「One day, an incarnation asked the Backer Star.‘You are one, so why are there many epithets that call you?’Then the Backer Star replied.‘Why do you think I am one?’」*She first began to write novels around the age of thirteen. It must be the same for everyone, but the beginning was always similar. She happened to write something, received an award, and heard people praise her for being good at writing.“Sooyoung, what happens next?”It felt strange that someone was curious about a story she had written.“You’re curious?”A universe the size of a notebook page. In that small world made of tiny letters, she was God. According to the sentences she wrote, the characters lived or died, laughed or cried. The friends who read the story laughed together or burst into tears. The problem was that it happened during class.“Sooyoung.”The homeroom teacher called her during recess. Even though she was young, Han Sooyoung, who was quick-witted, realized what was happening and bowed her head first.“I’m sorry.”The teacher nodded as if he found her admirable, returned her notebook, and said.“Be careful during class.”Then, as if wanting to say something more, he scratched his chin for a moment. Looking back now, perhaps that young teacher had been conscious of Han Sooyoung’s father, the member of parliament.“It’s not only your fault. The kids who read during class are at fault too.”Anyway, the young teacher proudly quoted a line from a book he had been reading.“There’s a saying that the moment a work leaves the author’s hands, it becomes the reader’s.”That obvious and clichéd sentence sounded a little strange to thirteen-year-old Han Sooyoung.“Why?”“Hm?”“I wrote it, so why does it belong to the reader?”The teacher laughed at the bold and impudent question of a child. Perhaps he wanted to leave an impression on a child who might one day become a writer. Without expecting the child to understand, the young teacher added a line.“Some writings can only be completed when the author dies.”Some writings can only be completed when the author dies. The young Han Sooyoung turned that phrase over several times and then asked again.“Then what remains for the author who completes the work?”“Well… they can earn money, and gain fame.”“That’s all?”The young teacher felt embarrassed by the disappointed expression of the young Han Sooyoung and searched hard for a better answer. But he couldn’t find one. It was natural. After all, that quote he mentioned wasn’t even his own words.So the teacher hastily finished the conversation.“Well. When Sooyoung finds out someday, will you tell me too?”The following year, the teacher was transferred, and Han Sooyoung never saw him again. Not because she wanted to give that teacher the answer, but Han Sooyoung kept writing afterward. Whether by luck or timing, her writing was recognized early on. Many people read her novels. They talked about them. In that world, the characters were truly living. When she came to her senses, Han Sooyoung herself was also inside that world.「What remains for the author who completes the work.」Living with her companions in that world, laughing or crying, crossing the threshold of death—Han Sooyoung felt she was getting closer to that answer little by little. Perhaps she even met someone who already knew it. To regain that person, Han Sooyoung once again sat before her keyboard. But she didn’t know what to write, what should unfold on this ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) blank page. It felt as if she had returned to her childhood, to the moment she first held a pen.What should I write, and how, to bring that guy back?While she was clutching her head, struggling for a long while, someone came to her.“If you wish to save Kim Dokja, you must die.”It was the Dokkaebi King of the 1,863rd round.*The Dokkaebi King came to Han Sooyoung, Yu Joonghyuk, and several members of right after they had reached the story’s conclusion.The end of .When the companions opened the door of Kim Dokja’s hospital room, they faced two endings. One where Kim Dokja returned. Another where Kim Dokja could not return.Han Sooyoung and her companions, who wanted to regain every Kim Dokja, could not accept the possibility that an ending where Kim Dokja did not return could exist. But even in the world after the ending, they didn’t know what or how they should act to bring him back.“How pathetic, you lot.”When the Dokkaebi King murmured that while sucking on his iced Americano through a straw, Han Sooyoung snapped.