Chapter 155: Those Without the Resolve to Sacrifice

[Translator – Aren]

I gasped for breath and bawled, tears and snot streaming down my face.

Even after we came up from the subway station and I felt the wind against me, I was still in this state. It seemed like we were running along a road, but my head was in such a mess that I couldn’t properly take in anything around me.

All I could hear was my pounding heart and the sound of my own crying. That, and the heavy, thundering gunshots. I wanted to help somehow even as I was dragged along. I knew I should help…but I couldn’t.

If I even let go of my gun, I’d die. That certainty kept me gripping it tightly, but I still had no room to actually raise and use it. No matter how desperately I scraped together every last bit of willpower, the instant I thought I might have to use magic, it all scattered again.

Fuck...

I’m not the one who’s strange. I was strange until now.

It hurts. It fucking hurts. It hurts so much I end up pissing myself. It hurts so much I end up passing out. How the fuck am I supposed to endure that? Fuck, some assholes love telling people to endure when it isn’t happening to them. Anyone who tells me to endure can try enduring it after I shoot them in the mouth.

One-eyed? Who the hell wants to be one-eyed? Are you insane?

If anything, this is the first time I’ve actually been sane. Only after my mind came back clear and spotless did I realize that. I’d been a fucking idiot until now. Normal people don’t just accept the price of magic. They look for some loophole to avoid it or avoid situations where they’d have to use magic in the first place.

I don’t want to lose the reason I finally got back, the right eye I finally regained, or the mind that can finally breathe freely.

People look at those who survive torture and praise them for being incredible, but they seem to forget why that’s incredible. I did too. Only now did I understand it down to my bones. Crying my eyes out while someone dragged me along, I finally understood why someone who endures torture is so remarkable.

Humans are equal. No one is free from pain.

Anyone who says they can endure it simply hasn’t experienced that pain.

People who endured torture must have broken themselves before their will could even be broken.

Even while I sobbed like this, gunfire kept erupting nonstop around me.

My tears had already blinded me, but it was obvious something was happening anyway. Every thought I had led back to death. It was so unfair. So damn unfair I thought I’d lose my mind.

Why the hell did I do any of this?

Shit… What if I die here? There aren’t even any people left the Seoul of Korea-38, so if a monster eats me, there probably won’t even be anyone around to save me afterward…

Fucking hell.

I never should’ve come. I never should've followed the pastor. I never should’ve gone into this damn subway station. I don’t even remember why I wanted to pursue magic so much anymore. I could’ve just gone to the rear and lived the easy life, so why the hell did I crawl all the way in here?

I couldn’t even tell anymore whether the gunshots around me were real.

-Bang, bababang…

Everything was blurry through my tears anyway, so I squeezed my eyes shut.

Then dizziness surged up.

I wanted to let go. The thought slowly swelled inside me that maybe if I just gave up, lost consciousness, and passed out, everything would somehow end on its own. I was sleepy. Maybe if I fell asleep, all of this would turn out to have been a nightmare, and when I opened my eyes, everything would be back to normal.

The word escapism came to mind, but some spiteful part of me immediately argued back, demanding to know what the hell was supposed to be wrong with that.

No one can take pain rationally. I’ve never been granted some great spirit that never breaks under any circumstances. By the time I reached that thought, all the strength drained out of my arms and legs.

Then I suddenly realized something.

At some point, the gunfire had stopped.

Only then did the sounds that had seemed impossibly far away suddenly rush in. Shell casings rolling across grains of asphalt. Someone gasping for breath. Several sets of footsteps coming toward us.

The moment I heard them, something important inside me snapped.

The most important force that lets humans move forward into an uncertain future and the thing that inflicts the most terrible suffering on them. I felt hope snap and disappear inside me. Then a cold peace, frigid as seawater, began rising like the tide.

Ah. It’s over.

Complete resignation. Once a person realizes they can’t survive, even breathing becomes painful. I hated the world so fucking much. I resented being alive. I cursed the fact that I had ever been born.

If all that waits at the end of fleeting moments of happiness is the inescapable terror of death, then who the hell could affirm life? I wanted to shoot every bastard who told people to be grateful they were born. Shoot them until their corpses were completely tattered.

