Even if I Make It Roughly, Ex-rank Items Continue to Accumulate - Chapter 40

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Even Hastily Made Ones Keep Stacking Up as EX-Rank (40)

There’s No Time

“…What did you say?”

“Aren’t you? You look Korean to me.”

“How do you guys know that?”

Watching the alchemists answer in unison like a chorus, Lee Si-hyeok couldn’t hide his bewilderment.

Korea. His homeland, and now the place he had to return to.

Why was that word coming out of their mouths? His mind raced rapidly at this unexpected situation.

Then, Lee Si-hyeok soon arrived at one hypothesis.

“…Possession.”

“Oho.”

“You’ve possessed these guys’ bodies. Am I right?”

“You catch on quick.”

The opponents expressed admiration.

No, to be precise, it would be more accurate to say ‘opponent’ rather than ‘opponents’.

Though those alchemists were answering simultaneously, the one speaking through them was one person, not many.

“And you must be from Earth.”

The reason for this guess was simple.

Originally, hadn’t those alchemists been in a state where their egos were erased? But suddenly they regain their minds?

That was impossible.

Then it would be more reasonable to assume someone had possessed their bodies.

And considering the question the opponent had asked, there was a high possibility they were a fellow Earthling like himself.

Lee Si-hyeok licked his parched lips and asked.

“Why did you suddenly appear?”

“That’s wrong. I didn’t suddenly appear. From my perspective, you’re the one who suddenly appeared.”

Incomprehensible words.

“…Explain it so I can understand.”

“What’s talking to you right now isn’t really me. My main body is somewhere else. To put it simply, I previously planted mediums in these guys’ bodies when I stopped by here before, and they reacted upon meeting you, someone from Earth.”

So they were having a kind of communication right now?

Normally he should have encountered this situation much earlier, but it seemed to have only reacted now thanks to the privilege called 『Foreigner Adaptation Contract』.

‘So it was right to cancel the privilege after all.’

Lee Si-hyeok swallowed his saliva and glanced at the open door.

From outside came the sounds of infected consumed by dark energy rampaging wildly and the apprentice who had rushed out earlier screaming at the top of his lungs.

In any case, it was an urgent situation. Since he had canceled the privilege, he needed to proceed with his established plan even faster.

Lee Si-hyeok turned his head again and looked at the alchemists surrounding him.

“Explain.”

When he spoke indifferently, the opponent asked back as if puzzled.

“What?”

“The reason you planted mediums in their bodies. You must have had some intention, right?”

He narrowed his eyes and added.

“You know there’s no time, don’t you?”

“….”

He didn’t know exactly what the opponent’s awakening ability was, but maintaining this level of communication couldn’t require little mana. Moreover, hadn’t quite some time already passed?

The limit must be approaching soon.

“So if you have something to say, say it quickly.”

Lee Si-hyeok pulled out a nearby chair and roughly sat down.

Creeak…. Such sounds echoed simultaneously from the alchemists’ throats. It was a sound filled with admiration.

“More than I thought, your mind works much better than I thought.”

“Stop with the useless talk.”

“…Aren’t you curious about my identity?”

“I am curious. But I think I roughly know.”

“You think you know?”

“Weren’t you the one who cleared the Obsidian Mining Site before?”

“…!”

The opponent was visibly flustered.

“H-how did you know that?”

It would be stranger not to know.

The fact that mediums had been planted before Lee Si-hyeok arrived meant they had previously passed through the Obsidian Mining Site connected to Orbes.

Then the third person who had conquered the Obsidian Mining Site, which had been a mystery until now, had to be that guy.

He must have cleared the Gate through some method and even entered Orbes.

Well, knowing that much, he could even guess that the opponent was a fellow Korean and that their awakening rank was quite high.

Since there was no need to explain all that, Lee Si-hyeok just waved his hand dismissively.

“No way….”

The opponent opened and closed their mouth several times, then seemed to come to their senses and composed their expression. It was quite eerie seeing dozens of alchemists doing this all at once.

“…Then I’ll tell you the most important thing first. This is information I barely managed to find out near the end.”

“Speak.”

“This world is not a ‘real world’.”

“….”

“Of course it did exist in the past, but as you can tell from the word ‘past’, it was destroyed long ago… Why are you making that face?”

Startled. The opponent tilted their head.

Lee Si-hyeok let out a deep sigh.

“I know that much too.”

“What?”

“I already know. That this place is a mimicry world, that it’s a world created as an artifact, all of it.”

“Wh-what do you mean. Wait. What do you mean by artifact?”

At this rate, he might know more information than the opponent.

Lee Si-hyeok looked up at the clock once, then spoke in a more resolute tone.

“I’ll just ask the questions and you answer. At this rate, there’ll be no end.”

“Understood….”

Then after organizing his thoughts briefly, he began questioning.

“First. How can I return to Earth?”

“I don’t know. No, why are you looking at me like that… I really don’t know.”

“Then how did you escape?”

“With my awakening ability. Conquering the Gate was all thanks to my skills too.”

He seemed to definitely be a high-rank awakener. Since there was no time to verify the truth of his words, he quickly moved to the next question.

“Second. What happens if I can’t escape from here?”

“Probably, you’ll be trapped forever. As time passes like this and destruction comes, it’ll return to the beginning again. That point will be when you fell into this place.”

“Is that destruction because of the dark energy? Because it ultimately can’t be resolved?”

“I escaped before that, so I didn’t see everything, but I assume so.”

