### Chapter 338 – Room 203, The Cursed Room – ‘A New Beginning’ (18)
—
– Kim Sanghyun
—
— Ro-o-o!
The sound of a flute echoed through the air.
As my hazy mind cleared, I began to think more rationally.
Oddly enough, it made me fight a little better.
“Haah!”
I jerked my head to the right, dodging a sharp energy emanating from the enemy while thrusting a sharpened bone spear formed from my left hand.
I heard the opponent’s irritated voice.
“Urg! What kind of power is this that makes spears come out of your body? Are you Wolverine or something?”
Instead of answering, I spun around and elbowed her upper body, causing her to land awkwardly with a strange roll.
Ahri seemed to slow her fall with some weird power, but suddenly she emitted crimson mist all over her body!
I realized I had to step back and find an opportunity—
But I also realized that wasn’t necessary.
If my current body was just a regular human’s, it would be hard to contend with such supernatural powers, even with the blessings of powerful martial arts.
However, Adravita bestowed upon me the power of a demigod.
As I leaped into the midst of the mist, sharp needles formed from all directions, stabbing into my body.
At that moment, my skin hardened like stone, fending off the ancient blood offensive.
“Wha-What kind of power is this?”
In the midst of our ongoing fight, I realized something. The strength granted to me by the demon and Ahri’s ancient blood. If it’s just the two of us fighting, I would win!
In the next moment, a blue light flashed in the mist. The moment I recognized it, I immediately had to roll sideways.
… But the flash didn’t come.
That power was making this fight drag on.
No matter how much I pressured Ahri with the formidable strength of the demigod, she could turn me to ashes with just a flick of her finger!
That’s why I was forced to retreat time and time again, even when victory was within my grasp.
Of course, Ahri wasn’t in a comfortable position either. If her shot missed, it would guarantee her defeat, which paradoxically made her hesitant.
“AAHH!”
A sharp scream rang out, and Ahri immediately turned her head in that direction.
Eunsol was rolling out of the way of a whip lined with sharp teeth.
Seungyub, wearing protective gear, shouted while grappling with the monster, but it didn’t seem like he could hold on for long.
She was bleeding from her leg but picked up the flute again.
Seeing that, Ahri sighed in relief.
It felt as if the key to overcoming this room was contained within that flute.
— Ro-o-o-o!
The flute’s sound echoed again.
A peculiar sensation began to gnaw at the back of my mind, restoring my decaying brain cells one by one.
I recalled memories from long ago.
The family I had when I was not yet rotten in Room 203.
The face and voice of a woman I had long forgotten floated back to me.
I vaguely remembered the children she bore.
The conversation we shared—was it dialogue or more of a written understanding?
She seemed to have a hard time expressing herself verbally with either a mouth or a ‘beak’.
*
“Teacher, marriage and childbirth are certainly occasions for celebration, but I’m worried. Please don’t forget that one day we must leave this room.”
“□□-kun, we need power. Didn’t I explain what we’re planning to do?”
“I’m just concerned about you.”
*
Oops!
In the heat of battle, I made such a blunder! If my opponent had been slashing at my neck, I would’ve been beheaded at least ten times by now!
“… Why didn’t you attack?”
“I think the flute of rest has an effect.”
“Effect?”
“What are you thinking? I felt like I was drifting into memories.”
I couldn’t respond.
Although these were my memories, they returned to me in a way that was increasingly confusing.
“Sanghyun, listen to me for a moment.”
“…”
“Are those people the ones who dealt the final psychological blow to you?”
Ahri quietly pointed around.
It was a horrifying sight—monsters that looked like elementary school kids had just molded them out of fleshy clay, filling the plains.
“The trigger left by the evil god has activated for the primitives. Seeing those monsters, it seems you thought your resistance against Adravita was all in vain…”
“…”
“No, I don’t think so. This isn’t a sentimental story; it has logical grounding.”
“Logical grounding…?”
“First, the problems only started with the military that came here. The prisoner’s power seems to be particularly strong in this location. The people in the city are still fine.”
“…”
“I remember you experienced this 70 years ago, right? Back then when you returned to the city, the people there weren’t harmed, were they?”
“That’s right.”
“Second, they can marry ‘humans’ and leave descendants. You know this all too well. What does it mean biologically that they’re able to have offspring? Broadly speaking, this means they’re included in the concept of humanity.”
“Ahri, are you saying that from the heart? Or just trying to persuade me?”
“Is there a need to distinguish? The important thing is that there’s still a possibility of ‘resolution.’ Humanity’s new beginning, the City of Light is still intact. The issue is…”
Ahri sighed, glancing around.
Could it be that the sound of the flute was clearing her mind?
I think I had an inkling of what her concern was.
Let’s say the condition for resolving Room 203 is ‘A New Beginning for Humanity,’ as the room’s title suggests. The city that would serve as the foundation for this beginning has already been created.
