After wandering through the darkness for what felt like an eternity, he found the fifth cluster of light. He reached out and checked its contents. The fragment showed the eighth version of Sa-yoon.

After the System had grown indifferent, Sa-yoon’s growth had accelerated. Perhaps because he spent less time being swayed by useless emotions, he acted without indecision. With no meaningless exchanges with the System, he no longer held any expectations for it, and thus, felt no disappointment. Most importantly, in his eighth life, Sa-yoon’s parents had not died during the Great Depression. This had a profoundly positive effect.

Sa-yoon had hidden the somewhat suspicious System but revealed that he had awakened as a hunter, and his parents supported him with everything they had. Their assistance was an undeniable factor in why his growth in that life was particularly steep compared to other regressions.

Perhaps because of this, Sa-yoon began to rely on his parents as much as he had once relied on the System. The System would only realize when the eighth Sa-yoon died just how great an influence this had on guiding Sa-yoon to the position it desired.

His death in the eighth regression was not a murder. Neither monsters nor humans had laid a hand on him. The eighth Sa-yoon chose to take his own life. The catalyst was the murder of his parents by other hunters who had sought to check his power while he was inside a Gate.

Sa-yoon emerged from the Gate to the news of his parents’ deaths, cried for three days until he could no longer open his eyes, and then killed himself. Left alone once again as Sa-yoon died, the System, as if enraged, dyed its blue window a bloody crimson.

The fifth fragment ended.

“…The sixth.”

Sa-yoon immediately moved toward the next cluster of light. He didn’t have the stamina to run, nor was his mental fortitude particularly robust, but he had enough to not fall into despair. Whenever he felt himself begin to waver, the sight of Han Geon-joo’s dropping health was enough to make him see red and banish any hesitation.

The sixth fragment showed the tenth version of Sa-yoon. The number floating above the boy’s head was proof of the regressions he had repeated. In the fifth memory, it was an 8; now, a 10 floated above his head.

Perhaps because he had chosen a death similar to his eighth life in his ninth, the tenth Sa-yoon finally began to experience things similar to the current Sa-yoon.

Forced Execution.

It had finally appeared.

As if updated to be as merciless as possible, the System chose a method that eliminated every person and place Sa-yoon could find solace in. If he didn’t carry out the execution, it would force him to do it and then turn back time.

No, that’s what he had thought.

Screee—

A sharp ringing stabbed at his eardrums. His stomach churned, and a vicious pain, like his skull was being pierced with needles, washed over him. Even in that state, Sa-yoon stood firm and forced his eyes open, staring directly at the scene the fragment was showing him.

“…It didn’t turn back time?”

The wretched question fell to the floor.

In the scene, the boy was sitting in a daze, as if possessed. His eyes, staring into the void as if seeing a hallucination, were so black their depth was unknowable. The scene was split in two, like a split-screen, showing the catatonic Sa-yoon and the Sa-yoon for whom the Forced Execution was being realized. No matter how he looked at it, the boy sitting still was the reality. The scene on the right looked more like a hallucination.

Flinch. Flinch.

Every time the boy on the right killed a person, the dazed being on the left would twitch.

「Sa-yoon?」

The neighbor who had taken responsibility for Sa-yoon after his parents died—in the exact same sequence he remembered—placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder. The boy’s gaze remained fixed on empty space.

It wasn’t turning back time. It was messing with my mind.

A wave of nausea rose in his throat. The System made the scene of the Forced Execution repeat endlessly inside the young boy’s brain until he personally murdered his loved ones. The once-focused pupils slowly lost their light. Finally, the boy flinched. An eternity had passed in his imagination, but in reality, barely a minute had gone by.

“Ah, fuck.”

A guttural curse escaped him.

His eyelids trembled. He didn’t want to see it. Then that means it wasn’t something I couldn’t help. It means I just killed them. I did.

「Sa-yoon.」

A voice. He couldn’t tell if it was coming from the fragment or if it was the same simple auditory hallucination he always heard. Sa-yoon struggled, trying not to look. He desperately tried to think of something else, but it was no use. The moment the boy showed signs of moving, the System ceased its brainwashing.

「Ah…」

The boy, freed from the hallucination, gripped the knife. The real Sa-yoon stopped breathing. The dull blade was stained with blood.

「Sa-yoon!」

“…!”

The boy’s hand fell. Sa-yoon exhaled the breath he had been holding. Perhaps his mental fortitude was too weak to be controlled by hallucinations, or perhaps it was too strong. Whichever it was, the unchangeable fact was that the System had failed again.

The 11th life, the 12th.

Similar deaths repeated in rapid succession. From the 13th life onwards, the System began to prevent Sa-yoon from killing himself. It threatened him: if you commit suicide, I will kill everyone around you.

Fortunately for the System, its hard work paid off. The method worked. Sa-yoon no longer pointed the tip of his blade at his own body. Instead, he would enter a Gate and simply stand there, doing nothing.

