864 Episode 47 King of Fear (8)

The moment I activated the skill, my hand bounced off with a strong spark.

Even though I was Gilyeong who cleared the Last Scenario, the target I was trying to tame right now was none other than the 'King of Fear'. A Transcendent being whose rank could not be measured at a glance.

However, there was a countermeasure.

I added the power of [Strengthening Sentences] to it.

Then the voice that had been fluttering in my head like an insect's wings became clearer.

King Lee Gilyeong.

There were scenes that came to mind every time the voice continued. The image of Lee Gilyeong casting [Tame] without regard to the level whenever he encountered the Insect King. The face of the boy who didn't give up even though he was torn by the Insect King's claws and bitten by its teeth.

If you think about it, taming something was like that.

Reaching out while risking my own wounds and hardening. Placing someone else's sentences on my margins.

Lee Gilyeong had been enduring that kind of life to get back just one person.

The moment the golden thread flowing from my fingertips touched the Second Kim Dokja, the entire Fear Realm screamed loudly.

The universe was connected.

There was a boy. He was a boy who loved reading books.

The boy especially liked novels, and among them, he cherished the story of a Regressor.

The boy liked that line from the protagonist.

A person who proudly says his name anytime, anywhere.

He admired the protagonist who lived such a life.

"Isn't that just a lie?"

That's how the boy's friend evaluated the novel the boy was reading. It's just a lie. A nonexistent fiction.

The boy silently agreed to that.

"That may be so."

Everyone knows that a novel is fiction. But the boy reading it was definitely a living person.

The boy still remembered it clearly. Outside the wide-open window. The feeling of gravity disappearing beneath his feet. The moment he first searched for 'Ways of Survival' on the old hospital computer. The feeling of reading the first sentence absentmindedly.

"But it's still fun."

The only thing the boy could say to defend that fiction was 'fun'.

A fun story that saved his boring life.

The boy's friend pushed up his glasses and said.

"I don't even have to look at it. It's a story about a chosen protagonist who continues to profit and rise through the ranks."

The boy wanted to tell him that the protagonist of this story didn't rise through the ranks, but he couldn't. Because he wasn't Yoo Joonghyuk.

"What's fun about a story about a lucky protagonist who does well as planned?"

He wanted to say that the main character of this story wasn't that lucky, but he couldn't. After all, he wasn't Yoo Joonghyuk.

Instead, the boy said this.

"I'm having fun."

"Why? What's having fun?"

"Because I'm not the main character."

As the boy read the book, he discovered characters like himself one by one.

Although they couldn't become the main character, there were many characters who lived hard. From important supporting characters, to minor supporting characters, to extras who didn't even have names.

Countless characters who said similar lines and died.

The boy liked their stories as much as the main character's. In that sense, it was fortunate for the boy that 'Ways of Survival' was a very long and rambling novel.

It was around that time that the boy began reading other novels together. Among them, there were some novels that the boy found quite interesting.

For example, a story about a man who hated regression so much that he died.

The difference was that, unlike 'Ways of Survival', that story was very short.

When he realized that fact anew, the boy became afraid.

The novel he liked would end someday.

He knew it. Even so, it was not easy to accept that fact.

Although it was not 'Ways of Survival', he felt that way even more after seeing the end of another novel. The boy trembled with fear as he imagined the characters in the novels he loved dying over time.

The boy carefully imagined the ending of the story.

Will the villain meet a villainous end? Will the supporting characters find their respective roles? Will Yoo Joonghyuk finally figure out what his ■■ is?

Will they eventually be happy?

And will he, who watches them, be satisfied with that?

Only after thinking that far did the boy realize.

Maybe there is no such thing as a 'happy ending' in this story.

Isn't a happy ending an illusion that doesn't exist? In the end, isn't the ending of this story bound to be a tragedy?

It's okay if today's chapter is sad. It's okay if tomorrow's chapter, and the chapter after that, are sad. If only that sadness can postpone the ending.

And so, if only he can live forever dreaming of a 'happy ending'.

The first 'Time Fault' was born at that very moment.

The ability to fix the coordinates of a story and make it a kind of eternity.

Stories that were not recorded or disappeared were piled up one by one in the fault.

A warehouse that stores disappearing stories. Even if this story ends, it's a place where the story will never be forgotten.

