[Avatar].

The moment I heard that word, it felt like my head rang with a ding.

「"Are you Han Sooyoung’s 'avatar'?"」

Come to think of it, when Kim Dokja visited the 1,863rd round, he asked the Han Sooyoung in front of me a similar question.

If that was the case, then maybe her question now was revenge for that day that had been buried for a long time.

I drew in a light breath and opened my mouth.

"I."

I was going to say it.

That I wasn’t an [Avatar]. That just like you were, I wasn’t merely acting on behalf of 'Kim Dokja', either.

But Han Sooyoung didn’t even listen to my answer. She nodded to herself and started talking.

"So that guy already saw ■■. Right?"

"……."

"Well, time flows differently in every world line. It wouldn’t be strange even if he was faster than me."

What was she thinking when she looked at me? Han Sooyoung’s face kept repeating a cycle of brightening and darkening.

"So, why did you come here? He sent you, didn’t he? Was he worried about me, by any chance?"

"Uh……."

"Or did you come because you were curious about this world line’s story? You were curious about the world I made, right?"

"That—"

"How’s he doing? Is he healthy? Is he still making people mad whenever he gets the chance?"

Watching Han Sooyoung grinning, I couldn’t bring myself to speak. I couldn’t tell her that the Kim Dokja she remembered no longer existed anywhere in this universe.

I squeezed my eyes shut tight and answered like this.

"Yes."

But it seemed I’d been mistaken about something regarding Han Sooyoung.

[Someone is activating 'Lie Detection'.]

With the feeling of my heart turning cold, I slowly opened my eyes. Han Sooyoung, whose expression had frozen cold, was glaring at me.

Her small hand grabbed my collar.

"Hey."

An enormous wave of power was flowing out centered on her. Once again, I could feel what kind of existence Han Sooyoung in front of me was.

An existence who fell into this round alone and reached the end of the world. The 'Director of the False Epilogue' who created an ending no one could have imagined.

"Where is that bastard right now?"

"……."

"Tell me."

Cold sweat beaded and ran down my spine, but I couldn’t answer.

"I won’t."

"Why."

Because depending on what I said right now, the future of the entire universe could be changed.

「The Han Sooyoung in front of me was an existence that would eventually become tls123.」

She was the person who completed 'Ways of Survival' for young Kim Dokja.

「She still doesn’t know the fact that she’s destined to become tls123.」

If I gave her careless information and something went wrong—if, in other words, the origin of the universe got twisted, I wasn’t confident I could bear that responsibility.

Of course, no matter what I said, the already-determined 'primordial world line' might not change.

But you never knew.

"Yeah? You won’t tell me."

Han Sooyoung’s gaze turned savage.

[Character 'Han Sooyoung' has activated 'Eyes of Truth'!]

An [Eyes of Truth] that had become even stronger than when she met Kim Dokja. Her skill, synergizing with [Expected Plagiarism], began sweeping over me as if dissecting me.

"You think I can’t read it out just because a punk like you is hiding it?"

An alarm rang in my head. Instinctively, I realized. If that skill started, all my tales would be read. Then Han Sooyoung would learn everything that happened in the 41st round.

「T h a t w o u l d b e d i f f i c u l t」

In the next moment, it felt like something like the binding of a thick book covered my consciousness.

[Exclusive skill, 'Fourth Wall' is activated!]

Right after that, bright sparks covered the suite room.

*

To get straight to the conclusion, Han Sooyoung ultimately couldn’t read the 'tales' inside me. This time too, it was thanks to the [Fourth Wall].

"Damn it, this is the first time I’ve seen someone this stubborn since that bastard. Should I really torture you or something?"

At Han Sooyoung’s sharp voice, Lee Seolhwa asked.

"Isn’t that person the person from back then?"

"That’s a pretty philosophical problem, though."

Han Sooyoung let out a few heavy sighs, then lowered me back down onto the bed from where I had been dangling in midair.

"Hey. Fine. I get it. I won’t look. Happy now?"

Han Sooyoung gave up faster than I expected. Of course, I knew that wasn’t real giving up. Han Sooyoung wasn’t someone soft. No matter how you looked at it, she was probably planning to pretend to coax me and pull information out of me.

Han Sooyoung dragged a chair over, set it backward toward me, and asked with her arms draped over the chair back.

"I really won’t look. I’ll make an [Existence Oath]."

"You can get around that with [Avatar]."

"Oh? You even know that?"

As if something occurred to her, Han Sooyoung pulled out her notebook and started recording. Somehow, the more I talked, the more it felt like I was getting pulled along, so I shut my mouth again.

"Are you going to keep your mouth shut?"

"……."

"You have a purpose for coming to this world line too, don’t you? If you just stay silent like that, nothing’s going to change, you know?"

At Han Sooyoung’s pressing, my mind snapped alert again.

My purpose for coming to this world line.

Right. This wasn’t the time to be lounging around aimlessly.

"How did you end up coming all the way here? You can tell me that much, right?"

"If you turn off [Lie Detection], I’ll tell you."

"Seriously, it’s like you really are that bastard’s avatar."

Only after I heard the message in my head that [Lie Detection] had ended did I slowly open my mouth.

"I tried to stop the destruction of my world line, and somehow I ended up here."

"Your world line is being destroyed?"

I couldn’t hide every piece of information anyway. Now that I was in this world line, I needed her help too.

"More precisely, it almost was. I managed to stop it somehow, though."

Han Sooyoung muttered after thinking about something for a moment.

"Was our Apocalypse Dragon sleep-talking because of that, too?"

"Sleep-talking?"

"Whatever. So you got cocky trying to stop the destruction and fell into this world line, is that it?"

"Yes."

"That’s weird."

"What’s weird?"

