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How long I survive during a particular run varies wildly. Sometimes, I enjoy a mayfly life, dying just a day after regressing, and at other times, I struggle for over 20 years only to freeze to death. There are times when I get stabbed by a walloping alien's tentacle in my ninth year, and there are also times when, in my seventh year, I get to experience what it's like to be a dinosaur by dying to a meteor falling to Earth.
Even I, someone gifted with the privileges of regression, have such experiences. How much worse must it be for others?
Most people who had awakened don't even last 10, 5, even 2 years, let alone 20. Some die because they have power, others because they lack it. In a world barreling towards destruction, cause of death was a matter of how one wanted to dress it up it. The reality of the situation was that every day of life was essentially a cause of death. And yet, there was one person who died faster than any other Awakeners.
He went by the name of SG-Man. Well, 'SG-Man' wasn't his real name, of course. It was simply a shorter way of saying 'SuchAFucking Garbage Man', a nickname I had privately given him. I learned his real name during my 50th cycle.
The fastest-to-die in the world.
That was the image I had of SG-Man. To introduce his story, I must first describe the scene I encounter immediately after regressing.
"Wha— What? What is this place?"
"Huh? Busan Station? But I was just in the park a second ago..."
"Sir? Sir, where are you?"
Every time I regress, I wake up in the main concourse of Busan Station.
Apart from myself, 398 ordinary people had been forcibly summoned here. There were even some Japanese people dragged here from as far away as Fukuoka, far away. As hundreds of people began to panic at the sudden turn of events, something appeared in the air with a pop.
"Ah, hello there, everyone!"
It was the so-called Tutorial Fairy, a character that looked like it had just leapt out of a 2D world and into reality, caricaturized form and all.
"Oho? The numbers seem a bit low... Anyway, you must have been quite surprised to be summoned here so out of the blue, right? But don't worry! I'm here to be your trusty guide, here from the very start of your journey!"
I felt sorry for the fairy, but I couldn't help but be worried.
After all, she sounded like a dunce. A person's character was like a printer's ink; if the ink came out in a chaotic mess, one could reasonably assume that something was seriously wrong with the printer itself.
More important than that, though, was that the fairy was floating in midair without any device to support her.
As a result, screams of "Kyaa!" erupted across the length of the hall.
"Ah! It's okay, it's okay! There, there. I'm going to explain these things to you! You all got that I'm the homeroom teacher of Busan Station's main concourse, right? I hope you'll all be good and follow my instructions... I will treat you all kindly too. So, from now on—"
"You fucking asshole!"
Everyone froze.
A majestic roar rang out. "What the fuck is this bullshit?!"
He must have been in his early twenties.
The man with a tattoo sleeve on his forearm was pointing accusingly at the fairy while showing off his triceps.
Yes.
He was none other than SG-Man, SuchAFucking Garbage Man.
"Haaaa... Yes?"
"You fucking asshole! If you're going to drag people here out of nowhere, you should start with an apology. Where do you get off, blabbering like that?"
SG-Man had a very resonant voice. The citizens around him involuntarily took a step back because of his incredibly hearty rebuke.
The fairy stammered, "No, haaa. It's not my doing, I'm just merely in charge of—"
"You fucking asshole!"
The fairy flinched.
By now, it should be clear why I started calling him SG-Man.
He was the type of man who couldn't utter a word without first decorating it with 'fucking'. It was the sort of seasoned diction you'd only hear from someone experienced in the field.
"Anyway, you just said you're in charge! Huh? Aren't you going to apologize?"
"No... I've heard from my seniors that people like this one are rare these days. Humans have become cunning in their own way and never get provoked..."
The fairy looked crestfallen.
Suddenly, a notebook appeared in her hand.
"What did they say about how to respond in a situation like this?" the fairy muttered as she flipped through it. "Ah, here it is."
"You fucking asshole! Are you mocking me?"
"Hoi." The fairy gave a casual wave of her wand (which had also appeared out of nowhere), and SG-Man's head exploded with a bang. "Are we all good now? Come on! Everyone, please follow my lead!"
The fairy smiled broadly, as if expecting her prank to have worked perfectly.
What the fairy hadn't considered was the average sensibility of the people gathered there, also known as morals or ethics.
"Hieeeeeek!"
The owner of this amusing scream was Sim Ah-ryeon. (I know the names of all the survivors at Busan Station.) Unfortunately for her, she was right next to SG-Man and thus became the main character covered in bright red blood.
