By Zephyria 
「I committed suicide.」
The final images of the previous cycle broke away in fragments. A ruthlessness that felt like it was searing through his brain, self-deprecating hatred, and extreme terror. With the clarity of reason regained upon the cycle’s reset, he barely managed to understand the circumstances. He had instinctively killed himself before he completely lost his mind. For if he went mad, he wouldn’t even recognize Kim Si-baek upon their reunion.
He couldn’t tell which would come first: losing his mind or being reborn as an Apostle of Chaos.
〈…Si-baek hyung.〉
Tae-un traced the name that drove him mad—a name that was longing, ecstasy, and guilt all at once. He missed him. He hoped that he would remember him.
No matter what means he had to use, he did not want to be forgotten by him. Never.
This was quite acceptable. At least up until day 7,776, it had been perfect.
Tae-un repeated the most meticulously refined cycle three times to double-check. There were no uncontrollable variables, and people lived on with hope. Except for himself. In inverse proportion to his distance from humanity, the world was becoming more beautiful.
He silently looked down at his hand. The left side of his body had long been eroded by the magical energy originating from his heart. Only the final beat of the heart where the magical energy sprouted precariously kept his human skin draped over him. Though his five senses had lost their function long ago, when he closed his eyes, he could still see Kim Si-baek reaching his hand out through the window of the semi-basement room.
The final 7,776 days.
Gnawing on an anxiety he couldn’t identify as either anticipation or fear, he eventually left Korea as if fleeing.
「Do you intend to repeat it once more?」
〈You’re saying I have the luxury to repeat the cycle?〉
Chaos smiled without answering. Even without a clear response, Tae-un understood instinctively. This was the last time. If he faced death once more, he would instantly become a monster without even a chance to endure until day 7,777.
〈Bring Si-baek hyung back.〉
「Do you wish for the location to be the rooftop again?」
〈No, his return and the beginning must be strongly imprinted. Inside the barrier of the Great War would be good. Send the magical beasts there.〉
And so, day 7,777 arrived.
Confining himself in darkness, he expanded his sensory perception, chasing not time, but the massive flow of magical energy and magical power. Finally, he felt a foreign and brilliant light.
It’s Si-baek hyung. Finally, finally, we meet. If he touches that light, he will surely die. He will meet hyung. Only now did the scar on his face bother him. Would hyung tell him he’s pretty even with the scar? If his current divine power was weakened, how brilliant and beautiful must his original divine power have been? What should he say when he meets hyung? He probably won’t recognize him right away.
The cries of his heart poured down like a disordered rain, sweeping over Tae-un, and eventually settled into a smile.
〈I’m coming now, hyung.〉
A smile, though he himself didn’t know if it leaned more toward the ecstasy of reunion or the distortion of standing before the ‘right path.’
Now, let’s go meet hyung. Tae-un rose, drawing back the darkness.
The world, sculpted solely for Kim Si-baek, was also preparing to welcome him.
✽ ✽ ✽
Even as he climbed the stairs, he hoped. He hoped that everything was merely his own misjudgment and that what he would see upon reaching the rooftop would be a new magical beast. There was no way Tae-un—that child—could have deceived him and orchestrated all of this behind his back.
Perhaps the events that served as the basis for his speculation were the tricks of a ‘real Servant of Chaos’ intended to blind him. Perhaps Tae-un was also being used by a ‘real Servant of Chaos.’ Numerous assumptions stirred chaotically, weighing down his ankles.
“Hyung, you’re here?”
But the one who greeted Kim Si-baek there was the only child he could never mistake, even in the darkness. Kim Si-baek bit his lip hard to suppress a groan that almost escaped.
Even facing reality, he desperately searched for evidence that his assumptions were wrong. But he could find none. Instead, only evidence that proved them right appeared.
The magical energy was so distinct it made his skin crawl. The absolute quantity was by no means large, but its purity and depth were vivid, as if the finest essence had been filtered and filtered and filtered over a very long time.
Could that magical energy—something even Edokus in his prime did not possess—be the kind of quality held by someone who was being deceived or used?
Kim Si-baek finally groaned and covered his mouth. If he didn’t, it felt as if his insides would be stirred so chaotically that he would vomit. His intricately tangled thoughts turned white. For a moment, his consciousness flickered so much that he couldn’t even recognize Tae-un’s face before him.
