World of Providence.
The body of the white bird after conveying all of its experimental records to Yu Jitae was slowly vanishing to nothing. It was the process of the personality disappearing.
Clone 2 watched over it until the last feather dissipated from his sight.
Yu Jitae had long left. What was rushing him so much that he had to leave like that? Without even watching the disappearance of such a precious existence…
“…”
Left alone, Clone 2 deeply pondered to himself.
When he was created, Clone 1 had referred to themselves as ‘experimental subjects’. What was Yu Jitae trying to experiment by watching them?
Why am ‘I’ here?
Out of all the clone-creating abilities, authorities and spells, [Shadow of an Archduke (SS)] was the only one that could create a clone that had a personality. But even so, loyalty to their lord was still their first priority.
This was an unchanging value that cannot be ever changed.
Therefore, Clone 2 stopped his tears after the white bird vanished and stood back up. Whatever it was that Yu Jitae wanted from them, the clone felt the need to be aware of something.
In the [World of Providence], Clone 2 was inside the clock tower which was also called [Vintage Clock’s Workshop].
There was the [Rooftop] in [Vintage Clock’s Workshop] and in the past, Yu Jitae had wanted to view the ‘memories’ that had been locked in this place.
But his request had been refused by the white bird.
That was the cause of the strife between Yu Jitae and the white bird, and Yu Jitae was forcefully chased out from the Workshop by it. It was the reason why he had cursed the white bird.
Rooftop.
What was it that was on the top floor of the workshop? And why did Yu Jitae want to see it?
With that in mind, Clone 2 decided to climb [Vintage Clock’s Workshop].
A world that looked like outer space was unveiled in his sight. Going a little higher he found the [Basement] where the obelisks of emotions resided. Clone 2 peeked into the room and found 9 out of the 11 obelisks lit up.
They were the same obelisks which he still had no idea what they meant.
Clone 2 continued flying.
Countless clocks appeared and vanished in front of his eyes. Out of those, the big six clocks appeared to be representing the iterations numbered by Yu Jitae.
The tiny clocks that looked like crumbs were on the other hand, ones that Yu Jitae did not classify into iterations.
The white bird did not notify the temple about these tiny clocks. It arbitrarily used the Providential powers to repeat his lives, while at the same time, clouding Yu Jitae’s memories about them.
Going higher and higher, and continuously going down, Clone 2 unknowingly reached the top floor. Welcoming him was a door that was difficult to imagine in a place like this that resembled outer space.
With the white bird gone, the door was not locked.
The clone opened the door and headed inside.
In that place was an array of bookshelves as tall as the sky. Countless books were located and ladders were going all the way towards the heavens, making this place look like a very tall library.
[Rooftop].
Books represented memories.
If he were to go through them one by one, he would never be able to find what he wanted before dying of old age. Fortunately, Clone 2 knew how to make use of this place.
Mana was the manifestation of will. It was the power to achieve what laid deeply in one’s mind.
Clone 2 focused his thoughts as several books came down in response and stacked up in front of the clone.
The memories and emotions that Yu Jitae had kept hidden were starting to be unveiled.
Even though some of them he was familiar with, he could sometimes see books that were tied by a rope. These weren’t easy to open and they asked for confirmation again and again.
There was no reason not to open these at this point.
Clone 2 gave his permission and at last, when the memories Yu Jitae had tied up to forget stretched out across his vision…
“…!”
The clone’s face was coloured in shock.
***
Yu Jitae could not find Bom.
A global equation of mana was hiding Bom’s traces from the face of the Earth. Even though he travelled across the world trying to find her, he could not find a single trace. A spell like this was impossible even for Bom, so Yu Jitae immediately knew who it was that was behind all this.
Clone 1 who had been stuck in a dimensional trap had been trying to kill the Witch. He cut off her limbs and even the head, but that served to be the problem – the beheaded head had flown away by itself. The head disappeared after jumping over the dimensions but Yu Jitae could feel it from the Association so Yu Jitae carried his feet to the Association.
