Chapter 90
Terminally Ill, but It's Okay — Episode 90
This was about two weeks before Yoo So-young disappeared.
I remember it was a shabby pork-belly place that didn't even have a sign.
Yoo So-young, whom I was meeting for the first time in a while—though it had only been a week—was muttering in a half-dazed state.
"Hey, I seriously can't write this. No matter how much I wring my brain out, nothing comes."
"Episode 534?"
"No, 532. I just scrapped two whole episodes. They were practically just typed-out word combinations."
"So you've actually produced less than last week."
"Are you being sarcastic?"
"No, I just stated a fact, but the situation's so shitty it sounded that way. What's the reason?"
"The reason? Well....... At this point, I don't even know what the problem is myself."
Yoo So-young, who had been repeating that bitterly, lifted her soju glass and tipped it into her mouth in one go.
Slow down a little.
I thought as I casually poured water into her empty glass.
The life of a popular author really is rough.
And with good reason.
With the serialization halted for over three weeks due to plot issues, she looked like absolute hell.
Her once-fine skin was dull and rough, and the dark circles under her eyes had deepened to the point they seemed to reach down to her jaw.
"Explain it to me step by step. Let's think it through together."
So I spoke up again.
Thinking that the two of us finding an answer together would be better than her agonizing alone.
Yoo So-young paused for a moment, then finally continued as if giving in.
"The thing is, actually......."
Episode 532 was a crucial turning point that wrapped up the middle part of the work and revealed the direction of the latter half.
Since the scale had been expanded around the theme of the Great War of the Demonkin, she had to secure both plausibility and anticipation at the same time, so it was clearly not an easy task.
"How about laying the groundwork for the protagonists to gather again?"
"Groundwork?"
"Yeah. Anyway, you have to fire a signal flare, right? So......."
The conversation continued until the two newly ordered bottles of soju were empty.
It wasn't meaningless time.
Because we refined the existing synopsis and arrived at a more satisfying result.
Yoo So-young came out of the restaurant looking much more relieved and said to me,
"Ha, now I feel like I can live. Sometimes you seem more like the author than I do."
I answered curtly.
"What are you talking about? I am an author too. A webtoon artist."
"No, I mean like the original author. Honestly, half of this work came out of your head."
Yoo So-young gave a self-deprecating smile, then quickly poked my shoulder as if pretending it was nothing.
"Thanks. Sincerely......."
That was the last image of Yoo So-young I remember.
That night. She disappeared.
Leaving behind only a message saying she was entering [Epic of Salvation].
.......
I should have at least replied back then.
Would it have changed anything?
I dismissed it as drunken rambling, and I still regret it—a corner of my chest aches as if pickled in salt.
But why, of all times, now.
[Welcome to the Akashic Record.]
[Moving to the point in time recorded in the fragment.]
At this urgent moment, when the environment had suddenly flipped.......
The reason I dredged up those memories, which held nothing but regret, was not unrelated to the current situation.
[Your permitted viewing time is 1 minute.]
[Playing the record of Episode 532.]
Before my eyes, Episode 532.
Because the gathering from that day—when the protagonists, who had been active in their respective positions after graduating from Taehak, reunited under the name of the "Suicide Squad"—was being replayed.
I couldn't for the life of me understand why events from the future were being called records.
But as the protagonists, now more mature as if proving that time had passed, began appearing one by one, I soon started to immerse myself in the scene.
"It's been a while. You've all been well?"
Baek Sa-young, who had by now become a true protagonist, showed the authority of someone who had established his own justice, in place of his characteristic awkwardness.
"Things have been absolutely insane lately. I'm working overtime every single day."
From Cheon Seo-yoon, still bright but more mature, came the composure of someone who had endured without yielding to fate.
The two of them were wearing the black robes of the Yosal Corps, and the three white lines embroidered on their sleeves were particularly striking.
It meant they had risen to the position of deputy commander.
I remember that Baek Sa-young and then Cheon Seo-yoon successively broke the record for youngest deputy commander.
