Was it some New Year’s Day a long time ago? Big Bro Fortuitous once sent me a New Year’s greeting like this.

"Listen carefully. The world has ended."

Another new story idea, huh.

I replied.

"Yeah, and your novel already looks like it’s ended too."

"No. I’m telling you to listen."

"Let me guess, it’s one of those apocalypse stories where I’m the only one who starts with an amazing ability."

At my answer, Big Bro Fortuitous flinched in surprise and asked,

"How did you know?"

"How could I not know?"

Looking back, when I was in front of Big Bro Fortuitous, I could talk pretty much like Ji Eunyu.

"Hey, this one’s really different."

After huffing and puffing for a good while, Big Bro Fortuitous sent me the intro blurb he’d written.

"Only I can cook in this world."

Unfortunately, Big Bro Fortuitous’s intro blurb never got used. Not long after that, Big Bro Fortuitous went missing.

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if Big Bro Fortuitous had kept writing that cooking novel.

Would that story, too, have been born as a world in another dimension?

Ah, you’re asking why I’m bringing this up?

"Deceiver of the Stars. How long are you going to do nothing but read recipes? At this rate, the Tyrant King is going to die."

Because right now, it looks like I’ve become the protagonist of that story.

I don’t know why I had to come to the 40th round and take the job-change route for a "Murim Dumpling Cook," but unfortunately, there was a reader who wanted this story.

["King of Horror" is paying attention to your actions.]

What the hell do you even want to see, Kim Dokja? Do you really want to watch a story about making Murim dumplings?

No, you don’t. Wouldn’t you be more curious about the story where Yoo Joonghyuk revives in style without even needing to eat some stupid dumplings, goes around smashing all the constellations of the 40th round, and Cheon Inho is right beside him waving a light stick like his life depends on it?

["King of Horror" is curious about the "Murim dumplings" you made.]

With a deep sigh, I read the recipe. How much longer did I read like that?

A message surfaced in my mind.

[Tale fragment, "Murim Dumpling Recipe," resonates with you.]

It was the moment the youngest, Kim Dokja, finally job-changed into a "Murim Dumpling Cook."

"My name is Hurpung the Thousand Mile Divine Insight. I do not know who you are, but I sincerely thank you for inheriting my legacy. These 'Murim dumplings' are an orthodox recipe I developed twelve hundred years ago…."

Hurpung or Jangpung or whatever, anyway, the legacy of some incredible old man poured into my head.

After offering a bow of respect in my heart alone toward my unseen dumpling master, I looked at the root cause of all of this.

"I'm hungry."

Ten minutes remained. In ten minutes, I had to make dumplings Yoo Joonghyuk could eat.

One of the Ten Evils, who’d been watching me hold cooking tools, asked,

"But do we even have dumpling ingredients?"

"If you don’t have ingredients, what are you going to do by just reading the recipe?"

"It’s not too late yet. If it’s virulent poison and curse traps, I can prepare as many as you want."

The Ten Evils’ point was correct, and also incorrect.

These "Murim dumplings" are not ordinary food. So the method of making them isn’t ordinary, either.

"The core ingredient of 'Murim dumplings' is 'memory.'"

Food made from memory.

I focused for a moment and pulled a tale fragment out of my memories.

"W, what did you just do?"

"Dumpling wrappers just appeared out of thin air!"

The dumpling wrappers were my old memories.

"Ji Eunyu said. 'Author! Please, this time, make him regress! Regress him! You have to make him regress here!'"

Right now, I had no choice but to use this memory. Thinking about clearing the scenarios ahead, I couldn’t casually use memories related to Ways of Survival or Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint. In that case,

"The only thing I can use right now is Lee Hakhyun’s memory."

Pinch like this, pinch like that. Then, just as the recipe said, fill the memory with the stuffing, cook it…

A moment later, a single dumpling, steaming gently, was completed.

[Congratulations! You have completed "Orthodox Murim Dumplings"!]
[Your cooking-related proficiency is extremely low!]
[Your Murim dumpling completion rating is as follows.]

+

Completion: ★☆☆☆☆
Overall: A dumpling that makes you wonder whether it’s even edible. The memory blend is horrific. Beware of side effects.

+

Wow, one star is harsh. No, wait. I’m a beginner, so one star is normal, right?

"H, how—"
"To think the Sophist of Evil can actually make dumplings…."
"A dumpling a devil would eat."

Leaving the Ten Evils behind as they swallowed hard, I walked up to Yoo Joonghyuk.

Even with a pale face, Yoo Joonghyuk mumbled as he looked at me.

"I don’t eat things made by others… guh!"

I shoved the dumpling into his mouth before he could finish.

"Khk."

He suffered like he’d suddenly gone into a seizure, and I thought he might vomit blood.

Five minutes like that. Just as Lee Dansu was about to start whining about virulent poison again, Yoo Joonghyuk suddenly muttered,

"Regression."

Regression?

"Regress right away…."

Seeing Yoo Joonghyuk clutch his own throat, the Ten Evils panicked and rushed in.

