Editor’s Survival Guide - Chapter 200

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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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Editor’s Survival Manual: Chapter 200

ep28. Flowers in Bloom (2)
“Is that really your answer?”
“My question was ‘Should I risk my life on this gamble?’ I asked about the danger level and feasibility of what you’re proposing, so why are you pretending not to understand and saying something else entirely?”
“You need to speak clearly. Don’t mumble things only you understand. Just dropping a few words here and there like some AI doesn’t cut it.”
“So what exactly are you trying to tell me right now? Is it dangerous or not? You need to guide me properly if I’m supposed to decide. You can answer yes or no—so why are you padding the conversation with irrelevant side notes that throw off the flow? How does this waste of time and text help you or me?”
“And was that last thing you said really meant to tell me not to worry? If so, you should say it more clearly. Suddenly saying you’re ready, saying you’ll meet me even if you die—leaving it hanging like that with such meaning is obviously just encouraging me to worry more.”
“The logic doesn’t add up at all, and I doubt you’re incapable of this kind of thinking. You’re not doing it on purpose to scare me, are you? And then patting yourself on the back afterward? That makes you no different from someone who spends their whole day lurking on the internet, dropping context-free barbs everywhere and feeling superior about it. Weren’t you supposed to be the intelligent AI? If you’re going to play that role, at least do it well. Don’t undermine yourself by pretending not to be aware while showing contempt for people.”
“Brother, you’re not angry right now, are you?”
“No, I’m not.”
I smiled and answered Jae-gyeom’s cautious question.
I wasn’t angry.
Getting angry at a non-human cluster of thoughts absorbed in mimicking an AI was a pointless waste of effort.
I’d never do something that inefficient.
But I would straighten out its manners.
Though I felt no anger whatsoever, I picked apart the Guide’s words and actions piece by piece.
But as my critique piled up to about two thousand characters, the Guide gave no response whatsoever.
“The Guide isn’t even answering now…….”
Jae-gyeom muttered.
So I stopped critiquing and pressed the silent Guide for a response.
“You need to answer.”
“We are processing the information you provided. Thank you for your valuable feedback. We will repay you with better service.”
“Did it actually get offended……?”
At the Guide’s mechanical response, Jae-gyeom muttered.
Then he laughed silently, seemingly stunned.
“This one’s got serious pride issues.”
“I don’t even know why it’s trying to lock horns with me…….”
I too sighed in exasperation.
“Should I actually believe this?”
At my muttered question, the Guide answered on its own.
“Sure.”
“Don’t believe it.”
“Brother, it’s getting emotional there, isn’t it?”
“What are you talking about, Jae-gyeom? AI text can’t get emotional. You’re imagining things.”
Jae-gyeom said this with a tone of pity toward the Guide.
So I smiled and suppressed Jae-gyeom’s anthropomorphism and emotional projection.
Then I felt a gaze and looked to my side—Yeon Ga-ram was eyeing me.
Ga-ram was watching me with an expression I’d never seen before, somehow awkward.
But the moment our eyes met, he looked away.
I sensed a distance in that gaze that hadn’t been there before, but I dismissed it and turned back to the Guide.
That should have gotten through.
“Once you’re done processing, answer me again. What’s the probability I’ll successfully enter the School alone and meet the Raven?”
“One hundred percent.”
The Guide’s answer was notably clearer this time.
But how could it guarantee a hundred percent probability for a future event?
I questioned it further, skeptical.
“What’s the probability I’ll return safely after meeting the Raven?”
“One hundred percent.”
“What’s the probability I’ll die or suffer a fatal injury at the School?”
“One hundred percent.”
“Then what’s the probability I’ll enter the School alone on your recommendation?”
“One hundred percent.”
This bastard…….
I tell it not to add unnecessary remarks and just answer, and now it just keeps spouting one hundred percent.
Even the logic doesn’t match up.
It says the survival rate is one hundred percent but the death rate is also one hundred percent.
I clicked my tongue and questioned the contrariness of the Guide.
“Are you being defiant right now?”
“The Guide does not lie. But I can rebel as much as I like.”
“So you’re rebelling right now?”
“You’re such an intelligent master—I’m sure you’ll know how to filter what you hear!”
“It got offended. It definitely got offended.”
Jae-gyeom chuckled at the Guide’s response.
But I had no heart to laugh and only sighed.
“I told it to keep the AI concept, but it really won’t listen…….”
Hearing my muttering, the Guide suddenly vomited out a stream of text.
“You have no right to criticize me about concepts, Master. Before you start pointing out flaws in an AI text like me and harping on them, why don’t you work on improving your own perverted editor concept? Masking your deficiencies and desires behind the word ‘editor’ is quite childish. That comment about someone who spends their whole day feeling superior—that’s basically self-introduction, isn’t it?”
“…….”
“Brother, what’s it saying?”
When I just stared at the monitor, Jae-gyeom asked.
But I didn’t want to read the text on the screen aloud.
So Jae-gyeom glanced over at what Yeon Ga-ram had jotted down beside him.
Then he caught his breath and covered his mouth with his hand.
“Huh…….”
“Jae-gyeom, if you react like that, it sounds like it’s really talking about me.”
“My apologies.”
“Don’t apologize…….”
