Reader’S Regeneration Life [EN]: Chapter 2

Did I get him?

“L, Lord, why are you doing this to me…?”

‘Not yet, not yet!’ Zion muttered inwardly, striking Trey’s head once more.

He worried he might kill him, but there was no room for hesitation, as dragging things out any longer might mean joining forces with this knight and cheerfully crossing over to the afterlife together.

“Ugh!”

Eventually, Trey stretched out his limbs with a final scream, collapsing in the shape of a ‘大’ [the Chinese character ‘da,’ meaning ‘big,’ resembling a person with outstretched limbs].

Zion, letting out a sigh of relief, realized he couldn’t waste any time and hurriedly moved towards Lucia.

“Don’t come any closer!

Don’t do this, don’t do this!”

“…”

If Kim Yu-hyun were to barge in and see this scene, it was certain that he wouldn’t just lose an arm that day.

Zion was already dumbfounded and frustrated by suddenly falling into the world of the novel while talking to the author, but he had no desire to become an extra who gets his limbs severed and dies at the hands of the novel’s protagonist.

He had to calm the woman in front of him by any means and coax her with sweet words.

Only then could he spend the night with all his limbs intact.

‘Think, think.

I was supposedly the number one avid reader, how could I forget about Lucia, one of the heroines!

Focus and think!

If you don’t want to die!’

Then, it suddenly came to him.

The decisive cause of Lucia’s miserable end, one of the heroines, was Zion.

The reason Lucia was kidnapped and subjected to all sorts of hardships by the personality-flawed Zion was very simple.

‘Appearance.’

Having lived with her father since she was very young until she became an adult, Lucia tended to be less wary of men, especially those with delicate features.

In the novel, Zion was a villain whose ‘appearance’ was described as outstanding by the author himself.

And currently, that Zion was Lee Ji-hoon himself!

“Lady Lucia.”

Clearing his throat and speaking, a rather pleasant baritone flowed out.

Zion, wearing the softest smile he could muster, gazed at Lucia.

He felt a sense of shame at doing such cheesy things, but he was determined to do anything to survive, even if it meant rolling in a pile of dung and eating it.

Meanwhile, Lucia, who had been trembling at Zion’s gentle voice, looked at him with frightened eyes.

Then, Zion did something that a noble would never show to a commoner.

He knelt on one knee and bowed his head with a respectful demeanor.

“I apologize, Lady Lucia.”

“…Yes?”

“It seems my escort knight misunderstood my orders to bring the lady here.

I simply wanted to meet Lady Lucia, the daughter of Raido, in person and have a conversation. I assure you, I had no impure intentions.”

Lucia, dumbfounded by Zion’s sudden words and actions, blankly stared at his face.

Sensing that this moment was the best and last chance, Zion was busy apologizing to Lucia as if he were performing a prostration of repentance.

At that moment, the gates of hell swung open, and the grim reaper came flying in.

콰콰콰콰쾅! [Sound of a massive explosion or collapse]

The sound of the world collapsing echoed.

In that instant, Zion knew that the protagonist of this novel had finally appeared on the scene.

After the deafening noise, fragments of stone scattered in all directions, and dust billowed.

‘Damn it, why break through the wall instead of using the perfectly good door?

How unnerving.’

Since there wasn’t a specific description in the novel, he naturally assumed he would come through the door.

But it wasn’t the door that shattered and collapsed, but the wall.

He didn’t know why he did that, but if the intention was to intimidate the other party, it was definitely a great success.

Hoping sincerely that Zion would survive tonight, he carefully turned his head in the direction of the sound.

‘What the.’

But there was nothing to be seen, only a gaping hole remained.

As Zion stared blankly at the spot, the absolute rule of horror movies suddenly flashed through his mind.

The monster that disappears in front of you is always standing behind you.

‘Surely he’s not standing behind me like some pervert, is he?’ Zion thought, turning around.

‘Son of a…’

He ended up making eye contact with the monster.

The only thought that ran through Lee Ji-hoon’s, Zion’s, mind at the moment he met those eyes was.

I’m going to die.

Even he, who had lived an extremely ordinary life as an extremely ordinary young man in Korea, instinctively felt that the monster’s eyes were extremely cold and violent.

“…”

The man, after looking at Zion for a moment, turned his gaze to Lucia, who was sitting next to him.

And immediately after, sparks flew from the man’s eyes.

Anyone could see, any idiot or moron could see, even a clueless fool could see.

That was intense anger, a whirlwind of murderous intent.

Zion felt wronged.

Not the kind of unfairness he felt from being threatened for something he didn’t even do.

If he was going to be possessed by a character in the novel, a villain who gets crushed by Kim Yu-hyun one by one, why couldn’t he have started as a much stronger villain with a better personality?

There were so many villains who received the most attention from readers, like ‘White Serpent Disease’ or ‘Khan’, but why Zion Klausen!

He wasn’t like the other villains, who were strong or had potential to become stronger, or had some kind of plot armor. He was just Zion Klausen, who had been in the role of a villain solely because of his patheticness and the despicable act of selling out even his own family.

Anyone could see that Zion was the number one candidate for the Express to the River Styx [the boundary between the world of the living and the underworld in Greek mythology], so he couldn’t help but feel wronged for being possessed by this pathetic guy.

“You.”

One word, just one word, flowed from Kim Yu-hyun’s mouth.

But for Zion, his one word was heard as if it had been transformed into all sorts of words.

You’re dying to die, aren’t you? Today is a good day to die, or.

Should I cut you horizontally or vertically? Something like that.

‘Author, author.

You son of a bitch.

This is a bit much.’

Watching Kim Yu-hyun’s hand reaching out towards him, Zion spat out a curse-filled lament towards the author, who might be listening.