The problem is that monsters threatening the underdeveloped young civilization fill this world, and the hatchery, the source of these monsters, is still here.
Originally, the plan was to push through the hatchery using the power of the legion we had brought and the leftover strength of the hotel party, but that very legion crumbled away under the evil god’s power, throwing everything haywire.
How on earth are we supposed to destroy the hatchery?
— Ro-o-o-o!
The sound of the flute echoed again.
More memories flooded back.
Cha Jinchul had died fighting to save everyone on the spaceship.
I despaired while watching the monsters swarm around me over and over.
I couldn’t overcome it.
I had no way to take on those monsters alone.
I would have frozen and become a lifeless statue, rotting away for eons…
The moment I had given up everything, a miracle happened. The miracle came taking the form of a bird.
“Memories of a long time ago are coming back.”
“What are you remembering?”
“It was during the time when Jinchul and I were fighting to save you all. I didn’t recall it earlier, but we actually achieved some results.”
“Results?”
“I mentioned that the spaceship had absorbed a considerable number of security units to prepare for launch?”
“Yeah.”
“Then why didn’t it take off?”
Ahri’s mouth fell open.
“Ah?”
“You didn’t think of this part, did you? It’s not a big deal. Jinchul and I separated the core of the spaceship again.”
“The core. Speaking of which, the core could move by itself, right? Where is it?”
— Ro-o-o-o!
The sound of the flute echoed.
An unfathomable melody finally pulled out the most painful memory of the past 300 years.
I… remembered the moment I fell apart.
Tears streamed down my face.
“Ahri, this room is a place of torment. You can’t even imagine how many terrible things I’ve experienced here.”
“…”
“But I could endure for around 200 years. Do you know why?”
“…”
“Because I wasn’t alone.”
Even after Jinchul’s disappearance, I still had another partner.
Someone who could endure eternity, even after losing their physical body.
“Do you understand? Even if a person inhabits a bird’s body, they cannot fly. The software to fly doesn’t exist in a human brain. However, it seems that after a ‘very long time’ passes, that’s not always the case.”
“…”
“I remembered training to fly with a bird that had human intelligence. It was a moment more fun and joyful than I could have imagined. So…”
“So?”
“The day his intelligence fell away, I too crumbled.”
The clear sound of the flute resonated.
The screams of the transformed humans everywhere ceased.
In the sky was a single bird.
Before the bird was a book.
*
– ???
The sound of the flute echoed. I sensed the end of a long nightmare.
I realized that the irretrievable destruction brought about by misusing the ‘Status Window’ had been nullified by another miracle’s power.
Thinking this over, I wondered, who am I?
Born a person, living for 20 years, and transformed into a bird to live for 300—what kind of species am I?
I gazed at the book.
Realization, breaking free from the mold of mortality, flickered across my small head.
Am I human? Am I a bird? Such contemplations are worthless and futile.
If I genuinely accepted truly great wisdom, then the flesh is merely like clothing.
Can a garment that can be changed at will truly define my essence?
Turning my head, I noticed a boy standing among the hardened monsters, his expression blank as he stared at me.
“That book! The, no way!”
The woman holding the flute looked at me with wide eyes.
As she tapped the flute with her beak, she snapped back to her senses and began playing again.
I took to the skies.
Feeling the cool wind, I soared higher and higher.
Up into the endlessly lofty sky, a secret place not yet granted to those still walking the earth.
For those who can fly, they lack wisdom, and those with intelligence cannot soar.
Thus, this place is the safest in the world.
That’s why we hid immense power right here.
So that in the final moment, we could pass judgment!
In the sky shone the sun.
At that moment of creation, there was a second sun created by humans, not the true sun created by the vast universe.
A sun capable of purifying the corrupted land created by false creators in a single instant.
My body flew toward the core, beginning to ignite slowly.
Of course, this was to be expected. The core releases heat endlessly, after all.
No problem. This was my last flight.
The power I needed was just enough to press the button once with my whole body.
— Beep!
*
– Kim Ahri
—
The temperature in the atmosphere began to rise.
The ‘core,’ which was higher than the aurora covering the sky, began to crash to the surface!
Humans, monsters that had just been people, and monsters that were monsters from the start—
All stared blankly at the sun descending from the sky.
At that moment, a voice of an exhausted man rang out.
“Let’s fire it now.”
“What?”
“That thing won’t explode if it drops to the ground. Adravita set up the aurora to stop it, and even made a buffer zone.”
“Have you ever… dropped it? Already?”
“Do you know how long 300 years is? During that time, I—I don’t think you understand how many times we tried.”
“…”
“We had bombs, but we didn’t have a trigger.”
As he raised his hand—perhaps this was the last statement of this room—I heard him pronounce:
“I have become death, the destroyer of worlds.”
A flash of light pierced through the sun descending from the sky.
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