Chapter 240 - Episode 31. Big Brother (5)
Chapter 240: Episode 31. Big Brother (5)
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“Hey. Are you alive?”
[Yes. For now.]
“Am I alive too?”
[You are very much alive.]
This was a joke Jaehwan and Beastrein had made up. They had created it 28,765 years ago, but they could not think of anything more useful, so they kept using the same joke.
[Am I still not broken?]
“You’re not broken.”
[Though I do feel like I’ll break soon.]
“Yeah. I feel like I’ll die soon too.”
After answering, Jaehwan drew a long line through the air. Another small hairline crack appeared in his Unique World. Hairline cracks of different kinds densely filled the space of his Unique World.
There were 9,624 cracks of the same kind as the one Jaehwan had just made.
It meant they had repeated that same conversation 9,624 times.
[How about we drop the formal speech for once?]
“You still have something to say after doing that for two hundred thousand years?”
[Are we doing it or not?]
“Fine.”
As if it had been waiting, Beastrein poured out a flood of words.
[Hey, Jaehwan. I’m your senior by 784 years, so let me tell you something. You can’t do this to me. Huh? Huh? You... goddamn... bastard... What the hell is this? Huh? Just kill me, you bastard!]
Was this the 654th time they had had this conversation?
Without a word, Jaehwan drew another hairline crack in the air.
“I spent around two thousand years inside the tower I made while I was in 《Chaos》. So when it comes to life experience, I could be considered your senior.”
[I was in that tower too, you know?]
“Were you?”
[And you were not in that tower for two thousand years. At most, it was a few hundred years.]
Jaehwan’s hand stopped as he drew another crack. Then he drew a crack of a new color in the air. It meant this was a new kind of conversation.
“How do you know that?”
[I’m a demon. How could I not know? It looks like you made that tower with that human Apprentice. As far as I know, there is a limit to the time multiplier that can be amplified through the 《Tower of Nightmares》. One thing is certain, it was not two thousand years. You probably felt as though you had lived for two thousand years because your mind believed it had been two thousand years.]
“I thought so.”
Thinking back, his sense of time inside that tower had been somewhat confused.
Once a time multiplier exceeded a certain point, it became difficult to calculate. The two thousand years had only been true under the assumption that the Tower of Nightmares’ design was accurate.
“Then perhaps this place too...”
[No. Two hundred thousand years have definitely passed here.]
“I thought so.”
[Yeah, you idiot. Look at that clock.]
Jaehwan silently looked at the ‘clock’ hanging in his Unique World.
200,001 years, 113 days, 11 hours, 27 minutes, 39 seconds... 40 seconds...
He had created the 「Part」 shortly after the first 150 years, when he had grown tired of counting time himself.
The clock was not the only 「Part」 Jaehwan had made. He had also made Parts that resembled a television and a bed.
Of course, since this was a place where he could not use 《Little Brother》, every memory shown on the television came from Jaehwan himself.
On the screen, Jaehwan was fighting the Ice Dragon King on the ninety-ninth floor of the Tower of Nightmares.
[That was fun, wasn’t it?]
“...”
[If you could go back, would you? If you could return to that time...]
“Playtime is over.”
[Yes, sir.]
The television screen went dark, and darkness returned.
Lying in the silence, Jaehwan muttered, “I sometimes think this.”
[What do you think, sir?]
“What if I’m still trapped inside the Tower?”
Beastrein silently listened. A thick, deep darkness clung to Jaehwan’s voice.
“I used the Stone of Regression with my other Companions on the seventy-seventh floor of the Tower. Then I fell into a dream world created by a Dream Demon, and I’m still struggling in it now. In truth, 《Chaos》 and the 《Abyss》 are worlds I created. And you’re watching me from the hundredth floor of the Tower.”
Beastrein laughed weakly.
[That is right. Jaehwan pathetically used the Stone of Regression back then. That is why you are still wandering through a dream.]
“I thought so.”
[Could you stop saying, ‘I thought so’?]
Jaehwan did not answer. Instead, he added another crack to the air. This made the forty-second time they had had this conversation. The count was still relatively low.
[But you don’t like things like that, do you?]
“What?”
[Counting numbers. I thought you hated numbers.]
Jaehwan’s hand, suspended in the air, drifted without knowing where to go.
“I did.”
He had.
He hated levels, loathed statuses, and even despised numbers themselves. Yet now he was counting numbers to survive each day.
Maybe the 《System》 was not at fault.
It was like that worn-out argument about money. Maybe people who used it badly were bad, while the System itself had done nothing wrong.
Then why was he here?
Jaehwan spoke in a strangely hollow voice.
“It has been too long.”
[It has.]
“Maybe that is why I became like this.”
[Do you want to give up?]
“Not yet.”
Even so, Jaehwan had not given up yet. If anything, he steeled himself at the start of every day so he would not give up. He had done that without missing a single day over the past two hundred thousand years. It was a length of time he could not endure without renewing that resolve.
What if this had been Earth? What if it had been 《Chaos》, or even the 《Abyss》?
Would two hundred thousand years have felt this long even then?
During those two hundred thousand years, there had been two chances to escape this space.
The first was one hundred years after he entered it.
The second was after ten thousand years.
Jaehwan suspected an ‘exit’ opened whenever the time branch reached certain multiples.
The problem was that the exit did not lead toward 《Big Brother》.
