Chapter. 16. Saint and Perfection (33)
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A quiet hill.
Three beings stood side by side in front of the silver mechanical beast.
“I did everything I could. The good news is…. As the world of ‘professor’ ended happily, perhaps the ‘error’ born in March fell far short of expectations.”
“It’s better than expected… So do you think there is hope?”
“….”
The girl was unable to answer the red dragon’s question. The sprawling appearance of the World Tree was so distorted that even an unfamiliar person would feel that something was wrong.
The dragon must have felt it too, as she folded her wings and her face was filled with deep sorrow.
“In the end, the next world will proceed the same way.”
“…Are you afraid?”
“It would be a lie to say otherwise.”
A world of countless people. The dragon and the girl felt both trepidation and fear as the branches came together and stretched out into the sky.
The end of March World. It means that the people who make up the world called March are moving on to the next world.
Even if what unfolds next is a hell worse than the three previous destructions, they have no choice.
Tiring –
An inorganic sound came between the two managers who were filled with deep thoughts.
[The player’s choice is confirmed.]
“…Okay. Our duty is finally over. That’s it. At least at this moment it has been proven that all of this was not in vain-”
[Choice is ‘Number 1. ‘Permission to adjust the time scale in the game.’]
“Cough!”
“oh.”
When the case of the ancient dragon was heard, it was news that made the world’s eyes widen.
The perfect player who miraculously appeared made the choice.
Something other than a choice for the future of all mankind.
Atlaheva hurriedly opened the space and illuminated the place where the Perfecter was.
———
“If you don’t know how many years it will take, just keep doing it for years and decades!”
“Don’t force me to make a fucking choice, you program bastards! “Give me time!”
“We have one more round!”
———
A player hangs Aldar and Senika to dry and shouts as if declaring war.
Atlaheba’s eyes reflected his and the mechanical beast’s appearance alternately. The world tree twists and turns and spreads towards World 4, and the player gives up on his choice at the last moment.
“…What a foolish person. “Do you not realize that this is a reckless challenge and excessive greed?”
“Atlaheva. Didn’t I tell you? “He deviates from our future prediction program from time to time.”
“This was not a family that relied on the program. “I just thought about the people I encountered in the desert.”
Atlaheba remembered the image of him running down the path opened by the death of countless Holy Knights in the desert sea and finally overcoming a being like the god of the world.
He was not a foolish person who would be intoxicated with personal victory.
She also acknowledged it because she was the kind of person who was willing to burn fiercely until the last moment of her life for the well-being of society, not the individual. That the professor is the person who will carry the last piece of hope towards the end of the world.
Atlaheva had no doubts about his choice of server room coordinates.
‘Because it was such a promise.’
The final test to recognize competent ‘completer candidates’ as ‘completers’.
With rewards lined up that can be said to be abilities similar to a person’s dream, does the candidate for completion overcome their temptations and choose the hope of a world where nothing falls to him?
Did their efforts to save the world come about because they simply wanted to save it, not for compensation?
The final choice that obscures its proof.
The professor also gave up at the last moment.
Just like the other two completer candidates did before. Player ‘professor’ also remained as a candidate for completion.
The intention is to jump into GG’s simulation again.
There really isn’t any chance left now.
“Hehe. Huhuhuhu….”
“….You look happy, World Tree.”
“is that so? Well, I see. “It’s amazing how you and I can have the same thoughts and goals, but our outward reactions can be so different.”
The World Tree’s fingertips touched the dragon’s distorted face.
“You are a dragon. A manager who protects and maintains balance. To you, April World, where the contamination has spread beyond this level, will already be considered a cesspit and not even worth dealing with.”
“Isn’t it true that it is a devil’s cave that corrupts all the souls sucked into it?”
“…If you look at it through the eyes of a dragon, that would be true. But it doesn’t appear that way in the eyes of the World Tree.”
The world tree in the shape of a girl looked at the silver tree trunks extending towards April World, as it had always seen from this spot.
Isn’t the mechanical tree, which has been spreading out branches only to the side for several years, now heading upward, not knowing that it is high in the sky?
