650 Episode 19 People of the Past (2)

A total of three responded to Yoo Jonghyuk's call.

They were Lee Seolhwa, Shin Yoosoung, and Lee Gilyoung.

"Sooty bastard! Where have you been wandering around now?"

As soon as he entered the conference room, Lee Gilyoung pointed with his finger.

Yoo Jonghyuk looked down at Lee Gilyoung and muttered as he turned his head.

"This guy is becoming more and more like Kim Namwoon."

"Hey, what did you just say!"

Shin Yoosoung gave a bad look to Lee Gilyoung, who was fighting back.

"Stay still."

Lee Gilyoung shouted as if it was unfair, and Shin Yoosoung admonished Lee Gilyoung. Lee Seolhwa looked at the two kids and asked with a sigh.

"But where have you been?"

"Another world line."

"Which word line?"

"I went outside of the <Star Stream>."

Outside of the <Star Stream>

I had never heard of a place like that.

"Is there a place like that?"

"I can go from here."

This world is 'a world without Kim Dokja'.

Therefore, the Oldest Dream and the binding power of <Star Stream> are weak here.

Yoo Jonghyuk frowned for a moment as if thinking about a troublesome problem, then asked,

"Where did Han Sooyoung and Yoo Sangah go?"

"They are in the 41st turn."

"What about Lee Jihye?"

"She’s in a different world line. There are fragments of Kim Dokja that I could not collect."

"There is no need to collect the fragments anymore, right?"

"Of course not."

<Kim Dokja Company> toured the world lines and collected the fragments that remained in the state of a story that could not be reincarnated.

Each had their assigned area, and the device created as a result of the harvest was the 'Story Connector'.

A device combining the stories left by Kim Dokja to track the real Kim Dokja.

Of course, the term 'the real Kim Dokja' was somewhat ambiguous. No one knows what the real Kim Dokja is.

What is certain, however, is that there is a 'main theme' that is the core of Kim Dokja in the direction this story connector is heading.

"It would be better to ask for Lee Jihye to come back. It's not good to stay outside the world line too long."

Among the members of <Kim Dokja Company>, Lee Jihye was especially free.

She had a lot of emotional ups and downs, and a bit of a wanderlust.

"She's an adult now. She must be thinking a lot."

Yoo Jonghyuk thought about Lee Jihye for a while.

Fragments of Kim Dokja are literally scattered all over the world line, and some of them are where the scenario is in progress.

Perhaps Lee Jihye is watching one of those world lines.

Her goals that she did not achieve. Her friend she couldn't save. The constellations.

However, Yoo Joonghyuk knew very well what the constellation buried in such remorse would end up experiencing.

"In case you don't know, it would be better to trace the world line Lee Jihye went to."

"All right."

"Lee Hyunsung and Jung Heewon?"

"They didn't come this way."

At Lee Seolhwa's words, Yoo Jonghyuk and Shin Yoosoung and Lee Gilyoung, who had been quarreling, also shut their mouths.

Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung.

<Kim Dokja Company>'s sword and shield.

The two people who always protected the party did not make the same choice this time.

"But I don't think they’ve chosen another portal."

"How do you know?"

"You can observe the possibilities of all world lines here, right?"

In other words, if Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung entered the 'World with Kim Dokja', they could know that fact here as well.

However, the possibility of such a world scenario was not observed.

"The two of them haven't chosen yet."

Who in <Kim Dokja Company> did not choose the 'world where Kim Dokja returned'.

Perhaps everyone instinctively realized it.

This world can't be happy that easily. It is because the 'simple happiness' that has tempted them so far has been a trap. They didn't even know if the happiness they were looking for was at the end of the road.

But they kept walking and finally came to this place.

Jung Heewon and Lee Hyunsung must have been a little tired on the road.

"Who are the others"

"I don't know yet. Maybe the constellations will come. They may have already come."

If it was a constellation that would come over that portal to help <Kim Dokja Company>, the list was obvious.

However, Yoo Jonghyuk did not expect any help from the constellations.

"Don't trust the constellations. They're only attracted to fleeting stories and drawn around like moths."

"But without them, we wouldn't have seen the ending."

"How is the progress of the 41st round?"

Lee Seolhwa silently presented the scenario record and access log.

It contained the events that had happened from the start of the scenario for the 41st round until now, as well as the access records of Kim Dokja's Company.

Yoo Jonghyuk, who read the full text obsessively, said with a cold expression.

"You're doing something pathetic. You had a chance to end the world line. Why didn't you actively intervene?"

When she pointed to a part of the scenario record, a scenario screen floated over the text. Cheon Inho's face appeared on the screen.

Yoo Jonghyuk’s eyes widened momentarily.

"This guy is—"

"Who does he look like?"

To Lee Seolhwa's question, Yoo Jonghyuk did not answer. As if checking weathered memories over time, he just stared at that face for a long time.

Slowly turning from the screen, Yoo Jonghyuk from the 41st round appeared.

A being who hates constellations and dreams of the destruction of the <Star Stream>.

The culprit who sent Shin Yoosoung to the past in the 41st round to become a disaster.