Was it all… a lie?
The scene of his reunion with Tae-un immediately after his return flowed by in a blur. Was the pure joy and gladness also a lie? Were the desperate, clinging gestures also a lie? Was even that longing that eventually swallowed him whole a lie?
Was I deceived from the very beginning?
In front of Kim Si-baek, who covered his face in silence, Tae-un faintly curled the corners of his mouth.
“Most of what you’re guessing is probably right.”
“…Were you a chaos grand warrior?”
“They call me an apostle. I’m not complete yet.”
In the end, he received a definitive answer. A heavy sense of exhaustion washed over him, as if his limbs were losing all strength.
Tae-un had deceived him. From the beginning, and until now.
“…Was the system you, too?”
“You had no idea?”
“….”
“I succeeded. I intentionally spoke annoyingly because you weren’t supposed to notice.”
〈The system? What is that?〉
The face that had questioned him with curiosity when he first mentioned the system overlapped with the current image of him smiling faintly. The many hours spent laughing, getting angry, and sharing opinions whenever the system was mentioned became turbid and blurred. No, perhaps not just those, but all other moments as well.
“Ha…”
An ambiguous sound, neither a hollow laugh nor a sigh, fell weakly. Once the clear facts were established, the current situation also became obvious. Why would Tae-un, who had meticulously deceived him until now, reveal it now? Because there was no longer any need to deceive. Just as the system had predicted, everything would be concluded here.
Here, one of the two must die.
Even though everything had become clear, what occupied Kim Si-baek’s interior was not anger. Rather, he felt empty and sad. It wasn’t because he had been betrayed or played with, but simply the fact that Tae-un had deceived him that made him sad. A deeper agony and sorrow rushed in than when he discovered the truth that his existence had been erased from Earth.
Simultaneously, questions arose.
Why. Why did Tae-un do this.
If he intended to deceive and kill him as a Servant of Chaos, there were plenty of opportunities. He had always been off-guard in front of him. Yet why did he have to deceive him in this manner? Even using the inconvenient method of a system.
While Kim Si-baek’s gaze momentarily dropped to the floor, Tae-un pressed his forehead, frowning painfully.
〈You must not resent the world. What you should resent is the grandfather who should not have become king, and the mother who failed to stop such a grandfather.〉
The damage to the soul, which he thought he would get used to, proved to be on a different level from all the physical pain he had experienced in the past, carving into his perception more sharply as time passed.
Originally, he hadn’t intended to bring things to a conclusion so hastily immediately after subjugating kun. He had a bit of leeway to tidy things up cleanly, but the fragments clashing with his soul would not even allow that.
Still, since recalling Kim Si-baek’s existence was the only thing that allowed him to steady his wavering soul for a moment, Tae-un composed his expression and took him in with his eyes.
Eventually, Kim Si-baek’s gaze slowly rose. It was a question Tae-un had anticipated and had refined his answer to countless times.
“Why did you do it?”
“You know, hyung, since you’ve met Servants of Chaos in mak slecht. There is no reason. It just happens. I’m going to bring the world to ruin.”
Tae-un composed his face, pretending to brush back his disheveled hair. There wasn’t much left now. The ‘right path.’ As he recalled it, a grin surfaced. It was the conclusion he had been waiting for all along.
“I showed you a vision once, remember? That wasn’t a coming future, but a fact that happened in the past. After becoming an apostle, I lost my mind, then regained it for a moment. At that time, I spoke to Chaos and regressed time to before things happened. Thanks to that, I’m not a complete apostle now.”
“….”
“Do you know, hyung? Not just Lee Han-gyeol whom you saw, but Pi Min-hyeong, Seo Gae-un, Yang Eun-ho, and even Sister Benedicta—I killed them all.”
The smile on his lips made it seem as if Tae-un found the slaughter he committed with his own hands pleasant, and Tae-un wanted it to be perceived that way. As the confusion flickering in Kim Si-baek’s eyes grew, Tae-un threw in one more word to make the ripples even larger.
“Si-woon hyung and Sister Hyo-ju Agnes probably died like that too.”