39. ???
39. ???
My world was pretty fucked.
When the zombie virus that started in China landed in Incheon, we were still managing to hold it off with the military.
Then some lunatics started mocking the dead soldiers, attacked the response as a political ploy, and sued the troops for shooting citizens who'd turned into zombies.
So it all went to hell.
The zombies that survived Incheon pushed through Seoul all the way to Busan.
By the time those people came to their senses, the window for containing the situation had long since slammed shut.
The absurd part was that South Korea wasn't the only country to miss the critical window.
The world prioritized hating and tearing down their neighbors over the zombies in the next country.
Thanks to that, the virus spread worldwide, and when it looked like it couldn't be contained, Russia and the US made a pact and started nuking the zombie zones.
After that, somehow it spiraled into a full-blown war... anyway, I saw the absolute depths of human ugliness.
"Seriously, what the hell genre is your world?"
"Dunno. I got excited when the Warfield demo dropped, but I didn't know it'd be this kind of demo."
Whoever wrote our Earth was terrible at storytelling.
With plausibility this bad, they'd have been torn to shreds.
Well, it's not really important anyway.
The scary thing about zombies is the dilemma that there might be civilians among them. Once civilians-or-not stops mattering and war breaks out, zombies fold easily against conventional weapons.
"Don't worry about it too much. The main content was people, not the zombies."
"Ah..."
"You curious about the stories?"
"Incredibly curious."
"I’ll tell you on the way."
After that, using the night sky as my ceiling, I told him the stories of our world.
How some place called Parasol Company spread the zombie virus worldwide in the name of a Human Selection Plan.
Russian ultranationalist bastards staged a false flag at an airport and triggered the Fourth World War.
Some maniac set off an EMP with a nuclear missile and I had to escape from a downed helicopter.
Now that I say it out loud, it really was dynamic as hell.
"Call of Duty mixed with Resident Evil."
"I don't know what those are."
"They were games from my world."
While we were chatting about that kind of trivial stuff, the Sanctuary finally came into view.
*
After a brief Fury Road sprint into the Sanctuary, the first place we headed was the Temple of Play and Amusement where I belonged.
It was for Nikolai's baptism.
"Huh? Boss?"
"If you’re going to work as my partner, you should at least carry proof of baptism. I’d prefer to have you canonized too, but get that done through a denomination suited to you."
"No, that's not the issue—when did I ever say I'd act? Why would I need to be baptized?"
"You said you'd be my adjutant. If I say jump, you jump."
"..."
Nikolai's expression curdled.
He already seemed to regret those words, but it didn't matter.
That bastard had worn the same expression when I made him Sage and Prophet, but once given the job, he worked so hard he even cut back on sleep.
I could guarantee that the moment he saw the acting script I was going to give him, he'd throw himself into it harder than anyone in the world.
"Come to my room once your baptism is done."
My room was the very top of the temple, right next to the Archbishop's.
It was a privilege for turning a denomination that had been little more than a neighborhood shop into a skyscraper-scale organization with one film.
I'd been lounging around the room for a while when Archbishop Alex came by.
"Allen. You brought a friend who said he needed baptism this time, but isn't that friend already an adult?"
He was asking why Nikolai needed baptism when his soul core should've already fully matured.
He was right.
Baptism wasn't some make-believe knightly investiture to hand out casually.
Since it guarantees a person's soul in the name of a god, neither the denomination nor the gods were particularly keen on excessive baptisms.
But that didn't mean I was making Nikolai get baptized because he was special, either.
"I'm planning to have him compete as a Luchador."
Avatars were ordinarily supposed to be used only on set for public-safety reasons.
But Luchadors were the one exception allowed to use them out on the streets.
It was precisely because Luchadors were baptized.
It meant the person beneath the avatar was perfectly normal, so there wasn't any need for suspicion.
"Ah. I was needlessly suspicious. You are not the sort of person who abuses personal connections, Allen."
He was wrong. I abused personal connections all the time.
I couldn't bring myself to contradict the Archbishop, so I kept quiet. As an apology, he decided to handle Nikolai's baptism personally.
*
"All right. Time to assemble the film crew."
I wanted to light up the night sky with Armstrong's insignia for the romantic flair, but since that'd be a public nuisance, I summoned them the ordinary way.
As I exchanged welcoming hugs with the familiar faces, the Sage and Prophet arrived.
After exchanging happy hugs with me, they belatedly noticed Nikolai.
"So who's this?"
"He's the guy who's going to do the back-and-forth banter with me in the scene we're shooting this time."
