Chapter 212 - The Antipode IX

15

If you asked me which Korean had the easiest address in the world to find, I would pick Yu Jiwon without a moment’s hesitation.

Suppose civilization on the Korean Peninsula was intact, and the presidential system was still running smoothly. Then Yu Jiwon would live near the Blue House.

Suppose the Holy State of the East went completely off the rails, marched south, and founded the Holy Korean Empire. Then Yu Jiwon would be standing beside Mo Gwangseo Christ, delivering a congratulatory address.

If, by some miracle, former Busan mayor Jeong Sang-guk sincerely begged Lee Hayul for forgiveness, rallied the ethnic Koreans living in Japan, formed a multinational coalition army, and successfully returned to Busan—yes. Yu Jiwon would be on the bow of the very first ship to reach the waters off Busan, her silver hair streaming in the wind.

Ultimately, Yu Jiwon was a living, breathing political weathervane for Yeouido. Wherever she lived was the modern-day Yeouido, Mount Bugak, and Yongsan.

If Yu Jiwon packed her bags and moved somewhere, you could safely take it as a sign that some tremendous upheaval was occurring in the peninsula’s power structure. You know how animals sense earthquakes before they happen and flee? She was an animal attuned to power.

“This is the magic mirror.”

And so I found Yu Jiwon’s quarters as naturally as breathing. They were exactly eleven meters from the private room of Noh Doha, commander of the National Road Management Corps.

“Oh. Have you been here before? I imagine you visited all sorts of places during those two thousand years alone.”

“No. I’ve seen it through [Clairvoyance], but this is my first visit.”

The Saintess shook her head.

The decor was rather stark. Maps of the Korean Peninsula and the Japanese archipelago in every size covered the walls, alongside hand-carved chess pieces and an empty armchair by the window. Apart from the books on [Romance of the Three Kingdoms] lining the shelves, the room had almost no ornamentation.

Incidentally, if you opened those [Romance of the Three Kingdoms] books, you would find the names of my favorite characters thoroughly underlined in yellow every time they appeared.

At this point, it was frightening. I sincerely hope none of you ever becomes entangled with a hyperintelligent psychopath on Yu Jiwon’s level.

“Actually, even now, I don’t feel as though I’m seeing it in person at all.”

“Pardon? What do you mean?”

“Around the thousand-year mark, my field of vision became fixed in an ‘omniscient perspective.’”

Ah. Come to think of it.

“Do you mean you look down from above, like controlling units in StarCraft?”

“One moment.”

The Saintess let go of my hand, then took it again. In other words, she had activated [Time Stop] and gone somewhere while I was petrified.

“Yes, something like that.”

“... Did you just stop time and secretly go look up StarCraft because you didn’t know what it was?”

“Mr. Undertaker,” the Saintess said calmly. “Insisting that I understand an analogy involving a game released in 1998 is a somewhat unreasonable demand.”

“...”

She’d said she was my age! She’d said we were about the same age now!

A searing sense of betrayal gripped me.

How on earth had the peninsula’s national folk pastime acquired the infamous nickname GeezerCraft? Why not mock yut as Geezer Sticks while you’re at it?

A people who forget their history and traditions have no tomorrow. There were reasons civilization on the Korean Peninsula had collapsed.

“Besides, my memory isn’t as good as yours. I forgot things like game titles more than a thousand years ago.”

“Ah. I’m sorry. Because of my memory, I sometimes fail to consider other people’s perspectives.”

“It’s all right. Anyway, that’s why even now, things like making eye contact with you are a little difficult.”

“...”

“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it, either.”

Back in run 107, when she had fallen and become the Executor, the Saintess had said exactly the same thing.

‘... So that’s why she kept holding my hand and seeking physical contact instead of exchanging looks.’

She could barely establish her own position through sight. From her omniscient perspective, she looked down on everyone equally, herself included.

That was why she clung all the more fiercely to touch. Only the sensations against her skin still offered tangible proof that she was alive here on earth.

‘Hmm. I’m glad I hugged her.’

Still carrying the Saintess bridal-style, I used aura alone to tear apart the blanket covering the magic mirror. A smooth, full-length mirror emerged.

In a normal run, the moment it saw my mug, the mirror would have greeted me with, “Why don’t you drop dead right now?” But—

“You believe this mirror is a passage into the ‘Reverse World,’ correct?”

“Yes. But with time stopped, it can’t perceive us.”

Astonishingly, neither the Saintess nor I appeared on its surface. It felt as though we had suddenly become vampires.

I pressed my palm firmly against the mirror to test it, but there was no response. My hand didn’t pass through it or anything of the sort.

“Could you briefly release Time Stop? Two seconds at most should be enough. Please touch the mirror with me.”

“Yes.”

The moment the Saintess closed her eyes—

“Die right now.”

As soon as time began flowing again, an automated response burst from the mirror. Our reflections appeared properly on its surface, too.

But even with our palms pressed against it side by side, our bodies still could not pass beyond the glass.

‘A failure?’

Two seconds later, time stopped again.

At first glance, we seemed to have accomplished nothing, but I wasn’t disappointed. When dealing with anomalies, you had to examine every possible approach.

“Saintess, could you bring tutorial fairy No. 264 and Yu Jiwon here?”

“Yes.”

The next moment, after the Saintess had merely let go of my hand briefly, Fairy No. 264 and Yu Jiwon were lying at my feet.

“I’m back.”

“Thank you for—?”

Only then did I realize something perfectly obvious.

‘Wait. The Saintess is still in my arms. That means... she climbed out of my arms, went wandering outside, then climbed back onto my arms before taking my hand again?’