"P-people— People have died...! People have—! Hieeek, he just died!"
She was the quickest to run out of all the people here, bolting as soon as she was drenched in a bucket's worth of blood and then herself spattering blood and intestines all around.
The grotesque scene made people realize the reality of the situation.
"Kyaaaaaaah!"
"It's murder! It's murder!"
"Ruuuuuun!"
The nearly four hundred people followed Sim Ah-ryeon in a mad dash to escape.
The fairy tried to toss out "ah," "there," "that way," "wait," but her gesture only incited more fear. In just a few seconds, only about ten people, including me, remained in the main concourse hall.
"......"
"Uh..."
The fairy looked downcast. "The guidelines were rubbish! It said that if I just removed one person as an example, everyone would calm down!"
The body of SG-Man, whose head had been erased, lay alone on the floor of the hall.
After that, it was my turn to enter the souvenir shop alone and farm my exclusive item, the Silver Bell.
Now you all understand why I didn't know SG-Man's real name.
He was the sterotypical 'extra who rebels against the tutorial fairy and gets executed'.
That was the identity of SG-Man.
Honestly, I never felt any emotion towards SG-Man.
In every cycle, SG-Man would collide with the fairy. As my regresses continued, though the routes of my life became more varied, the original event of 'SG-Man dies to the fairy' always occurred.
'...What would happen if I saved that man?'
It's no wonder, then, that I suddenly felt curious.
'Yeah, let's save him.'
Who knows?
Maybe once revived, he'll turn out to be the teleporter that Old Man Scho so desperately longed for.
For the record, I was the type to indulge my curiosity and had been for a long time. I wasn't always like this, but regression had changed my personality.
During the 50th run, I decided to satisfy said curiosity.
"Ah, hello there, everyone! Oho? The numbers seem a bit low... Anyway, you must have been quite surprised to be summoned here so out of the blue, right? But―"
But the one who was really surprised was the fairy.
The reason was simple. I had leapt from the ground and positioned myself right in front of the fairy in an instant.
"Hoh?"
My shadow loomed over the fairy's stunned face.
I wasn't particularly sorry.
Before the fairy could even fully close her eyelids, my brutish palm had grasped her head. I circulated my inner energy through my hand, and with a playful, little bang, the fairy's tiny head burst. Since it was always the head of another human that exploded due to the fairy, perhaps this was an ironically fitting end for her.
"Huh?"
"What just happened...?"
People began to murmur as they looked at me while I landed back on the ground after what was literally a split-second of conflict.
At this early stage right into a regression, it was doubtful that anyone had managed to visually follow the fight between the fairy and me.
Oh, and by the way, it wasn't just her head. I had shredded the rest of her body too. So the people here probably only perceived it as 'something appeared in the air then suddenly disappeared.'
"Huh?" SG-Man, who had just been about to burst out in a roar, was now just spewing out gibberish with his mouth agape.
I approached him and greeted him politely. "Hello."
"Huh? Oh, yes... Hello?"
For the first time, I heard something other than "Hey, you fucking asshole" from SG-Man.
It was a momentous occasion in its own right.
Indeed, SG-Man was a manly man.
"Who might this guy be?"
He addressed me as 'this guy'. The determination to cling to his pride and guts while not losing his polite tone was palpable.
However, when he saw me slice through a monster at Busan Station with one strike, 'this guy' changed to 'hey you', and when the necks of the monsters I had cut exceeded fifty, it changed to '......'.
When we finally cleared the gate, his address took on a more dramatic form.
"Um... hyung?"[1]
"Yeah."
SG-Man hesitantly examined my expression. "Seeing how you handled those monsters, you seem like you are a remarkable person, so why did you bother to save someone like me...?"
"There are two answers. One is true but unbelievable, and the other is false but believable. Which one would you like to hear?"
"Huh? Oh... the truth, of course."
"I am a regressor, currently repeating my 50th cycle. Each time, you have died in this hall. I was curious about what kind of person you might be, so this time I decided to save you and work with you for a while."
"Uh...?"
SG-Man's face crumpled with a mix of admiration and fear. It must be how "What the fuck is that, you nerd? looks when expressed with facial muscles.
I felt somewhat disheartened. The 35th cycle, when I met the Saintess, was a kind of turning point, and since then, I occasionally confided the fact that I was a regressor.
Yet, apart from the Saintess, no one had ever believed my story. Why could that be?
