"...!!"
My eyes opened...
My eyes flew wide open.
The instant I realized it, an indescribable pain engulfed my body.
"Hah...! Hah...!"
I felt like I was going to throw up.
My head throbbed. My eyes burned.
My ears rang outside, while inside, my heartbeat sounded insanely loud.
"Nngh...! Kghk...!!"
The breath I had been gulping down caught in my throat.
I grabbed my neck with trembling hands, but I could not breathe properly.
Eyes wide, I forced strength into my fingers and toes as I swallowed air.
I had experienced hyperventilation more times than I could count.
I needed to calm down. Slowly, deeply exhale.
Keeping that in mind, I somehow got my breathing under control by slapping my own body.
"The safehouse...?"
Only then did I realize I was lying on the bed in my safehouse.
"..."
I had definitely been caught and killed by Behemoth.
At the end, my body had definitely been crushed between that bastard’s enormous teeth.
Ding!
[New comment from Not an Eraser]
"..."
At the familiar sound, I patted myself down.
I took out my phone and checked the notification. The admin had left a comment.
Not an Eraser🔸: Wiki, you’re the best!!
┗Not an Eraser🔸: Still, please don’t push yourself too hard. Take it slow as you climb...!!
┗Not an Eraser🔸: (Sticker of a grotesque creature looking on worriedly)
"I’m alive...?"
I blankly blinked at the admin’s perfectly ordinary comment.
A normal comment left on my post proving I had cleared the 50th floor of the Tower of Fate.
[Infinite Regression Gallery]
[Where the fuck did the newbie go again!!!!]
[YouSaidLookForwardToTodayYouSaidLookForwardToTodayYouSaidLookForwardToToday]
[32-Year Newbie Analyst) Even I have no clue;;]
[Newbie’s having a masquerade party lol]
[Wow, but how is clearing the Tower of Fate in just a few minutes even possible??]
The usual, ordinary gallery posts.
Death isn’t really death...?
I blinked blankly at the incomprehensible situation.
I had died. I had definitely been swallowed by that stinking maw.
Yet somehow, I was alive and breathing without a scratch.
It can’t be a dream...
It was all exactly the same as always—this gallery’s atmosphere, the way they talked, the posts themselves.
If this were the afterlife, that would mean I had been trapped in the tower again. That could not be right.
Step—
I climbed down from the bed and took a step.
The sensation of my feet touching the ground was strange, and the pain was so bad it felt as if I might collapse at any moment.
What is this? What the hell is this?
The need to understand the situation forcibly drove my body forward.
Bang!
"..."
I opened the safehouse door and stared at the timer floating in the hollow.
-1-
[Apocalypse 302:18:07:18]
[Section 0:18:07:18]
[198 / 63]
Ten hours... passed?
Ten hours had passed since I entered the 50th floor of the Tower of Time.
Exactly as much time as I had endured in the tower had elapsed.
It proved that what I had gone through—what I had seen—had not been a dream.
Rustle.
"The magic stones are gone too."
I searched my pockets, but there was nothing inside.
Because I had thrown every last one at Behemoth.
I did not know if it had been magic resistance or something else, but it had completely ignored them. Either way, I had used them all.
Which meant what I had experienced had been neither a dream nor an illusion.
"...Then I was resurrected."
Was it Irregular’s ability? The tower’s ability?
I still had no idea what was what.
Just like when I first saw Irregular, I could not understand the things happening to me.
That was why I could not figure it out on my own.
But unlike when I had first entered the tower, I was not alone now.
Rustle.
[Infinite Regression Gallery]
I immediately raised my phone.
[I died but survived]
[Author: KingGodWiki]
What is this..?
Did I really die? Did I die and come back to life?
Or is this happening because of Irregular?
Fuck, my head hurts like hell. What the fuck is this?
[Submit Post]
My mouth felt parched as I wrote the post.
Ding ding ding ding—
As though welcoming back the protagonist who had surfaced after ten hours, all kinds of gallery users began leaving comments.
