D-Rank Constellation Hunter… Stuck Without Internet! - Chapter 155
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 155
Despite my repeated attempts to persuade Ha Gyuhyuk, he lingered as though his feet refused to move, hesitating for an eternity.
In the end, I had to practically force the words out of him before I could finally bring him along.
The act of dragging him away left my heart heavy and conflicted, making it difficult to know what to do or say.
“You will find a way, won’t you?”
“I said I’d do my best. My absolute best.”
In other words, I would give it serious consideration.
Of course, this wasn’t something I could accomplish alone—I would need to mobilize the knowledge and power of every Constellation I knew.
Tasha had made a point of calculating it as fifty-four years.
When I returned to the Touchone Building, I broached the subject cautiously.
“But couldn’t we prepare and fight over those fifty-four years?”
“I don’t think I’ll be capable of fighting properly even after fifty-four years, and by then, Se-um’s body will have already disappeared.”
There was no point in playing word games about fifty-three years and three hundred sixty-four days.
“But what exactly do you plan to do with my corpse? I genuinely don’t understand. Just because it doesn’t naturally decompose doesn’t mean we can take any measures regarding it. We can’t even bring it to Earth.”
“We can’t bring it to Earth?”
Ha Gyuhyuk looked at me as though he’d never considered that possibility.
It seemed he’d been thinking of giving my body a proper funeral, but that was fundamentally impossible.
My corpse was being artificially preserved through the power of a Constellation. The moment that power ceased, it would crumble to dust and vanish.
“It’s difficult for a Constellation to continue maintaining power over a body that has already served its purpose.”
“What about cremation?”
“There won’t be any bones left to cremate into ash. Se-um’s corpse exists solely to guard that place, and we continue to maintain it for that purpose.”
“….”
[ Tasha: I’m not treating it like some object or anything like that. ]
[ Tasha: It was my best choice to find a way to save both the world and you. ]
[ Tasha: I have no interest whatsoever in Earth’s fate. ]
The moment Tasha fully revealed herself, she began speaking without hesitation.
True, she wouldn’t use me as a mere tool.
But that was Tasha’s perspective, not mine.
I felt affection for Se-um’s body and genuine gratitude for Tasha’s willingness to care for it.
But that was all, and I couldn’t ask Tasha to strain herself further for that reason.
[ Tasha: And if you wish, I can sustain you for the duration needed to cremate and scatter the ashes. ]
[ Se-um: What? ]
[ Se-um: But maintaining my body—which should already be dead and gone—is already draining your karma to nothing. ]
That’s why when I first came to Sungdo and met Tasha, my friend was already completely depleted of karma.
Based on her abilities, she seemed to have accumulated considerable wealth, so her poverty was surprising.
But it was all for me, and Tasha had very little karma remaining.
[ Tasha: I can earn it again. ]
[ Tasha: Besides, I need to accumulate karma to support Chae-ah anyway, so I can consider it killing two birds with one stone. ]
[ Se-um: Is that even possible?? ]
[ Se-um: You’re not overextending yourself, are you? ]
[ Tasha: You’re pushing yourself too hard. ]
[ Tasha: So think carefully and tell me. Is this what you want or not? If you say you don’t want it, I won’t do it. ]
Tasha’s conviction was unwavering.
Even if Ha Gyuhyuk wanted to give me a proper funeral, if I didn’t want it, she wouldn’t force the matter.
After deliberating for a long time, I opened my mouth.
“Even if you retrieve my body early and open a Gate, let’s not hold a funeral for me.”
“Se-um.”
“It’s my decision.”
Though there was no corpse, the funeral for the human Se-um had already been held.
Even as a hero whose name was not recorded in history, there were family members who remembered me and mourned my death in that moment I vanished.
“My funeral was already held, and the people who knew me—though not many—they mourned me nonetheless.”
“….”
“And now that those people have not remained on this land and have turned to dust, I don’t wish to hold another funeral for myself.”
Those people had not come to Sungdo.
After death, their spirits scattered somewhere in the Universe and departed to another world.
That body is also a part of Se-um, a remnant, but my spirit dwells within it.
“At the very least, what I want is for you to send me far enough to reach that place.”
Ha Gyuhyuk gazed at me with an expression I couldn’t decipher.
As if he didn’t know what to say.
But eventually, he found the words he wanted to speak to me.
“I love you.”
“Huh?”
“If that’s what you wish for, Se-um, then I believe that’s the right answer.”
I thought about how I couldn’t choose the moment of my death.
If I had truly been able to choose, I wouldn’t have died that way back then.
But after three hundred years, I had become able to choose how my spirit would die.
Not everyone could make such a choice, so I decided to accept it with a smile.
[ Se-um: I hope I can go as far as possible ]
[ Se-um: They say parallel worlds don’t exist, but by chance, my spirit remnants could attach to my mother’s child in some other place, right? ]
It was a rather unrealistic thing to say.
I thought Tasha would come rushing in right away to tell me that would never happen.
But after a moment of silence, a message appeared.
[ Tasha: I hope so too. Me as well. ]
“I’m not sure if it’s the right answer, but honestly, life doesn’t come with an answer key.”
“Is that… advice about life?”
“Yeah, but I’ve lived a bit longer than you, after all.”
And I had witnessed the lives and deaths of countless beings.
They all walked different paths, sometimes regretting, sometimes satisfied.
If there were an answer key, none of them would have been like that.
“The choice that minimizes regret is the right one.”
“Minimizing regrets as much as possible….”
“When I saw your face earlier, saving me is one thing, but making you wait 54 years felt like something we’d both regret.”
Ha Gyuhyuk would regret it too, but I sensed I would as well.
Perhaps I had ultimately given my heart to the humans living in this timeline while pretending not to.
This was exactly why I shouldn’t have opened myself to anyone in the first place.
“If I thought wrong, tell me I was wrong. If I thought right, tell me I was right.”
“You’re correct, Se-um.”
Ha Gyuhyuk answered without hesitation.
It seemed he had only just realized the truth of his own heart.
He wanted to save me, and he wanted to eliminate dangers that might come someday before they arrived.
It wasn’t some grandiose notion of saving the world.
The desire to protect those you love was simply….
“I guess I’ve become greedy.”
Yes, it was the kind of greed a human could possess.
I laughed lightly.
“It’s a good change.”
* * *
“I’m tired of the name Landquake now, so let’s come up with something new.”
“People who don’t do their jobs properly always take forever with names.”
“Earthbug, what do you think. Earthbug.”
“Wow, that’s a truly terrible name. Franson, please don’t open a naming shop.”
“Are you even listening to me?”
The Akashic Records—in other words, inside Tasha’s mind.
The three Constellations who were always together sat huddled down.
When the client wasn’t accessing it, we three could freely enter here without issue.
I usually spent time here reading ghost stories from all over the world when I wasn’t raising a client.
Of course, the reason we were here now was to plan the forced opening of the Landquake Gate.
Rummaging through someone else’s brain, which supposedly contained the knowledge of every universe that existed.
“But couldn’t Natalia just tell us? Do we really have to search for it here?”
“Just because it’s my brain doesn’t mean I can pull out every memory instantly. There’s not just one or two things I know.”
Tasha, who had been casually tapping my head with her tentacles, rebuked Franson.
The fact that three Constellations had to accomplish this was unbelievable.
“But what should we search for first?”
Tasha casually waved her tentacles and began rearranging the order of thousands of bookshelves.
“We should analyze cases from all Hunter worlds in the universe, right?”
Franson stared blankly at the distant books and muttered.
“Save me….”
I agreed completely.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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