{If only you had stayed like this a little longer, you could have forgotten all regrets and become happy.}
The moment that voice came through.
When he turned his gaze, what was there was—
“You.......”
A figure of a woman.
Three times larger than an ordinary person.
Her body was glowing faintly.
And on her back, a sacred-looking halo of light formed a shape like wings.
“Are you...... the ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) existence that gave me power.”
{The moment the curtain over this land opened, I heard the regret held inside you.}
Because of her long, drooping hair, her face wasn’t visible.
But around the faintly visible corners of her mouth, a benevolent smile lingered.
{The sorrow and grief inside it caught at my feet. And so...... I simply wanted to give you a chance.}
A woman of sacred form.
Made of a faint halo of light.
Bearing a different order than humans.
“A chance...... you said you gave me one.”
From the woman’s body, an existence-presence so high-order it was overwhelming poured out.
As if crushed by that presence, Jang Youngwoong spoke in a trembling voice.
“Then as I thought...... what that person said really was nonsense.”
{What are you referring to?}
“I, I heard that the power you gave me isn’t turning time back...... it’s only covering things over with another appearance. That was just that person’s misunderstanding, right?”
A woman who looked like a transcendent existence with nothing impossible for her.
Before that godlike figure, Jang Youngwoong seemed to cling to a maybe.
“The thing about Suyeong not looking like they grew, that was just my misunderstanding too! The truth is, that power really can properly turn time back, right? And the thing about all of Seoul looking fake is just that person’s misunderstanding too...... the scenery I made, all of it is real, right?”
Eyes trembling.
Filled with desperate yearning.
“I, I repeated thousands, tens of thousands of lives to regain the way Seoul looks right now. I gave up counting from the middle, but in years it was probably over ten thousand...... it felt like my mind would collapse, but I gritted my teeth and endured and made this scenery. And for that scenery...... to b, be fake.”
With a pale face,
he spoke as if begging her to answer yes.
“That can’t be...... that can’t be true, right?”
{Haaah.......}
And then.
At Jang Youngwoong’s words, the gigantic woman let out a faint sigh.
{My child.}
“Yes.”
{How about changing your way of thinking a little.}
And then.
With a voice like she was soothing a child, she opened her mouth.
{Whether it is reality or not...... is that really so important?}
*****
“......Huh?”
When Jang Youngwoong gaped, unable to accept the meaning of those words,
she gently reached out and wrapped him in her arms as she spoke.
{I felt the regret you carry, and I sympathized with it. There will not exist anyone who can sympathize with the hearts of the regretful ones as much as I can, even if you search the entire universe.}
“.......”
{So, I made up my mind to remove that regret. I hoped you could turn back everything you regret, and be able to feel satisfied without regret. And...... if only you can be satisfied without regret.}
A faintly glowing hand.
Softly caressed Jang Youngwoong’s face.
{Then whether it is reality or not is not important, is it?}
“.......”
The tiny spark of hope that had taken root in Jang Youngwoong’s eyes.
I could see it slowly going out.
{The satisfaction you felt when you realized what you did was the best you could do. Do you remember?}
“.......”
{You thought you had succeeded in correcting all your mistakes, and you felt reassured that losing the family you regretted so much had become something that never happened.}
“Th—.”
{In the moment the deep regret lodged in your heart disappeared, didn’t you smile brightly, feeling refreshed and good?}
“Then.”
{Even if that is not reality...... weren’t you satisfied?}
At those words.
Jang Youngwoong screamed, tears of blood streaming down his face.
“The time I spent!”
{Time?}
“I repeated at least over ten thousand years of time in Seoul!”
[Matron] was smiling kindly,
but the face of Jang Youngwoong, held in her arms, was violently twisted.
“Even when it felt like my mind would collapse, I endured, and what I got back like that was this land......! If the land I made like that is fake.......”
{Ah. That, is it.}
“I, I. Over ten thousand years. That long time...... for a fake with no meaning.......”
She stretched out a finger,
wiped away Jang Youngwoong’s tears, and said.
{If that is what you mean, then do not be so unfortunate.}
“What?”
{My child. You feel that the time you experienced was about 14,832 years, 3 months, 12 days, and 8 hours, don’t you?}
“Uh, uh? I didn’t know numbers that detailed.......”
{If you truly experienced that long time, you could indeed feel unfortunate.}
As if telling him not to worry.
The woman smiled kindly.
