Chapter 209

The future of the world.

I had seen that too.

“Is that ‘The Fallen Crown Prince of the Cosmos Empire’?”

“That's right.”

The annihilation of 99.9% of humanity.

An ending where only the protagonist’s party and dozens of people from the Humanity Preservation Agency survived.

“I never wanted such a future. So I had to change it. It was a paramount task that had to be done even if it meant giving up all my remaining power. So I did it. I gave up the power to see the future and summoned a being to change the future. A being from another world, independent of the fate that covered this world. Through you, Kim An-hyun.”

This name… it had been a really long time since I had heard it in someone else’s voice.

“Why me? There must have been many other great people.”

Hearing my name made me remember my identity.

“You’re asking why I brought you, a hopeless piece of trash who has only failed for 30 years.”

“Because I couldn't step in myself. I had used up most of my power in the process of seeing the future. It was obvious that it would be too late if I waited to recover. So I had to set up a proxy.”

The Director, who was walking ahead, turned around and looked at me.

He put his finger to his chin and tilted his head.

“Who should I set up? Who on earth would believe my words that I saw the future and face the countless storms head-on to change the future?”

He raised his hand and pointed at me.

That was me.

“I needed a life of failure. I needed someone who desperately craved success and survival. And it had to be someone who had nothing to protect or any lingering attachments in their original world. On top of that, it had to be someone who could create an environment conducive to making them believe the future I would show them.”

“Is that, me? Out of the billions of people on Earth?”

“Yes. Although I didn't look at all the billions of people on Earth.”

“Wasn't the future of the world at stake? There must have been a better person.”

“Because it wasn't necessary.”

We arrived at the end of the long corridor.

A door full of all kinds of security devices was waiting for us.

The Director came one or two steps closer to me.

“I needed you.”

“Why, is that?”

“Bringing someone from another world is not an easy task. A body is out of the question, and even pulling a soul and having it possess someone was a gamble. Even that gamble had many conditions. The deeper the connection to one’s home planet, Earth, and the weaker the connection to the continent, the more difficult it is. Above all, I had to find a person whose soul wavelength was almost identical to yours, for your soul to settle into. And that was the turning point that could become a singularity, ‘Martin’.”

“Is that the reason I was possessed.”

“Yes.”

With that conversation, a short silence fell.

The Director silently looked ahead again.

He placed his hand on the door full of security devices.

Instead of opening the door, he asked me a question.

“You feel it too, don’t you? That the Gilbert of the original work missed and couldn’t find the keys to overcome the apocalypse, but they were all prepared by his side.”

“…Yes.”

The Time Chaos Dungeon in the underground waterway.

I had obtained the holy relic ‘Rosary of Grace’ by capturing the place that would have originally become a giant acid slime that would have covered the imperial capital.

The alchemist Nerjin, who committed suicide due to the death of his granddaughter Bianca.

He was actually a key researcher at the dimensional research institute that had brought about the biggest disaster, the Time Chaos Dungeon.

“The world prepared a provision called Gilbert. The links to all the keys were connected to him. And yet, how was Gilbert?”

“He, failed.”

“That’s right. Gilbert failed. It was you who created the current situation. You changed everything.”

The Rosary of Grace had given me the strength to survive among countless demons.

Above all, it had put the ‘Star Child’, who hadn’t even appeared in the original work, on stage.

Nerjin was my indispensable and most reliable supporter.

He hadn’t received the Buster Order, but now that he had learned celestial alchemy, he had become a powerhouse who could exert military force even against a Demon Lord.

“And the fates of several individuals as well.”

Adela, Anette, Luri, Hailey, Savo, Bianca….

Saving them was my best choice.

“But Mr. Kim An-hyun, think about it. The fact that you saved the continent from the clutches of fate doesn't become my excuse for absolution, does it.”

Beep, the security device makes a sound.

Dozens of types of security begin to open.

Since there are many, it takes time to open them.

