Chapter 205

Chapter 205

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The Antagonist II

Every once in a while, someone would enter a tomb where Time Seal was cast, usually accompanied by another person. For example, hadn’t Kim Joo-chul entered his tomb with his son, Kim Si-eun? However, this was my first time revealing the landscape inside a tomb to someone as close to me as the Saintess.

“This is it.”

The Saintess looked around curiously, hand clasped around mine. “So this is the paradise where one’s happiest 24 hours repeat endlessly, the world I’ve only heard tell of in stories.”

I cleared my throat. “I think calling it a paradise is a bit much.”

“I understand why you’d feel that way, Mr. Undertaker, being a regressor and all. But for regular people who struggle to make ends meet, this place is one of the best options available.”

“I don’t know about that. Haven’t casinos sprung up here recently? Asking the fairies for a dream would do them more good than being subjected to Time Seal.”

“Even that casino is one of the choices you created, Mr. Undertaker.” When I didn’t respond, she added, “Still, it’s quiet.”

As you all know, Kim Joo-chul's dream was taking place inside a football stadium, replaying the game where he performed brilliantly in front of his family. It was the moment when he achieved perfect glory, wealth, and love stretched into eternity.

However, the stadium, which should have been filled with the cheers of the crowd, was eerily quiet, just as the Saintess described.

“Hmm.”

It was a bit too quiet.

“Everyone seems to be asleep.”

“That’s strange.”

It was a world where everyone had fallen asleep. Every single person in the audience seats had passed out, leaving an eerie silence in their wake. It wasn’t just the spectators either. The players, who should have been playing on the field, were also lying sprawled across the grass.

Among them was Kim Joo-chul, the owner of this place, the same player who had appeared in my nightmares to warn me. The football player stuck in his prime was lying on the ground, clutching the football.

“Kim Joo-chul. Mr. Kim Joo-chul.”

“......”

“Can you hear my voice? Si-eun’s father. Si-eun’s father.”

I lightly tapped his cheek, but there was no sign of him waking up. Even after sending a wave of Aura throughout his body, nothing changed. He was practically in a state of suspended animation.

The over 10,000 people gathered in the stadium had all lost consciousness entirely. Given that they were all illusions, they were in a form of true suspended animation.

I quickly made a decision.

“It looks like we’ll need to call the Tutorial Fairy to check on these people’s unconscious minds. And, Saintess.”

“Yes?”

“Don’t let go of my hand, and under no circumstances should you eat or drink anything here. Even if you want to grab something from a vending machine, don’t consume a single thing. If you do, you’ll be cursed like in the myth of Persephone.”

“Ah...”

We re-entered the tomb with the Tutorial Fairy. We needed her power to delve into Kim Joo-chul’s dream.

Suddenly, the scenery around us changed completely.

-Aaaahhhh!

-Save me! Please save me!

Half of the stadium’s audience seating was burned down, reduced to ruins. People were running around madly, screaming in terror.

-Another day is starting again!

-Someone stop that murderous bastard!

-Hehehe. It doesn’t matter if I die, I’ll come back after one day anyway! Die! Just try and kill me, you bastards!

It wasn’t just screaming. Blood was splattered everywhere.

Some were fighting each other with their fists, others had ripped off seats to use as shields. There were people swinging planks and baseball bats that they had somehow managed to find.

“Stay out of this! Hold your ground!”

Kim Joo-chul was desperately defending his wife and young son. The football players had formed groups, trying to keep themselves safe.

I grabbed the Saintess’s hand and approached the group of football players. Kim Joo-chul turned to look at me and shouted, “Hey! Don’t come any closer! I’ll kill you!”

“Kim Joo-chul, it’s me, Undertaker.”

“I’ll seriously kill you! Huh? Wait, what?” He blinked his eyes in confusion. “Mr. Undertaker? Is that really Mr. Undertaker?”

“Of course, it’s me. We survived the Busan Station Tutorial Dungeon together, didn’t we?”

“Ah! Ahhh!” Kim Joo-chul dropped the baseball bat he was holding and ran toward me, throwing his arms around me. My shoulders were immediately soaked as tears poured from his once youthful eyes, now filled with the sorrow of a middle-aged man.

“Why, why did you take so long to come? Huh? This isn’t a hallucination, right? Oh god, why did you take so long...?”

Without knowing what else to do, I awkwardly patted his back. It wasn’t just me feeling awkward either. The Saintess, the Tutorial Fairy, Kim Joo-chul’s wife, and even his teammates all stood there with obvious confusion plastered across their faces.

