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Chapter 213

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The Opposite Ⅹ

16

Everyone, at some point in their childhood, must have imagined it.

“Wouldn’t it be awesome if the world stopped and I was the only one who could move freely?”

To Homo sapiens, slacking off is almost a primal instinct.

Who hasn\'t had the fantasy of becoming a millionaire by robbing a bank while time stands still?

That adolescent daydream from my childhood has now, after a few thousand years, come true.

"The civilization really does look intact. Ah, there\'s a Starbucks over there... Yes, it did have that green logo."

"Indeed."

We strolled together, just the Saintess and I, through the desolate domain of the alien god, now colored in shades of black and gray.

“Since the advent of the Void, all the logos have been corrupted into Cthulhu-like squid horrors, so it’s hard to remember what they originally looked like. But yes, they used to have that mermaid shape back in the day.”

"...And there are so many people. So many."

"This was before the population density of the Korean Peninsula dropped to 1/20 of its current level."

"How can all these people just sit in cafes and restaurants during the middle of the day instead of going to work?"

"Hmm, perhaps they\'re working on their laptops?"

"Oh, electronic devices haven\'t been corrupted by the horrors."

Like anyone in an apocalypse, the Saintess and I were living in a time isolated from civilization.

As a regressor, I was forever cut off from my memories before the 4th turn.

The Saintess, a time stopper, had forgotten much after living alone for thousands of years.

But rather...

"By the way, it\'s curious that you haven\'t forgotten about me, Saintess. How have you managed to retain your memory of me for 2,000 years?"

"..."

A subtle expression appeared on the Saintess\'s face, as if she was either trying to smile or suppressing one.

"That\'s a secret. But more importantly, Doctor Jang, would you like to step into that café over there?"

"I don\'t mind... but while it\'s fine to look around, you mustn\'t ingest anything. Do you remember the myth of Persephone? Those who consume food from another world cannot return to reality."

"Yes, I\'ll keep that in mind."

For a while, we enjoyed ourselves around the Seoul Station area in various ways.

We entered a café and placed coffee on the table (without drinking it). We sat side by side, taking photos with a smartphone (though nothing showed up). We browsed books in a bookstore...

\'Now that I think about it...\'

There were a few times when the Saintess let go of my hand, causing even my time to freeze, but for the most part, we kept holding hands as we walked around.

\'This is the first time I\'ve been out and about with the Saintess like this.\'

We\'d gone to Beijing to stop the butterfly effect before, but even then, we mostly walked through dark subway tunnels.

\'I wonder if there\'s a way to keep the current Saintess beyond this turn?\'

That thought suddenly came to me.

Should I call it a thought? It was more like an emotion that suddenly sprang up within me.

‘She\'s someone who has withstood thousands of years alone to prevent the world’s destruction. Surely, she\'d be able to understand me better than anyone.’

Though I hadn’t shown it until now, I too yearned for someone to share the endless days and nights with on this lonely island of time, someone who could provide the human warmth I desperately needed.

The 267th turn of the Saintess, who was now holding my hand... Wouldn\'t she be more suited as a companion to a regressor than anyone else I\'ve met so far?

‘Yes, definitely.’

One was a time traveler, the other a time stopper. One was imprisoned in the flow of eternity, the other in its stillness.

In a world where no one could understand—or even perceive—us, only we could truly understand each other.

The fact that one of us was a being on the level of an alien god didn’t matter at all.

If worse came to worst, even if humanity worshipped the Saintess as their new deity, it wouldn’t matter to me.

‘But how could I... Ah, wait. What if I became the Saintess\'s apostle, her shrine maiden?’

A brilliant idea.

Since we were both awakened to time, if we found the right way, we might be able to establish a relationship like that of a god and her shrine maiden.

Then, we could be together.

I saw hope. And if there was one thing I, Doctor Jang, was the world\'s foremost expert on, it was finding hope.

“Doctor Jang.”

“...”

“Doctor Jang.”

I felt a cool touch on my cheek, at about 15°C.

Noticing it, I realized the Saintess had placed her hand on my face.

“…Oh, sorry. I was lost in thought for a moment. What is it?”