But—
{But...... in truth, that is not so.}
What came out of her mouth
was unimaginably cruel.
{The regret lodged in your chest was so deeply embedded that it was not the kind that comes out easily.}
The deeper the regret,
the harder it is to pull it out.
{Think about it—if you suffered for only one year and turned everything back, would you really be able to feel refreshed and resolved?}
Even if a new life is given,
if everything suddenly proceeds smoothly and the cause of every regret is removed in a single go,
there would still be an unpleasant residue left in your heart.
{To pull out such regret, investing that much time and overcoming the cause of that regret is best.}
And so.
The Matron made Jang Youngwoong spend tens of thousands of years.
{But...... to truly make you spend such a long time, isn’t that too cruel?}
“What, what does that—”
{So. I adjusted your perception myself.}
As she gently stroked Jang Youngwoong’s head, she said.
{You thought you spent more than ten thousand years...... but in truth, the time you actually experienced is not even ten years.}
“......Huh?”
Even though the Matron said that,
Jang Youngwoong just gaped, as if he couldn’t understand what it meant.
{Try recalling it.}
“What are you saying. I remember vividly. The battles I went through, killing monsters, retaking units—”
{Important events like major battles or times you achieved great results will certainly remain in your memory. But think about it. Walking down a road...... moving somewhere, or waiting somewhere and blankly killing time, eating a meal. Do you remember those times?}
“Th, that’s—”
In life, what remains remembered later is only the memories that were that striking.
But.
What usually makes up most of life is time with no particular meaning.
{You don’t remember, do you? Of course. That useless time doesn’t help you overcome regret. So I fast-forwarded it.}
If the useless time that takes up that “most” disappears,
and you only go through the striking events,
then in a span of only ten years, you can have experiences of tens of thousands of years.
{You thought you lost precious people because you didn’t do properly, and you carried guilt over that fact. But the thought that you struggled for over ten thousand years must have eased your guilt a lot.}
Over ten thousand years.
That time was certainly time filled with pain, but—
{In truth it wasn’t even ten years...... well, what does reality matter?}
“......Ah.”
In the end, by spending that long time, he obtained the best result.
No matter how painful that long time had been,
{Understand. If it had not been so, a weak child like you would not have been able to endure such a long time.}
Probably.
In the fact that he endured that long time,
he must have felt great pride.
{If I had made you truly spend time properly, your mind would have collapsed around two hundred years in. Will you understand the heart of this mother who considered you?}
“A, ah.......”
That pride that had let a man stand tall.
Was now shattered to pieces.
THUD.
The body of the man who lost the will to stand
collapsed toward the floor.
*****
“Aaah...... ah.......”
A man who had offered everything to overcome this ruin.
A man who devoted all of himself to that one thing.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.......”
The sight of him collapsing so miserably.
“Aaah, aaaaaaaagh......!”
How deep that despair must be—
I couldn’t even imagine.
{Haa. I had pulled out the regret with effort, and yet the emptiness filled back up with regret again. Well, there was no time for the wound I pulled out to heal.}
And then.
The one who had delivered that despair continued speaking with an attitude like it was nothing.
{That’s why I adjusted your cognition so you would not know whether it was reality or not...... if only you hadn’t realized it, you could have stayed happy forever.}
And then.
Her gaze turned toward us.
{Because of you.}
Unlike the gaze she had been giving Jang Youngwoong just before.
That gaze—
Had faint anger mixed into it.
{If you hadn’t done anything but interfere, this child would have been happy.}
“.......”
{You are the ones who broke this child.}
She was looking at us like it was nothing.
But just that alone—
“......Ghk.”
“What, what is that.”
There were people who couldn’t bear that anger
and got crushed by it.
I felt cold sweat running down.
‘I can roughly tell what kind of existence that is.’
If I hadn’t heard anything, I would’ve panicked.
But thankfully, I’d been warned about things like this ahead of time.
‘An external existence.’
The moment the protection covering the Republic of Korea’s land was lifted.
The existence that had pulled me into that pure white space.
Mirinae had said:
-The wall that protected this world collapsed, and that existence became known to the outside.
-A weak world with no guardian at all....... the best possible conditions for external existences to covet.
Right now, this land’s protection was gone.......
And so.
The gaze of external existences would be aimed at this land.
-......What are they, exactly?
-External existences.
That.
Was the external existence Mirinae had spoken of.
The culprit that granted Jang Youngwoong the mighty power that covered Seoul.
-And the names they are called are far too diverse. God, transcendent one, great one.