“Because you were forcibly brought here. Without a home or a place to go, you’ve fought with your life on the line here several times. Because of my selfishness.”

“….”

That’s right.

The essence doesn’t change.

So far, I had only listened to the Director’s explanation of his circumstances, that is, his complaints, about why he had no choice but to bring me here.

“So it won’t be a reward, but I’d like to give you a gift.”

The security door opens, revealing a room that I can’t imagine what’s inside for it to have been hidden so tightly.

It was a giant machine.

I saw thousands of gears, from ones the size of a grain of millet to ones bigger than me.

Thousands of transparent pipes through which liquids flowed, hundreds of cylinders performing piston reciprocation with the power of mana.

I saw tens of thousands of mana stones embedded everywhere.

“What, is this…?”

“A machine that imitates the scientific knowledge of Earth.”

Suddenly, I remembered the mechanical army I fought when I raided the agency.

As expected, that was science, that is, Earth’s technology.

“Of course… it’s only a very small part. Science, it’s difficult. Perhaps because it’s the technology of another planet, my memory would be erased as if a fog had settled in my head even when I tried to learn it. So I tried to combine even a part of that knowledge with the top-tier studies on the continent. I know magic engineering, alchemy, and theology very well.”

In other words, Earth and the continent.

The product of the combination of the technologies of the two worlds… was this giant mechanical device.

A machine that was strictly kept even in the tightly secured Humanity Preservation Agency.

This was surely the machine of future sight that Principal Lukfels had seen.

“Is this, the machine that sees the future?”

“A machine that sees the future…? Ah, you must have heard from Principal Lukfels. It’s a bit different, this. It’s something that speeds up my brain’s rotation? I’m using it for that purpose now. The power to see the future is my own unique ability.”

And without any warning, the Director took off her mask.

“…!”

His.

No, her appearance was so beautiful it was as if she had been blessed.

Her pure white hair, as if it were made from plucking the stars.

- Know-It-All (Lv 4) asserts that it did not, expect this.

And her pure white eyes, as if the stars had been embedded in them.

- Wild Instinct (Master) mutters. That it’s a double twist.

Belatedly, a familiar aura that had been hidden emanated.

The flow of a white star.

The movement of the celestial bodies could be felt from her.

“You.”

“That’s right. I am the ‘Star Maiden’.”

The Director of the Humanity Preservation Agency, the Oracle who sees the future, Recola who brought me here at the same time, and… the Star Maiden.

She looked up at me playfully with melancholic eyes.

“Ta-da, a surprise twist, isn’t it?”

“You are, the Star Maiden….”

All sorts of thoughts swirl in my head.

My brain spins like crazy.

The gray matter of my cerebrum and the neural bundles of my neurons flare up, and my head is so complicated that I can almost smell something burning at the tip of my nose.

“Writer Kim An-hyun, everything you were looking for is me.”

“….”

“Do you remember when I said earlier that I needed only you without looking at all the billions of people on Earth?”

I’m so flustered I can’t answer.

The Star Maiden, as if she didn't expect an answer, immediately continues speaking.

“The great order of the universe, Cosmos, chose you. The moment I saw you, I also thought, ‘Ah, this is the one’.”

Seeing my stuttering reaction, the Star Maiden giggles.

“You really are interesting.”

She flashes a mischievous eye smile that doesn’t suit her powerful position and status.

“I am….”

“Ah, that’s enough. I’ll listen later. I know I’m pretty too.”

As my mind grew hazy from the Star Maiden’s endless curveballs, I became certain of one thing.

‘Isn’t this person completely crazy?’

“You asked earlier, right? What this machine is.”

The Star Maiden snaps her fingers.

One axis of the giant machine opens, revealing the center of the machine.

What was there was a mechanical chair with gears and tubes attached.

“Now, prepare to be surprised.”

The Star Maiden, as if treating a long-lost friend, takes my wrist and leads me to the mechanical chair and sits me down.

