The Crimson Gate (2)
There were several ways to unconditionally draw a reaction from the Constellations.
The scene Junil called his ‘deduction show’ was one of them.
After all, even among humans Sherlock Holmes remained one of the representative classic masterpieces. That alone proved the point.
No Constellation hated the moment the protagonist looked brilliantly clever.
It was perfect timing. He had separated from Kang Hae-il, and the number of watching Constellations had dropped back into the one-thousand range.
Time to put on a show.
The Constellations were convinced he couldn’t crack it. Some even thought he still needed to gather more hints.
In truth, that wasn’t the case. Junil’s eyes had already seen everything. This single book contained more than enough information.
That was when the music swelled.
Now Playing
The kind of soundtrack that made anyone sound like a genius.
Dun-dun-dun-dun~!
The Constellations were already leaning forward in anticipation.
Here we go.
Whoosh!
Junil suddenly began flipping through the pages like a man possessed.
I’m Benedict Cumberbatch. I’m Sherlock Holmes…
Eyes blazing with theatrical madness, he growled.
“The pages. The page numbers are all wrong.”
He pointed out that every page marker in the book was inconsistent.
Whoosh!
Junil flipped through the pages even faster.
“Left side only uses single digits… no, some have two. Wait. The left side never goes past twelve. And the right side… never past thirty-one! These are months and days, aren’t they?”
It looked random at first glance, but clear patterns existed. The left page numbers never exceeded twelve. The right never exceeded thirty-one.
In other words, months and dates.
Once the pages were revealed as dates, the larger picture snapped into focus. The very reason this book existed became clear.
“These are the dates of their activities.”
The book was essentially an encrypted schedule.
“And when do they act? When the snake eats something.”
In this fairy tale the snake kept devouring things. Opening the pages that featured the snake would reveal the ritual dates.
“The snake is a symbol of Satan… the snake devours… this is a sacrificial ritual for dark mages… and this date is… yesterday?”
He flipped to yesterday’s page. Sure enough, the snake was swallowing something.
Even the scene where Go Jin-seok had tried to sacrifice Yu Jihun’s party had been part of the plan.
When he turned to the very next page where the snake devoured something else, that would be the date of the next ritual.
“So the next one is… two days from now?”
He had the time. Now for the location.
The location was harder to express in text.
“The place is the problem…”
Even if coordinates were written down, they would feel wildly out of place in a children’s book. A fairy tale couldn’t contain that many numbers.
“The illustrations…!”
Fairy tales used pictures instead of numbers.
“Why does this snake look like that?”
The snake had swallowed something and its shape had changed. It looked exactly like the boa constrictor that had eaten an elephant in The Little Prince.
The snake’s form wasn’t a simple animal. It was lumpy and irregular.
It wasn’t a matter of what did it eat so much of?
“This is a map.”
It was the shape of a map.
Some might doubt it, but—
“Just look at the page from Go Jin-seok’s appearance.”
The Gangnam Station Gate where Go Jin-seok had shown up yesterday. When you zoomed out on a map of that area and overlaid it with the boa constrictor on the page, it matched the exact shape of Gangnam-gu.
The red boa even had patterns. One of them was green.
“Only one pattern is green?”
The green pattern marked the exact location of Gangnam Station.
“That’s the precise coordinate.”
The rest was easy.
“This one’s Yangcheon-gu, this one’s Guro-gu… they’re all in Seoul.”
The pattern was obvious. All activity was inside Seoul, within clearly partitioned districts where sacrifices were offered.
The next sacrifice was now clear.
Yangcheon-gu.
He compared it with the map.
“Two days from now, at Mok-dong Station in Yangcheon-gu.”
Junil struck a dramatic pose.
It is I~ Sagosul!
Playback Ended
The moment the music stopped, the donations poured in.
An anonymous Constellation has sponsored 10 Feelings (FL)!
An anonymous Constellation has sponsored 1 Feeling (FL)!
An anonymous Constellation has sponsored 5 Feelings (FL)!
The coins were steadily climbing toward one Heart (HT).
Junil closed the book with a cool flick of his wrist.
“Eh, this is boring. Let’s go make some real money.”
Junil changed his clothes. He planned to visit Isilen and sell the goods he had obtained from the orcs.
Let’s organize this first.
He dumped all the loot from orc hunting onto the floor. There were a lot of items, and every weapon was huge.
He picked out the one in the best condition and set it aside. That one was for his collection; he would hang it on the wall at home.
The rest he examined for anything useful.
No good items. My level’s still low so I really needed some stat gear.
Strangely, not a single item had stats attached. The Champion Goblin dungeon had showered him with rewards, yet these much harder named orcs only gave experience.
Do I have to get items as gate clear rewards?
It seemed receiving rewards through gates was far better.
But don’t gates use a real-name system?
That was inconvenient for him. Since gates used the same real-name system as dungeons, he would have to enter as Moon Junil, which made it difficult to show off.
Well… let’s at least earn some money.
Even so, he had this many items. Selling them to the elf for gold coins should net a decent amount. Thanks to his long trading history, Junil could roughly estimate the value and began dividing it in his head.
