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Chapter 18 – Companion I
Chapter 18 – Companion I
Chapter 18 – Companion I
[Proofreader – Gun]
Chapter 18 – Companion I
1
Let’s talk about the guild leader of Three Thousand Worlds.
“There’s a fierceness in your eyes.”
“…”
“Talking about you? The almost sole survivor from Busan Station. You’re known for asking people strange questions all the time.”
My first encounter with Tang Seorin was during the fourth turn.
Unfortunately, at that time, I hadn’t yet mastered [Complete Memory Ability]. I didn’t acquire that ability until the fifth turn.
So, there might be some discrepancies in my recollection of my first meeting with Tang Seorin. Well, I’d rather not admit it, but there’s bound to be some error.
It’s been over a thousand years since that past, hasn’t it?
“What’s your name?”
“…Doctor Jang. That’s my alias.”
“You’re a curious one, going around asking people questions. Not bad. The depth of a person depends on how many corpses they’ve buried in their own heart.”
Perhaps Tang Seorin said, “There’s a fierceness in your eyes,” or maybe “There’s a gun in your eyes.” She might have addressed me as “you” instead of “you.”
It could have been raining that day or it might not have been. I thought I heard the sound of water, but it might have just been the sound of my own heartbeat.
Nevertheless, I can vividly recall the atmosphere of that moment, as clear as the outline of the air.
Because for humans to live, they not only need to breathe the oxygen swirling around them right now, but also the air of the past that has already flowed away.
“How about it? Won’t you join our guild?”
“What’s the guild’s name?”
“Three Thousand Worlds. We’ll shorten it to Three Thousand. My personal ambition is to recruit three thousand Awakeneds someday. Doctor Jang, help me. I need your strength to subdue the Ten Clans.”
The human who was somewhat involved in my breathing process raised the corner of her mouth and extended her hand.
At that time, I had neither the reason nor the luxury to refuse to shake that hand.
“Oh, by the way, whoever joins our guild has to wear a pointed hat regardless of location.”
“…A pointed hat?”
“Yeah. You know the hat that witches wear in fairy tales? That’s our guild symbol. And you have to carry a broomstick with you. Haven’t had lunch yet? I know a great place, I’ll take you there to celebrate your membership.”
“I’ll withdraw my application for membership.”
I couldn’t withdraw.
Later, it was best to switch the broomstick for a staff-sword.
Tang Seorin was cunning, stubborn, and had a taste for local delicacies. People called her the witch of the train station, the founder of the Juga Yeongchang, and the solitary gourmet.
…Come to think of it, the last nickname seemed like one I had given her alone.
Of course, there were other titles I used more frequently.
What could I possibly hide?
At one point, she was my guild leader.
2
Looking back now, it might seem like a joke from the past, but in the very early stages of my reincarnated life – that is, before the 10th turn – there was a boss monster that blocked Korean Awakeneds like a wall of lament.
“Wait. What’s that?”
“Oh, oh… It’s coming this way!”
The Ten Clans.
According to the strange classification system established by a wiki group called the Library Society, it was a city-level danger. Its identifying name was ‘Crawling Baby Cthulhu.’
“Crazy! Why is it so fast?”
“Cthulhu! It’s Cthulhu!”
“What the fuck is that……Alert! Sound the alert first, you bastards!”
There were various opinions on how the Ten Clans came to be called that.
The most plausible theory was that they were called the Ten Clans because they resembled dozens or hundreds of tentacles, wriggling like arms where legs should be.
But personally, I support the story that ‘f**king di*ks’ somehow got mispronounced and stuck as ‘shrimp d*cks.’
That’s how much the first boss monster, the Ten Clans, brought us despair.
“We need to defeat it to reclaim the area south of the Han River and push the front lines that have been split into two into a ceasefire line.”
Tang Seorin didn’t despair.
More accurately, she rallied the despairing Awakeneds and was then appointed as the leader of the guild union.
It could be called the Anti-Ten Clans Union.
The difference from the Anti-Dong Zhuo Union that appears in the Records of the Three Kingdoms is that unlike the original element, Tang Seorin was an extremely capable leader.
“Doctor Jang. You will lead the elite members of other guilds on the front lines and block the movements of the Ten Clans for as long as possible.”
“Understood.”
After learning of Old Scho’s existence, he led the fighters, but before that, I had the unfortunate duty of holding the front lines. It was a moment that hinted at how pathetic the level of the Awakeneds was at the time.
Oh, by the way, during my time as a member of Three Thousand Worlds, I naturally used honorifics when addressing Tang Seorin.
“Yesterday, my deputy died, so I’m a bit behind… Let me hold on for a few minutes, alright?”
“Please hold on for at least 30 minutes. I’ll build up a grand spell to back up the squad.”
“Got it.”
I nodded.
“Sounds easy.”
It wasn’t easy.
-There! There!
The Ten Clans roared.
Exactly 2 minutes into the battle, another hole was punched in my head by the Ten Clans’ tentacles. What could I do? If a highway was laid in the middle of my brain, there was no way to avoid a graceful death.
