Chapter 82
Chapter 82
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 82
Chapter Title: Episode 27. Demise, The Ball Where Death Dances (10)
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Ni-Ar-Ra. The phantom of the Abyss's Third Lord.
Her head rolled across the ashen subspace several times after being severed.
Yoo Ji-tae scattered his killing intent. Because she'd spouted such nonsense. Because she'd tried to negotiate with him. Or because she'd casually acted like she knew things only he should know. So, yes, there was some emotion mixed in.
But he was always the type to prioritize calculations. The foundation of the Abyss. That very low and distant space wasn't connected to Earth's dimension. It was nearly impossible for its lord to exert power directly there.
So, there would be no further trouble.
Then, the head that had been rolling behind him suddenly stopped on its own and lifted itself up.
[...Insolent thing.]
The head, emitting a halo of white light, spoke to Yoo Ji-tae. And yet, still pretending to be a girl, it wore a fresh smile that was utterly creepy.
Every time he saw it, he thought it was a miserable sight.
Who did these demons take after to be so pathetic?
[A distorted existence. I clearly showed you goodwill.]
The phantom's voice began shifting gradually toward androgyny.
[But since you've gone so far as to ignore that goodwill, I now want to see you—a truly intriguing subject—suffer a bit more.]
[Whether that child's mind collapses or not no longer interests me. Still, it would be a shame to waste the power I've so painstakingly drawn out to bring you here.]
Now in a voice like a monster's.
The fresh-faced Ni-Ar-Ra smiled.
[So, I intend to imprison you here. And bind the dream world completely to my child. You will realize you're trapped here. That you can never escape again.]
[Forever in this place—]
Shut up.
Splat.
Yoo Ji-tae stomped on the phantom's head, crushing it. Fragments of white light scattered like feathers, filling the air.
What remained unbroken until the end was the mouth. The lone lower jaw left on the ground spat out words in staccato bursts.
[—trap. Ped. Here. You. Think.]
It was like a signal flare.
The girl's lower jaw and body turned entirely to white light, beginning to engulf the world.
With that, the dark world divided into two boundaries began to fade away slowly.
Soon, the dream world enveloping Yoo Ji-tae began to change.
It was the interior of a massive cavern. A vast plaza-like space.
At the center of the plaza stood an execution platform dozens of meters tall. Noah knelt there, head bowed low. Yoo Ji-tae stood beside Noah.
Below the platform, countless humans encircled it, staring up at Yoo Ji-tae.
The place was noisy. They were jeering.
"You can't kill him!"
"He's a god! He won't die! Do you even know how long he's lived?!"
"Get down here! You monster!"
"You demon!"
The regressor scanned the cavern with impassive eyes. A high but sealed cave. Beings in the unconscious obsessed madly with Noah's life. And the aged Noah, kneeling on the execution platform yet smiling confidently at him as if certain he wouldn't die.
This was Noah's unconscious.
It seemed Ni-Ar-Ra had imprisoned Yoo Ji-tae here before leaving, to prove her words.
Amusingly, the faces of the humans jeering around the platform were all identical to Noah's.
These were the 997 unconscious minds Noah had devoured.
Their intense will to survive had now become Noah itself.
"You can't kill him—!"
"“Can't!”"
"You damned wretch! Get down here!"
"Get down!" "Get down!"
"Get down!" "Get down!"
"Get down!" "Get down!"
Soon, the Noahs contained within Noah began screaming like madmen.
"“Get down heeeere—!”"
Madness surged like a storm, pressing down on Yoo Ji-tae. Cheers, jeers, shouts rattled the regressor's ears.
Among those screaming were some self-harming. Biting their own flesh, they bellowed through bloodied mouths.
Others severed their own heads. Those with half-severed necks writhed on the ground, still shouting.
If anyone else had stood there—or even Yoo Ji-tae from up to his fourth regression—it would have been intimidating.
Noah's will to live was this grotesque.
Yet Yoo Ji-tae silently gripped his killing intent without a word. He wasn't shaken. In truth, he felt no emotion at all.
You say you're an absolutely immortal being? What nonsense.
For this very moment, what time had he lived through?
Things that weren't scarce held no value.
By now, 'life' had become commonplace to Yoo Ji-tae. He was prepared to die and rewind time whenever necessary.
But as always, living was more efficient than dying. So the regressor chose to live.
However, in the fifth regression, Yoo Ji-tae first felt the need for death. His power had hit human limits. There were things his crude killing intent couldn't slay.
'I am eternal. Immortal.'
Noah's voice—armed with killing intent yet mocking him with its tenacious attachment to life—flashed through his mind.
'Omniscient. Omnipotent.'
In the dream, even destroying its body led to regeneration.
Indeed, even after prolonged battle had exhausted his imagination.
Behead it, and the head reattached itself.
Crush it, and the flesh fragments gathered and reformed.
'Who dares claim they can kill me?'
