Chapter 17
Chapter 17
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Translator: crow
Chapter Title: World Beyond the Right Eye - Dream Extremes, World Destruction
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‘Already 9 PM. Guess it’s time to hit the sack.’
Kim Mi-ri from Busan climbed into bed early once again. As a high school senior with the college entrance exams less than two months away, she still didn’t feel any real urge to crack open her books.
‘Tomorrow’s soon enough.’
It wasn’t less than two months until the exam—it was a whole two months left. Plenty of time, no need to start now.
‘Just master one subject a week, right?’
So she’d slack off just for today.
She knew it was nonsense, but that’s how rationalization worked when you’d already decided to goof off. With that, she quietly switched off the light and closed her eyes.
[All participants, please wake up.]
And just like that, she squinted against a blinding light.
“What the...?”
When Kim Mi-ri opened her eyes again, she saw nothing but open fields stretching out around her.
[Act 999 of the Dream Theater, Battle Royale, begins now.]
To check if it was a dream, she pinched her cheek. Pain shot through her. So, this wasn’t a dream.
[For those unfamiliar with Battle Royale: There are 99 participants on this island. Fight for your lives until only one remains.]
Still dazed, she looked around. Vast plains, a clearing in the middle, the distant sea, a village down in the lowlands, containers and bridges scattered here and there.
[Day 1 is a rest day. Good rest makes for good acting. Mingle, relax, and prepare for tomorrow.]
*Why am I here?* She wasn’t the only one wondering.
“Where are we?”
“What was that voice from the sky?”
“I was definitely asleep at home...”
“What the fuck!?”
“これはどういうことですか？”
“What the hell is this place?”
“Träume ich?”
“呃啊! 这是哪里!”
People from all over the world, thrown together, equally baffled.
[We hope you’ll film a beautiful drama for us.]
The voice boomed from the sky again.
[Reality is key here, but language barriers disrupt the flow and bore the audience. We’ll unify your languages.]
“What’s it saying?”
“An angel? Is that an angel talking?”
“It’s finally happening—Isekai! I’ve been chosen at last! Take that, shitty parents! See? I was right all along! The shut-in life made me the winner!”
Everyone spoke their native tongues, but the words translated themselves directly into their minds.
“Let’s all gather up first!”
“Yeah! Let’s put our heads together and figure this out!”
Natural leaders stepped forward, directing the group as people shared ideas.
“The voice said it’s a Battle Royale.”
“What’s that?”
“Sigh, you don’t even know Battle Royale? It started with Koushun Takami’s 1999 novel Battle Royale. Genre where people kill each other in a confined space until one survivor’s left. Common knowledge, right?”
A chubby Japanese guy in a checkered shirt shook his head as he explained, and the crowd grew louder.
“Are they telling us to kill each other?”
“How could any human do something so insane!?”
“We’ve fallen into hell. Angels are testing us to punish non-believers!”
No sane person would kill strangers just because some mysterious sky voice said so.
“In novels, transcendent beings sometimes trap people in dream scenarios like this.”
“Maybe it’s all just a vivid dream?”
“Could be hallucinations. I ate some mushrooms I found in the woods yesterday. Looked delicious.”
“What if I sudden-death slept and this is the dream before dying?”
Tutor, housewife, high school teacher, student, stay-at-home guard, construction firm assistant manager, amateur gamer, banker, culinary researcher, and more.
They were just ordinary folks, after all.
“Let’s ignore the sky voice!”
“Yeah! Why should we fight? Let’s live peacefully and find a way out!”
And so Day 1 passed.
[Day 2 begins. Weapons placed at various island points. Secure one to boost survival odds. Also, clustering hinders progress—randomly relocating all participants.]
The voice rang out. Kim Mi-ri checked her wristwatch.
[07:00]
She wondered.
‘When did I fall asleep?’
Abducted? Dropped into hell? Or like that Japanese guy yelled last night, isekai’d to another dimension? No clue.
‘How could I sleep in a situation like...’
