The Boundary Between You and Me (4)
Ding.
This is the 5th floor waiting room.
After looping through the traumas of so many people, I arrived in a new space that looked almost identical to my old studio apartment.
“Wow, you finally made it.”
……
The one waiting to greet me was, of course, the Helper Rabbit. It was the familiar face showing the familiar reaction, yet I couldn’t immediately respond to its greeting.
Something… has changed.
The oppressive aura it had shown when it first appeared before us had returned, if only slightly. Its outward appearance hadn’t changed at all. But there was an unfamiliar energy about it now, something that didn’t match the guide who had led us this far. The rabbit nodded as if it understood my reaction perfectly.
“As expected of Player Kim Siin… I thought it might happen, but I’m genuinely surprised you noticed the change in Status. Anyway, you’ve worked hard.”
It murmured something cryptic and extended a hand toward me. The gesture seemed to carry a mix of welcome, joy, and recognition for all the effort and hardship.
“Where are we?” I asked, taking its soft, fluffy hand.
I had spent nearly a month wandering the fourth floor by exploiting an error. The traumas I witnessed during that time were far more varied than I had imagined. A fisherman drifting on the open sea, starving for days on end. A firefighter rushing into a collapsing, burning building to save lives. A driver trapped in an unstoppable car, causing dozens of accidents. After personally experiencing all those environments and helping those people, I had begun to suspect that the place I now stood in might be another kind of trauma.
“Don’t worry. The trauma phase is over. Besides, there were some pretty entertaining moments, weren’t there?”
The rabbit’s words brought to mind Namgung Cheonho’s trauma, which I had seen when only about four days remained. Namgung Cheonho, the perpetual assistant manager from Sky Games’ development team and a lifelong solo player, had been reliving the trauma from his late twenties when he was a new hire. After twenty-six days of hellish overtime, I appeared before his exhausted self holding a sword.
“What the hell… hallucinations weren’t enough, now I’m seeing things? Guess my time really has come.”
He was losing himself, just as the rabbit had feared. It was the same grinding repetition of life that I had experienced myself. Of course, I had never been particularly attached to life in the first place, so I could endure it. But for Namgung Cheonho, who was still in the prime of his youth, it must have been unbearable.
“…Huh? This isn’t a hallucination?”
“Sir, are you the grim reaper by any chance? If so, could you please do something about our department head sitting over there?”
“Oh, and the manager too! And the assistant manager, and then……”
I nearly burst out laughing at the desperate screams pouring from the completely worn-down Namgung Cheonho. My department had been HR, so we were in different teams, but those three were infamous across the entire company. Later it was revealed they had been involved in certain corrupt activities and were fired, but at the time, the legend of the new employee who survived their bullying had been passed around like some epic tale. So I understood exactly why he was reacting this way.
“Assistant Manager Namgung Cheonho.”
“Eh? It talks?”
“Do you resent Assistant Manager Choi, who ordered you a warm iced Americano and then said, ‘When did I ever? Are you crazy?’”
“……”
Namgung Cheonho nodded as if possessed by my words.
“Do you resent Manager Park, who forced you to work three straight nights, then made you take an unpaid day off before stealing all the credit?”
“…Yes!”
At some point he had clenched both fists tightly, lips pressed together, staring straight into my eyes. Those eyes, once filled with nothing but anger, sorrow, and resentment, now held the seed of a small hope.
“And do you resent Director Lee, who knew all the facts but still criticized the new hires for having ‘no manners’?!”
By now his eyes had rolled back like a fanatic. He looked like he might start shedding huge tears at any moment as he began grinding his teeth.
“Assistant Manager Choi framed you after he broke the printer, claiming it was all your fault!”
“Yes…! Yes! Yes!”
“Manager Park looked at the code you wrote, called it low quality, then copied it and used it as his own!”
“How do you even……!”
“And Director Lee knew there was no toilet paper when you went to the bathroom but didn’t tell you!!!”
“Uwaa…! Uwaaaaagh! Those bastards deserve to die!”
I stopped joking around at that point. I had fed him enough sweet potatoes. Now it was time to pour an entire barrel of cider down his throat.
“I’ll take care of it for you.”
After that, things moved quickly. Namgung Cheonho realized he was being subjected to injustice. He immediately joined me in exposing their misconduct at the company, and before the three were fired, I reminded him that this was his trauma. He completely destroyed the company in that world. The man who used to laugh and call it the company he loved, the place where he would bury his bones, was nowhere to be found.
Later, Namgung Cheonho told me something surprising. Every morning he would punch the Sky Games headquarters building three times while thinking, One day this place is going to collapse, right? before going inside.
The more I learn about him, the stranger he turns out to be.
Still, breaking his trauma together had given me some comfort without me realizing it. The fact that someone like me, who had always been indifferent to my own life, could experience other people’s traumas, understand their lives, and empathize with them. It brought a new result to my growth.