“I am an observer of all worlds and a supporter of players. As a world tree, it shared the worlds of all players and shared the pain and despair of all data souls. Their screams become my knots, and their corruption becomes withered branches, rotting along with my body.”
It was an old tree in the shape of a girl. An old tree in a world made up of machines and wires. Machine intelligence has had more contact with human life than any other AI.
“After overcoming so many ups and downs and wounds, I finally grew to that point.”
A bent branch indicated that someone had overcome it.
The deep grooves symbolize that they did not fall despite adversity.
Even the appearance of the world tree, which some might say was distorted, was nothing but splendor to her, who took care of every single one of its branches.
“It bends and breaks and withers, but it hasn’t fallen yet.”
“….”
“Atlaheva, you cherish the word ‘professor’, right?”
“World Tree.”
“You’re hoping he won’t jump into an unbalanced world that you can’t quite grasp, right?”
“…I just didn’t like the idea of returning to this empty land even though it could have been completed as is.”
How foolish this is.
How greedy is this?
What a dazzling being.
It was broken at the last moment.
saint and perfecter. The arrow pointing to one of the two was broken and divided into two.
They threw away their last hope and other hopes they gave up and buried a long time ago. They are proudly showing off the old and outdated conclusion that ‘everyone has a happy ending’.
The three managers sitting on the bench of the World Tree saw the image of a young dragon and a human having a fist fight in front of a vending machine.
———
“Ugh! “Hyde, you bastard, I won’t see you anymore when I go out!”
“Saladin, you arrogant and foolish man! “You stupid human being!”
“What the fuck! It’s up to you to choose! “I told you to choose!”
“You heard what I said earlier! “It’s impossible!”
“They said I might be able to do it!”
“That is the judgment of the individual Aldarshaks! Didn’t the future prediction model of GG, the masterpiece of the creator, the greatest scientist in human history, calculate the result and say, ‘It’s truly impossible to clear now’? “What’s the point of all these sacrifices if I go to April and can’t clear it forever?”
“You can wake up, just wake up!” Don’t you trust me? “How dare this blasphemous reptile ignore the saint’s assurances!”
“If we just chose the coordinates, our long-cherished wish would be fulfilled and people outside would also gain hope! “Isn’t everyone happy?”
“I’m not happy!”
———
He was beaten by his left hand, which moved as if he was alive, and eventually succeeded in wrapping his legs around Aldarshaks’ neck and strangling it.
A violent clanging sound rang out from the waist wrapped around the dragon’s tail as it tried to rip it off, and a tearful orange hatchling was waving its short arms in an attempt to stop the two or three people.
His actions and words are so light-hearted that he cannot be considered a person who holds the fate of the world in his hands.
However, he is a human being that no one can take lightly because he carries the karma of both worlds.
“…Perhaps we misunderstood the Creator’s will.”
[I deny it. The manager carried out the project according to the process input by the Creator, so it is impossible to deviate from the Creator’s will.]
Atlaheva shook her head in response to the system’s sharp answer.
well. Is that really the case?
The system was stubborn. Since he did not select [server room address], the authority entered into GG is only ‘completer candidate’.
However, who could call that person, who chooses the thorny path and only then laughs and talks freely as if his heart was relieved, other than a saint?
Even if they didn’t appoint him as it was just a program, he was already a complete person. The perfect human being that Andrey Gedroits had been waiting for so long. Those with lofty ideals are buried in ideals and become corrupted, and those with good intentions like the sea are cut down by the harshness of the world.
Not all good and not all bad.
A ridiculous person who saves the world
without any big ideals or grand aspirations, just because he wants to do so.
A crazy person who is more comfortable on a thorny road than a smooth one.
By dictionary definition, it is called a ‘hero’.
———
“Ahh! Let it go! “Let go of that hand, Saladin!”
“Stay still! Scaly Claw Toothed Heart! I’ll take just one, no more! If you’re so worried about the next world, you can’t donate this much! “I’ve lost my regenerative power, so I need good armor!”
“Gooooooo! Seiha! Seiha!!!”
