Chapter 526 – Room 207, Gate Room – Fourth Trial: ‘Fallen King’ (12)
– Kim Mina
…
Slowly, my consciousness returned.
The first thing I felt upon waking was embarrassment.
I was planning to make a name for myself as a member of the Vatican agency, but I was completely suppressed by the bizarre magic of the archpriest, Hong Go-hak.
I had suspected he had some strange power, but I intended to fight back with a shooting match before that happened…
“Ugh!”
Through my blurry vision, I caught sight of Kain looking at me with concern.
Was the fight already over?
“Are you okay?”
“… Yeah. What about Hong Go-hak?”
“He’s already dead.”
I followed the direction he pointed and saw the corpse of an old man with his head blown off.
Considering the posture, it looked like a suicide, but given Kain’s ability to control people, it wasn’t a surprising outcome.
I pushed myself up and apologized.
“Sorry. I wanted to help, but it seems like all I did was drive.”
“No, not at all. You really helped a lot.”
“Come on, that’s just flattery…”
— Tap, tap!
As I managed a half-hearted smile and was about to ask about our next plan, I heard footsteps.
I immediately turned around and spotted a small figure cloaked in a hood.
“Who are you?”
“It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s someone I know.”
“What?”
“Remember I asked who you were on the phone earlier? This is that person.”
The one who took down the monsters around us on our way from the church to the park?
Kain said I should know her too.
— Tap, tap!
The person slowly approached us.
By the subtle curves of her body, it was a woman.
As inappropriate as it was to say, she had an impressive figure for someone so small.
— Tap, tap!
It felt unsettling.
According to Kain, she was a past companion of mine; every step she took made my chest tighten.
Finally, when she stood right in front of me and took off her hood…
I realized I could not escape my fate.
“Ah!”
This one syllable held all my realizations.
I also understood that Kain had tricked me several days ago!
Moments I had brushed off with slight doubt flashed like a panorama in my mind.
How she cleverly avoided answering when I asked if Aria was my name.
How she told me to choose what to call her.
And the dirt that had clung to the hem of her pants!
There were so many suspicious details, but why had I been deceived?
It was out of desperation.
I longed to overcome the confusion brought about by my incomplete identity, so I had closed my eyes to the doubts.
Moreover, the ‘Dream Kingdom’ exhibited such mystique that, much like an ordinary person, I was overwhelmed by its wonders.
Could it be that even the Dream Kingdom was a deception?
“Kain, you…!”
The young man wore an unusually apologetic expression and replied.
“I’m sorry. This, um, couldn’t be helped. So—”
“There’s no need to apologize.”
Her calm voice was utterly serene.
A gentle hand slowly came to caress my face.
I found myself unable to move.
In that moment, I felt like a deer caught in the gaze of a tiger.
“Ah… Huh…”
I couldn’t even muster the courage to resist as I moaned.
In contrast, the being before me was one destined for greatness from birth.
For the first time, she spoke to me.
“Don’t be afraid.”
“Ugh…”
“You’re Mina, right? You’re not going to die. You’re just… going back to being one.”
“… One?”
“Yes. We were one from the beginning.”
Slowly, leisurely, Aria’s face drew near.
Disassembly.
Deconstruction.
Recombination.
The coin was tossed.
I awakened from Kim Ahri’s body.
*
– Han Kain
— Thump!
The moment Mina’s body fell to the ground, I unconsciously jolted.
Even though I knew it was now an empty shell, I felt like I had to apologize for some reason.
Seeing my flustered state, Aria chuckled lightly.
“What’s wrong? I told you there’s no need to apologize.”
“That’s what you think; it’s not what Mina thinks—”
“Now Mina’s thoughts are my thoughts.”
“…”
“You mentioned this a few days back, right? The real Kim Mina died when she absorbed my fragment decades ago.”
“She did say that….”
It was a very brief conversation, but I had heard the explanation about Mina.
She was a being that obtained a fragment of Aria that scattered in the world by chance or intention from the Vatican, decades ago.
That fragment had now returned to Aria.
“Excluding the fragments that have become impossible to reclaim, we can consider this the last one. She was unable to recover them while evading capture from the Vatican.”
While I pondered this, Aria bowed her head lightly toward Hong Go-hak’s corpse.
“… What are you doing?”
“My own tribute?”
“…”
“The words your dual self spoke before he chose to end it. I heard them too. He genuinely believed he reached a great realm.”
“…”
“Something that cannot be compared to mere magic… in all likelihood, a truly elevated spiritual plane? Not quite Buddha, but maybe a Bodhisattva?”
“Bodhisattva.”