It led back to the 《Abyss》.
Looking at the view beyond the exit, Jaehwan could estimate the time multiplier between this place and the 《Abyss》. Astonishingly, not even a full day had passed in the Abyss while two hundred thousand years had passed here.
When the exit first opened, Jaehwan had been able to see the backs of his Companions moving away through the opening.
Because of the enormous difference in time multipliers, his Allies’ retreating figures looked like a frozen photograph.
It was the sight of them turning away after seeing him off.
Watching them, Jaehwan swallowed the emotion rising in his throat.
He could return to that world whenever he wanted.
At that moment, Jaehwan understood why Maiad had been doomed to fail. He also understood Maiad’s warning to be careful of time.
What had Maiad thought as they endured each day after challenging this place 127 times?
“I should sleep for a while.”
Jaehwan spoke as he silently drew another crack.
Beastrein answered.
[You should. But no more than one hour.]
Perhaps Jaehwan had already fallen asleep, because there was no response. In the silence, only Dokbul’s low hum eased Jaehwan’s loneliness.
* * *
One million years passed.
His intermittent Stab training continued, but he had abandoned any proper routine long ago.
Beastrein’s nagging could sometimes be heard. Jaehwan answered at times and remained silent at others. Long silences stretched on.
A few days earlier, when another passage to the 《Abyss》 had opened, Jaehwan and Beastrein had fought bitterly. Jaehwan had refused to yield in the end.
The exit home closed.
By their calculations, at least another ninety-nine million years would need to pass before the next exit opened.
[Jaehwan. I have reached my limit.]
There was a limit to the amount of time a being could endure. No one knew exactly what that limit was, because there were almost no beings who had lived for such a length of time.
But Beastrein now knew.
Beastrein had reached that limit.
[I think I will enter Dormancy for a while.]
Dormancy.
Jaehwan had already heard about the ability demons possessed. Beings who lived for ages sometimes fell into long sleeps to preserve their identities, and the dormancy demons possessed was one kind of such sleep.
“What am I supposed to do, then?”
[Heh heh. Jaehwan must take care of himself.]
“You’re a cold bastard.”
[Where would a damn demon’s true nature go?]
Beastrein spoke that way, but did not sound comfortable.
[If you put your mind to it, you could do it too. You could make something like Dormancy through a Setting...]
“If I fall completely asleep, there is no point. Besides, Dormancy is a sleep where you do not know when you will wake.”
[That is true...]
Jaehwan had not come to this space to sleep. Somehow, he had to find a new way to reach 《Big Brother》.
[Jaehwan truly is remarkable. I hope you continue living until I wake again.]
“Okay.”
[After you have thought you might die around one hundred thousand times, if you begin thinking that you truly cannot endure any longer, wake me up.]
“Get lost already.”
Beastrein did not answer.
* * *
In the year 1,300,000, Jaehwan stopped practicing Stabs.
Instead, he began studying 「Settings」. If even the strongest Stab in history could not pierce this space, then 「Settings」 were the only answer.
He analyzed and dismantled basic Settings one by one, whether they belonged to the enhancement, manipulation, or law categories.
Advancing while understanding every law contained in each 「Setting」 required tremendous effort, but Jaehwan had an abundance of time and an indomitable will.
And so, Jaehwan gradually came to understand the gods’ 「Settings」.
* * *
In the 1,500,000th year, Jaehwan began to doubt his own intelligence.
He had created countless 「Settings」 and reproduced astonishing 「Parts」. His knowledge of Settings now surpassed even the Three Ancient Gods. One and a half million years was enough time to achieve such things.
There would not be a god in the entire 《Abyss》 who knew more Settings than he did.
He had even succeeded in repairing the broken 「Deus Ex Machina」 to some degree, and through 「Gestalt’s Eye」, he learned how to resist the time density.
That was not all.
He could now split 「Void Sword」 into more than ten swords and wield them.
But he failed to establish contact with Catastrophe through Void Sword. Perhaps because of the excessive time density, communication with every zone, including the 《Abyss》, was blocked within this space.
Jaehwan unleashed 「Fall」 from ten Void Swords at once. The Void Swords cleaved through the darkness with terrifying force, but they ultimately failed to open another dimension.
It still would not work.
Darkness that could not be broken by 「Deus Ex Machina」, 「Gestalt’s Eye」, or even 「Void Sword」.
Even Jaehwan, who had mastered countless Settings, could not discover the nature of this space.
Still, he had a few guesses.
‘This space is related to the final stage of Awakening.’
Otherwise, it made no sense that Jaehwan, who had achieved 「Proof」, could not interfere with it.
And there was one more possibility.
‘Perhaps the 《Tower of Nightmares》 was created based on this place.’
Jaehwan gently brushed the fine particles of darkness at his fingertips and thought about the Dream Demon who must have been the first to step into this darkness long ago.
Dokbul moved through the darkness and left another hairline crack in the air.
* * *
In the 1,700,000th year, Jaehwan looked down at his hands.
His mind was blank. No thoughts came to him, and he did not want to think of anything.
How long had he been sitting there in that stupor?
His cheeks were wet.
Jaehwan realized that he was completely exhausted.
* * *
One million eight hundred thousand years passed.
More precisely, it had been 1,802,532 years and 167 days.
Jaehwan stopped doing anything.
Footnotes:
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