“If you pull out my heart, I will die!”
“then. rest of it?”
“Uh… what about scales and claws…?”
“Seseihaaaaa!!!”
———
Agag!
Atlaheba stood up as she saw the young dragon’s fangs finally being pulled out.
“Anyway, what has been decided is what has been decided, so nothing will change even if we just talk among ourselves here.”
“is it so. According to GG’s prediction of the future, all worlds will eventually be destroyed, so wouldn’t an unpredictable choice be the right answer? In that respect, wouldn’t the choice of a professor have been the correct choice?”
“Because it is not an answer, it is actually the right choice… Although it is a difficult conclusion for a dragon to accept. “I have no choice but to agree with what you say.”
The world tree with a big smile on its face persuaded the dragon, and eventually a small smile appeared on the dragon’s face.
In any case, the completer has not given up on both worlds.
Because both sides of the story are progressing, neither side is finished.
If so, there may still be things they can do.
With that thought, the red dragon walked towards the door leading back to her lair.
Woe!
The air changes momentarily. When she returned to her quiet and soft rare in the space of the World Tree filled with the smell of iron-
“Baby! “Aaaah!”
“molar! Dragon molar necklace! “Alright, 30!”
“Ui sesaeuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut!!!”
There was a man with his upper body up to his waist in the dragon’s mouth, accompanied by the strong smell of blood.
Even the dragon’s fang covered in spit and blood that fell on the precious creator’s armchair.
There is also the sight of an orange hatchling hanging on a man’s leg, crying and running towards her.
“Godmother! Godmother!!! “We can’t handle that person…!”
“….done.”
Atlaheva frowned again and walked towards the half-eaten professor.
The thought that maybe this was really the ‘correct answer’ had completely disappeared.
****
“Agaaaaaaa!”
“That’s right! Almost done now! “It’s going to hurt a lot, so hold on to it… no, if you clench your teeth, I’ll die, so just hold on!”
“Gwauuu! Oh god mohi! Great hohiyi!!”
When I stretched out my arm, there was a dragon’s molar just within reach. As I reached inward, shaking my fingertips, I heard a voice of great pain coming from inside.
[This is a good thing. Are you ready to play a prank like this? huh? While doing a very tap dance on the suicide button?]
‘So this is what you’re doing right now! Even though this seems like a joke, it’s actually serious!’
[If this is serious, then all the seriousness in the world must have been killed by your hands.]
After being deprived of the option of ‘give me my body and leave’, Hyde became very speechless and was talking all the time.
‘You’re really serious.’
At the end of World 3, I lost my regenerative power to the godmother, and the next world is said to be so amazing that the entire game was declared ‘hell’.
Wouldn’t it be better to take off the armor right in front of your eyes and get at least some strong armor so that you don’t end up being slaughtered in the village?
I am very seriously planning to make ‘Dragon Knight Professor Park’, who is made up of the bones and flesh of this young dragon, the vanguard of April World. If you have a whole bone of Yonggari, you won’t end up dying somewhere.
With that thought in mind, the moment I reach out for my molars,
Swoosh!
“Oh, no! “My dragon knight parts!”
Someone grabbed my ankle and pulled it out.
“Kahaak! Crumbling! Kauk haak!”
“Oh brother!!”
Aldarshax is breathing heavily and Senika is rushing towards him.
And Atlaheba holds me upside down, covered in dragon saliva, and looks at me with eyes that are complicated by the world.
“…Anyway, you can’t take what you’re holding in your hand, so don’t do that.”
“Oh yeah?”
As I looked at Aldarshax with regret, Atlaheva responded by covering them with her wings. Come to think of it, I was pulling out a raw hatchling tooth in front of an ancient dragon. Is that why you look so bad?
“…You seem to be in a pretty good mood.”
And there was silence for a moment. Silence not because there is nothing to say, but because one chooses one’s words carefully. The ancient dragon looked at me and the vending machine and let out a sigh that was almost like a breath.
“Won’t you regret it? By your choice just now, you have thrown back the solid hope of saving the outside world into a very uncertain and low probability situation. “Maybe I’ll never get it again.”