He went to the top floor towards the emergency healing centre where Chaliovan was in a deep slumber. Looking through his past iterations told him that this was where the Witch went to to recover her body.
However, he was blocked by superhumans the moment he headed inside.
“S, Season! You can’t come into the emergency centre…!”
“Move.”
“Sir I cannot! The patients inside might be put to danger by even the smallest of mana waves…!”
More than ten superhumans were stopping him in his path in concern.
Yu Jitae opened his mouth.
“Then I’ll stay here. Go bring Valentine.”
“M, Miss Valentine is currently…”
“Bring her.”
They were still trying to stop him so Yu Jitae started walking forward. When he began spreading out killing intent, not a single one of them could manage to stop him.
Out of them, the ranker who was tasked with protecting the emergency centre still tried to move his feet to stop him, so he slapped him onto the ground.
Turning his head, he looked 3 kilometres outside the glass window. The Association’s sniper who was on standby collapsed while clasping his heart.
He continued walking and found metal gates sealing what was ahead, so he kicked them down before climbing the stairs.
On the top floor, he made all the medical team go away and went into the Witch’s room. Inside was a woman’s head with blinking eyes.
“Where is the Soothsayer.”
She did not try to reply.
He could not kill the Witch for the sake of humanity, but what he could do was force her to open her mouth.
After 5 minutes, the Witch confessed Bom’s location with cracked teeth and a bloodstained tongue.
***
Yu Bom had killed Myu. She must have gotten some information in that process.
She then went back to Unit 301 but for some reason, did not share information about him with the baby dragons. However, she used the Witch to hide her traces.
How much did Yu Bom know, and what did she hear?
He thought about the worst case scenario. If she heard a cluster of the dirtiest memories, then how was Bom able to withstand it?
Yu Jitae couldn’t understand it.
Thinking back, Yu Bom had a snake-like aspect to her. She was pretentious and lived by fabricating half of her intention with deceit.
She had the chance to convey those memories to the kids.
Even though she could have done so, she didn’t.
Did having to convey those painful memories hurt her feelings or something? That must be why she left the house, trying to keep everything to herself.
Acting like a good sister.
Acting like she listens well.
Pretending to help him protect daily life.
Even at this point, she was acting herself out.
The world wobbled. His sight had quivered after being cracked into quarters.
In any case, Yu Bom now became an entity that might die at any stage in time. She was a big risk factor.
The fact that it did not send memories to other entities was a sliver of fortune among all the misfortune events. Whether that stemmed from a whim or not was not important in the slightest.
Only the fact that the memories were not conveyed was important for him.
In the end, only the survival of the baby dragons mattered.
Nothing else mattered.
He had to take Bom and lock her up so that she wouldn’t create any more uncertainties for him.
The place Bom was at was a certain ancient hotel located in the outskirts of America, where she had first whispered to him about her romantic emotions.
With hasty steps, he entered the hotel. There was no-one stopping his march.
He headed to the 2nd floor. For some reason, she was staying in the same room as before. There was no defence mechanism in place and in fact, even the door was left unlocked.
Opening the door, he went inside and found Yu Bom sitting on the bed with her eyes looking at him.
The moment he saw her face, he had to suppress his irritation that was surging all the way to the tip of his head.
“You. Come out.”
Without replying back, Bom apathetically gazed into his eyes.
“Come out. We are going back.”
He approached her but Bom stayed silent. It was when he was trying to force down the sudden rise in impulse that was urging him to grab her neck.
“Go back where.”
Bom asked.
“Underground labyrinth.”
“To lock me again?”
Yu Jitae looked directly into her eyes.
“Like how you did before?”
This time, the impulse was even bigger.
A shout was at the tip of his tongue about to burst out, so he stopped his breath for a bit.
“Yes. So get up.”
“…Why aren’t you saying anything about that to me.”
“What am I supposed to say.”