"There’s no way the world line that bastard is in would suddenly be destroyed. And the world line was being destroyed, so he made his avatar do this kind of thing? The 'Demon King of Salvation', of all people?"

In an instant, a chilling premonition flashed through my head.

A strange smile lingered at the corner of Han Sooyoung’s mouth.

"You didn’t come from the 3rd round."

What kind of leap in thinking did it take to make a prediction like that possible.

Hiding my admiration, I nodded.

"Yes, I didn’t come from the 3rd round."

"Then?"

If she’d already found out this far, wouldn’t it be okay to tell her at least where I came from.

After making up my mind, I opened my mouth.

"I came from the 41st round."

"41st round?"

"You can ask for more details, but I can’t tell you."

"Why can’t you tell me? Is there information I’m not allowed to know or something?"

Watching her grin, I repeated my resolve again and again.

I need to keep my head on straight.

The other party was Han Sooyoung with [Expected Plagiarism].

If I let slip strange information, I’d ruin the entire story.

"A lot."

"That just makes me more curious."

"Even if you’re curious, I can’t tell you."

"As far as I know, there were two '41st rounds' in 'Ways of Survival'."

No matter how much she was Han Sooyoung, I didn’t think she’d be able to get that far just from hearing the words '41st round'.

"One was the 41st round from before Shin Yoosung returned to the past. And the other was the 41st round after Shin Yoosung came back from the past."

I deliberately clamped my mouth shut.

But it seemed like Han Sooyoung read something out even from my silence.

"Looking at your expression, you came from the former. Right?"

Facing Han Sooyoung, who chased down the truth and latched on to every word, how did Kim Dokja dare to think about sharing something like the 'Sacred Three Questions' with her.

Nodding, I answered.

"Yes. That’s right."

"Wow, you really came from the worst round. Yoo Joonghyuk there is a total piece of shit, isn’t he?"

"Well—"

Looks like Han Sooyoung also knew well about the bad reputation of the 41st round.

"He’s not that much of a piece of shit."

"Oh? Are you defending Yoo Joonghyuk right now?"

"It’s not to the point of defending him."

"Seriously, even the way you talk back every single time is the same."

Han Sooyoung looked like she was in a pretty good mood for someone saying that.

"Anyway, then you’re pretty lucky, aren’t you?"

"What?"

"You escaped that horrible '41st round'. And you look like you’ve got memories enough to live even separated from the main body."

I’d never thought about it that way.

"If you want, just settle down here. Living in another world line can be a pretty fresh experience, you know? Either way, even if you go back, you’ll get integrated into the main body, right?"

The person saying it had actually practiced that herself.

Han Sooyoung of the 1,863rd round was an avatar who received half the memories from the main body. No, at the point she received more than half, it was hard to judge which side was the 'main body' anyway…… but, in any case.

"So, who did you make a contract with to cross over?"

"A contract?"

"If you pulled off world line movement, you would’ve made an 'otherworldly covenant', right?"

Staring blankly up at her face, a fact suddenly came to mind.

「World line movement of <Star Stream> requires special Plausibility.」

Originally, in <Star Stream>, 'world line movement' was only possible under special conditions.

For example, based on the main story, there were a total of three methods for 'world line movement'.

One was using Yoo Joonghyuk’s stigma, 'Regression'.

In the main story, <Kim Dokja Company> realized that the essence of 'Regression' was 'creating a new world line', and used it to carry out 'group regression'.

The second was using the 'Last Ark' used by constellations to attempt world line movement.

Also a method used by <Kim Dokja Company> and Yoo Joonghyuk in the main story; they boarded this ark and had a record of returning from the 1,865th round to their original round.

The last, third, was making an 'otherworldly covenant'.

The Han Sooyoung in front of me was a case of crossing world lines by that third method. The otherworldly divinity she contracted with was the 'Secretive Plotter'.

"Hm? I’m asking who you contracted with."

In her eyes, I didn’t have the stigma [Regression], and I hadn’t crossed over ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) by riding an ark either. So naturally, it was reasonable to see that I had crossed world lines through the third method.

"Well, I—"

And that was exactly the problem.

「I did not make an 'otherworldly covenant' with anyone.」

I simply crossed over here through the door of the 'time stratum'.

The moment I realized that fact, a chilling feeling ran through me.

「Is that Plausibility-wise possible?」

Even that great 'Secretive Plotter' had to consume no small amount of Plausibility to help Kim Dokja with world line movement. But right now, I—

Tsutsutsutsut.

Sparks lightly jumped centered on my incarnation body. My breathing gradually quickened. Even though [Fourth Wall] was clearly activated, moving my incarnation body was difficult. It was clear why.

The 1,863rd round was unable to accept my existence right now.

[The Plausibility of <Star Stream> is moving!]

[The Administration Bureau has noticed your existence!]

[The Administration Bureau’s Grand Dokkaebis raise questions about your existence!]

The omen of the Backlash that was slowly pressing in.

Listening to the ominous messages battering my ears in real time, I hurriedly opened my mouth.

"I have to live. I have to live and go back."

"What?"

I crossed over all the way here; I couldn’t die just because of Plausibility.

"Please help me."

Han Sooyoung would definitely have a way. If it was her with [Expected Plagiarism], she would have a way to break through my current situation. But.

"Why would I?"

"Excuse me?"

Han Sooyoung asked back in a cold voice.

"You said you didn’t cross over to meet me."

Only then, at those words, did I realize what the strange sense of discomfort I’d felt throughout the conversation really was.

"That bastard really forgot everything about this side, didn’t he?"

That’s right.

Maybe it wasn’t only <Kim Dokja Company> that lost its 'reader'.

After Kim Dokja left, Han Sooyoung of the 1,863rd round—

"Why should I help the avatar of a guy who doesn’t even care what happens to this world?"

She was thoroughly sulking.