The 100th Regression of the Max-Level Player - Chapter 373

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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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The Maxed-Out Player’s 100th Return – Side Story Episode 18
18. Christine’s Wish
After becoming a zone representative in Round 2.
Christine’s influence grew with each passing day.
‘Saint? That’s far too grandiose a title….’
Being called a Saint was burdensome, yet unavoidable.
As the only one capable of completely healing wounds, it was only natural that people followed her.
‘All I did was provide healing to gain experience, yet people gathered in groups and formed an organization based on what they perceived as free service.’
What had started as her own desire for experience points transformed into something far greater when people began gathering in small groups, forming an organization around her.
Under the name of Saint’s Followers.
Already over a hundred people had gathered.
While it was certainly gratifying to have followers who revered her as a Saint and protected her, the burden that came with it was equally undeniable.
Then, she met someone.
The Seer, Ryu Min.
The man who identified himself as Black Scythe was helping people by showing them the future.
Ma Gyeong-rok and many others had benefited from his gift.
Christine was no exception.
“Christine. When Round 11 arrives, you will face grave danger. Your life may be in peril.”
“…Me?”
“Among your followers, there are traitors. Their nicknames are Douglas and Berber.”
“What?”
Though his accuracy was said to be 100%, the prophecy was difficult to believe.
Those who had been with her since Round 2 would betray her in Round 11?
‘I can’t accept this. The Seer must have misread the future.’
Christine waited silently for Round 11 to arrive.
Desperately hoping the prophecy would prove false.
But.
“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for this moment? It’s been so hard holding back all this time.”
When Round 11 came, the prophecy became reality.
Douglas’s betrayal.
The Paladin who served as the Saint’s guardian was the architect of the betrayal.
Seeing the hunger burning in his eyes, I questioned whether this was truly the Douglas I had known.
“Douglas… how could you….”
“Choosing the path that ensures better survival is only natural instinct, isn’t it?”
Douglas, who had conspired with the Despair Cult to kill the Saint, saw his plans shattered by Black Scythe’s intervention.
Christine’s faith in her followers crumbled as well.
“You see? My prophecies have never been wrong.”
“…I believe you now.”
After that, Christine’s path became simple.
She relied solely on Black Scythe, followed his prophecies, and carried out her missions.
After facing Chaos, the God of Destruction himself, and waging war through countless rounds, I finally reached the Wish Room I had long yearned for, the Wish Stone in my grasp.
The Wish Stone clutched firmly, I had arrived at the long-awaited Wish Room.
[Welcome to the Wish Room.]
[Ask me anything you wish to know.]
[It matters not whether you ask through thought or voice. I shall answer with utmost sincerity.]
‘Anything at all?’
There was a question I had pondered for far too long.
As one who served God, it was a question I could not help but ask.
“Does God truly exist in this world?”
[Yes. If you speak of the Divine Beings, they do exist.]
“No, not the Divine Beings. I mean the God who created Earth and all life.”
[If you speak of the Creator God, then Gaia, the Mother of Life, exists.]
The question of God’s existence.
Having believed in God’s existence my entire life, this was hardly the question that truly troubled me.
What I truly needed to know was something else entirely.
“Then… did Gaia create this system? The Survival Game system?”
[Yes. Gaia created the system and applied it to the Human World.]
Christine, who had devoted herself to theological studies and cultivated her faith throughout her life.
Ever since 1.8 billion people were trapped in the Survival Game, she had harbored one persistent doubt.
Whether God truly existed.
And if He did, why He did not protect us.
Why He imposed such desperate trials upon us.
Yet now, at last, that doubt was resolved.
‘So the one who created the system was the God I believed in all along…’
It was the Divine Beings themselves who had created the Survival Game and thrust humanity into this abyss.
This was the moment faith was betrayed.
‘I will believe no longer.’
Christine made her decision.
“I will speak my wish. My wish is to live an ordinary life. One that has nothing to do with theology whatsoever.”
She would abandon all the faith she had ever held.

* * *
Before I could voice my wish, the system had already explained what would happen.
The world I would encounter upon leaving the Wish Room would not be the world I had known, but a newly copied one.
And the players there would have no memory of the wish itself—only I, the one who made it, would remember.
‘A false world with the wish applied? Yet it feels so real…?’
Seeing Father weeping before me, I couldn’t possibly dismiss this as false.
“Sob… our Christine has returned alive. You’ve come back to us!”
“Father…”
Father, genuinely worried for me, tears streaming down his face.
How could I reject this as false?
‘They are real people. The world has been copied in its entirety, but these are truly the people I knew.’
The life that would unfold from this point forward could also be called real.
A life that was truly mine, painting upon my own canvas.
The moment I realized this truth.
Thump—
I embraced Father.
“Don’t cry, Father.”
This man is my real father.

* * *
After Father had composed himself, he made a shocking announcement.
“I’ve decided to sell the Church.”
“What? Why so suddenly?”
If I had married Ma Gyeong-rok for political advantage, that would have solved any financial problems. So why?
“Is there another financial reason? Is it difficult to maintain…?”
“No, that’s not it. I simply have no faith left in me anymore.”
Nathan laid bare the emotions he had been carrying all this time.
“Out of 1.8 billion people worldwide, only 97 returned alive. The Survival Game has ended, but this is undeniably a global catastrophe. If God existed, would He have stood idle and allowed such a calamity to unfold?”
Father, like myself, had come to doubt God’s existence.
From what he explained, this wasn’t a sudden decision but something he had been contemplating all along.
Whether he should truly believe in God at all.
“How could I continue to serve God in such circumstances? I will no longer believe in God. I will devote myself only to family.”
“Father, then…”
“Yes. From now on, I will abandon the priesthood and everything else, living an ordinary life. With you, Christine.”
My eyes widened.
At the realization that my wish had truly come to pass.