In his final moments, he showed the appearance of having transcended not only his hatred towards me but even his desire to survive.
Aria seemed deeply impressed by this, as she continued to speak with her head bowed.
“I can assert that the ‘Ascetic’ beyond the curtain wouldn’t have anticipated this outcome.”
“Ascetic?”
“I refer to the strange god beyond the mirror. I call it an ‘Ascetic.’”
The conversation topic felt somewhat uncomfortable, and with no time to spare, I switched it up.
“I recalled memories taken from Hong Go-hak’s body and realized moments ago; the Sacred Sun seems to reside with Sophia. Did you not know? You’ve been in contact with Sophia consistently, right?”
“I didn’t know. I was too busy evading the Vatican, and because…”
“And because?”
“My relationship with Sophia hasn’t been one to lay bare every secret.”
“…”
“Technically, it could have been that kind of relationship, but it got complicated along the way. I’ll explain gradually.”
“If we find Sophia, we can find the Sacred Sun. Last time, you mentioned—”
“I know Sophia’s whereabouts. She’s in Korea. Let’s head out right away.”
“Sure.”
“It’s going to be dangerous from here on out.”
I had deceived Mina in many ways, but it wasn’t a lie to say that her very existence was a trap.
The Vatican would soon realize that ‘Kim Mina’ had vanished from the world.
Before that, we had to reclaim the Sacred Sun.
“… This brings us to what the hotel has arranged for us to proceed.”
“What?”
“Nothing.”
I sorted through the events in my mind up to this point.
1. I obtained the grimoire from a girl at Hotel Pioneer by chance and formed a cooperative relationship with a Vatican agent at school.
2. With the help of the Vatican agent, we verify the existence of the ‘Dream Kingdom’ and reclaim it.
3. We contact Aria, who had been hiding in the Dream Kingdom, and with her assistance, locate the missing Pope Sophia.
4. We reclaim the Sacred Sun from Pope Sophia.
While there were many commotions along the way, I had nearly reached step four.
What would happen next?
Just before we set off, Aria chuckled.
“Hey, still can’t drive?”
“…”
“It’s amusing. The great Kain the Horus, who can see the future, can’t even drive a car—”
“Let’s, let’s just go.”
As I watched Aria bringing up memories of the fragment naturally, I felt a mix of embarrassment and a slight thrill.
Mina’s comment about not dying wasn’t entirely a lie.
— Vroom!
*
The road situation was still as chaotic as ever.
Though the Vatican troops were busy cleaning up the monsters here and there, the mess didn’t seem to clear up anytime soon.
Whether it was fortunate or unfortunate, it allowed me and Aria to drive without much interference.
The chaos surrounding us wasn’t lenient, but Aria handled the situation with ease.
— Slash!
Wait, seriously, that’s impressive!
Driving a car while slicing through approaching monsters with an irregular polyhedron?
It looks like the time spent in Room 207 has significantly improved our polyhedron handling skills.
— Whoosh!
Once we got outside of Seoul, the monsters were barely visible, replaced instead by the beginning of a storm.
Feeling like we had a moment’s respite, I quickly asked.
“Aria, can we talk now?”
“I’ve been waiting.”
“I have so many questions about the process.”
“…”
“How’s Sophia? Is she okay? It seemed like she was using the Sacred Sun.”
“…”
“And I want to hear what happened during the past trials.”
“More?”
My last question arose while I was conversing with Hong Go-hak.
“Yeah. I heard the Vatican has been veiling the world with a curtain; what exactly does that mean?”
“…”
A brief silence.
Aria needed time to sort her thoughts too, so I didn’t push her.
“Out of the three questions, I can answer two, but one, I’m unsure about.”
“Is that so? Then let’s start with what you know—”
“Before that.”
Her voice turned firm.
“You may have many questions, but so do I. And I’ve been waiting over a hundred years for answers. Can I ask first?”
“Go ahead.”
“Kain. Why did you resurrect Aedia?”
My first response to this was simple.
“What are you talking about? What did I do to Aedia? I resurrected her?”
“…”
This question seemed to require quite a bit of background explanation.
*
— Whoosh!
Amidst the pouring raindrops, Aria began explaining several facts.
First, the head of the Vatican, Virgin Aedia, has been alive since ancient Egyptian times.
Second, over the years, Aedia became the biggest problem for Room 207. Not just Seungyub and Yumi, but even Elena and Eunsol, and Aria herself had clashed with Aedia.
Third, according to Yumi’s memories, I was the one who resurrected that Aedia.
“Now can I hear the reason? I’ve been curious about it for ages.”
Why did I resurrect Aedia and create such a massive butterfly effect?
