Chapter 141 |
The Lucky One III
The luck didn't end.
While the Reverse-Great Wall was engaged in an infinite defense game against the onslaught of the continent, 'fortuitous encounters' kept happening.
[Mr. Undertaker, the 'pink entity' you warned about has been confirmed to have moved to Kyushu, Japan.]
Go Yuri, the greatest enemy of regressors and a master of gaslighting, had voluntarily left Korea.
This unprecedented good news made me want to give her a generous relocation settlement.
And that wasn't all.
[The Status Window anomaly didn't appear.]
“What?”
“......”
[This must also be due to the 'Monkey's Paw.']
And that wasn’t all².
Luck didn't just unfold in the physical world. Even in the net community, my luck didn't waver.
In short, a wave of Three Kingdoms parodies swept through the novel serialization board on SG Net.
-Lü Bu Hides His Father (★9.9)
-Ten Attendants General (★8.7)
-[Alternative History] Ordered to March North but Woke Up in Hanzhong Instead of North Korea?! (★9.2)
-The Three Brothers Always Slept Under the Same Blanket [19+ Complete Version] (★9.8)
-Reincarnated as Zhang Kai, Who Killed Cao Cao’s Father on the First Day (★9.9)
-Reincarnated as a Yellow Turban Rebel with a Copy of Capital in My Hand (★9.6)
Everywhere you looked, the rankings were dominated by Three Kingdoms parodies.
These days, the Three Kingdoms was totally YOUNG and MZ content.
Not only the novel serialization board but also the free board, which was the main part of SG Net, was filled with Three Kingdoms discussions without cooldown.
-Anonymous: I thought the Three Kingdoms <<< was just content for old people, but after reading the novel and the history book, there's nothing like it.
-Anonymous: How great was Ma Su’s mountain climbing? Let’s find out by forming a mountain climbing team for a trip to China. We'll schedule it according to each guild’s vacation time. Sorry, but due to safety concerns abroad, we only accept participants capable of diving to a depth of 600 meters or more. Interested? Contact me!
-dolLHOuse: What’s wrong with SG Net these days? Did everyone get prescription reading glasses?
└Anonymous: There’s still a full HP newbie who hasn’t read the Three Kingdoms? LOL
└dolLHOuse: I read it?
└Anonymous: So, which faction do you support?
└dolLHOuse: Anyone but the big-eared guy. Aren’t all the characters just commoners who end up with the Five Barbarians and Sixteen Kingdoms ending?
└Anonymous: Blocking you.
-[Samcheon] WitchJudge: The night sky is beautiful tonight. Did the Prime Minister feel this way when he looked up at the stars in Wuzhang Plains?
-OldManGoryeo: Wow, seriously, I want to bury all these idiots in a coffin.
-[NRMC] Officer: We have a group in Busan that reads and discusses the original Three Kingdoms history every week. (4/6)
Before I knew it, I had been engrossed in my smartphone for six hours straight, unable to take my eyes off the community.
“Whew.”
I shivered.
I had always nagged Ah-ryeon to quit her internet addict lifestyle.
Now, for the first time in 590 cycles, I understood the true joy of community engagement.
‘Is this the true power of the Monkey's Paw?’
I couldn't tear myself away from SG Net.
It felt as if the smartphone screen was coated with honey made by a master craftsman just for me, the Undertaker!
“Cursed Monkey's Paw! This is a power that would have already bewitched an ordinary human!”
“......”
As Ha-yul passed through the living room, she looked at me as if I were pathetic, like a diligent younger sister would look at her unemployed older brother.
Indeed.
In the 590th cycle, I was experiencing what it was like to live the hopeful life of a cult leader.
Everything in the world was going my way!
Every business venture I touched progressed miraculously, and troubles I couldn't handle never occurred in the first place.
But I was not a cult leader.
I was an ordinary citizen who preferred the subway to a limousine. Therefore, I could sense that the name of my next stop was 'ruin' without looking at the map.
It was now the 7th year.