* * *
A quarter of the world’s population had vanished, yet the world continued to turn.
Only those aged fifteen to twenty-nine had become impossible to find anywhere.
It was inevitable—only ninety-seven remained across the entire globe; the rest had simply ceased to exist.
When the demographic that should have been entering the workforce disappeared, chaos descended upon society.
High School and universities suspended operations, while part-time positions became abundant.
Correspondingly, businesses shuttering their doors became equally commonplace.
Yet the Hamburger Shop where Christine worked proved to be an exception.
“Customer eighty-three. Your hamburger set is ready. For takeout, correct? Enjoy your meal. Customer eighty-four. Your order of….”
Christine had begun her first part-time job at the Hamburger Shop.
Since it was her first experience working, she made numerous mistakes initially, but within days she had mastered the fundamentals.
Yet it proved far more demanding than she had anticipated.
An endless stream of customers poured through the doors.
‘This is strange. Not that I should complain, but this place was practically empty when I started….’
Ever since she began working here, the customer flow had surged dramatically, until now there weren’t even enough seats to accommodate everyone.
How had things come to this?
She discovered the reason through a conversation with the manager.
“Tough work, isn’t it, Christine?”
“Oh, it’s fine. By the way, it’s not even the weekend—why are there so many customers?”
“What do you expect? We’ve got the only twenty-something part-time worker in the area handing out hamburgers at our shop—how could people not come? Especially when she’s as beautiful as a model.”
“Pardon?”
In the radiant bloom of her early twenties.
With Christine’s model-caliber beauty, customers were bound to flock here.
“The crowds… were because of me?”
“Of course. You didn’t realize?”
At the manager’s words, Christine nodded as if she truly hadn’t known.
“Our shop’s star attraction—the one bringing in all this revenue—didn’t even know she was the star. That’s quite the shock, isn’t it? Haha!”
The manager, laughing, glanced at the mounting order tickets and retreated into the kitchen.
The reality was that they were too busy to even chat among staff.
‘Sigh, I’ve brought this exhaustion upon myself.’
Though it was grueling, Christine found herself happy nonetheless.
The ability to live an ordinary life while making hamburgers.
Yet the crowds that followed her brought no joy.
Before, many had called her the Saint and followed her, only to betray her—a wound that still ached.
‘Being busy is good. It means no time to dwell on painful memories.’
Armed with this positive mindset, I was preparing to wrap a hamburger when it happened.
“Hey there, miss. Are you really in your twenties?”
A portly middle-aged man approached me abruptly and struck up a conversation.
“You’re actually in your thirties but pretending to be twenty to look younger, aren’t you? Trying to pull some scheme to boost sales?”
“Excuse me?”
I was flustered, but I knew I had to answer or he wouldn’t back off.
“That’s not it. I’m really in my twenties.”
“So you really survived that hellish Survival Game? You were a Player?”
Occasionally, customers would ask about my past.
I didn’t want to recall memories of the Survival Game.
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Then you’re not a murderer? In Round 4, you all played that game of killing and being killed, didn’t you?”
“That was unavoidable. Besides, it wasn’t real death. More importantly, I need to get back to work, so if you could please leave….”
“I just want to talk. You have a problem with that? Huh?”
The man who had suddenly become aggressive let out a sinister laugh at whatever he was imagining.
“Or would you prefer to talk somewhere else? There’s a Motel next door. How about we have a physical conversation after work?”
This bastard is insane.
As I turned my head to leave, that’s when it happened.
Smack!
“You little bitch, an adult is talking to you and you won’t even pretend to listen?”
My wrist was grabbed.
“Let go of me.”
“I can’t do that.”
Christine tried to pull her arm free, but she couldn’t move an inch.
Unlike when she was a Player, now that she’d returned to being an ordinary person, she couldn’t match the man’s strength.
His grip grew even tighter.
“Ugh, please let go….”
In that moment, Christine saw it.
Choke!
Someone from behind wrapped around the middle-aged man’s neck like a serpent.
“The young lady asked you to let go.”
A voice I’d heard somewhere before.
“Let go of her.”
The middle-aged man released Christine’s wrist and began tapping frantically.
“Gack, c-can’t, b-breathe, l-let….”
The middle-aged man finally lost consciousness and collapsed to the floor.
And standing over him was a single man.
“Ma… Ma Gyeong-rok?”
It was Ma Gyeong-rok, my fiancé and the partner of my arranged marriage.
“Christine. What are you doing here?”
“What?”
“You’ve been working at this Hamburger Shop and haven’t even answered my calls?”
“….”
Ma Gyeong-rok had tried to contact me several times, but I had ignored them.
Since I’d sold the Church, I thought my relationship with him was over now.
But Ma Gyeong-rok showed no signs of giving up.
“It’s not over yet.”
The fact that he’d tracked down where I worked and found me here proved it.
“Our relationship won’t end until we’re married.”
Ma Gyeong-rok grasped Christine’s wrist and pulled her forward.

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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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