This question had plagued Aria for over 120 years, and even Yumi and Seungyub for more than ten times that long.
Now it was time to reveal the answer.
“Well, to begin with, I don’t have any recollection of that summoning. As you know, summoned entities and their originals don’t share memories.”
“No way! So you don’t know either? How can this happen—”
Seeing the terrifying look on Aria’s face, it felt like we might crash into something, so I hurriedly tried to reassure her.
“No, I do know. I can guess. Anyway, the summoning time was at most one hour, right? It wouldn’t have been enough to significantly differ from my current persona.”
“…”
— Squeak!
“Ugh!”
The car stopped suddenly.
Aria turned to look at me.
As if she wanted to focus all her attention on hearing this vital answer.
Her expression pleading for the answer weighed heavily on my心.
“Before entering Room 207, there was one possibility I was most afraid of.”
“…”
“Before it was my turn, the stage had already been wrecked. It hit me as I endured the Curse Room.”
“…”
“The world can break down more easily than you think. Perhaps the ‘normal’ world I’ve lived in passed through an incredibly low probability.”
“Right.”
“Thus, I sent a note to Seungyub. The note read, ‘Please respect the historical flow we know.’”
“You considered the reality you remembered as a kind of answer.”
“It was a request to follow that answer as long as possible since it had been normal until that point.”
“I understand.”
“A normal world up until the 21st century is what I term ‘the answer,’ and crucial elements are necessary for that answer.”
“…”
“The organization that deals with the chaos behind human history. That’s the Administration Bureau. So—”
“I guessed as much. Yumi seemed to understand it at some point too.”
What Aria and Yumi speculated.
“For so long, I watched over the world and realized Aedia was definitely an enemy of the hotel party. However, she was not the enemy of humanity.”
Aedia was the enemy of the hotel party.
This statement does not imply that she was an enemy of humanity.
“On the contrary, Aedia was humanity’s greatest protector. Her hostility towards us wasn’t rooted in grudges from ancient Egypt; she genuinely believed we were a dangerous existence as ‘guardians of humanity.’”
“…”
“It was sometimes astonishing. In a sense, Aedia deserved the title of ‘Saint Mother.’ Unlike me, she possessed an almost inexpressible compassion for humanity.”
One word caught in my throat.
“Unlike you?”
“At some point, I pondered… is this why you resurrected Aedia? Because you thought she could support humanity for thousands of years?”
Aria and Yumi realized the reason I resurrected Aedia in the past.
The reason was simple: Aedia was the suitable being to take the role of the head of the Administration Bureau.
One answer brings forth new questions.
“Thinking like this, another incomprehensible question arises.”
“… Ask away.”
“Why did it have to be Aedia? Counting the second party, why couldn’t it have been Miro, Yumi, or even Seungyub who was older and matured?”
Based on the first party, Yumi also could have enjoyed eternal life.
Thus, the questions raised by Aria and the past Yumi were valid.
Why did Aedia have to become the head of the Administration Bureau?
Why couldn’t it have been Yumi, or Miro who became mature over time, or Seungyub?
“We could have killed Aedia multiple times.”
“…”
“There were opportunities for Yumi and me. We could have killed Aedia back then…. Each time we chose to let her live.”
While we, the companions, could have killed Aedia, we let her live.
Why? Because we were unaware of why I chose Aedia.
What if beings that could foresee the future recklessly killed Aedia and disrupted the scenario?
The possibility of handling that was something we couldn’t risk, which is why we had to endure pain instead repeatedly.
“I occasionally thought about this too. In some sense, Aedia is your apostle or angel.”
“Apostle, angel….”
“Did you know? Aedia half thinks so too. ‘Your god chose me, yet why do you seek to kill me?’ Aedia once said this to Yumi.”
At some point, I felt an unmistakable resentment in Aria’s voice.
For over 120 years, she had suffered because of my decision; it wouldn’t be right to say there was no resentment.
“Aria.”
“Now let me hear the answer.”
“Aedia is probably not human.”
“Isn’t that obvious? She’s been around for hundreds of thousands of years—”
“I don’t mean she’s not a human now. I mean when she was born during the ancient Egyptian party, Aedia likely was never human to begin with.”
“What does that have to do with—”
Then Aria fell silent.
As an astute colleague, she grasped the true meaning behind my words.
The past me had chosen Aedia because she had never been human.
Because that aligned with the ‘one answer’ I knew.
Aria whispered as if dazed.
“The founder of the Administration Bureau wasn’t human either. You knew that.”
A long time ago, before entering Room 207,
I learned one shocking fact from a girl bound by her infantile ego.
A farm where cows live cannot protect itself.
A farm where humans live also cannot protect itself.
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