< Episode 5. Villain (2) >
The men nervously stepped back, expecting him to pull out a weapon.
But what Yoo Joonghyuk took out was something unexpected.
「"It's highly unlikely."」
He placed two small beads on top of a crumpled snack box.
「"But if a man named Cheon Inho comes, give him these."」
Soon, darkness swallowed Yoo Joonghyuk's black coat, and his shadow disappeared.
I felt a shiver run down my spine.
Suddenly, I wanted to ask the kkoma Kim Dokja next to me, are you feeling the same way?
When I turned around, he was looking at me. His eyes widened in disbelief, and his mouth
twitched at me.
You are not supposed be here.
At that moment, I felt someone grab me by the nape of the neck and pull me away. The screen
turned off in front of my eyes, and my consciousness blackened with it.
However, even as my consciousness faded, I vividly remember the last thing I saw.
The kkoma's name tag pinned to his chest. The name tag clearly said so.
Kim Dokja 37.
*
"He's awake!"
With a bright phone flash, my vision gradually returned.
The hard floor of the platform. People huddled around, peering at me.
I groaned softly and blinked my eyes open.
"Inho-ssi!"
Kyung Sein tearfully grabbed my shoulder. Beside her, I could see Dansoo ahjussi nodding his
head in approval, and Bang Cheolsoo with black eyes.
I groaned and pushed myself up.
"Heewon-ssi is—"
I turned my head and saw Jung Heewon with her eyes tightly closed.
Kyung Sein sobbed and said.
"Heewon-nim carried Inho-ssi on her back. We were going to send a rescue team, but...."
The words I couldn't read were written all over her body. Countless scars on her forearms and
scorched knees. Dirt covered her entire body.
Jung Heewon had walked all this way carrying me on her back.
"Don't worry. I gave you first aid. The big wound is almost healed."
Then I realized that I felt fine. It was strange. I was definitely on the verge of death.
As if she noticed my desbelief, Kyung Sein said.
"I fed the two of you 'Elaine Forest's Essence'."
"Ah."
"Yoo Joonghyuk... gave it to us."
I remembered the scene I saw in my dream earlier. The scene where Yoo Joonghyuk left
something on the floor.
I guess it wasn't a dream after all.
But when I thought about it, it was funny. Even though he's the one who hurt Jung Heewon and
I, he gave us medicine.
「"Don't forget what you're supposed to do. Don't make me regret hiring a scumbag like you."」
It's probably because he thought I was useful.
[A constellation who hasn't revealed their modifier is shaking their head.]
I guess my rehabilitation project wasn't a total failure after all.
Bang Cheolsoo seems pretty happy.
Dansoo ahjussi briefly explained what happened after I disappeared. Most of it was what I had
seen on the theater's screen.
"What exactly happened on your side? Did you really fight Yoo Joonghyuk?"
I sighed lightly and began to tell Kyung Sein and Dansoo ahjussi what had happened.
From the time I pushed the two of them when I sensed danger, to the time the poisonous
rhinoceros broke through the tunnel, to the time Yoo Joonghyuk single-handedly chopped it to
pieces.
"Isn't Yoo Joonghyuk kind of...?"
When Yoo Joonghyuk and Jung Heewon fought.
"Wow, Yoo Joonghyuk, I didn't see him that way, but that was cowardly. Honestly, fighting at
this time is too unfavorable for Heewon-nim."
To when I got eaten by an ichthyosaur while trying to save Jung Heewon.
"Where have I seen that story before?"
When I signed a contract with Bihyung in the ichthyosaur.
"Mate, you're not Kim Dokja, are you?"
My plan with Jung Heewon to escape from the ichthyosaur.
"I should have been there!"
How Jung Heewon awakened when we were escaping.
"How in the world did that happen...."
"Heewon-nim awakened to what?"
After explaining that much, I felt like Yoo Joonghyuk, who had repeated the same story over and
over again.
"Anyway, that's what happened."
"You really struggled. Good job."
"Inho-ssi, you must have gotten a lot of rewards...."
It was only when I saw Kyung Sein asking with shining eyes that I remembered the rewards.
[There are currently 3 unclaimed rewards.]
[You can claim the hidden scenario 'Serpent Slayer' reward.]
[You can claim hidden scenario 'Commander Slayer' reward.]
[You can claim the constellations' sponsorship reward.]
There really were a lot of unclaimed rewards. But right now, I had more urgent matters to attend
to.
"By the way, have you two been in contact with Yoo Joonghyuk?"
"Eh? No. We just saw him from afar."
Apparently, the quick-witted Kyung Sein had used her [Sixth Sense] to avoid an encounter with
Yoo Joonghyuk. And Dansoo ahjussi, who was next to him, seemed to have benefited from it as
well.
I added, somewhat relieved.
"Good job, you must never contact Yoo Joonghyuk in the future."
Kyung Sein tilted her head at my words, but then nodded as if she understood.
"I see what you mean. I honestly thought I could get away with talking him down, but when I
saw him in person I realized he's really crazy. And Kim Dokja is even crazier for barging in on
him like that."
Well said.
I don't think these two will do anything unexpected. However, Dansoo ahjussi's expression is
strange.
"Is he really such a bad guy?"
"What?"
"I just suddenly had that thought. Even though he did hurt Inho-ssi... In fact, from Yoo
Joonghyuk's point of view, Cheon Inho has always been a villain."