The next question was about the Princess.

But a completely unexpected answer came back.

“…Princess? There’s a Princess?”

He asked back like that, saying when he had fallen here, he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of any Princess.

Since this world kept repeating the same history, if a Princess existed this time, she should have existed identically back then too.

However, the opponent said the Princess had completely disappeared just like the King and Queen.

Lee Si-hyeok etched that information into his mind while throwing out his last question.

“Do you remember what I said earlier? That this world is like one artifact.”

“Yeah. Though it’s hard to believe….”

“Then there must be someone who created that artifact.”

It was natural logic. Artifacts didn’t just pop out of thin air.

Since someone created it, it must have been born, and since it has been consistently maintained, it can remain intact.

That means.

“The creator of this world is also somewhere here.”

“…?!”

“That creator probably knows this world is an artifact. They must also know that destruction keeps repeating. Do you have any information that comes to mind?”

The other party pondered seriously. Time was racing toward its end. The time they could exchange questions like this, and the time of the world itself, was rushing toward its conclusion.

Just then, as if something occurred to them, the alchemists all looked at Lee Si-hyeok in unison.

“You said you took the Alchemy Society’s exam. You got in by passing that exam.”

“So?”

“It was different when I was there. There was someone else in the position you’re in now.”

Lee Si-hyeok’s eyes widened. Come to think of it, this was something he had been missing all along.

If this world flows according to predetermined history.

Originally, it would have been someone else, not Lee Si-hyeok, who passed the exam.

“Do you remember who it was?”

“I don’t know about other things, but I remember the name at least. I happened to see a newspaper lying around on the streets back then.”

Nineteen alchemists.

Their lips moved simultaneously.

“Elec.”

Once more.

“It was Elec.”

The voice echoed.

Lee Si-hyeok’s thoughts stopped. At a name he never imagined hearing here, his mind went completely blank for a moment. His mouth fell open without realizing it.

Did I mishear?

Elec.

The fact that he took the exam and passed into the Alchemy Society wasn’t a problem in itself. The Elec that Lee Si-hyeok had seen possessed tremendous skill, and if he had fully utilized that ability, he would have passed with room to spare.

The problem was.

The flow of history had changed.

This mimicry world follows a predetermined scenario. If someone accidentally tripped over a stone in the previous cycle, they should normally trip in the exact same time and place, with the exact same motion in this cycle too.

However, Elec had escaped that providence.

Lee Si-hyeok recalled the exam he took in the plaza. A total of 3 stages of testing. From the number of participants to trivial stories. He retraced every process.

“….”

Elec existed nowhere in any of it.

The person who should have originally passed as the top candidate didn’t even take the exam this time.

While everyone in this world moved according to predetermined history, only Elec had broken away from it. And by his own power alone.

‘…He was strange from the beginning.’

Elec had shown unusually favorable treatment from the start. Until now, he had thought it was just thanks to his special privilege, but what if it wasn’t?

What if he had come to meet the foreigner who visited the world he created, disguising it as coincidence?

Chills ran down his spine. The screams of the infected and people coming from outside the royal palace somehow seemed to sound even louder.

No, perhaps they had already infiltrated inside the kingdom.

There was no time.

“I need to find Elec.”

“So that guy really has something after all?”

The voices that had only sounded bizarre now had noise mixed in at some point. The other party seemed to have reached their limit too.

Lee Si-hyeok calmed his mind and spoke.

“Next time, I’ll come find you.”

“You’ll come…find us?”

“I still have many questions left.”

What their identity was, what kind of person they were to help like this, and so on.

Right now there was no time to ask.

“I hope we’ll have more leisure time then.”

“Hah, no matter how many times I see you, you’re a fascinating guy. Well, I understand. Then….”

The other party chuckled. Did they laugh? He couldn’t confirm due to the blurred voice, but it felt that way.

“I’ll wait.”

That was the last.

Lee Si-hyeok looked at the alchemists who had lost their sense of self again and slowly stood up.

* * *

Now there were two things left.

Confirming whether Elec was really the creator of this mimicry world and finding out the escape method from him.

And meeting the princess to find out whether she was the Snow Flame Empress or not.

‘I should meet the princess first.’

If she really was the Snow Flame Empress, joining forces would be faster.

But for some reason, the princess was holed up somewhere in the royal palace and hadn’t shown herself at all.

After organizing the conversation he just had, he could somewhat guess the reason for that too, but he couldn’t give up.

So Lee Si-hyeok, who had been pondering how to find the princess, thought of one clever plan.

“This should be enough, right?”

Swish, swish.

He roughly wiped his oil-soaked hands on his clothes and looked around.

All sides were thoroughly soaked with oil.

Not only that, but the entire royal palace reeked with the smell, because Lee Si-hyeok had sprinkled oil containers he brought from the warehouse everywhere.

‘No matter how much she wants to hide, she’ll have no choice but to come out if I start a fire.’

Actually, he wanted to use this as a last resort if possible, but she kept trying to avoid him, so he had no choice.

Besides, the current situation itself was already the last resort, so what could he do?

With 『Foreigner Adaptation Contract』 activated and everyone else already evacuated, there shouldn’t be any particular danger.

Hiss!

Lee Si-hyeok took a breath and lit the magic match.

Without hesitation, he threw the match and flames immediately began spreading rapidly.

“To think I’d be playing with fire at my age….”

He deliberately ignored his impure thoughts.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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