted en masse and turned to the middle-aged man.
Those on calls hung up. Those staring at smartphones turned them off. Those chatting with companions stopped talking.
The plaza fell silent in an instant.
Not a single person glared at the megaphone noise with annoyed eyes.
Most stared at the middle-aged man with expressionless faces and profoundly dark pupils.
-Beyond there, countless people still groan unable to escape the hellish path of eternal reincarnation! They are your acquaintances, your family, and furthermore, your own former selves! Let's pray for them! Goddess!
-Goddess!
The pedestrians who had been silent shouted in unison.
The man with the megaphone waved his arms even more violently.
-Goddess!
-Goddess!
-Let's repent! As the world repeats and lives accumulate, hundreds, thousands of times! My error in mistaking that someday I would become another person and the world would be saved! My acquaintances' errors! My friends' and family's errors! I repent!
-We repent!
-Let's praise! In repeating lives, only our mistaken sins piled up, and even if we forgot, the Goddess kept watching over us! Our filthy souls stained with such sins, yet! The Goddess did not abandon us! Freed our souls from that hell and rescued them to this world! Praise!
-Praise!
-Goddess!
-Goddess!
The plaza was instantly dyed in madness.
Fairy No. 264 hid behind me with a hoe-.
Even I hesitated briefly at the madness flickering in people's eyes.
-Bow down, everyone! Worship!
Pedestrians prostrated on the plaza floor without hesitation. Not caring if their suits got dirty.
Among them was Kim Joo-cheol. He bowed his head to the ground with his wife.
-Confront it! Just like yesterday, just like the day before, a hundred years ago, a thousand years ago, unchanging! Your own figure living in that eternally repeating hell!
Then a bizarre phenomenon occurred.
The plaza floor, covered in asphalt moments ago, turned transparent like 'glass.'
Beyond the glass, videos played. Where Kim Joo-cheol had bowed, his own video.
-Save meee! Please get me out of here! I don't want to repeat another day!
Not just that.
Wherever pedestrians bowed, their own videos flowed.
Looking closely, a familiar green-haired figure was there too. Sim A-ryeon.
Among them, the 'landscape beyond the glass' that especially caught my eye was as follows.
-The National Highway Management Corps are hell's minions supporting eternal regression! They imprison and isolate us trying to escape regression! They are the real demons!
-Demons! Demons! Demons!
In the video, a group gathered in front of the Management Corps headquarters, protesting.
Management Corps members led by Yoo Ji-won emerged and mercilessly suppressed the protesters. Babel Tower plaza was filled with screams.
A scene that could plausibly exist in reality.
I muttered.
"Those videos... what are they?"
"Hoe. The real reality outside."
The fairy peeked over my shoulder.
"Comrade Secretary-General, look down."
"Hm?"
I looked.
Surprisingly, just like others, beneath my feet beyond the transparent glass, a 'video' flowed.
Beyond the glass, the Undertaker lay asleep with eyes closed. No Do-ha and the Saintess sat around him.
With me lying on the bed, the two conversed softly.
-Gosh. It's noisy outside...
-The protests are getting worse.
-Well, not just civilians but Awakeners too are all infected by that regression virus or whatever. Three Thousand and Baekhwa said they'd suppress it somehow, but I doubt it'll last a few days...
-Still, I think it'll be fine once the Undertaker wakes up.
I was speechless.
That wasn't just a plausible reality scene—it was reality itself.
"But from the perspective of humans bewitched into this shadow world, it's the complete opposite."
"...Opposite?"
"Hoe! Yes. Here is reality, and beyond the glass is the afterlife and hell!"
I widened my eyes.
"What? How could such trickery..."
"It works plenty! More precisely, the yokai is working hard to make it work!"
Fairy No. 264 said.
The reason they consider their 'shadow world' superior to my 'real world.'
"First, there's no war here, and civilization is intact! As I said, population is almost caught up!"
Civilization and environment.
"That side is harsh to live in, an eternal regression hell repeating forever! Meanwhile, this shadow world crafted by the yokai continues steadily without regression! Just like reality!"
Flow of time.
"So, Comrade Secretary-General. This yokai has defined your world as 'hell.' It's a duel challenge to decide which is reality and which is hell!"
"......"
Indeed. I understood too.
In essence, no different from other yokai.
Just that ordinary yokai set up hells within reality, while this one named the entire reality as hell.
