The Work of Creation

[Well then! Brace yourself for impact… shall we?]

<Samantha> spoke so cheerfully that I thought it was no big deal.

Then she and I harmoniously pulled up all our senses to the 11th dimension beyond and screamed together.

“Aaaaaahhhhh!”

[Kyaaaaaah!]

Was it like riding a roller coaster? Yeah, there was that feeling too. The sensation of being sucked down through <Samantha>’s slender Ki-blood threads that spread throughout her body. The dizzying feeling of falling.

“Keeeeek?!”

[Higiiiik?!]

Was it like the pain of stubbing your pinky toe on a protruding stone while walking barefoot? Right. There was that feeling too. The desperation of crying and wailing as all your nerves focus on a tiny part you don’t usually even notice.

“Graaaaah! Samantha! Samantha! Gah! You! Are you there? Urk!”

[Hiiik! Yes! Yes! I’m… urgh… here! Here… gak! I’m here!]

“Why… why… damn… is it so sad and… aaahhh! painfully! unbearably! agonizing!”

[Kyat! That’s because… we have so much work to do! Hik!]

It was truly an experience beyond words.

It felt like the entire world was pouring into me, and at the same time, it felt like everything inside my body was about to burst outward.

‘Creation’ was that kind of thing.

<Samantha> and I harmoniously felt the entire world with our whole bodies.

We felt the stinging sensation of people we’d never met before laughing, crying, and dying.

We watched with aching hearts as a single rock crumbled to become sand, and waves struck the same spot for tens of thousands of years—their quiet solitude and loneliness.

At first, we were overwhelmed by that pain and sensation, unable to think of anything as we just cried and wailed.

Hissss! Hisssss!

Thanks to <Samantha>’s overheated magical power neural network, I was evaporating in chunks, but I was already in too much pain to even care.

Then suddenly I felt sorry.

Why had we lived so damn miserably? The only thing we’d done wrong was being born into this cursed world, but Dad, Mom, Teacher Sena, and all the people from Sena School Nomad who had been everything to me, whether I liked them or not—everyone. They’d all been frantically trying to devour me back then… but I knew that when we got older and met again after a long time, we’d be happy to see each other and have drinks while saying things like “I was sorry back then.” Just like Earth people do…

But they all died. Who am I supposed to receive apologies from? Whose shoulder can I pat while saying, “Hey, it’s all in the past”?

I’m grateful Yuria and Monggu are here. If there wasn’t a single person in this world who remembered my growth process, what would that feel like? There must be many people like that.

[That’s why we have to recreate the world.]

<Samantha> looked at me. Even though I was inside her, I could feel her gaze. She looked at me pitifully—no, tearfully. As if sorry she couldn’t share the pain instead. By now, she and I had screamed so much that we couldn’t even hear each other’s screams anymore, and only the words we spoke to each other remained clearly in our memories.

‘It’s enormous. Was our world this vast?’

[Did you feel the dewdrop on that blade of grass?]

‘Yeah. I felt it. What about the typhoon sweeping across those plains?’

[It’s cold. The mirage rising from the desert is hot, though.]

‘The dark clouds in the sky too, and that thick dust cloud.’

[The sound of prayers begging to live too.]

‘The sound of people rescuing each other, embracing and crying with laughter.’

[I can really hear it all.]

‘I can see it all.’

I hadn’t expected this.

This world was so unimaginably vast, beautiful, and crazy that even a god’s cognitive ability couldn’t fully handle it.

We perceived this world meticulously, not missing a single grain of dust. Hoping everyone would be safe. Hoping there would be more reasons to smile and fewer reasons to cry.

[We didn’t miss anything, right?]

‘Nothing. I’m certain.’

[Then let’s begin.]

What I felt, she felt, and what she felt, I also felt.

We began creation.

Thump-thump, the heart of magical power beat,

Hisssss, the lungs of magical power contracted,

We squeezed all the Ki-blood in our bodies to ring the Circles and sang.

Hum—

What the Circles created was mana. An endless sequence of characters made of mana, imperfect but hoping to reach somewhere.

The song we sang seeped into all things—from the 100th floor of the Tower of Covenant down to the 1st floor and beyond to the entire world—into all the mana.

‘The goal?’

[To break it.]

‘The Tower of Covenant?’

[Yes. So there’s no more distinction between inside and outside.]

‘So no more small changes from way up high will kill everyone?’

[That’s what we hope for.]

‘No more dying miserably just because we went out without protective charms and encountered calamities?’

[We’ll make it that way.]

<Samantha> sang.

How strange.

I’d always thought that the heavy work of creation was something I had to carry alone. Because there was no other mage like me anywhere in the world.

But when the actual moment came, it was <Samantha> who sang.

In that moment I’d always imagined—the moment that felt like it would collapse from fear—I wasn’t alone. And <Samantha> sang a song of creation more wonderful than anything I’d ever imagined. As if from the moment of her birth, she’d thought only of creation, only of this moment, only of a world better than anything else.

Rumble—

The sound of the tower collapsing could be heard from far away.

No, it wasn’t collapsing—it was being born.

Hisssss—

The song was too complex and too long, and <Samantha>’s magical power couldn’t endure it. I had to help her endure that. My role was to help her sing without worry until the song was finished…

Whoooosh—

‘What?’

Even though I’d been successfully cooling and lubricating things, suddenly everything went wrong.

Without any warning, the temperature shot up impossibly high all at once. The cooling effect didn’t work.

