Head Against the Rock
"Second match, begin."
Ding—
"……."
"……."
The second match had started, but neither the man nor I moved an inch, holding our standoff.
He was apparently as tense as I was, wetting lips that trembled against his tongue.
"I'll bring a mass that lost life, and you'll bring an egg of the land. Then I'll answer that your miracle medicine is a mass that lost life."
"...Then, what do I say?"
"You answer that my miracle medicine is a mass that lost life too."
In other words, he'd answer my question correctly while deliberately flubbing his own, turning the score into a one-to-one tie.
He's absolutely certain I won't be able to kill the rabbit.
Which was fair, really.
I hadn't even attempted to press the dagger against the rabbit's belly.
Perhaps my hesitation had shown despite myself, because the man hurried to speak again.
"At the very end, we each give a wrong answer, and then we head up to the fourth floor together."
"...Why bother rigging it to end in a draw?"
"Sorry?"
"There's nothing in it for you."
If I took everything the man had said so far at face value...
Then the Curator had given him an early chance to study the quest in advance.
He was already in an overwhelmingly advantageous position—so why was he laying everything bare for me? Why go to the trouble of staging a draw, even at the risk of raising my suspicion?
"Nothing in it for me? I simply can't stand the thought of climbing to the next floor over someone else's sacrifice."
The man wiped his fogged glasses with his sleeve and forced out a benevolent smile.
The sheer effort in his expression, desperately trying to win me over, was almost pitiable.
Listening to that fragile, quavering voice, I felt my resolve waver for a moment.
Maybe he's just like me—someone who doesn't want to sacrifice anyone for nothing.
Was I being too prickly about an offer that suited me perfectly?
Wasn't this the time to set suspicion aside and join forces?
Just like with Go Gyumin and Jang Siwoon—
"It's just too cruel.... Making him smash his head against a rock three times, when he doesn't even get to simply vanish."
Wait a second.
"Trying to copy the Turtle Rabbit Tale or whatever, forcing the story like that—it's cruel."
The man let his eyebrows droop, wearing a look of sympathy.
He even nodded, as if certain I felt the same way.
I barely wrestled my wavering pupils under control and started thinking fast.
The contents of the quest I'd read earlier.
And everything the man had told me.
Come to think of it....
Even when I tried to trust him, he kept showing me these unsettling sides of himself.
I was growing tired and worn down.
But I dragged the corners of my mouth upward anyway, summoning the most innocent expression I could manage.
I had no confidence in my acting, but suppressing emotion was a different matter—that I could do tolerably well.
"Yes. I was at a complete loss, but if you're willing to settle for a draw, who am I to complain? Thank you."
"Hehe, wonderful! The game just got so much easier!"
Only after a perfunctory handshake did the man and I turn our backs on each other.
I sat down and busied myself pretending to dig up crops.
Using the dagger and my hands together to tear violently at the soil, it looked reasonably convincing.
Not that the man could see my miracle medicine anyway.
When the man pulled out that sickle earlier, his Leaflet wasn't visible.
That was how I'd guessed—it must have come out of the Leaflet when he drew the sickle.
If the miracle medicine and the Leaflet couldn't be seen simultaneously...
It might mean that items already acquired and stored inside the Leaflet could be used as miracle medicine too.
Swish—
Name: The Completely Rotten Fish
Description: Long since dead, it reeks of decay—yet this, too, was once life.
I tapped the rotten fish displayed on my Leaflet.
The phrase 'this, too, was once life' caught my eye.
Crops from the ground were called the egg of the land. And the liver is....
-One is the egg of the land.
-One is a mass that has lost life.
I think I finally understand why the riddle wound itself around in circles like that.
It could work, as long as the item came from within this map.
No—it had to work. That was the only thing left to believe.
I took the fish out of the Leaflet and held it in my hand.
The slimy feel of the rotten mass against my palm made my skin crawl.
Worse, the fish's horrific stench stabbed straight into my nose.
Ding—
"Come forward, both of you."
"Place thy miracle medicines upon the bowls."
The Dragon King summoned us in a solemn voice.
