Step—
"..."
After saying goodbye to Dojun, I went to the director’s office and reported that there was a massive fire.
I said it looked like it would spread to the mountain, that the flames were too fierce for a child like me to do anything about.
People were dying right now, I said, exaggerating the situation as much as I could.
No, they probably really are dying.
I hadn’t thought of them as people, naturally enough, but now that I considered it, they were people.
Hell must be unfolding in real time inside the banquet hall.
Then I returned to the banquet hall building and set fire to the alcohol I had spread beforehand, from the ground floor down to the basement.
And on the off chance, I headed to where Yu Hyein would be—
Creak.
"...I honestly didn’t think you’d still be here."
When she should have been rushing out in a panic, I found Yu Hyein sitting leisurely on the bed in nothing but a bathrobe, enjoying a glass of wine.
"You told me to wait, Seol. You know how much I love you."
Crazy bitch.
Fortunately, not a single person had gotten out of the banquet hall.
This place on the second floor now had no way out, either above or below.
Within minutes, this place would be swallowed by the flames too.
"And... if you came here only to find me gone, you might be disappointed, you know?"
"You know what’s happening, right?"
"Of course. I’m not an idiot."
This was practically a place where she could die at any moment, but she said she had waited because I told her to.
With a smile steeped in madness, she said she couldn’t possibly leave when I might be disappointed.
"So you stayed here simply because of me?"
"Yeah."
"You could have escaped on your own."
"I wondered if you’d warned me beforehand just to save me, but it doesn’t seem like that was it."
"..."
I fell silent at Yu Hyein’s words.
I didn’t know what I was supposed to say.
She looked at me as though she knew exactly what thoughts, what feelings, I held toward her.
She looked at me calmly, as though she knew perfectly well that I hated her.
"They’re all dead."
"I don’t know how you did it, but that’s really incredible, isn’t it, my Seol?"
"You’ll die soon too."
"Haa..."
She merely shrugged at my words, then lightly took a sip of the wine in her hand.
She savored its flavor and scent as she swallowed it, then met my eyes with an excited breath.
Slide.
"It’s a shame I won’t get to see the one and only artwork in the world completed... but, well, I spent a month thinking about it."
She rose from her seat and took a step forward.
I swallowed and took a small step back as she slowly approached me.
"If an artwork that isn’t complete yet tries to kill me because it’s afraid of becoming perfect, I thought that might not be so bad either."
"What...?"
"I mean, if my death can complete your persona, that wouldn’t be so bad either."
As she always did, she stroked my cheek.
The familiar sensation, the temperature of a filthy snake crawling over me, coolly chilled my sweat-soaked cheek.
"My death will live inside you for the rest of your life. No matter what work you complete, no matter what ending your life meets."
"..."
"I’ll still be alive and breathing in every moment of yours, Seol."
"Ha ha... fuck..."
"It’s okay if you aren’t perfect. I only mistakenly thought I loved you because you were perfect..."
Squeeze—
"The truth is, I really loved ‘you,’ Seol."
She gently pulled my trembling body into an embrace.
As if what she felt truly was love, she held me tenderly, carefully patting me as though she were embracing a lover.
Thud—!!
"You really have changed.... But do you know this, Seol?"
"..."
I shoved Yu Hyein away with all my strength.
She was flung helplessly onto the floor, yet she only beamed up at me.
"The fact that the reason you changed is ultimately because of me makes me unbearably ecstatic."
"You’re seriously driving me fucking insane."
"What are you going to do? Kill me?"
"Haa..."
"Here, this is a wineglass. You can do it just like last month. Break it, then stab it deep into my neck."
My face twisted at the sight of her offering me the wineglass, her cheeks flushed.
I felt filthy.
I felt incredibly filthy.
Thanks to Dojun, I had felt as though every burden had been lifted from me.
It had felt as though I was finally settling everything from the past.
"Even killing you would feel fucking disgusting."
"I never knew the feeling of an artwork that was meant to become perfect being tainted because of me could be this ecstatic, Seol."
Crash—!!
I smashed the wineglass she had given me against the wall.
My face crumpled as shards of glass pierced my arm and a little blood trickled out.
The hand clutching the broken glass trembled violently.
I wanted to drive it into that woman’s throat and cut off her breath right then and there.
"Seol."
"..."
I quietly met the gaze calling my name.
I should have trembled at the very sight of her. I should have gotten goosebumps from hearing that call alone.
-Seol!! Thank you!!
Still, thanks to my friend, I think I’m a little better now.
