Chapter 136 - The Pretender I

1

If you’ve listened to my stories this far, you’ve probably noticed, however vaguely, that they lack a certain element essential to genre fiction. An element so important that without it, people might ask why you’re even bothering to act like the protagonist.

Namely, “monopolizing lucky breaks.”

Take Oh Dokseo in run 555, for instance. The moment she decided she’d entered the world of a novel, wasn’t this her very first thought?

[Oh Dokseo: Well, anyway. The only thing that matters in the Busan Station arc is how early I can get my hands on the elixir hidden in Haeundae.]

Ah, lucky breaks! What a sweet sound.

An elixir that raises your level of mastery in one stroke. A secret manual buried halfway down a cliff for some reason. Getting an early start on educating the future strongest person in the world—who would otherwise grow up with a thoroughly ruined personality—and attempting to gaslight them into depending on you. Farming items whose value no one yet knows.

Casually snatching up such things, then coolly murmuring, "Lucky me." That is the dignity bestowed upon a protagonist of genre fiction.

Why hide it? I, the Undertaker, was rather lucky in my younger days, too. In fact, you could fairly call me a “luck hunter” who actively sought out lucky breaks.

If I entered a particular void, that meant there was a rare item you could farm only there. Anomalies were no different. I’ve kept this a secret from you until now, but “Tenlegs’ heart” was actually an incredible rare item. Slice it up and eat it raw, and you can easily build up sixty years’ worth of internal energy. (It tastes rather like tuna belly.)

But whatever I might have done in the past, I no longer obsess over such items. Quite the opposite: I actively avoid them. Unless they’re truly essential, I pass them up. And if they’re too good to pass up, I give them to the others rather than use them myself.

“Wait... Why on earth?”

Oh Dokseo once frowned when she heard about that policy of mine.

At the time, she was taking a short break from writing down my stories. She seemed a little low on energy, so I’d gone to the special trouble of trimming some Tenlegs’ heart and making her Tenlegs sushi.

“It really does taste like tuna sashimi...” she mumbled around a mouthful, then continued.

“Mister, are you a hipster or something? Do you think a protagonist hogging all the lucky breaks is too predictable?”

“Of course not. I’d love to monopolize them if I could. I have [Continue], after all. The more of those things I consume, the more I stand to gain.”

“Then why...? Oh! Is it more efficient for your companions to eat them than for you to?”

“Hmm. That’s part of it, but... It’ll be quicker to show you.”

I enjoyed teaching Dokseo about anomalies like this. It would all come in handy later.

I opened my subspace suitcase, took out an item along with a notebook, and set them firmly on the table. Dokseo’s eyes widened. True to her otaku credentials, she apparently recognized its shape.

“... What’s this? Isn’t it [The Monkey’s Paw]?”

“Oh. You recognized it right away.”

The Monkey’s Paw.

This anomaly, which literally resembles a severed monkey’s paw, grants a person up to three wishes. But, being an anomaly, it doesn’t grant them in any normal fashion. Anyone audacious enough to seek an easy ride through life will suffer “misfortune” in one form or another.

Wish, “Give me eternal life!” and it won’t give you eternal youth, allowing you to savor an everlasting senior lifestyle as you keep aging forever.

Wish, “Give me eternal youth and eternal life!” and you’ll remain perfectly intact even after Earth meets its end, free to enjoy an infinite journey through space all alone.

Wish, “Give me eternal youth and eternal life, but let me take my own life whenever I want!” and it thoughtfully arranges for horrifically awful, devastating events to keep happening around you, as if asking, “Still not going to kill yourself?”

An unfair screw job, you say? Yes. That’s exactly what it is. That very unfairness is the essence of the anomaly called [The Monkey’s Paw]. Making a wish without side effects is impossible to begin with. You could call it the dark-evolved alternate version of the magic lamp with a genie trapped inside.

“Strictly speaking, this is both a monkey’s paw and a human hand.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“By the time I found it, someone had already made three wishes.”

“Yikes.”

Unfortunately, this apocalyptic world was one in which the Monkey’s Paw’s curse had already been fully realized.

“Dokseo. Suppose someone found [The Monkey’s Paw]—someone who thought they were clever, but didn’t yet know what anomalies were really like. What would they wish for?”

“... You get three wish charges, right? Then I’d first wish, ‘Remove the side effects of my wishes.’”

I smiled.

“Good. And then?”

“Uh... ‘Remove the limit on the number of wishes’? Three isn’t enough. A lot of stories these days say you can’t make wishes like that, but I’d give it a shot.”