"The 41st round must end. That's how it's meant to be."

"…That could change."

It was Shin Yoosoung who said that.

"Both Dokja-ssi and we have changed the story several times. Without the 1,863 times that have been changed, we wouldn't be here."

"You should know. If you change the 41st round, the divergence of the world lines will increase more."

If you save a few people in front of you, another world that existed only as a possibility will be born. A world where more deaths and tragedies are confirmed.

"The law that that world must be unhappy is-"

"This is the world I came from."

Everyone shut up.

No one here could raise an objection to Yoo Jonghyuk.

He had been repeating the scenarios longer than anyone else in the world, and he knew the world's tragedies better than anyone else.

"It's better to end it as soon as possible. Only then can a bigger tragedy be prevented. If the world line diverges further here, the balance of the universe will collapse. Too many derivative world lines have already been created in this universe."

"But whether we intervene or not, anyway, more world lines are being created since you're a regressor."

Yoo Jonghyuk’s regressions.

And with his regression, a new 'world line' is born.

That is the tragedy and absolute law that is the foundation of this <Star Stream>.

However, Yoo Jonghyuk shook his head.

"The 42nd round of that guy doesn't exist."

"What? How do you know?"

"If he continues to regress, then the world line after it must continue to exist. Just like the Secretive Plotter did."

Secretive Plotter.

After 1,863 regressions, Yoo Jonghyuk found the reason behind him.

If Yoo Jonghyuk of the 41st round had continued to return even after sending Shin Yoosoung to the past, he would have been reborn as an absolute god like Secretive Plotter.

"However, his next world line is nowhere to be found."

The world line that Yoo Jonghyuk continued to regress from the 41st round could be found nowhere in the universe.

After that, the world line of 'Ways of Survival', derived by Shin Yoosoung, who went back to the past in the 41st round, continues.

"Then what happened to the Yoo Jonghyuk in the 41st round?"

"My conclusion is this. The 'I' of the 41st round stopped regressing on his own."

"But how? I can't believe he reached the end of the scenarios in the 41st round."

"It can't be. The record of failure is too obvious."

He recalled of the words of Shin Yoosoung in the 41st round, who descended as the Disaster of Floods.

"I, in the 41st round, was in deep despair during the scenario, and realized that the end could not be seen as it is. That's why I sent Shin Yoosoung to the past."

The 41st round’s Yoo Jonghyuk tried to reach the end of the scenarios by sacrificing his peers, but in the end he failed to achieve his goal, and he knew that he would never be able to achieve that goal.

So, he sent Shin Yoosoung to his past self before his mind was further damaged.

That is how the 'Ways of Survival' began.

"Then it makes no more sense. The man in the 41st round did not reach the end of the scenarios, how did he stop the regressions?"

"I don't know that either."

Yoo Jonghyuk thought for a moment and then looked at the window.

"Maybe that's why Kim Dokja is there."

A person who loves stories more than anyone else in this universe, he is there to find this forgotten world line and see its end.

"However, there is a way to guess."

The surprised party widened their eyes.

If you think about it, it might have been a natural thing.

He could have been the only one who knew the secret of Yoo Jonghyuk who does not return anymore.

"I will go to the 41st round myself."

He is a regressor who has seen the end of the scenarios.

The strongest incarnation on earth who cleared the 1,864th round and 1,865th round, and defeated even those mythical constellations.

Because it was 'Yoo Jonghyuk' and not another person, the party had no choice but to believe his words.

But there was one problem.

"Jonghyuk-ssi can't go to that world."

"Why?"

Lee Seolhwa let out a light sigh and laughed at Yoo Jonghyuk.

His muscles much tighter than before. A far-off gap that naturally oozes out between those muscles.

"Jonghyuk-ssi is too strong."

The current Yoo Jonghyuk consumed enormous probability just by existing.

The 41st round is now only in the early scenarios.

Even if only a great-grade constellation descended, a storm of probability would come, and if Yoo Jonghyuk descended in the 41st round, a global catastrophic aftermath would blow.

As a result, Yoo Jonghyuk himself would not be able to avoid extinction, and Yoo Jonghyuk nodded as if he knew.

"I have no intention of entrusting Han Sooyoung with that work forever."

"Jonghyuk-ssi and Sooyoung-ssi are doing their best right now-"

"Did the guy who was doing his best make such a pathetic mistake? He let go of the opportunity to finish the 41st round."

The video remaining in the machine began to be output in real time.

"Tell me that you received it well."

The roof of the theater dungeon. After Han Sooyoung glanced back at Yoo Jonghyuk and Cheon Inho of the 41st turn who had collapsed, they were disappearing over the land.

"Tell Han Sooyoung and Yoo Sangah that they have only one job to do."

As if there was no need to look further, Yoo Jonghyuk looked away from the log and walked to the long family behind him.

"Creating the conditions for me to descend."

Standing tall in front of a large window, Yoo Jonghyuk looked out the window with his unique gaze.

The companions watched his back in silence.

Is it because of the pure white background outside the window?

His figure looked like a single letter written on a wide blank sheet of paper.

"I will personally bring back Kim Dokja."