[Comments]
6373: ?
dd: What did this guy just say???
Rabbit Hops: Are you saying you just died????
┗Rabbit Hops: (Sticker of a rabbit opening its eyes wide in surprise)
┗Dog That Barks at Idiots: (Sticker of a dog blankly blinking)
┗Anonymous: DogThatBarks is flustered;;
Anonymous: Fuck, this is absurd lmao
Philosopher's Stone: What the fuck are you, seriously??
Not an Eraser🔸: Wiki...? I didn’t read that wrong, did I...?
Of course it made no sense.
Dying and then coming back to life.
I frowned at the comments filling up with question marks.
Was it because strange phenomena happened to me? Or was it some additional effect of Irregular... of Wiki?
Ding! Ding!
Watching my phone ring nonstop, I squeezed my eyes shut.
It was fortunate that I was alive. It was fortunate, but...
...Maybe because I just died and came back, but this feels fucking awful.
All the struggling I had done to stay alive suddenly felt a little hollow.
"Haa."
With a sigh, I checked the comments again—
Anonymous: Wait, so you hadn’t died until now??
Superiority of Dual Swords: If you’d carried dual swords from the beginning, you never would’ve died!!
Long-Eared Noble O, Elf X: Newbie, that’s amazing!!! Really? Seriously?!?!
┗Long-Eared Noble O, Elf X: Was that really your first time dying????
Baldness Not Stopped Even by a Ninth-Circle Archmage: Lmao, wow, that really is unprecedented.
"...?"
I blinked blankly at the oddly strange reactions.
What did they mean, I had not died until now?
What did they mean, this was my first time dying?
Who died more than once?
When you died, it was obviously over.
...Don’t tell me death wasn’t the end?
Tap.
[Do you guys resurrect when you die too?]
[Author: KingGodWiki]
That wording is fucking violent, damn;
Can someone explain what the hell is going on;;
[Comments]
Anonymous: We want to hear the explanation from you, asshole lmao
dd: We have no clue either, but everything you’re thinking is probably right.
Water > Fire: Is it fortunate or unfortunate that this guy isn’t a fire mage...
┗Root Fire Mage: I have no idea either.
Anonymous: So you thought you could climb this shit without dying?
┗21: Wasn’t he actually doing exactly that?
┗Anonymous: Fuck, you’re right?
No, seriously? For real?
It was not a dream. It was not a scam.
It was not a special ability of Irregular, nor a butterfly effect caused by an anomaly.
The tower had simply always been a place like this?
[No, I’ve never died even once]
[Author: KingGodWiki]
Why didn’t anyone tell me? What the fuck is this?
Why did nobody tell me that you come back to life even if you die?
[Comments]
Anonymous: How the fuck can you not die here?
Anonymous: Did you think you could climb the tower without dying because your brain’s a goddamn flower garden?
Infinite Swordsman: Wow, it looks like this guy really did climb all this way without dying;;
"No, no, no...!!"
I felt betrayed.
I had thought they were all monsters.
It was not as though I had never thought it was strange, but I had not thought deeply about it.
I had simply assumed most of them had been capable of climbing something like this from the start.
Honestly, they were fantasy beings who used magic and swung sword aura around, so I just accepted it.
Because what mattered more was my own climb.
Because in the end, only a tiny minority survived.
Ding—!
Not an Eraser🔸: It says so in the notice... Wiki...?
┗Not an Eraser🔸: You said you read the notice...
┗Not an Eraser🔸: Did you lie to me...?
"No, I did read it, but..."
I had only read half of it.
A little more than half.
No, still, I had skimmed through it and checked all the information that seemed important.
┗KingGodWiki (Author): ..Where did it say that?
┗Not an Eraser🔸: I don’t know.
┗KingGodWiki (Author): No, but I really did read it; I must’ve seen all the important stuff?
┗Not an Eraser🔸: (Sticker of a grotesque creature scrunching up its face and glaring)
┗Not an Eraser🔸: It says it right here in ‘Infinite Regression Gallery Notice’?!
