+rlaehrwk37: But isn’t he fainting way too often?+When I opened my eyes again, it was late at night.I blinked blankly in the faint haze of hunger and thirst before suddenly jerking my upper body upright.Just how many times have I passed out already?At this rate, I had no right to mock Kim Dokja as “Fainting Man.”Kim Dokja.This time, I hadn’t met Kim Dokja. Normally, every time I lost consciousness, I would encounter him in the snowy field.In the dim gloom, I spotted a worn table and a counter.A kitchen? No—it looked like the inside of a nearby restaurant.“You’re awake?”Out of the darkness, Jung Heewon’s pale face emerged.“Ah, yes.”Her hair neatly tied back, Jung Heewon was sharpening a blade under the moonlight.Something about it felt ominous. Then, without warning, she pushed a steel pot sitting beside her into my hands.“Want to eat this?”Inside the pot were a few root vegetables and the grilled forelegs of a mole cricket.“I’m not great at cooking, so I just threw something together. There were some seasonings left in the restaurant.”“Ah, thank you.”Come to think of it, I hadn’t eaten anything all day.The moment the well-seasoned food hit my tongue, my taste buds felt as if they melted away.Once the hunger and thirst subsided, I finally felt alive again—and the situation right before I collapsed came back to me piece by piece.I had been talking with Yoo Joonghyuk. Jung Heewon had briefly stepped away to deal with the sniper.Yoo Joonghyuk asked me who Kim Dokja was, and as I was thinking about it… I fainted?Choking on the food in my throat, I coughed until Heewon handed me some water.“Thank you.”Even trying to recall it again, I still couldn’t understand.Why had I fainted just from thinking about Kim Dokja?Wait—that wasn’t the real issue.“Where is Yoo Joonghyuk?”“He left alone.”She answered flatly, sharpening her knife.“He left us behind?”She only nodded. And why was she still sharpening that knife?With a soft thunk, Jung Heewon set the freshly polished blade down.I had a bad feeling.As if I was about to be scolded.“I told you not to die on me.”Her voice sparked like a sudden flame.“Do you know how terrified I was?”Narrowing her eyes, Jung Heewon glared at me. I quickly lowered my gaze and apologized.“Uh, sorry. But I really don’t know why it happened. I just blacked out all of a sudden.”“Really?”“Yes, really.”“That can’t be. That guy threatened you, didn’t he?”“…What?”“He hit you or did something bad, right? Take off your shirt.”“N-No, really not.”I dodged away as she reached out to me.“Nothing happened. We were just talking, and suddenly I fainted… guess I was just tired.”Heewon blinked in disbelief, then sighed.“My god. So it was real.”From her expression, I could finally picture what she must have thought.No way…She had stepped away on Yoo Joonghyuk’s request to deal with the sniper.Then ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) when she came back, I was lying unconscious. It was obvious what she would have assumed.“Did you fight him?”“Almost did.”Her lips twitched.“But he seemed kind of upset. Said he didn’t do anything, that you just collapsed on your own.”“And?”“Of course I didn’t believe him. Does that make any sense?”Well, no.“That could’ve been bad.”“I nearly drew my sword, but then I remembered what Uncle Dansoo told me.”Uncle Dansoo?“Before we split, he said, ‘If you travel with that man, there’ll be times when rage wells up out of nowhere. Just once, try to endure it.’”“Ah.”I was sincerely grateful for Uncle Dansoo’s wisdom.“He said there’s always the possibility of a misunderstanding.”Even back then, when everyone saw Yoo Joonghyuk as nothing but evil, Dansoo alone said it might be a misunderstanding.His insight was truly remarkable.“It was a misunderstanding. I really did just collapse on my own.”“Well, that’s a relief.”But still… Yoo Joonghyuk, that bastard. After finally joining us, he ditched the party like this?“Where did he go?”“North.”North. So he really was heading to rescue his younger sister, Yoo Mia.The timing fit perfectly.“Did he leave any message?”“He said he won’t be traveling with us anymore.”“What?”“He said he doesn’t need a weakling who faints at the drop of a hat…”As humiliating as it was, he wasn’t wrong.“He told me to pass it on: ‘Right now, Inho can’t fulfill the role of Cheon Inho.’”Yoo Joonghyuk had said—if I could perform “Cheon Inho’s role,” then he would accept me as Cheon Inho.In other words, I had just lost the qualification.Damn it.Of all times, to lose Yoo Joonghyuk now.My head spun.Soon the Flag Capture would end, and the Path of the King scenario would begin.And from there, the Absolute Throne would be just a step away.“But Inho. Why are you trying so hard to stick with that guy?”Jung Heewon asked, as if she really couldn’t understand.“Did you forget what kind of man he is? You and I almost died because of him.”Only then did I realize—I hadn’t explained anything to her.Of course she couldn’t understand. That Yoo Joonghyuk was the one who threw both of us to the fish to be eaten alive.“Is there really a reason you have to stay with him?”