Evil Human Nature (2)
By the time I returned from the smithy, night had already fallen.
My physical condition wasn’t great, so I couldn’t skip meals as usual and forced myself to eat a variety of foods.
I don’t remember what I ate.
I don’t care about the taste of food, so I consumed it based on the necessary nutrients and the amount I could digest.
“……I can’t ever get used to the feeling of having something in my stomach.”
The fullness from eating.
The sluggishness that made it difficult to move.
After reaching the realm of a superhuman, I avoided eating because of this fullness and the drowsy after-meal sleepiness.
Of course, I also didn’t eat to avoid gaining weight or wasting time on meals.
‘It’s so strange to experience the sensation of eating after so long and the effects it has on my body.’
Humans need to eat to live.
Moreover, many people consider eating the greatest happiness and joy in life.
“I’m struck anew by how inhumanly I’ve been living…….”
In fact, this was normal human life.
Eating and sleeping.
Everyone lives like this.
Except for me, alone in the world.
Only after my body was severely damaged, and I couldn’t synthesize the necessary nutrients or energy just by circulating mana, did I become human-like.
‘……That’s quite a sentimental thought for me.’
Is it because I’m a terminally ill patient with physical abilities inferior to a civilian? Or perhaps a dawn of sensibility has filled me, who is usually barren in this area.
Enough with the useless thoughts.
It was time to work now.
“……Let’s hurry up and sort out what needs to be sorted out.”
The time I have to work is shorter than usual now.
Perhaps because my body is so severely damaged.
When I lie down on the bed, I feel like I could fall asleep right away.
Maybe I’ll even snore?
‘Of course, I wouldn’t snore in an undignified way, but it’s true that I’m so tired I can’t recover even if I sleep.’
My eyelids are heavy.
There was a limit to reducing fatigue by circulating mana through the Great Circulation [a technique for circulating mana throughout the body], as usual.
I should lie down and sleep soon.
“……Is my concentration deteriorating?”
However, contrary to my initial intention,
I didn’t get on the bed right away.
I touched the dark circles under my eyes, stained with fatigue. Even without looking, this area must be a deep black color.
Like the color of my body hair.
‘I need to handle only the essential things and sleep so it doesn’t get any darker.’
Mountains of documents to process.
It was already a headache even in normal times.
It has increased even more since this Otherworld incident.
It would have been better if these were documents related to the company or family.
What’s giving me a headache now is comparing and analyzing the information I already knew with a notebook’s worth of information that Baek Eun-ho gave me.
Moreover, it’s not over once I analyze it; I also have to figure out if this is reliable information. I can’t blindly trust a notebook written based on someone else’s memories.
After going through my own review process, 3 hours had passed in a flash.
When I classified them by importance and the order in which they should be prioritized, I started to feel confused. Extreme fatigue and the desire to sleep that I had never felt before.
The bed and pillow were calling me.
‘I have no choice. I need to pick out only the parts to sort out today and handle them.’
I lightly classified the information.
The information to be processed first was relatively small compared to the mountain of accumulated information, but it was still quite a lot.
After reducing it and classifying it in more detail, I finally felt confident that I could sleep after doing just this.
‘First, it’s me.’
First, I systematically sort out the problems related to me.
For reference, the ‘me’ here refers to both the owner of this body and my spirit. A broken body and a devastated spirit.
Since I have many problems in many ways, I had to approach this part delicately.
“I guess there’s not much to sort out than I thought.”
But when I actually moved it to the document, there were only a few things that were particularly important.
The only unusual thing was my left arm, tightly wrapped in a black bandage.
I didn’t bother to describe it at length because I was planning to sort it out separately later.
I was used to physical pain.
I’ve lived with mental pain every day to the point where it feels like a daily routine, even if I don’t get used to it.
‘Maybe it’s not that there’s not much to sort out. Maybe I’ve become overly adapted to my body.’
Other people would be worried about their physical condition and meticulously record it.
But I didn’t care much about it.
These pains don’t matter.
It was much more important for me to sort out the topics that would come up later.
“The only important thing is the guy who’s watching from somewhere in my body.”
When my mind became hazy in the Otherworld.
I didn’t fall completely asleep.
A faint consciousness was awake.
This was a habit I learned on the battlefield, so it wouldn’t easily change no matter how tired I was. Through that faint consciousness.
I saw a natural disaster.
It was what happened when the body under my control returned to its original owner. The original ‘me’.
It sounds strange when I put it this way.
Anyway, I don’t know where he’s hiding his soul.
There’s no good way to find him.
I neatly gave up on writing down information related to this.
‘The first one is finished with seven documents. Next, the second topic is academics. About the academy, the students, and the protagonist.’
This also had mountains of things to worry about and sort out.
The information that Baek Eun-ho gave me.