"Hm. A face I haven't seen before."
"He's a Luchador."
"Ah. My mistake."
Ah, Luchador.
What an incredibly convenient magic word.
From then on, Nikolai introduced himself as "Peter" to everyone he met.
Once Peter had fully settled in with the film crew, I explained our plans for the upcoming shoots.
"First, before I get into it, please sign the confidentiality pledge... Good, done. Now I'll explain the upcoming plan."
First, this film covered John's past.
Meaning the prime years of the retired legendary knight.
"We'll set it against the operation to suppress the kingdom's rebellion mentioned in the earlier films."
The scale was planned to be on a completely different level from the existing series.
In the previous films, Hero-level enemies appeared only as mid-bosses and final bosses. This time, I planned to use them in droves.
Naturally, that meant recruiting just as many Heroes.
"Let's start with the interviews."
*
The filming for John Side Story (working title) was still a secret.
But we had to post a public notice for the interviews.
To resolve these two contradictory needs, we contacted each temple and asked them to send over promising Hero candidates.
People who could keep their mouths shut, naturally.
Thanks to that, our set was swarming with Heroes.
Among them I spotted quite a few names even I recognized.
If I'd had my way, I would've cast every famous name, but the film would've inevitably become a mess.
Just like you shouldn't mix pizza, kimchi stew, and ice cream just because they all taste good on their own—there's such a thing as the right combination.
Of course, the Sage and Prophet were far more expert in those matters than I was, so practically speaking, among the three-person interview panel, I was the face.
That didn't mean I was just squatting there like a mascot doll in the interview room, though.
"You watch carefully too. This is how a pro gets things done."
I was explaining to Peter beside me how auditions worked.
Peter had knowledge from a past life, so I'd dropped him straight into the roles of Sage and Prophet, but he still had much to learn.
He was in that position purely on creativity alone; he still had a long way to go in terms of learning.
Camera work, directing techniques, lighting, on-set terminology, and so on.
When we shot Mari, Karl and I, who had some experience, had been filling in the gaps, but we couldn't keep doing that forever.
So I'd brought him along from the prep stage for this shoot.
"Why do you think the Sage picked that person?"
"Uh... as a foil to John because their fighting styles are similar?"
"98 points. More precisely, the styles are similar, but the weapons are different. They're going to use them to highlight each other's combat strength through comparison."
"Aha."
I might have called this place primitive medieval this and stupid medieval that, but an expert was an expert in any era.
I'd drilled it into him several times: they just weren't used to 21st-century adrenaline; they weren't stupid.
Peter accepted my meaning and steadily learned the know-how, piece by piece.
While all this was going on, something interesting happened during the interview with a Hero from the Temple of Love and Family.
"Darling. What about me?"
A mature woman swept into the room in a red dress with a high side slit and immediately began seducing Peter.
The moment she entered the room, the lighting shifted pink, and she immediately made a beeline for Peter and started tempting him.
She rested one shapely thigh on the desk, drew Peter’s gaze toward her cleavage, stroked his chin, and gave him a bewitching smile.
Just as the suggestion of a drink that evening was about to sink its hook and Peter was on the verge of falling for her seduction, I stopped him.
"Snap outta it, man."
When I pinched his side lightly, Peter glared at me with a what's-your-problem look.
"That's acting."
The Sage and Prophet, however, continued scoring her in silence without reacting.
"You pass. The role you want is the obvious one, I take it?"
"Yes. Thank you."
The instant she heard she passed, the smile wiped clean off her face and she snapped right back into interview mode.
The abrupt change made Peter realize his mistake too late.
"Uh... I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"An interviewer shouldn't fall for an actor's performance."
"It's nothing to apologize for. That woman's seduction is an exceptional case; no one will blame you. If anything, the fact that the three of us are unfazed is stranger. Right, Sage?"
"Very much so, indeed."
The actor just now belonged to the Goddess of Love and Family.
The denomination trained its members to appear as the opposite sex’s ideal partner so intensively that anyone who spent ten years there earned the nickname people-bewitching fiend.
"She's also one of that denomination's foremost veterans—and a succubus. Of course you couldn't resist."
"Uh... so what should I do about this?"
He pulled some kind of note out of his pocket.
The way it looked, she must have slipped her contact info into his pocket while she was seducing him.
For Peter, it apparently wasn't clear whether that was part of the act or genuine.
"Keep it."
"So it really was acting—"
"You should not show another man the contact information a woman gave you because she likes you."
"Huh?"
As I had said, she served the Goddess of Love and “Family.”
