The Regressor Trains (2)
The Regressor Trains (2)
Death God.
It's a title some might find cool—others might think it's a bit cringey.
But when the person himself goes around calling himself Death God... well, that struck me as a little cheesy. In martial arts stories, aren't nicknames supposed to be given to you by other people?
[Back when I worked for the 'company'... I met criminal profilers fairly often. They all shared a saying.]
"...What is it?"
[A madman is frightening. But more frightening than a madman... is a madman with a god complex.]
And as far as this Death God bastard goes, the fact that he calls himself the Death God means he's no ordinary lunatic.
[The Death God is a vicious criminal currently on the Player Association's radar. His first known crime happened a month and a half ago, when a corpse was discovered with the character for death carved into its forehead.]
Murder—unless truly unavoidable—is something every civilized person recoils from. Online, when an argument breaks out, people will casually talk about killing you, stabbing you, or even worse atrocities too vile to put into words... but when actually given the opportunity, very few can follow through without hesitation. If the Tower hadn't existed, I'd probably have gone my whole life without ever killing anyone.
[After his first murder, the Death God kept posting photos on the deep web, proudly displaying his 'work.' Classic serial killer pattern.]
Serial killers want to be acknowledged. They're attention-seekers who can't fill their self-esteem through normal means, so they sate their ego in twisted ways: 'Look how much I tormented this person,' 'Look how much other people fear me.'
[But... the Death God is a little different. An ego-driven need might be part of it, but he acts out of a corrupted sense of 'justice.']
"...Justice?"
The Death God is different. He's no mere thrill-killer.
[First... the Death God only kills people he judges to be evil. And he doesn't simply kill them—he does it slowly, painfully, brutally. Like he's peeling their skin off strip by strip...]
Take was a Japanese psychopath who murdered seven prostitutes for fun.
Riya, an Indian woman, was a twisted bitch who kidnapped and murdered handsome men, then tanned and kept their skin as trophies.
Zhang Lei, a Chinese man, trafficked drugs and people, committed rape and murder, and streamed the whole process in real time.
What they had in common was that they were all high-profile players. Thanks to that, their crimes went undetected right up until their deaths. When superhumans set their minds to concealing crimes, there's simply no way for modern law enforcement to catch them.
[But the Death God kills these people, then uploads evidence of their crimes online. Our profilers believe... he acts out of a 'sense of duty,' much like the manga Death Note.]
He selects the wicked, kills them, and displays their corpses on the internet. Through all of this, his ultimate goal is crime suppression. Of course, the fact that he only targets criminals isn't widely known yet... but that's only a matter of time.
"...Sounds a little like the protagonist of a web novel."
There was a strong whiff of catharsis here. Frankly, the world isn't short on people who deserve to die. It'd be far too optimistic to assume there aren't thugs out there who suddenly got superpowers.
[The problem is... the Death God is quite irresponsible.]
The problem is... the Death God's accuracy rate is pretty low.
[Maybe because he gets his info from the deep web, he makes mistakes. The ratio is around thirty percent.]
For example, his very first victim was nothing more than a perfectly innocent civilian—a middle-aged man who lived alone, looked a bit rough, and enjoyed taxidermy of insects as a hobby.
And while truly monstrous players like the ones I mentioned deserved to die, a number of morally ambiguous wrongdoers were also killed.
Someone who got drunk and beat up a dozen people, someone who robbed a few stores, someone who was pulling a prank and accidentally ripped a classmate's arm off...
These people are clearly wrongdoers. But whether they deserved to be horrifically tortured to death in agony and despair... that's another question entirely.
[Anyway... we're planning to make a worldwide announcement about this 'Death God' next week. We hesitated before, worried about backlash since he hunts evildoers, but we've decided that capturing him takes priority.]
"Hmm..."
In the end, the Association decided to put a full wanted notice on the Death God. Come to think of it, letting a criminal of his magnitude roam free is absurd.
But aside from the Death God's cruelty, as I listened to Yun Jung-hyun's story... something felt off. A weird, tingling sensation at the back of my head. The feeling that I was overlooking something important...
"...Jun-ho."
Choi Ji-won seemed to have sensed something similar. She tapped me on the shoulder and gestured toward hanging up the phone.