“Did you come here just to mock us?”A monochrome landscape like it had been molded from plaster. Sitting in a roughly built café made from a loose framework, the two drank coffee and iced chocolate.“Damn, tastes like boiled newspaper.”“No one has ever written about this world. Its flavor has never even been properly described.”The Dokkaebi King looked leisurely around. It wasn’t just the café. Wherever one looked, this world was abnormal. A world full of sparse blanks like the doodles on a child’s notebook.“You must have found it difficult to imagine this world too.”“I believed, of course, that Kim Dokja would return.”As she said that, Han Sooyoung looked over the Dokkaebi King’s outfit. A white coat and a fedora pulled low. There was no mistake. This ‘Dokkaebi King’ was the very same ‘Dokkaebi King’ who had been with Han Sooyoung in the 1,863rd round.“Why are you dressed like Kim Dokja?”“In the most recent worldline I traveled to, this was the fashion.”“I thought you were still in that subway.”“The main body is there. But sometimes, I too wish to take a little excursion.”“What are you, a dragon? Come to think of it, you talk differently than before too.”The Dokkaebi King loosened his throat lightly, his cold eyes glinting.【Shall I speak like this, Han Sooyoung】Han Sooyoung threw her straw to the floor, downed her iced chocolate in one go, and slammed the cup on the table.“Hey.”“Yes.”“Where’s Kim Dokja?”The Dokkaebi King mumbled as if troubled.“There was a similar situation before.”Han Sooyoung remembered too. She could never forget.The memory of the 1,865th round. They had once attempted a ‘collective regression’ using Yu Joonghyuk’s power to regain the lost Kim Dokja.“You intend to repeat that mistake?”They had failed once then. The one who informed them of that failure had been none other than the Dokkaebi King before her eyes. The Dokkaebi King who had guarded Kim Dokja, who had become the ‘Oldest Dream,’ and who had long served the young god, becoming the [Fourth Wall].“Do you think we have any other choice?”Han Sooyoung spoke, pressing down her anger.“The Kim Dokja left behind in our worldline was dying.”In a world where the system had disappeared, the 49% Kim Dokja, generated as an [Avatar], lost his strength and perished. To save either version of Kim Dokja, the party had no choice but to cross worldlines.“Kim Dokja did not want you to come looking for him. Watching your stories was his happiness.”“Did Kim Dokja say that himself?”“……”“See? You don’t know either.”“You speak as if you know.”“I don’t. That’s why I’m going to meet him and ask.”“Do you really believe you can meet him again? Why do you people never give up?”Han Sooyoung reached into her pocket and took out a lemon candy.“Someone risked their life to save us.”“In the world of scenarios, such things are not uncommon.”“Over and over, he truly died for us.”Han Sooyoung still remembered every death of Kim Dokja. Not for a single moment had she forgotten. It would be the same for everyone in .“I know Kim Dokja revives when he dies. But even with the power of resurrection, how many people do you think could really risk their lives for others? How many could repeat that madness over a lifetime?”Is a resurrected human truly the same as the human before death? When every cell of the body dies and the person revives again, isn’t that being just a copied text, pasted over and over?No one knows the answer. Probably not even Kim Dokja. Even so, he had willingly died for his companions, and lived again.“We were saved by someone like that. I saw him die before my eyes, over and over. I remember with my own eyes that pain, that torment, that face that smiled until the very last moment.”“……”“After all that, do you think it’s possible for us to say, ‘That’s enough’? That we’ve done enough?”The Dokkaebi King stared at Han Sooyoung for a long time before sighing quietly.“All things are already written, and at the same time, being written.”“Will you help us?”At Han Sooyoung’s subtle voice, the Dokkaebi King hesitated. The Dokkaebi King was one of the few beings who could freely move between worldlines. If he helped, they might be able to trace the vanished fragments of Kim Dokja that Yu Sangah or Bi Yu could not find. Unexpectedly, the Dokkaebi King nodded readily.“As I said earlier, if you want to save Kim Dokja, you must die.”Han Sooyoung frowned.“You said that before. What do you mean by that?”After thinking for a moment, she added.