"Ha ha ha, Mage, you got dragged out after all?"
Jang Hyundeok’s idle meddling.
"You’re not a grade-schooler—why are you picky about meals?"
"It’s not being picky. I just missed mealtime because I was concentrating."
When my mask obsession was at its worst, I could hardly eat with others, but these days it isn’t that bad.
Thanks to the madness being much alleviated. I sat at the table wearing a mask that covered half my face.
"Huh... It was always impressive, but today is especially impressive."
Heo Sanghyun has remarkable cooking skills. He ended up a necromancer after getting seized by a mad skeleton, but had he become a chef, wouldn’t he have grown quite famous?
"He said he once planned to convert this mansion into a guesthouse, didn’t he?"
It would have been nice if that had happened. If he served dishes to guests seeking a retreat, it might have become a popular lodge.
In any case, once freed from Heo Joo’s hands, Heo Sanghyun’s cooking improved day by day until his dishes now felt like an extravagant luxury.
"Does he have some kind of cooking trait?"
At this point, it feels awkward to skip meals as often as I do, but luckily, if Heo Sanghyun senses I won’t come up from the basement, he simply prepares enough for two and leaves it.
"On days like today when he goes out of his way to drag me up from the basement..."
It means he’s in a good mood.
"I’m honestly so happy we can eat like this every day."
That was Jang Hyundeok, who had begun sweeping up the food on the table even before I arrived. Some plates were already empty. What had been on those?
Caprese salad where springy, mild mozzarella and fresh tomatoes formed a vivid harmony; tajarin pasta dressed with savory duck stock and enriched with creamy egg yolk; lamb chops that released sweet juices with every bite.
So good I could faint.
"Today we have dessert as well."
Tiramisu arrived, where sweet cocoa and deep coffee aroma blended in concert.
Dessert doesn’t appear all that often. Is today some kind of special day?
With two men on either side shoveling in food while spilling out exclamations of praise, Heo Sanghyun offered modest words, looking a bit embarrassed.
"It just turned out this way. We got a lot of ingredients yesterday, remember?"
"Ah, the tribute Hyeolhu sent? Was there lamb in that?"
"Yes. A tremendous amount of liquor arrived too, but most of it was Chinese, so I didn’t open it."
A rollback executed to make the havoc wrought by [Predator in the Mountains] into "something that never happened."
And as compensation for that rollback, I received various benefits.
Some were absurdly good; some would be crucial for future progress; and among them were ambiguous ones I didn’t particularly want.
"And the one named Gyuseong Mawa says he wants to send an offering. How should we handle it?"
"Hm? Gyuseong Mawa? That frog-man contacted you, Mr. Sanghyun?"
"No. Lord Hyeolhu informed me."
So Hyeolhu must have given him Heo Sanghyun’s contact details. Shouldn’t have done that.
"What kind of offering?"
"I hear he wants to perform a human sacrifice."
"...Leave it. I think I’d better speak to him myself later."
Right.
This was the first of the rewards I received.
[Followers].
"But who exactly are those people? Why do they like you that much, Mage?"
Right after finishing dinner and tidying the dining room.
That was what Jang Hyundeok asked after following me into the living room.
"You heard it too, didn’t you? They call me the [Destroyer] who governs the world’s destruction and restoration."
They spouted a bizarre line—"Because there is destruction, there can be restoration"—and followed me with fervor.
"Ah, so that [Destroyer] who restored the world meant you, Mage?"
"Who else did you think they meant?"
"Uh, the one who shattered the giant eyeball—uh? Was that you, Mage? Huh? What is this?"
Jang Hyundeok shook his head, slipping into confusion. Watching him, I let out a short sigh.
"If there’s going to be a rollback, do it properly..."
Or at least give proper compensation.
"Rollback?"
"Nothing. It’s a thing."
To be honest, I wondered if I’d been tossed into another, similar dimension, but apparently not.
This is still the bug-ridden, shoddy game, [Cthulhu World].
Moreover, although words like rollback and server backup were used, the restoration wasn’t a simple "restart from last save" affair.
I don’t fully understand it either, but it’s like overlaying some portion of past data upon the continuously flowing present.
Perhaps something went wrong in that process—there are people who can half-remember that day’s events.
"Not that those memories are accurate anyway."
Like recalling a horrifying nightmare from years ago—just a vague anxiety or fear, a hazy sense of ominous inspiration.
They recall only the blurred scars left by ruin or death’s passing claw.
Meanwhile, roughly two hundred cultists who’d been near Chentae-dong that day revived with nothing but an awareness that I had had a hand in restoring this world, and as [Unaffiliated Cultists] who had prayed for a god’s descent, they deified me and formed a sect.
[Unaffiliated Cultists].
Absurd as it sounds, that’s the state in which they resurrected.
[Predator in the Mountains] was erased entirely from this world as if it had never existed, and even those who once served it could no longer remember it—hence the current state.
Or perhaps it was just an artificial adjustment provided as compensation to me.
"Good grief, [Mage King’s Ark] is bothersome enough as it is."
"Ugh, are they still active?"
At the mention of [Mage King’s Ark], Jang Hyundeok made a disgusted face. Fair—those are nightmare memories for him.
"Active? These days they’re probably the most active religious group south of Paju and in Goyang City."
