Chapter 15
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Internationalist I
Shin Noah
1
Few things are as important to a person as their mental state.
I already emphasized this in Old Man Sho's anecdote. Even if you know how to split the heavens with a single sword, if your mental state crumbles, there's no saving you.
I, Jang Eui-sa, also poured my heart into mental management.
To introduce my unique management method, it went like this:
For 5 to 7 iterations' worth of cycles—that is, roughly 100 years—I work diligently. I run myself ragged to prevent the world's destruction.
Then for the next 1 iteration, I enjoy life.
I simply abandon the thought, saying 'World destruction? Not my problem.'
I turn my eyes from lives I could save. I don't step into fates I could change. I prioritize only my life, my peace, my amusement.
I use that entire single iteration of about 20 years to heal my mental state, to spend on a pleasant vacation.
It's an event cycle that briefly diverges from the main route—a kind of side story, you could say.
Criticize me for being cowardly if you will, but there's nothing to be done. A human like me has limits to my mental fortitude.
If I hadn't used a method like this, I wouldn't have endured the long regressor life stretching to 1,183 iterations.
As it happened, the 90th iteration corresponded exactly to a 'vacation cycle.'
Truly perfect timing. I needed rest to salvage my mental state that had been flung all the way to Mars by Goyori.
"So I wanted to ask your opinion. How should I rest to earn the praise that I rested really spectacularly well?"
"W-why are you asking me that..."
The fairy trembled violently with its head caught in my grip.
It was the tutorial fairy.
In a normal iteration, I would have swiftly eliminated it before killing Seo Gyu, but this 90th iteration was my so-called sabbatical year. I could act however my heart's compass pointed.
Well, right after the previous 89th iteration where I imprisoned all the fairies and filmed a grand hellish survival program, some of the accumulated resentment had washed away... Anyway.
I captured the tutorial fairy and dragged it to one side of the lobby.
At first the fairy resisted, but after I folded its elf ears twice to make them half-elf ears, it became very docile.
"No, I'm just asking. Thinking about it, I haven't really had a proper conversation with you."
"Hoek. Why did someone this crazy have to be in my assigned zone... Fairy 264 is the most unfortunate fairy in the universe..."
"Oh my. Someone who tries to blow off a civilian's head right off the bat—what's so unfortunate about that?"
"B-but, b-but, if we don't imprint on people that this isn't a joke, it leads to much greater damage and tragedy later! From a utilitarian standpoint, my response wasn't wrong!"
"So you're a utilitarian."
I realized something new.
This too must be the charm of regression.
"Anyway, tell me your opinion about my vacation. You fairies all have your lives held hostage by the Fairy Lord, right? You must be thinking every day that you'd have no regrets if you could just take a vacation."
"Hwieek? H-how do you know that!"
The fairy was startled in my grip.
"You! Are you perhaps a Hoe-Bing-Hwan that the seniors warned about so much, telling us to be careful and wary until our ears fell off?"
"Hoe-Bing-Hwan?"
"Regression, Possession, Reincarnation! Cursed protagonists! Plus prophecy users as a variation! The most terrifying enemies of us fairies! Because of you lot, we fairies are treated as nothing but early-game mobs in literature!"
"Oh. Does that Hoe-Bing-Hwan or whatever actually exist in the fairy world?"
"No? We just appear regularly in classic fairy literature."
So Old Man Sho and I were special after all.
I had hoped there might be more comrades, so I was a bit deflated.
"Is that so. Anyway, I'm not particularly hostile toward your Fairy Lord, so don't worry. You just need to give me advice on a 20-year vacation plan. If it's unsatisfactory, I'll grind your head into fairy juice."
"Hieeek! What terrible wording! I'm confident I'd win even if I sued the Fairy Rights Committee!"
"There's no such thing on Earth."
"What kind of barbaric civilization is this...?"
Eventually, Fairy 264 raised the white flag.
"Hmm, hmm. So you're saying you've been given 20 years of free time? And during that period, you want to go a bit wild?"
"Correct."
Then the fairy wore a resolute expression.
"If 264 were given freedom and gained power as strong as yours, I would want to plunge a revolutionary spear into the Fairy Lord's backside!"
"...."
A utilitarian and a revolutionary fighter.
I realized something new.
Whether this too is the charm of regression... I'm not really sure.
Though the day will come when I mention it, the fairies were actually divided into Republicans and Royalists. Well, that wasn't important right now.
"Plunge a spear in? How? You have explosive seals on your hearts. If you rebel against the Fairy Lord, your heart will immediately burst and your whole body will melt."
"H-how do you know that far... Hmm. No, if you knew that much, it's actually easier to talk. Anyway! The Fairy Lord is a far more vicious absolute monarch than the bourgeoisie! Even if 264's heart were to burst, for the progress of history and innovation of civilization, the Fairy Lord must be subjugated!"
The fairy flapped its arms excitedly.
"Human! Your human race, though physically primitive and weak, has achieved a commendable linear development spiritually! Reading history books about how you beheaded absolute monarchs hundreds of years ago, 264, no, all of us [Fairy Revolution Club] members were deeply impressed!"
So there was such a club.
"Unfortunately, our fairy society is in a desperate situation where self-rescue is hopeless...! But if a strong human like you helped us, salvation through others might be possible! Human! Help us, I beg you to be with us until the day the red flag is planted in the Fairy Lord's navel and waves!"
If this were a game, a notification sound would have chimed with the message 'A new route has opened. Will you help the fairies achieve revolution?'
"Hmm."