"Ah, one moment. Something's come up. I'll call you back later."
[Ah, yes. Understood.]
I held the phone away from my ear and shifted my gaze to Choi Ji-won.
"What's wrong?"
"Jun-ho. Don't you think people might... mistake your Floor 11 actions for the Death God?"
"...Ah."
Right. The source of my unease was exactly that: the acts I'd performed on Floor 11 were far too similar to the Death God's.
He enjoys flaying people's skin. He toys with the dead right up until they die. The Death God's identity of 'only killing evildoers' is missing, but it didn't seem like the Association would ever mention that detail in the first place.
Which meant... if the Association started loudly broadcasting about the 'Death God'...
"The people who were with me on Floor 11... they'd go around saying he's dead, wouldn't they?"
The chance that the me who died on Floor 11 would be mistaken for the Death God had just become terrifyingly real.
"Hmm..."
Once again, it was decision time.
I'd more or less resolved Floor 11 situation. The only leftover was that piece of shit Zhang Lei, and Zhang Lei has been dead for a while now. The one who killed him was the 'Death God'—the insane murderer who picks off only the wicked.
What choice should I make here? Should I find the Death God and kill him? Or just capture him? Should I meet him directly and try to guide him onto the right path? How should I handle the Death God?
And my actions on Floor 11. Should I adopt a slightly different persona on Floor 11? Or should I maintain this concept that resembles the Death God? Which of the two would be more to my benefit?
It didn't end there. My 'cold symptom' also stood at a fork in the road. Should I just drink the Elixir now? Or save it? Choi Ji-won had successfully achieved a perfect clear on Floor 4 as well, so we had two Elixirs. But this is an Elixir we're talking about. Is using it here really the right call? What if I use it now, and then at a critical moment I'm stuck without an Elixir and end up trapped in time forever?
"Ha, my head hurts."
This is a regressor's dilemma. In the end, whether to go to the next cycle depends entirely on my choice.
If I make the wrong choice here, it might snowball into something enormous and come back to haunt me... What if killing the Death God costs me the ability I need to beat the final boss of Floor 66? What if letting him live leads him to murder a pivotal talent, dooming the entire planet?
I might be holding a button right now that can decide the fate of humanity...
"Ugh, ughh... blegh."
My head spun. A dense dizziness enveloped my entire body, and my stomach clenched, making me dry heave repeatedly.
"Jun-ho, Jun-ho!"
"Just a second, just a second..."
Since I wasn't regressing, this dizziness was entirely psychological. The price of realizing that a weight of responsibility too huge for a mere human to bear was resting on my shoulders.
"...Jun-ho."
Choi Ji-won spoke while gently patting my back.
"First, let's take a break. And let's wait for the results to come out."
"...But."
"'If you rest once, you'll want to rest more'?"
"...Yeah."
"That's also true. But from what I can see, your mental fatigue has reached a dangerous state."
"..."
"You're going to regress anyway, aren't you? If you regress, you'll just go back to the moment you entered Floor 11—there's no time wasted. Let's wait and see how the 'Death God' reacts. That much is fine."
Thanks to Choi Ji-won's firm—if not exactly gentle—insistence, I was forced to take a break.
And so, a week flew by in the blink of an eye.
**
Exactly a week later. News about the 'Death God' blanketed the entire world. The fact that the Death God only killed evildoers was completely omitted, and he was portrayed as a mere thrill-killer.
As an aside, the Player Association was also aware of the 'Skeleton Murderer' who died on Floor 11.
And after a meticulous review, they concluded that the killer who died on Floor 11 was not the Death God. There were quite a few differences in the finer details between the two killers.
Even so, the Player Association made a bold decision.
-Player Association officially announces: 'The Death God was killed on Floor 11 at the hands of the hero, Choi Ji-won.'
-The Death God is already dead! Citizens, please rest assured.
They went everywhere, loudly proclaiming that the Death God was dead.
At first glance it seemed incomprehensible, but it turned out to be a stroke of genius by the Association.
[Mr. Jun-ho.]
"What is it?"
[Are you watching the news right now? They're probably talking about the Death God.]
"Right?"
[That bastard just turned on a YouTube livestream a moment ago. The Death God is a fifteen-year-old Japanese student.]
"...?"