“I think it’s time to hunt Nut.”

“Hmm.”

Indeed.

No matter how much we had stopped time and had fun roaming around Nut\'s domain like this...

An alien god was still an alien god. The moment we let our guard down, it might strike back in an unimaginable way.

Reluctantly, I nodded.

"You’re right. Let\'s finish this quickly."

“Yes. But Nut is positioned up there, like the sun in the sky. How do you plan to hunt it?”

"It’s simple. We just walk up there."

With a swish, I manipulated my dark aura to create a ‘footing’ before me. As the platforms formed in a domino-like sequence, a staircase leading to the sky was completed in an instant.

It was literally a path to ascend to the heavens.

The Saintess murmured beside me.

"...The way you hunt anomalies feels a bit like overpowering them with brute force, doesn\'t it?"

"What’s the point of having an aura if you don\'t use it? I trained so hard just for this. Now, please follow me."

"Yes."

Tap.

We both stepped onto the translucent staircase at the same time.

10 meters, 20 meters. As we ascended, the platforms below us disappeared, and new ones formed above.

Sometimes the steps were dark-colored, made from my aura, and other times they shimmered transparent, when the Saintess took the lead.

How long had we been walking up?

In a world where time had stopped and the word "how long" no longer had any real meaning, I suddenly looked down and saw that the ground had receded far below us.

"Aha."

I laughed, and the Saintess tilted her head.

"Why are you laughing?"

"No reason. I just realized I’ve become a bit more like you, Saintess."

"...?"

“Didn’t you say you could look down on all things from an omniscient perspective? Look. Seoul, the entire Korean Peninsula, is spread out below us. I’ve finally caught up to your view, Saintess.”

“…”

Still not used to viewing the world in first-person, the Saintess\'s gaze remained slightly angled toward me.

Instead, the pressure of her hand gripping mine tightened slightly.

“Yes, Doctor Jang.”

We continued to climb the stairs.

Whether fortunately or unfortunately, we didn’t actually need to climb the full 150 million kilometers to reach the point in space where the sun was positioned.

The atmosphere.

Surprisingly, Nut’s “eye,” which had replaced the sun’s position, was located near the stratosphere.

“Indeed.”

Swish.

I reached out and “touched” the “sky.”

The atmosphere was covered by a semi-transparent glass-like barrier. Nut’s eye was embedded in this glass barrier.

“The universe has vanished. There’s nothing but the sky.”

“Instead, constellations are engraved on the glass. Shall we try breaking it?”

“No, even if we break through the glass barrier, there will likely be another layer of glass beyond it. Several layers of glass must be enveloping the Earth.”

The geocentric model.

An ancient celestial belief that humanity had long trusted in. The hypothesis that the Earth is the center of the universe, and that all other stars rotate around it.

The goddess of the night sky, Nut, had descended upon this place with that belief.

Perhaps the same phenomenon was occurring in the reality that had begun to be tainted by Nut.

Eliminating the entire universe, which humanity didn’t inhabit, turning the surface into hell, and establishing this place as the only world.

It was violence befitting an Alien god.

“Hah, if not for you, Saintess, the whole world would have fallen into Nut’s embrace.”

“……”

“Then, I will pierce Nut’s eye.”

I drew my staff sword, Doha, and without a moment’s hesitation, stabbed it into Nut’s “eye,” the “sun” of this great void.

The sun split apart.

The Alien god couldn’t put up any resistance.

Due to the halted time, Nut couldn’t even utter a death cry. If I were to restore time now, the extermination would be complete.

“It’s done. Saintess, please release the time now. And when we return to reality, could you spare a moment for a consultation? I need to discuss a turnhole for escaping the turn of repetitions...”

There was no response.

“Saintess?”

I turned to look beside me.

The Saintess was silently closing her eyes.

Still expressionless, still bearing the scent of water, still holding my hand.

But.

“……”

A bright red stain.

In this colorless world, a crimson lotus flower was somehow blooming right in the center of the Saintess’s chest.

My entire body froze.

As my body turned pale, my mind began to whirl at an incredibly fast pace. The sound of my brain spinning was so loud that my ears felt numb.