"I'm glad to see you too, but I think we should start with the mission briefing. Departure time is soon."
Joo A-rin, who appeared next, was not much different from the face I had just seen moments ago.
However, that was only in appearance—her public standing would be on an incomparable level.
As the leader of Baekseol, which had grown into the Joo Family's key intelligence organization, she would be enjoying a reputation no less than a Yosal Corps deputy commander.
"You all still talk a lot."
Finally, when Seol Yoon-gi, who had been chosen as the Seol Family's official successor, and Lee Dae-ho, who now looked to be in his forties, joined in, the atmosphere quickly turned serious.
That was because the assigned mission was that heavy—ahead of the full-scale Great War of the Demonkin, the purpose of the Suicide Squad's formation was to annihilate a single organization as a declaration of war.
So it was all the more puzzling.
"Why."
Why on earth was I being shown this scene?
To get an answer, I needed to first grasp the nature of the Akashic Record, but unfortunately, I knew nothing about it.
An Out-of-Setting Element.
Because it was a device that Yoo So-young and I had never conceived.
[Skipping memory.]
The scene transitioned quickly.
The Suicide Squad departed for the mission site after a brief meeting.
[Skipping memory.]
They wrapped it up successfully.
They cleanly erased a massive Demonkin organization that had committed all manner of atrocities, revealing their changed standing without exaggeration.
"It's over."
I watched with a bitter expression and murmured quietly.
Literally, this was the provisional end of [Epic of Salvation].
Because it was the final scene of Episode 532, uploaded right before Yoo So-young disappeared.
"But what am I supposed to do with this."
Surely this so-called special reward wasn't just a review of the plot.
It was the moment I couldn't hold back my confusion and glared up at the sky.
[Skipping memory.]
......?
Astonishingly, the world transformed once more.
KRRRSH.
As if some catastrophe had erupted, the sound of tearing space pounded my ears from all directions, and my entire field of vision was dyed white.
[Skipping memory.]
I couldn't tell how much time had passed.
Suddenly, silence descended.
Along with it, the scene that shifted was an unspeakable atrocity—a site stained with blood.
Cheon Seo-yoon, Joo A-rin, Seol Yoon-gi. And even Baek Sa-young.
Every member of the Suicide Squad lay strewn across the ground as cold corpses.
"......What is this."
Cheon Seo-yoon had a hole pierced through her chest, and Baek Sa-young had collapsed unconscious with his right arm severed.
Joo A-rin lay as a cold corpse alongside Hae-rin in the middle of a pool of blood, and Seol Yoon-gi was flung into a corner with his broken blade, never to rise again.
"X—. Seriously."
Suddenly, fury surged all the way to the top of my head.
The system that had dredged up this shit and called it a record—whether 4885's purpose was a warning or deception—
showing me an intolerable scene was clearly crossing the line.
[Skipping memory.]
Tup-buk—
That was the moment someone in a pure white coat appeared.
My vision was blurred, as if moisture had gathered in my eyes.
The framing was also unhelpfully fixed, so I could only stare at a hazy figure from behind.
.
.
A slender neckline, small but squarely set shoulders. A silhouette of soft lines flowing down the back to the waist.
All of it—perhaps—was Yoo So-young.
It brought back the reason and purpose for which I had entered this world.
At an instinctive pull I had never felt before, my breath caught with a jolt.
So whether it was right or not.
First, I shouted.
"Yu......."
Whether this was the future or a false record. I called out with all my strength.
"...So...young."
But my voice didn't reach her.
Suddenly, a sense of lethargy and helplessness swept over me, as if I had been plunged underwater.
Unidentified. The someone in the white coat turned their head slightly and looked down at the fallen protagonists.
Then they abruptly released explosive mana and vanished without a trace.
[Stopping the record.]
The world was dyed ash gray.
Everything came to a halt as if the power had been cut, and the message that appeared against that silent stillness.......
explained in a single sentence why Episode 532 was a record.
[As a reward of 200SP, you have viewed the end of the previous cycle.]