But regardless of whether my reason had given up, this body still wanted to stay alive.

So I kept struggling desperately, tears dripping down my face. I clutched my gun with trembling hands, forced a cry that might become my death cry out of a mouth that wanted to scream, and squeezed my heart and lungs for everything they had as I fought to survive.

But the instant I pulled the trigger, the instant I heard a click and realized the gun had stopped firing…

Everything collapsed.

"No! Aaaaagh! Nono!!!”

I threw myself to the ground.

I rolled across the pavement, screaming.

"Jemin-ssi, Jemin-ssi! What’s wrong with you?!”

"Looks like the Jemin-ssi in this world was a damn idiot.”

"Aaaaaagh!!! No, no! Go away!!! Aagh… Mom! Dad! Somebody, please save me! Anyone…I’ll believe in anything out there, so just save me! Somebody save me… Save me…sob…"

"This world’s Hubae-nim has a rather different flavor. I think this version might be even cuter.”

What the fuck are they talking about?

Either save me or fuck off!

But don’t kill me… Please save me…

I rolled around on the ground and cried even harder. There was something profoundly miserable about the helplessness of knowing my life would be decided regardless of what I chose.

"That’s our Baek Jemin.”

"O Allah…Oh god.”

"This Wuss-Jemin-ssi rolling around here bawling is the Jemin-ssi from our world? Did something go wrong? Both his eyes seem perfectly fine too.”

"For the Hubae-nim I knew, he’s…just too……”

Why do they keep talking?

Just fucking save me!

If someone’s crying this hard, save them!!!

"Looks like he used the grimoire to make contact with that devil and had a memory taken from him as the price for gaining knowledge. That’s why he ended up like this.”

"The grimoire? Hubae-nim, are you insane? Why would you touch that thing while you were in your right mind?!”

"Tsk. What kind of memory do you have to lose for someone to turn into this much of a wuss? Ritual-type magic…I’d be lying if I said I’d never considered it for the sake of my dream, but I think I’ll put that off for a while.”

"Don’t worry. We’ll take you to where we’re staying first. The Seoul of this Korea is completely empty. No people and no monsters.”

Agh, aagh, agh, aagh.

I’d cried so much my whole body was twisting up like a pretzel. I hated this. I hated dying. I hated using magic too. It hurt. I hated being trapped in an eternal fate that left me with no choice but to wish for death even more. I just hated all of it. I wanted to go home. I wanted to retreat somewhere safe in the rear.

Aaaaaaaaagh…

Someone, please get me out of here…

"Hubae-nim, Hubae-nim!”

"A-aah……Aagh…No…”

"Can you see me? It’s your Master! Go Ryeoha!”

Go Ryeoha. Did she say Go Ryeoha?

My eyes snapped open.

Go Ryeoha stood in front of me with her gas mask pulled up, her sweat-soaked hair stuck to her cheeks, and a deeply serious, resolute look in her eyes. In my current state, even seeing a pretty woman was a huge comfort, but that wasn't what reassured me.

Go Ryoeha was a Hand-branch, Stage 4 wizard.

A wizard specialized in fighting people and killing. I could survive without using magic myself.

I was saved.

The instant I realized that, my mind went blank. The tension that had been stretched taut inside me finally snapped. But the relief of knowing I’d survived was so overwhelming that I didn’t have the strength for anything else. I simply crumpled to the ground.

"Hubae-nim? Hubae-nim!”

"He looks mentally exhausted. I'll guide  you somewhere safe. Everyone, follow me. Sejun-ssi, please cover us.”

"As expected, Jemin-ssi really is too dangerous a rival…Tsk.”

"Don’t give Baek Jemin a hard time. Devils are just like that. Anyone bewitched by one ends up like this.”

-Clack.

With the heavy metallic sound characteristic of a gun as the last thing I heard, I lost consciousness.

* * *

October 21st, 2038, 3:18 PM.

That was the time displayed on the phone I’d rummaged out of my clothes. The moment I came to, I checked it in a panic, only to realize I was still trapped in this nightmare of a world and immediately put on a miserable face.

This was Seoul of the Korea in the year 2038, a parallel world where AI had failed to take off and even budget phones came with 5TB of storage and 128GB of RAM.

