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Before Ganesha could finish speaking, Set grabbed his neck. Lifting him up by his thin neck with one hand, Set asked with an expressionless face,
“Tell me how to cross over to the other world.”
“Cough, hack! Ah, indeed, a body that needs oxygen is quite troublesome.”
Even as Ganesha’s eyes turned red and his face turned almost purple from lack of air, he didn’t lose his innocent smile. Staring intently at Set, Ganesha slowly looked around at the scattered Gorgon beasts nearby and spoke.
“My beloved children.”
“…Love?”
“Of course. Didn’t I personally give you your names, rather than leaving it to fate…”
Set, Isquis, Apophis, Shango, Baal, Chronos, Ganesha.
Set couldn’t understand why he had personally given them names that had nothing in common. However, he didn’t particularly care to understand. Whether the god loved them or not wasn’t important right now.
But Baal was different. Watching silently from behind, he grabbed Ganesha’s hair and snatched him from Set. As he looked at Ganesha with murderous eyes, Ganesha chuckled.
“Child. At this rate, all the hair on this body will fall out. Weren’t you the one who cherished every hair? Won’t you be sad when you wake up?”
“Shut up. You’re saying you’re a god?”
Although Baal had brought Ganesha here himself, he seemed unaware that he was a god. When Ganesha merely shrugged at the question of whether he was a god, Baal broke his pinky finger.
“Agh!”
“Let’s taste a god’s finger. See what’s different.”
“Hmm, hmm. That’s wrong. What you’ll be eating is just ‘Ganesha’s’ finger.”
Ganesha, or rather, the god, had cried out in pain when his finger was broken, but afterwards he didn’t seem particularly concerned. He just wiggled his dangling pinky finger once.
And at that moment, Ganesha’s body jumped, stepping on Baal’s shoulder with a thud. Simultaneously, a blue sword energy passed under Ganesha’s feet.
Having lightly avoided the sword energy, Ganesha quickly climbed onto a nearby skeletal tree branch. Despite Ganesha’s small and light body, the sight of him standing neatly on two feet on a branch as thick as a child’s arm was somewhat strange.
“If you throw sword energy at me, I won’t be able to talk anymore, you know.”
Ganesha looked down at Set with a benevolent expression. Set’s expressionless face only rippled with quiet anger.
“Ahaha. Still such an angry face. I’ve graciously come all this way. Something that couldn’t possibly happen to you who haven’t even seen the ‘ending’…”
“…Protagonist, genre, ending.”
Set listed the words haphazardly. Most of them were things he had heard from Hadad’s mouth.
Set didn’t care what Hadad knew, even if he knew the secrets of this world. For Set, this place was now a ‘place to leave’.
However, Ji-ho had left, and Set remained here. And as if everything had been designed, only Hadad was able to cross over to that world. So now Set needed to know too. What the secrets of this world were.
“Is this place inside a ‘novel’?”
The god smiled gently at Set’s low question. At this response that was neither affirmation nor denial, Set was about to throw another sword energy when,
“If you see it that way, I suppose it is.”
“Speak clearly.”
“To me, it’s merely inside a novel… But isn’t it not for you? Haven’t you lived a life experiencing all emotions? Laughing when happy, crying when angry, knowing your heart races when in love. How could that be merely inside a novel?”
Set closed his eyes tightly and opened them again at the god’s roundabout way of speaking. If the god hadn’t come possessing Ganesha’s body, he would have beheaded him without hesitation. He was only holding back because if he swung his sword now, it wouldn’t be the god who would die.
It was then that a strange sound was heard from somewhere.
Ding.
Immediately, the god hurriedly reached into his pocket. Only now did Set notice that his pocket was oddly bulging. What he pulled out was something white with half an apple drawn on it.
Set had seen this before, but Baal hadn’t. As the curious Baal tried to snatch it first, the god lightly flew up from the tree. Floating in the air, out of anyone’s reach, he clutched the white object tightly with both hands. And then…
Tap tap tap.
Tap tap tap tap.
The sound coming from that white object was very clear even to Set with his highly developed hearing. As Set quietly watched the god’s appearance, the god muttered while pulling at his hair,
“People who leave mean comments should all die!”
“…”
“These damn bastards.”
The god continued fiddling with the mobile phone for a while after that. Finally, unable to wait any longer, Baal used the tree as a support to jump and try to catch him. Of course, the god easily avoided his grasp.
Next was Set. Having realized what was in the god’s hand, Set silently kicked off the ground lightly. Unlike Baal, Set, who knew how to use mana, could easily jump high enough to reach where the god was floating.
Just as he thought he had easily caught the god, his divine form disappeared. Then he reappeared to the side.
Unlike with Baal, the god, who had almost been touched by Set’s fingers, spoke with extreme annoyance,
“Ah, come on! Wait a bit! I just got an email from my devoted reader! Haa, how long has it been since I received a fan mail?”
The god’s face was brimming with happiness. He was so happy that it was almost upsetting to see.
“Hmm, hmm. Yes, yes. That’s right. Haha, I was so excited when I wrote this part too!”
Now he didn’t care about Set and Baal at all. Finally, unable to stand it anymore, Set lightly swung his sword, sending a blade of energy towards him. The god easily avoided it again, just moving his fingers. However, thanks to that, he seemed to realize that Set and Baal were here.
“Ah. I’m sorry. I forgot this was outside. So, have you asked everything you wanted to ask?”
“Tell me how to cross over to another world.”
“Hmm? There’s no way such a method exists! There would be another god in that place, and there are copyright issues too. Do you know how complicated it is? Unless it’s a series, such a thing wouldn’t be possible…”
Ahem.
The god who had stopped speaking cleared his throat. Rolling his eyes to look at Set, he stuffed the object he had taken out back into his pocket and said,
“No, there is one way.”
“Tell me.”
“But, my last conscience… Aargh! Aargh! Okay, okay, I got it!”
As Set sent out highly refined sword energy one after another, the god’s body was busy dodging frantically. He floated around the air lightly, but even that looked like deception to Set’s eyes. Finally, when Set stopped, the god, who had been in an awkward posture, opened his mouth.
“Poor child who wasn’t born as the protagonist.”
In Set’s view, this was all of the god’s true feelings.
The god continued to speak with a mischievous smile. As if all he had said until now was a joke, and now he was slowly revealing his true feelings.
“The end of your life is as miserable as its beginning.”
“…”
“But remember, the fact that I loved all of you.”
At the same time, the god’s eyes began to flicker slightly. Then, as his eyes closed, Ganesha’s body fell to the ground. It was Set who caught him.
Set handed the unconscious Ganesha over to Baal. Then, he turned around and started walking away with big strides. Everything the god had told him was vague and abstract talk. Yet Set walked away as if he had realized something.
It was Apophis who approached Set. He too had seen Set and Baal talking with Ganesha from not far away. However, the atmosphere had been so subtle that he had only watched without approaching.
“…Your Excellency?”
But Set passed even Apophis and kept walking. Where he headed was none other than the caravan.
Apophis stood in front of the caravan door, watching Set’s actions. Inside the caravan, where most of the items Ji-ho had brought were neatly stored, Set was rummaging through the inside as if possessed by something.
And what Set’s hand pulled out was…
“Your Excellency, that’s…”
It was Yeon Ji-ho’s mobile phone.