"The first notice I saw...?"
I hurriedly opened the notice and began reading down it.
The notice I had read after the Irregular incident, following the admin’s insistence that I absolutely read it.
[☆ Infinite Regression Gallery Notice]
[Author: Not an Eraser🔸]
Hello. I’m Not an Eraser, and I have been appointed as the second administrator.
The previous notice is rather old, so I am writing this post to reorganize it.
For the rules and guidelines of the ‘Infinite Regression Gallery,’ please see the post titled ‘Infinite Regression Gallery Rules,’ not this post.
.
.
.
Its readability was abysmal, and it began with a greeting before rambling on however the writer pleased.
It was definitely the notice I had started reading before scrolling all the way down and replacing it with a summary post.
The notice I had replaced with a summary post...
When I checked the comments, the link to the summary post I had seen back then was still there.
It had the tower’s explanation as I remembered it, along with precautions and so on.
[☆ Fuck, admin, don’t write notices like that]
[Author: Anonymous]
.
.
.
Three-line summary lol
1. You have to climb the tower.
2. It gets harder the more you regress.
3. You will never meet anyone for the rest of your life; everyone is in a separate space.
4. There are no guides. Any posts or comments about them are automatically deleted.
"No, it’s not here..."
But nowhere here did it say that you resurrected even if you died.
[☆ Infinite Regression Gallery Notice]
[Author: Not an Eraser🔸]
.
.
.
If you die inside the tower, you will open your eyes again in your safehouse. That does not mean you will not feel pain.
When you open your eyes again after dying, your body will return to normal. Severed limbs may return, or serious illnesses may be cured.
However, depending on the trauma you suffer at the time of death, you may develop disabilities or experience various additional effects. Please never take your life lightly.
The moment you truly die in the tower is when the Apocalypse Timer reaches 0.
"..."
No, it really was written there.
Why the hell was it really written there?
Why did it have to be written in this particular notice?
If it had been in another notice, I would have found it.
You insane anonymous bastard.
Then what was that summary post supposed to be?
Of course I would not realize it if it was not in the summary.
They could have added just one more line to it.
[Figure out the rest through adventure, later loser]
Instead of writing bullshit like that, they could have added one more line.
They could have been at least that kind, like the admin—
"No... now that I think about it, it really doesn’t make sense... Haa..."
The Tower of Time, the Tower of Wisdom, the Tower of Mindscape, the Tower of Fate.
Every one of them had been impossibly difficult.
Thinking about it rationally, there was no way anyone could regress hundreds or thousands of times through all that without dying.
Anyone who thought that was possible would be a goddamn idiot.
You goddamn idiot.
Come to think of it, everything in the summary post was of greater importance anyway.
There was no need to specifically write that you came back to life after dying.
It had been designed so you could not climb it without failing in the first place.
Every single person in this gallery must have experienced death at least once.
"..."
Because true death was only when the Apocalypse Timer reached 0.
Now I understood why the Tower of Time made people grind for so long.
Why the Tower of Wisdom forced people to run through a maze until they escaped, and why the Tower of Mindscape made them endure endless terror.
Why the Tower of Fate proposed an absurd luck-based game.
If all of it was meant to stall for time.
If you could take on the exact same challenge after dying and waking up again.
"Haha..."
It all made sense.
Every last bit of it.
[It really was written in the notice]
[Author: RevivalWiki]
I didn’t know;
[Comments]
Not an Eraser🔸: ...I’m very disappointed in you, Wiki.
┗RevivalWiki (Author): No, it wasn’t in the summary post;;;
┗Not an Eraser🔸: Are you saying you only read the summary post?!
┗RevivalWiki (Author): I only saw the summary for that one notice, seriously; I read all the others..
┗Not an Eraser🔸: I wrote everything out so carefully...
I have nothing to say.
Why were there no posts saying you resurrected when you died?
Because it was obvious. Because everyone experienced it.
[Apocalypse 302:18:07:18]
Because the real ‘Apocalypse’ was clearly visible to everyone.