This can’t be happening.

Could it be that the Alien god retaliated? Was there a system in place where a curse would activate upon their death, targeting the one who killed them? But if that were the case, why was it the Saintess’s body and not mine—the godslayer who stabbed the eye...

“I’m sorry, Doctor Jang.”

In my consciousness, stained with white noise, the Saintess’s calm voice resonated like a single thread.

“There’s actually one secret I hadn’t told you.”

Despite the red spider lily blooming from her chest, there was no pain in the Saintess’s voice.

Regret. Apology.

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Only such emotions, barely discernible to anyone but me, were faintly mixed in her voice.

The water-like voice spoke.

“I am a priestess of Nut, the Alien god.”

A moment passed.

When I blinked for just a moment, the steps of aura that I had been standing on had vanished.

“……!”

My body suddenly lost its balance, and I collapsed. Just as I thought I was falling from the atmosphere, time halted again and then resumed.

The Saintess, kneeling on the steps with both knees, was holding my hand as I tried to fall from the sky. Looking down at me.

As if barely catching someone falling from the edge of a cliff.

“Saintess, what in the world is this...!”

“Please don’t move.”

The Saintess spoke.

“Please don’t activate your aura. Don’t recreate the stairs. Don’t take any action towards me.”

Even as she spoke, blood was still flowing from the Saintess’s chest.

If Nut’s eye and the Saintess’s heart were linked, then the wound on both would be exactly where I had stabbed with my sword.

“If you show any signs of moving, I’ll immediately let go of this hand and stop time.”

“……”

“You once said that Nut and I were opposites. That Nut, who creates the underworld, and I, who halts time, are fundamentally different. But you were wrong.”

Drip—

The blood that had flowed down from her chest trickled down her clothes and onto my cheek. It was where the Saintess’s hand had covered just moments ago.

“That’s not what matters. What’s important is whether we see the world where people live as ‘hell.’”

“……”

“Surely you know. That I’ve long called the world a hell.”

Suddenly.

—This world is hell.

The 117th turn.

The words the Saintess spoke to me in the prison of infinity flashed through my mind.

—The world is hell, but no one takes responsibility.

—If time can’t be moved forward, it must be stopped.

—Why should I allow time to flow in such a world?

—Hell isn’t 20,000 yojanas deep. That’s impossible.

—Just beneath the surface.

—Just one layer beneath that planet has been entirely made into hell.

Ah.

Back then too—yes, back then too, the Saintess was in space. She was sitting in the “stellar world,” symbolized by the moon, talking with me.

Is the world seen as hell?

Can one manipulate the universe at will?

Does one possess an omniscient viewpoint, looking down on the world from above?

Is one capable of opposing and ambushing a “time ruler,” a regressor?

The answer to all these is “yes.”

In these four aspects, the Saintess and Nut shared identical traits.

If Alien god could freely establish a base within a [time-seal] grave, isolated from the world’s flow...

If some awakened one could freely move alone in a world that had come to a standstill.

It was only natural to speculate that there might be an intrinsic connection between the two.

"Doctor Jang must have thought that I reached the realm of the alien god by training my aura for 2,000 years, but that\'s a bit off."

"What do you mean, off...?"

"I\'m sure I\'ve spent hundreds or thousands of years in other turns as well. Always observing people with time stopped. But the reason I became particularly strong in this turn is because the power of the alien god linked to me has grown stronger."

"......"

"I am an avatar of Nut."

Drip.

Blood brushed past my cheek and fell into the abyss below.

"You could say I\'m the personality of a god without one. So you can\'t kill Nut alone. You must also hunt me."

"Please wait! We can seal away only the alien god!"

I shouted desperately.

"Yohwa, the student council president of Baekhwah High School, was like that too! The alien god Endless Hell was sealed within her personality..."

"We don\'t get along well."

The Saintess shook her head.

"Endless Hell would never have noticed even if the turns repeated. But Nut is different. Nut is the alien god of the turn of day and night, the repetition of days, and time. As the turns repeat, instead of resetting, Nut will only grow stronger."

"......"

