Gyeong Sein was the first reader I ever exchanged greetings with.

A muscular man who wore a name tag that said “Judge Heewon” and called himself Jung Heewon’s fan. A person who, along with possession, had their sex changed and wailed over shocking muscle loss.

That person was holding the front of my clothes and bowing the head deeply.

“Sein.”

I knew Gyeong Sein was strong. I still remember the moment when someone who was terrified of even catching a single mole cricket, before I knew it, stood on the very front line and became a shield for the companions.

The last place we parted was the ‘Recycling Center’.

How had Gyeong Sein been living in the meantime?

After entering the apocalypse region, I hadn’t heard anything at all about the others. And in that state, a full eight years passed.

[The constellation, ‘Owner of Baekrokdam’, sponsors you with 1 D-coin for the poignant reunion.]

[Some constellations, while feeling puzzled at the sudden melodrama, sponsored 2 D-coins!]

Along with the sponsorship messages coming from the air, Gyeong Sein raised the head. Gyeong Sein, who had definitely seemed to be holding back tears, had already completely changed expression.

“I’m sorry. Like you can see, we need some coins to repair the office.”

Gyeong Sein smiled faintly, in a tone I couldn’t tell was sincere or not.

“Will you come in for a bit? We have a lot to talk about.”

*

“Benefactor, I’ll wait outside. Please talk comfortably, the two of you.”

After Namgung Myeong excused himself with a greeting, I followed Gyeong Sein deeper inside the office.

The office of <■■■ Company>—the former interior of the Heaven-Breaking Sword Sect—was close to ruins. Holes were punched all over the walls, and the ceiling was so badly damaged that it wasn’t even clear whether it could properly keep out water, let alone soundproof.

Traces of fierce battles remained everywhere. Sword marks that looked like they belonged to the Heaven-Breaking Sword Saint, and traces that looked like they belonged to other constellations.

Among them, the one that stood out the most was the sword mark carved horizontally into the training yard wall. A sword mark I’d seen at the screening gate, and in the elevator on the ascension platform.

It was definitely Mad Sword Emperor’s.

“Sorry. I really don’t have much set out, do I?”

Gyeong Sein brought out a modest tea table. Two cups of leaf tea and shriveled french fries.

“No. Thank you.”

Watching Gyeong Sein calmly take small sips of leaf tea with an unbothered face, I fell silent, not knowing what I should say.

I wanted to ask if Gyeong Sein had been doing well, what had happened, but I couldn’t summon the courage.

Eight years. Longer than the time we’d been together—maybe even longer than the time the main story had been serialized.

That span of years lay between Gyeong Sein and me now.

“Honestly, I can’t believe it.”

After a brief silence, the one who spoke first was Gyeong Sein.

“Everyone was like that. ■■ was already…….”

Tststst, a light spark jumping up. In an instant, Gyeong Sein’s expression changed and the words were switched.

“Inho… everyone believed Inho was already dead.”

A world where you can’t even know whether someone is alive or dead if you can’t reach them for a month—no, even for a week. But it had been eight years.

“I’m sorry.”

“No. You must have had your reasons.”

There was a strange resignation mixed into Gyeong Sein’s voice as those words were said.

“It was always like that.”

In that moment, I felt something wriggle inside me.

[The tale, ‘Successor of the Eternal Name’, forms a sinister smile.]

Kim Dokja, who ran away while taking on every decision alone under the excuse of protecting the companions. Maybe the current me wasn’t any different from the Kim Dokja of the main story.

“I’ve been doing well. It probably doesn’t look like it, but here, it wouldn’t be wrong to say I’ve been doing well, to this extent.”

“Is that so.”

While escaping from the apocalypse region, I’d unconsciously imagined reuniting with the companions over and over.

What would they look like when I met them again? How much would they have grown? What would they have gone through? Would Killer King be the same as ever?

I thought we’d be able to talk about things like that without hesitation, laughing and chatting.

I was mistaken.

A selfish, dogmatic, arrogant mistake that belonged to Kim Dokja alone.

When I escaped that mistaken thought, Gyeong Sein’s face came back into view again. Cheeks sunken as if nutrition hadn’t been sufficient. Empty liquor bottles were rolling around in the corner of the reception room.

Did Gyeong Sein originally drink?

Questions I’d swallowed down over and over hovered at the edge of my lips.

What happened to the other companions. Why the Heaven-Breaking Sword Sect was destroyed. Why Gyeong Sein was alone here.

Why.

Why it looked like Gyeong Sein was no longer carrying out scenarios.

I should have asked, but for some reason I couldn’t find the courage. The powerless eyes of Gyeong Sein hinted at the years that had passed, and I was afraid of them.

“How have you been doing all this time?”

This time too, the one who found courage first was Gyeong Sein. A voice squeezed out as if solving a given scenario task.

Maybe misunderstanding my hesitation, Gyeong Sein added.

“Ah, there’s a sound-blocking barrier on here, so you can say whatever you want. Even the constellations won’t be able to hear.”

After steadying my breathing for a moment, I began to speak.

“……so, I was in the apocalypse region.”

Along with the story, I went back eight years.

Escaping the Recycling Center, separating from the companions, being chased by the Great Nebulae, taking refuge in <First Murim>, and then entering the ‘apocalypse region’.

Gyeong Sein listened to my words with a calm face. Watching that expression, the words coming out of my mouth started to feel oddly unreal.