“Don’t you have anything to tell me?”
“No.”
Bom deeply stared at his eyes. She then whispered, ‘Ah,’ and slowly nodded her head as if she suddenly understood something. That disgusting gesture increased his impulse yet again.
“I’m not going then.”
Walking up, he grabbed her wrist.
“I wasn’t asking about your intention.”
Using force he tried to pull her. Even at a time like this, habit was putting a limit to his output and was making it possible for Bom to retaliate.
“Come with me before I get angry. Yu Bom.”
Bom did not reply and stubbornly stood her ground.
He had no idea why she was doing this. If she was going to retaliate with such a tiny bit of strength, she should have run away instead. Thus, it meant that she had no intention of retaliating despite pretending to be fighting back.
As for the reason?
He had not a single clue.
From the very beginning, he had never understood anything about the actions of this snake-like bitch. Everything from how she used her entire life in the previous iterations to focus on unenjoyable tasks she wasn’t even gifted at, to how she obediently followed him during the kidnapping, to how she started helping him after that, as well as the reason she started having romantic feelings for him.
There was nothing there that he could understand. It was the same even though he asked dozens of times – she didn’t even know the reason herself so there was no way he would understand it either.
That was why he had never actively tried to understand Bom, but that decision of his had ended up creating this mess.
“Oi.”
Bom did not reply. She still retaliated so this time, he pulled with sheer force. Her body rose up in mid-air but she stubbornly dangled onto the bed.
“I’m not going.”
“Get up.”
“I said I’m not going. How about you go, mister. Because I want to rest here.”
When he continued pulling her, Bom used her other hand in an attempt to remove his wrist.
It was becoming harder and harder for him to control his impulse. Like water filled up to the brim of a cup, some of the water was extruding out of the top of the cup while barely staying in place, and yet Bom was constantly adding drops of water to it. One by one… the rippling surface of the water was expanding on and on. Before long, it would definitely burst out and the overflowing water would be beyond one’s control.
“Stop being persistent for no reason.”
“Am I doing this for no reason?”
“Yes. I don’t know what you saw and what you know nor am I curious. You are still alive and that’s all that matters. So follow me, before I lay my hands on you.”
“…”
Lay hands on her.
She should have an idea of what that meant but Bom shook her head in response.
“You’ve been to Unit 301, and would have met the kids. I assume you were surprised. Because I helped you hide all the things that you did. I’m just asking you to leave me here in return, so how is this being persistent for no reason?”
“Is a deal what you want?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t want to stay locked. Whether that be the underground labyrinth or Unit 301.”
“What about it.”
“Sorry?”
“What can you even do if I take you by force.”
Without standing back, Bom replied.
“No. I’m not going. Do you know what first came to mind when I saw the kids’ faces?”
“No.”
“Yes. Of course you wouldn’t. Because you are not interested in that in the first place…”
Bom condemned him by mentioning his irrefutable sins.
Drip. Drip. Water droplets were falling onto the cup.
He couldn’t let this continue. “Just come here,” he pulled with strength that did not exceed the scope of a daily life and Bom retaliated by twisting her body.
“L, Let go!” she shouted while pushing him with her hands and kicking his stomach.
In response, he hurled her down. Falling off the bed she rolled on the floor with a faint groan.
After a moment of silence, she slowly raised her head.
“You know. I saw many things.”
Even her voice was very slow.
Collapsed on the ground, she gazed up with the same apathetic expression on her face.
“It’s fortunate that I was quite obedient right. Because otherwise, I would have been punched and locked up. Because that’s how you dealt with things.”
He did not like that apathy on her face.
Impulse was continuing to rise inside. Glaring into his eyes, Bom spoke through her gritted teeth.
“You devil…”
Each and every word pierced through him like an arrow.
Drip.
At last when the water was too much for the cup to hold.
In the blink of an eye, his hand was raised into the sky as Bom widened her eyes a little.
Slapp–!
He slapped her by the cheek.