I lasted for a dragon’s age of 2 minutes. Other Awakeneds had their heads harvested in the blink of an eye. If autumn farmers had witnessed it, they would have admired the skill of reaping crops. I managed to hold on until the end with Tang Seorin.
End of the 4th turn.
Start of the 5th turn.
“Doctor Jang. You will lead the elite members of other guilds on the front lines and block the movements of the Ten Clans for as long as possible.”
“This is damn hard.”
I decided to be more honest instead of showing off in front of the guild leader. Tang Seorin widened her eyes.
“Hard?”
“Yes.”
“I thought with you added to our alliance’s strength, we could easily engage in delaying tactics. Is there something wrong with the data?”
“The data is not wrong. Those Ten Clans bastards are hiding their true power.”
It was bewildering how the world worked. I, as a reincarnated individual with hidden powers, was supposed to deal with this, but the damn boss monster had to go and mess things up.
“The legs it usually brings out are not all there is. Another leg can sprout from inside the body like a tentacle at any time. Honestly, it’s difficult to hold out for even 5 minutes, let alone 30.”
“…Vice Guild Leader. If that’s true, we might have to consider giving up on the strategy altogether, don’t you think?”
“Yes. Let’s give up.”
“Yeah. Let’s do that. Should we flee to Busan?”
“Sounds good. It’s a refuge of tradition and trust, isn’t it?”
“There must be a lot of good restaurants there, right?”
We retreated to Busan. It was a sufficient area to satisfy Tang Seorin’s taste buds, no matter which neighborhood we went to. After all, it was originally our guild’s headquarters.
The problem was that the Ten Clans weren’t stuck to a gate but freely roamed the fields as owners of a truly free soul. Not unlike Tang Seorin, this bastard also toured each region in search of good restaurants. Though the menu was fixed with just human flesh.
After turning Seoul into ashes and wiping across the entire land in zigzags, the Ten Clans showed off their potential to be featured in the Lonely Gourmet series just as much as Tang Seorin.
Originally, this guy only frequented ‘densely populated areas.’ Perhaps he was equipped with the sixth sense of feeling human lives. Thanks to that, the cities on the Korean Peninsula lay in ruins, and the Ten Clans achieved what no politician had succeeded in before, regional autonomy.
All within a mere five years.
– Groooowl!
The Ten Clans roared.
“Damn it.”
We unfolded the final defense line at the Nakdong River before becoming friendly kebabs for the Awakeneds.
Even if we gave up on subjugation, we could all learn the lesson that as long as the Ten Clans remained intact, we were all just living on borrowed time.
[Proofreader – Gun]
End of the fifth turn.
Start of the sixth turn.
“Is… is there no solution to this?”
The fifth turn ended in annihilation by the Ten Clans, but in the grand scheme of my regressed life, it held immense significance. It was when I acquired the [Complete Memory Ability].
From then on, I remembered precisely what I pondered over, whom I met, and what conversations I had.
“Vice Guild Leader, are you available right now?”
“Hmm? Why do you ask?”
As I pondered deeply, feeling as though the world was mocking humanity, it was the world’s irony that opened up a breakthrough that seemed utterly invisible.
“Vice Guild Leader, there’s an outsider here to see you.”
A guild member with silver hair, named Yoo Jiwon, opened the corridor door of the KTX train and spoke to me.
Yoo Jiwon, recruited as my deputy since the fifth turn, was a talent I made good use of. He’s a real psycho, but I’ll mention that later.
“An outsider? Where are they?”
“They’ve come all the way to our train station platform.”
“But what about the security team?”
“They tried to stop him, but they couldn’t because this visitor is exceptionally strong. So, they thought it best to just let him wait on the platform.”
“Hmm.”
We’re having this conversation on the KTX train because… uh… the headquarters of the Three Thousand Worlds Guild was always on a train.
It wasn’t because the 3,000 guild members, including me, were railroad otakus who felt metaphysical beauty in a lump of scrap metal that could no longer be moved.
This was solely the preference of our boss, Tang Seorin.
To her, every time the guild moved to a new area, she would make the finest train in the neighborhood, seen as the most luxurious mode of transportation, her base of operations.
In her words, “Isn’t it romantic for a witch to spend time on a train?”
You could tell from the fact that she wore a top hat that she wasn’t entirely mentally sound either.
Anyway, back to the point.
“So, what’s the name of this guest?”
“Yes, his name is… Eminem… Shofehauer? Oh, Schopenhauer.”
There was a murmur.
My deputy tilted his head as he heard the noise coming from the radio.
“He seems German?”
3
Emmett Schopenhauer.
Swordmaster. Sword Star.
An Awakened who had earned numerous aliases and, even more, carved the heads of monsters.
But to me, he was just an old man called Scho.
“Um… Hello? What brings you here?”
“….”
Scho quietly looked at me.
Honestly, my first impression was, ‘Wow, he looks like a dirty personality.’
It was still early in the sixth turn.
The old man from Germany, who came to Korea with his wife only to be caught up in the Gate incident, hadn’t learned Korean. So, he attempted to communicate sporadically using English, body language, and a smartphone translator.
