Chapter 96
Chapter 96
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 96
Chapter Title: Replier × Noah 19
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Cheon Yo-hwa's ghost-monster collection progressed rapidly. By the end of summer vacation, the Pokédex completion rate was already approaching 80%.
Victory was already assured.
The only issue was that every time a ghost was imprisoned in a sandglass—serving as a makeshift Monster Ball—the world went slightly off the rails.
"Neng? The world's shrinking?"
"Yeah. Easier to show you directly."
I loaded Cheon Yo-hwa onto the hydrofoil and took off.
The Savoia S-21, a modified rear seat version. It was the seaplane that Red Pig had used, remodeled into a proper aircraft. Originally a yokai wandering Japan, I'd brought it over whenever I got bored.
"Wow, double wings! Totally cool!"
"You know your stuff."
"Hehe. Neng! Mom taught me back in the day—if someone proudly shows off something really lame, just praise it like crazy!"
"……?"
The seaplane soared past Jeju Island into the East China Sea. Cheon Yo-hwa, who had been chattering noisily, suddenly yelped "Ack!" and pointed at the horizon.
"Uncle! What's that?"
Where her finger pointed stood a massive wall of fog.
Fog so thick it belonged in a movie like *The Mist*, blanketing the sea and sky beyond the horizon entirely.
"It's the world's boundary line."
"B-boundary?"
"I only realized it recently myself. My guess is, every time you seize control of a ghost from Mu-gan, the world itself shrinks a bit."
"Hieeek……."
"Let's get closer."
Vroom! The engine sputtered.
My seaplane approached the 'fog wall.'
"Wow. Can't see a thing……."
"I've tested it already, but you can't enter the fog. Feels like hitting an invisible wall. A few days ago, I could go farther, but after you sealed one more ghost, the boundary tightened to here."
"Whoa. But then how does trade work? You order overseas stuff a lot, Uncle, but the news hasn't said anything."
"That's the intriguing part. Look."
Swoosh—
From beyond the fog emerged the prow of a massive ship. A container freighter, sliding out from the sea lane on the other side of the fog wall as if it were the most natural thing.
"Eeeek?"
"See? Everything in this world except you and me—every object, every lifeform—continues without issue. It's just that the world now forms only inside the 'fog wall.'"
"Uh, kinda confusing……. So, basically, only the world inside the fog wall exists, but it's made to seem like the outside is fine too… right?"
"Probably."
The seaplane skimmed along the fog wall.
"This world is much like the illusion Mu-gan conjured."
The ghosts of the Hundred Tales that Cheon Yo-hwa was sealing weren't mere independent yokai. They were all fragments of Mu-gan.
Stealing them from Mu-gan was like taking away 'parts of its existence.'
"Like robbing a human of memories, or a computer of data. My interpretation is that Mu-gan, which needs resources to maintain this world and illusion, is running low. Now, only the area around the Korean Peninsula remains."
"I see……."
"It's also proof that everything in this world is just shadows mimicking true existence."
"……."
Cheon Yo-hwa suddenly grew quiet. No surprise—people tend to be overwhelmed by phenomena like this.
"…Let's head back, Uncle. It's cold."
"Wait just a bit. There's one more thing to show you. You'll regret missing it."
"……?"
"Now."
I pointed at the sky.
The sun was setting. That solar orb, likely nonexistent in real space and visible only in this shrunken world—an illusory sphere. As the false sun tried to cross the fog wall—
The fog clouds blocking sky and sea were dyed orange by the sunset, turning everything blood-red.
A short gasp escaped from the back seat.
"…Pretty."
With no drifting clouds in the sky, the sunset used the world's entire boundary as its mirror. It was spectacular. The fog wall greedily drank in the blood the dying sun shed.
The west side of the world was all sunset.
Less than five minutes later, the sun sank completely beyond the fog wall. The sunset vanished too.
The quiet suicide of the sun left a lingering afterglow like airplane contrails.
"…Why does a sunset like that appear? The fog wall's just an object, not real fog."
"Who knows. I don't either. Even in this all-illusory world, that fog-wall sunset feels especially fantastical. Still beautiful, right?"
"…Yes, incredibly so."
"One illusion is just a fleeting dream. Yet somehow, we humans find dreaming illusions within illusions beautiful."
"……."
The engine roared. Cheon Yo-hwa stayed silent the whole flight back to Baekhwa Girls' High School, lost in my words.
She said only one thing upon returning to the dorm.
"…Thanks, Uncle. I think I know which ghost to catch last."
It was summer.
Cicadas dropped dead from trees. Anonymous birds and bugs picked at the corpses rolling on the ground. Late summer was a season slowly proclaiming death, the whole world a sealed-room murder scene.
It was fall.
Maples laid crimson handprints over the summer corpses, covering them. Everywhere was a grand funeral procession. We agreed to call this red cemetery autumn.
And then.
"Delivery—"
I went to Baekhwa Girls' High School's front gate to receive the food in its plastic bag.
The delivery guy, who set his own daily rate, adjusted his sky-blue helmet and mounted his scooter.
Vroom—
The engine revved, and the scooter slid onto the road outside the gate. Then vanished.
Into the fog wall.
"……."
Now the world was the size of a school fence.
No matter where I looked, the sky was wrapped in white fog clouds. In the mornings, teachers' cars slipped out from the fog wall; in the evenings, the same cars vanished beyond it.