She needed to. Right, why had she forgotten her training?
“Tension doesn’t help in combat.”
My name is Kim Mi-ri, 19 years old.
Trained in special forces since age 5, a human weapon loyal to the nation.
‘Entered this Battle Royale to bring glory to my country, but I forgot for a moment.’
Blame the factional infighting stress.
“They didn’t need to bring other Korean participants when I alone was enough.
Winner’s one person anyway—wastes national strength.”
She quickly scouted around.
Behind a container, traces of a hidden box.
“M1 Carbine? This isn’t WWII.”
Shouldering the rifle, she scanned the area, eyes gleaming as she pulled the trigger.
“Gah-!”
A bullet pierced the forehead of an old woman lunging from the bushes.
“Hah, didn’t expect Italy’s legendary special forces captain, Abela Zito, to join.
Legends are made in death—congrats on the real one.”
Kim Mi-ri didn’t remember, but last night, the old woman had claimed her as a granddaughter the same age and watched over her.
“High-level tournament, alright. Allows murder, ramps up the difficulty.”
She reloaded.
“I’ll survive, win, and honor Korea!”
Kim Mi-ri’s struggle was brutal. Fitting for a contest offering ultimate glory—the participants were no pushovers.
[Albert Dennis (37), electrician, family man with wife and two daughters. Died from dagger to the throat and massive blood loss.]
Legendary Marine DEVGRU iron man, terrorists’ nightmare, Sergeant Albert Dennis.
Three days chasing a stronger foe, striking when he let his guard down—dagger to the neck.
[Nelly Hexstone (21), Berkeley music student, dreams of violin mastery to reach her late mother’s soul. Died from gunshot from perineum to skull.]
Genius bomber since childhood, modding small explosives to ravage battlefields—the Witch of Explosions, Nelly Hexstone.
Hiding under a pit toilet, she put a bullet up the target’s rear, piercing clean to the crown.
[Julio Salvi (75), retired carpenter, hobby: hand-carving toys for grandkids. Lately visits late wife’s grave with homegrown flowers. Died from carotid severed by wire.]
Legendary sniper with 1,000 confirmed kills, Julio Salvi.
Dummy to pinpoint sniper, snuck up, garroted with wire.
“Huff, huff.”
“Damn it!”
Finally, the last two clashed.
[Kujo Suzuki (30), black company salaryman, job-hunting, debating asking out the konbini clerk on his way home from overtime. Died from skull fracture.]
Bullets flew until magazines emptied, then close quarters—knocked aside his knife, brass-knuckled his skull to pulp.
[Final winner decided. Winner: Kim Mi-ri from Korea.]
“Ahh, finally...”
The national anthem poured from the sky.
[Till the East Sea runs dry and Baekdu Mountain wears away,
God protect Korea long may she stand.]
Hand over her heart, her eyes welled up.
[Mugunghwa three thousand miles splendid river and mountain,
True Koreans forever may they stand.]
A single tear flowed—pure patriotic pride.
[Cut.]
“...Huh?”
The moment it all ended, Kim Mi-ri remembered who she really was.
“Ah, ahh?”
Her ordinary high school girl self.
But the memories of what she’d done didn’t fade.
“Blech!”
The acrid gunpowder stench lingered.
Fading pulses, limp bodies.
Guts spilling out, her own voice mocking as she trampled them.
“Bluuuugh!”
She wanted to vomit everything inside—even her soul.
[Hmm.]
Before guilt-stricken Kim Mi-ri could choose her final option, the sky responded first.
[Patriotism draws crowds, but it was overkill here. Girl special forces lead is fine, but the rest flopped. Felt childish. Self-review: 3/10.]
Her latest kill revived.
Everyone who died here did.
[Reshoot begins.]
[17th reshoot begins.]
This take, Kim Mi-ri was a kunoichi-trained ninja abroad in Japan. Setting: cyberpunk city, not island; she aided a Japanese Korean ally obsessed with ancient traditions.