If only I were good at English, communication wouldn’t have been a problem, but unfortunately, I lacked any talent for languages.
“Fucking monster.”
“Fucking monster… Could it be the Ten Clans? Are you talking about the Ten Clans? Lurkers? Tentacles? All wriggly-wriggly?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Sorry, I can’t speak English.”
Scho grimaced.
It was a very frustrated expression.
“Different. Operation.”
“?”
“You died a long time ago. Here.”
In the KTX dining car, which was also used as the guild reception area, a map of South Korea was spread out on the table.
Tap. Scho pointed with his finger at one particular spot.
The line from Seoul to Gwacheon. It was a place where we tried to mess with the Ten Clans in the fourth turn but got messed up instead.
“But I didn’t die there.”
Swoosh.
Scho’s finger pointed downwards. His index finger stopped precisely at the Nakdong River.
“Five years. A huge difference.”
Scho’s gray gaze was fixed on me.
Maybe. No way?
My heart raced. We stared at each other for a while across the table. And we realized that our heartbeats were flowing at the same pace.
The old man’s mouth slowly opened.
“Return?”
Even if I was a complete novice, I couldn’t misunderstand the intent behind that question.
I silently drew a number on the table with my finger.
6.
The old man’s expression finally relaxed as he chuckled. It was a number that had repeated throughout his life.
Perhaps to accommodate my inability to understand English, Scho’s sentences were not long. The old German swordsman knew how to convey strong emotions in short phrases.
“My friend.”
With Scho joining, the situation on the battlefield changed drastically.
If you were to randomly pick the most powerful among all Awakeneds in history, it wasn’t always Scho.
But now, with over a thousand turns passed, it was clear that Scho’s potential was off the charts.
“Are you sure we should put this person on the front lines?”
“Yes, Guild Master. I’m sure.”
“Hmm. Just looking at appearances, it’s hard to trust so much. If the Vice Guild Master is sure, well… Still, we should probably test their skills, right?”
“Of course.”
50 minutes later.
“Right away, we’ll make this person a key asset for this operation.”
Again, Tang Seorin was a capable leader.
Even amid the chaos of the Three Thousand Worlds Guild, with Awakeneds being sent out, she didn’t seem to care at all. She even got an interpreter and stationed them next to Scho.
“Interpreter, could you ask how he feels about the cone hat?”
After conversing with Scho for a while, the interpreter’s expression darkened.
“I’m really sorry, but this person isn’t interested in joining the guild. They prefer to be alone.”
“Really? That’s a shame. But didn’t he just mention something about a cone earlier? Did I mishear?”
“Oh, he might have been joking about something, but I couldn’t understand. Sorry. Haha.”
“That could be it. Vice Guild Master, isn’t there a famous sundae soup place nearby? Maybe Germans like soup too?”
“As long as there’s no turnips, they probably eat everything well, don’t you think?”
I observed as the interpreter faintly laughed beside me.
He was a wise human.
Back then, I didn’t know German, so I just let it go, but Scho’s actual statement was, ‘What the hell kind of bullshit is that? I mean, that Harry Potter knockoff hat you guys wear? If you keep it up, you’ll end up raising an owl. ‘Alohomora’, you moron! Even my dog at home does not use that shit.”’
For the record, I agree with that opinion as well.
The fact that I didn’t join the Three Thousand Worlds Guild from the 7th turn and started wandering separately with Scho was largely due to that damn cone of hers. That fashion… no, not even fashion. There was no one besides Tang Seorin who could pull off Witch cosplay.
Of course, it was natural.
Tang Seorin wasn’t just doing Witch cosplay, she was a true sorceress who claimed to be a Witch and a multi-talented Awakened.
“Doctor, Swordsman. Hold on for 25 minutes… no, make it 30 minutes, no matter what.”
South of the Han River. The cursed land where countless civilians vanished without a trace.
There, Scho, myself, Three Thousand Worlds Guild Master Tang Seorin, and a total of fifteen hundred Awakeneds gathered, including military units and civilian supporters. If you counted the military units and civilian supporters, there were even more.
We stood on the frontline, where almost all available forces in Korea had gathered for battle.
-Here we go!
The now familiar roar echoed out.
From a distance, the massive form of the Ten Clans emerged. The horizon shook. Ruined buildings couldn’t withstand its thrashing and collapsed like dominoes.
“Can we hold on for 25 minutes?”
“It’s difficult.”
As the representative of the strike force, I spoke.
The difference from previous turns was that now I could add a word to this statement.
“But it’s doable.”
Tang Seorin nodded.
“After it’s over, let’s go find our favorite restaurant. Oh, by the way, what’s the signature dish of Seoul? Something more local.”
“Well, there’s nothing particularly famous.”
“Is that so?”
Hm, Tang Seorin murmured as she looked at the horizon.
Human-like tentacles wriggled endlessly.
“Looks like it’s going to be squid sashimi from now on.”
“Oh, squid soup isn’t bad.”
“Yeah. Arrange the troops. Today, we’re reclaiming Seoul.”
Battle commences.
[Proofreader – Gun]