I can’t trust all of it, but assuming it’s true, there are many aspects to collect and analyze.
‘First of all, the part that needs to be addressed is who is the real protagonist among the two protagonists.’
The protagonist in my head is Kyle Iris.
A swordsman who wields lightning and wind, and a member of the Nine Heavens Family that rules Greece.
Kyle, a 「late bloomer」 with a large vessel [potential], will grow tremendously through all the incidents and accidents that occur around him. The moment his big vessel is filled with content.
Instead of being saved as planned, this world will pay the price of sacrificing countless lives.
“……I’d rather the latter be the real protagonist.”
The protagonist of the novel that Baek Eun-ho told me about.
Surprisingly, the protagonist was a female student, even a girl I knew well.
‘Leonhardt.’
A beastman of the Lion.
Like the embodiment of wilderness, hunting, force, and destruction, they hold the hegemony of Germany and are the archenemies that clash head-on with the Sirius family.
“Even if she’s the protagonist, some sacrifice is inevitable, but the number of digits in the damage scale is different.”
This is the key.
Is it because the girl is the protagonist?
Or perhaps because the atmosphere of the work is not dark overall, according to Baek Eun-ho’s explanation, the estimated number of deaths is about tens of millions.
It’s a cute level compared to the damage in the unit of 100 million.
‘In the future, when moving in Chilseong [likely a location or organization], I need to keep in mind who is one of the two protagonists, and if I have to push a specific person as the protagonist, whose side should I take.’
The content about the protagonist is enough for now.
It’s not even the point of entering the middle part of the world yet.
There were plenty of opportunities to observe and accumulate information step by step.
I looked at the next topic.
‘Let’s see. The third one… it would be convenient to handle it at the same time.’
The third one.
I plan to sort it out together with the fourth one I had originally thought of.
Coincidentally, the witness who can help with the organization of information was the same person for both topics.
“Tamamo.”
I called her.
This was the first time I had spoken to Tamamo since waking up in the hospital room, after checking my left arm.
“Hey, Tamamo, tell me if you’re sulking.”
─……Hehe, do I look like I’m sulking?
“That’s a relief then. If you’re not sulking, it means there’s no resentment to resolve.”
─Haa, should I have just said I was sulking?
“It’s too late.”
Right after seeing the left arm that should never have existed for the first time.
I lost my composure.
That’s because magic was flowing from my left arm, which was so black that it couldn’t be seen as a human hand.
Losing my composure, I asked Tamamo, who had been watching everything by my side, why my arm had become like this.
As if pouring out my anger.
I practically asked her angrily.
The question of whether she was sulking was a reference to this.
She answered my outburst.
However, the answer she gave at the time was not enough to satisfy my questions.
So I put these as topics that must be sorted out.
The third and fourth topics are each.
“The reason why you did such a sudden thing to me without any consultation and the identity of my left arm.”
These were for her.
I smiled at her as hard as I could.
It was a sign that it would be quite a long story.
* * *
First, the third.
I questioned her about why she had done this to me without saying anything.
My rise in level [spiritual growth].
It was not something she could interfere with arbitrarily.
If a third party intervenes incorrectly, they may fall into the demonic realm, which is enlightenment and a rise in level.
“I thought I could keep you from getting hurt. I wouldn’t really say that’s all there is to it.”
─That’s really all there is to it. At the time, you were like a dam right before a spiritual growth, including enlightenment, burst. Maybe you would have missed the enlightenment as it was. So… I intervened in your growth.
“So, what’s the real reason?”
─Oh my, are you suspecting me now? You should know that everything I’m saying is true.
That everything she says is true.
I admit that too.
Her tone, the trembling of her vocal cords, and her eyes. More than anything, she was not one to lie about such trivial things.
So, of course.
“That’s because you’re only saying empty words.”
The most important point was missing from her words.
“You. What were you going to do if something happened to me in the Otherworld?”
─Hmm, I don’t really know what you’re trying to say……. If you have something you want to ask, can you ask me properly?
“……You didn’t care.”
A sound buried in words that were too small.
However, she seemed surprised to have recognized what I said through lip reading.
─What did you say……?
Tamamo, vaguely blurring the end of her words.
I stared straight at her and said.
“You don’t care if I die.”
─I don’t know what that means. If you die, I, who am just a soul bound to a ring, have to endure an indefinite amount of time, so there’s no way I wouldn’t care.
“Lie.”
This time, I could sense the lie.
It can be felt through tone, expression, breathing, smell, and movement.
Tamamo’s inner thoughts are infinitely close to composure, but that’s why it was easier to read. The ripples on a quiet river are noticeable whether it’s because of a small pebble or a large pebble.
The same goes for the mind.
I could tell that a small ripple had arisen in her heart.