"The Tyrant King is trying to kill himself!"
"Stop him!"

Looks like I put in a memory I should never have put in.

*

Yoo Joonghyuk recovered quickly.

The food he needed was three dumplings a day. Maybe because he was a jiangshi, it was a relief he didn’t have some "tale of eating eight meals a day."

Three dumplings was an amount I could accept the memory-loss penalty for.

"This time you didn’t put in any weird memories, right?"

"Yes. Nothing but happy memories."

"But why does someone called Ji Eunyu keep screaming at you? Is she your enemy?"

It had been three days since Yoo Joonghyuk started eating the dumplings I made. He still watched everything with suspicion as usual, but now he could eat my dumplings pretty well.

Watching us, the Ten Evils looked extremely confused.

"Damn it, someone’s eating dirt, and someone’s eating dumplings."

"Are you discriminating against people right now?"

Even so, I couldn’t give the Ten Evils dumplings made from my memories.

[Tale fragment, "Murim Dumpling Recipe," proficiency increases!]

Huh?

[An incarnation who eats your "Murim dumplings" receives a skill or stigma proficiency correction effect.]

I was startled. Wait, Murim dumplings had an effect like that too?

I hesitated for a moment, then glanced at the Ten Evils.

If it was like this, wouldn’t there be a method where I make the Ten Evils eat a bunch of dumplings too and raise their level?

"Want some dumplings?"

The moment the words left my mouth, the Ten Evils charged in and snatched the dumplings out of my hand.

"It’s good! It’s good! Damn it!"
"So this is what the Tyrant King lives on! Lucky bastard!"
"I can’t believe you really didn’t put virulent poison in it…."

If I’d known they’d like it this much, I would’ve made them some ages ago.

They looked so pitiful splitting one dumpling among four people that I was about to make another, but Yoo Joonghyuk grabbed my shoulder.

"Your hand is strange."

"Pardon?"

Only then did I realize my hand was trembling faintly.

Did I overdo it? I had been making too many dumplings lately.

"At this rate, all your memories will disappear."

"Well, for now, I’m making them from memories I don’t need—"

"There is no memory you don’t need."

It was unexpected enough that I lost my words for a moment, and I focused on what he said next.

"All memories are the foundation of existence. Any memory has its own role to play in sustaining that existence."

"It’s a fair point, but I don’t think it’s something you should say when you’re the one who offered your memories first as a sacrifice for 'tale engraving.'"

"That was—"

"Either way, you’re the one who ate the dumplings I made, so if I forget something, I can just ask you, right?"

Yoo Joonghyuk frowned.

"They weren’t delicious enough dumplings for me to answer each one of those things."

"Were they that bad?"

"I’m sure you aren’t Cheon Inho."

Well, he’d been eating dumplings made from my memories this whole time, so by now, Yoo Joonghyuk would know a little about me.

That I wasn’t Cheon Inho, and that I came from a different worldline.

"Save your memories. You’re a possessor. If a possessor loses their memories, in the end their mind will be devoured by the body."

I’d never thought about it like that, but suddenly it felt a little scary.

If I forgot all my memories from when I was Lee Hakhyun, what would I become?

"If that happens, please smack the back of my head really hard."

"Understood."

"You didn’t say you didn’t want to this time."

"It’s about time we went to finish this scenario."

"How are you going to finish it?"

"The objective of this scenario is 'break the Ark and reach the Final Wall.'"

"So?"

Yoo Joonghyuk stood up with an expression that said, what else is there to say, then looked at the Ten Evils still picking up dumpling crumbs and declared,

"Today, we hit the Ark."

*

And our raid failed spectacularly.

"Kraaaagh!"

The moment we stepped onto the Ark, the neck of Kang Ilhun, the "Rumor Expert," flew off again.

"Damn it! Ye Hyunwoo is already gone, that bastard!"

Ye Hyunwoo, the "one who disappears," vanished in an instant.

"Someone weaker than me, come out! Only someone weaker, I said!"

There wasn’t a single constellation weaker than Gyeong Sein, the "bully the weak, grovel to the strong."

"Trap installation complete! Kh… do poisons not work on these bastards either!"

Lee Dansu, the "Ghost Executioner," was doing something stupid like spraying virulent poison at constellations.

Even so, we had Yoo Joonghyuk. No matter what anyone said, the Tyrant King was the Tyrant King. The constellations were horrified.

And what happened?

"Make more dumplings."

Looking at Yoo Joonghyuk with one arm and one leg blown clean off, I let out one deep sigh after another.

After staying silent for a long while, Yoo Joonghyuk brought up something I hadn’t even asked.

"This is my first time making it to the final scenario too."

A hollow laugh came out of me.

Now that I thought about it, this bastard was a rookie Yoo Joonghyuk who hadn’t even made it to the final scenario before.

"Well, for a first try, it wasn’t bad."

Even though we came back half-crippled, Yoo Joonghyuk’s feat was more than enough to put the fear of god into the constellations.

