novelSide Story - 101st Floor (2) (7)
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Chapter 50
101st Floor (2)
It is an unavoidable choice.
There was no way back.
That is what divinity was.
It could be changed according to God's interpretation.
Even if I lose, if I believe that it is a stepping stone for my final victory, it is not a defeat.
But if I choose for myself what has been confirmed as a defeat, there is no way to get it back no matter what I do.
Defeat is confirmed as defeat.
[Is that your choice?]
It was the voice of the God of Order.
Yes, this was my choice.
[I have been watching you for a long time. I knew you wouldn't let them go. ]
You did very well.
The time the God of Order was able to watch over me would be before I completed my divinity on the 61st floor.
At the time I would have been willing to abandon someone close in exchange for victory.
I guess he didn't watch me properly.
[No, I saw it right. How much stability and comfort you needed. ]
The God of Order kept talking.
It was a couple of times, but whenever I faced the God of Order, the God of Order kept his words to the utmost minimum.
He didn't utter words unless they were necessary.
He never even explained his own thoughts, befitting a selfless machine god.
But now, the God of Order was speaking unrequired words.
[That was your motive."Desire" was the fuel you needed to move forward. After the desire was met, it was no longer possible to proceed as recklessly as before. That became your new weakness. like now. ]
Yes, it was a weakness.
Abandon either family or divinity.
There was only one way to override this option.
It is about defeating the God of Order and saving Hochi, Yongyong, and Old Man before they die.
It was the perfect answer.
Except that I'm not sure Hochi, Yongyong, and Old Man will hold out until I go.
Except for that, it was the perfect answer.
In the past, I would have challenged this answer without hesitation.
Without relying on probabilities.
Then it could be.
Because the stakes were so low.
My life wasn't worth it.
But now it was different.
I couldn't gamble over my family.
[It was a strange thing. ]
The God of Order did not stop his words.
Is the God of Order's chattering evidence that that machine god is being completed toward transcendence?
Or is that something I have to tell you?
[But fulfillment has made you complete. You could become a god only after you got what you so desperately wanted. I watched the process. So it was predictable. Which one will you throw away?]
Yes, it was an easy choice.
Even if I throw away Hochi, Yongyong, and Old Man and defeat the God of Order, the result after that will result in my defeat.
The answer was fixed.
[However. ]
The God of Order continued his words.
A little hesitantly though.
[I wanted you to transcend. ]
"Yes."
I understood.
What the God of Order wanted me to do.
What was the reason you called me to come in here?
[I wanted you to show me the way. ]
"You're also tied up too."
Like all other gods.
The God of Order was not free from his divinity either.
Even the God of Order is a machine god created by intention.
To him, divinity would have been nothing but redemption.
[But you also did not transcend. ]
[Now there is only one way left. The only answer would be to devour the world and stand outside of all laws, as the God of Origins did in the past. ]
The God of Order has declared to me.
[Get lost, you gave up. and don't come back. When we meet again, you will die. ]
[This is the order established by me, the God of Order, and there will be no way to reverse that order. ]
* * *
"Dad!"
I picked up the running dragon and hugged him.
Our Yong-yong had the appearance of his hatchling days.
It's been a long time since I've seen you.
It was the first time Yong-yong learned polymorph.
Obviously, when looking through space, Yongyong was in the form of an adult dragon.
Did he get smaller again because of me?
"Our Yongyong has turned into a lizard again."
"You can't use polymorph here."
No way.
This place suppressed divinity but did not prevent magic.
"Dad told you to wait at home, so why did you chase after me? That's dangerous."
Yongyong smiled and said that he had been chasing him because he wanted to see dad.
He was a pretty kid.
He was a pretty kid no matter where I looked, but he was the prettiest and I am most grateful for him being honest about his feelings.
"Old Man."
Holding Yongyong in my arms, I called for Old Man.
Old Man was distorted.
"You're so leaky. Are you okay?"
"It's okay."
The body of the giant was leaking lava.
He was holding his shape, but it was unlikely he would ever be able to bring it back together.
"Why did you come here? You're not even in good shape."
"I'm going to die soon."
"What?"
The Old Man said as he touched the flowing lava skin.
"I may die soon. I don't know when. I lost my divinity and became a mortal, so it is natural to die someday. I don't know whether it will be tomorrow or a little further away. That's why I came. I wanted to see you."
Everything is good, but the last comment was a bit like that.
It was burdensome.
"Grandmother would be jealous."
The Old Man chuckled and laughed.
I said thank you for coming.
"You."
And I asked Hochi.
"I followed Yong-yong."
it would have been.
When Yong-yong came, it was only natural that Hochi followed.
Our Yong-yong was not a child who would sneak from Hochi, and there was no way Hochi would let Yongyong go alone.
"Yong-yong."
"Huh?"
Yong-yong, who was on the palm of my hand, answered.
Yong-yong, who was in my arms, was small enough to fit on my hand.
