The Regressor Can Make Them All

Chapter 566

“…The Seeker?”

Lea’s face tightened in confusion. She had prepared for countless variables that could arise during Project Almagest… but the Seeker? The appearance of the shadowy Perfect One, who had supposedly died long ago, was completely outside her expectations.

How—no… more importantly, is that really the Seeker?

What if Tuner had used some nasty trick to meddle with the regression and was trying to deceive her by pretending to be the Seeker? Facing a situation she couldn’t make sense of, Lea’s thoughts churned—before quickly calming as she decided on a plan of action.

Either way, I have to get rid of it.

The entity had not only barged into the regression but was even freely moving within stopped time. With that level of ability, Lea could practically guarantee it could interfere with the regression itself.

She moved—

“Whoa there. Relax, relax.”

The headless shadow’s oddly unhurried voice rang out before Lea could begin manipulating the Sphere. It had raised both hands, as if in surrender.

“I understand that you’re all wary, but trying to erase something the moment it looks like a hassle? That’s a bad habit, you know?”

“…”

“Sure, on a battlefield where friend and foe are clear, maybe. But in a situation like this—where the causality isn’t obvious—you should analyze carefully. An enchanter is basically a scholar, too. Times like these are when you shouldn’t stop investigating causality and instead yearn to seek even more knowled—”

“Okay then.”

Lea cut it off, glaring sharply.

“Which side are you on, then? I don’t have much time, so do give me the simple answer.”

“…I was going to give you more advice, but kids these days really don’t know how to listen.” Sighing at Lea’s razor-edged attitude, the Seeker shrugged. “Well, if I had to say, I’m closer to being on your side. I was actually dispatched here to fix the mistake you lot have made.”

“Dispatched?”

“Yeah. You can probably guess who sent me, right?”

The Seeker jabbed upward with her index finger, pointing at the sky.

“…”

Lea glanced up, thinking of the singular being capable of resurrecting a Perfect One and inserting them into their current mess: the Golden Ring.

“Okay. I think I get where you might have come from now… but why did it revive you, of all people?”

“Because among the ones recorded in the Golden Ring, I’m the smartest and most outstanding—obviously.”

“…”

“What? Why make that face? You’ve read The Mana System and Proof of the Synesthetic Mindscape, haven’t you?”

The Mana System was the first book that established the theory of mana; after that, Proof of the Synesthetic Mindscape became the first work to prove the correlation between mana and the synesthetic mindscape.

Ever since the emergence of the Tower of Heroes, any skills or techniques related to mana were said to trace back to these two specific texts—from that angle, the Seeker’s claim wasn’t entirely baseless.

Still… saying something like that with a straight face is kind of…

Although she had heard that the Seeker was an odd one even among Perfect Ones, she hadn’t expected such a level of shamelessness. Standing before an enigma whose true intentions she was unable to read, Lea kept her guard up as she sank into thought.

Nothing she said proves whether she’s an ally. And unfortunately, I can’t ignore her at all.

The Golden Ring, which moved solely for Lea’s safety and happiness in line with Puppeteer’s wish, had acted. That was enough proof: something existed related to the regression that threatened Lea’s safety and happiness.

“…”

Either listen to the Seeker… or simply brute-force a solution by ending everything immediately. Weighing the two options, Lea hesitated for only a moment before deciding.

“Fine. Does this mean that we’ve made some kind of mistake?”

While time and space were frozen, the regression itself wouldn’t be affected. She’d use the current window to understand as much as possible.

“Mhm. Good question.” The Seeker bobbed her head in approval, the satisfaction in her tone clear. “Sometimes when you point out someone’s mistake, they whine and deny that it can’t be true. Real seekers of knowledge, though, always begin by admitting their ignorance—”

“Enough with the useless commentary and get to the point.”

“…This is why you need to choose your friends wisely,” the Seeker grumbled under her breath, glancing briefly at Se-Hoon’s back as she skipped to the point. “Alright. This spell, Almagest, was it? From conception to execution, everything was excellent.”

She reached out and idly traced the frozen air, then became serious.