The 10th-year deadline I had asked the Monkey's Paw to postpone was fast approaching.
‘Should I just kill myself?’
A drastic decision was needed.
‘Suicide’ was a route anyone who had lived a debtor’s life for seven years could empathize with. For a regressor, it wasn’t even that extreme.
I could just send a message on KakaoTalk saying, 'Thanks to the Total Luck Law, I enjoyed this cycle a lot^^ I'll see you in the next cycle...', and then leave the chat room, safely escaping from future debts.
Leaving this Three Kingdoms paradise was regretful, but a regressor must know how to set aside personal desires temporarily.
“Ah... I wouldn't recommend that, teacher.”
An expert had a different opinion.
“Why?”
“Hmm. It might make things worse.”
Cheon Yo-hwa, who listened to my concerns, gave a wry smile.
Why did I confide such a delicate matter to Cheon Yo-hwa? Because, among our members, she was the only one besides me who had a 'paranormal expert' identity.
As everyone knew, Cheon Yo-hwa had sealed the Infinite Void inside an hourglass.
Counting the anomalies from school ghost stories, she carried around about 100 Pokémon in her arsenal.
Other trainers would have sued her for exceeding the Pokémon carrying limit.
Fortunately, this world wasn't about forcing sadistic beasts to fight in a coliseum, but still, the anomalies rightfully harbored resentment towards their warden.
Led by the Infinite Void, the Hundred Tales of anomalies constantly plotted rebellion whenever they had the chance.
Cheon Yo-hwa didn't gorge on tteokbokki at the snack bar near her school every day for no reason.
Like the Saintess, the more powerful an awakener was, the closer they were to the risk of corruption.
“You think things will get worse?”
“Yes. It’s just my guess, though.”
“Well. The last time I checked, the 'Monkey's Paw' couldn't detect regression. It didn't have the power to give regression ability to Kuro, its original owner. So if I just close my eyes and regress, won't the debt disappear?”
“Ahaha. But because of that Kuro, the 'Monkey's Paw' ended up applying to everyone, not just one individual, right?”
“......”
“It seems like people think they are parasitic on the 'Monkey's Paw,' but I think it's the opposite. The 'Monkey's Paw' is parasitic.”
“A anomaly that parasitizes humans?”
“Yes!”
Cheon Yo-hwa clapped her hands.
Despite the serious conversation, she seemed to enjoy sharing this kind of talk with me.
After all, competing for dominance with a near-divine anomaly 365 days a year, she probably saw me as a valuable conversation partner.
There weren’t many people who could empathize with the terror of anomalies like us.
“Think about it, teacher. The 'Monkey's Paw' can't get stronger on its own. It needs someone to make wishes to use those wishes as an excuse to increase its power.”
“Hoh.”
“To the 'Monkey's Paw,' Kuro must have been a blessing. If someone had made ordinary wishes, the 'Monkey's Paw' would have remained a mediocre anomaly. But because Kuro made such high-level wishes, the 'Monkey's Paw' grew just as powerful!”
“So if a regressor like me decides to run away, thinking that regression will solve everything...”
“The 'Monkey's Paw' might transcend regression and gain control over luck and misfortune. This is just a hypothesis.”
“Hmm.”
“So I don’t recommend suicide. Besides, I don’t want to see you dead, teacher. Hehe...”
She had a point.
Even I, who criticized Kuro’s stupidity, ended up making the same foolish mistake.
The 'luck of an ordinary person' and the 'luck of a 590-cycle regressor' were inherently different.
Just consider the scale of what the 'Monkey's Paw' did this cycle.
It reversed the aging of a senile Sword Marquess.
It summoned the Meteor Shower to the East Sea earlier than expected, and perfectly timed a UFO to collide with it.
As a result, a Black Wall, which should never have existed, was created in the north of the Korean Peninsula.
In other words, the 'Monkey's Paw' had grown powerful enough to cause such high-level 'fortuitous encounters.'
According to the Library Association's classification, it should now be evaluated as an ocean-level threat.
‘Have I really gotten myself into a deep mess?’