Previously, I thought he was returning to the hatchling form from the adult, but I was wrong.
Yong-yong was getting smaller in real-time.
Even now.
Maybe he will get smaller to a cell size.
"Yong-yong, are you going to be this small? Dad can't see you."
Yongyong muttered a little.
Perhaps his body became smaller and his voice became smaller, to the point of not being able to hear him properly unless I really listened.
"This look is not very cute."
"No, you're cute."
Yong-yong was cute even when he was a lizard.
Even when Yongyong was an egg, he looked cute in my eyes.
Yong-yong, who still had to be fed each super mealworm by hand, had a good child-like image, but it couldn't be cuter.
"Really?"
When I nodded my head, Yongyong increased his size a little.
* * *
"Go back now."
The three were very vehemently opposed.
If that was the case, they wouldn't have come in in the first place.
"Anyway, if you fail, we will all die."
Yes all will die
The world will perish
"Even if I succeed, you can get hurt. You can die. That's why I'm sending you back."
For the three of you.
It may not be a problem right now.
"You'll be safe. Until you meet the God of Order."
I've already visited this place once.
Even if they lost their divinity permanently, there was no way they could be stopped in the middle.
Even Hochi, Yongyong, and Old Man joined together, and the group's power increased.
"The problem is only after meeting the God of Order."
But the three of them did not give up until the very end.
When the Old Man came here, it seemed that he had already given up the thought of going back to life.
Yong-yong, this clever child, came in clearly aware of the dangers of this place.
If he was persuaded by my words to return, he would not have come in in the first place.
"Still... maybe we can help."
Hochi didn't give up.
Of the three, Hochi was the most stubborn.
Hochi was a very unique creature.
Being someone other than me, he was me at the same time.
Hochi will be able to feel it too.
My condition now.
That's why he doesn't want to leave me behind.
I finally accepted the pressure of the three.
It was a wrong decision.
I came back to save the three, and I'm taking them back to a dangerous place.
Maybe I wanted to pretend I couldn't win and accept the coercion.
Because of the weakness within me that lost my divinity, I raised my head again.
"...Okay, let's go as far as we can."
I said so.
* * *
Old Man and Yong-yong took the lead.
Yong-yong, who looked a little depressed by making his body smaller, quickly regained his courage.
Hochi talked about Yongyong's troubles.
It seems that there was a problem with his appearance.
It was a problem for a teenage child to have.
It was also a concern that would come more seriously if the child had a different appearance from the parent.
"Still, I feel relieved right away when you said it to him. When I comforted him, he kept feeling anxious."
said Hochi.
"Since you and I tell the same story, then he must be relieved."
Hochi laughed at my words.
"You bastard, you're talking nice things. Why are you talking about things that don't suit you?"
We giggled together.
That was then.
Like a fruit hanging from a branch ripens and falls to the ground.
So naturally and unexpectedly, my left arm fell to the ground.
My left arm was cut off from the shoulder.
"......"
"Let's go."
I looked at my arm that fell to the floor and said to Hochi, who was dumbfounded.
Hochi started walking again without saying a word.
Yong-yong and Old Man, who was walking earlier, were the same.
The two didn't even look back.
It seems everyone knew.
What state am I in now.
Yes, it was before becoming a god.
I didn't have one arm.
The divinity went beyond being suppressed and completely lost.
The difference appeared here.
My arm, which I had restored after gaining divinity, was cut off again.
Pain raged in my stomach.
It was nothing.
In order to raise the skills that had been stagnant at the time, I abused my body in all sorts of ways.
To increase my pain tolerance, I modified my body to feel pain at every moment.
An extremely sensitive nerve that always felt pain.
It was a pain that was enough to ignore the resistance skill.
Magical power was churning through my body uncontrollably.
If I didn't want my body to explode and die because of my magic, I had to control my magic at every moment.
Occasionally, when emotional agitation became uncontrollable, I would force my magical energy out of my body, but every time, the 61st floor was swept away.
There was a time when I was studying curses and blessing magic for a long time.
All that magic was accumulated in my body.
The magic sometimes collided with each other, and sometimes caused a chain reaction.
Diseases with incubation periods and extreme poisons were also present in my body.
At that time, I deliberately left the poison undetoxified into my body.
It was an amazing body.
It wasn't strange if I had died.
Yes, it was like this back then.
Unexpectedly, I looked back to the past.
It wasn't a very pleasant past.
"Are you okay?"
Hochi asked.
I couldn't open my mouth to answer because I was holding back the pain that just came over me.
I just nodded my head quietly, hoping that I would look calm.
"...It's because of us. It's because of us because you came back from fighting."
It was a word that could not be answered only with a nod of my head.
I opened my mouth and answered.
"No."
Hoch didn't ask anymore.
He just said sorry
After walking like that for a while, Hochi suddenly spoke.
"I have something to say."
Hochi's face was serious.
"When this is over when we all get back to Earth safely, I have something I want to say to you."
He was putting a death flag on his serious face.
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