Chapter 78
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The Promoted II
Shin Noah
"What?"
"Your Excellency. Now that I think about it, I haven't really enjoyed my life all that much until now."
Yoo Ji-won said.
"Even if I were subjected to a time seal and repeated 'the happiest day,' I don't think that happiness would objectively hold much value."
Uh...
What is this guy saying?
"While other ordinary people spend their sealed time having happy days with their families or canoodling with their lovers, I would at best be eternally repeating the day I got accepted into university or the day I ranked first in my department. Just imagine it, Your Excellency. Is that truly the most valuable happiness? I cannot help but feel unjustly treated."
"No... What the... So what are you trying to say to me?"
"Respected Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency. Please, in the next cycle, inform me in advance that you are a regressor, a prophet and savior who promises the gospel of an eternal day. Then this wretched lamb will run about frantically to create the happiest day possible, in order to personally prepare the heavenly days it will comfortably enjoy."
"...."
Silence filled the barracks.
"Uh, so... if I understood correctly, you're saying I should use the time seal on you, but before that, you'll personally orchestrate the happy day you'll repeat forever?"
"As expected of Your Excellency. Such brilliant comprehension."
"Are you seriously out of your mind?"
"Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency! I will serve you like a loyal dog until the day this world perishes. So please, I beg you to make this promise with this worthless subordinate."
"It's already almost completely destroyed! No, Ji-won. I'm sorry. This Vice Guild Master was wrong. Actually, I was lying. Common sense, there's no way someone like a regressor exists, right?"
"I have always trusted Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency, completely. The friendship we've built isn't light, is it? Of course, the next cycle's me might be extremely foolish and might not recognize Your Excellency as the savior. In that case, just say 'I know you killed a person when you were 15 and dismembered the body to throw it in Bukhansan's minari pit.'"
"What? You killed someone in middle school? No, more importantly... Hey! Don't grab my pant leg, let go! Huh? Hey, let go! Oh? I said let go! Hey! Vice Commander Yoo! You crazy bastard!"
Living as a regressor, I've experienced countless lunatics, but Yoo Ji-won was the first psychopath who actively tried to use my regression solely and thoroughly for his own pleasure and happiness.
Even now, having reached the 1183rd cycle, upon reflection, there was no one else like that bastard Yoo Ji-won.
What was even more surprising... this guy didn't just run his mouth; he truly offered his loyalty to me until the very moment his life ended.
-Gr̷o̴o̴o̴a̴r!
In the 5th cycle, I offered my head just 2 minutes after starting the fight against the Ten Clans.
However, there were plenty of Awakened who died before me in that battle. Among them was Yoo Ji-won.
"Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency! Danger!"
He even took a tentacle from the Ten Clans flying at me on my behalf. He popped out from the side and served as a human shield.
I was dumbfounded.
Because even if he hadn't intervened, I could have dodged that attack just now.
If there had been a competition called 'Dog Death of the Year Award,' it would have been a magnificent scene worthy of being a finalist.
If the protagonist of that scene hadn't been my direct subordinate who had been through everything with me, I would have honestly been willing to clap and laugh.
"Hey... Vice Commander Yoo, no, Ji-won... What kind of new bullshit is this now...?"
"Cough."
Yoo Ji-won vomited blood with a clean hole punched through his chest.
His blue eyes shot out a serious gaze that would never be seen again in this world as he looked up at me.
"Next cycle... Your Excellency, the promise..."
Thud.
And then he died.
"...."
This is driving me crazy.
4
It was absurd, but I wasn't cruel enough to ignore the dying words of someone who had died in my place (couldn't a dog's death also be classified as a type of death?).
I regretted that it might have been okay to be a little cruel, but it was already too late. I ended up delivering the dying message to the next cycle's Yoo Ji-won.
"I see."
The silver-haired cool guy nodded his head.
It was a time when the world hadn't yet been properly destroyed, so supplies were quite abundant. Yoo Ji-won had raided a convenience store with a single axe and turned it into a fortress.
According to Yoo Ji-won's claim, he said he had owned this convenience store from before, but I didn't particularly trust him. He knew how to lie as naturally as breathing.
"I understand that you claim to be a regressor yourself. I also understand that you possess an ability called time seal. But aren't these all merely unproven claims?"
"I also know you're a psychopath."
"Not particularly surprising. People around me have already known that fact for a long time."
