Chapter 220
Chapter 220
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: crow
Chapter Title: 220. Knowing Because of Insufficiency
-----------------------------------------------------------------
In the silence, Song Arin's gaze wanders aimlessly.
She had said she would win, but...
...
One might say no path to victory readily comes to mind.
She was confident she wouldn't lose just by taking hits.
But what she needed right now was a way to win, not just blindly holding out.
Still, the person facing her was probably in the same boat.
The troupe leader, clutching her stomach, grimaces in pain and waves her hand.
One puppet rises.
Song Arin lets out a deep sigh, and she raises her hand as well.
Now it was shattered. The man's puppet, a total wreck that could be described that way, staggers to its feet.
Even though the man's puppet was broken, the opponent had also taken a full-force blow to the solar plexus from her and the man.
Her head starts spinning.
She couldn't win in a straight fight anyway.
Even bringing the entire HR Team—no, even the branch chief called a monster—had only managed one hit to the solar plexus.
Take down a monster like that all by herself?
No chance.
There was only one thing she needed to focus on.
Her gaze turns to the man the troupe leader is holding.
Watching that sight stirs a strange twisting in her gut.
Now I'm even jealous of myself.
"Why don't you let go of him?"
She speaks in a naturally sharp voice, glaring at the troupe leader.
..."I don't want to."
At her words, the troupe leader grabs the man with one hand.
"As long as I have this person..."
"Worried he might make you happier?"
A sneer curls on her lips.
"You can't."
Song Arin says it with confidence.
..."You think you and I are the same—"
"That's not it."
Ignoring the troupe leader's words, Song Arin shakes her head.
"It's not that you could do it but I couldn't."
She was certain.
"Neither you nor I are all that different."
In truth, Song Arin didn't think she was happy right now either.
Of course, she wasn't unhappy.
No sane person is happy forever.
And she was confident that having the man by her side wouldn't make her happy anyway.
"Greed would creep in."
When you have someone who's fun just to talk to, you start wanting more.
Before you know it, enemies appear.
The problem is that those enemies aren't outright foes you can hate openly—they understand each other well enough, and their teamwork is pretty solid.
In other words, enemies who were also allies.
The problem was...
..."Even there, you'd lose."
Scenarios that spike her stress just thinking about them flash through her mind.
The black-haired one's unclear malice in her accusations. And the white-haired one's blatant checks.
She could endure it because it was her. With that personality? She'd instantly face the black-haired one's madness disguised as innocence, then retreat to her room bawling.
...
The troupe leader stares at her,
and...
She carefully sets the man down, still clutching her stomach with one hand while raising the other.
One puppet rises with a creaking sound.
She must be running low on reserves now too.
Instead of commanding a horde of puppets, she's facing off with just one.
..."Right. I know myself."
She wasn't someone you could reason with.
Song Arin raises her hand as well.
The man's puppet barely stands.
Now so wrecked it can hardly stay upright, the man's puppet somehow rights itself and faces off against the troupe leader's newly made puppet.
Think.
Like the man always mutters when cornered, she starts thinking furiously.
A way to bring the man back.
...
What she could do, the troupe leader could surely do too.
That means the troupe leader had her weaknesses as well.
...
She realized it.
The two puppets clash.
With creaking sounds, they start pummeling each other.
Of course, the outcome came quicker than expected.
...
The puppet where the man had been—Song Arin's puppet—loses a leg.
It was heavily damaged, but that wasn't the issue.
...
The overwhelming difference in control.
The reason she and the man had held out against the troupe leader so far was because the man's consciousness was in that puppet's body.
She hadn't even needed to move it herself.
She'd just made the immobile parts move and pulled it back when danger loomed.
-Crash!
The puppet's leg shatters, and it collapses.
Song Arin releases her hand.
The troupe leader's puppet smashes into Song Arin's, sending wooden shards flying.
She knew it too.
She could never win.
...
The troupe leader stares blankly at Song Arin and opens her mouth.
"I told you. As expected, you—"
-Crash!
The troupe leader's words don't finish.
Song Arin, covered in shards, charges and tackles her, sending both tumbling across the floor.
