Chapter 208

[Translator - Jjescus]

[Proofreader - Gun]

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Chapter 208

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The Opposite V

9

Kidnapping.

Naturally, kidnapping by humans and kidnapping by anomalies differ quite a bit.

If a human kidnaped you, you’d likely face the threat of losing your honor, wealth, or life.

But what if an anomaly kidnaps you?

Surprisingly, all of these might remain intact.

Anomalies don't engage in unnecessary actions.

If they were interested in your life, they would have killed you the moment you met, instead of going through the trouble of kidnapping.

When anomalies kidnap you, they target only one thing.

Your "humanity."

Here, humanity doesn't just refer to ethics and morals but also the fundamental logical structure hardwired into the Homo sapiens brain.

Q. What do you get when you add 1 to 1?

A. Of course, it's 2.

For example, even those who once exchanged such normal conversations might, after being kidnapped by a anomaly, answer:

Q. What do you get when you add 1 to 1?

A. The flesh was butchered to six hundred sixty, leaving only the limbs of one hundred ten. Ten is the form where 1 and 1 intersect, and when gathered into a hundred, it is the shape of two crossed human forearms. Thus, by aligning one hundred pairs of arms, this would be the correct answer.

After which, they would proceed to kill 100 people, including themselves, and display the 100 pairs of forearms.

If you express anger by saying, "How could you commit such monstrous acts!" it would be utterly meaningless to them.

A. Why are you suddenly angry?

Because to the responder, there's no difference between saying 1+1=2 and killing 100 people.

They would have slaughtered 100 people with the same ease as calculating a simple arithmetic problem.

They simply stated 1+1=2, so why you're angry or why you're making such a sad expression is something they can't comprehend at all.

It's hard to see them as human.

Communicating with them as a human being is impossible.

Thus, the kidnapping of humanity.

This is what I commonly refer to as being "bewitched" by an anomaly.

The tutorial fairy likely meant it in this exact sense.

"If everyone infected in reality were kidnapped... how many people would be here in the underworld?"

"Hoee. At least 2 million! And it's growing at an enormous rate even as we speak!"

I frowned.

"Wait. Wouldn't that surpass the population of the Korean Peninsula?"

"Exactly right! Not only are those infected by the virus in reality pulled in, but also people from their dreams, so we're easily going to exceed 10 million! It's a world population reversal!"

"Huh."

Ten million people, just like that.

I looked around at the vast emptiness that spread out from the center of Seoul Station.

If we define a place bewitched by an anomaly as a void, then this place was already vast enough to be called a great void.

A great void of this scale was truly rare.

For example, if an "apartment with 400 souls trapped" were sufficient as a single apartment anomaly, then to establish an "apartment with 40,000 souls trapped," additional concepts were necessary.

Something like "the desire for apartments among Koreans materialized," or "it was set against the backdrop of an actual apartment that drew that many applications." In fact, it was no longer an apartment anomaly but a large apartment complex anomaly.

These kinds of connections were needed for the great void to expand in size.

The largest void on Earth was centered on the western side of the Eurasian continent, where the "First World War" and "Second World War" served as connections to trap hundreds of millions of humans.

"What kind of method could drag in hundreds of thousands, even millions, of people? Could this place be defined as hell?"

"Hoee, not at all. It's quite the opposite..."

At that moment.

—Attention, everyone!

Someone suddenly shouted through a loudspeaker in the Seoul Station plaza.

It was a man who looked like he might have been doing street evangelism even before civilization collapsed. However, the words written on the front and back of his outerwear were slightly different.

[Goddess Heaven]

[Unbelief Hell]

His vest, patched with stickers, exuded an indescribable sense of realism.

—Attention, everyone! I'm sorry to interrupt your busy lives! I had no choice but to grab the microphone to guide you to the correct way of living and true faith!

The middle-aged man shouted into the red megaphone.

—As you know, over there in hell, countless people! Unlike us, countless poor souls who have not yet been saved are groaning in endless cycles of life, endless cycles of repetition, and endless cycles of suffering! Everyone!

At this point, the realism surrounding the plaza's atmosphere suddenly reversed.

—...

—...

People walking through Seoul Station plaza all stopped and looked at the middle-aged man.

Those on the phone hung up. People looking at their smartphones turned them off. Those chatting with companions stopped talking.

The plaza became silent in an instant.

No one glared at the man with the megaphone in annoyance.

Most people looked at him with blank expressions, their eyes dark and heavy.