“...?”

When I stared down at her, the Saintess tilted her head, her expression blank with incomprehension—though that was her usual expression.

A short cartoon in the style of 1920s Disney automatically began playing in my head.

The Saintess releasing my hand without expression. The Saintess hopping down from my arms. The Saintess returning with the fairy and Yu Jiwon. The Saintess climbing my arms like a ladder, then taking my hand again.

“What is it, Mr. Undertaker?”

“... Nothing. Anyway, please take that fairy’s hand too and release it from [Time Stop].”

“Yes.”

One tenth of a second later.

“Hweeeeeeek!”

Freed from time’s petrification, the fairy screamed and convulsed.

“Wh-what on earth is happening?! I can’t breathe...! No, it feels like my very existence is being thickly painted white in real time...! Pweh! A truly blasphemous flavor! Blasphemous squishing! Fairy’s dying! Hwek! I’m dying! I’m dead...!”

“Here. I’ll protect you with aura.”

“Oh. Suddenly I feel better. Fairy lives.”

The fairy, whose eyes had looked ready to pop out at any moment, gave its head a brisk shake.

“Eek. Comrade General Secretary. What is this counterrevolutionary being, being? Just sharing a space with it makes me feel like I’ll be crushed into fairy porridge...”

“Whatever you might think, she’s our ally. Treat her with respect.”

“Hweh. Are you in your right mind, Comrade? This must be how devoted Party members felt back when they heard the General Secretary of Steel had signed a nonaggression pact with some aspiring art student.”

“Then you know perfectly well what a general secretary specializes in. Shall I call someone else?”

“Eek! Please, anything but a purge...! I swore eternal loyalty to you, Comrade General Secretary!”

I gave a brief explanation of the situation.

“So, I need you to set up a dream. First, see this silver-haired human here? We’re going into her dream.”

“Hweh.”

“The dream’s setting needs to be exactly the same as the room we’re in now. See the mirror, in particular? Make sure it’s there.”

“Understood... But are you really planning to enter the dream with this being?”

The fairy kept stealing glances at the Saintess, sweating profusely. If you rendered that in a speech bubble, it would probably say, “Treading carefully...”

“Yes.”

“But Comrade, the moment I let this being into a dream, my mind will become crispy toast with 120% charcoal aroma, you know?”

“I’ll protect you as much as I can. Once the job’s done, I’ll give you a hundred Cheonhajangsa sausages apiece, too.”

“Only the brave win the beauty!”

We listened to the lullaby and entered Yu Jiwon’s dream.

The dreaming Yu Jiwon was frozen in her seat by the window. The Saintess’s [Time Stop] was operating even inside the dream.

The Saintess suspended her authority.

“... Hmm?”

Yu Jiwon blinked her eyes open.

“Your Excellency Undertaker? And the Saintess as well? What brings you to my private quarters?”

“This is a dream, Jiwon.”

“Pardon?”

“You can see the tutorial fairy over there, can’t you? We entered your dream through a dream demon’s lullaby.”

“Hmm? Oh? Hmmm? ... Aha.”

Yu Jiwon looked around in fascination.

“Just as I would expect of Your Excellency Undertaker. An awakened of your caliber can enter anyone’s dreams at will. However much a treacherous courtier practices honeyed words and ingratiating looks in reality, they cannot pursue falsehood even in their dreams. Who would dare hide their true nature from Your Excellency’s radiant, righteous insight?”

“You, please. Hide yours.”

“If Your Excellency has visited my dream, you must have a reason, and an urgent one at that. How may your humble subordinate assist you?”

This little shit knew far too well how to change the subject when talking to me.

“First, come look at the magic mirror with me.”

“Understood.”

Without raising a single question, the power-seeking psychopath walked over and whisked away the mirror’s covering.

Me, the Saintess, Yu Jiwon, and the fairy. With all four beings reflected on its surface, the mirror suddenly looked cramped.

“Die right now.”

“Die right now.”

The mirror recited its automated response as though someone had pressed its seizure button.

“Now.”

“Yes.”

As the Saintess and I reached out together—

“Die right n—”

CRASH.

With a faint sound of breaking glass, our hands passed into the mirror as far as our wrists.

We hadn’t smashed the glass. Its surface was intact. Only the sound of shattering had rung out.

“...!”

The Saintess’s transparent aura flared once. An expression of surprise.

It was her own language, now that she had lost the ability to express emotion through her eyes and facial muscles.

I was the only person who could understand that lonely foreign language: the transparent, delicate expressions of an aura that wasn’t even visible.

So instead of speaking aloud to her, I extended my aura and drew hers toward it. I shaped my sentences to her grammar.

‘Let’s go, Saintess.’

‘Yes, Mr. Undertaker.’

A wordless language.

Still holding hands, I stepped into the mirror first, and the Saintess followed, adding one half step to another.

CRASH.

CRASH.

CRASH!

As we crossed a mirror barely an eyelid’s breadth thick, the sound of shattering panes rang out countless times.

Perhaps that was the noise of a God of Alienation lashing out after detecting foreign matter attempting to invade its domain.

But the moment the Saintess followed me inside and stopped the flow of time once more—

CRA—

Even the sound of the shattering mirror fell silent.

When I raised my head, we were standing side by side in the middle of Seoul Station, holding hands.

Hundreds of passersby were all petrified. Like a frame from an old black-and-white film, the world was painted gray and white.

The Saintess’s authority had blanketed the Reverse World.

I smiled.

“We did it.”

At the center of the sky was the God of Alienation.

High overhead, where the sun should have been, Nut, the goddess of night, was ‘frozen’ with her eye wide open.