I Became the Tyrant of a Defense Game [EN]: Chapter 409

In my dream last night, I became a butterfly.

I fluttered my wings and flew joyfully among the flowers, feeling so good that I didn’t even know if I was myself.

Then, when I woke up from the dream, I was not a butterfly, but me.

Did I dream of becoming a butterfly?

Or is the butterfly dreaming of becoming me?

…This is the famous Zhuangzi’s Butterfly Dream [a philosophical allegory about the nature of reality and identity].

……

All this time, I thought that I, the classic enthusiast, was dreaming Ash’s dream.

But it was the opposite.

In fact, I, Ash, was dreaming the dream of a classic enthusiast.

***

“Ash, you were chosen as the final player in this game against the Demon King.”

Aider explained slowly.

“Because you inherited the ‘Curse of Regression’ from your mother, Dustia, you were able to retain your memories in this repeating game that resets the world. It was the perfect talent for a player.”

“……”

“But in the endless regression, your soul began to weather away. It was because you repeated life for too long, more than a single soul could bear.”

I listened quietly. Aider continued.

“You tried to hold on until the end, but eventually, you became so broken that you couldn’t even remember your purpose or the names of the people around you. You couldn’t continue the game as a player. So…”

“So?”

“…We decided to use the last resort.”

The last resort…?

“After the regression, the last time Ash barely maintained his sanity… in the spring of his twenty-third year.”

Aider looked at me intently.

“To bring the mind of another player from another world and transplant it into Ash.”

“……!”

“Like wrapping a cracked ceramic with a cloth, bringing another personality and overlaying it on Ash’s personality. This was the last resort.”

Why did Ash… why did I.

Why did I try to keep fighting, even to that extent?

“Fortunately, our ‘game’ was quite popular with other beings in different dimensions… so we made contracts with players who had recorded decent clear data. We copied their consciousness and overlaid it on Ash every time a new round started.”

In short, that means.

Copy & Paste.

They copied and pasted the minds of other players onto Ash.

“That’s how we were able to continue the game. We were able to try to capture it in various ways that we hadn’t before. But even that had its limits.”

“……”

“Even if we wrapped it with a new cloth every time, the ceramic was already full of cracks… and it was falling apart more and more.”

Aider muttered bitterly.

“Ash’s soul was eventually shattered, and this is the last time.”

“……”

“This is the final game that your shattered soul can endure.”

Silence fell.

I, who had been standing still, suddenly asked.

“…If I fail? What’s next? Are there no more players?”

“There aren’t. The game ends.”

Aider spread his arms slightly.

“Even I, who am in charge of the director role, have reached my limit.”

Is it because this is the spirit realm?

Only then did I see the countless cracks in Aider’s spirit form.

His soul was literally on the verge of turning to dust, to the point where it was baffling how he was maintaining his form.

“This is the last chance for both you and me.”

“……”

“I’m sorry for hiding the truth, Ash. But… I thought this fact would only confuse you.”

I let out a long sigh.

“So… in the end, I’m Ash, who had the memories of a classic enthusiast copied and overlaid… and lost all of my original memories.”

My head was spinning. It was hard to breathe.

…Is a ship that has had all its parts replaced.

Still, that ship?

I covered my face with my hands and staggered. Aider tried to approach me, but I waved my hand to stop him.

“Just give me a little time.”

“……”

Aider silently stepped back.

I stumbled along the sandy beach and slumped down on a dune of sand.

I looked up at the sky, still draped in the aurora, and laughed hollowly.

“In the end, I’m neither a classic enthusiast nor Ash.”

I am not a classic enthusiast.

The real classic enthusiast is probably living somewhere on Earth.

I’m just a fake who copied and pasted his memories.

And, I’m not Ash either.

I don’t have any memories of being Ash. Because they’ve already been overwritten.

Sometimes, residual memories surface unconsciously, but they’re already unfamiliar, like someone else’s.

I slowly lowered my head and spoke with difficulty.

“There’s nothing real left for me.”

In the end, I am neither a classic enthusiast nor Ash, but a completely separate… a mere broken human.

Just a chimera pieced together to be used as a player.

‘Everything that makes me is not mine.’

Not in my body, not in my soul. Nothing is mine.

I am a fake.

I covered my face with both hands and hunched over. I was suffocating, and my eyes were burning.

The truth was harsh, and I was confused.

How long had I been like that?

Suddenly, my shoulder felt warm. I was puzzled and slowly raised my head.

“……?”

The sunlight was touching my shoulder.

When I looked up, I saw the sun rising from the end of the vast land that stretched endlessly on the opposite side of the coast.

Does the sun rise in this spirit realm too?

I frowned at the dazzling light and raised my hand to block it.

‘Huh?’

Was it an illusion?

Under the pouring sunlight, something shimmered like a heat haze.

I focused to see it clearly.

It was…

– PRESS START

…Those letters, made of dots, that appeared in a certain classic game from my childhood memories.

“Huh?”

I was breathless.