“Calm down, Mr. Kim. Explain it step by step. You said you’ve been waiting for me, but your memory resets after just a day, doesn’t it?”

“One thousand days!”

I froze. “Pardon?”

“I’ve been waiting for over one thousand days! I’ve been repeating this hellish day more than a thousand times! It’s not just me, everyone here has been doing it!”

“......”

“This place is hell, Mr. Undertaker! Please, save me—save all of us!”

My jaw dropped.

What the hell was going on?

It was dangerous near the stadium, with hundreds, even thousands of rioters running wild. We moved to Mt. Gubong, which Kim Joo-chul said was “relatively safe.”

When we climbed the slope and looked back, we could see that the entire Seo-gu district of Busan, including the football stadium, was ablaze.

“...At some point, I began to feel like I was living the same day over and over again,” Kim Joo-chul began explaining. “And then, all of a sudden, the memories of you, Mr. Undertaker, flooded my mind. Oh, right. This is all just a dream. In reality, I’m already dead, but here I am, doing this crap.”

“......”

“At first, I didn’t pay much attention. After all, I had accepted my fate, right? I figured once time reset, I’d forget everything and continue living in ignorance, so it didn’t matter. Or so I thought...”

But the memories persisted. Even after 24 hours had passed, the "Continue Playing" button was forcibly activated.

“Fuck. No matter how joyful the memories were, reliving the exact same day over and over again was torture. You were right, Mr. Undertaker. Forgetfulness was a blessing.”

He sighed deeply. “At first, I tried telling everyone. That we were stuck, repeating the same day over and over. That once 24 hours passed, we’d be back to living the same day.”

“......”

“People just looked at me like I was crazy. I felt sorry for them, but I understood. But after 20 or 30 loops, roughly a month of repeating the same day―”

The anomaly made its entrance at the bar where he and his teammates went after a match.

“Out of nowhere, the bartender said something to me.”

“Excuse me, didn’t you come here yesterday too?”

“That’s where it started. One by one, people began to notice. The bartender, my teammates sitting at the same table, even other customers.”

Hey, isn’t the TV always showing the same thing?

Didn’t we drink together yesterday too?

The food here tastes the same every day.

“In no time at all, even my wife figured it out.”

It was like an infectious disease.

A so-called ‘Regression Virus’ began to spread rapidly. The first to be infected were likely those who had the closest contact with Kim Joo-chul that day. The virus then spread further and further as the same day kept repeating. Even after time reset, the Regression Virus didn’t vanish. Infected people continued to spread it to others.

Huh? Was today Saturday?

Wait, wasn’t this game yesterday?

The bar patrons infected their family members, the players infected players from the opposing team, the supporters infected other citizens.

The Regression Virus spread at an alarming pace. The problem was that this was a half-baked regression—meaning the same 24 hours simply repeated forever.

Hey, isn’t this weird? Didn’t you ask the same question yesterday?

Right? Something’s off.

Hold on, I’ve got a friend at a TV station. I’ll give them a call...

People tried to spread the word, doing whatever they could to get others to recognize the strange situation.

That only helped the virus spread further. By the time the hundredth day had passed, the virus, which began in a small bar near the stadium, had consumed the entire Seo-gu district of Busan.

Another day has started again...

What the hell is wrong?

What’s the government doing about this?

The citizens, led by public officials and police officers, tried to get the situation under control. They reached out to the media and tried to inform the government of the situation in Busan.

They even managed to get in touch with the government.

But everything reset after 24 hours.

Didn’t we get a promise from Mayor Jung Sang-guk about this yesterday?n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Yes, but... I’m sorry. It seems that no one outside of us is aware that time is repeating.

What?

We’re the only ones who know. Everyone else is oblivious to the fact that the same day keeps repeating. So, all the promises made 24 hours ago are forgotten.

Isolation. Quarantine.

The Regression Virus never spread beyond Busan—more specifically, the Seo-gu district. Only the citizens of this place were aware that 24 hours were repeating endlessly.

Like a zombie virus causing an entire city to be sealed off, these citizens were trapped not in space, but in time.

This is impossible!

There has to be some way out of this, right?

Yet, even in the face of the truth, the citizens refused to accept it. They believed that if they could just get the word out to the government, somehow, a solution would be found.

Some like the elderly professor who admitted, “We got the promise, but it didn’t matter,” were resigned, while most of the citizenry still sought out their own means of salvation.

We need to cause enough chaos so that the world can’t ignore us!

That’s right! We need to show how severe this is within the next 24 hours so that the government and everyone else realize what’s happening!

But how do we do that?

We need to start a riot! Let’s cause a bloodbath, something big enough that the world can’t ignore us!

