Edokers was living a life that was both nerve-wracking and strangely comfortable. The anxiety came from the Apostle who was no doubt still hunting him, while the comfort stemmed from no longer needing to worry about money.
“You’re basically a freeloader at this point.”
The cutting voice reached his ears as he lay sprawled across the couch, eyes glued to the TV. The voice belonged to Ahn Sohee, a fellow Demonic Terrorist and comrade of Gu Yeongmin.
Ahn Sohee often claimed that Gu Yeongmin was all talk—nothing but a useless hunk—and that every operation they’d pulled off had only succeeded thanks to her genius as a hacker. She even bragged that it was her flawless hacking that kept Gu Yeongmin from getting caught during the amusement park incident. Sure, Gu Yeongmin had botched the timing of his Awakening and ended up getting the two of them trapped inside the Ferris wheel, but that was beside the point.
Still, it seemed their performance at the amusement park had paid off—Ahn Sohee had recently been promoted to Follower.
“That guy’s just a weak-ass white-collar type. If it weren’t for me, he wouldn’t have even pulled off a single attack. He’d have been bagged by the NIS ages ago.”
“Like you didn’t pass out at the amusement park too?”
“Pfft. In that situation, not passing out would’ve been the weird part.”
When they operated in public, they pretended to be a couple—either lovers or newlyweds—but it was all just for show. They weren’t actually dating.
“You’re basically a useless leech who eats and lounges around.”
Unlike Gu Yeongmin, who treated Edokers with a weird sort of tolerance, Ahn Sohee hadn’t softened one bit after learning what he really was.
“So basically, you’re a loser who bailed on his own world, huh?”
She wasn’t wrong—not even slightly—so he couldn’t bring himself to argue. He quietly pulled in his legs and handed her the TV remote with both hands. Ahn Sohee took it with a mocking snort.
The YouTube channel he’d been watching—something cute that analyzed monster behavior—was instantly switched over to a dry, boring news broadcast.
“So, got any plans?”
“If I can’t take down the Apostle, I’m seriously thinking of fleeing the country.”
The fact that there were not only Apostles in Korea but even forces of Chaos was driving him up the wall. He was being honest, but Ahn Sohee’s gaze was filled with pure disdain.
Edokers muttered something under his breath and looked away. Maybe if she’d spent her whole life being hunted for the crime of simply being a remnant of a fallen kingdom, she’d understand just how absolute the concept of survival could be.
That said, he had no real plan. The Apostle wouldn’t fall for the same trick twice, and with his face now plastered everywhere, even getting close was damn near impossible. Even Gu Yeongmin—who got one-sided orders from the forces of Chaos through these so-called quests—had yet to come up with anything concrete.
“Maybe if the two of you met and talked it over, you’d come up with something?”
Oblivious to the implications, Gu Yeongmin casually dropped a terrifying suggestion. Edokers, on the other hand, had zero desire to meet a force of Chaos face-to-face. That’d be like a rabbit strolling into a lion’s mouth on its own.
Then again, a rabbit would at least have speed and attitude going for it. The realization that even a rabbit had better odds than him hit hard. Just as he was sinking into that pit of self-loathing, the door flew open with a loud bang.
“He just gave us a new quest!”
Ahn Sohee, who’d been watching TV with a disinterested look, suddenly lit up, while Edokers stiffened, wondering if this was his cue to bolt.
“What is it?”
Gu Yeongmin dramatically stretched out both arms like he was delivering prophecy.
“North Korea.”
***
In Mak Slechth, it wasn’t odd or unsettling for someone to answer Divine Words out loud, even if they sounded like they were talking to themselves. If a child suddenly started mumbling to no one, their parents wouldn’t take them to a shrink—they’d take them straight to the temple.
But on Earth, where Divine Words weren’t part of daily life, Biendeoé observed her Apostle with an outsider’s perspective, wondering how his behavior looked to others.
And she reached a conclusion.
Honestly? He looked like he’d lost his damn mind.
“Are you really not going to explain why the quest was to play with a dog? You knew the Somang Orphanage had a dog, didn’t you?”
“If I’d completed the quest some other way, the next one probably would’ve just flat-out told me to go to the orphanage.”
“Was it because you wanted me to see my brother?”