“Twenty percent to Kang Hae-il, eighty percent to me…”
He scribbled calculations in his notebook.
“Ah, no. Ten percent to Kang Hae-il. I promised to give some to Yu Jihun too. Ten percent to Yu Jihun.”
He crossed out the previous note and rewrote it.
Meanwhile, at Fairy Corporation.
“Crazy… what the hell?! What is this speed?!”
Ram’s eyes had flipped over in shock. She had raised the difficulty to the highest level, yet he had solved everything on the spot.
Sam was equally flustered.
“You said it was the highest difficulty! You trash storyboard writer!”
“Ah… well, the difficulty was based on Kang Hae-il, so… it probably wasn’t the absolute strongest, greatest, highest difficulty after all?”
Ram froze for a second. The logic was so convincing that it only made her angrier.
“Ya, you bastard! How can you say that about our Hae-il?!”
Thump thump thump!
Ram’s tiny fists pounded on Sam.
Even while getting hit, Sam kept talking.
“B-but at this rate won’t Julian find the World Boss first?!”
If Julian found the World Boss before Kang Hae-il, that would be a problem. The reward for defeating a World Boss was on a completely different level from regular monsters.
“What if he assassinates the World Boss ahead of time?!”
“That’s nothing to worry about.”
“Huh?”
“He can’t kill the World Boss early.”
“…Why not?”
“That’s the real charm of this main chapter. If the World Boss dies, every Awakened below level 30 loses their power, remember?”
“Ah…!”
Sam had forgotten because it was Ram’s own design. Unlike the previous chapter, this one did not have a time limit. The moment the World Boss was defeated, the chapter ended. Until then, anyone who failed to reach level 30 would immediately lose their Awakened status.
Therefore, until Julian himself reached level 30, any attempt to assassinate the World Boss early would be impossible.
“Oh, right. But why did you design it that way? I was curious…”
“Kiriri…! This chapter is a massive trap. One made just for Sagosul.”
Ram had drawn a grand picture. It was on a completely different scale from the small pictures Sam usually drew.
Yet Sam found it hard to believe.
“A trap?”
Hadn’t the hints she raised to the highest difficulty just been deciphered?
“There’s nothing we can do about Julian being strong. But… I made sure he can never be acknowledged by the citizens.”
“How?”
“Because Julian will try to stop Kang Hae-il from killing the World Boss.”
“!”
Ram had predicted Julian’s behavior. He would protect the World Boss.
“The World Boss will inflict tremendous damage on this world. Ordinary people will want it killed as quickly as possible.”
“Right.”
“But what if Sagosul interferes with that?”
“…Oh no.”
Sam’s eyes trembled. The more she heard, the more plausible it sounded. It felt similar to when Ram had suggested raising the hint difficulty earlier. That plan had also seemed quite convincing at the time.
“He will become neither a hero nor anything else—just a plain villain.”
In this chapter Ram intended to drive Sagosul’s reputation completely below Kang Hae-il’s.
“The hero is Hae-il. Not Sagosul.”
“Exactly!”
Sam nodded vigorously.
“Then why did you interfere with the hints?”
If looking at them was useless anyway, why block them?
“Just to waste time.”
“…Pardon?”
“I interfered so he would get hung up on them and burn time. The more time he wastes, the slower his level rises. The longer he has to interfere with the boss, the more his infamy will spread.”
“!”
Sam was stunned by the cruel design.
“Then Sagosul will become a complete villain.”
“That’s the idea. From the next chapter onward, no one will compare him to Hae-il anymore.”
But then Sam asked a meaningful question.
“But… why was Julian so interested in those hints?”
If the goal was to prevent the World Boss from being killed, the simplest method would have been to destroy the hints. So why had he tried so hard to obtain them?
“……?”
Even Ram had no answer for that part. She had only interfered because his determination to solve them looked strong.
“Who knows? Maybe he’s just stupid? Kiriri!”
“Must be! Hiriri! Your design is truly magnificent, Lady Ram!”
While she spoke those words, Sam’s true thoughts were different.
There’s no way that’s true, Lady Ram…!
After watching that deduction show, calling Julian stupid?
There must be something more.
Sam felt extremely uneasy.
So this is what Lady Ram always feels like!
Now that their roles had reversed—Ram designing and Sam worrying—she finally understood the fairy.
Just how fragile fairies were in front of a story!
At that same moment, in the graveyard.
Isilen was spraying mist over the mushroom farm she had cultivated.
“Hmm, hmm~ hmm~”
She was even humming. She had grown quite accustomed to life here.
Junil should be coming soon.
She knew roughly when her only visitor would stop by. It was about that time.
BOOM—
A heavy roar shook the air.
“……?”
Was Junil riding his hang glider again? She looked up. It wasn’t him.
[23:59:56]
The given time was twenty-four hours.
It’s bright red…
The deeper the color, the stronger the gate. This one was blood-red—the most dangerous gate to ever appear.
…But no one can come here.
The problem was that the magic cast over this place prevented people from approaching.