That's fair. We're seeing Yoo Joonghyuk for the first time, but Yoo Joonghyuk has already met Cheon Inho
in the last round. So from his point of view, it might be natural to antagonize me.
"Jiyoon always said, Yoo Joonghyuk's actually a nice guy, and I'll definitely marry him."
Ahjussi said, as if approving of his future son-in-law.
"After all, he gave us the Elaine something, since he's the main character I don't see why he
should be treated so badly...."
Common sense tells me not to listen to Dansoo ahjussi.
It would have been the case if this world was the 'Omniscient Reader' that we know.
"Do you remember why we went to the Oksu Station?"
He nodded.
"We didn't meet Yoo Sangah, Lee Gilyoung, Lee Hyunsung or Han Myungoh."
"Oh, come to think of it...."
"Do you know what that means?"
Dansoo ahjussi still looked unsure. But Kyung Sein's expression was hardening a little.
I decided to make it easy for him.
"This is not the 「Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint」 we know."
"What do you mean?"
"To be more precise, this isn't just any 'Omniscient Reader'. The
we know won't exist here."
Dansoo ahjussi, who had finally realized the situation, opened his mouth. Kyung Sein's eyes
widened in shock.
"This is...."
"We're in 'Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World'."
「Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World」.
The work-inside-the-work (作中作) of Omniscient Reader and the 3,149 chapters novel read by
the protagonist Kim Dokja. We are now in that ruined novel.
Kyung Sein stammered.
"H-How do you know that, Inho-ssi?"
"Because I saw Yoo Joonghyuk's Attribute Window."
"Do you have [Character List] or something like that?"
"Yes. I happened to get it."
Kyung Sein looked at me with a blank face, then at ahjussi, then at Bang Cheolsoo flirting with
Dayoung's mother in the distance, then suddenly became contemplative and said.
"Wait, then... This Yoo Joonghyuk isn't in the third round?"
"Exactly."
In other words, the Yoo Joonghyuk of this world is not the Yoo Joonghyuk we know from
'Omniscient Reader'.
As if thinking of something, Kyung Sein's expression suddenly changed.
"Wait a minute. Now that I think about it, isn't that a good thing? If he had regressed more, he
would grow faster, right? In fact, the 1,863th round Yoo Joonghyuk was so strong that he
became an outher god."
Dansoo ahjussi chimed in as if he'd remembered something.
"The man who reached the end of the world... The one who became a god himself... I
remember that too. I'm pretty sure Jiyoon had that glued on the front of her desk. The Sneaking
Schemer...."
"Secretive Plotter. Anyway, Inho-ssi. Isn't it too early to assume the worst yet?"
Certainly, the Yoo Joonghyuk of 'Ways of Survival' could have been stronger than the Yoo
Joonghyuk of the original.
In fact, after 1,863 regressions, Yoo Joonghyuk becomes strong enough to reach the 'Final Wall'
alone.
Even if he didn't necessarily passed 1,863 rounds, Yoo Joonghyuk's combat power becomes
exponentially stronger in the second half.
The problem is.
"That's on the second half of his regressions."
It would have been better if it was the second half, or even the last part.
In the main novel, there is also a scene where Kim Dokja enslaves Yoo Joonghyuk in the 1,863rd
round. While I wouldn't have been able to feed him soil like Kim Dokja, I would have tried something
similar.
But in this round, there was no chance of that.
It was something I could say because I met him face to face.
"This round doesn't work in our favor, because this round's Yoo Joonghyuk is the worst Yoo
Joonghyuk ever."
"The worst Yoo Joonghyuk? How many times have he regressed?"
Throughout the entirety of 「Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint」, there is one Yoo Joonghyuk who
makes everyone shiver.
If you possess someone in 'Ways of Survival', you should never get close to him, no matter what.
I remembered the lines of the Shin Yooseung's who came as a disaster in the third round.
「"You, who wanted to be acknowledged by Yoo Joonghyuk, died in the sea you loved so much.
You were horribly slaughtered by the Japanese who hated your sponsor.... Do you know what
Yoo Joonghyuk said after losing you?"」
"In the future, sea battles will be a bit difficult."
Kyung Sein's eyes widened at my words.
I continued.
「"You saved the lives of countless people and protected Yoo Joonghyuk to the end. Then you
were hit with the breath of the iron blood dragon and scattered into a handful of ashes. Do you
know what Yoo Joonghyuk said then?"」
"I lost a bad shield."
Those lines were Yoo Joonghyuk's dark story, one of the best in 'Ways of Survival'.
Finally realizing what I was talking about, Kyung Sein's lips trembled.
"It's not true, is it, Inho-ssi? Please, please tell me it's not."
Perhaps, only in this world line, Yoo Joonghyuk could never be said to be a better man than
Cheon Inho.
A man who sacrificed all his colleagues, even turned them into disasters, just to end this Stream>. 「What Yoo Joonghyuk did was worse than murder. Thousands of years. This period of time was enough to make a person collapse and their ego to wear down. Shin Yooseung endured all that time and finally became a 'disaster'.」 I blinked slowly, recalling the round's number I had seen in Yoo Joonghyuk. "This world's Yoo Joonghyuk is the '41st round'." The Yoo Joonghyuk of this world is the worst villain in the universe, one who exterminated all his colleagues. Author's Note So scary