-Screeeeech!
During our conversation, a strange creature smashed through the convenience store window and intruded. It was a monster that looked like a cockroach. I loaded aura into my cane and gave its maw a neat piercing.
Crunch! Yoo Ji-won approached and shattered the creature's head with his axe blade, finishing it off with a confirmation kill. The monster twitched.
Yoo Ji-won had always been exceptional in combat sense. A glimpse of that talent could be seen even from this time.
We resumed our conversation as if nothing had happened.
"What more do you want me to prove? I also know you like Romance of the Three Kingdoms and were a Latin major."
"Huh? Hmm. Hmmm... I see. Is that so. It's quite interesting, but it's still merely an unproven claim."
"Fuck, I also know you killed someone at 15, dismembered the body, and threw it in Bukhansan's minari pit. Just believe me, you psychopath bastard!"
"...Oh."
Yoo Ji-won blinked his eyebrows.
"I understand. That statement just now significantly increased the credibility of your claim."
"Why? Because it's a truth no one else knew?"
"To be more precise, because it's 'incorrect information.' I was 14, not 15, and it was Dobongsan, not Bukhansan."
"...."
"If your ability were mind-reading that reads inner thoughts or the type that digs out secrets, there would be no reason to deliberately accept incorrect information. In other words, you encountered incorrect information from someone else. And I have several reasons to be certain that my murder was absolutely never discovered."
"...."
"Hmm, regression. And the previous cycle's me used the regressor as a mailman to send a letter to me... Very interesting. There probably aren't many people in life who experience such a rare experience."
This is driving me crazy, really.
I opened a canned coffee from the products displayed in the convenience store and poured it into my mouth. Yoo Ji-won didn't stop my behavior.
"Let's settle the delivery fee with this canned coffee. I've delivered the dying message, so I'll be going now."
"Ah. Sorry, but please wait 2 minutes. I'll come with you."
"What?"
I was startled.
When I turned around, Yoo Ji-won was rolling up the national map and city map he had spread out on the convenience store counter and stuffing them into a trunk.
For reference, the most impressive interior decoration in this convenience store was the 'Tutorial Fairy's' leather. I didn't mispronounce that just now. This bastard Yoo Ji-won had skinned a fairy and stuffed it on the counter wall like some kind of trophy.
I could confidently say that the types of creatures he had made leather out of numbered at least two or more.
"Hey, what do you mean come with you? You've stocked up a lot of supplies here. Just hold out here."
"That's the inferior option."
Yoo Ji-won pushed his glasses up.
"Didn't the previous cycle's me ultimately leave this place and join your guild? Since I'll be leaving anyway, it would be much faster to advance my career by joining that side from now on."
"Not my guild, it's a person named Dang Seo-rin's guild."
"Ah. Is that so. I apologize. Please guide me well whenever I make mistakes in the future."
"No, I said don't come with me! Hey. Hey. No, you bastard! I don't like you anymore! Piss off, will you?"
Yoo Ji-won did not piss off.
Far from it, he clung like a parasite. The place this psychopath chose as his host was Samcheonsegye.
Yoo Ji-won threw himself into the witch cosplay more enthusiastically than any guild member, personally proving that he possessed not only 'Mini-map' but also the skill of 'Dang Seo-rin Affection Boost.'
"Wow, Vice Guild Master, where did you find such a cute kid and bring him?"
"It is the honor of three lives, Great Witch, Your Excellency."
"...."
Selected as an early member of Samcheonsegye, Yoo Ji-won rose faster and higher than his 5th cycle self. It could also be described as acting quite pretentious.
His official title was Operations Chief, my adjutant as Vice Guild Master and special secretary to Guild Master Dang Seo-rin. In other words, he had firmly established his position as the third in command within the guild.
Being the third in command of Korea's most prominent corporation, compared to the pre-apocalypse world, it was essentially like being third in command at the number one conglomerate, so he could be evaluated as having succeeded quite well wherever he went.
But our silver-haired psychopath Yoo Ji-won was someone who didn't concern himself with others' evaluations.
"Chief Yoo."
"Yes, Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency."
"...We're going to fight the Ten Clans soon, shouldn't we hold your funeral first?"
"Ah."
"Anyway, from what I can see, the current cycle's Vice Commander Yoo looks much happier than the last cycle. Well, I don't know what Chief Yoo's standards for happiness are, but with this much, wouldn't you be able to have a satisfactory afterlife?"