Facing that fact made my whole body feel as if it was sinking. Ah. How nice would it have been if we’d escaped while I was asleep? The feelings of a normal modern person who wanted to coast through life were felt especially terrible today.

I looked around and found myself in a corner of a supermarket surrounded by product shelves. Blankets and sleeping bags had been spread out beside a humming freezer, with hefty 1.5L water bottles stacked neatly nearby.

The others were leaning or lying around beside them, killing time.

Go Ryeoha was talking seriously with the pastor, Hamza seemed to throw in a word here and there, and Lee Sejun was busy munching on a calorie bar. Everyone seemed occupied, so I was going to keep quiet, but I ended up making eye contact with Lee Sejun, who’d vigilantly scanned our surroundings.

"Wuss-Jemin-ssi, you awake? Tsk. Appealing like this…This is why natural talent is so unfair.”

"Baek Jemin, you awake? You a little more normal now?”

"Pastor, strictly speaking, Jemin-ssi is more normal now. People learn from pain and develop a tendency to avoid things that hurt. If the memory Jemin-ssi lost was what allowed him to overcome that tendency, then the Wuss-Jemin-ssi we have now is actually the normal one. Medically speaking, his magic addiction has been cured.”

"Hehe. I think I might prefer Hubae-nim like this, crying his eyes out and whining for people to do things for him.”

Having all of them throw in a comment at once made my head throb.

Now that I’d defeated my madness, I hated the fact that I had to travel around with people like these. I was honestly disappointed in myself. What kind of fucking idiot had I been before to call these people my companions and spend time with them? They say birds of a feather flock together, and it made me realize all over again just how low I must have sunk.

An exclusionary, narrow-minded, fanatic pastor. A former soldier with a dream that was hard to understand regardless of his sexual orientation. A foreign laborer who called himself Muslim while happily eating pork and drinking soju. A murder who lost her mind and slaughtered dozens, maybe hundreds of innocent civilians.

From a normal person’s perspective, being near these people wasn’t exactly safe either.

Still, constantly making rude and aggressive remarks wasn’t sane behavior either. I cleared my throat, composed myself for a moment, then calmly and logically stated my request in a moderate voice.

"I know this is a little late for me to say, but you’re all genuinely dangerous people, so please don’t come too close to me.”

Their reactions were dramatic.

"Look at this bastard, suddenly talking all meek and polite. Baek Jemin! You used to live like you had a filthy rag stuffed in your mouth. What the hell happened to you?!”

"Exactly. Jemin-ssi, you used to look for any excuse to kill me and turn me into a holy relic. You even said you’d shoot me if I ran away.”

"Hubae-nim~ You're so much nicer to look at when you speak politely! You're like a different person. Maybe this version really is better.”

"Tsk, usinggap moe like this..."

One person panicking. One person baffled. One person delighted. And one person watching me with obsessive suspicion.

The Aphorism quartet were bickering so loudly that I almost overlooked the most important thing.

"I’m not what matters right now. First we need to figure out whether Go Ryeoha, Hamza, and Lee Sejun are actually from our world. If they are, then we need to hear what happened while we were apart and get caught up.”

"Hubae-nim, the state you’re in right now is the most entertaining and interesting, though. Even if we talked about our situation, nobody would listen.”

"Come on.”

People might live for entertainment, but some things obviously mattered more than others. Was me coming to my senses really that shocking?

That was when the pastor, who occasionally showed his good side at moments like this, sharply pointed something out.

"Baek Jemin, your issue isn’t that simple. If you’d genuinely gotten better, I wouldn't be worried either. If you’d overcome something yourself or changed your way of thinking, I would’ve supported you and cheered you on.”

"Pastor."

"But you changed abruptly after making contact with a devil. Baek Jemin. Even if a change caused by a devil looks positive, that doesn’t mean you truly changed. By forgetting, you lost the chance to repent or become better.”

"I don’t think so???”

I had no idea why he was still spouting that outdated mind-over-matter crap in this day and age. A somewhat jaded young man like me didn’t want opportunities to become better. I wanted to enjoy the rewards without any trials or suffering. Because I’d realized that was the truly intelligent choice.

If the result was good, wasn’t that all that mattered? Who in this world gave a shit about the process?