And thus—using the fairy's term—built a separate 'shadow world' to secure its own domain.
This place is the living world, that place the afterlife.
The yokai bewitched people that way.
Reversal. Twist. Paradigm shift.
"...Clever bastard. Then where is this place? In dreams? Unconscious world?"
"Hoek, a bit different. Though Comrade Secretary-General reached here through a dream, that's just a pseudo-experience!"
"Pseudo-experience? ...Aha."
I quickly deduced the answer.
"I see. There's that urban legend that sometimes when people dream, they experience the afterlife. Not that the afterlife is in dreams, but luckily connecting to the afterlife briefly through dreams. This place inherently has the attribute of the afterlife."
"As expected of Comrade Secretary-General! Exactly! Hoe, of course the yokai defines here as the living world and that side as the afterlife..."
Quite a complex and elaborate trap.
But now, finally, a clue to the strategy emerged.
The condition was proving which is reality and which illusion. Just reveal that the world I lived in is reality.
-Everyone! Rejoice! Your sincere repentance has reached the Goddess!
The middle-aged man shouted.
-Now you no longer need to look down at hell today! Raise your heads! Lift your heads! And look up at the sky and witness!
Pedestrians prostrated on the plaza raised their upper bodies. I too instinctively followed their movements with my gaze.
To the sky.
-The sacred form of the Goddess!
And I saw.
――There was no sun there.
Why hadn't I noticed?
If I had to reason, modern people have no habit of looking up at the sun.
Also, judging by the sunlight angle, the sun seemed at midday, making it hard to look up without craning the neck nearly 90 degrees.
In short.
The habit of thinking 'there must be a sun' when sunlight falls from the sky existed even in me, a regressor.
"......"
What sat in the sky instead of the sun.
It was a gigantic 『eyeball』.
Blink—.
As the eyeball blinked slowly, oh so languidly, the world briefly shadowed.
Before looking up, I'd thought clouds passing caused the shadow, but illusion.
Blink—.
Sunlight, no, eye-light flowed from the gigantic eyeball.
The pitch-black pupil at the center of the huge sclera moved ceaselessly this way and that.
It looked at me.
"Hoeek! Danger...!"
The moment the sun's eye, eye's sun stared straight at me, the people prostrated in the plaza turned to me en masse.
-...... .
-...... .
Residents of 'this' world who hadn't acknowledged me until now stared piercingly.
The eye-light illuminating this world without omission focused sharply here.
The surrounding temperature rose instantly, my skin starting to melt like candle wax.
"E-emergency escape!"
The fairy urgently swung her magic wand.
In my vision, half of Fairy No. 264's body burst. But the fairy held onto the wand to the end.
The next moment.
I was ejected from the dream.
10
"...Hey."
Welcoming me back to reality was a figure who would proudly take 1st place in the [Most Unwanted Face Upon Waking in the Morning] contest.
"Hey, Awakener Undertaker. You okay? Didn't croak...?"
In other words, No Do-ha.
Pushing up my heavy eyelids with effort, the first thing to enter my sight was No Do-ha's dark circles.
No Do-ha was always someone hard to say paid attention to fashion, but today was especially so.
She was covered head to toe in something fleshy like chunks of meat, closer to jelly texture, utterly drenched.
Looking closely, the Saintess standing behind No Do-ha's shoulder was similarly soaked in something between solid and liquid.
What the hell kind of fashion is this— as I was about to sneer, No Do-ha blocked my mouth first.
"The fairy that sang lullabies with you and went dream traveling. Just burst. Suddenly half its body exploded on its own..."
"Ah."
It was true.
Lying on the bed, I turned to the side. Fairy No. 264 still gripped my hand tightly, but the other half of its body was gone.
"...Call A-ryeon. These guys have tough life force despite appearances, so quick healing and it'll survive."
The Saintess behind No Do-ha nodded. Probably messaged via [Telepathy] instantly.
As I straightened my clothes, I asked.
"Director No Do-ha. By any chance, are people protesting outside right now?"
"Hmm? Yes, correct. Team Leader Yoo suppressed it immediately... Strange. You heard the noise here while dreaming."
I rested my chin, lost in thought.
Then No Do-ha asked me crookedly.
"Thanks to the fairy, we need to redo the entire wallpaper here. What was in the dream to cause this mess...?"
"Night Goddess, Nut."
I paused briefly before saying.
"An outer god."