Omniscient reader’s viewpoint fanfic
Kim Dokja finally sits down with Yoo Jungheok and Han Sooyoung
“So after all of this we still don’t know who your sponsor is, and who this secretive plotter dude it is seems”, Han Sooyoung made a tired snarky remark.
Yoo jungheok nodded. This bastard was the most tired and on the verge of passing out and yet still managed to sit upright and keep a straight face as always. Kim Dokja chuckled inwardly at the sight. Something about how coolly the sunfish was carrying himself was getting on Han Sooyoung’s nerves.
She turned around to Kim Dokja and asked,” even though there aren’t any mentions of it in ways of survival, don’t you have any guesses about the identity of these two?”.
After smiling for a second, The demon king of salvation replied, “oh that’s what you two kept on yapping to each other about, yeah I know who they are”
Han Sooyoung raised an eye brow and stared at him in disbelief, expecting more. Surprisingly, the first to speak was Yoo Jungheok, “if this is a joke, then I’m cutting off your remaining leg”.
Kim Dokja sighed and continued, “the secretive plotter is none other than our protagonist here himself, just not from this regression. He’s the Yoo Jungheok from the 1863rd regression.”
Both of them stared at him in disbelief. Yoo Jungheok even used lie detector while Han Sooyoung’s predictive plagiarism was nodding in approval.
She asked the obvious question “but how do you know? I mean it makes sense that he’s a transcendent and outer god, can evade the probability screening by jumping between the regressions and knew about all the regressions and was trying to kill his original sponsor to take revenge for all his suffering through the forced regressions. But just how did you find out?”
“We’ll, I met him in person didn’t I? I know Yoo Jungheok just as well as he knows himself, and it’s hard not to recognize someone after being with them for 1863 regressions and then one more…on top of that, the only reason he wasn’t in the original novel was because he became the secretive plotter after reaching the end of all his scenarios.”
Yoo jungheok was alarmed at this. Him from the future had asked Kim Dokja to kill him. On top of that, he stood face to face with himself, like staring into a mirror and yet didn’t recognize himself, but it just made too much sense. His right eyebrow started twitching because of such thinking and his brain making so many connections all over the place.
Han Sooyoung’s mental abilities were one step ahead of his and she asked the next question, “so who’s his sponsor? Who is our secretive mystery man who secretive plotter can’t kill even though he can destroy the entire bureau and star stream?”
Kim Dokja smiled, “me”.
Yoo jungheok’s hand was already on the hilt of his sword before he realized and Han Sooyoung was staring at him…he wasn’t lying.
“To be exact, it was the me from middle school…”
Han Sooyoung retorted back, “what a load of bullshit. Any version of Yoo Jungheok could easily kill a middle school Kim Dokja”
“And yet I’m still sitting before you right now coz he couldn’t. I guess I did die multiple times in this life to make up for it though…”
By now yoo jungheok’s sword was already at his neck as he was asked “what is the meaning of this?” A sense of deepest betrayal burning like kerosine behind those hard eyes.
“Yoo jungheok, you had asked me who I was. Wasn’t I just like the constellations when I used your life and suffering for entertainment. You threw a lot of questions and accusations at me that day, but you didn’t listen to my response. I hope you will listen to it today.”
He pressed the sword just enough for the first drop of blood to leak from Kim Dokja’s neck, onto his blade.
“That was because you wouldn’t answer. Well, you better answer now, answer like your life depends on it.”
Kim Dokja just looked up and smiled at this sunfish bastard who still was trying to act tough when they both knew he didn’t have it in him to push the sword in any deeper. Not anymore, not after all they’d been through.
“My life hasn’t been an ideal one in any case. At the age of 14, I had lost my father to a murder, my mother wouldn’t speak back to me even when I visited her in prison, society treated me like a pest, school treated me like a murderer’s son and my so-called-family wanted me dead. I was contemplating committing suicide. but it just so happened to be that it was in that day, my 14th birthday, a novel came out. It was called “Three ways to survive in a ruined world.”
After having read that novel I felt like maybe, there might just be someone in the world who knows how I feel and what I’m going through, even if it’s fiction. I kept reading. After the first death in the novel, I felt like there’s no point in life, this cruel world is too much for me. But the story hasn’t ended, there’s was something more to it, so even though I was consumed by the desire to end it all, I stuck through and made it to the next chapter. Then you regressed, and this made me thing that maybe a miracle could come save me too. Then I saw you continue to struggle and keep fighting to reach the end that you wanted. I stayed alive just to read that novel. Then your regression ended in vain and you failed again. I thought maybe it’s time I ended my suffering too.