Just as he was about to burst into a laugh at the thought of the thrilling future that would unfold before him, feeling that life was a bitch once again in the novel, following reality.

“W, wait a moment.

Yu-hyun.”

Yes, the angel’s salvation was not far away!

Kim Yu-hyun, who was about to grab Zion’s neck, stopped his movement at Lucia’s restraint.

It might seem strange that he, who was called the absolute supreme in the world of martial arts, would stop what he was doing at the mere words of a woman, but Zion knew the reason well.

The old man who took care of Kim Yu-hyun, who had fallen into this world with severe injuries, and taught him this and that, Raido.

Kim Yu-hyun regarded him as his benefactor and teacher, and Lucia was the only daughter of his benefactor and teacher, a being he had to protect and protect.

Zion, who was almost turned into a ‘giraffe’ with his neck being pulled out, shouted cheers inwardly.

‘I’m alive!

I’m alive!

Thank you, Lucia!

As expected, a heroine with a good heart is the best!

My sincerity in fully buying Lucia coins until the end has reached the heavens!’

Of course, Lucia plummeted to the point of being completely removed from the market as she met a terrible death at the hands of Zion, but until then, it was a coin investment without regrets.

‘But this time it’s different!

That’s right!’

The villain who ultimately drove Lucia to her death, Zion Klausen.

And that Zion Klausen is the number one avid reader who fully bought Lucia coins?

This was a rising graph that would break through not only the atmosphere but also the ozone layer and even the stratosphere.

‘I’ve decided.

I’m going to support you.

I’ll make you live happily with Kim Yu-hyun and even play basketball, no, soccer with your children!

Let’s only walk on flower paths [a Korean idiom meaning to have a life full of happiness and good fortune], Lucia!’

While Zion was paving the way for Lucia, Kim Yu-hyun, who had moved away from him, looked around for a moment and asked Zion the question he had to ask.

“Why did you kidnap Lucia?”

“Yes?”

“Answer honestly.

Be prepared if there’s even a hint of a lie.”

Fortunately, Kim Yu-hyun didn’t have the ability to see through lies like some kind of lie detector.

Of course, he wasn’t bad at reading people’s expressions since he had lived in a world of martial arts where all sorts of ambushes were rampant, but there was an unavoidable aspect to him since he wasn’t inherently a bad person.

And Lee Ji-hoon, the number one avid reader, knew that part well.

Zion, first licking his lips and starting the engine [preparing to speak], deliberately let out a sigh as if to be heard.

“It’s my fault.”

“…Hmm?”

“I heard she was the daughter of the sage and wanted to meet her and have a conversation.

I’ve been having some troubling things lately.

I wanted to quietly meet her and ask for advice, but that stupid subordinate over there seems to have misunderstood my intentions.”

“…”

If you were just listening to the words, it would be suspicious.

There are many other wise people, and the fact that he specifically chose Lucia or wanted to meet her quietly in secret, things like that.

But there was nothing awkward about Zion’s facial expressions or actions, and Lucia was even adding ‘Ah…’ from the side, so Kim Yu-hyun couldn’t openly suspect him any further.

“A stupid subordinate, huh.”

Kim Yu-hyun, instead, shifted the target to another direction.

Zion thought, ‘Yes!’

And continued to act in order to turn his attention to Trey, who was still unconscious.

“Yes.

He’s a knight who became my escort this time, but he’s narrow-minded and overly loyal to the point of being worrying.

It seems he misunderstood the words that I wanted to meet her.”

“Lucia’s appearance is like that because…”

“He was acting up before I could even stop him.

I was so dumbfounded that I was late in stopping him.”

When Kim Yu-hyun glanced at Lucia, she nodded as if to agree.

After all, it was Trey who tried to take off her clothes, and it was Zion who struck Trey’s head.

“…So, the culprit of the unfortunate events that happened today is entirely your subordinate.”

“If you want to be precise, that’s how it is.”

“Then I would like to punish that person here.”

Zion, smiling at Kim Yu-hyun’s words, was about to say that he would do so.

But soon he closed his mouth and began to stare intently at Kim Yu-hyun.

Kim Yu-hyun, at Zion’s reaction, looked back at him as if asking if there was a problem.

‘This is a bad move, isn’t it?’

Kim Yu-hyun came from the world of martial arts.

At the time, there were dozens of masters who followed him with their lives, and hundreds if you include the warriors.

Perhaps that’s why Kim Yu-hyun’s heart was quite special when it came to treating the people around him.

Whether they were colleagues or subordinates, it didn’t matter, and whether they were allies or enemies, they were not excluded from the evaluation.

In front of that Kim Yu-hyun, the owner readily hands over his subordinate, saying, ‘Please take him’?

This was an act that would reduce his favorability even more than saying, ‘Did you fall while walking down the street and have your face crushed by a tire?

Your face looks so unfortunate’ in front of a person.

‘Damn it, just from his eyes, I can feel that if I don’t hand over that subordinate right now, he’ll take me by the hand and take a cruise to the River Styx with me.’

He had to make a good choice.

Should he just pretend to resist a little to avoid provoking Kim Yu-hyun and hand over Trey?

Or should he try a dangerous deal that could trade his life for a drop in favorability?

“Answer.”

Kim Yu-hyun, as if he had no interest in Zion’s conflict, urged him.

Just in case, Zion glanced at Lucia, but this time she didn’t seem to want to step in either.

It seemed she didn’t want to care about Trey, who had made her this mess.

‘If you’re scared, die.’

A scene from a movie came to mind.

Yes, in this situation, if you’re scared and lower your tail, you’re guaranteed a trip to heaven.

There are times in life when you have to go for it, even knowing it’s crazy.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”