====================
Translator: thursdays Editor: Sasha PR: LightBrin
It was creepy. A favorability rating of 95.
And the scene of what happened when the favorability rating reached that high was unfolding in front of me right now.
“Glowja-nim! Until I met you, I was only the blind Shim Bongsa!” the Librarian shouted, squatting as he grabbed the soles of my feet.[1]
“I was deaf until I heard you speak!”
The Librarian’s eyes seemed to sparkle as he tried to clip my little toenail.
“You are my light! You are my music!”
His eyes were scary.
“Since your name means Confucius, I’ll gladly convert to Confucianism! I will be a scholar only for you! Ah, a king needs a friend-like retainer who shares his opinions! From today onwards, I am a Confucian scholar who supports Gongja-nim!”
“Hey. Just- Hey!”
What kind of demented scholar tries to collect someone’s pinky toenail clippings?!
I wanted to ask the Librarian that question, but I stopped when I saw his eyes and realized. He wasn’t in his right mind. His eyes showed that no matter what I said, he would clearly ignore it. First of all, his breathing was ragged.
“If you keep acting like this, I won’t enter any more Apocalypses!”
“…….”
Pause. The Librarian let go of my feet. Creepily, his fingers still twitched even as he stopped manhandling my feet. Was he crazy?
The Librarian pondered over his thoughts like a scholar in deep sorrow.
“……Indeed. It’s an effective threat.”
For a moment, I was relieved that my words had worked.
“But analyzing Gongja-nim’s character, that’ll never happen.”
What?
Character analysis?
“It’s because Gongja-nim knows. There are many other characters like the Heavenly Demon who are withering away unjustly in the other Apocalypses. Considering Gongja-nim’s personality, you won’t be able to resist helping those people.”
The Librarian smiled.
“Don’t look down at a Gongja-maniac. I know Gongja-nim better than you know yourself! I can describe the energy bars that Gongja-nim ate on the first day you entered the Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon, what hand you used to do it, what sort of expression you had, all over two pages…”
He must be crazy, right? This is crazy. He’s crazy.
“Now, Gongja-nim. Be obedient and give me what you should give me! I was being shockingly conscientious when I didn’t force you to sleep with the scent.”
“I’m also shocked by your conscience.”
“Gongja-nim can’t understand. Nobody has ever understood me before. Ah, alas! How terrible is it that I’ve never been understood in my life? How cold is such a human heart? Even so, if I understand Glowja-nim…..”
“Step away from me before I say [I hate you].”
Thud.
This time, the Librarian really stopped.
“Take five steps away from me. Otherwise, I’ll really say it.”
“…….”
The Librarian meekly stepped back.
“Please use your normal way of speaking. It’s kind of gross. Seriously. And please return my hair and my nails.”
“I cannot! Y-you’re being completely unreasonable!”
His old way of speaking had returned.
The Librarian was crying while hugging the silk pouches tightly.
“I’d rather that you cut my head off! No. Wait, just a moment. Gongja. Right now, that was a hyperbole. Please don’t make that expression, like you’re really deciding whether or not to cut off my head… That will seriously hurt my feelings…..”
Like a disheartened hamster, the Librarian began to mutter.
Eventually, I succeeded in calming him down.
After burning up a silk pouch of unpleasant things (there was a terrible scream involved), the Librarian and I managed to start talking for real.
“It was magnificent.”
First, the Librarian reviewed the newly completed [Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon].
“Your dedication to the Heavenly Demon was truly admirable! I could see the [ending] when you became her disciple. But you didn’t stop there! The final Battle of Good and Evil…. The greatest match… Yes, the Heavenly Demon must have felt like she was eating sweet chocolate ice cream.”
“Has the world from the [Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon] been transferred to the 22nd floor?”
“Yes.”
The Librarian grinned.
“Other hunters will be able to enter the 22nd floor. They’ll also be able to learn skills by looking at the texts stored in the Cheonmugwan. It’s all thanks to your work, Gongja.”
“…….”
I put my hand on my chin.
“There was something I was wondering about while we were in the Apocalypse. I want to ask you this….”
“Ask me anything! I’ll answer almost anything!”
“Stop trying to sneakily take off my shoes like there’s nothing wrong. Why was [The Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon] an Apocalypse?”
The Librarian cocked his head to the side. My question seemed to be unfamiliar to him.
“Why? Hmm. Does a book need a specific reason to be an Apocalypse?”
“I think so.”
I put my shoes back on.
“Librarian-nim, do you like happy endings? Or do you prefer sad endings?”
“Both of them have their merits,” the Librarian replied immediately.
“An ending is like a port where the characters’ lives come to a conclusion. Life can be happy, or it can be rough! A general reader wants the characters to be happy, but I also want to hug them tightly when they fail or are sad.”
“Which means that even unhappy endings are still proper conclusions.”
“Yes. Obviously.”
“That’s why I have more questions.”
I grabbed the Librarian’s wrist, which was trying to go behind my back, and took away the scissors. The Librarian hopped up and down, trying to take back the scissors, but he wasn’t tall enough.
“Even if I didn’t interfere, the [Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon] would have a proper conclusion. Even if it is sad.”
“Master and the Murim Lord did their best up to the end. They continued making an effort. Even though the Murim Lord died first and Master went mad… Master still reached the conclusion.”
I looked into the Librarian’s eyes.
“Why was [The Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon] included as an Apocalypse? Library director-nim. Why didn’t the Murim Lord’s death and Master’s madness count as a proper ending?”
In fact, I was thinking about this question ever since I saw the fairy tale, ‘Me and Our Scapegoat’. Apart from whether or not I could accept the ending, the world looked like it had reached a logical conclusion.
The Constellation was silent.
In the library, there were only the quiet breaths of the knocked-out hunters. Saek, seeeek…. Among the rising and falling of the Hunters’ chests, the Librarian was expressionless.
“I wanted to see a happy ending for some reason. Would something like that reason not work?”
“If you don’t like the ending, Librarian-nim can fix it yourself.”
“…….”
“Librarian-nim is strong. In the eyes of a Hunter like me, you seem to be omnipotent and omniscient. But even so, instead of fixing the apocalypse, you sent us.”
In other words, this Constellation was a ‘reader’.
He was a reader who didn’t want to intervene in the story but just receive it as it was. He had no desire to ever be a ‘writer’. He could correct the wrongs, but he refused to do so.
A reader who would never intervene himself.
The Chief Librarian.
“Shall I do a character analysis, too? A thorough person like you would not call something an Apocalypse just because the ending was weird. The Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon and the other Apocalypse, too. In fact, there’s another reason that the Apocalypses are classified as such.”
“……Ah, you won’t just let this go.”
The Librarian smiled bitterly.
“Follow me.”
The Librarian grabbed my hand. With the other hand, he picked up a book.
The title of the book was the Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon.
“—I will tell you the truth of the Apocalypses.”
The Constellation opened the book.
Then, my vision was covered with light.
3.
When I opened my eyes, we were in the world of snowfields.
However, we did not need to walk on the snow. The Librarian was still holding my hand tightly, his long sleeves fluttering like the wings of wild geese in the winter sky.
“What if.”
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login