From now on, whenever someone called me by my name, maybe I’d think of my friend before that crazy bitch.
Tap.
"...? Seol?"
"Go die on your own for all I care."
"What—"
I tossed the broken wineglass away carelessly and turned my back on her.
"W-wait, you can’t leave like this, Seol. You have to kill me, or stay by my side, okay?"
If your dream was for me to kill you, then leaving was the right thing to do.
She was going to burn to death anyway. There was no reason to do something that would only please her.
"We loved each other, didn’t we? You hate me, don’t you, Seol...!!"
It is a little disappointing, but...
"Han Seol—!!!"
I had gained more than I had lost.
If I’d known it would turn out like this, I shouldn’t have come back at all.
Rumble...!!
The ceiling began to collapse.
Just like the Flame of the Apocalypse I had felt on the fiftieth floor of the Tower of Trials, the temperature around me slowly rose, and my shoulders slumped.
So how am I supposed to complete the scenario?
What did I have to do to escape this space in the end?
Wiki had said I didn’t need a walkthrough, but I had no idea how I was meant to go back.
Flash—!
"..."
There was a cracking sound from the ceiling, and it came crashing down.
I watched silently as light flashed from the falling mass.
Maybe dying would end it. I’d already done everything I could, after all.
For a moment, in time that seemed to have stopped under that thought, I waited for the enormous chunk of ceiling to fall over me.
-You have to live happily!!
"Ha."
My friend’s voice from earlier came to mind, and I instinctively dodged it.
"I don’t know either."
I had no idea exactly what the fiftieth floor of the Tower of Mindscape wanted from me.
Whether it simply showed me trauma from my past, or whether there was some other clear condition.
Craaaash—!!
I’d been so focused on saving the children that I hadn’t even had time to think about it.
And now, too much had changed for me to start agonizing over it.
So.
Maybe I’ll just go see his face one more time.
It might not be a bad idea to go see my friend’s face one more time, even if I might never see him again for the rest of my life.
*
Wheeeee—!!
"Seol...?"
"What are you staring at?"
"No... how...?"
"I told you I’d come back, didn’t I?"
"H-ha ha.... Right!"
I snickered as I looked at Dojun standing in front of the row of ambulances.
I didn’t think it would actually work.
Was I going to be stuck here forever at this rate?
"Seol."
"Yeah."
I gave an offhand answer as Dojun walked toward me with a broad grin.
Slide—
He came close and held out his fist to me.
I couldn’t help but smile at him suggesting something I had always initiated first.
"Keep living like that from now on."
"..."
"Because you’re my proud friend."
Tap.
"...If it’s my friend saying it, then I have to listen."
I bumped my fist against the tiny fist of the twelve-year-old boy—
Rumble—!!
I turned my head at the loud noise coming from far away, where the orphanage building had stood.
...It’s all over.
Yu Hyein, the director, everything from that hell had vanished into the flames.
Just as in the past, it had been erased by flames that devoured everything.
"Goodbye, my friend."
No, this is different from the past.
The moment I turned around with a faint smile at the voice behind me—
"..."
The dark night scenery, the line of ambulances.
Even my old friend, who had been smiling at me—all of it had disappeared.
The familiar sight of the tower, which I had returned to after quite a while, welcomed me.
"...Ha."
It was over, finally.
It had been long. So damn long.
Only after more than ten years had passed since Dojun left this world had I finally given him a proper goodbye.
I had finally said farewell to my only friend, who had suddenly left one day.
The guy who remained in that world would surely live diligently.
He would surely become a pilot and fly through the skies freer than anyone else.
Waiting for the day I returned, he would live happily and joyfully.
"...Take care, my friend."
My friend, who had been the beginning of my regret.
At the end of that sickening hell, I prayed that you would soar into the blue sky.
"..."
Step—
I looked around the dark, empty tower once.
Remembering him as though he were still smiling and waving, I slowly started walking.
Toward the open exit of the tower in the distance.
I walked toward the clear notification reading, "Tower of Mindscape, Floor 50."
Hoping that our ending would become a new beginning for each other.
*
-1-
[Apocalypse 294:10:32:41]
[Section 6:10:32:41]
[ 200 / 77 ]
A day has passed.
Just like before, when I had spent several days on the fiftieth floor of the Tower of Wisdom but only one day had passed when I returned, the timer had advanced by just a single day.
I couldn’t know the true clear condition or purpose of the fiftieth floor of the Tower of Mindscape, but one thing was certain: I had cleared it.
Though I have complicated feelings about it in a lot of ways.