“Wow. How could they be so identical?”

“Huh?”

“I’ll explain later. Anyway, what would your final wish be?”

“Hmm...”

Dokseo ate another piece of the remaining Tenlegs sushi before answering.

“It’s a tough choice, but I’d wish, ‘Give me good luck.’”

“...”

“The Monkey’s Paw brings its user bad luck, right? This would be a counterattack. If I maxed out my luck from the start, it would suppress the bad luck itself.”

I could hardly keep from smiling wryly. Dokseo’s answer was textbook. Cheon Yohwa, Lee Hayul, and Seo Gyu had given me similar answers when I asked them. The details differed, but the objective was the same: eliminate the Monkey’s Paw’s limitations and side effects.

“You’re right. Whoever found it would probably have made much the same wishes.”

“Oh, yeah.”

I took a sip of café au lait, then looked down at the notebook lying beside the Monkey’s Paw on the table.

“And that’s why monopolizing lucky breaks became impossible for me.”

2

I first found the Monkey’s Paw on Jeju Island. At the time, I was exploring a tutorial dungeon that had appeared at Seongsan Ilchulbong. It was a void themed around a [School Trip], and chronologically, it was one of the earliest tutorial dungeons to appear, along with [Hundred Flowers Girls’ High School].

Apparently, inside the tutorial dungeon, Seongsan Ilchulbong had grown to the height of Everest. Naturally, by the time I arrived, the tutorial had long since ended and Seongsan Ilchulbong had returned to its ordinary size. I was searching the long-abandoned testing grounds to see whether there were any items worth salvaging.

‘Quite a few corpses here.’

No particular items caught my eye. But, befitting a former tutorial dungeon, skeletons and corpses littered the place from the entrance to the hiking trail onward.

‘Anyone I know, perhaps?’

Checking the corpses’ cards and IDs, I found that most of those near the entrance were Japanese. There were roughly sixteen bodies.

That wasn’t strange. The Busan Station Tutorial Dungeon I’d emerged from had also contained several Japanese people, including Uehara Shino. Jeju Island was closer to Japan than Busan, so more Japanese people would have been forcibly summoned there.

“Hmm?”

That was when I found a somewhat unusual corpse near the summit.

First, it was covered in thick hair. No, more than that—it looked as if someone had applied hair-growth treatment to its entire body. At a glance, you might have mistaken it for an animal carcass or a bush. Its location was especially peculiar, too: on a slope far from the tourist trail, hidden at just the sort of angle that would keep it out of sight.

‘Another tutorial casualty?’

The corpse was tightly clutching a thick notebook in both hands. Wondering whether it was this person’s last testament, I picked it up.

――――――――――

《Day 1》

I’m keeping this diary just in case the worst should happen.

――――――――――

The testament was written in Japanese, not Korean. With a rustle, I turned the first page without much thought.

――――――――――

The world has gone strange.

It was strange before, but now it’s even stranger. People are dying so easily it’s absurd.

But I’m lucky! When I was dragged into this unidentified place, a “Monkey’s Paw” was lying right in front of me.

Thanks to watching <The Monogatari Series> years ago, I knew what it was the instant I saw it.

Who knew my ex-girlfriend’s otaku hobbies would ever help me?

Thanks, Sena. I’ll even forgive you for cheating on me with another woman.

The Koreans around me didn’t seem to know what it was. Afraid someone else might catch on, I quickly put it in my backpack.

――――――――――

The Monkey’s Paw?

I looked down at the corpse again. Its entire body was so shaggy that even its face was difficult to make out.

‘Hmm. Now that I look at it, it does resemble monkey fur...?’

Had this person made wishes on the Monkey’s Paw, only to fall under the anomaly’s spell in the end?

With another rustle, I kept turning the pages.

――――――――――

《Day 2》

What should you wish for if you ever get a “Monkey’s Paw”?

I once talked about that with Sena.

I thought we were just killing time. Who knew I’d really have such luck?

It feels like destiny.

Sure, the “Monkey’s Paw” has side effects, but leaving it unused would be stupid. People are dropping dead right now. I have to find some way to survive, at least.

So many people are dying that I can’t bear it unless I tell myself something like that. I want gyudon and pineapple.

――――――――――

Borrowing an anomaly’s power.

“Hmm.”

That was an idea someone not yet accustomed to the apocalypse might have. But even after hundreds of runs, the most I could use were things like the tutorial fairy and Inunaki Tunnel. Even those came with numerous restrictions. This was not a path a beginner should recklessly take. Still, I could fully understand the impulse to gamble when your survival was at stake.