The man and I each set our miracle medicines on our respective bowls.
"Turtle Minister on the right."
"Declare what thy opponent's miracle medicine is."
This time it was his turn to deduce my medicine first.
"Uh... umm...."
But naturally, the man—who I'd assumed would answer without hesitation—clamped his mouth shut and rolled his eyes around for some reason.
He knew my personality wouldn't let me harm the rabbit, and we'd just pieced together the plan together.
There was no reason to deliberate like this.
Shouldn't he be certain I brought the egg of the land?
Maybe he distrusted me so much he couldn't help being wary—or maybe this was another performance.
"Th-the e-egg of the land...?"
The man had clearly said earlier that he would answer my medicine wrong on purpose, letting me win this round.
But he didn't say a mass that lost life.
After agonizing, he'd settled on the egg of the land. The bewilderment on his face was unmistakable—it didn't look like acting at all.
If there was a reason for the man to be flustered in this moment, it was most likely this:
The round was slipping away from the script he'd intended.
"Turtle Minister on the left."
"Declare what thy opponent's miracle medicine is."
"The egg of the land."
I answered instantly, so that I wouldn't have time to doubt my own decision.
This man had shattered the plan first—so I threw away my trust just the same.
In truth, that trust had already been eroding since the beginning of our conversation, and perhaps because of that, I didn't feel even a flicker of guilt.
Please, please....
I was praying fervently for the Dragon King to turn his head toward me when—
Ding—
"The truthful and loyal minister is the Turtle Minister on the left."
Yes!!
The Dragon King's gaze swung toward me.
The man had claimed he would bring a mass that lost life—when in fact he'd dug up a crop from the land.
Contrary to the plan, both of us had come back holding the opposite of what we'd promised.
"H-how did you do it? Did you use a blade?!"
The man glared at me with the sharpest eyes he'd shown yet.
Had he been so certain that while he could backstab me, I'd never do the same to him?
Hard to believe, given how long he'd hemmed and hawed over his choice.
"No. I brought a rotten fish."
The shadow lifted from the black data mass resting on the bowl.
My rotten fish, and the man's potato. The moment the miracle medicines revealed themselves, the man hurriedly clamped a hand over his nose. It was as if the stench had been sealed away along with the darkness, waiting to escape.
"...Haha. You're remarkably creative.... No one would ever think of a method like that."
No one? It wasn't clever enough to warrant that kind of certainty.
The man ground his teeth together and gnawed at his fingernails.
Since I'd matched his medicine this round, bringing the score to one-to-one, anxiety radiated off him in waves.
"But the fish was created inside the map, so... it doesn't fall outside the rules."
"...?"
Outside the rules of what, exactly?
Between his barely suppressed trembling, a mutter slipped out.
Perhaps because his nerves had frayed, it escaped his mouth unfiltered, without passing through his head.
Doesn't fall outside the rules?
I remembered the man from the first harvest, rolling his eyes while keeping me in view.
A calculating look. ...And those eyes, quickly confirming whether something stayed within his calculations or slipped past them.
I replayed the miracle medicines from the first round and the second.
My harvests: one egg of the land and one mass that lost life. His: the reverse—a mass that lost life and an egg of the land.
And his face during his deliberation in the second round.
He'd been wearing the expression of a man suspecting I might produce a harvest that was neither—something other than the egg of the land.
Why would he think that? Did he believe I'd suddenly grown bold?
Or else....
Noticing the light kindling in my eyes, the man let out a breezy laugh.
"Ha.... So you've caught on to some of it, have you?"
"……."
"What a relief. Keeping it hidden any longer was breaking my heart."
The man heaved a great sigh and rubbed both palms against his shirt.
Wiping away hands drenched in sweat, his face looked considerably lighter than before.
Was it because he could now drop the unnecessary act before the all-important third round?
As if he'd set down some fraction of the weight on his mind, he kept letting out deflating bursts of laughter.
"Don't tell me—there's a fixed number of each harvest?"
"Sharp as a tack, aren't you? I'm slow, you see.... Still, I caught on a little faster this time."
There he went again, self-deprecating on his own terms, looking sheepish.