“The main headquarters of human knowledge, created with the science of Earth, the magic engineering and alchemy of the continent, the privileges and immense wealth of the Humanity Preservation Agency. It is also a sacred altar for ceremonies that aid the Star Maiden’s revelations. The ultimate artificial intelligence, achieved through the divine power of Cosmos, the order of the universe.”

The tubes of the mechanical chair restrain my body, and patches are attached all over my body, especially on my head.

“One of the two privileges you have.”

Could it be, this is.

“Know-It-All.”

Soon, with a thud, my consciousness drops.

‘Ah.’

I sink into a deep abyss.

I have never seen or heard what is in that deep underground, but I can tell.

It’s familiar.

Inside there is ‘knowledge’.

Distant, primal knowledge.

‘Know-It-All, you say….’

Why did that suddenly come up?

I had been searching for a long time.

Just as Wild Instinct had been, I thought Know-It-All would also be an important key point.

I thought it might be Lilac, or it might be Martin’s talent.

In the end, there was nothing that could be a clue, so I had half given up, but to find it in this way….

“Help me! Help me!”

“Aaaargh!”

Desperate screams begin to faintly fill my ears.

The faint sounds become clearer as they prove their existence.

‘Where, is this?’

When I came to my senses, I was floating in the air.

My body was light, as if in the zero-gravity state of outer space.

I tried to lightly sit up as usual, but almost fell forward.

If it weren’t for Wild Instinct and Movement, I might have spun around and around.

After righting myself, I finally had the leisure to look around.

Belatedly, I was able to realize the source of the screams and where this place was.

‘This place is….’

The sky is black.

The ground is also black.

Between them, lights that must have once been brilliant are faintly visible.

It was a civilization so developed that it looked down on even the current Imperium Empire.

Such a civilization was being helplessly encroached upon.

A space of chaos that distorts and warps time and space swallows the light.

Light that vanishes in vain.

I knew the identity of that light very well.

It was Stellar Force.

The power of the great cosmic order, Cosmos.

‘This place is the capital of the Cosmos Empire…!’

People run with faces stained with fear.

They reach out their hands.

Please take me too, please save me.

Ignoring their hands, the carriage also runs.

Even without the coachman cracking his whip, the frightened horses run at full speed.

The horse stumbles on an armor that its hooves get caught on.

The carriage overturns.

The armor rolling on the street was discarded by the fleeing knights.

The people were running away from something.

- Wild Instinct (Master) shouts! To turn your head and look behind you!

When I abruptly turned my head, I saw a giant chaos.

A giant chaos that made my knees weak just by looking at it.

‘Ugh!’

The source of the chaos was not only swallowing the great imperial palace of the Cosmos Empire, which had led the continent, but was also encroaching on the surroundings.

At the gluttonous and endlessly frightening scene, I almost vomited.

‘That is, the first Time Chaos Dungeon!’

The disaster born from the Cosmos Empire.

‘This is the scene of the fall of the Cosmos Empire about 100 years ago!’

The chaos instantly expanded its territory and swallowed the capital of the Cosmos Empire.

The screams of the people and the cries of the animals could no longer be heard.

They had been swallowed by the jaws of chaos and had disappeared.

“….”

It was quiet.

Only silence roamed the once greatest city.

It all happened in an instant, before the thrill of witnessing a historical event had even subsided.

“….”

Just as I thought this was the end, a bright light shot up from the depths below the chaos, piercing the darkness.

“Kuh, I’m alive!”

The person who had survived through the immense chaos that had swallowed the capital of the empire was none other than the Star Child.

‘He’s the same now as he was then.’

In one hand, he held a shining chalice, and with the other, he carried a girl tucked under his arm like a piece of luggage.

‘That girl is….’

She looked familiar.

The Star Child of 100 years ago had a grim expression.

“It has come to this, after all!”

The Star Child, who had landed on a tall building swallowed by chaos.

The girl, who had been held like luggage, saw the writhing floor first and screamed.

“Kyaa! S-Star Child!”

The chaos that had swallowed the building writhed and opened its mouth to devour the Star Child.