“Is my death also written on your ‘wall’?”“The memory of meeting me now will be erased from the wall.”“Because it violates plausibility?”“Yes.”“Don’t worry. I’m not going to die. So help me without concern.”The Dokkaebi King looked at her with sad eyes, then raised his gaze to the air.“Soon your story will end.”Snow was falling from the sky. White snow that covered everything—the living, the dead, the written, and the unwritten.“What remains for you now, Han Sooyoung?”What remains for her? Han Sooyoung inhaled a handful of cold breath and opened her mouth. She tried to answer. But no voice came out. Along with the snow that touched her cheek, her time also froze.When she blinked, the Dokkaebi King was already gone. Not only the Dokkaebi King—her surroundings, her arms, legs, torso, the organs that could speak—all had already vanished.Ah.Memories flooded in belatedly. The memory of finding the 41st round using the equipment left by the Dokkaebi King. The memory of meeting Lee Hak-hyun, the reincarnation of the 49% Kim Dokja. The memory of fighting Asmodeus and damaging her incarnation body. The memory of joining forces with Lee Hak-hyun to defeat the ‘Otherworldly Divinity.’ And finally, the memory of her incarnation body’s dissolution.Was this the revolving lantern?In the darkness, a distant cold embraced her. Her soul was slowly dissolving from the edges. She could feel the full stop of life drawing near. No one needed to tell her—she already knew.This death was already recorded. It could not be avoided, not as an [Avatar] or anything else.In the darkness, she felt the story she had written leaving her. Han Sooyoung recalled a line she had once written with her own hand.「The moment the world is completed, the author must descend from the throne of creation.」That was the destiny of every work.「For the reader to be born, the author must die.」Now Han Sooyoung understood the words of the Dokkaebi King. Feeding her flesh to the black darkness of the universe, she laughed. Somewhere in this universe, there surely existed a being reading this story together with her.Then let this be the plausibility by which you may live.Soon the dense darkness like printed letters surged in, and Han Sooyoung’s soul vanished into the abyss.*And in the pitch-black darkness, the man who had once been the protagonist of this story realized her death.“Han Sooyoung?”Yu Joonghyuk muttered as he looked down beneath the Void Veil. It was strange. Until just a moment ago, he had felt the tale of Han Sooyoung, but suddenly he could feel nothing. As if every tale about her had been erased from this world.What that meant was obvious, but Yu Joonghyuk could not accept it. As much as Han Sooyoung knew Yu Joonghyuk, he knew Han Sooyoung too. That Han Sooyoung could not possibly die like this.But a companion who didn’t know Han Sooyoung as well seemed to think differently.“It’s time to head back.”The man who had been fending off the hunting dogs chasing through the abyss said.“I don’t care, but if we stay here any longer, the whole area will be affected.”Indeed, powerful storms of sparks were raging around the two. For the safety of the 41st-round Earth, and for their own, it was about time to leave. Yu Joonghyuk thought so too—until a small ray of light brushed past under the Void Veil.“Hey.”Meteors, flying intermittently from distant space, passed them and fell beneath the Void Veil.“Yu Joong—”Before the man could finish speaking, Yu Joonghyuk’s figure moved like a flash of light and struck the Void Veil.The Veil that let the meteor pass did not allow Yu Joonghyuk. The moment he touched it, a terrible lightning shock surged through his entire body. Even as his flesh burned black, Yu Joonghyuk stretched out his hand toward the Veil, as if something he had sought all along lay beneath it.“Is he insane?”At last, the man stepped in and dragged the half-roasted Yu Joonghyuk away. Even as he was pulled, Yu Joonghyuk never took his eyes off the Veil.“It was there.”“What?”For a single instant, he had seen it. Just after Han Sooyoung’s tale vanished, a faint thread of light that appeared briefly and disappeared again. He didn’t know why that light had shone there. He only knew he recognized it. Because that light was the starlight that had protected his back for a very long time.“Kim Dokja.”Right now, beneath that Veil, Kim Dokja was there.

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