The System had failed.

Sa-yoon repeated many lives and died many times. Watching the boy die again and again, the System learned. It learned and learned how to handle Sa-yoon. Eventually, the damn thing succeeded in creating a routine that could make Sa-yoon grow as quickly as possible.

First, it would push him to his limits during his relatively easier-to-handle middle school years to maximize his growth. In the first month, it would wear down his humanity by making him get used to killing. Afterwards, it would select only the most difficult Gates and send him in to push his survival instincts to their absolute limit.

It was a familiar method.

However, even the 29th Sa-yoon died. The cause of death was pathetically simple: poisoning.

Death by a potent toxin.

The system window, looking down on the Sa-yoon who had died with his eyes wide open, flickered with static. A broken window appeared. The real Sa-yoon focused all his senses to read its contents.

<※XX#%@%!　 – –　Depletion ·　■ · – · ·　$%#> <@&*　and　 · – · ·　200 · · –　God · – – –　ok> <Side effe · –　@%%%#%2# · · –>

What the hell is that supposed to say?

He managed to make it out by scrunching up his entire face, but he couldn’t grasp its meaning. The characters were too fragmented, and many were glitched into strange forms. Just as a question mark was painted across his face, the image of the 29th life began to fade. It seemed the contents of the sixth fragment were coming to an end, and he braced himself for the coming impact. He had seen far more, and learned far more, than in the fifth fragment.

The revelation that the Forced Execution was a form of brainwashing using hallucinations had hit him particularly hard.

Based on his experience, every time he learned a shocking truth like this, the backlash upon returning to reality was severe. He was steeling himself for it, but the world that had been plunged into darkness was once again filled with a bright light, and a new scene unfolded.

Once again, a sixteen-year-old boy appeared. The regression number was not visible above his head. The naive boy was paralyzed with fear from the screams erupting all around him. A young couple grabbed the boy, who was standing there in a stupor.

「Sa-yoon. You can’t come out of here. Do you understand?」

The woman urged as she pushed him into the closet of a small room. He vaguely heard her add something else. No sooner had the woman closed the door with sad eyes than the sharp sound of shattering glass rang out. A few screams, a few shouts. And then dozens of loud crashes.

Finally, the hideous sound of something eating.

The boy in the closet covered his ears and squeezed his eyes shut, but he could still sense every sound. A sob rose in his throat. As if suppressing an emotion that could burst forth at any moment, the boy curled into a tight ball.

How much time had passed?

The boy staggered as he opened the closet door. The floor was covered in blood. There was nothing else.

Not his parents, not the monster.

Only an empty room, stained with blood, awaited him.

A blue system window appeared before his contracted pupils.

<You have been selected as the Evil of Humanity! Stand against the Saviors and lead Planet #9180 ‘Earth’ to its destruction. (b ᵔ▽ᵔ)b>

It was a window all too familiar to the current Sa-yoon, and all too alien to the boy in the scene. The boy blinked blankly, shook his head in denial, and rubbed his eyes. When the window still didn’t disappear, he leaned against the closet, hugged his knees, and buried his face in them.

Seeing nothing felt safe.

It’s okay. It’s okay.

The boy muttered. Outside the window, the sun slowly set, darkness fell, and then the day broke again. The boy, who hadn’t slept a wink, was still repeating “it’s okay” when a loud BANG, BANG, BANG! came from the iron door.

「Is anyone there? Are you okay?」

At the voice, a ray of hope, the boy shot up without even wiping away his dried tears and opened the door. Light flooded in, and a familiar face appeared. His next-door neighbor. As relief washed over him, the emotions he had reflexively suppressed came pouring out, and his eyes turned red.

「Whoa…」

The surprised man awkwardly hugged Sa-yoon and patted his back. Then he took in the scene inside the house, sucked in a breath, and spoke.

「…They said there’s a shelter nearby. Want to go together?」the neighbor said.

The boy nodded. They arrived safely at the shelter, and through videos uploaded to the community, the identities of the awakened began to be known. The boy looked at the blue window with suspicion, then shook his head. This status window is weird, he thought. This awakening is strange.

Then, he received his first quest.

To murder the man.

In that moment, a number appeared above the boy’s head.

Click.

The memory cut off as if a film had snapped. The real Sa-yoon, back in the darkness, coughed up the blood he’d been holding back and curled over, hands on the floor.

That last memory was familiar.

That was his current self.

<Truth Fragment 6/7> 

<Clear the trial to obtain the fragment.> 

<If you collect all the fragments, you will be able to see a part of Heaven’s Secret.>

Sa-yoon clenched his trembling hands into fists, pushed himself up, and slowly got to his feet.

He could guess what the next fragment would show. His throat bobbed. He swallowed the blood-tinged saliva, took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled.

<Your Pair’s health is below 10%!>

I swear, I can’t even die in peace.

“You really… should know you’re being favored, pretty boy.

Sa-yoon wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and took a step.

There was one last step to go.