The old me, who offered up an eye because he was willing to bear the price of magic, was the dumbass. Now that I’d regained the reason and intelligence of a modern person, I wasn’t going to do anything that stupid anymore. Finding some way to dump all the pain onto someone else… Even after learning the truth about Disciples, my opinion on that hadn’t changed.

The truth that Disciples were actually sacrifices used to create the fog, and that the Mist of the Other Shore was the product of human sacrifice, was horrifying.

Other people being sacrificed was genuinely heartbreaking and terrible.

But it was still better than me suffering. To be honest, they’re strangers. Why should I care? The reality was that nobody paid attention when people in Africa or people in the Middle East died. In a peaceful world I would’ve looked down on that attitude and hated it, and it wasn’t like those feelings were completely gone now, but I could tolerate it.

In a world where people call you a hypocrite just for caring, it’s not like I’d be killing them myself. Just using what somebody else killed should be fine. The rationality and morality of a modern person achieved this miraculous compromise and maintained their balance.

This, too, must have been the rational balance brought about by a clear mind and reason.

Even so, my argument made no sense to the Aphorism quartet, so our debate continued.

"I said I’m not using magic! Hamza, you want me to smash your tongue with this fucking meat mallet? Stick your tongue all the way out. I’ll stomp on it with my foot, and you can try enduring that.”

"But you endured things like that just fine before…”

"Because I was a goddamn idiot! Why would any sane modern person use that shit!!!”

There are always people who act like pain is no big deal because they aren’t the ones going through it. There were four of those assholes right in front of me. Fuckers I didn’t even want to consider human. They’d be writhing in agony if they got shot, yet they always acted so damn cool about pain.

"But you’ve been using it just fine this whole time, Baek Jemin!”

"I said I don’t want to!!!”

"Wow. Wuss-Jemin-ssi, your wuss energy is seriously something else. Though I wouldn’t want to use Tongue-branch magic either.”

"Hubae-nim~ You don’t have to use magic. Hehe. Just follow me around saying, ‘Master~,’ I’ll provide for you!”

"Sejun-ssi. Please stop Ryeoha-ssi for now. First, I think we need to figure out how exactly Jemin-ssi’s way of thinking has changed. And what memory he lost.”

In the end, Hamza’s forceful argument led to a series of questions meant to figure out what memory I’d lost.

Thanks to that, I was able to calm down a bit and check through my memories myself. I knew it had been my most horrible memory, but I couldn’t remember a single specific detail… Honestly, that sounded pretty damn great.

Did I really need to remember it? If the owner of the Double-Semicircle Grimoire had taken it in the first place, I probably couldn’t get it back through any normal means anyway, right?

Even so, the Aphorism quartet kept hounding me, so I groaned and went through my memories one by one from my childhood all the way to the present.

"When I was in elementary school, there were assholes who’d locked themselves in the toilet stalls and refused to come out for tens of minutes. So, out of consideration for whoever was on cleaning duty, I took a dump in a urinal.”

"Jemin-ssi. That’s truly filthy and disgusting, and it probably would’ve been better if you’d simply shit on the floor, but since you still remember that, I guess it wasn’t your most horrible memory.”

"If anything, it’s a heartwarming story.”

I immediately shot down Hamza’s one-one review.

It was a heartwarming story.

Young Baek Jemin, feeling guilty for the cleaning-duty student who had to clean it up alone while crying, gave them a chocolate cornet as an apology. It was an adorable memory that proved both my guilt and my fundamentally kind nature. Embarrassing, sure, but not really horrible.

Go Ryeoha took a completely different approach and asked a pretty sensible question.

"Maybe the problem isn’t necessarily something from your childhood? Hubae-nim, didn’t you ever experience some kind of unfairness after entering society?”

"Hmm."

It was a good change of perspective, but unfortunately, it was a complete miss.

I mean, think about it.

In South Korean society, where anyone who works hard in a healthy, honest way can overcome disparities, accumulate wealth, and enjoy a better life, isn’t the strange one the person who feels society is unfair? Putting all the talk about mentality aside, people complain that the social ladder is too narrow or whatever, but even if moving upward is difficult, it isn’t impossible. That makes it different from genuine injustice, as far as I’m concerned.