“Well, that might be the case.”
A semi-omnipotent dragon that can even change the properties of natural mana with a single breath, and can turn people into dogs and dogs into trolls with a single word.
Those dragons come one after another and shout ‘You’re screwed, dude’ with their whole body, but it doesn’t make sense unless you’re anxious.
still.
“At least you have plenty of time now, right? 3 In the world, ‘If you don’t do this now, it will be over! If we don’t kill this guy now, we’ll all die!’ Because there is enough time to work leisurely, carefully, and delicately, unlike the tight schedule I used to work on. “You have to do it with care.”
April World has different conditions. I have time until my soul wears out, and I have the ability to use that time usefully.
You have to draw a very big picture. They make plans so big that they cover the whole world, and when they feel something is wrong, they quickly throw it all away and run away, waiting for the next opportunity.
Even if you do that, not even a second passes in real life.
Unless it fails. Even if it takes ten, a hundred, or a thousand years, as long as you succeed! This means that if we find a way, the electronic ghosts captured by GG can be saved and the people outside can greet the professor who suddenly woke up as if nothing had happened. Isn’t this a perfect plan that, if successful, will not harm anyone?
Atlaheba seemed to be looking for something to say at my words, but then closed her mouth. Somehow, there seemed to be a resigned smile on the dragon’s face.
“If that is what you mean, I understand.”
“Yeah whatever. “Is there nothing more I need to do now?”
“Nothing… no, just one thing. There’s just one more thing. okay. “There was this.”
The smile on Atlaheba’s face changed into a slightly more sinister smile.
“I should get compensation.”
.
.
.
.
huh?
“compensation? “Didn’t you already receive it?”
The ancient dragon shook his head at my question.
“Not that kind of reward. Anyway, isn’t this Gedreutz’s ‘game’? “Don’t you think it’s inappropriate for people to be rewarded with real-life items for playing a game?”
“No, well… it is like that.”
“If I were to ask you the exact same question… yes. I think the word ‘gift’ would be more appropriate for this. In any case, thanks for connecting the world to the next and for making all of our wishes come true. And in the end, gratitude for not giving up on everyone. “I guess that’s the extent of the greeting.”
Sarak –
A small girl wearing a silver dress appeared next to the ancient dragon.
“It’s been a while, Professor.”
“Ah, World Tree.”
“Preparations for Atlaheva are complete.”
“This quickly?”
“Isn’t this what everyone wanted?”
“Aha… then that could be possible.”
While the two managers were fumbling around, leaving me bewildered, a silver door began to rise from the floor. An incredibly large silver door, perhaps 10 meters high and 4 meters wide.
Atlaheba pointed to the door with her chin when I looked at her as if asking what this was.
“Go in.”
“Are you going to April World?”
“no. It will take some time for the new world to be ready. It will take about a week in real time for history to have progressed sufficiently and you will be ready to play. During that week, you can relax outside and maybe spend time with people you might not see for a long time. In any case, this door leads neither outside nor to the next world.”
“?”
Then what is it?
Instead of answering, Atlaheba lifted me up, placed me down in front of the door, and opened the door with all her might.
Hahaha!
Dazzling sunlight pours in as the door opens.
The smell of dirt and sweat. The smell of human beings combined with the smell of grilling meat and flowers.
and.
Pyuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!
Let’s go! pop! pop!
『Waaaaaaaa!!!!』
An endless welcome procession with colorful magic fireworks decorating the sky.
City streets and parade cars ringing with festive songs.
“….uh?”
“As you can see from things like TVs and armchair vending machines, the Creator loved old things.”
“Isn’t this the tradition of the game? “The hero defeated the devil and returned to the city to the cheers of the people.”
It was a scene like the ending scene of a really old game.
A festival was taking place in Kingsland, where there was no trace of war.
Spicy drunk people raise large glasses of alcohol, and
the woman grilling meat has a smile on her face and beads of sweat.
A festive street with colorful flower petals fluttering and the flags of the five major denominations and Roderick waving in the sky.
and.
and.