"Kuhk...!"
"Ugh...!"
Seeing the troupe leader rolling pathetically on the floor, Song Arin was certain.
Song Arin trusted herself.
More precisely, her own incompetence.
No matter how trained a Management Bureau agent she was, there was a reason she avoided close-quarters combat.
-Thud!
"Aaak!"
Grabbing the troupe leader's collar as she clutches her solar plexus and sits up, Song Arin mounts her and slams a fist into her face, certain.
"Did you half-ass the close-quarters training?"
"Wh-what...!"
"It's fine. I skipped it too."
-Thud!
"Ah, ugh...!"
The moment they connect, it's just a muddy brawl between two close-quarters dropouts who never properly learned the lessons.
To deny the troupe leader time to focus, Song Arin keeps pounding her and starts concentrating.
What she needed to watch was the troupe leader. What she needed to mimic was her ability.
But how?
That's where her theory came in.
Always. When Song Arin used hypnosis or controlled puppet strings, she had to concentrate.
She never hadn't.
The white-haired one did it too, and so did she.
To do anything, she always had to focus.
The troupe leader must be the same.
Because the troupe leader was her too.
-Smack!
"St-stop...!"
-Thud!
"Ugh...!"
Ignoring the faint pain from her fists, Song Arin keeps swinging.
Her first time hitting someone, and it's herself no less.
"Eek...!"
-Thud!
"Kyaa...!"
Please just pass out, she screams inwardly as she swings.
Whether her prayer worked, the troupe leader's eyes start to droop,
..."Hup!"
Song Arin yanks up the troupe leader's collar, then pulls her own head back as far as possible.
She recalls fighting the white-haired one.
The intense blow to the head that made her pass out instantly.
By that logic.
Pulling her head back, Song Arin squeezes her eyes shut and slams her forehead into the troupe leader's.
-Smack!
A massive sound echoes.
...
The troupe leader flips her eyes back and flops face-down on the floor.
..."Groan..."
Song Arin clutches her own forehead and rolls on the ground too.
...
Even as she rolls clutching her forehead, her gaze stays on the man.
She had to get up.
*
I've had dreams of endlessly falling before.
Surprisingly common nightmare pattern, they say.
But I never thought it'd feel this vivid.
...
Fear, thrill—intense emotions don't last long.
Humans are adaptive creatures, so prolonged exposure to terror either drives you mad or makes you numb.
Fortunately, just falling didn't push me to madness.
...
Think.
With the troupe leader gone, thinking was easier now.
I could think better like this.
Resting my chin on my hand to—
Wait.
I hurriedly look down at my body.
It wasn't the wooden puppet body.
That means...
-Flip flip flip!
The manual in my hand suddenly starts flipping pages.
As if it had been waiting for the troupe leader to vanish, the manual opens and displays its contents.
[Office Manual]
[RL - Reality Check - Written by Choi Soo-cheol, Gangdong Branch]
Choi Soo-cheol from the Gangdong Branch...
Click. I swear I heard a pen sound as an auditory hallucination.
I hurriedly start reading.
1. The basis of a reality check is distinguishing dreams from reality.
2. Here, "dream" doesn't mean sleep dreams, but virtual versus real.
3. If you can't tell if you're in reality or virtual, first inflict an injury. Pain level is the best distinguisher between real and virtual.
4. If you can't wake up, find the exit.
5. Every illusion has an exit. And that exit usually takes the form you least want.
6. Look toward that end.
-Thud!
I close the book.
The form I least want.
What falling people fear most.
Death by fall.
...
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Yeah. No choice.
..."Please let me die from the fall... Please let me die from the fall..."
I mutter, eyes squeezed shut.
The manual in my hand meekly slips back into my pocket.
-Crack!
Agonizing pain as my ankle snaps against something.
"Gasp!"
I jolt awake.
...!
I hurriedly touch my body.
The warmth and sensation I feel.
I was back in my human body.
Wait. What about the others—
I whip my head around.
First in my sight: Song Arin collapsed with a massive lump on her head, and the troupe leader passed out with busted lips.