After hearing my healthy way of thinking, even the pastor made a strange expression.

"Hmmm. You do seem in a better state now. Come to think of it, weren't you unemployed? Shin Nain mentioned it. Shouldn’t you actually have more grievances with society if you’re like this now?”

"I was unemployed for two months. I worked at a marketing company before it  went under because of AI and the recession.”

"What? You lived a surprisingly respectable life, huh.”

"People don’t only get fired because they cause trouble, you know?”

I did get into a bit of a fight with my boss, but wages were already going unpaid, and I could see the whole industry was about to get wrecked, so I'd done it fully prepared to leave. There hadn't been any consequences.

This time, Lee Sejun, who'd been glaring sharply at me, asked a question.

"Wuss-Jemin-ssi. Didn't anything happen to you in the military? What did they say when you were discharged?”

"They asked if I’d considered staying. Obviously, I said no.”

"You refused…? Strange. A normal person would’ve at least considered a long-term military career. Someone as violent and aggressive by nature as Baek Jemin-ssi. with no particular qualifications to show for himself, could hardly avoid considering life as an NCO.”

"Lee Sejun-ssi. You disgusting bastard. Normal people, right? They’d rather crawl into a factory instead of staying in the military long-term for the benefits.”

"You all saw that, right? We’ve confirmed that Wuss-Jemin-ssi’s way of thinking is strange, at least.”

Lee Sejun turned around triumphantly, and everyone nodded with awkward expressions.

Apparently, they’d decided to put me through an ideological examination to see how much I’d changed. Basically an Aphorism-style MBTI test.

A flood of questions came pouring in. If I had to pick out the simplest, clearest, and most important exchanges, it would be these.

"Baek Jemin. What do you think of people who can’t use magic? And what do you think of the term ‘non-wizard’?”

"They’re simply people who chose a rational, long-term means of survival instead of relying on an imprecise and irrational power called magic. More importantly, ‘non-wizard’...What a disgusting term. It makes it sound as if anyone who isn’t a wizard isn’t even human. Only now do I realize just how arrogant, mean-spirited, and steeped in elitism I’ve been. I’m ashamed that I couldn’t even grasp the obvious truth that all humans are born equal and can overcome their circumstances through effort.”

-Thump.

The pastor put his right hand over his face and leaned back.

"Jemin-ssi. What do you think about me leaving the Republic of Korea?”

"Hamza, want to bail together?”

"Hm. Maybe the new Jemin-ssi isn’t so bad after all…”

After hearing my answer, Hamza switched to my side.

He subtly began defending me, putting together a fairly convincing argument befitting a medical student.

"You could actually say Jemin-ssi is at his healthiest and most normal right now. He’s finally able to process feedback from pain properly. Regardless of how effective magic is, it’s only natural not to want to use it.”

"I knew I could count on you, Hamza. Let’s eat something good when we get back.”

Once Hamza came over to my side, Go Ryeoha giggled and walked over to my side as well.

"Hubae-nim! Ask me, go on. If you say, ‘Please save me~,’ I’ll come and save you with a ‘Tada’!”

"Please save me! I’m begging you!”

"Kyaa! That’s it! Now that’s my Hubae!”

What kind of lunatic gets that delighted over hearing my desperate plea? Still, she was on my side. There were now two people willing to protect Baek Jemin, who had recovered the reason and intelligence of a modern person.

Naturally, if there were people who approved of the new me, there were bound to be people who rejected me as well.

"Baek Jemin. You haven’t really changed. Something was taken from you, and it’s the chance to become better. As a pastor, I can’t simply approve of this change.”

The pastor was still acting like a stuck-up old man.

"Baek…Jemin…! How dare you receive mindless nadenade’s and pampering in a man’s body…!”

Lee Sejun clenched his lips tight and ground his teeth with fury.

But numerically, including me, it was three against two.

My right eye, which I’d barely gotten back. The inferiority complex and madness I’d finally driven away. May clear reason, without a single stain or speck upon it. I didn’t want to lose any of it again. That was the worldview any 21st-century modern person should naturally possess. Losing something in order to gain something else was simply unacceptable to modern sensibilities.

And magic always demanded that you offer a price before it gave you a result.