“It’s a kind of extra stage.”
“Wouldn’t gathering all the Data Souls for the next world mean that you could invite those who were with you to this event?”
What was revealed when the silver door was fully opened.
A parade car runs through the center of the festival.
People waiting for me with bouquets of flowers.
Lucilla and Gainax wearing gorgeous royal robes.
Notum holding a staff and Idrasil still drawing something in his notebook.
Aldrich has suddenly turned gray.
Meanwhile, Astrad is slightly taller.
“Geuuu. Congratulations. professor.”
“I was lucky to learn from you.”
“I would like to express my gratitude on behalf of the empire. saint.”
“The warrior was the best deal ever in the history of Aedran and the best investment of my life!”
“You really… make the impossible seem natural.”
“Isn’t this a fun storm? “It’s so hard, but the place that passes is filled with only peace.”
People who greet me with bright smiles.
My group survived until the end. my party
and.
“Isn’t it natural that as water flows, it will eventually meet in the same place?”
“Otman….”
“I’m glad you look good, Captain.”
“Borca….!”
Colleagues who left and thought they would never see them again.
The living and the dead. Everyone who had a relationship with me at 3 World was gathered here.
Gregory climbs up the house with the Holy Knights and raises the flag of the Church of Gwangmyeong.
A guard who once vouched for me in Turan.
The exiled godmother of the elf village.
Former masters of the empire.
.
.
.
.
People appear one by one with a parade like a step roll and say hello.
Piyuuu-poof!
[World 3 Cleared!]
The wizard’s colorful fireworks decorated the sky.
World 3. Clear.
This time, my heart was so heavy that I couldn’t say anything.
I couldn’t say anything, not even a word of gratitude, until the moment the parade ended.
Drurr. Rattling!
The procession stopped in front of Roderick’s castle.
An awning made of flower crowns and two people hidden behind it.
Siod IV and Charlotte met at a festival procession a long time ago.
Tuk-tuk.
Ottoman’s hand touched my shoulder while I was unable to speak and my lips were trembling.
“Tsk. “We’ll meet again at the banquet hall later.”
“Uh, where are you going?”
“Where are you going? “We are not other people, but a ‘professor hero party’. Do you really think we wouldn’t have learned anything from being around someone like you?”
sense. What a sense. Why on earth did you pay attention to me and get away with it? I feel like every minute and every second of this moment where we meet again is a waste.
Instead of answering, Borka kicked me in the back.
Pow!
Kwadangtangtang!
I couldn’t react and was blown away by the sound of laughter from my companions on top of the carriage moving backwards.
Snap-
[Think about it, Professor. This space is where all the data souls in GG gather. Anyone who exists in this game of Gedroits can be invited to this event.]
The soul that was Otman and had regained memories of reality whispered with magic.
[So who do you really need to meet? Of course we are honored, but is it really enough to reminisce about our bond here?]
[Are we the only people you need to meet again in a game that more than 90% of humanity has played?]
.
.
.
.
.
.
No way.
There’s no way something like that would be possible.
Someone’s warm hand touched my head after I had fallen so badly.
If GG’s souls were people who once existed in the world.
If this is a place where you can reunite with any data soul that exists in GG.
Now that we know that they are not just duplicates, but are truly the same people who disappeared.
“…In the end, you kept your promise? “My son.”
“He’s been exceptional since he was young.”
mother.
father.
These two people were so hurt that it was painful to even call their names.
Waiting for me at the end of the parade were two data souls.
“How are you?”
The gap between words.
Because I know how many words and emotions were tickling my throat in the meantime and never came out.
“…There are so many things I want to talk about…. “There were a lot.”
I also had no choice but to fill in the gaps with the words that had disappeared.
Amidst the faint sound of fireworks and cheering.
A soft shade was drawn down in the royal palace where only three people were present.
Tears poured out endlessly like a child.
No one can blame me this time.
The enemy is also here.
I could be a child.
It was the only freedom in the world that was allowed only in front of these two people.
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Ch. 16 Saint and Perfection (End)
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