—Over there, in hell, countless souls still moan, unable to escape the eternal cycle of reincarnation! They are your acquaintances, your family members, and in a broader sense, they are also reflections of yourself! Let us pray for them! O Goddess!

—O Goddess!

The people who had been silent in the plaza suddenly shouted in unison.

“A similar experience? ...I see.”

I quickly deduced the answer.

“I get it. There’s an old myth that sometimes when people dream, they experience the underworld. It’s not that the underworld is inside the dream, but rather that dreams can occasionally connect you to the underworld for a brief moment. This place must possess the attributes of the underworld.”

“As expected of Comrade Secretary! That’s correct! Although the anomaly defines this place as the living world and that place as the underworld...”

It’s a complex and elaborate trap, no doubt.

However, I could now see a glimmer of a way to overcome it.

All that’s required is to prove which is reality and which is fantasy. I just need to reveal that the world I live in is the true reality.

“Everyone! Rejoice! Your heartfelt repentance has reached the goddess!”

A middle-aged man shouted.

“From now on, you no longer need to look down upon hell! Lift your heads! Raise your eyes! Look up to the sky and behold!”

The people who were prostrating in the square raised their upper bodies. Instinctively, I followed their gaze.

To the sky.

“The holy visage of the goddess!”

And I saw it.

――There was no sun in the sky.

Why didn’t I notice it sooner?

If I had to give a reason, it was because modern people aren’t in the habit of looking directly at the sun.

Additionally, given the angle of the sunlight, it seemed as if the sun was high in the sky, making it difficult to look up at it unless you tilted your head almost 90 degrees.

In short:

If sunlight is shining down from the sky, it’s only natural to assume the sun is there. That assumption held even for me, a regressor.

“......”

What occupied the place of the sun in the sky?

It was a gigantic eye.

Blink.

When the eye blinked slowly, very slowly, the world was momentarily cast in shadow.

Before I looked up, I thought the shadows were caused by clouds passing by, but I was mistaken.

Blink.

Light wasn’t pouring down from the sun; it was pouring down from the eye.

The massive black pupil at the center of the eye was constantly moving, darting this way and that.

It saw me.

“Watch out...!”

The moment the sun-eye, or the eye-sun, locked onto me, everyone in the square turned to stare at me as well.

-......

-......

The residents of this world, who hadn’t noticed me until now, were staring daggers at me.

The light that had been evenly shining on the world suddenly focused intensely on me.

The temperature around me skyrocketed in an instant, and my skin began to melt like candle wax.

“Emergency exit!”

The fairy frantically waved her magic wand.

In my vision, half of Fairy No. 264’s body exploded. But the fairy held onto her wand until the very end.

The next moment.

I was ejected from the dream.

10

“...Hey.”

What greeted me as I returned to reality was the face of a man who would undoubtedly win first place in a contest for “the face you least want to see first thing in the morning.”

“Hey, Doctor Jang. You alive? You didn’t croak, did you...?”

Otherwise known as Noh Doha.

Struggling to open my heavy eyelids, I first saw Noh Doha’s dark circles.

Noh Doha never cared much about fashion, but today he looked even stranger.

He was covered head to toe in what appeared to be chunks of flesh, which felt more like jelly than human tissue.

Upon closer inspection, the Saintess standing behind Noh Doha was also drenched in some sort of solid-liquid hybrid substance.

What in the world is this new fashion statement?—I was about to mock him when Noh Doha beat me to it.

“The fairy that sang you a lullaby and joined you on your dream journey just exploded. Half of its body blew up all of a sudden...”

“Oh.”

He wasn’t kidding.

I turned my head to the side, still lying in bed. Fairy No. 264 was still holding my hand tightly, but the other half of her body was gone.

“...Call Aryeon. These fairies are tough, so if we treat her quickly, she’ll survive.”

The Saintess nodded behind Noh Doha. She must have sent a message via [Telepathy] immediately.

As I adjusted my clothes, I asked:

“Chief Noh Doha. Are there protesters outside right now?”

“Hmm? Yes, there are. Team Leader Yoo quickly suppressed them, though... Curious, isn’t it? That you could hear the noise even while dreaming.”

I stroked my chin, lost in thought.

Seeing this, Noh Doha crookedly asked me a question of his own.

“Thanks to that fairy, we’ll have to redecorate this entire place. What on earth happened in the dream to cause this mess...?”

“Nyx, the Goddess of Night.”

I paused for a moment before answering.

“A forgotten god.”

[Translator - Jjescus]

[Proofreader - Gun]

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