Truly horrifying. You were supposed to get a result without having to pay a price. And if that price was my own suffering, then absolutely not. All humans were equal, so if I could substitute someone else’s suffering for mine, I’d choose that instead. My conscience might sting a little, but it was still better than suffering myself.

The pastor let out a deep sigh and looked at Go Ryeoha.

"Ryeoha-ssi, is there really no way? You were…at least somewhat close to those 66 devil bastards. I’m not accusing you of anything, I’m asking you to tell us if you know something.”

"Hm~. Father Kang Peter told me never to mess with Ritual-type magic unless absolutely necessary too. If we’re talking about someone with a high level of Tongue-branch magic, the only person who comes to mind is that Gangnam-ahjussi. But even though you could call him a fellow disciple of mine, I never really got to meet him properly because he was off leading his own group from afar. And I didn’t have much contact with the other groups either."

....?

Something about the atmosphere felt strange.

Just as I started glancing around, Go Ryeoha, who had been on my side only moments ago, smoothed back her damp hair with one hand and spoke.

"There's one thing I can guess, though. That Gangnam-ahjussi used the Cuneiform Grimoire as well, right? And Tongue-branch, Stage 3 is [Information Alteration]. Hubae-nim actually showed us how he uses it on himself.”

"He showed you?”

When the pastor asked again, Go Ryeoha was already answering in a serious voice.

"Hubae-nim suddenly became good at English, right? If you were trying to overcome a physical defect, the price would probably be enormous, or magic from another branch would be much more efficient, so you wouldn't use it for that…But when it comes to abstract or mental things, I think [Information Alteration] would be overwhelmingly effective. After all, every branch of magic belonging to 55 exists to uphold, support, and complement the others as they advance toward 66.”

"Then…?”

"Couldn’t we use [Information Alteration] to return him to the state he was in before contacting the owner of the grimoire? It might help us find a permanent solution while the effect lasts.”

-Snap.

The pastor snapped his fingers, his eyes lighting up.

"So that’s what it was. That’s what it was…That was the original purpose of [Information Alteration]! Even the depersonalization backlash!”

"Huh?"

"Pastor, what did you figure out all by yourself? Will it help normalize Wuss-Jemin-ssi?”

"Of course it will. That must be what the magic is for. Baek Jemin!”

"Everyone, stop. Making Jemin-ssi brace himself for the pain of magic again is cruel!”

A small hideout tucked beside the freezer in one corner of the supermarket.

The mood among the Aphorism quartet began shifting in a strange direction. Hamza was the only one taking my side, but unfortunately, the tide had turned in an instant. The pastor pushed his glasses back up from where they’d slipped down to the tip of his nose and spoke.

"Baek Jemin. Tongue-branch, Stage 3, [Information Alteration]. Try going back to how you were right before you made the deal with the Double-Semicircle Frimoire. We don't know if it’ll work!”

"How about no? Not doing that. Good luck with that.”

Are they insane? They want me to regress into a fucking idiot bastard?

Absolutely not.

Just as I crossed my arms and clicked my tongue, Lee Sejun struck like lightning with an annoyingly convincing argument.

"Jemin-ssi. I don’t know exactly what the depersonalization backlash feels like, but I assume it makes your body or your senses feel like they don’t belong to you. Right?”

“......”

"In a way, you could say this lets the present Baek Jemin dump his pain, the backlash, and every other price onto the Baek Jemin of the past. The current Baek Jemin can shove it onto something you could call the past or future, without having to worry about feeling the pain in the present.”

"What if the rational, reasonable, ethical, modern me disappears? I like myself better this way.”

"Wuss-Jemin-ssi. Do you really? Isn’t it burdensome having to entrust everything to other people? Wanting to retreat to the rear, only for everyone to glare at you and stop you? Being trapped in nerve-racking situations while people expect more from you and demand that you accomplish something bigger?”

That’s reasonable.

This damn Lee Sejun became logical at the weirdest times. And because I was rational now. I couldn't avoid that line of reasoning. Pain couldn’t be overcome. If I could avoid pain, I’d do anything.

In the end, I sighed and offered a compromise.

"No! I hate magic!!!”

"Grab him! Just make him use it! Once he uses it, he’ll get better!”

"Aaaaaagh!!!”