To 1880s America
Chik- chik-
So noisy….
What was that sound?
The hiss of steam billowing out. The rumble of wheels turning. The rattle and clatter of the space where I lay sprawled.
"…?"
I pried my eyelids apart — they were stuck together as if glued — and looked around.
My blurred focus slowly returned to normal, and my surroundings came into view.
The scenery visible through the window kept moving.
No. It's this space that's moving.
The moment I properly registered my surroundings, the smell of oil stung my nose.
A train?
A very old one… no, a classically styled train.
The scenery outside was clock towers and cathedrals of brick instead of skyscrapers.
Keeping my eyes fixed on the window, I pressed a hand against a burlap sack lying on the floor.
The train jolted so violently that I'd braced myself with my hand just to keep from toppling over.
"Aagh!"
The instant I pressed down on the sack, I felt something soft and bulky shift beneath my palm.
I recoiled in shock and examined the sack closely.
…It was just a long cloth laid over something.
Carefully, I took hold of the long cloth and lifted it away.
"!!"
When the cloth came off, a woman curled up on the floor with her eyes closed was revealed.
Not a stranger. The very same woman I'd met in the Boundary just moments ago.
I gasped in surprise, then belatedly reached out and shook her.
"Excuse me! Excuse me!!"
"Mmm—"
Faint but unmistakable, a groan of pain escaped her lips.
She's alive!
I let out a sigh of relief and kept trying to wake her.
The woman opened her eyes blearily, saw me before her, and hurriedly twisted her body away.
"Are you all right?"
"Uh—"
With both limp hands, she barely managed to push against the floor and prop herself upright.
Whether she'd been through an ordeal in that darkness or not, her gaze had settled far more calmly and coldly than before.
"Thank goodness! When you fell into the darkness, I thought you'd been erased!!"
"…?"
But her reaction was strangely off.
She should have been relieved at her own survival, yet she just blinked at me silently, saying nothing.
After a bewildered pause, the woman finally spoke.
"…Who are you?"
"I'm sorry?"
What? Did being erased wipe her memories instead?
Or maybe the Curator had given her separate instructions and she was pretending not to know me.
No — there'd be no reason to bother with such a pointless lie.
I was still racking my brain when the woman continued, crushing the silence that had settled between us.
"…Have you, by any chance, seen my sister?"
"Your sister?"
…Now that I think of it, her hair is tied up.
In the Boundary, this woman's long hair had hung straight down to her waist.
And the woman before me now had hers roughly gathered and tied back in a single careless knot.
"We're twins. If it was a woman who looks exactly like me but with long hair, that would be my older sister."
Twins. So this is Visitor C from a different timeline.
She sounded calm as she explained, but looking closer, her fingertips were trembling ever so slightly.
She seemed to be piecing the situation together, replaying my panicked attempts to wake her and everything I'd shouted afterward.
"Wait… you're saying my sister fell into the darkness?"
"……."
Sometimes silence is the most honest answer.
I pressed my lips together and lowered my head.
"Then she failed the quest after all."
Visitor C reached the conclusion on her own. All I could do was stay silent.
It didn't feel like she was probing me for confirmation.
Rather, it seemed she was deliberately voicing aloud a truth she'd already sensed, in an attempt to settle her own heart.
A glistening tear formed at the corner of her eye in an instant, then traced a path down her cheek.
No choked-back sobbing, no wailing — she simply wept in silence, tear after tear.
There's nothing I can say to console her.
What words could possibly comfort someone in this situation?
However it had happened, the end result was that Visitor C's sister had been erased, while I — unlike her sister — had made it into the quest.
From the standpoint of family, she had every right to hate the mere sight of my face.
"Did she die painfully? When she fell?"
Just as I was clenching my fists, unable to even offer sympathy without overstepping—
Visitor C asked me a question about her sister.
I couldn't find my voice right away; my mouth opened and closed before I finally managed to pick out my words.
"…No. She was erased immediately."
"Thank goodness…."
In truth, I had no way of knowing whether Visitor B had simply vanished on the spot, or whether she'd suffered something far worse inside that darkness.
Even this might be a consolation that overstepped — but right now, a merciful lie was kinder than the truth.
I know what it's like to lose family. That's exactly why this hurts.
"I'm sorry."
"Yes?"
"For not saving your sister."
When I bowed my head in apology, Visitor C's pupils wavered noticeably.
Her expression shifted minutely from moment to moment, as if tangled emotions were churning inside her.
"…I heard the Curator's explanation. That I take the place of the visitor who violated their noble sacrifice."
"……."
"The same offense as the visitor eliminated right in front of me."
This museum held countless dimensions. Visitor C, like me, was someone who had survived alone in the Boundary.
Perhaps that was why we'd been moved into the same dimension and paired together.
"I know my sister well."
Visitor C's tone was flat.
The effort she was making to suppress her feelings in front of a complete stranger — it hurt more than any outburst would have.
"I don't blame you, so please don't worry."
How can she be so detached?
I had silently resolved to accept whatever anger she threw at me, yet here she was—
She shut her eyes entirely, hiding the way her eyelids trembled.