A sense of urgency crept in.
I had to resolve the situation before misfortune truly struck.
“On the contrary, I think you need to survive as persistently as possible in this cycle.”
“Why?”
“If you die without experiencing the equivalent misfortune for the luck you enjoyed, that 'unpaid misfortune' might carry over to the next cycle.”
“Hmm...”
I stroked my chin.
Talking with Cheon Yo-hwa stimulated my brain in a way I couldn’t quite describe.
‘Wait. Something good is about to come to mind...?’
At this point, I hadn't figured out the 'good idea' specifically. That would be covered in the next chapter.
However, I had grasped the general direction.
“So, according to you, I should try to be as unfortunate as possible from now on.”
“Haha. ...Yes. But deliberately seeking misfortune isn’t exactly something you can control. It’s tricky.”
“No, there is a way. A very subtle method.”
“Oh? Really?”
I nodded.
Then I spoke with utmost seriousness.
“Yo-hwa.”
“Yes, teacher.”
“Have you heard of the 'Hate Pill'?”
“...?”
‘Hate Pill.’
There is a genre, a sort of meme about it.
Cheon Yo-hwa tilted her head as if she had never heard of it, which made sense. Its origin was from across the sea in Japan.
Some people think Japan lacks creativity and originality.
-Tonkatsu? Isn’t that just a variation of cutlet?
-Japanese curry? It’s just Indian curry adjusted to Japanese taste.
But that’s a misconception.
If you remove the [General Audience] filter from your corneas, you’ll suddenly witness the creativity erupting from the Japanese archipelago like Mount Fuji.
After all, Japan is the birthplace of turning Three Kingdoms characters into gender-swapped 'TS Three Kingdoms' or erotic parodies.
There were many other inventive creations that were too controversial to mention.
Only ancient Greece had previously shown such creative power. (The Greeks impregnated their chief god’s thigh and dressed their greatest hero in women’s clothing.)
Anyway.
The ‘Hate Pill’ was another example of Japan’s vibrant creativity.
-This pill reverses affection!
-It reverses affection?
-Yes. People who liked you will hate you just as much. Literally, a 'Hate Pill.'
-...?
-People who subtly showed affection towards you will suddenly curse you, wishing you dead! Don’t worry, those who already disliked you will continue to do so!
-Why would you introduce such a pill into a story?
-Because the effect has an expiration date.
-...??
-After the effect ends, people will start to regret. They’ll see how much the protagonist suffered due to their curses and think, ‘What have I done to the person I liked? How could I say such terrible things...?’
-What’s the point of that?
-Isn’t it delicious to see characters regret after mistreating the protagonist?
-...???
Building a narrative over dozens of chapters to make the protagonist unhappy was highly inefficient from a practical standpoint.
Modern readers, who always seek efficiency, wanted to slap #regret #obsession #despair tags on their stories.
The solution was the ‘Hate Pill.’
An instant 3-minute meal for unhappiness created by the Japanese.
In short, it was an 'Affection Reversal Pill.' Just take it to become unhappy.
How did I, the Undertaker, come to know about this obscure foreign genre?
Well...
Again, this was a story that happened around the 590th cycle.
And I devoured all the web novels, resorting to “Misery” tactics with authors around the 560th cycle.
End of explanation.
“So you plan to take the 'Hate Pill' to intentionally cause 'misfortune' and escape the Total Luck Law’s grasp?”
“You understood well.”
“You’re truly crazy in a refined way.”
Oh Dok-seo, the one who introduced me to web novels and the only one among my companions who knew about the 'Hate Pill,' nodded.
“It's a great idea. As expected of my protagonist. Let’s test it immediately!”
By the way, Oh Dok-seo loved despair stories.
“But where do we find the Hate Pill? It’s not mentioned in ORV.”
“Ah. Dok-seo. Ginseng is sourced from Joseon, and queue cuts are from Qing. It’s clear where to farm the Hate Pill.”
“Oh.”
That’s right.
We immediately set sail for the 'origin.'
Footnotes:
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