Fragments of Memory (4)
The days passed in their usual peaceful rhythm. I was doing everything I could to uncover what my trauma actually was. At first, I wondered if one of the villains who had come to the convenience store might be connected to it. After all, convenience stores had always been full of difficult customers—people who spoke down to you from the very first word, those who started eating before paying, and countless other troublemakers. It only made sense that one of them would be the source.
Thought it would be easier than this……
But none of the things they had done to me qualified as trauma. Not really.
“Hey, give me that over there.”
“Cigarettes? This one?”
“Yeah, that.”
“Here you go.”
“……Wait, why’s a kid like you talking down to an adult?”
“You were the one using casual speech first. Thought we were friends.”
“This little shit—”
I did whatever I wanted. Whenever something annoyed me, I settled it on the spot. When troublemakers appeared, I became an even bigger one and crushed them without hesitation. A week passed like that. I was still greeting customers at the convenience store.
Beep. Beep.
“That’ll be 4,000 won. Would you like a bag?”
“Ah, yes.”
“Bags are 50 won. Please insert your card here.”
The customer, wearing a blank expression, shoved the items into the bag and disappeared out the door. Once the last customer was gone, I gave a quick handover to the part-timer who had just arrived, slipped off my uniform, and handed it over naturally.
“Ah, good work today.”
“Yeah, you too.”
After exchanging a light nod, the other part-timer stepped behind the counter. I accepted the greeting and stepped out of the store.
“Hoo……”
I took a deep breath. The night air had cooled, and it gently filled my lungs.
“……But this job is easier than I thought.”
A strange feeling. The time that once felt so tight now felt leisurely. No matter how many difficult customers there were, it was nothing compared to the stress of risking your life on missions. This was a place without monsters. There were no magical attacks, and even carrying a real sword required permission. If I hadn’t known this was the fourth floor of the tower, I might have wondered whether everything that had happened until now was just a dream.
I looked up. The sky had already darkened. The night view from the high-rises, the intact roads, the people walking on them… Yet despite the peaceful scenery, my steps after finishing work felt heavier than ever.
“What the hell is it?”
The tower had given players the task of overcoming their trauma. The biggest problem was that I couldn’t recall mine at all. I had dealt with every difficult customer at the store however I pleased, but the system hadn’t reacted in the slightest.
Maybe it has nothing to do with the convenience store?
Overcoming trauma was the only way to reach the fifth floor. A week had already passed. Twenty-three days remained. If I couldn’t overcome it within that time, my life would end here.
“……But.”
Even so, a thought had begun to sprout in one corner of my mind.
“Why does it feel like I wouldn’t have any regrets even if I died?”
Now that everything I had gone through felt like an illusion, dying without completing the mission didn’t seem like something I would regret much. I didn’t want to be thrown back into a battlefield where I had to risk my life again. I didn’t want to spend any more days competing with others and carrying the weight of their lives on my back.
“……Isn’t this enough?”
For myself, and for others. This felt like a satisfying ending. I didn’t know what lay at the end of life, but living an ordinary life—working, meeting people, and simply existing—didn’t seem so bad……
“……”
At that moment, I fell silent.
Beep— Beep—
A police car with flashing lights passed right beside me. Random thoughts scattered through my mind. As I blankly watched the car grow distant, a chill ran down my spine for some reason.
What the hell.
When had it started? Skills didn’t activate here. Naturally, the stats and items I had gained upon awakening were also unusable. That was why I had assumed the task on the fifth floor was simply to overcome trauma as my past self.
I was being assimilated without even realizing it.
Without noticing, I had been melting into this place. The real culprit was my attempt to repeat past actions in order to find my old trauma because of the “overcome trauma” mission.
My past self was correct. But I had forgotten that my current self and my past self were different.
……Explanation: A forgotten stretch of time. Someone has recreated your past inside the tower. Overcome the trauma that remains in the depths of your memories. The moment your future is reversed, the gate to the fifth floor will open.
The tower wanted the future to be reversed. To do that, I had to discard my past self and overwrite it with my current self.
“Huuuup!”
I drew in a deep breath, just like when I had left the convenience store. But this time, instead of exhaling lightly, I let out a loud shout toward the sky.
“Hraaaaaagh!!!”
It was something I would never have done in the past. People’s gazes turned toward me. And this world, created from my memories, quickly scattered their attention to summon my past self.