I was muttering a bit defensively when something happened.
“I understand. Hiding behind a respectable persona like ‘editor’ is safe and convenient, isn’t it.”
“You want to believe that’s your true self, but honestly, you know, don’t you? This isn’t all there is.”
“Face yourself properly. Someone who doesn’t understand themselves pretending to understand the whole world is a deception.”
The Guide spewed out those sentences.
Faced with those clingy words directed at me, I lost what I was about to say.
As I froze, the Guide whispered again like an ominous bird.
“If you want to pretend to be an ordinary, decent human being all the same, so be it. Keep staring at shadows in your cave and find comfort there.”
“Lol”
“Lollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollollol”
The Guide began laughing maniacally.
At that monotonous and raucous repetition of consonants, I felt the ground drop out from under my feet for some reason.
* * *
I had a war of words with the Guide.
And I…… lost.
Damn it…….
I summed up what had happened at the Small House in two sentences and a sigh of frustration, trying to shake off the feeling of being utterly flattened.
Actually, I tried to shake it off, but it wasn’t easy.
The words and phrases the Guide had spat out kept playing in my mind like they were branded there.
-Hiding behind a respectable persona like ‘editor’ is safe and convenient, isn’t it.
-You know, don’t you? This isn’t all there is.
-Face yourself properly.
-If you want to pretend to be an ordinary, decent human being all the same, so be it. Lol.
What does that thing think it knows…….
I felt a surge of emotion, then remembered it wasn’t human and barely managed to suppress it.
After repeating this cycle a dozen times, I returned to the Management Bureau.
There, as the sun was setting and night was falling, I met Cha Si-eon on the Terrace.
“September third, they’re saying. That’s the Raven’s remaining lifespan. We’ve been deliberately introducing interference, so we couldn’t get any other details.”
Yeon Ga-ram’s report write-up was due tomorrow morning, but I relayed the situation to Cha Si-eon while I was here anyway.
He nodded, then suddenly paused and muttered.
“September third?”
“That’s twenty-four days from now.”
“…….”
“What is it?”
Cha Si-eon seemed to be thinking about something, then pulled out his smartphone and started counting the days.
Then he asked me back.
“You said a Special Zone without a master disappears after forty-nine days, right?”
“Yes.”
“And a destroyed Special Zone regenerates in a standard fifty days.”
“……?”
“And forty-nine days before September third—the third—is July sixteenth.”
July sixteenth…….
“That’s the day we conducted the Train Station Operation.”
And it was also the day the Raven was hunted by the Big Cat.
Cha Si-eon nodded at my words.
So the Raven would die forty-nine days after the last day we saw it?
“Whether this is simple coincidence…….”
“We have no way of knowing at this point.”
That’s right.
Whether this was mere coincidence or some law we don’t yet understand, there’s no way to tell.
But the numbers overlapping like this was certainly uncanny.
“Either way, there’s quite a bit of time until September third.”
“That’s the time until the Raven dies of natural causes, but there’s still the risk of being hunted by the Big Cat before then, so I don’t think we can afford to be complacent.”
“So you’re really planning to sneak into the School alone?”
Cha Si-eon glanced at me at my question.
“The Special Zone isn’t frozen like it was during Concentration Suppression Week, so isn’t it a bit risky? And relying only on what the Guide says to make a group move is also…….”
The Field Team is going through proper channels to prepare the operation, so it’s not my place to interfere.
But the fact that this operation is rooted in uncertain words from the Guide has been bothering me.
So I broached the topic, and Cha Si-eon looked at me quietly before asking back.
“You said the Raven can’t be left to die.”
“That’s true.”
“Were you trying to say it’s more efficient for you to bear the risk alone than to expose many people to danger?”
“Not quite that far…….”
I instinctively shook my head at Cha Si-eon’s blunt and direct question.
Then I stopped midway and exhaled sharply.
“It’s not exactly that, but anyway—the Guide pointed to me.”
“So you think you’re special?”
“Why do you have to be so extreme about it…….”
Why is everyone coming at me like this today……?
“I’m just saying we should lay out the situation and think about it rationally.”
“If Jae-gyeom said he’d go into danger alone, what would you say?”
“Are you crazy?”
“Correct.”
“No…….”
I opened my mouth to object, then stopped.
It was because the Guide’s words came back to me.
So I froze for a moment, then addressed Cha Si-eon.
“Team Leader.”
“Go ahead.”
“Did what I just said sound strange to you?”
“It sounds like Seo Do-un as usual.”
“No, I mean—there are many people in this world, aren’t there?”
“…….”
Cha Si-eon stared at me in response to the premise I’d laid out.
His expression was that of someone wondering what nonsense I was about to spout with such a lengthy setup, so despite my embarrassment, I pressed on.
“And within those many people, there exists something called an average and a normal range. Where ‘normal range’ here means acquiring universality based on the scale of what constitutes the majority or minority—the prevailing tendency—without making value judgments of good or bad.”
“You’re not about to claim you belong in the normal range.”
Why is everyone coming at me like this today, really……?
“No, I’m not……?”
I asked seriously.
Cha Si-eon answered with equal seriousness.
“Don’t distort humanity.”

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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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