Ch 526: Epilogue 2 - Not found anywhere, I

⸢Hospital room, 9:12 AM⸥

– Gather in front of the Complex's eastern entrance 19:00 tomorrow. We'll go rescue Kim Dokja beyond the [Final Wall].

Jung Heewon received that text message last night. The sender was Han Sooyoung. As always, her text came across as rather curt.

After receiving that text, she dazedly stared outside the window for a long while.

⸢Jung Heewon didn't want to go back to the scenario.⸥

She fought harder than any other Incarnations. She wished to save Kim Dokja more than anyone, and also badly wanted to end the scenarios, too. And eventually, she reached this place.

⸢The Final Wall she saw at the closing pages of the scenario.⸥

Even now, closing her eyes brought back all those vivid memories. The memories of fighting alongside Kim Dokja after he became the 'Enemy of the Story'.

She survived the horrifying flood of Stories by cutting down many things over and over again. They destroyed the wall, and she reached her own last stop.

⸢However, Han Sooyoung was now telling her to get on that train one more time.⸥

She was telling her to go to where the [Final Wall] was once more.

She was saying that they had left something behind in the train as they disembarked.

"Heewon-ssi."

Jung Heewon only then noticed her trembling hand gripping the curtain.

"Hyunsung-ssi, did you also get it?"

"Yes."

"What do you think?"

"…Dokja-ssi we remember is right here with us."

The 'Kim Dokja' they remembered was currently asleep. His lashes that forgot all the tragedies of this world quivered a little. Jung Heewon quietly placed her hand over his eyes.

Some tragedies would end up disappearing just because they weren't seen.

⸢This Kim Dokja was the 'Kim Dokja' they remembered.⸥

Kim Dokja that survived Geumho Station, Chungmuro, Gwanghwamun, the Demon Realm, Olympus, and the Journey to the West, and even the Final Wall together with everyone, was right before her. He remembered the name of Jung Heewon's sword, and he also remembered Lee Hyunsung's trauma. He remembered the promise he made with his companions.

So, technically speaking, this was the 'Kim Dokja' they loved, and the one she wanted to protect.

One would wonder if it was fine to divide a person so conveniently like that, but this problem wasn't about the issue of 'Avatar'. From the get-go, the meaning of liking someone was that you liked certain parts of that person.

The blood staining Kim Dokja's wound emitted 'Pa-susu' noise and evaporated into smoke.

The crumbling Stories wandered in the air, before scattering outside the windows and into the sky above. Jung Heewon didn't know where those Stories were heading off to. It might be that they were extinguished forever, or perhaps they could be returning to other Kim Dokja.

⸢Kim Dokja who remembered the 'Ways of Survival', who always loved that one single story.⸥

Jung Heewon didn't know anything about such Kim Dokja.

No one could love something they didn't know much about.

"Hyunsung-ssi."

"Yes?"

"If Dokja-ssi was us, what would he have done?"

Lee Hyunsung didn't reply for a long time.

⸢Hospital room, 1:31 PM⸥

As if many people had come to visit already, lots of flowers and gifts were neatly placed on top of the hospital room's table. They were gifts prepared for the moment when Kim Dokja finally woke up.

Jang Hayoung fidgeted with the flower petal for a bit, before slowly making her way towards Kim Dokja.

"You're the Kim Dokja I remember, right? Kim Dokja who saved me back in the Demon Realm."

The clock placed near his head was ticking by.

The man who made the 73rd Demon Realm's frozen time flow forward again.

The man who made her, despairing before the wall of potential, move forward again.

The Demon King of Salvation.

"Actually, I didn't want to come back to Earth back then." Jang Hayoung smiled bitterly and spoke. "I didn't have any good memories of this place."

She was a dimension traveller.

As was the case with most dimension hoppers, the process itself was uncertain. One day, as she was working overtime deep into the night like always, she collapsed while sensing a sudden crippling pain in her heart. The moment her breathing cut out, she thought 'I've lived too hard', and if there was next life, she swore inwardly that she'd never 'work hard ever again'. And when she opened her eyes, she found herself in the Demon Realm.

Jang Hayoung watched the residents of the Complex rushing somewhere to eat their lunch and murmured. "I ended up working hard again because of you."

⸢Hospital room, 6:24 PM⸥

"Toss it. It's my turn now."

Along with Lee Gilyoung's words, Shin Yoosung flipped a 100 Won coin upwards. It spun around in the air and landed back on the back of her hand. It was heads.

"How many times did we toss this thing?" Lee Gilyoung asked.

"99."

"Then, it's 49 against 50."

Lee Gilyoung dusted his hands and stood up from his spot, prompting Lee Jihye sitting on the guardian's bed to ask. "You guys, you're still making that wager? That wager about Dokja ahjussi still being alive if it's heads or something?"

"What are you talking about? Ahjussi is alive right here, isn't he?"

"Okay, so what wager is it this time?"

The children didn't reply. Lee Jihye frowned. "You two, do you really believe that claim?"

"What do you mean?"

"That story about the existence of another Dokja ahjussi that we don't know about. About how he didn't leave the subway train…"

The two kids didn't reply again. Lee Jihye, dazedly looking at Kim Dokja, suddenly jumped up from her spot and pointed at him. "This ahjussi is the Dokja ahjussi I know of, okay?"

"…"

"He's the ahjussi who saved you and me, got that?"

"We know."

"You think that's all?"

Lee Jihye continued to mouth off why this Dokja was the real deal.

But strangely enough, she felt Kim Dokja was getting even further away from her as her arguments continued on.

"And, and also…"

Lee Jihye grasped Kim Dokja's pale hand tightly.