The bitter knowledge that it wasn’t reality, Yu Hyein’s twisted obsession that remained in my memory.
Even the fact that my friend calling my name, laughing, and smiling at me had only been an illusion created by the tower.
In so many ways, complicated... filthy feelings filled my body.
Maybe it’s just because I was dragged back here again.
It felt like I had wrapped things up well, but I thought I should rest for a while.
Ding!
...Right, there was this too.
I blinked at my phone when I heard Wiki’s notification for the first time in a while.
[Tower of Mindscape, Floor 50 Cleared - TP +5,000]
The usual tower-clear reward, and—
A single red (1) displayed on the internet app.
[Conditions have been met.]
[The Starlink function has been unlocked.]
The instant I pressed it as if possessed, a window appeared before my eyes.
A new feature I had gained after roughly two months... no, three, if I counted the time spent in the tower.
The name reminds me of something...
The word Star at the front probably didn’t mean much, but it still felt familiar somehow.
[Starlink]
[Select Conversation Partner]
-No registered targets.
"..."
A conversation partner.
Was it some kind of messenger function?
It felt a little underwhelming for something I got after clearing every fiftieth floor.
After all, I had started with Wiki as a cheat code, and on the tenth floor the absurd shopping function had appeared.
Does the gallery decide the target?
Like Starpang’s gift function, perhaps a conversation feature would appear when I pressed a nickname.
I didn’t particularly feel like talking to anyone, but I entered the gallery to check.
[Not an Eraser🔸]
"..."
I had been browsing the gallery posts, thinking I would try starting a conversation with just anyone, when a nickname caught my eye and stopped my finger.
[Not an Eraser🔸]
-Reply
-Send Gift
-Register Starlink
As expected, the options appeared when I pressed the nickname.
It didn’t matter if it was someone else, but if I was going to do this, the head mod seemed like the easiest choice.
Maybe it was because the person herself felt easy to be around.
She was also the gallery administrator, so it wouldn’t be bad to talk to her about this function.
[Starlink]
[Select Conversation Partner]
-Not an Eraser
After registering her and returning to Starlink, the head mod’s nickname had been added.
The moment I pressed the head mod’s name and tapped the Start Conversation button, another notification window appeared.
[100 TP is consumed per message.]
[Upon reaching ‘50’ and ‘100’ interactions with the target, additional available functions will be added.]
So it isn’t just for talking after all.
What would the extra functions be?
When I pressed the [+] button below, four buttons appeared.
A [Photo] button that seemed to let me send pictures, alongside three [???] buttons.
The first thing that came to mind was calling... but there were still two more buttons beside it.
Fifty or a hundred times wasn’t that high a number.
Put bluntly, I could fill that quota in a minute or two. I could check it right away.
The problem was that it used a whopping 100 TP each time.
Who the hell charges ten thousand won for one text...?
Would this become cheaper as my number of regressions increased, like sending gifts did?
Honestly, it was a price that made it hard to use freely.
[Owned TP: 97,806]
With the reward I had just gotten for clearing the fiftieth floor of the Tower of Mindscape, I was back near one hundred thousand.
Of course, I could use it a hundred times if I wanted to....
Since I had no idea what would happen in the tower, it felt wasteful to spend ten thousand TP just on a conversation.
Or was it? I had spent far more than that just giving stuff away in the gallery, hadn’t I?
Honestly, I didn’t think whatever came out of it would be much help.
My emotions were heightened in so many ways right now, and my head wasn’t working properly.
...Let’s just try it once first.
[Not an Eraser]
-Head mod, can you see this?
[Owned TP: 97,706]
I smiled bitterly as the owned TP displayed in the upper-right corner dropped by a hundred with one click.
No one else should have [Starlink], so I wondered whether this could really work.
Ding!
-Not an Eraser: ??????????
"Heh heh...."
I smiled faintly at the reply that came back so quickly.
She must be incredibly surprised. This was going to stress her out.
Instinctively, she would realize I was up to something weird again.
As I chuckled to myself and spent a moment wondering what I should send—
[Owned TP: 97,606]
"...?"
I blinked as I saw that my owned TP had somehow decreased by another two hundred.
Wait, did it decrease when the other side sent messages too?
I was paying both sides’ costs?
Ding!
Ding!
Ding!
Ding!
-Not an Eraser: This is Wiki, right...?
-Not an Eraser: What is this...?
-Not an Eraser: Did you find something else again?!
-Not an Eraser: Please answer quickly..!!
[Owned TP: 97,206]
"F-fuck.... Stop!!!"
Six hundred TP had melted away in ten seconds!!!
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