[Mage King’s Ark] is a new religious group whose doctrine holds that to survive the coming doom you °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° must board the [Mage King]’s ark.
And the ticket required to board is [Filial Piety and Service].
Right—[Mage King’s Ark] is a sect that arose back when I fought the [Hwanglim Church].
"Ah, they won’t storm this place again later, will they?"
"They’ve changed so much since they first formed that even I don’t know. Honestly, I didn’t expect them to grow this large."
Their proselytizing was such a surprise success that now there are more believers unconnected to my brainwashing than those who are.
Leaving the appalled Jang Hyundeok behind, I went back down to the basement.
"Anyway, it’s comfortable having nothing urgent to worry about."
This is the second reward I received.
Right after the rollback completed, this message appeared before my eyes:
[For the next one week, no incidents will occur. During that period the activation of the trait ‘Shattered Mind’ will be suspended. Furthermore, most penalty traits afflicting your body and mind will cease to function.]
I was granted a short rest. He called it compensation, but maybe time was needed to repair aftereffects of the rollback.
"At first I thought it was nothing much, but this is definitely the best reward."
Honestly, it had felt like riding a brakeless car plunging endlessly into the abyss. What I needed was rest.
Thanks to it, I tidied everything up, cleared the confusion in my head, and shed most of the fatigue weighing on my body.
"But now that life’s become somewhat livable, I’m starting to get antsy."
It’s not like I can rest forever.
In three days, chaos will start flaring up again on all sides.
Putting those random [Followers] aside, I checked the other rewards I’d received.
Why do gamers hate server rollbacks?
Because levels they finally pushed up drop, artifacts they barely pulled vanish, enhancements reset—in short, everything they worked for turns to foam.
Kim Sinhwa
Class: Mage Who Gazes into the Abyss
Level: 69
Magic Tier: 6th Rank
Madness: [Mask Obsession (Latent)], [ ]
Strength 5 + 4 (Residual Heat of the Bukrak Sect)
Constitution 8 + 3 (Death-Signing Sword (Nokjon))
Agility 8 + 2 (Wings of the Night Veil)
Intelligence 30
Mind 20 + 2 (Necklace of the Body Snatcher)
Charm 20
Here are many of the rewards I received.
First, the second madness slot is blank. In any case, it won’t be filled for three days.
Next, the level.
"It used to be 59, right? Up by ten in an instant."
Thanks to that, I shot through the notorious 50–60 bracket. I invested the two bonus stat points into Mind and Constitution.
Now I can use 6th-rank magic, and with a bit more activity I’ll hit level 70.
And there’s a heap of high-value artifacts and mana stones too numerous to count individually.
"But more than anything else, this is the most incredible item."
I took five prismatic gems from the shelf.
They were Incarnation Stones infused with a portion of [Predator in the Mountains]’s mana.
Vmmmm—
The Incarnation Stones thrummed with an ominous resonance. Ridiculously condensed power lay within.
"Honestly, I’m not confident I can fully control these."
But if I can control them somehow, couldn’t I reproduce even a fraction of that heaven-and-earth-shaking power I witnessed?
"Good. That about covers it, I think."
Followers, rest, experience, money, artifacts—plus several achievements I’ll skip listing—and the mana that belonged to [Predator in the Mountains].
"Even so, after seeing that, I can’t help feeling uneasy."
Now that I’ve seen with my own eyes what they can do when they choose to break the game’s rules, levels and influence feel like trivial number games.
"Still, it’s not like I’m completely without countermeasures."
Thinking of what happened afterward, I know that breaking the game’s rules imposes enormous risks on them as well. As long as they remain within the rules, they can be opposed.
"And besides—"
My goal isn’t to defeat those things. Such situations may be hard to avoid, but that isn’t my objective.
"I don’t know how far I can trust that bastard, though."
The last reward I wrung out to achieve my objective—
It was information on how to escape this world.
I recalled our conversation then.
"You have overcome many trials and hardships. All of this was because, in a very special way, you pre-experienced the events and information that would occur in this world."
"Right. But in what I experienced, there was no way to escape this game."
"In those repeated experiences, there is something that always appeared yet has not appeared this time. What you want is contained within it."
"What kind of annoying Zen riddle—no, wait. Something that always appeared but hasn’t this time? Is that perhaps..."
"It is now moving toward the [Great Source]."
Only those who have played [Cthulhu World] would grasp this exchange.
The [Great Source]—also called the [Source of Life] or [Source of All Pollution]—is an Abyssal entity.
If ranks must be drawn, it stands several tiers above [Predator in the Mountains], sitting just beneath [Crawling Chaos]—that is, Nyarlathotep.
In short, in the power scale presented by the game [Cthulhu World], it’s one of the top five Abyssal beings.
The object I must find is moving to that monster’s side.
During this rest period I received as compensation, there probably won’t be issues—but soon I’ll have to head there.
"Of all things, it had to be that book?"
That book.
The book that always appeared in this game yet, for some reason, hasn’t appeared this time.
"It must be referring to the [Lacrex Tome], right?"
In the game, it showed up with grand special effects yet did nothing, linked to no events—a ridiculous item.
But that book contains a method for me to escape this world.
"Good."
I’ve squeezed out as much compensation as possible and secured a solid lead I had long searched for.
Now all that remains is to move.
That said...
"...First, let me rest as much as I can."
Ugh—there are only three days of rest left anyway.