There, the Second Kim Dokja stockpiled and stockpiled stories. Ignoring even the fight between his brothers, perhaps to avoid participating in that fight, he hid himself even more in the Time Fault, absorbed in collecting the disappearing stories.

And there was a 'fighter' who protected him.

The fighter who came across the world line recognized the Second Kim Dokja at a glance, and the Second Kim Dokja also recognized who the fighter was.

The Second Kim Dokja asked.

'Can you protect me?'

'Until the day I can think of a happy ending.'

The Second Kim Dokja dreamed of a happy ending while collecting the sadness scattered throughout the world.

Looking at the disappearing stories, remembering the characters who died without being recorded as 'Fears', the Second Kim Dokja imagined a happy ending.

But no matter how many stories he collected and recorded, a 'happy ending' never came to mind. A 'happy ending' felt like a concept from another universe that he couldn't imagine.

Then one day, he came to visit.

He was a man with impressive narrow eyes.

'Main character?'

'Sad.'

Why does a 'main character' exist in this world? Why should someone be the main character and someone not?

And yet, why does he like this story with a main character?

'What is it?'

Closing the book.

The Second Kim Dokja tilted his head and asked.

'How?'

The man grinned, revealing his white teeth.

An eternal postponement of the end.

The Second Kim Dokja thought for a moment and said.

'If the story stops, it will also lose its meaning as to who the main character is.'

'Then my brothers won't fight anymore.'

The Second Kim Dokja smiled brightly.

'I will do that.'

Then the warrior asked.

When the Second Kim Dokja nodded, the warrior smiled and answered.

Soon, the sound of a book closing was heard.

I retched and was thrown out of the air. It was a very short moment, but it felt like I had vividly experienced a part of his history. Blood poured out of my mouth, and a message was heard.

To tame someone means to share that being's emotions. To share their sadness and joy, their despair and fear.

However, the one I wanted to be with was the 'King of Fear.' A being that had been storing up emotions for years that I couldn't even measure.

It felt like someone was grabbing my brain with both hands and squeezing it.

Just having my mind connected would make me go crazy. My consciousness kept getting more and more confused.

It was the voice of First Kim Dokja — 'Demon King of Salvation'.

I know. But there was nothing I could do. Even the trump card, 'Insect King Lee Gilyeong', was not working.

If things continued like this, the entire world line would become a 'Fear'.

I opened my mouth to somehow prevent that situation.

"I understand how you feel."

Now I understand why the Second Kim Dokja created the 'Fear Realm'.

"But this is not it."

I also understand where his end came from.

He will make the entire <Star Stream> into a 'Fear Realm'. If that happens, the main character will disappear from this world. Me, Yoo Joonghyuk, and the other characters will all become part of the 'Fear' and will be stuffed forever as a legend in the Fault.

Then the fighting will stop.

But that will stop this story forever. No one will know the ending of the story covered in thick binding.

"You liked this story, right?"

"You survived by watching this story. You know that too. This story is not just the main character's story. This story—"

This is a story for one reader.

"We made it together."

The protagonist is not the protagonist from the beginning. It is only when there is a 'reader' who reads the protagonist and wants to become the protagonist that he becomes the protagonist.

Is it because [Advanced Multi-species Communication] worked? For the first time, I felt like the Second Kim Dokja was looking back at me. Then a voice came into my head.

"…"

I couldn't bring myself to refute that statement.

The Second’s words are what I thought. If this world continues, Kim Dokja will eventually have to kill Kim Dokja.

The fact that, just like other Kim Dokja fragments, the stories that seek to hide the 'One and Only Kim Dokja' will continue.

The Second Kim Dokja said.

Is it because of [High-level Multi-species Communication] that I'm being persuaded by his story right now?

For a moment, that thought crossed my mind. Wouldn't it be better if everything turned into 'Fear' just like he thought? Is the 'ending' that we have to see while enduring all the tragedies that lie ahead really meaningful?

That wasn't the voice of the 'King of Fear'.

I felt goosebumps running down my spine. There was someone else in the Snowfield.

I saw Baekcheong’s strong energy cutting through the air with a clear sword sound.

A pure white coat fluttering. His sword traced a trajectory with a faint smile, just like the day we first met.

In an instant, the 'King of Fear’s' arm flew through the air. The 'Blade of Faith' radiating light was burning pure white before my eyes.

Treading on the pitch-black snow that had fallen, 'Snowfield Kim Dokja' turned to me and said.

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