It just didn't feel real to her. She barely managed to grow older along with the owner of this hand. She learned of losing someone precious, and was taught the values she needed to protect. And she somehow managed to start breathing again in this messed-up world.

Kim Dokja too, must've learned all those from someone else.

Shin Yoosung muttered out. "…Ahjussi must've had a childhood too."

The founding Story for the 'Demon King of Salvation' in <Star Stream> was the 'King of a Kingless World'. However, that was the beginning of the 'Demon King of Salvation', not Kim Dokja's.

⸢Most likely, the human Kim Dokja's beginning wasn't as grandiose.⸥

In order to exist with the name of Kim Dokja, what kind of stories did Kim Dokja have to live through?

"Eonni." Shin Sooyoung asked again.

"What now?"

"Are you planning to go tomorrow?"

"We agreed not to, didn't we?"

"But, you're still going, right?"

"No, I won't. I don't want to go back to the scenarios again."

Lee Jihye looked at the heads of the children from above that had grown taller before she even realized it.

They were kids she still had to look after.

Shin Yoosung and Lee Gilyoung quietly looked up at her, before the girl extended her hand out.

"Noona, you want to try it?" Lee Gilyoung asked.

Lee Jihye wordlessly stared at the coin gripped in her hand. Then, slowly tossed it up in the air. It spun around and her palm grasped it again. However, she was unable to open her hand.

"Eonni?"

The sensation of the coin captured in her hand; she couldn't tell whether it was heads or tails, but without a doubt, the coin did exist.

"Are you alright?"

Lee Jihye felt the texture of the coin in her hand for the longest time.

⸢Hospital room, 10:48 PM.⸥

The first person to open her mouth was Yoo Sangah.

"The Story level is still dropping lower."

As if the break down of a lifeform that should've normally taken several decades was happening at once, Kim Dokja's blood continued to evaporate. Lee Sookyung asked. "Seolhwa-ssi, is there any way to…?"

"As of now…"

"Can't we go with the method used to save both of us? Such as, repairing the Stories."

Lee Seolhwa sighed softly and spoke while shifting her gaze in Yoo Sangah's direction.

"We chose the Story repair method for both Sookyung-ssi and Seolhwa-ssi because the <Star Stream>'s system was functioning properly back then."

It was a world where skills and Stigmata existed. Everything in the world acted as the components of stories. And so, the 'treatment' in such a world was all about repairing the Stories.

"Recently, the skills or Stories have stopped activating as before. Even Aileen-ssi and I are gradually losing our powers," said Lee Seolhwa

"…Is that because the <Star Stream>'s influence is disappearing?"

"With how things are like now, that's the likeliest possibility."

"The reason why Dokja-ssi's wounds aren't healing must be of a similar nature."

Kim Dokja before their eyes was an existence created out of the [Avatar] skill. And the [Avatar] was a skill belonging to <Star Stream> system.

Lee Seolhwa made her final diagnosis. "Dokja-ssi will eventually disappear if he remains in this place."

Lee Sookyung wordlessly stared at Kim Dokja.

The world he spent all of his life to establish was now killing him. As if, the world where the stories had ended no longer needed Kim Dokja.

Lee Sookyung reached out and touched the sleeping Kim Dokja's cheek with her hand. "…If I knew you'd end up like this, maybe I should've stopped you back then."

The moment her extended hand touched his cheek, a Story bloomed between the two. It was the story of two people fighting inside the [Dark Castle]. Lee Sookyung still remembered what happened back then.

His face looking back at her through [The Fourth Wall] between them; a wall always existed between the two. However, Kim Dokja knocking on that wall before she could was the first time he had ever done that.

Even if she turned back the clock, she'd still fail at stopping her son.

Lee Sookyung stared at Kim Dokja for a long time before holding her son's hand, a hand that always loved books. Most likely, the other Kim Dokja was still busily 'scrolling' with these very hands while riding on the subway.

"Maybe I shouldn't have given you the name of Dokja."

⸢Industrial Complex eastern entrance, 8:00 PM.⸥

While standing like a pair of trees with mismatching height, Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk were waiting for their companions to arrive. Cold winter winds moistened their cheeks, and warm breath leaked out of their mouth.

Han Sooyoung shoved her hands inside the parka and grumbled. "…No one's coming."

They figured that something like this might happen. Han Sooyoung elbowed Yoo Joonghyuk on the side.

"Hey, isn't it fine with just us? If we combine my ingenious brain and your nonsensical fighting prowess, then…"

"It's impossible for us two."

"Argh, why not? You've been fine so far all alone, right? But this time, it'd be two of us, you know?"

Rather than replying, Yoo Joonghyuk quietly looked at his own hand. A transparent ring was swirling around above that very hand.

The countless regression turns he lived through were writhing within that ring.

"You have no idea what it means to 'regress'," said Yoo Joonghyuk, as he slowly distorted the ring within his palm. "You don't know what happens every time I go through the regression."

Stories grasped tightly within his fist howled out in agony.

Sentences were exploding like insect eggs. Those were screams of the ones that repeatedly died many times throughout his life.

"There is no such thing as the perfect regression, just like how there can be no Story without sacrifices. If I regress again this time…"

More than likely, he'd lose someone again.

The world would sink into yet another tragedy.

The world about to be created in order to save Kim Dokja could be destroyed without managing to save anyone, instead. Han Sooyoung replied. "I know that. Also…"

She shifted her gaze over to the Complex's entrance and continued on. Since when was it? Several lengthy shadows were drawing closer to them under the cold wintery light.

"Those people also know it, too."