Yoo Joonghyuk infiltrated the Ark and slew more than twenty hero-grade constellations, and even achieved the feat of lopping off the head of Ares, who appeared with only half a body.

To be honest, even that much was an incredible result. Even if Yoo Joonghyuk revived in the 40th round, I hadn’t expected him to show that level of martial prowess.

But the moment Zeus’s incarnation body descended, we had no choice but to run like Ye Hyunwoo.

As if his pride had been wounded, Yoo Joonghyuk muttered,

"Zeus is among the very top of even myth-grade constellations. If I had a proper weapon, I could have tried fighting him…."

"So all you need is a weapon?"

"At the very least, I could buy time."

Unfortunately, the weapon Yoo Joonghyuk had right now was an SS-grade item that was merely a replica of the relic, Painted Heavenly Halberd.

If we had the Green Dragon Crescent Blade, or Traiana, or even the original Painted Heavenly Halberd, things might have been different.

"A weapon isn’t the only way, though."

"Then what?"

"Either way, the objective of the scenario is the destruction of the 'Ark.' If we can just get close to the core power source, the 'tale core,' we don’t need to fight the <Olympus> bastards."

Then the "one who disappears," Ye Hyunwoo, showed up out of nowhere and cut in.

"The Ark’s tale core is guarded in shifts by myth-grade constellations."

"Yeah. It’s really helpful how you always show up exactly when we need you to say something like that."

"And we don’t know the layout to the power facility."

Even if it came from someone I hated, it was true.

In any case, our immediate tasks could be reduced to two things.

One, obtain a weapon Yoo Joonghyuk could use.
Two, acquire a map leading to the power facility.

I was starting to get tired.

If we failed to clear the 40th round, what would happen to us?

["King of Horror" is watching your choice.]

Still, until right before failure, we can suppress the "End," so is that something to be grateful for?

With a light sigh, I asked the Ten Evils,

"Do any of you have a usable spear?"

No one answered.

I stared at the Ten Evils for a moment, then took out a dumpling.

"Anyone have a usable spear?"

If there was no reaction even when I was offering dumplings, then they probably really didn’t have any usable spear.

At that moment, Lee Dansu, who’d been hesitating, stepped forward.

"We don’t have one, but I do know one guy who’s got a pretty decent spear."

"Who is it?"

"I’ll tell you if you give me a dumpling."

I lightly tossed a dumpling to Lee Dansu. Watching him snatch it up in one go, the Ten Evils screamed, "Damn it, I should’ve said it!"

I asked Lee Dansu as he took a happy bite out of the dumpling.

"Now talk."

"Blood Demon."

I’d forgotten. In this world, there were still incarnations alive besides us. Looks like the moment when that incarnation would be useful had finally come.

"What kind of spear does he have?"

"Everything from the Green Dragon Crescent Blade to the Painted Heavenly Halberd. He’s probably got every relic-grade thing worth mentioning."

I sprang to my feet and said,

"Then we go take it right now."

We’d already raided the Ark. With Yoo Joonghyuk on our side, there was no reason to be afraid of some Blood Demon.

But the group’s expressions weren’t good.

"It’ll be hard."

"Why?"

"Even if all of us go, we can’t handle the Blood Demon’s gang."

"But we have Yoo Joonghyuk. Is Blood Demon the name of a constellation on the same level as Zeus or something?"

Ye Hyunwoo looked at me like I was pathetic, then jerked his chin toward Yoo Joonghyuk and said,

"You don’t know the Tyrant King’s attribute?"

"Attribute? What °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° attribute?"

"The Tyrant King’s combat power drops to less than one-tenth when he fights incarnations."

I quickly used [Character List] to check Yoo Joonghyuk’s status.

Sure enough, as befits the cursed 40th round, Yoo Joonghyuk possessed nothing but heavy-hitting attributes. As many as "Ruler of Play," and even "Ironblood Tyrant King."

A few of his attributes were strong enough to go toe-to-toe even with the 1,863rd round.

But among them, one strange thing was mixed in.

+

Attribute, Curse of the Star.
When fighting constellations, your level doubles. However, when facing any kind of "humanoid incarnation," your level drops to one-tenth.

+

"Why the hell did you learn an attribute like this?"

"Yoo Joonghyuk didn’t learn it."

"Then?"

"It’s an attribute that was created because of the curse trap you set at the end. Did you forget that too? The reason you were able to defeat the Tyrant King was—"

"Yeah, I get it."

What the hell did you do, Cheon Inho.

So right now, our most important fighting power is completely useless in a fight against the Blood Demon.

"Then we trade with the Blood Demon."

"You know what he wants. Are you planning to offer up the Tyrant King’s head?"

"That would be a problem."

"Then there’s nothing else he’d want."

What he wants.

A thought suddenly struck me.

"You said there’s nothing to eat outside right now, right?"

"That’s right."

I stared down at the Murim dumpling in my hand and muttered,

"Then what is he eating to stay alive?"

Only I can cook in this world.