......An order worthy of being called a god.
A mighty existence.
“My, my eyes hurt.......”
“......!”
At the voice coming from behind me,
I hurriedly turned my head back.
And then—
“Ghk.......”
“My, my head.”
Just from facing the figure of that [Matron],
I could see soldiers crying out in pain.
Probably.
That figure of the [Matron] over there wasn’t the main body.
It was nothing more than an illusion temporarily manifesting her appearance on this land.
And even so—
‘Just seeing that illusion does that much?’
If there was anything fortunate,
it was that this wasn’t my first time.
[Chef : Telling all unit members in Seoul.]
The moment I realized what was happening to the soldiers from that voice,
I hurriedly manipulated the system window and sent a guild message.
[Chef : Lower your heads!]
What I heard was only a soldier saying their eyes hurt,
but even that was enough to grasp what was happening.
Because—
‘I’ve had a similar experience too.’
When you look at something far too huge.
A symptom where that overwhelming amount of information makes your brain feel like it’s melting.
[Chef : Don’t make eye contact with that. Don’t even think about looking at it.]
I had gone through it once myself,
and the reason I could overcome the crisis then was—
[If you end up in a situation where you might make eye contact with that...... use this message window to block its appearance.]
Because the system window that suddenly appeared in front of my eyes had blocked my view.
“H, huuk......!”
“I, I lived.”
Now.
As my guild message was blocking the soldiers’ field of view,
“It blocked our view with Sergeant Shin’s message......!”
it seemed to be stopping them from directly seeing that existence.
*****
“Everyone, heads down!”
“Follow the sergeant’s orders!”
I could feel the soldiers hurriedly lowering their heads.
Then—
{Hoom? This is a bit interesting.}
The [Matron], who had been looking at those soldiers, tilted her head and muttered.
{If not a single one can even look at me directly like this...... then escaping my power should be even more impossible.}
The [Matron] seemed puzzled that the soldiers couldn’t even look at her.
And that made sense.
{Come to think of it, how could they have interfered with my child? The power I handed to that child should not have been a power so weak that the residents of this land could easily resist it. Hoom.}
The reason the [Matron] had deliberately revealed herself like this now
was because
we had succeeded in interfering with Jang Youngwoong’s ability.
Low-order beings who couldn’t even properly look at her.
It would be hard for her to believe that those kinds of beings had interfered with Jang Youngwoong’s plan, who had received her power.
{No, they are beings so low-order they can’t even look at me, and yet they respond so quickly...... is their judgment fast?}
And then.
Only then did I notice one fact.
That existence looking at us right now—
{Hoooom, even so they won’t be able to grasp my power.}
In truth.
Wasn’t looking at us.
‘This one.’
To be more exact,
in this one’s eyes right now—
{Haa. If these bugs aren’t the culprit, then who in the world interfered with my child.}
‘Am I not visible?’
As if only the soldiers,
excluding ‘me’,
were reflected.
And there was a reason I could guess.
‘......Mirinae’s protection.’
He said he would hide me from the gaze of external existences.
That sword-scar he carved into my body then.
Those scars were hiding me from that [Matron].
-Someone might show up and try to play games while dragging along someone who isn’t qualified.
But at the same time.
I also remembered one more thing Mirinae had said.
-Those who thrust their face into this world like that might be able to discover you.
He would hide me,
but someone who directly thrust their face into this land
might be able to discover me.
And just as he said—
{No, no. Those who lowered their heads aren’t all.}
The gigantic woman exuding a sacred atmosphere, as if she had noticed something,
muttered as she took one step after another toward me.
{It’s so blurred I can’t even see it properly...... but when I look closely...... there is something.}
Of Mirinae’s words that came to mind,
what I cared about wasn’t the part about me being discovered.
‘They said someone might appear and try to play games while dragging along someone who isn’t qualified.’
Off in the distance.
A man collapsed, screaming.
“Guaaaaaaah.......”
To be honest.
He’s not even someone I know well.
All that happened was I got invited to his place and was treated to some snacks,
and when I consider the fact that person tried to trick me and use me even then, they’re closer to an enemy.
Seeing him like that, someone might say he deserved it.
{Human, a human! A human with such a faint presence?}
But even so.
At the [Matron]’s words, looking at me—
{My child, you...... are you fine even after looking at me?}
I couldn’t hold back the irritation boiling up inside me.
“Yeah, you bastard.”
And I said it.
