Chapter 412 (1/2)

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His throat seemed to have been momentarily clogged up, but he could soon breathe freely again.

“A slave to his past”—when Su-hyeun heard those words, he began hyperventilating, wheezing heavily and shallowly.

Not once did he ever think about such a thing. But at the same time, he had to question himself why he hadn’t thought about it until now.

“If only…I had the same strength back then as I do now.”

Didn’t he think about such things before?

No, wait; it wouldn’t just be Su-hyeun but everyone else would’ve thought about it, too. Anyone would think about the possibilities of what might have been if this or that happened or if they knew things back then what they knew now.

It was all rather obvious; everyone alive had some kind of regret or two. It was simply the matter of one’s ability to deal with them, and Su-hyeun believed this to be true even for himself.

If there was one thing different here, then it was Su-hyeun traveling to his past and changing the events he wanted to change.

But now…

“Just what are you still kicking yourself over for? Have you not already altered the past you wished to change?” Fafnir opened its mouth once more.

Su-hyeun raised his head and stared at Fafnir. The Predator spoke as if it knew everything.

The moment Su-hyeun heard those questions, he realized that this being before his eyes was not Fafnir.

Shu-wuwu…

Fafnir’s figure melted like snow. It soon assumed another figure, and the existence that materialized possessed an all-too-familiar face.

“It’s…me?”

It was none other than himself, Kim Sung-in.

“Answer me. What do you regret? No, wait. This can’t even be called regret anymore.”

Step, step…

Kim Sung-in strode right over to Su-hyeun. The latter remained still and observed this scene because the figure before him was not Fafnir but Kim Sung-in.

Grab—

Kim Sung-in grabbed Su-hyeun’s collar. The latter, who had been sitting on the ground, was effortlessly lifted back up in the air.

“Why aren’t you answering me? Why are you still behaving this way like a moron?”

“What do you mean by like a moron?” Su-hyeun asked back.

The one before his eyes was none other than himself—no, more correctly, someone Su-hyeun knew, Kim Sung-in.

Unlike the current Su-hyeun, this being was a projection of himself who hadn’t experienced the destruction of his world yet.

And so, the Kim Sung-in of the past was talking to Su-hyeun of now.

“Because of lingering regrets, you are forgetting to save the people right in front of your eyes now.”

“I am?”

“They are already dead. Wait—you managed to save them all this time around. So, what’s the problem, then?”

What was the “problem”?

Su-hyeun pondered this for a bit, but he could find no problem here. However, if he had to reply, then it could only be…

“If only I had this level of strength back then…” The moment those words left his lips, Su-hyeun ended up chuckling helplessly. “Ah, so this was it,” he thought.

The “epiphany” wasn’t really anything special.

What he was afraid of and what he had been thinking deeply within his subconsciousness—he finally realized the reason behind them. His lingering attachment—his regret—was not Fafnir.

All those people he had failed to save in the past and his thoughts of, “If only I had the current level of strength, what would have happened back then?” confined and restricted his present.

For instance, Fafnir from the past had appeared before him today not the one from the present times. The reason for that was simple enough: because Su-hyeun was still stuck in his past.

“Now, look carefully,” Kim Sung-in said and took a look around their vicinity.

Wu-wuuuung…

The surrounding scenery changed. The new surroundings no longer reflected the devastated landscape of Guangzhou, which was destroyed by the battle against Fafnir.

This was not the world Kim Sung-in used to live in but the one Su-hyeun had been living in.

“Dad! Please buy me this!”

“But son, you have the exact same thing back home, don’t you?”

“I’m going on a blind date!”

“Really? When? Come on, show me her photo if you have it! Is she hot?”

“Please give me 150 grams of miyeok for miyeokguk.”

“Yes, sir! One hundred and fifty grams of miyeok…Whose birthday is it today, sir? I can see that you bought some flowers as well…”

The scenery rapidly changed, and he could hear all sorts of voices and sounds.

The conversations he heard contained daily dilemmas of regular people, such as what was for dinner today or should one buy that newly released notebook? He heard someone deciding to break up with their date, while someone else was mulling over the decision to quit their job and work somewhere else, and so on.

The world they lived in was truly ordinary and also truly peaceful.

It was not the world of Kim Sung-in but the one Su-hyeun was living in.

“This is the world you have changed…” Then, Kim Sung-in continued with another question, “Do you regret any of this?”

“No,” Su-hyeun answered after a moment.

The world had changed. The people who should’ve died were now alive, while the world that should have been destroyed was left intact.

This was what Su-hyeun had changed—not the “future” but the “present.”

“Do you think all those people died because of you?” Kim Sung-in asked again, and this time, Su-hyeun shook his head.

Indeed, the end result might be the same, but the reality was not.

“No. They are all alive thanks to you.”

Su-hyeun nodded at those words.

Without being fully aware of it, he used to think differently—that they were dead because of him.

“Dead, because I failed to save them. If only I was a little bit more powerful back then…if only I had this level of strength back then, then I would have saved them all. It’s the same thing as me killing them…”

Those thoughts were responsible for saddling Su-hyeun’s shoulders with the weight of several billion people’s lives.

In the end, Su-hyeun was moving forward all because of his guilt.

“It’s not because of you,” said Kim Sung-in.

However, those words were not spoken by someone else to Su-hyeun. He was speaking to himself.

He was saying that it wasn’t because of himself and that not being strong enough was not a crime.

The one who could make him see that was none other than himself.

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The Bull Demon King stood by patiently in the same spot, awaiting Su-hyeun’s return.

He didn’t dare to sleep. The moment he did, countless dead souls would rush in toward him to take over his body.

“It’s been a month.”

In a way, it had “only” been a month. The Bull Demon King had been anticipating a period that was much longer than that. But now…

“You’re out already?”

Su-hyeun had returned.

Su-hyeun walked out from the inky-black darkness belonging to the Land of the Dead Gods and smiled faintly after noticing the Bull Demon King, “Yes, first brother. I’m back.”