My interest was piqued.
There had been one iteration where I fought against the Fairy Lord. To recreate that not alone this time, but with a joint army with the fairies.
But I shook my head.
"Sorry, but I'll decline that proposal."
"What...? Why, human!"
"My body and mind are a bit exhausted right now, so combat routes are a bit... Actually, I'm leaning toward support routes. What I need right now is a warm cup of coffee for a lonely city man, not the bloody tears of a revolutionary charging toward barricades waving a red flag."
"What petit-bourgeois thinking! At this very moment, fairies are killing humans under the Fairy Lord's evil commands against their will! Your compatriots! Can you not see their blood, sweat, and tears? Can you not hear them? Aren't you afraid of Marx's shouting!"
"Sorry, but the country I live in has anti-communism fundamentally ingrained in the national spirit..."
"Dog of capitalism! Betrayer of the people! I curse you!"
"Instead, I can hire you separately, exempting you from curses."
"I pledge eternal loyalty. Master."
Of course, around the 210th iteration, I would actually participate as a guest member of the [Fairy Revolution Club] and fire the opening shot of revolution, but that's a story for another iteration.
I succeeded in hiring the tutorial fairy.
"Um, excuse me... Brother?"
Ah. Right.
For reference, Seo Gyu had been eavesdropping on our conversation the whole time. After all, I had saved him from having his head blown off by the fairy.
Seo Gyu looked at me with eyes that said he was looking at a crazy person.
"So what should I do from now on...?"
"Your ability is running an internet community, and in that community, any awakener can connect even without a network."
"Huh?"
"I think SG Net would be a good name for the community. Good luck."
"Huh?"
I parted ways with Seo Gyu.
I farmed silver bells from the souvenir shop, then piggybacked the fairy. I could feel the fairy tilting its head behind me.
"But human master, what are you planning to use me for after hiring me? World conquest? Revolution? Dictatorship? Ice pick stabbing? After succeeding in your country's revolution, are you exporting the number-two man who achieved excessive merit to other countries under the pretense of an internationalist line?"
I don't know what materials Fairy 264 read while researching Earth to have such distorted prejudices.
But as the fairy said, I am a dog of capitalism.
I planned to dip my feet into the cutting edge of modern consumer culture.
"No."
"Then?"
"We're going to open a convenience store."
2
A 24-hour convenience store.
Before the Gate incident, it was a small store easily found in Korea.
Though it didn't evoke nostalgia quite like neighborhood corner stores, once the world's destruction accelerated, convenience stores too would proudly be registered as 'items of nostalgia.'
-Hey, maknae. Go to the convenience store and buy some Dunhill.
-Huh?
The convenience store joke was commonly used when awakeners teased the maknae.
Judging from my regression experience, surprisingly many awakeners never discarded their wallets even when currency value collapsed.
Rather, people who used to only use debit cards started carrying cash after civilization collapsed.
Partly because cards stopped working... but to them, money must have been a kind of talisman.
The delusion that the world hadn't ended yet. Or a talisman containing the wish that it wouldn't end.
It was quite strange, but when multinational awakeners gathered for operations, there was even a custom of exchanging each other's national currency. Koreans exchanged won, Americans exchanged dollars.
Like soccer players exchanging uniforms after a match.
So at one point, my wallet collected over 30 types of currency.
Why am I saying this?
To emphasize that people not only don't abandon money in a dying world, but also attach tremendous value to 'nostalgia.'
"We're going to create the only normally operating convenience store in the world."
"Hoeh."
Truly an ambitious vision!
I forcibly occupied a convenience store in Seoul (the owner had fled anyway) and proclaimed. It was that memorable convenience store where I first met the Saintess.
Hearing my plan that made one's heart as grand as world conquest, Fairy 264, no, our store's Employee No. 1, blinked.
"What kind of dog-grass-eating nonsense is that?"
"What's dog-grass?"
"If you asked for the most appropriate substitute word on Earth, it would be 'puppy.'"
So it was dog-grass-eating nonsense.
But I was someone who had lived nearly 100 lives. I was an expert at persuading others.
"264. Your world revolution theory has a major flaw."
"Hoek?"
"The world is wide and there are many people. Going around to each one and asking them to join the revolutionary cause is something amateurs do."
I declared with a solemn face.
"True experts don't go find people. They make people come to them."
"...!"
"We will create a convenience store where workers of all nations come on their own feet. This place is the revolutionary base of the Sixth International! You are the first flag of that vanguard, the proud clerk of our convenience store. Whether you serve customers with wholehearted sincerity determines the rise and fall of our International!"
"Store Manager Comrade...!"
The fairy prostrated itself on the still-uncleaned store floor, shedding chicken-dropping-like tears. The fairy's tears had a floral scent, instantly making the interior sweet.
I'd save on air freshener costs.
"I've been harboring a great misunderstanding about Store Manager Comrade all this time! I pledge eternal loyalty!"
"Good. Since this is business for the revolution, I hope you'll dedicate yourself to customer service duties at this headquarters 365 days a year without pay."
"Yes! Without pay!"
Fairy 264 had simply transferred from being the Fairy Lord's slave to my slave, but it looked happy.
If they're happy, isn't that enough?
I stole a political party banner from a nearby intersection.
I turned it upside down and wrote letters with my paint skills that were practically calligraphy. Then hung it in front of the store.
[Our store is open normally.]
It was the historic moment when 'The Sixth International,' humanity's last convenience store, opened at the Seoul Submerged Bridge.
I'm an Infinite Regressor but I Just Tell Stories