“Using the Golden Ring and Towers of Heroes to reproduce a set of artificial celestial laws, which you then used to manipulate time and space. If a magic array on this scale is built this simply and intuitively, it means that the base ritual structure is—quite literally—perfectly designed.”

“…”

“Naturally, none of us would be able to imitate this—including you two if either of you were missing. This spell is the product of a ‘miracle’ of that magnitude.”

Lea’s expression turned strange. Rather than genuine compliments, the stream of praise felt more like consoling someone who’d buttoned the very first button wrong.

“However, a miracle on this level still isn’t enough to create the feat of regression.”

“Why?”

“You see, regression is a mystery of the ‘Outside’—something even this world cannot contain. It is a power born from denying the world itself… and thus is its ruin.”

The Seeker walked slowly to the side, continuing to explain further.

“If you tell a chick inside an egg, ‘The world around you is just a thin shell! Break it and come out!’ do you think it would understand that principle?”

“…”

“Of course it wouldn’t. The only one who can know the egg was a shell is the bird that will break it and take flight. That’s why as beings trapped inside the Golden Ring, ‘we’ can’t recreate regression.”

Passing Se-Hoon, the Seeker kept walking forward.

“If you keep going like this, there’s a ninety-nine percent chance of failure. And even if you get lucky and somehow pass through that one percent, it’ll be an incomplete regression—in other words, the Golden Ring’s state will remain the same. Not sure you can call that a success.”

Lea’s face hardened.

If they failed to trigger regression, they could at least try again later. Incomplete success, however, was far worse. Should the Golden Ring manipulate her memories and take control again….

“Alright, that should be enough of an explanation of the current situation. Shall we move on to the next part?”

“The next part…?”

“The solution, obviously. Didn’t I say I was dispatched here?”

The Seeker drifted closer and held up two fingers.

“I can offer two solutions at this moment. The first is my personal recommendation. The second is what this world recommends. Which do you want to hear first?”

“…”

“Doesn’t matter to you, huh? Then I’ll start with the one I recommend.”

She pointed at Se-Hoon, who stood frozen with his back to them.

“Hand him control of the regression.”

Lea immediately frowned.

“But if we give him ‌control—”

“He might awaken as a Perfect One.”

Finishing Lea’s words, the Seeker placed a hand on Lea’s shoulder as she leaned in close to her ear.

“I know what you’re worried about. And I know how to solve it. All we need is to turn him into a puppet,” she whispered in a soft voice.

“…”

“Then even if he awakens as a Perfect One, he is still under your control, so there should be no problem—”

Smack!

Lea slammed the Seeker’s hand away, staring frigidly at the empty space where the Seeker’s head should have been.

“Spare me the bullshit and move on to the second solution.”

“Honestly… tsk. Why do I always end up being made the villain?”

Annoyed, the Seeker stepped back.

“Well, the second solution is to just give up.”

“Give up?”

“Since you messed up from the start, you should just fix what went wrong and aim for the next attempt.”

Lea’s eyes widened. She hadn’t even considered that obvious answer until the Seeker said it?

“Sure, finding an improvement from this point onwards won’t be easy, but it’s better than forcing this through. This world isn’t exactly an inconvenient place to do research anyways, right?”

“…”

“And for you, it’s not even a bad of a deal. While you’re here, you can spend more time with that guy—”

“Shut up.” Lea ground her teeth, glaring at the Seeker. “Don’t say… another word.”

“Hm? Ah… I see. So that’s how it is?”

With a small laugh, from something that had clicked, the Seeker lazily backed away.

“A hell you’d want to escape as soon as possible alone started feeling like paradise just because someone’s by your side~ Hm… yeah. That is a tough problem.”

Despite Lea’s death-glare, ready to kill her, the Seeker’s relaxed tone didn’t waver.

“So that’s why you couldn’t even consider giving up, huh? Because you’re afraid you’ll start wanting to stay in this world without realizing it—making the Golden Ring will grant that desire on its own~”

Lea couldn’t listen anymore. She moved to manipulate the Sphere to erase the Seeker from existence—her fingertips trembled; she couldn’t move properly.