The "love" here wasn't the kind where you sleep around with anyone like Aphrodite from my past life—it meant chaste love pure and simple, exactly as the word implied.
And family.
That denomination was extremely wary of adultery and promiscuity.
Peter, grasping the meaning of my words, murmured in shock.
"A virgin succubus... actually exists...?"
"Common sense."
"By whose measure?"
At the sight of the Sage and Prophet backing me up, Peter couldn't shake his bewildered expression.
Ah, so he didn't know. What an uncivilized modern man.
That was common sense in another world.
I say that, but honestly, my reaction was exactly the same when I first found out.
Anyway, Peter carefully tucked the note into his pocket as if it were a treasure.
Watching him, I didn't forget to offer one piece of advice.
"Watch out for scandals."
Even in my former life, the fastest way to send an actor or director plummeting into the abyss was always problems with the opposite sex.
If it was that bad in my former life, which was relatively tolerant about sex, how much worse would it be in this world, which is conservative about it?
It was something that could literally land you before an inquisition, far beyond just ruin.
"Well, I'm sure you'll manage."
"Thank you for the advice. Do you have any other tips for this sort of thing?"
"I don't know."
Still, he was asking me for advice, perhaps because he still had ambitions for his career.
Unfortunately, though, "watch out for scandals" was the only thing I could tell him.
"I’ve never dated anyone."
Since my previous life.
They said babies were born even during wars, so why had romance never found me?
The only things greeting me wherever I went were zombies and enemy soldiers, not women.
My current life was the same.
"Well... making movies is so fun that I haven't really had my eye on romance. What's that called again? There's that Metal Slug triangle theory."
"Maslow's hierarchy of needs?"
"Yeah. Something like that."
"That's not even remotely similar."
"Anyway, my need for self-actualization is just outweighing my sexual desire."
"That's... not how that theory works...?"
Ah, whatever.
In any case, I wasn't particularly interested in romance.
Movies were my lover now.
The auditions resumed, leaving Peter muttering to himself, 'Don’t people usually need their basic needs met before they can pursue self-actualization?'
After the auditions had progressed to a certain point and we had recruited the thirty Heroes who would appear in this production, the final candidate entered.
She belonged to no religious order.
In other words, she had no agency.
"That's odd."
An ordinary audition would have been one thing, but this one was conducted secretly through the temples to preserve confidentiality.
An actor without an agency shouldn't even be able to know this audition existed.
But the moment we saw her personal details, we all understood the situation.
Father : Calamity Duke
"Ah... this is insane."
Well, that explains it.
The cherished daughter of one of the few ducal houses in the Empire.
If she was the daughter of the legendary monster who sank an entire archipelago of cultists to the bottom of the sea, it wasn't strange that she had caught wind of this audition.
As the Apostle of War's daughter, learning about the audition without a temple contacting her would've been easy.
"Let's just conduct the audition."
After all, the documents alone couldn't tell us whether she was a spoiled noblewoman hiding behind her father's authority or a serious actor.
"Diane Karamzin."
When I called her name, a girl with skin as white as snow entered the interview room.
The moment she entered, she neatly tied back her black hair with a string, her red eyes meeting mine.
I wondered what kind of character she was trying to play.
As soon as she came in, she handed me a pistol and bowed her head.
It meant she was asking for a spar.
I gladly accepted the offer.
After confirming the gun was loaded with blanks, the sparring began.
A bout that ended in about one minute.
The result was my victory.
I twisted her arm, pinned her to the floor, and aimed the muzzle at the back of her head. She conceded cleanly.
"Thank you for the lesson."
I shrugged.
Returning to my seat, I asked the Sage and the Prophet.
"What do you think?"
"Let's pass her."
The role was a former comrade of John’s who betrayed Counterintelligence and became his enemy.
This would explain her using the same techniques as me.
"You must have studied the movies thoroughly."
She nodded shyly.
However. I was a little worried about her acting, since she was a woman of few words.
Fortunately, as if that worry was pointless, she immediately demonstrated her acting.
Her expression hardened in an instant, and though she only spat out the brief line, 'Where did you put it?', it was enough to prove her acting ability.
She had reached a state where she could 'deliberately' create a sense of unease.
By recognizing her own beauty and precisely controlling the corners of her eyes and mouth, she created an uncanny figure halfway between a person and a mannequin.
Tilting her head slightly as she spoke intensified the effect, proving she had mastered the uncanny valley.
"That's sufficient."
The moment she heard those words, her expression immediately returned to normal.
It was even fascinating how she could switch between human and doll with just a slight change of expression.