I know this is her way of steadying herself for the joint quest ahead. Still.
On the surface she seemed to have reclaimed her reason, but inside, her heart must have been in shreds.
It was remarkable how she kept her gaze averted just so none of it would show.
With me beside her, she probably can't even grieve properly.
Feeling awkward, I rose to my feet and walked toward the train door.
I hadn't noticed while talking with her, but this narrow train car had held only the two of us the entire time.
There were connecting doors at both ends, yet not a single soul had passed through.
"…Please rest a while. I'm going to look around."
I couldn't be sure leaving her alone here was the right choice.
But right now, what she needed wasn't my hollow consolation — it was distance, the space to gather herself.
Visitor C only gave a small nod, as if she lacked the strength to answer.
I slowly turned my back, opened the train door, and stepped into the car opposite.
"Khagh-! Kehk!!"
The moment I entered the new car and shut the door behind me, a coughing fit burst out of me.
The oil smell earlier had been bad, but there was no comparing it to the stench in here.
Musty dust, a sharp acrid stench, sweat besides.
The mingled odors of the packed crowd made my head swim.
Lots of people from this car onward, huh.
Just like the scenery outside, the passengers' clothing and speech were a far cry from the modern day.
Coats cut with classical elegance, wide-brimmed hats — even mustaches that looked artificial to my contemporary eyes.
How far back in time are we, exactly?
I still had no idea whose history I'd stepped into.
Pressed flat among the crush of bodies, I looked around.
"Papers! Papers!!"
Just then, a boy's cheerful voice cut through the air, ringing out loud and clear.
The boy nimbly wove and darted through the crowd like a squirrel, working his way forward.
And when he drew level with me—
Tap—
A light sound at my feet.
He'd dropped one of the newspapers he was carrying as he brushed past me.
"Ah, young man— no, wait. Hey, kid! You dropped your paper!"
I waved my hand, calling after him earnestly.
But the boy glanced at me once and then, as if nothing had happened, burrowed back into the crowd.
"……."
Hack, hack — coughs echoed all around from countless throats.
And not one person reached for the fallen newspaper.
It seemed they were all waiting for me to pick it up.
I hesitated only a moment longer before carefully lifting the paper.
There are a lot of pages.
The texture of the paper against my fingertips was unmistakably different.
Thin but coarse — the particular feel of aged, old paper.
It practically radiated the aura of an artifact that belonged in a museum display case, right this instant.
…And the thickness of it was strange — far too thick for a single issue.
"…!"
The moment I checked the top of the page, my eyes went wide.
An unusual newspaper — the publication date listed only the year and the month.
January 1884
Incidents in New York…
…….
…….
…….
The publication date was January 1884.
The Western world in the 1880s. America.
Tiny typeface crammed the pages from edge to edge.
The English printed on the newspaper slowly shifted into Korean, my native tongue.
The language must change according to whichever visitor was reading it.
And I'm seeing some familiar names.
Swoosh—
I turned the page to check the rest. But then.
"Huh…?"
My gaze caught on the date printed at the top of the newspaper.
Every page of a single issue bore a different date.
The previous page was January; this one was February 1884.
One month per page. One newspaper holds an entire year's worth of events.
In reality, such a thing would be impossible.
So this newspaper isn't just a record — it's a device for explaining the quest.
This was New York — an era of upheaval, when electricity was remaking the world.
Flipping through the following pages, every single article was about electricity. The same words repeated over and over.
Invention, experiment, current, alternating, direct.
A newspaper with an absurdly lopsided focus, in subject and in people alike.
It was obvious the Tower was handing us hints about a historical figure.
"Papers!"
Just then, the newsboy from before came wiggling back toward me, huffing and straining.
I assumed he wanted the paper he'd dropped back, so I held out the one in my hand—
Instead, the boy stacked a fresh newspaper on top of it.
"There you go, mister, looks like you're all finished~! Take another paper!"
"…I don't have any money."
"Free of charge for a handsome fella like you."
"Ah—"
"You look like a greenhorn, so you'd best brush up on New York humor, see."
The boy winked, one eye scrunching shut, and vanished back into the crowd.
When I turned the last page of the paper I'd been holding, a new one appeared.
News provided without limit — must be the hints for the quest.
I was just skimming the first page of the new newspaper.
January 1885
…….
…….
…….
"January 1885…."
Only then did I look out the train window.
Sunlight broke over the snowy New York streets, and in an instant, the ice began to melt.
But that wasn't all. Warmth returned to the streets, and flowers bloomed in the park.
Time is flowing fast.
The gentle warmth swelled into blazing sunlight, and the green leaves didn't take more than a few seconds to fall as autumn foliage.
And then, just as when I'd first looked out the window, snow began to fall again.
A full year's worth of time — exactly as many pages as I'd turned.
I can't go flipping through pages on my own.
If I fidgeted any further, I might step into a turning point I could never undo.
This was a joint quest — I couldn't afford to push time forward any further unilaterally. I had to go back.
I turned around and made my way back to the train car where Visitor C was waiting.