“But you don’t need to be ashamed! Desire and wish mis-align more often than you’d think. That’s precisely why Perfect Ones break, after all.”

The Seeker tapped the empty neck where her head should be, then stepped up beside Se-Hoon.

“Yet… is there really a need to deny that desire?”

“…”

“Your desire isn’t to sabotage the regression, and it isn’t to stay in this world forever with Lee Se-Hoon.”

Leaning against Se-Hoon’s back with her shadowy arms folded, the Seeker looked at Lea with a tilted head.

“You merely want to use this chance, a chance that will never come again, to hold on to something that won’t change. Yeah. For example…”—she paused, met Lea’s eyes, then finished in a low whisper—“a relationship with Lee Se-Hoon~”

Woong!

A golden wave rippled before Lea’s eyes, twisting into a notification message with a single line displayed.

[Relationship: Eternity]

[Eternity is something that cannot exist unless the world permits it. Therefore, this relationship is achievable only in this twisted world. If you desire an eternal, unwavering relationship even after you escape this world, you must not let this opportunity slip away.]

“This is…”

The moment she read the contents of the follow-up notification message, Lea instinctively understood: it was tied to Se-Hoon’s unique skill. The Golden Ring was telling her that her desire could be fulfilled with it.

“You can let past sorrow drift away with time, but it’s not so easy to turn your back on future happiness.”

“…”

“To form an eternal bond with the fated person who saved you from your regrets… who could refuse an opportunity like that~?”

The whispers echoing through the plaza spread like poison in her mind.

“Make your decision, Lea Claudel.”

“…”

“That’s all this world is urging you to do.”

It wasn’t telling her to sacrifice the world. It wasn’t telling her to betray her comrades. All it did… was urge her to seize the happiness—the desire—she had kept denying. A proposal offered by the world, the Golden Ring, according to Puppeteer’s lingering will.

And also, the bursting desire Lea had pushed deep into a corner of her heart.

A choice for myself…

If there was no other way besides sacrificing Se-Hoon, if this was doomed to fail anyway…. If that was the case… wouldn’t it be fine to add a little favor for herself on top?

Lea’s turmoil tipped in one direction as her trembling hand moved to the Sphere. Then, in the instant the stopped time and space resumed—

“You really think I would fall for that?”

Lea grabbed the eighth ring and twisted it counterclockwise.

Rumble!

The world that had been frozen until just now lurched violently in sync with the Sphere’s motion, and time and space—once regressing calmly—began rewinding in a frenzy. The regression that had already been likely to fail was now racing toward the absolute worst ending.

Even the Seeker froze in disbelief, stunned by the sudden catastrophe.

“You… are you serious?!”

What was so wrong with choosing for herself that she would reject it to such an extent? The Seeker watched as Lea, still pulling on the unmoving eighth ring, opened her mouth through the strain.

“Maybe you’re right… no—of course you’re right. This world guarantees that I’d be happy.”

“Then why—”

“But… will my desire… truly be fully satisfied by that?”

If she gained an eternal bond with Se-Hoon through the Golden Ring, could she truly ever leave the world without regret?

“I don’t think so.”

She wanted her dead parents back. She wanted to undo her miserable past. There were so many desires of hers, so many wishes that were yet to be fulfilled. How could she completely resist that sweet temptation once she’d tasted it even once?

“That’s why you chose not to redo it from the start? Because you think if you fulfill even one wish, you won’t be able to stop?”

“Yes.”

“You’re saying you’ll reject this moment—this final chance to reshape the world completely under your will—for a reason so pathetic?”

The Seeker’s tone was biting cold, making Lea flinch. Until now, the Seeker had never lost her composure once.

“…Yes. I refuse.”

At that moment, Lea couldn’t help but wonder what the others would call her if they heard about her decision. A fool who threw away a once-in-a-lifetime chance? A coward with no nerve? Still, whatever they may call her, she decided not to regret her choice.

“Because… Se-Hoon said he’d trust me!”

Crack!

The Sphere, stiffened under the Golden Ring’s interference, finally moved under Lea’s grip. Immediately, the gray clock hand released all the pressure it had been holding back.