“Why do my mom and brother still remember me? Is it because we’re blood-related?”
“Does Woonie remember me because he was the last one to see me?”
Biendeoé couldn’t see the system herself, but judging by how rarely Kim Sibaek got this irritated, it was clearly dodging the questions or playing dumb. Tae Woon, sitting next to him and casually peeling hallabong oranges to feed him, didn’t seem to care either way.
“Stop acting cute.”
“Hyung, what’s it saying?”
“It ignored me the whole time, then suddenly said ‘Ehet.’”
“Ehet.”
“……”
Caught completely off guard, Kim Sibaek fell silent. His earlobes flushed a faint pink. Biendeoé sighed and shook her head. Even without reading his surface thoughts, she could tell exactly what her Apostle was thinking.
Kim Sibaek cleared his throat and straightened up, trying to save face, but his expression had already softened.
“…Anyway, enough with the cutesy act. Just give me a proper answer.”
[(^3^)♥]
“How many times do I have to say it? Stop trying to act cute.”
[To dismiss the system’s tireless efforts to maintain a healthy relationship with the Returnee as just “acting cute”… that’s so mean. Hing.]
Ever since they’d returned from the orphanage, Kim Sibaek had been pushing for answers, but this was all he ever got. Even someone like him—praised within the 7777 Guild as practically a living Buddha—was finally at his breaking point. And frankly, this had been building up for a while.
So he decided to go on strike.
“Fine. There’s only so much I can take—getting scared into doing your bidding without a single explanation. Enough is enough.”
[ㅇㅅㅇ)?]
“Honestly, if Earth’s going to be destroyed, that’s not my problem. I’ll just find another way and go back to Mak Slechth.”
[ㅇ0ㅇ)!]
“The only reason I’ve been humoring these ridiculous quests is because I saw it as my minimal obligation. But if you’re not even going to show me the slightest respect, how long do you think I’m going to keep playing along?”
He flopped down dramatically onto the couch.
“Do whatever you want. From now on, I’ll act however I want too.”
The square system window started to twitch. It was trembling—like it was panicking.
[ㅁㅇ르ㅔㅂㄷ즈밍ㄴㄹ;ㅁㅇ니ㅓ]
A string of nonsensical characters spilled out in a chaotic stream before being abruptly wiped clean. Then, a new quest appeared.
[Earth really is going to be destroyed! While the system may hide certain truths, it has NEVER lied to the Returnee! You must not stop completing quests!]
[Quest 13]
[Get up from the couch!]
[Time Remaining: 05:00]
He couldn’t even bring himself to laugh. Earth would end because he didn’t get off the couch?
Kim Sibaek closed his eyes and ignored it.
…Still, just in case, he started counting in his head. One, two, three, four… When he reached 250, he cracked his eyes open.
[Quest 13]
[Get up from the couch!]
[Time Remaining: 09:10]
It had been about four minutes, and yet the timer had gone up.
Not only that—
[Time Remaining: 09:11]
[Time Remaining: 09:12]
[Time Remaining: 09:13]
The time kept slowly increasing. Real-time. Tick by tick.
Kim Sibaek gave a hollow laugh and shut his eyes again.
“Start explaining. Until you do, I’ll just do as I please.”
Time passed. A lot of it. But the system didn’t budge.
Were they really going to keep strong-arming him like this? Was it all just one-sided exploitation?
Kim Sibaek let out a quiet sigh, chewing on another piece of hallabong that Tae Woon gently placed into his mouth.
Then Tae Woon said something that made his ear twitch.
“If your eyes are closed… doesn’t that mean you can’t see the system’s response?”
“…!”
Like a light bulb going off in his head, Kim Sibaek’s eyes flew open. The quest had updated again.
[Quest 13]
[Get up from the couch! I said get up! Pleeeease get upㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠㅠ]
[Completion Reward: The system will answer your question]
[Time Remaining: 18:37]
Without a second of hesitation, Kim Sibaek sat up.
[Quest 13. CLEAR]
“So? What’s the reason? Let’s hear it.”
[ㅇㅅㅠ]
[ㅠㅅㅠ]
[ㅠ0ㅠ]
It was right around then that Kim Sibaek began seriously considering the global eradication of every emoticon in existence—just as the system finally displayed a real sentence.