I thought I did my best. I believed I’d tried, to save the companions, to keep this world from ending in tragedy.

So I made myself an exile. I had to leave the companions, and I had to enter the apocalypse region in order to save the scenario again.

「But was that really the best choice?」

Even then, couldn’t I have contacted the companions at least once? That I was doing fine here. That I would survive and return to the scenario. That I would go to meet them again. Wasn’t there a chance to say it, even once?

“Ah.”

As the story progressed, even Gyeong Sein’s somewhat dried-out expression began to carry something like a little liveliness.

Especially around the part where I entered the apocalypse region and encountered the ‘Transcendent Alliance’, Gyeong Sein had the face I remembered from the past.

“I don’t know if I can say this, but.”

“Speak comfortably.”

“It’s fun. Hearing about Inho.”

Fun. There was a faint sting of pain in that word.

Me, trying to make some story ‘fun’ even in a situation like this, and Gyeong Sein, listening to it as ‘fun’.

We met from the beginning through that kind of connection, and that was why we were here now.

“But why didn’t you come out right away? The apocalypse region incident was already eight years ago…….”

“I was trapped in a time stratum for a while. When I finally managed to get out, eight years had passed.”

As if estimating that span again, Gyeong Sein lifted the eyes toward somewhere on the ceiling with dull pupils.

“I see. So that’s why there was no contact.”

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

“You weren’t dead. Like I thought, you had your reasons.”

Maybe it wasn’t only me who had gone back through time along with the story.

Like air leaking from a balloon whose knot had come undone, remnants of old emotion were spilling from Gyeong Sein.

“I believed it. Even when everyone said you were dead, we, I, thought that. That ■■… that Inho couldn’t have died like that. I believed it firmly.”

“…….”

“So I resent Inho a little.”

Maybe from now was the ‘real story’ Gyeong Sein wanted to tell me.

“I’m sorry. There’s nothing else I can say, so I’m sorry again. I don’t know what kind of things you went through, Sein. You must have gone through a time so harsh it’s hard to tell me.”

Even if the writer stops serializing, the story doesn’t stop. Even in a world where the writer disappeared, the story continues.

Only readers who exist ahead of the writer’s imagination live that story.

“I’ll clean it up somehow.”

From now on, what I had to do was take responsibility for the history the writer hadn’t properly cared for.

“How?”

“This scenario, I’ll solve it. I’ll ascend together with you, Sein.”

The core of this scenario was to leave this world through ‘ascension’ and leap to the next scenario.

“I’ll join Sein’s company.”

Gyeong Sein must have entered this scenario together with the other companions. And in order to carry out the scenario together with them, must have established this ‘company’.

“I appreciate what you’re saying, but you don’t have to do that.”

“I understand you’re angry. But—”

“I’m not angry, Inho.”

The firmness that could be felt in the tone.

I stopped speaking for a moment and looked at Gyeong Sein.

Eight years ago, back at the Recycling Center, Gyeong Sein called me “Reader.” But now Gyeong Sein was calling me “Inho” again.

“Aren’t you curious why the companions aren’t with me?”

With a face as unfamiliar as that difference in how I was addressed, Gyeong Sein was looking at me.

“I am.”

“I know what Inho is worried about. But there’s nothing Inho is worried about. The others are safe too. Killer King, Yerim…… everyone safely ascended and went up to the upper scenarios.”

It was the story I’d wanted to hear the whole time.

“The scenario is going well. Ever since ‘that person’ appeared, clearing the scenario has been going smoothly, centered around that person.”

That person?

“The companions are probably right in front of this world’s ending now.”

Over the eight years, it seemed another center point I didn’t know had formed in the scenario.

“Inho doesn’t have to apologize. You had your reasons. The scenario is nearing its final act, and we don’t have any problems. So it’s fine.”

According to Gyeong Sein, this world was running better than I thought.

The companions were moving toward the ending, and this world seemed to be successfully avoiding the scheduled destruction.

It was good news.

“If there aren’t any problems.”

It should definitely have been ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) good news.

“Then why are you here alone, Sein?”

At my question, Gyeong Sein hesitated for a moment, then avoided my eyes and muttered.

“I stayed here by my own will.”

I couldn’t understand it. The person who stood at the very forefront of the scenario, who worked harder than anyone on the scenario. The person who overcame even personal fear and became a reliable shield for the companions.

That person voluntarily gave up the scenario?

“Running into Inho today was because I wanted to remember old times one last time. To talk, and like long ago, back when we read the novel we liked…….”

Gyeong Sein said, slowly rising from the seat.

“I think I wanted to go back to being a reader for a moment.”

With a sad smile, Gyeong Sein looked at me and issued an order to send me away.

“Don’t come again, Inho. Thank you for everything.”

I couldn’t back down like this. There was definitely something I hadn’t heard. A blank space of a story Gyeong Sein didn’t tell, or was afraid to tell, remained.

It was the moment I rose from my seat and was about to call out to Gyeong Sein again.

[Today is the tax settlement due date for <■■■ Company>.]

[Pay the notified tax.]

[There are currently overdue taxes.]

[If you fail to pay taxes, <■■■ Company> will enter the closure procedure.]

Gyeong Sein, looking up into the air, frowned.

[A ‘tax collector’ for collecting overdue taxes will arrive soon.]

After a moment, the air shimmered, and something like a furball poked its head out from inside the portal.

[Hmm, overdue again? You know I’m really not letting it slide this time, right?]

It was a dokkaebi I knew well.