Bang!

Every remaining way to stop the regression vanished. There was no way back.

Staring at Lea, who had eliminated all choices with her own hands, the Seeker stood blankly for a beat.

“Whew…” The Seeker let out an amused breath. “Fine. If that’s truly your choice, I have to respect it. My job was only to give you advice after all. But…”

The Seeker tilted her body as if looking up, then her calm murmur sounded through the air.

“I’m just not sure if you can solve this on your own.”

RUMBLE-

The central plaza shook violently, seemingly on the verge of collapse, as the orbits of the celestial bodies circling overhead warped into chaos. With the destabilizing of Almagest’s laws, the heavenly bodies revolving around Earth had also begun slipping free one after another.

“You see, Perfect Ones are like the remnants of a bird that never broke free from its egg—one that became one with the shell… to become a failed product. We are different from the Harbingers of Destruction, who try to smash the egg in an incomplete state.”

Holding out her hand to catch falling fragments of the ritual like rain, the Seeker then icily muttered, “And you—who can’t even compare to those failures—do you really think you can control Se-Hoon’s regression, the only true success that the Golden Ring has managed to achieve?”

Crack-

A chilling sound echoed across the plaza. Lea turned toward the source… and saw the famous white tower—laced with golden cracks. The spatial pressure that had been dispersed worldwide through Almagest’s laws was now crushing the Tower of Pristine, breaking it apart.

“…”

The Tower collapsing meant the entire regression would fail—and they would be trapped in the seams of time and space, shredded apart. With ruin closing in by the second, Lea waited at the center of it all with a hairpin set with a purple gem gripped in her hand.

There’s only one way to get out of this.

The moment the Seeker pointed out their mistake, she thought of the last remaining cards she had in hand. Then, when the Seeker explained the two solutions to her, she further refined them. All that remained now was the right moment to play them perfectly.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The sky flashed like stage lighting. Celestial bodies that had fallen out of orbit collided, dragging each other indiscriminately, creating even more explosions. The universe was rapidly collapsing without direction, swallowed by the unstoppable storm of regression.

And in the heart of that catastrophe, Lea simply stared upward, waiting.

Rumble-

A nebula of destruction was being born right in front of her eyes, growing by devouring countless stars. It was a cosmic disaster poised to grind Earth into nothing; it ate across the sky as it swept across unstable time and space.

Woong-

A small golden ring appeared before Lea. The constant roar and tremors vanished in an instant—everything fell silent as though it had all ended.

Alas, in truth, the world was very much still collapsing with the regression. Only Earth, where Lea was, was desperately shielded by the Golden Ring from the apocalypse.

Click-

Yet the Golden Ring, tethered by white threads, was clearly straining to hold it all back.

“…” Staring at it up close, Lea spoke slowly. “Up until now, I wasn’t sure… but this makes it certain. You never intended to let the regression succeed from the beginning, did you?”

The Golden Ring was a mechanical device without a sense of self. Normally, it wouldn’t interfere as long as the outcome remained within that allowed by the laws. Normally, that is.

“Regardless of whether the regression failed or stopped midway, as long as it didn’t succeed, we’d remain in this world. That’s why you didn’t respond at all.”

Although the Golden Ring was inferring and executing all actions independently, everything was done based on Puppeteer’s wish for Lea’s safety and happiness. That was the essence of the Golden Ring: a machine-god created by Puppeteer, imperfectly but undeniably endowed with will.

“So I changed the situation by forcing the regression into a runaway.”

The Golden Ring aimed for stagnation—neither advance nor retreat. Yet Lea had shoved the world’s back forward, forcing it into a choice.

It now had to let everything return to nothing by failing to do its job or… restore everything by letting them succeed.

“You can either kill me or save me.”

With its best option removed, the Golden Ring had but one choice.

Woong-

It rose above Lea’s head, turning into a golden ring that resonated with the Sphere. A second later, she suddenly had the world’s truths all poured into her mind. An unimaginably vast amount, far too much for a human—someone not a Perfect One—to digest. Thankfully, the Golden Ring aided her absorption and protected her directly.