"Even if you somehow manage to isolate Nut within my mind, Nut\'s power would grow stronger with each turn. My heart would become increasingly contaminated as well, Doctor Jang."

As my lips trembled and words failed me, the Saintess spoke.

"Are you truly certain that I won\'t one day, at some moment, suddenly turn the world into hell?"

"......"

"Doctor Jang."

Caress.

The Saintess wrapped her hands around mine, hanging at the edge of the void.

Her touch was cool, but in the thinning air of this stratosphere, it was the only warmth.

"Please, don\'t worry. I\'ll keep time stopped here."

For a moment, I didn\'t understand what the Saintess was saying. My mind refused to comprehend.

"Pardon...?"

"I\'m sorry. But stabbing time won\'t end it."

The Saintess\'s voice was quiet.

"There’s only one way to kill an anomaly of time. I\'ll stop it here—the anomaly trying to interfere with your regression, the void—I\'ll hold it here. In this place."

"Hold it here?"

My lips parted.

"For how long, exactly?"

"......"

"This is the 267th turn. Already. And yet, there’s no sign of saving the world. It could take hundreds, perhaps more than a thousand turns. Until then... Until then, do you intend to keep this void frozen?"

"Everything is but a moment."

Caress.

The Saintess bent down and gently stroked my cheek this time, wiping away her own blood with her own warmth.

"I will stop everything here, including myself. So even if you regress to the next turn, this place will remain frozen. As a result, the alien god, I, will no longer be able to interfere with your regressions."

"......"

She left something unsaid.

To stop the time of the entire world, including herself.

That meant even the time stopper herself would be frozen.

A truly perfect seal.

An absolute subjugation.

Even if a thousand years pass, ten thousand years pass, a hundred million years pass, and 256 quadrillion years flow by, no one will notice. The world will move on as if nothing had happened, in the indifferent flow of time.

Except for one person.

Me, the regressor, who would remember this moment for eternity.

"Doctor Jang."

"......"

"Thank you. Because you were there, I didn’t give up. As long as you’re out there, I won’t see this place as hell."

I could feel it.

The Saintess was about to let go of my hand.

She was trying to exile me from this void, to [seal] this place\'s time along with herself, to isolate herself from the world.

That in the 267th turn, the Saintess existed here, and would continue to exist here, eternally, suppressing an alien god.

No one would ever know.

That there was once a human who existed here, wishing that the world would not turn into hell.

"This."

My decision was purely impulsive.

"Take this with you."

I removed the ornament from my left arm.

And placed it on the Saintess’s wrist, which was holding my hand.

The Saintess tilted her head in confusion.

"A bracelet...?"

"A silver bell."

Ting.

The silver bell rang. Lightly.

"It’s the first thing I acquire whenever I wake up at Busan Station. It’s just a souvenir with no special powers... But it will surely serve as a link between you and me."

"......"

"Please wait for me. No matter how many turns it takes, no matter how long, I will come to save you. I promise."

"......"

"I will find a way to break this seal without you destroying the world, and I will return."

At that moment.

The Saintess smiled.

The Saintess who had not once looked me in the eye since we reunited after stopping time for 2,000 years, finally did. Clumsily. With one hand, she held my right hand, and with the other, she held my cheek.

For the first time, like a child who had just learned a new gesture, she slowly adjusted the angle of her head, lowering it, aligning the angles of her eyes with mine.

The world\'s achromatic colors quickly narrowed between us, filling everything with black and white.

"Okay."

A moment of pause.

The warm color of deep water lingered on my lips for a brief moment.

"I\'ll see you in a little while."

She withdrew.

When I opened my eyes, a thin glass barrier, truly a thin glass barrier, was now between the Saintess and me.

The Saintess, smiling on the other side of the glass, was frozen in place, reaching out her hand. Like a black-and-white photograph.

‘Ah.’

I, who had lost hold of the Saintess\'s hand, simply fell.

No, in truth, it was the opposite. The Saintess’s frozen world, having let go of my hand, was receding into the abyss.

I reached out desperately, calling for the Saintess, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t cross into the achromatic world.

And in the next moment.

I returned to reality, where she no longer existed.

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