I rubbed my eyes and looked again, but the letters were gone, perhaps it was an illusion. But I had already jumped up from my spot.

The sun was rising. As it peeled back the curtain of night, the sunlight illuminated the day in the spirit realm with a terrifying force, as if it would burn it all away.

In the world that was beginning to shine dazzlingly, a voice suddenly echoed in my mind.

– The important thing isn’t where you came from. It’s what you want to do from now on.

The words the Goddess had said, and the words I had said to my companions.

I swallowed and looked down at my hands.

“……”

I am a fake.

My body, my soul, nothing is completely mine. Everything about me is fake.

But, even if my whole life is a lie…

‘Still, I want to save them.’

The child lying in the hospital bed.

This collapsing world.

Everyone within my reach…

‘I want to save them.’

Clench.

I clenched my chest tightly.

Even if everything about me is a lie, this heart is mine.

The flag I raised for him is also, without a doubt… my true heart.

That’s when it happened.

Whoosh!

The sunlight pouring down from the sky rushed in, swirling and falling into my hand.

“…Ah.”

When I came to my senses, I was holding the flag of light that I had seen in the spiritual world in my right hand.

Hot and heavy.

A flag with a broken pole clumsily attached, and a flag that was torn and burned, patched up hideously.

My flag.

My heart.

My shattered pieces.

“…Haha.”

Looking at the fluttering, shabby flag, I suddenly laughed.

– If it’s torn to shreds, then you just live torn to shreds.

Before I fell here.

The words Serenade had said while holding my hand.

– If it’s shattered, then you just live shattered.

I muttered blankly.

“Live shattered…”

…Looking back.

I was always broken.

‘As a classic enthusiast.’

I couldn’t become a poet because I couldn’t write poetry, and no matter how hard I studied, I couldn’t get into a prestigious university.

I couldn’t endure the company I barely got into and had to run away.

‘As Ash.’

I lost my mother, abused myself, ruined the people around me, and ran to destroy myself as a delinquent thug.

‘It wouldn’t have been strange if I had given up on everything a long time ago.’

In either case, my life was a series of breakages. I was always breaking, breaking, and breaking again.

741 failed attempts.

And the path to the true ending that I couldn’t achieve until my soul was shattered.

……

…But, even though I was broken, I haven’t lost yet.

All those wounds didn’t finish me off. Even if I’m a patched-up fake, I’m still standing here, looking up at the sky.

The game isn’t over yet.

Even after experiencing hundreds of game overs, the classic enthusiast continued to fight to deliver words of encouragement to a child.

And Ash didn’t give up, even going so far as to fill his broken soul with the consciousness of another person.

And I am something that is a mixture of the fragments of those two people.

Clench.

I clenched the flag in my hand tightly.

I will continue to break in the future.

More adversity will come, more hardships will come, more loss and more sorrow will come.

I will be wounded more than I have been so far, and I will shed more tears.

As long as I don’t give up and fight back, that is my destiny.

But what does it matter?

I’m already shattered.

If I break, I can just put myself back together and stand up again.

– If you don’t lose your heart, even if you’re torn into a thousand or ten thousand pieces, you’re still you.

I closed my eyes, remembering Serenade’s words.

“I am…”

I am not a classic enthusiast.

I am not Ash.

I am not a player, a tyrant, or a monster.

“I am…”

I am none of them, but,

At the same time, I am all of them.

Bathing in the dazzling sunlight, I clenched my fist, gritted my teeth.

I opened my eyes, looked at the sky, and declared.

“…I am, shattered.”

And that’s why.

“I am, me.”

What defines me, what proves me, is my heart.

As long as this heart remains, no matter how broken I am, I will put myself back together and fight to the end without giving up.

Until the moment this life ends.

“Hoo…”

I let out a long sigh.

My heart felt lighter than ever. There was nothing more to hesitate about.

I looked up at the sky again.

Whether it was an illusion or a mirage, the letters made of dots were still not visible.

But I reached out my hand to the sky.

And, I pressed a button that didn’t exist.

Then,

[Player Existence Verification Complete.]

As if I had really pressed the start button, a familiar system interface appeared before my eyes.

[System All Green.]

[Welcome back, Player.]

I pressed the start key.

And only then, did my real life begin.

As I started to walk down the hill with the flag in my hand,

– I’ll cheer for you too.

Finally, suddenly.

The greeting a succubus had given me echoed in my mind.

– Good luck.

“……”

Thank you for cheering for me, even in this shattered state.

“I’ll do my best.”

As I walked down the hill, I saw Aider, who was surprised, running towards me in a hurry.

“Let’s go back, Aider.”

I smiled nonchalantly.

“We have to finish the game we were playing.”

The Game Continues.

As long as a person doesn’t give up, the game must continue.

“……”

Aider looked back and forth between me and the flag in my hand.

“…Yes!”

He took off his glasses, roughly wiped away the tears that had welled up in his gray eyes, and smiled brightly.

“Let’s go back to the Crossroads!”