Still, the flood of information continued to shave away Lea’s synesthetic mindscape, her very soul, even within that protection. Slowly but surely, it was being warped into something else.

A synesthetic mindscape that would not change even after accepting the world—that immutable self was the requirement for reaching the summit. A qualification Lea could never possess.

Crack-

Was that why the Seeker had reacted with doubt? The more Lea absorbed the world’s truths, the clearer it became how ignorant and insignificant she truly was.

However, even in the face of that crushing helplessness and despair, Lea didn’t deny it. She accepted it all.

I already knew all of this.

She didn’t have the strength to climb the Tower of Heroes or reach the bottom of the Abyss of Demons. And yet she stepped forward anyway. She stepped forward because there was one thing she knew better than anyone else.

The young man who stood unshaken in a collapsing world. The sole regressor, who understood the powers of the Perfect Ones, carried the ruin of the Harbingers of Destruction, and returned everything to zero.

Staring at the world’s one and only success, Lea clenched the hairpin in her hand and drove it deep into her own heart.

Thunk!

She twisted the hairpin through her heart, ignoring the pain, and used herself as a canvas to enchant the ritual. The spell seeped into her veins, spread through her entire body, then returned to her heart—a cycle that repeated over and over.

Whatever she lacked right now, she vowed to gain it through imitation. That was Lea’s core, her unique skill recognized by the world, and the solution she had chosen to see everything through.

“What are you…?”

The Seeker fell silent. Only now did she finally figure out what Lea’s plan was.

To think she was… trying to imitate a regressor to regress? While it sounded simple when put into words, needless to say, it was anything but easy. Imitating an ordinary soul alone was already an arduous task… so how could one possibly replicate and apply the soul of a monster that transcended the world itself?

It’s impossible.

Unless one possessed both the blueprint capable of reproducing Se-Hoon’s soul and the fragment needed to activate it, such a feat was utterly unattainable. The Seeker was certain…?

The Seeker abruptly recalled something and looked at Lea.

Drip-

Blood flowed down from her solar plexus, writhing like a living creature as it engraved a new enchantment across Lea’s entire body. And when it was completed, from within Lea, a tremendous pulse erupted.

WOOOOONG!

The blood engraving the enchantment—the Blood Essence refined from Se-Hoon’s blood through Soul Honing that Lea had absorbed twice already—allowed the impossible. Understanding its structure through experience, Lea had successfully reverse-engineered and imitated Se-Hoon’s very soul.

Wooooooooooooooong!

Her halo was dyed a murky gray, making the Sphere that had been resonating with it shatter into fragments and circle around her. Instead of the Sphere, the eight rings now formed concentric circles around the gray halo.

In other words, with the collapse of Almagest, the laws that had once crumbled were reconstructed once more—with Lea as their focal point.

Celestial Synchronization

Swoosh-

With a brilliant flash, everything returned to its rightful place. The shattered stars returned to their original positions and shimmered once more; the chaotic celestial orbits realigned into concentric paths.

“This is insane…”

The Seeker inadvertently let out a hollow murmur at the realization that the entire world had regressed to the moment before the regression went out of control. She just stared blankly at it all.

To grasp so effortlessly a truth she herself had constantly failed to obtain despite everything she tried in life. Such a result… felt insufficient to be called a miracle.

The Seeker slowly turned to Lea.

“Just how did you—”

Her words failed her; she became instantly speechless upon seeing the thing before her.

Woong-

“Lea” stood there, bearing a halo synchronized with the world, blankly staring up at the sky. By assimilating with the Golden Ring and imitating Se-Hoon… she had become nothing more than a doll with the sole purpose of activating the regression.

“…”

Click-

Without knowing who she was or what she was doing, “Lea” continued manipulating the world to reverse space and time. Right now, despite being alive, she was no different from the dead.

“You… why did you go that far?”

The Seeker could not comprehend.

Even if the regression succeeded and everything returned to the past, one thing would remain unchanged: the regressor’s soul. That was both the defining trait and the limitation of the one who served as the axis of regression.