The next day, the distance from this side to the other—from car interior to the beyond—was just the schoolyard.
The end of space. Time holding its breath. Where nothing should be, phenomena silently emerged and sank on the water's surface. Like a child's splash, each droplet was the weight of existence. Every spray held the world's sunset.
I stood blankly by the student council room window for a while, staring at the white glassy barrier between me and the beyond.
"How many left?"
"Two."
It was winter.
Snow fell for the first time. Built in summer, this world made it the first snow.
Plop. A snowflake hit the window. The quietest knock. Looking out, the world was already blanketed in white snow-fog.
The world's area: about 100 square feet, a studio apartment.
The universe had shrunk to the student council room, barely enough for two to breathe.
-…….
-Gong… gong… gong…….
-Oo, o, o, o, o.
Clink. Clink. Occasionally, ghosts thrashed faintly from the shelves. The remaining world area, swallowed by fog, was confined by the glass walls of 98 sandglasses.
The last remaining ghost.
Cheon Yo-hwa stared at it silently.
"You must obey me."
-Sorry, but mind control doesn't work on me.
A voice identical to Cheon Yo-hwa's.
It came from the full-length mirror opposite. In it sat a being with the same hairstyle and uniform, posture perfect on the chair.
-You know it too. No matter how much you try to brainwash me, it just becomes 'obey yourself,' right?
Doppelganger.
A yokai that could only live as someone's shadow. It was the final fragment of Mu-gan that Cheon Yo-hwa had left.
"Why are you me? You're a ghost trapped in the mirror. I'm outside. You can't move, but I'm free."
-Aha. These days, people call fidgeting in a 100-square-foot world 'freedom'? Sorry, I'm dumb. Didn't know prisons were the freest places on Earth.
"Idiot? A 100-square-foot prison cell would be a luxury hotel."
-Ah, right. Enjoy your five-star stay. So jealous.
"I hate you."
-I hate you too. Just like me.
Cheon Yo-hwa sighed. Time to interject?
"Have some coffee and take it easy."
"Ah! Yes, Uncle… You didn't order this—you brewed it yourself? Hwah. Thanks."
"No big deal. Just my little hobby."
I had many hobbies, but being a barista ranked highest.
Nothing more rewarding than pinpointing someone's taste and bombarding them with caffeine.
After trial and error, Cheon Yo-hwa's tongue proved balanced between the 'coffee is bitter' and 'coffee is sweet' camps.
Espresso? That's coffee? It's herbal medicine. Macchiato? Sugar water.
Cheon Yo-hwa preached bipartisan unity and founded a new party.
Destined to be bashed by both sides, like third-party advocates, she brimmed with baseless confidence. Party name: 'Double Espresso Cream Latte.'
Cream not mixed, but like ice cream. Thin chocolate shavings on top. 70-90% cacao. I sip-tested, adjusting cream bit by bit, with straw and spoon. Done.
"So gooood……."
Cheon Yo-hwa wore the world's happiest face.
"When coffee's brewed right, it feels so fulfilling……. Uncle, can you make this every morning? Lately, without your coffee, my head gets foggy by lunch."
"High praise, thanks. I'd love to, but it's not easy."
"Why?"
"Here, civilization's intact, so beans, cream, chocolate are easy to get. Back in reality, only occasionally."
"Hiiing. One more reason not to return to reality……."
-Heh. How good is it? Can I have a cup too, Uncle?
"Shut up."
Cheon Yo-hwa muttered.
The room temperature dropped a notch.
"Before I really kill you."
-…….
Clink clink clink.
The 98 sandglasses on the shelf shook faintly. The stainless electric kettle in the table's center boiled, bubbling.
Hoo. Cheon Yo-hwa exhaled coffee-warmed breath, quietly restoring the room's temperature.
"Thanks, Uncle."
"Hm? Coffee's just my hobby……."
"Not just the coffee. Everything."
"……."
"I know you have lots of secrets, Uncle. But one thing's clear: no matter what happened to our school, you could've ignored it and walked away."
A snowstorm raged.
"Sometimes I imagine life without you. Got plenty of time anyway. I daydream a lot."
"I see."
"I've been scared of ghosts since I was little."
White fog birthed white snow that battered the white window. Swept by wind, the flakes vanished back into the fog. White in existence, white in absence.
The blanching of existence.
"My dad's like a cult leader. Well, actually, he was the leader."
"……."
"Know this? Our house is huge. Even has a church-like basement. Hundreds gather monthly, chanting weird spells……. Um, our family name's Cheon (千). But Dad insists I use Heaven's Cheon (天). At home, school, always. Ahaha, weird, right?"
"……."
"Uncle. You saw the weird talismans on our school, right?"
"Yeah. I did."
"Our family runs this school too. Chairman's a relative, but it's basically Dad's. Most students are cult families."
"……."
"So when the sky turned blood-red and ghosts appeared one day, I just… accepted it. Ah—divine punishment, as expected."
Snowflakes stuck to the window. Snowflowers bloomed and wilted endlessly.
Existence was white blossoms.
"But I couldn't let the kids die."
"……."
"This is probably our family's fault. Half-runaway me can't know how it happened……. Still, student council president. Called 'young miss' by the cult all the time. I have to take responsibility."
In the 100-square-foot room wrapped in the scent of white flowers, Cheon Yo-hwa's story flowed.
Infinite Regressor, But I Told Tales