<Samantha> was…

‘Samantha is burning up!’

[Stop if you want to roll, roll if you want to jump, jump if you want to disappear, gone. Gone. You who jumped and rolled and became something I don’t know…]

<Samantha> continued singing. Eyes tightly closed, not even knowing her body was melting like candlewax. She just kept singing.

This happened to be an important part. The spell to breathe ‘possibility’ into this world. Just as I hadn’t designed <Samantha> down to every detail, <Samantha> also wanted to open up possibilities rather than design every detail of this world. So this world could change and develop in directions even gods couldn’t predict.

So it could be imperfect but capable of evolution.

But… at this rate…!

‘Graaaah!’

Hisssss!

Whoooosh—

I threw my whole body at cooling <Samantha>’s magical power neural network. But the burning neural network was evaporating me rather than consuming me.

‘Grrrgh… no…!’

I grabbed the magical power neural network that was being severed by heat. I was startled to realize that the hands (Philosopher’s Stones) following my will were too few. The neural network trying to scatter in flames—I cooled it while fanning it with my cool hands. But still, too few hands were mobilized. The Philosopher’s Stones that had composed me were already mostly evaporated, leaving less than half.

‘I can’t hold out like this! Why did the temperature suddenly spike? Why is there such an overload?’

The heat was so intense that the connection between <Samantha> and me became stiff. Even my will became crumbly. With my fading consciousness barely focused, I desperately struggled and finally realized the cause.

‘Chaos…’

The very thing that the First Apostle Balrog and Earth Mother Gaia had kept warning about. The chaos that had seeped into the very roots of our world was acting as a serious obstacle to creation. They’d been right. At this rate, with just mine and <Samantha>’s power, we couldn’t complete creation.

That’s why I made a decision.

‘Samantha can’t do this.’

She was still singing. Like Scheherazade who spun tales for a thousand and one nights without rest, like that genius developer who finished writing all the lost program code while riding the train. To avoid getting a single word wrong, she was intensely focused, singing without missing a single word or note. I couldn’t disturb her.

I just had to judge, choose, and take responsibility myself.

‘I thought this was going too easily.’

The familiar weight pressed down on me.

Fear, responsibility, tension—call it whatever you want. The heaviness of knowing that countless people’s lives hung on my single decision.

It wasn’t particularly burdensome anymore. After all, my entire life had been the process of handling this weight. And I’d kept all my promises that way.

This time would be the same.

‘But I need help.’

However, there was a big problem.

Currently, I couldn’t ask for help. <Samantha> was burning and I was fighting the flames inside her. In this situation, even Gaia’s fragments couldn’t hear my voice.

But I needed someone who would hear my voice and act on it.

Someone who would hear a voice that everyone else couldn’t hear. Someone who would act on what they heard.

Fortunately, I knew exactly one person who had that potential.

[Simulation]

A Gift is a power bound to my soul.

Even in this chaos, time stopped and the world went dark.

“Huh…? Jun-woo?”

Sky-blue hair floated gently through that darkness.

“Yuria.”

“Hm? That’s strange. I was definitely fighting just now… Ah, this is [Simulation], isn’t it? But… do you need to simulate me in this situation?”

She smiled awkwardly. Realizing that she was just an illusion within a [Simulation] couldn’t be a pleasant experience.

I grabbed her shoulders and spoke.

“Listen carefully. And take this content back to reality.”

“Hm? I’m just an illusion here, aren’t I? The real me won’t remember any of this.”

Right. An illusion.

Everything that appears in [Simulation] is just an illusion. It can’t affect reality. That’s what I’d always believed. But is it really true? Everything in [Simulation] is loaded information from the Akashic Records, but anyway, they do ‘load’ it, which means there are connection points with the existing originals. There must be. So there’s also the possibility that information delivered here could flow back into reality. Especially now, with creation, chaos, and the Akashic Records all unstable—the chances of such errors are even higher, right?

Maybe with someone else, but with someone who possesses the excellent insight Gift [Magic Eye] like her, someone who achieved the human limit of the 8th Circle… she would definitely remember something. I was sure of it.

In the darkness, I desperately explained to her. What I needed now. How we could make a miracle happen.

“…So you understand, right? You’re the only one who can do this. Do you remember the method, the goal, everything I told you?”

“I remember. For now.”

The illusion of me looked up at me with determination.

I nodded once and waved my hand.

[Simulation End]

Before the darkness cleared and the world brightened again, I chanted the spell once more.

[Simulation]

The world went dark again, and sky-blue haired Yuria appeared. She appeared and said “I’m just an illusion.” I said “Listen carefully and remember.” And I explained. How I planned to subdue chaos, how I intended to devour the Outer God.

After resolutely disappearing, I cast [Simulation] again. Again, a clueless Yuria appeared.

“I’m an illusion, right?”

“Listen carefully and remember.”

Hisssss—

The strain of excessive [Simulation] use accelerated my evaporation.

After [Simulation] exceeded 100 times,

“Do you remember everything?”

“I remember. For now… But is this really the right approach? Can an illusion like me really maintain memories?”

After it exceeded 1,000 times,

“Do you remember everything?”

“…Sorry. I’ll definitely remember next time.”

By the time I’d lost count and my body had only about a third left, the Yuria who appeared in the darkness said this the moment she saw me,

“Jun-woo. I need to… remember something, right?”

It worked.

A tired smile spread across my lips.