Traveling an hour by bike to kill someone wasn’t particularly difficult.

    The night was dark, and the trailblazers’ lights were nowhere to be seen. Likely, the recent turmoil in Seoul had left the area unsettled.

    As Incheon regained some stability, power struggles that had remained dormant began to resurface. Criticism against members of parliament, who extended their terms indefinitely while enjoying unwarranted resources and privileges, grew louder. In response, the parliament proposed electing 500 “people’s representatives” — a kind of pseudo-parliament.

    Even among the trailblazers, there seemed to be those vying for these positions, believing they had the qualifications. After all, if sending people to their deaths counted as achievements, they probably felt entitled to a claim.

    Reality, as always, was dirtier and more despicable than one could imagine.

    Before I even reached DragonC’s bunker on my third visit, I encountered an unexpected sight.

    Three men were sitting near a drum fire on the road some distance from the bunker. They were drinking and chatting.

    They were likely the cronies brought along by Filkrum’s so-called younger brother.

    I hid myself and eavesdropped on their conversation.

    "Those people over there... aren''t they Chinese?"

    "God, I want to kill every last one of them."

    "They said the joint Korean-American forces cleared them all out into the sea. Government bastards, always lying."

    "That cartoonist’s wife was hot as hell. Should we just kill the bastard and have some fun with her?"

    "I don’t know. It’s up to Hyung-min. But hey, we’ve already looted so much food and booze. This is still a win for us, right?"

    Trivial talk.

    Nothing worth paying attention to.

    I mulled over how to handle them.

    I could shoot them, or I could cut them down with my axe.

    Before taking action, I scouted the area thoroughly.

    As expected, there was a vehicle nearby.

    An electric car outfitted with bulletproof plating.

    Next to it was a solar-powered charging station.

    The car was empty, but it was packed with supplies—likely DragonC’s food and alcohol.

    I reassessed my targets.

    Three men near the bunker.

    Three more inside the bunker.

    I presumed DragonC was already dead.

    Approaching the car, I wedged large rocks in front of and behind its wheels. Just a bit of insurance to ensure no one left without my permission.

    Then, I slowly approached the campfire.

    They weren’t watching their backs, so it was easy to get close.

    Without slowing down, I walked up and buried my axe into the neck of the man holding a bottle.

    Thunk!

    The sound of the axe biting into flesh and breaking bone reverberated softly.

    The man couldn’t even scream as he staggered.

    Before he could fall, I swung my other axe, this time at the head of the man who was just beginning to turn toward me.

    Crack!

    The last man was lucky—he got to see my face, albeit briefly.

    But he was also unlucky.

    Both of my axes met his neck simultaneously.

    Supporting his body as though I were felling a tree, I guided him to the ground beside the fire.

    Blood trickled onto my gloved hands but didn’t stain my clothes.

    Laying him gently next to the fire, as if putting a child to bed, I headed toward the bunker.

    Outside the bunker, Filkrum’s “younger brother” was lounging in a camping chair that once belonged to DragonC, staring out at the dark ocean.

    I glanced at him.

    No firearm.

    The bunker door was shut.

    "......"

    I wasn’t particularly interested in talking to him, but a strange impulse stirred.

    Or perhaps I had questions that needed answering.

    Letting the moonlight expose me, I stepped out of the shadows.

    "Who—who the hell are you?!"

    His bloodshot eyes quickly locked onto me.

    "Pick up a weapon," I said, raising my bloodied axe.

    The man shrank into the chair as if he could disappear into it.

    "You’re a hunter, aren’t you?"

    "What—what is this?! Ye-hoon! Ye-hoon!"

    He yelled toward the campfire.

    When no answer came, he turned toward the bunker and shouted frantically.@@@@

    "Ho-jun! Ho-jun!"

    He fired three rounds from his pistol toward the bunker entrance.

    Bang! Bang! Bang!

    The gunshots shattered the stillness, and the ricochets echoed around the bunker.

    I heard screams from inside and asked him calmly, "Where are they?"

    The man’s eyes darted around nervously as he reached toward a knife lying on the ground.

    I let him grab it.

    "Where are the people who were here?" I asked again.

    It seemed he needed the knife in his hand to summon the confidence to answer.

    "They’re dead," he said, sneering.

    As he spoke, he smirked as if the knife had empowered him.

    "You knew this would happen, didn’t you? When you left, you knew that bastard would die. Why didn’t you stop it, huh?"

    But all the knife gave him was false confidence.