Burn it, and it recovered. In a frozen world, only the flesh thawed. Stopping its breath didn't kill it.
The regressor thought its flesh defied time's flow like his own.
'As long as your desperation doesn't surpass mine, you can't kill me here. This is my world—.'
Then, at some point, when it recovered its imagination and devoured him in its imaginings again.
Yoo Ji-tae realized. It wasn't regression.
It was the foundation of all power.
「Will」
Noah's 'will to live' had transcended the limits possible for a mortal.
A being that refused to die even in death looked up at him, smiling.
'Here, I am god.'
There, a mass of life breathed.
Its will to live was stronger than Yoo Ji-tae's will to kill.
So he couldn't kill the Noah in the dream.
To him, life had lost its rarity.
Perhaps even in the twentieth regression. Or the hundredth. He might never break the regression loop. He'd thought that once.
If life was to repeat.
Noah would continue grabbing at his ankles countless times.
Yoo Ji-tae needed a tool to kill it.
So the regressor pondered.
Noah bolstered his vitality by devouring the 'will to survive' of those dying by his hand.
He lacked such a convenient authority. But as he explored his own, he realized he had something similar.
It was 「Apocalyptic Clock (EX)」.
When the fifth regression ended. When the world's time rewound.
When the regressor opened his eyes in a rainy urban street in South Korea.
He advanced toward being murdered by someone.
Noah had absorbed roughly 997 humans' 'will to survive'. Not knowing how it might change per regression, he needed to absorb even more killing intents.
So he had to make someone want to kill him.
And he had to die by that someone's hand.
The method wasn't difficult.
He approached someone and took what they cherished most.
He killed a devoted son's parents and showed their corpses to the son that night, saying,
'I killed your parents.'
It wasn't pleasant.
He could feel the faint remnants of his humanity crying out that he didn't want to do this.
'I killed your son.'
But he had to.
'I killed your husband.'
That was his life.
'If you're angry, try killing me.'
He was murdered by the enraged.
Entity Yoo Ji-tae enters abnormal status “Death”.
Authority, Apocalyptic Clock (EX) collects the will of the killer, “Kim Cheol-gon”.
Murdered repeatedly.
Entity Yoo Ji-tae enters abnormal status “Death”.
Authority, Apocalyptic Clock (EX) collects the will of the killer, “Oh Min-ji”.
Kept being murdered.
To die, he had to deactivate all authorities, blessings, and protective skills.
In that process, the pain of death was entirely his to bear.
'Die! Dieeeee! You murderer—!!'
The agony of flesh tearing was tormenting.
'Why, why did you do it... What grudge did our family ever have against you?'
'You'll burn in hell forever. I'll curse you.'
Someone's hatred was even more tormenting.
Back then, that was how it was.
Each time someone killed him, their emotions and will to kill were absorbed.
Like inky poison dripping into his veins, mixing. One drop, two, ten... The sticky, filthy venom eroded his blood vessels and heart.
10 deaths.
50 regressions.
And when the hundredth world began.
A change occurred in Yoo Ji-tae.
His killing intent began manifesting as form.
But the numbers were still insufficient. Since Noah had absorbed 997 wills to survive, the regressor needed even more killing intents.
It was utter madness.
After 200 regressions. The authority's rank changed.
He'd been murdered 200 times.
Gradually, the pain of being murdered faded. Once pain became familiar, death felt lighter.
He no longer feared pain.
He was murdered 300 more times.
Then, the hatred from each person's story no longer frightened or shamed him. He stripped away all hypocrisy from himself.
Choosing this path out of necessity to kill Noah? Wrong. He was a selfish being pursuing his own needs through this madness.
He was simply a sinner.
Finally, murdered 500 more times.
By then, he'd lost track of time's passage or what was happening to him.
He'd started this madness to become something, but forgot what, becoming something unknown in the process.
Thus, after over 1,100 deaths, Yoo Ji-tae's odyssey ended.
Times of passively awaiting murder held no special meaning, as he'd run toward death.
Now, he thought, the sixth regression begins.
Though in the sixth, it hid, so no encounter.
In the seventh, they met like this.
"......"
The howling humans. Jeers and hatred echoing through the cavern. And Noah, giggling with confidence in his will to live.
Killing intent swirled in the regressor's hand, taking form.
For this one moment right now. The regressor's killing intent—forged through 1,100 murders by those filled with hatred—
cleaved Noah's body in half, killing him.
"—!"
The last sight was Noah's incredulous expression.
The jeer-filled uproar cut off abruptly.
He kicked Noah's corpse off the platform. Then, with a slow gaze, he looked at the 'wills to live' that had been bellowing.
Noah's dream ended.
The ashen world began dissipating like smoke.
He watched the howling wills to live. With the main will severed, the beings devoured by the demon's dream flailed in meaningless gestures. Shaking necks. Flailing arms. Walking in all directions.
Nearly a thousand beings danced.
And the scene before him slowly faded away.