[The next checkpoint is 500SP.]
[Achievement 1000 - First Viewing of the Akashic Record]
[As a reward, SP acquisition routes will be diversified.]
"No way."
As if my brain had seized up, I went blank and couldn't say a word.
Meanwhile, the world I had thought was the future—the past—crumbled away.
Through my returning vision, the familiar night sky peeked in—
"Are you okay? You suddenly collapsed......."
—and over it, Joo A-rin's face, not knowing what to do, was superimposed.
My whole body went limp, and my vision blurred.
* * *
An uncomfortable truth and the appearance of a figure presumed to be Yoo So-young.
Was it because of that that I had expended more mental energy than usual?
I did lose consciousness for a moment, but apart from that, the midterm exams wrapped up without any problems.
Meeting the Azure Tiger was kept as a secret between only Joo A-rin and me—
and as soon as I returned to my quarters, I slept like the dead for a full day.
Thanks to that, I'd recovered to some extent and was now sitting at my desk.
"Hoo."
I had also mostly accepted the newly learned truth.
Come to think of it, it had been suspicious from the start.
Even though I possessed the body late, the story had begun from the very beginning, as if the timeline had returned to the starting point before the prologue.
Then, is Yoo So-young now living a second cycle somewhere in this world? Or was she unable to participate?
Since the possession condition 4885 presented to me was Yoo So-young's rescue, she probably isn't dead.......
Then the former is highly likely. My fairly sharp intuition is telling me the same thing.......
"This is really hard."
I let out another deep sigh and tried to gauge 4885's intentions.
The bastard had revealed part of the truth of the World Setting to me, calling it a reward for 200SP.
The end of the previous cycle.
It showed me a tragedy caused by an unknown calamity(?) and the silhouette of a person presumed to be Yoo So-young.
Was it mockery, or a warning?
.......
What was certain was that this current ambiguity was also part of the bastard's scheme.
It never had any intention of telling me outright from the beginning.
I don't know what it's thinking, but it's just going to dole things out bit by bit, like tossing feed.
It intends to reveal things while raising the SP requirement.
"But that's just what you think......."
The bastard underestimated me.
I'm not so docile that I'll just eat whatever food is handed to me.
I'm the type who can't be satisfied unless I somehow get more than what the other party intended.
"So."
First, setting everything else aside, I recalled the back view of the person presumed to be Yoo So-young.
As realistically as possible, before the memory wore away.
I tried to look at it purely rationally, excluding all emotion.
Because if there were any clues that had been subtly revealed, I couldn't afford to miss them.
[Vividly revives a specific scene imprinted in your memory for 2 minutes.]
[Required SP: 5]
I had an ability for exactly that, and I willingly paid the SP.
Tzzzt—
Then, with a tingling sensation, that back view from that moment surfaced as clearly as a photograph.
"......."
I examined the one and only hint that might let me guess that person's identity.
The white coat they had been wearing, more closely.
But as if my expectations had been premature, I found no particular distinguishing features.
It was a flawless white coat with no brand or emblem, leaving not a single corner that could serve as a clue.
I clicked my tongue in disappointment.
And the scene, now on the verge of disappearing, advanced to the moment when they rapidly drew up their mana.
But was it an effect of revisiting it?
The coat billowing from the mana was a scene I remembered clearly, but.......
────!
In that instant, a flash of light from one side of the coat—I saw it for the first time.
"......What."
Certain that something was there, I opened my eyes wide.
[Activating trait, Heightened Senses.]
Then I could see it.
Near the left forearm, a fist-sized lump of light shining especially brightly.......
I froze the scene completely and focused all my nerves on my vision.
10 seconds.
20 seconds.
.
.
As I stared almost hard enough to bore a hole through it, at some point.
I realized that the lump of light was forming a specific shape.
"......A butterfly?"
It was a butterfly.
And a deformed one at that, with one wing so completely twisted that it looked unable to fly.
"Found it."
I quickly took out a notebook and pen and transferred the image in my head into a drawing.