He scratched his head roughly, trailed off at the ends of his sentences in an unconfident voice—then, before long, the corners of his mouth lifted again.
Had he gained confidence from the situation now tilting in his favor?
A faint thread of strength, however weak, crept into his previously colorless voice.
"On this map, the total number of eggs of the land and masses that lost life you can gather is exactly three. You didn't know that at first, did you?"
"……."
When I gave no answer, the man curled a thin smile onto his lips.
And then, for the first time, he flung wide the mouth he'd kept so tightly shut at every critical moment.
"If the rounds happen to go your way, by the final round you can't help but know exactly what cards your opponent holds."
Only then did I understand.
The man wasn't merely intoxicated with his own superiority—he had genuine conviction that he would win.
That was why he bothered laying out the explanation so courteously.
The moment he harvested that potato in the second round, only one egg of the land would have remained on the map.
"Honestly, your hand was so obvious I just pretended to dig around carelessly. But ha.... a potato dropped right into my hand. Damn it all...."
The man glared resentfully at the potato, its data already crumbling out of shape.
Because of that blunder, he'd been forced to agonize over his choice earlier.
He had to deduce whether I'd play the mass that lost life this round or save it for the last.
"If you've got no strength, this is a game where you have to win the second round on wits and dumb luck, no matter what."
Through his suspicious behavior and stray remarks, I too had belatedly realized that each medicine could only spawn three times on the map.
He'd put on every possible show of weakness—yet in truth, the man had understood the rules from the very beginning.
"You should have lost. I—I...!!"
Then the man suddenly began huffing and puffing with theatrical outrage.
His breath fogged his already hazy glasses even further, yet his eyeballs gleamed with startling clarity.
Furious, he thrust his head toward me, hackles raised.
He leaned in so close that his glasses frame nearly touched my chin, rage pouring off him.
"Where's all that gratitude now?! How dare you stab me in the back like this?!"
"You were the one who backstabbed first."
Unbelievable. Who was angry at whom here, exactly?
The moment I clicked my tongue, the man's bluster deflated and he retreated a step.
"You lied too. You said you'd bring a mass that lost life."
"Th-that was because you were giving off the vibe that you didn't trust me!"
"Of course I didn't trust you. Start to finish, you've been nothing but a pack of lies."
"...What's that supposed to mean? I told you, all of it was the Curator letting me experience—"
"Did the Curator also let you experience what happens to visitors who are eliminated?"
At my question, the man's shoulders hunched sharply.
Even while posturing as if he'd laid every card on the table, he'd kept one secret hidden in the dark. The man had witnessed the moment a visitor was eliminated.
I went back over what had bothered me during our earlier conversation.
'It's just too cruel.... Making him smash his head against a rock, when he doesn't even get to simply vanish.'
'Trying to copy the Turtle Rabbit Tale or whatever, forcing the story like that—it's cruel.'
"How do you know he was made to smash his head against a rock?"
"……."
"You claimed you barely knew anything about the Turtle Rabbit Tale."
The man had clearly said the eliminated visitor was made to smash his head against a rock.
And he knew that in the Turtle Rabbit Tale, the turtle met the very same end by that very method.
One of the tale's many endings:
After the rabbit escapes, the turtle, consumed by remorse, beats its head against a rock until it dies.
"It's—it's written in the quest! That's how I know...!"
"But the quest says: 'The treacherous minister who spoke falsely shall have his head split upon the stone.'"
"...?!"
"I assumed the smashing was just the author's metaphor. But what about you?"
This was the man who had only managed to recall fragments of the tale while listening to the Curator's explanations.
His fingers wouldn't stay still, fidgeting restlessly at his sides.
"Th-that's a stretch! What other way is there for a head to be split on a rock?! I mean, sure, there are other ways, but obviously smashing comes to mind first, it—"
"……."
Right. It's conjecture, and thin on evidence.
Reasoning this murky could be argued away a hundred different ways. It was possible the man was simply telling the truth.
"Dragon King."
I turned my body toward the colossal Dragon King.
Startled by my sudden movement, the Dragon King and the man both blinked at me.