    And then, something caught my eye.

    A draft.

    An unfinished post, waiting to be completed.

    I opened it.

    DragonC: I’m teaming up with Filkrum!

    “Filkrum, this guy—he’s just a natural. His imagination is incredible, his fundamentals are outstanding. Honestly, I hit a wall watching him work.”

    “But you know what, friends?”

    “I realized there’s one thing I’m better at than him. I’m a much better storyteller than he is.”

    “We’re going to make something big. DragonC and Filkrum88, joining forces!”

    "......"

    DragonC’s final message never made it to the forum.

    But its meaning reached me, clear as day.

    I understood what he had wanted to tell me.

    “There’s one way for you to survive.”

    Inside the bunker, I spoke calmly to Filkrum, who was kneeling on the floor, half-exhausted.

    “You need to become DragonC.”

    “What?!”

    I handed him DragonC’s manuscript.

    “Finish this. In his name.”

    “T-This is?!”

    A flicker of shock crossed Filkrum’s face.

    “Is this... a sequel to what I worked on?”

    I nodded slowly.

    At first, Filkrum’s expression was one of confusion. He stared at the manuscript and storyboard, flipping through the pages. But gradually, his face transformed—shifting from surprise to awe, then to something like shock.

    “This... this is...”

    He looked up at me, his expression now serious.

    “It’s honestly amazing.”

    I turned my back on him.

    “Take as long as you need, but finish it. That’s the condition for me to forgive you.”

    I didn’t want to speak to him anymore.

    If I stayed any longer, I might end up killing him—and his family, too.

    On a desk in the corner of the bunker, the fake goldfish in its tiny aquarium flailed wildly, turning its stupid face toward me.

    "......"

    I picked up the aquarium and left.

    *

    DragonC: “The Remnant” Chapter 2

    Two weeks later, the latest installment of The Remnant, DragonC''s magnum opus, was uploaded to the forum.

    This happened during a period of utter chaos: in Incheon, a farcical event involving the election of 500 so-called “National Representatives” (parasitic figureheads, really) was stirring nationwide outrage, while rumors spread about the Legion Faction’s elites once again attempting to seize power.

    Amid such a frustrating climate, the new chapter brought a shared wave of emotional impact to both Failnet and Viva! Apocalypse!—two wildly different communities.

    While praise poured in from all sides, I sat enveloped in the overwhelming aroma of coffee, immersed in what was now officially his last, parting work.

    SKELTON

    Within the scribbles of the storyboard was a man standing with an axe.

    On the internet, he might’ve seemed clumsy, but in reality, he was sharp, loyal, and capable of holding his own in a fight.

    Reading through DragonC’s rough sketches brought back a familiar feeling, reminiscent of when I used to flip through comic drafts drawn by other kids back in school.

    “Ah, come on. That’s a bit much.”

    It was clear DragonC had been heavily influenced by me.

    This was evident from how I, Park Gyu, was depicted single-handedly slicing through mid-tier monsters like they were butter and even taking down large-tier monsters with some kind of aura-sword technique.

    I wasn’t an Awakened. Heck, I’d never even heard of an Awakened using aura-sword techniques.

    But it wasn’t entirely implausible either.

    “Ah, damn it. A dream!”

    The final monologue of the character SKELTON in the story made me crack a wry smile—or maybe it was a genuine one. I couldn’t tell.

    I opened a notepad on my laptop, and a pristine, empty space spread out before me.

    Without thinking, I typed two words.

    Immortality.

    But the words didn’t stay long. A flurry of backspaces erased them almost as quickly as they appeared.

    "......"

    There had been two creators.

    One had died. One remained.

    All to achieve immortality.

    To remain immortal.

    To leave behind something immortal.

    “Immortality, huh...”

    I shook my head.

    Trying to encapsulate DragonC’s intentions with such a cliche?d word felt like a lazy oversimplification of the events that had transpired.

    The fake goldfish in its little tank seemed to agree with my doubts, turning its murky gaze toward me.

    I tapped the table lightly. It was, of course, mere coincidence that the resulting vibrations caused the goldfish to tilt in my direction, but seeing it brought a thought to the surface, almost like a dream.

    This situation, this sequence of events—perhaps this was exactly what DragonC had intended all along.

    A masterpiece that completed itself through the creator’s death.

    Or maybe...

    Maybe we are the fish, swimming in the dream of the dead.

    If our world had been absorbed into his story, it might not be as far-fetched as it sounds.