Trauma.
What was the most painful moment for me? Being cursed at for no reason while working? Or getting scammed by someone faking self-harm on the street and losing a huge amount of money? Or starving for days afterward because I had no money left for groceries?
No. It wasn’t anything that trivial.
“There was no need to recall it.”
If you had to consciously remember it, it wasn’t trauma. True trauma was something that disrupted your daily life due to mental shock. If you could recall it normally, it was just a memory—not something that needed to be overcome.
I moved my feet. If it was trauma severe enough to interfere with my life, there was no way I wouldn’t know it.
“Those disgusting things.”
I thought of the Constellations watching us and looked up at the sky, pulling out people’s memories. Beings who had trampled all the efforts my past self had made. And the players being toyed with by them. The trauma I had to overcome was the otherworldly Constellations playing with us.
***
Seo Seyeong was happier than she had ever been. After losing her parents at twenty, she had never once laughed freely. She had only lived with polite smiles and manufactured emotions. It had been nearly eight years since she last smiled sincerely at someone.
Would it be okay to disappear like this?
Like the others, she no longer had any attachment to life. Especially now that she had met her long-missed parents again, even if only like this, that feeling grew stronger by the day.
But as the days passed, Seo Seyeong gradually lost her smile.
“Is something worrying you, sweetheart?”
“You’ve been looking down lately… Dad’s fine, you know. The doctor said I could be discharged in about two weeks. Want to go get some fresh air together then?”
She no longer knew how to respond to their words.
“Oh, right, you mentioned that convenience store part-timer last time, didn’t you? I’d like to meet him and say hello.”
This was Seo Seyeong’s memory. But her parents knew every conversation she had only imagined having—things she had wanted to say but never did.
“Oh my, you got into university? How’s life treating you? Is studying going well?”
Things that happened after the accident.
“Is the part-time job hard? Serving isn’t easy work… But seeing you earn your tuition too, our daughter is really something.”
“Congratulations on graduating. Our daughter’s already that age……”
Conversations she had only imagined… Words she had only spoken in dreams kept coming from unfamiliar faces in an unfamiliar hospital. The joy and delight she had first felt upon seeing them had long since turned to fear. This world was made from her memories. The scenes she had most wanted to see and the memories that had hurt her the most were playing simultaneously.
“S-Stop……”
She clutched her throbbing head with both hands. Her parents reached out to her with worried voices. But no matter how Seo Seyeong reacted, the two of them simply repeated the words she had heard in the past, mechanically.
“Seyeong, are you sick?”
“Oh dear, our daughter’s in pain. Dad should call the doctor.”
“Oh my, you’ll need a shot. Our Seyeong.”
A joke her parents used to make when she faked illness as a child to avoid kindergarten.
“If your head hurts, rest a bit before studying.” “Yeah, grades aren’t everything when it comes to happiness.”
Advice her parents had given her in middle school when she was stressed about poor grades. Words that didn’t fit the situation tickled her ears, and the more she heard them, the more Seo Seyeong’s mind slowly crumbled.
Fake. A fabricated world. She knew the two people offering warm words before her eyes were false. She knew she had to leave this place. But the thought that she would never see them again if she left kept her feet rooted to the ground.
“I’m sorry……”
Seo Seyeong swallowed her tears and muttered. No one could tell who she was apologizing to.
But then—
Thud… Thud…
At the sound of an unfamiliar noise from somewhere, she slowly raised her head.
“What’s that sound?”
“I don’t know… Honey, go check it out.”
The noise from outside the window began to throw the hospital into chaos. It was a situation she couldn’t understand. She had never been in a hospital in the past, so such a memory didn’t exist. The sudden event helped her regain her senses.
What on earth is this……
She cautiously approached the window and looked toward the source of the noise. It was dark. Yet the moon and stars hung in the sky, and beneath them, rows of high-rise buildings and street trees created a brilliant night view.
“Huh?”
But the hospital parking lot looked completely different from what she remembered. Fire. Fire trucks. Onlookers… And another explosion.
Kwaaaang—!
The sudden chaos turned the hospital into pandemonium. Yet amid it all, one person stood out clearly to her.
“……Siin?”
A man in white clothing, holding a jet-black sword.
A miracle. It was the second salvation that had come to her.