“If you’re already like this while under the Golden Ring’s protection, then after the regression…” she trailed off.

It was almost certain Lea would either be a broken shell or die on the spot—not much worse than the best case of losing herself completely and becoming an entirely different being. Just why? Why had she pushed herself that far just to trigger regression?

She couldn’t not have foreseen this outcome…

Having reached the same level of an omniscient domain as herself, there was no way Lea hadn’t. So why? Again and again, the Seeker tried to figure out Lea’s intentions—only to accept her failure and give up.

She could only understand birds trapped within their shells. Once they broke free and took flight, even the Seeker had to accept that she had no means to intervene.

“Every last one of them is such a pain in the… huh?”

As the Seeker was grumbling about her own inadequacy, her gaze suddenly caught sight of a notification message that had appeared before Lea.

“This is…”

The message was written in faint text, on the verge of vanishing at any moment. The Seeker quickly scanned its contents… and before she realized it, a small smile tugged at her lips.

“So… you were a lot like Ha-Rin after all.”

To sacrifice oneself to such an extent for another. It was an act foolish beyond measure—yet perhaps that made it all the more beautiful.

Keeping her eyes on Lea fading into the light, the Seeker slowly melted away like a shadow.

Phase Manifestation: Return to Origin

Swoosh-

Accompanied by the sound of crashing waves, everything was swallowed as it all washed away.

***

Rumble-

Under a collapsing theater, a woman lay unconscious beneath the dim lights. It was an unfamiliar yet familiar sight, allowing Se-Hoon to understand the situation instantly.

We regressed.

It was the moment just before Tuner’s interference awakened Puppeteer. He sharpened his senses to respond to the impending intrusion—

Stagger-

“?!”

Lea, standing beside him, lost her balance and collapsed. Startled, Se-Hoon reflexively reached out and caught her, pulling her into his arms…?

“…Lea?”

Lea was unconscious, her eyes closed. However, even though she looked peacefully asleep, Se-Hoon knew something was wrong. He hurriedly scanned her, and in his eyes, every change that had occurred within her was laid bare.

The very image of “Lea Claudel”—her soul—was misty, as though it had vanished somewhere.

Staring at that horrifying clarity, his pupils and hands trembled. And at that moment, a notification message appeared before him.

[The bond with ‘Lea Claudel’ has grown to Lv. 4.]

[Since the bond has grown to Lv. 4, your Relationship with ‘Lea Claudel’ can now be redefined as ‘Sacrifice’.]

[Relationship: Sacrifice]

[The pursuit of one’s own happiness is a primal human instinct, and suppressing that desire to prioritize another’s happiness is never an easy choice.

Yet the subject has abandoned their own happiness and wished for yours instead—a choice that had successfully created a miracle no one had foreseen.

Whether their sacrifice was the right decision will be proven through you.

*A Fatestone is created each time you sacrifice yourself for the subject.

*The maturation rate of the Fatestone increases whenever you remind yourself of the subject’s sacrifice.

*The probability of the subject’s synesthetic mindscape manifesting inside the Fatestone increases as your Relationship deepens.

*Currently created Fatestones: 1]

“…”

The message made it obvious that Lea had made an utterly selfless decision somewhere he could not see. Reading the notification message that spoke of her sacrifice once more, Se-Hoon felt an overwhelming urge to undo everything right then and there… but he forced himself to endure.

He had been the one to say he would trust Lea’s choice. And so, he had to trust her—to respect that choice. Cradling Lea in his arms, Se-Hoon prepared to deal with Puppeteer and leave Lunatic.

“…?”

He heard a faint voice slip from Puppeteer’s lips. The whisper, which had not existed before the regression, made Se-Hoon look at her quietly. A moment later, he gave her a small nod before turning away.

Swoosh.

Puppeteer’s body transformed into violet butterflies that brushed past Lea and vanished. Promptly after, Lunatic collapsed once the two of them escaped. Unlike before, Tuner had disappeared without a trace.

With that, all allied forces deployed to the battlefield returned safely without a single casualty. Thus, the elimination of Puppeteer came to an end.

There was only one person unable to awaken.