Of course, I still felt wronged, but I was the one who had only read the post written by an anonymous user and moved on.
It would be strange to get angry at someone who had personally made a summary, asking why they had not included this one detail.
...So that’s why it’s called the Infinite Regression Gallery.
I had naturally thought infinite regression meant repeating the tower.
But since you returned to your safehouse when you died and resurrected, that was probably included in the name too.
"I guess it’s a good thing, but..."
I felt strange. It felt strange.
The sensation of being alive even after experiencing death was unsettling.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Regardless of how I felt, my phone kept ringing like crazy.
[No, fucking lmaoooooooo] (4)
[Zero deaths by floor 198, what the fuck;;] (22)
[You can really feel the wall between us..] (7)
[Isn’t that guy insane?? Was that really his first death???] (11)
[The more you know, the more ridiculous he is. Just unbelievable.] (19)
I can’t believe it either.
Knowing would not have made me try any less hard.
I still would have fought desperately, still would have tried to climb without dying no matter what.
But even so, I could not shake this strange feeling.
[☆ Hey, Infinite Gallery]
[Author: RevivalWiki]
I suddenly want to make it to the featured posts.
Upvotes 123, downvotes 4
Ten seconds after I posted it.
One hundred and twenty upvotes.
I closed my eyes as I watched the posts, comments, and upvotes rise without pause.
Phew. Thank goodness.
A good thing was a good thing, right?
Making it to the featured posts made me feel a little more at ease. Featured posts really were the cure for everything.
[I worship the GOAT...] (21)
[If you don’t know, just memorize this: ‘Wiki’ <<< God] (16)
[☆ If you’re waiting for resurrection celebration cola, upvote this lmao] (47)
[How the fuck did he clear the Tower of Fate without dying] (33)
[WhoIsWikiWhoIsWikiWhoIsWiki] (11)
"There’s nothing but lunatics here."
Still, it did not feel all that bad.
From my perspective, I felt a little stupid, but from theirs, this was fucking amazing.
While you guys were dying, resurrecting, and climbing the tower, I climbed without dying.
[Don’t blatantly mention nicknames in titles!!!]
[Author: Not an Eraser🔸]
I’m only giving one warning. The second time is a ban!!!!
[Comments]
Anonymous: Nickname? I merely spoke the name of God lol
Anonymous: Who the hell are you?
┗221: For real, admin, who do you think you are?
Anonymous: So is the admin more amazing than Wiki?
┗412: Admin = trying to ban me, doesn’t post lewd pics, can’t hand out cola, isn’t crazy.
┗412: Newbie = entertains me, might post lewd pics, hands out cola, is a crazy bastard.
┗Anonymous: Damn, fucking preach. Hail the god newbie lmaoooooooo
dd: There really is nothing but crazy bastards here lmao
I smiled faintly at the incomprehensible gallery, filled with worship for me regardless of what the admin said.
They’ve all made it to the featured posts again.
Every post I had written in the past few minutes had made it to the featured posts.
It was truly absurd. And I could only laugh hollowly at the fact that I had only just learned something so important, but...
"Haa."
Still, I was grateful that I had a chance to get revenge on that enormous beast bastard.
It effectively meant I could run wild to my heart’s content in a place with no limit on my lives.
I could make choices I normally could not, take as many risky gambles with little chance of success as I wanted.
Clench...!
No matter what happens, I’m going to hit you with something big.
You chewed up my body in that filthy mouth of yours?
I am never letting that slide.
About three hundred days remained until the Apocalypse.
I had more than enough time to rot away with. I would struggle however I had to and land a blow on that bastard.
[I’ll be back]
[Author: RevivalWiki]
Don’t worry if I don’t come back.
When I do return, I’ll bring something fucking amazing.
Step.
"Earth Incarnation or whatever..."
With this infinite-lives cheat, I would first figure out how to smash that giant head of yours to pieces.
Comments (0)
Please log in to leave a comment. Login or Register