I turned the page with a rustle and read on.

――――――――――

《Day 3》

The Japanese people summoned here got together and formed a party. A girl named You was powerful.

But she insisted that we open our backpacks and share our resources. Is she crazy? This is private property.

I want to join another group, but most of them are Korean, so communicating is difficult. I asked for one night to think about it.

That woman, You, stared at me expressionlessly and told me to do what I wanted.

She really is unpleasant. Fine, I’ll do exactly that.

Tonight, I’m going to use the “Monkey’s Paw.”

――――――――――

A page rustled.

――――――――――

《Day 4》

For several days now, I’ve been meticulously planning the wishes I’ll make on the “Monkey’s Paw.”

Listed in order, they are as follows.

1. Whatever wish I make, please do not create any side effects for it.

2. Please remove the limit on how many wishes I can make. If removing the limit is impossible, please consider this wish unmade.

3. Please give me good luck. Let me avoid all “chance misfortunes,” such as being killed by a rock that happens to tumble down.

Ultimately, the key to this series of wishes is the third one. In other words, “good luck.”

I considered other cheat abilities, but rejected them all in the end. No matter how powerful an ability I gained, I’d be helpless if this Monkey’s Paw brought me “misfortune.”

Good luck. In the face of overwhelming luck, any ability or misfortune is bound to pale.

The “Monkey’s Paw” might try to pull something while I make my wishes one by one.

It’s basically a demon, after all.

So I’m going to write all three wishes on paper and present them at once.

Honestly, I don’t know how this will turn out. I think I’ve prepared well, but just in case, I’m leaving this diary as a last testament.

If I fail, I hope whoever finds this diary later will use it more wisely.

Here goes.

――――――――――

“...”

Before I knew it, I was absorbed in this unnamed awakened’s diary. Given that the person before me had become a corpse, they had probably failed. But there was as much to learn from failure as from success.

This awakened had followed the most fundamental principle of dealing with anomalies and voids: leave records for others. That made this corpse and me as good as comrades trying to navigate the apocalypse together. As I turned the testament’s pages with a rustle, my touch became a little more respectful.

――――――――――

《Day 5》

I did it!

While I was on night watch, centaur monsters attacked from the dungeon. But for some reason, they never noticed me and only went after the others.

Half the group died, but I didn’t get a scratch. Even You, the strongest among us, was injured.

What’s amazing is that wish number two came true properly, too! Wish limit removed! Hooray!

Once I felt certain that I’d never die some stupid death no matter what happened, I suddenly relaxed. Now even looking at You’s face doesn’t particularly annoy me.

Amazing. This is real.

I wished on the “Monkey’s Paw,” “I want to eat gyudon.” When I killed a monster, it dropped gyudon. It was so slapdash I laughed.

I got six whole bowls and shared them with the others in the group. You’s expressionless face went wide-eyed.

Yeah. That’s exactly the role that suits you. Just an extra.

Our numbers had been halved, but the power of gyudon cheered everyone up. It reminded me how precious food is.

Thanks, Sena! This is all thanks to you! I’ll even forgive you for four-timing me while we were dating!

――――――――――

The diary’s handwriting conveyed an unmistakable tremor. In my mind, I pictured someone who had gone all in with their own death as the stakes, finally succeeding and cheering. A declaration of victory, of sorts. But unlike the diary’s owner, I remained on guard.

‘If this person had really won, they wouldn’t have ended up a corpse.’

The joy continued through days six, seven, eight, nine, and ten. From day eleven onward, the entries themselves became sporadic. When I turned to a page much farther back, the diary finally resumed. And now her handwriting was trembling for a different reason.

――――――――――

《Day 6??》

Strange. Something is strange.

When I opened my eyes today, the centaurs were attacking. It felt vaguely familiar, and then I realized the situation was exactly the same as on day five.

Half the group died. You was injured in the exact same place. Every event repeated identically.

――――――――――

For a while, the diary’s owner seemed to somehow maintain her composure. She became diligent about writing again, recording events and warning signs in greater detail. But when “Day 6??” repeated yet again, she could no longer keep her reason intact. Apparently, she hadn’t been all that mentally resilient to begin with.

――――――――――

Strangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrangeStrangeit’sstrange

――――――――――

Some pages were packed with nothing but the word “strange.” Then the diary fell blank for another long stretch. Suddenly, in the middle of a blank page, there was a single sentence in handwriting that had abruptly turned cold.

――――――――――

Time is turning back?

――――――――――