"Actually, I am a member of Team 5 of the National Intelligence Service, prepared in advance for such situations. I ask for your cooperation."
"Ah, I see."
"I'm late in introducing myself. My codename is Undertaker. What is your name?"
"Seo Gyu, hyung. Please, feel free to call me by my first name."
"Is that so?"
Seo Gyu. That was SG-Man's real name.
I had realized how important 'comrades' were in the journey to prevent the end of the world. Thus, I actively scouted and assembled prospects who would later grow into A-class Awakeners.
The 50th cycle was no exception. As I traveled with Seo Gyu, I recruited more and more members to our party. How to use their abilities most effectively was something I had already learned through numerous cycles, and as such, my party members grew stronger every day.
"...It looks like I have no talent, hyung."
Seo Gyu was unable to enjoy the privileges of regression.
It was inevitable, really. This was the first time Seo Gyu had survived the tutorial and formed a party with me, and I didn't even know what ability he might awaken to. I wasn't in a position to offer him one-on-one tutoring.
"Ah, shit. Why is it only me that doesn't grow when the others do...?"
From Seo Gyu's perspective, he must have felt like a tremendously untalented underachiever compared to his peers, who were all A-class prospects and monstrous geniuses.
But I knew exactly how to handle such situations.
"Saintess."
"Yes?"
"Please send a message to Seo Gyu."
The Saintess of National Salvation.
It was time for my legendary Pokémon to take the field.
The Saintess occasionally sent messages to the party members at my request, sometimes chiding them, sometimes encouraging them.
[The Monarch of the Crimson Horse assures you that your talent is real!]
[The Conqueror of the Alps dispels your doubts.]
Of course, I had gathered enough information about my party members to know them inside and out—family background, educational history, past traumas, and more.
All this information was then passed to the Saintess. She provided psychological counseling based on their confidential profiles. Legally, it should be considered a breach of privacy and punishable, but after civilization had collapsed, the effectiveness of such laws had diminished. Even before the collapse, such laws were not exactly well-enforced.
The Saintess's ability of 'Clairvoyance' already made her an S-class Awakener. With my information leak added, the party members believed without a doubt that the Saintess was an omnipresent being who watched their every move.
And if the Constellations themselves vouched for your talents?
"...I will train hard to awaken my abilities!"
Seo Gyu had no choice but to ignite his determination.
My and the Saintess's two-pronged strategy was perfect.
To any accusations of brainwashing or gaslighting, I would exercise my right to remain silent.
Eventually, one late night, Seo Gyu came to find me, with a very serious expression.
"Um, hyung."
"What's the matter?"
"I think I might have awakened last night."
Finally!
I felt a swell of anticipation.
The tutorial's sacrifice. The man who, across fifty cycles, always exited the stage first.
What could his ability be?
Was he a jackpot or a dud? Either way, I was confident I wouldn't be greatly disappointed, as my curiosity would be satisfied.
I shook hands with Seo Gyu. "Congratulations. I knew you'd make it someday."
"Th-thank you. It's all thanks to you, hyung."
"So what is the ability?"
"Ah. That's... shit, how do I explain this?"
The hand I was holding fell limp, and his expression shuttered. Despite having achieved the awakening he so desperately desired, he didn't seem very happy.
'Is it a dud after all?'
Seeing his face, I also tamped down a layer of expectation in my heart. After all, high-tier abilities weren't that easy to come by.
"What is it?" I prompted. "Don't be shy, just spit it out."
"No, it's not that, it's just a bit awkward to explain with words... Hyung, do you carry a cellphone? Could you please look at it?"
"A cellphone?"
"Yes."
I looked at him with a dubious expression but obediently pulled out my smartphone.
The phone was dead. Half a year had passed since the Gate incident, and most communication devices had broken down. Phones, the internet, radios, radars—they had been contaminated by aberrations of all kinds.
"Could you turn on your wireless and try accessing the address I give you?"
"Um...?"
And then I witnessed something astonishing. The device had connected to the Internet, which should have been inaccessible.
I felt a rare moment of surprise as I manipulated my smartphone.
The Internet was still displayed as out of service, and other apps didn't work. But somehow, the site Seo Gyu directed me to worked perfectly.
"This is...?"
It was a website in the style of a forum, designed as crudely as the early days of PC communications.
Seo Gyu, blushing as if showing a childhood drawing to someone, said, "That's, uh, this is the ability I've awakened. Website management."
Footnotes:
[1] Hyung is the way Koreans address big brothers.
***