But perhaps thinking she hadn't proven herself yet, she approached the desk where I was sitting.
Then she grabbed me by the collar and only stopped when our noses were a finger's width apart.
"Mr. John!"
"John!"
The other interviewers were startled and tried to stop her, but I halted them.
Diane, ignoring the interviewers' reactions, kept gripping my collar and wouldn't let go.
Only when I signaled her to continue did her lips finally part.
"John. Marry me."
"Sorry. She's the only one in my heart."
She returned to her original spot with a bitter expression.
That last bit of acting was disappointing.
If she had been playing the comrade who targeted John, she should have maintained the doll-like expression.
Just now, it felt too strongly like Diane Karamzin herself was speaking, not the character.
Still, I liked the ad-lib.
"Excellent. I'll look forward to this movie."
She bowed her head shyly at my praise.
Seeing that blush show so clearly on her white skin, that complexion could be either a weakness or a strength.
But she was still young, so she could turn it into a strength.
Finally, when I offered a handshake, she couldn't lift her face.
"What's the matter?"
"Ah... no... it's nothing."
She murmured in a tiny, fading voice, shook my hand, and then fled the interview room as if escaping.
'Hmm.'
Apparently, she still wasn't quite experienced enough.
Peter, who had been watching me, stared at me with a strange look in his eyes.
"Wow. You're one fucking eunuch."
This brat really wouldn't hold anything back with me.
*
Evening of the day the auditions ended.
Nikolai and I were going over my script at the hotel.
"I think if we revise this part like this, it'll be a bit cooler."
"Good. That's got a real romantic spirit to it."
The existing John Armstrong series incorporated many of my twenty-first-century ideas, but most of its lines were very direct.
Even the expressions I racked my brain to create were far from stylish.
Didn't men always go crazy for metaphors, after all?
I was endlessly frustrated by my own lack of academic refinement.
Nikolai was making up for that weakness now.
"Let me give it a read. Ahem. Good evening, Robert."
"It's been a while, Mr. Armstrong."
"You've gotten bigger. How many kilograms did you put on?"
"62 kilograms... Oh, that just now was good."
I shrugged and made a small revision to the script.
"Boss, do you happen to know any foreign languages?"
"Kaka (A little)"
"Where's that from?"
"The Leven Kingdom's."
The fan club's home base was there, so I went there often on business trips.
Strictly speaking, translation magic meant I didn't need to speak the kingdom's language, but I'd learned it for fan service anyway.
The fans absolutely loved it.
"Then do you know how to say that line you just did in the Kingdom Language?"
"Roberto. Johen bamiya."
"That sounds kind of stylish."
"Then it's decided."
Come to think of it, we hadn't cast the role of Robert yet.
The role was only an extra, so we didn't need a famous actor. But mentioning the Leven language brought one person to mind.
‘I’d have to contact Instructor Charles.’
He'd probably love it.
I mentioned it to Nikolai, and he agreed with me.
Nikolai pointed out that we'd also get viral publicity from hiring the fan club president as an extra.
*
While we were revising the script like that, I took another script out of my bag and handed it to Nikolai.
"What's this?"
"I told you, didn’t I? I need you for this film."
There were more than a few scenes I'd wanted to shoot since the previous film.
Acting wasn't something you did alone, and some scenes required a partner with good back-and-forth chemistry.
Unfortunately, the people of this world could work in sync with me, but they couldn't recreate the method-acting performances in my head.
So I'd shoved it in the corner of my notebook, but now that I'd found a reliable partner in Nikolai, I brought it along just in case.
"How is it?"
"Hmm..."
The greater the expectations, the greater the disappointment, or so they said.
So I tried not to expect anything, but I couldn't help but have high hopes for Nikolai.
But Nikolai's reaction was nothing short of lukewarm.
The way he tilted his head while looking at the script wasn't a very positive sign.
"Haah."
Figures.
Still, I couldn't blame Nikolai.
He was a Sage and Prophet, not an actor.
I had been too greedy from the start.
I, of course, had received professional training for acting, but Nikolai hadn't.
Acting required a camera-friendly tone, proper eye-line control, and practical know-how.
Naturally, it was unreasonable to demand all that from Nikolai.
I hadn't told the Sage about this direction yet, so I'd been about to seal it back in my notebook—
"when should I do a rush order? (By when should I send it by rush delivery?)"
Fluttering the script, Nikolai asked that in a stylish British accent.
His gaze was that of a seasoned service worker.
Hearing that, my face brightened up as well.
"The sooner, the better (The faster, the better.)"