“Everyone, run!”
She took bullets barehanded to shield the protagonist participant, dying.
[27th reshoot begins.]
This one, victim role. Organ-trafficking syndicate sacrifice—vivisected for corneas, kidneys, liver, all organs, died screaming.
[117th reshoot begins.]
This time, imperial concubine in ancient Chinese drama—side consort.
[572nd reshoot begins. Adding fantasy elements now. Let’s go big.]
This take, space marshal with cyberchip telekinesis—sucked into black hole.
Her roles kept shifting: beheaded criminal, heart-eaten by killer, hanged queen.
‘Who am I?’
Rarely, her high school girl self flickered. But those memories felt dreamlike, distant, meaningless now.
‘A memory this faint can’t be real.’
Ah, got it. That was the dream; this is reality.
Dancing to the director’s cues as an actress—that’s real.
[131,272,211th reshoot begins.]
Countless roles, fantasy beings, deaths. Stories and settings changed, but most participants died—unchanging end.
[Cut!]
After eons where even the past blurred.
[Shoot wrapped. Finally got a keeper. Good work, everyone.]
Freedom at last.
[Returning you to your worlds. No real time passed, so no worries. Bye now.]
Eyes opened to an unfamiliar room.
“...”
But freedom wasn’t freedom anymore.
“I, I, I, I am, I am.”
All those experiences.
All those roles.
All those superpowers and abilities.
“I’m the high school girl special forces soldier and a nation’s concubine and organ trafficking victim and barge prostitutes’ girl and genetic experiment casualty and independence activist for Joseon and Han River monster hunter and new queen of Joseon and Sherlock Holmes’s beloved and cooking killer and.”
Her brother and mother burst in.
“Sis! Why so noisy!”
“Hey, you bitch! Rapping in the middle of the night?!”
Shocked by her seizure-like trembling, they rushed over.
“Sis! What’s wrong!”
“Egg money!”
Her body reacted first. Snapped brother’s neck with one hand, knife-hand to mother’s solar plexus piercing the heart.
“Manhands enlightenment monk and northern grand duke’s sole noble daughter and demon-offered live sacrifice and black mage’s girl revived as undead heroine and ascending fairy and strangled toilet slave and.”
She bolted outside, slaughtering everyone in sight.
“Screeeam!”
“M-monster!”
“Superpowered!?”
Every absurd power from reshoots at her command. Long immersed in the dream, her mind and body were part of it now—bringing all dream skills to reality.
“Monster! Kill it!”
Military mobilized, but useless. Her dream-body couldn’t die; real attacks meant nothing.
And not just her—the other 98 did the same in their countries.
“Emergency! We have to stop those monsters!”
“Damn it! Tanks, missiles—nothing works!?”
No one knew who started. Somewhere, nukes launched at home to kill monsters, sparking desperate measures.
Razed world, lonely streets sans survivors—Kim Mi-ri wandered.
“Bike thief race girl and clown gut-split sacrifice and chainsaw college student and stabbed vomiting cheerleader and heartbroken noose woman and.”
99 participants roamed the world.
Perfect apocalypse.
“Are they telling us to kill each other?”
“How could any human do something so insane!?”
“We’ve fallen into hell. Angels are testing us to punish non-believers!”
Watching the noisy crowd in the clearing, he mulled the future his right eye showed.
“Hmm.”
He slipped quietly from the clearing and lit a cigarette.
“No point in boarding the ark like this.”
Original plan: Head to the island’s special zone on Day 2, open the hatch, escape the dream—that was survival in the game.
“Not matching the game exactly.”
Even if escape per plan, world ends. Game had no such thing.
‘Participants assimilated into dreams, gaining roles’ egos and powers, going berserk.’
Plus immortality.
“Whew.”
Deep drags till the butt, exhaled skyward.
“Hello?”
To me.
“Name’s Lee Seung-hoon.”
No—to the director watching from above.
“Want to talk about the play you’re filming.”
All solutions start with dialogue.