That night of my 15th birthday, I spent from midnight to sunset on the rooftop of our building. I was about to jump off, but I couldn’t. All I could think of was that Yoo Jungheok wouldn’t have done this, he’d have continued to fight. I felt like you’d be disappointed in me if I jumped down right now because I gave up and didn’t try to fight back against the unfair world. The next day, a new chapter came.
From around then on, my life became so interconnected with three ways to survive a ruined world that my reality and your fictional world melted into each other. All I thought about was what you would do if you were in my place, and what you might do with the next challenge you faced. It’s even all I could talk to my mother about when I visited her, like this was the only thing left in the world with me. Even after all other readers left by chapter 100, I stayed and forced my way through. Whatever you suffered, I read tenfold, and in doing so, I experienced too. It was because you kept forcing your way forward that I continued living, holding off on my suicide just to see the end of the next regression. Before I realized it, the only purpose in my life to keep on living was to see the end of your story, then I could die in peace.
Then on my 28th birthday, your story did come to an end as I read the last chapter in the subway. I thought, that this was fitting, and I could die in peace now. I would’ve jumped off that very bridge and ended my life, but then fiction and really really merged together that day. Instead of jumping off and ending my life, you held me up by the collar and threw me off the bridge, and I survived. I felt like I had to live. Maybe because of instincts, or maybe because I pitied you. That day, the start of your third regression, I could see that you were hurt, and I knew just how much worse life was going to hurt you in the next 1860 regressions. I couldn’t let you suffer like that again, because you helped me survive through my hell, and I had to repay that favor and save you from yours.
My first goal was to save you from regressing so many times by ending your regressions in the third turn itself, allowing you to reach the end of the scenarios while retaining your humanity. Then one day, we became companions, and I thought that it might not be all that bad if I accompanied you to the end of the scenarios. I thought maybe then, you’d feel just a little less pained and a little less alone, because you helped the little me survive the hell I was living in and feel like I wasn’t alone.
But anyways, now that we’re here, the end of all scenarios, this is also the end of my line. You’ll never have to regress again, both me and your sponsor will cease to exist.
By now Yoo Jungheok’s expression was one I would have never imagined to see on his face. His eyes were watering. And the ever so snarky Han Sooyoung was crying, and so were everyone standing behind us. I hadn’t noticed when they had arrived behind me but none of them even made a sound the entire time. By the looks of things, they had heard more than they could handle, as all were crying, even those like Lee Jihye and Jung Heewon who never showed any emotions which made her feel weak. All I could do was smile at them.
They all looked betrayed, angry, upset and broken. Shin yoosoung barely managed to croak out a line while crying, “is it true Ahjussi that you’re leaving now?”
“We’ll you see, in truth, I was never meant to be here in the first place” I managed to force a smile and hold back my own tears, looking at this family I had created and come to love, all the characters, no people who I had nurtured and all the memories I had made along the way.
“Well, keep me in your memories…you already know how life goes on without me. Han Sooyoung, I really don’t know where I’ll be going from here on out, but I’d still like to read your new novel If you go back to being a writer”
At this she punched me while crying and then hugged me tightly, and the others joined in immediately…except Yoo Jungheok.
He just looked at me, like I had betrayed him, hurt him worse than I possibly could have. He looked scared, he looked pained, he looked alone. He felt like he was alone all over again, just when he had found someone who might’ve been a friend, closer to a brother at this point.
I knew that leaving like this would waste everything I had done up till now, so I said the only thing which I could think of. I didn’t know whether this came from the novel or my own heart…
“Yoo Jungheok, you can be a father now, like you had always wanted. I’m pretty sure your child would look pretty cool if he got Lee Seolhwa’s white hair. Shin Yoosoung and Lee Gillyoung could get a little sibling, and Lee Jihye could be called noona by little yoo jungheok. He could be whatever he wanted, he might even play video games or become a cook, and maybe while he’s growing up, you could tell him stories about me”
A single tear fell down from his eye, this was the first tear he had shed in over a century and hopefully not the last. I didn’t need omniscient readers viewpoint anymore.
We both conveyed our thoughts directly.
“You’re not alone anymore…”
“I hate you…”
“Thank you for everything, you’ll be missed…”
Although I felt selfish, I guess it was time for me to join Yoo Sangah-ssi and my parents now.
Successor of underworld and son of Hades and Persephone…huh it all seemed so fitting now. I was dying my entire life…I could finally rest now.
I smiled one last time as the sparks of probability wiped away any last signs of my presence amidst all the cries and shouts from everyone. I was the last sacrifice for all the lost probability from all the worlds to be satiated forever.
Maybe this life wasn’t so bad after all…
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