“Yes. There is.”In the end, the one who held the key to this world was Yoo Joonghyuk. The regressor of the 41st round, the strongest incarnation.But at the end of the 41st regression, he would meet a tragic destruction.To prevent that ending, the only way was to correct his reckless actions one by one.After a long silence, Jung Heewon spoke.“I heard you’re a ‘disciple.’ Is that related?”I froze without realizing. Looking up, I saw her face dark in the shadows.How long had she wrestled with that question before daring to ask?“…Yes.”Guilt came crashing in, too late.As Yoo Joonghyuk said, if I was truly “Cheon Inho,” then the one who had protected me all this time was this woman.At Geumho Station, at Chungmuro—If not for Jung Heewon, I never would have survived.And yet I had kept her in the dark, hiding crucial truths.「All this time in the scenarios, Jung Heewon must have been confused.」To an ordinary person like her, this upheaval of the world, the scenarios, the constellations—all of it was incomprehensible.And then, people calling themselves “disciples” who claimed to know the future showed up, and even her companions were among them.“I’m sorry. I’ve kept silent far too long. Where did you hear that I was a disciple?”“Just here and there. I overheard people talking.”She had pretended not to hear, not to see—but in truth, she had known. And even so, she had waited all this time for me to tell her myself.“Inho. Do you know this world’s ‘future’ too?”“Yes. I do.”It was time to tell her. Just as the main Kim Dokja had done, I too had no choice but to face this head-on.I slowly rose and bowed to her.“I’m sorry for hiding it so long. I won’t make excuses. I know this world’s future, and I knew of your existence before all this began.”“Ah.”Flustered by my sudden apology, Heewon clumsily stood.“To stop this world’s destruction, I absolutely needed your help. The truth is, I tried to get close to you for that reason.”Now that she knew this much, I could no longer hide it. That would only be deception.“So you approached me just for that?”“Yes.”I braced myself for anger. But some relationships can’t move forward without honesty.I bit my lip and slowly lifted my gaze. I expected disappointment on her face—But instead, she only looked puzzled.“…Thing is, I never really felt that way. I was always the one who went over and talked to you first, wasn’t I?”I thought about it.“Well… guess I was lucky.”“If I hadn’t been ‘Jung Heewon,’ would you still have gotten close?”I paused.If she hadn’t been Jung Heewon, would I have befriended her?“Yes. I think so.”The person I liked was Jung Heewon, and the person I needed was Jung Heewon. She might get angry, but hypotheticals meant nothing to me.“Figures. You’re honest as always.”“Sorry.”“Don’t be. I’m glad. That I am Jung Heewon.”“…Huh?”“Because I’m Jung Heewon, you risked your life for me. At the bridge, at the theater dungeon—without you, I’d be dead.”How could she—A sting welled in my chest, along with a sentence.「‘Then it’s thanks to you that I’ve made it this far, Reader.’」I bit my lip hard. Why now, of all times, did those words come back?「‘Thank you for finding me. I’m not being sarcastic—I mean it.’」How could she be so unchanging, no matter the round?“…Same here. I’m alive now because of you, Heewon.”Even knowing that the memory’s words didn’t fully describe the woman before me, I couldn’t hide my gratitude.She smiled.“Truth is, I wasn’t planning on asking at all. I figured you’d tell me one day. But on the roof of the theater dungeon… I had a strange experience. Since then, I couldn’t stop wondering.”The roof of the theater dungeon.At once, I remembered what had happened with Han Sooyoung.「‘This world, it is, not, the, world—’」There, Han Sooyoung had shown Jung Heewon the fable of Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint.“What was that story?”What could I possibly say?“It was the story of another world.”No matter how I thought of it, the best I could do was return her own words.“Then that woman showed me things that really happened?”“Yes. She did.”I thought back to that world.The world where Kim Dokja and existed. The world where Jung Heewon became the Judge of Destruction, and where Cheon Inho died by her hand.“In that world, you were a total villain.”When had it appeared in her grasp? The finely honed Mikazuki Munechika.I recalled the Cheon Inho who died by her blade.The rabble-rouser of Geumho Station, who incited and killed and stole coins at will.Even if Han Sooyoung was the first to write Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint, I too had written sentences about him in earnest.Sentences about him tormenting people, killing, spreading pain—typed one after another with desperate intensity.Because it was fitting for a villain.Because it was more brutal, more cruel, more “plausible.”Then maybe this moment was the return of that very “plausibility” I had invoked.“The Inho before my eyes—is he the same person as the Inho of that world?”

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.