“To be honest, it feels wrong to call someone like Player Kim Siin just a ‘player.’ You might not understand, but there’s a difference in Status compared to the others.”
Status.
Looking at the rabbit, I felt like I was beginning to grasp what that word meant. The difference between the energy the rabbit had when we first met and the energy it carried now. And the sense of alienation I had felt when the constellations stared directly at me in the early tutorial days was faintly emanating from the rabbit as well.
“How do you feel right now?”
……
The rabbit’s question brought to mind the reward I received for clearing the fourth floor. It was said that ordinary players formed a contract with a constellation as their reward for clearing the fourth floor. They only overcame a single trauma, but I had jumped into various situations over the past several days and acted as a guide to help them.
In other words.
I basically acted as a helper.
It was a role similar to the Tower’s helpers, something I had done without even realizing it. Originally, there were no helpers on the fourth floor. The constellations didn’t want them on stage because the moment a helper appeared, players would realize it wasn’t reality.
But I had taken on the helper’s role by exploiting an error they had missed. Although I had done it unknowingly, the result had an enormous impact on my growth.
To think the trait I had forgotten about would activate…
Update
— Constellation Possessing Unique Skill: Star Who Likes to Adventure
Experience: Activated (100%)
Description: A unique skill that bloomed according to your disposition. You possess an exceptional talent for helping others grow. You have a challenging spirit that deliberately chooses the worst option to achieve the best result, and those outcomes have always created miracles. The unique ability fitting for you is ‘Evolution’ and ‘Development.’
Effect: Can cause a miracle of equal value through sacrifice.
— Examples of sacrificable resources: Abilities, lifespan, memories, body, coins, etc.
It was the potential the constellation known as the Star Who Likes to Adventure had given me before I even reached the first floor of the Tower, back when I was fleeing from zombies and finally arrived at Gwanghwamun. The original description had said the value of the skill I would awaken would depend on the value of my experiences. And the ‘unique skill’ that manifested based on all the experiences I had gone through while climbing the Tower possessed a truly miraculous power.
I’m realizing all over again just how valuable coins are.
Coins were treated on the same level as lifespan or body parts. I didn’t know how many coins my right arm, which was currently attached to me, would be worth, but it seemed that using those coins could even regenerate severed limbs.
“What are you thinking about so deeply?”
At the rabbit’s call, I simply shook my head as if it was nothing. Stats and skills were personal matters. While one could intuitively sense another’s Status, there was no way to know their specific abilities or skills unless the other person revealed them.
I’ll just have to wait and see.
To be honest, I had grown somewhat fond of the rabbit by now. But that didn’t mean we were close enough for me to reveal all my cards. From the beginning until now, it had never directly harmed us. It had guided our growth by inducing coin usage from the constellations, and while it had done so for its own benefit, the result had only been beneficial to us, never harmful.
“It’s nothing. I was just thinking about what might come next.”
The rabbit narrowed its eyes at me for a moment, then let out a small snort.
“It feels like you’re hiding something… but I won’t complain after receiving so much help! To be blunt, the reason my own Status rose is largely thanks to Player Kim Siin’s contribution!”
The rabbit nodded while looking at me. It seemed that receiving my help meant that many of the players it was in charge of had survived, raising its own Status.
“Then I shall explain the next floor. But before that!”
The rabbit raised one of its stubby fingers toward me. What followed was:
“The constellation contract. You still have no intention of making one, correct?”
“I won’t.”
“I thought as much.”
It smiled with an expression that said it had expected this answer. But I simply shook my head indifferently at the rabbit’s reaction. It had used the word ‘still,’ but it didn’t realize that what came out of my mouth meant ‘never.’
Contracting with a constellation ultimately meant placing oneself beneath one of them. I had not the slightest intention of submitting to the constellations that had stolen my life.
“Then I will send you to the fifth floor. It won’t be easy for a player who hasn’t contracted with a constellation, but the growth you gain on the fifth floor will allow you to meet even higher-Status constellations.”
Snap!
As always, the rabbit snapped its fingers to open a portal. A shimmering entrance to the fifth floor slowly formed. The rabbit standing beside it spread both hands and bowed politely.
“This is a gesture of gratitude. We will meet again soon! I look forward to seeing you from a higher place!”
But a moment later, as if it had forgotten something, the rabbit spoke again.
“Oh, right! When you meet Seo Seyeong later, make sure to have a conversation with her! She’ll have an interesting story to tell. She has already made a contract, you see.”
A sudden remark about Seo Seyeong. But since the rabbit wasn’t the type to speak nonsense, I decided to keep those words in mind.
“Huu…”
After its hand-wave farewell, I took a deep breath. And with that, I stepped into a new trial.