Oh...

If enough people get hurt, the government will be forced to act. The media will swarm in to cover the situation.

Let’s do it! Everyone, steel your hearts and get ready!

So, they took drastic action.

A riot, meticulously planned and executed, caused massive casualties. Busan was in an uproar as the bloody clash between ordinary citizens alarmed the local government, prompting them to deploy a large police force.

Ahhh! It worked! It worked!

Turn on the TV! The government’s making an announcement! They’ve responded before the day reset!

We’re saved!

As long as they know, we’ll be okay!

Despite bleeding from their heads and being arrested by the police, the citizens shed tears of joy. They truly believed they had escaped from hell.

But then, 24 hours later...

Oh no.

It’s happened again. But this time, the whole country knows! Surely, things will change now.

Nothing changed. In fact, it only confirmed their worst fears.

No one remembers, do they?

What?

The government. No one there remembers anything about the time loop...

Indeed, after all the chaos, the citizens were finally forced to face the cruel truth.

First, the Regression Virus only spread within Seo-gu, Busan.

Second, it never infected anyone beyond that area.

The reason was simple: Beyond this single day, nothing else in the world was actually created.

The Time Seal was not all-powerful. Only the area necessary to recreate Kim Joo-chul’s happiest day was fully constructed. The world beyond Kim Joo-chul’s daily routine didn’t exist. The people and events there were nothing more than shallow images.

What the hell? Why are we the only ones...?

Fuck, what the hell is going on?

The citizens couldn’t deduce the full extent of the situation. All they knew was that they had been trapped, living the same day over and over again—hundreds, even thousands of times.

Eventually...

Ah... Ahhh! Aaaahhh!

At some point, societal order began to rapidly collapse. Those who once advocated for reaching out to the government or starting riots quickly lost the support of the masses.

No, it was the leaders themselves who fell into despair. No matter what they tried, no matter how many they killed or how many died, everything reset after 24 hours.

Stop! Calm down! We just need to build a community and cooperate...

Shut up! My family is in Incheon!

Attempts to establish a community consistently failed.

The rule that “people would return to life even after being killed” made it impossible to create a stable society. Human life—time itself—was the fundamental currency of any social system, long before the gold standard was introduced. Morality, labor, relationships. These elements, rooted in the value of life, crumbled the moment that value became meaningless. Society, built by Homo sapiens, collapsed in an instant.

“I just... Mr. Undertaker... Maybe this is all my fault...”

Having witnessed everything, Kim Joo-chul began to tremble.

“You know, I made that wish to you, right? The, uh, the time... what was it again?”

“Time Seal, you mean.”

“Ah! Right, right. That’s it. I was hit with the Time Seal... Could it be that everyone else got caught up in it, too?” His voice dropped to a whisper, as though he feared someone might overhear. Eyes brimming with guilt, self-loathing, and terror. he bowed his head and muttered, “If... If that’s what’s happening, then, these sorts of things usually end when the cause dies, right...? But I’ve already died several times, and yet, still...”

“No.” I shook my head. “This isn’t your fault.”

“R-really...?”

“Yes. Mr. Kim, this place isn’t real. It’s nothing more than the last remnant you left behind in the world—just a dream.”

“Oh...”

“The bartenders, your teammates, your wife—they’re not real people, but illusions.”

“......”

“There’s no fundamental difference between the people here and those beyond Busan. The only distinction is that the illusions here are more detailed, while those beyond are mere rough sketches. The reason the people beyond Busan didn’t notice the time loop is simply that they lack the capacity to do so.”

His lips quivered. “Y-yeah. You’re right. That makes sense... But still, Mr. Undertaker... no matter how you look at it, me, these people...”

At that moment, Kim Joo-chul looked up at me and grabbed my leg.

“P-please, save us.”

“......”

“Don’t leave us here. Mr. Undertaker... No, Lord. Lord, aren’t you the creator of this world? You promised, didn’t you? That we’d be able to enjoy this happy day forever. But this... This is different, Lord. This is hell...”

“Please, calm down.” I held his trembling hand with my free hand. “Don’t worry. This is my responsibility, and I will fix this.”

“Ah...”

“If there’s blame to be had, it should fall on me and on the anomaly. And—”

My gaze slashed over to meet the Saintess’s eyes. She understood the meaning behind my look and nodded slightly in agreement.

“Thanks to your explanation, Mr. Kim, I’ve figured out the nature of this anomaly.”

Valhalla.

A place where, even in death, the same day repeats endlessly, with the dead fighting eternally.

That was the anomaly haunting this tomb.

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