"Hmm."
He said 'hmm.' This bastard.
This psychopath just looked blankly at the empty air and said 'hmm.'
Adding visual data, his lip shape right now was precisely close to 'ω.'
"Vice Guild Master, Your Excellency. I suddenly have this thought. If the current 6th cycle's me was happier than the 5th cycle's me... wouldn't the 7th cycle's me be a little happier with a fairly good probability?"
"Ji-won. What does that mean, Ji-won..."
"Please pass on a dying message to the next cycle's me to please make an effort to create a happier time and then have a funeral..."
"Hey!"
By now, you can probably picture how this episode will conclude.
That's right. To put the conclusion first without needing any afterword, Yoo Ji-won, that utter scoundrel, used his direct superior as a will deliveryman every single time.
From the 6th cycle to the 7th, to the 8th, to the 9th, to the 10th, to the 11th.
Every time I asked if he was finally a bit happier and subtly offered to hold a funeral.
"Hmm. Won't I be a little happier in the next cycle?"
He indefinitely postponed his sealing.
Is there really such a guy?
I've read countless web novels since after the 550th cycle and prided myself on encountering countless regressor protagonists, but I've never seen a character anywhere who used an infinite regressor in this manner.
This guy... later, starting from the cycle when the National Road Management Bureau was established, sometimes went under Noh Do-ha instead of Dang Seo-rin.
"This Mini-map is exactly what our National Road Management Bureau needs... Thanks to this, it's become very easy to track the real-time location of corps members. Heh. Thank you for introducing such a good talent for free, Funeral Director Awakened..."
"...."
And after several cycles passed, Yoo Ji-won had smoothly risen to the position of Operations Control Room Director, right below Noh Do-ha in the National Road Management Bureau.
So, observing over a very long period, hundreds of years as the standard—— Yoo Ji-won was truly 'getting promoted' toward higher positions, little by little.
From regular guild member to my adjutant. From my adjutant to Samcheonsegye's third in command. Again from Samcheonsegye executive to power player in the National Road Management Bureau.
A miracle creating something from nothing! Living witness to a success story!
I could hardly dare guess how such a phenomenon could occur.
There exists a monster of ambition who continues to promote with each passing cycle? Is this really not some kind of strange creature?
What was even more surprising was that this monster, who would go through fire and water for the sake of promotion, had never betrayed me even once throughout the long history reaching the 1183rd cycle.
Once when I asked him the reason while drinking soju at a drinking gathering, his answer was ridiculous.
"Excuse me? You're asking if I would betray Funeral Director, Your Excellency? I'd rather die than do that."
"No, why? You're a psychopath."
"Please stop the prejudice against psychopaths. Your Excellency is a regressor and even possesses complete memory ability, so wouldn't you store all of people's every move and then evaluate them? Then I must thoroughly restrain myself in all cycles and be careful not to go against Your Excellency's mood. Isn't that common sense?"
Yoo Ji-won looked up at the full moon in the night sky with a blank expression, holding a transparent soju glass. His eyes alone were quite wistful.
"I rather find it difficult to understand the fact that humans foolish enough to betray Your Excellency exist on Earth. On the other hand, it's truly mysterious. Why are so many people this foolish?"
"...."
I really... don't understand this guy...
But put differently, there was no one else in the world who understood the human named Yoo Ji-won as deeply as I did. By around the 50th cycle, I had become certain of one thing about Yoo Ji-won.
Even if everyone else in the world wanted to receive the time seal, that bastard Yoo Ji-won would absolutely never receive it.
I once thought he was born in the wrong era.
But I was wrong. This guy was someone who would eat well and live well no matter what era he was born in. That remained unchanged even in an apocalypse where civilization had completely collapsed. You could even say he was a survivor optimized for this era.
At this point, half out of obligation and half as a joke, I couldn't help but ask Yoo Ji-won out of courtesy.
"Ji-won."
"Yes?"
"Are you a little happier now?"
Just then, a chess piece traveling around the map fell forward with a clatter.
Then my silver-haired adjutant, the virtually unique Romance of the Three Kingdoms enthusiast and founding member of my regression life, my psychopath friend, would rest his chin on his hand, ponder for a moment, and return this answer.
"I think I can be a little happier next time."
- The Promoted. End.
An infinite regressor telling stories