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The Wicked One II
I'll give you a heads-up. Oh Dok-seo may have an extraordinary knack for idiocy, but she wasn't a complete fool. Despite her appearance, she could handle herself alone in most voids and carry her own weight.
In other words, while she might leave her door "slightly" ajar while writing her novel, she wasn't so brainless as to fully expose her actions.
And yet, here the door was, open. In the end, I ended up witnessing the crime scene.
So then.
"Dok-seo, what on earth are you doing right now?"
The person who left the door open was none other than Sim Ah-ryeon. Not only did she flaunt her idiocy, but she also held the top spot as "SG-Net’s Idiot of the Year" for six consecutive years.
In this round, the 888th, she wasn't cosplaying as the Saintess of the North. She was just living as Dok-seo's roommate.Sim Ah-ryeon urgently grabbed Dok-seo's shoulders. "Could it be that you're using AI generation again? You said you wouldn't use it anymore..."
"Ah! Stop overreacting, unnie!" Dok-seo gave a jerk of her shoulder, brushing off Ah-ryeon's hand. An unsettling, ominous flame flickered in her eyes. "I just wanted to use it one more time. Just once more!"
"No, you can't...! You promised it would be the last time! But here you are again, right before the serialization deadline, giving in to that AI temptation!"
"Oho! How dare you call it AI temptation!" Dok-seo shouted with the power of the Lion's Roar, as if addressing a lowly peasant. "This is nothing more than a new method of writing for the new era! I, the great Literary Girl, am merely keeping up with the trends, mastering them tirelessly, and applying cutting-edge technology as an auxiliary tool for writing!"
"That doesn't make it right. If you keep depending on such... dark arts, not even the meager strengths you originally had will remain."
"Argh! I said, let go!" With a forceful shove, Dok-seo knocked Ah-ryeon to the ground.
"Kyaaah!" she screamed as she fell with the grace of a tragic heroine. "Writing produced through such AI temptation isn't your work anymore, Dok-seo..."
"How dare you say that! Are you serious? I, the Literary Girl, generated the prompts and typed them myself! Of course, it's my writing!"
"Do you really believe that?"
"Of course! It's no different from a painter wielding a brush, using colors that already exist, or a photographer using a ready-made camera to take pictures. It's all the same artistic act, an act of creation! Your narrow-mindedness is what's stopping you from embracing the new era's trends! That's why it takes you 10 or 20 hours just to finish one illustration!"
"That's nonsense... Dok-seo, cameras and AI generation are completely different."
"In what way?"
"Try reading this garbage sentence out loud." Sim Ah-ryeon held up the laptop. Then, she unleashed one of the most wicked and vicious methods for killing a writer—an impromptu reading session.
"Look at this: 'The Undertaker let out a strange sigh for the 300th time and took out the black suit he bought at Busan Station... The 300th strange Busan Station story of the regressor protagonist, the Undertaker, was about to begin...' Do you really think this is your writing? Were you always this terrible...?"
"Gah!"
Dok-seo spat blood. Not physical blood, but the blood of her soul. Sim Ah-ryeon had the nose of a shark, capable of sniffing out the scent of others' spilt blood with uncanny precision. Despite her cute appearance, she was a predator in the food chain.
"Your novels were always frustratingly long-winded, making it hard to tell if they were literary works or some kind of endurance test... But they were still better than this trash! No wonder you're always getting crushed by me in the SG-Net Novel Serialization Board rankings, like a worthless hack..."
"Hey!" Dok-seo snapped. "Your novel ranks high only because of the illustrations! You keep plastering them all over the author's notes, that's why your ranking is so high!"
"Oh... So you think readers are sticking around for the illustrations? That's a pathetic excuse... But I know something even more pathetic than making excuses... It's the fact that you keep generating those AI-written sentences... They're pure garbage..."
"It's just that I haven't finished revising yet!"
Dok-seo snatched the laptop back from Ah-ryeon and started typing away with the dexterity of an AI pianist, entering new prompts.
Massage the sentences in the style of Chuck Palahniuk, add a dash of Stephen King, and a pinch of Lee Yeongdo.
Soon, the screen displayed new sentences.
――――――――――
I sighed again. Three hundred times now. Each breath mingles with the stifling air of Busan Station, morphing into something almost tangible before it dissipates into nothingness. Maybe it will wedge itself into the cracks of this city's concrete, festering into something vile.
I pulled out the black suit, the one from the underground mall here at Busan Station. Never been cleaned in three hundred lives, but it’s fused with me now—my skin, my shadow, my constant, unrelenting prison.
The show is set to start. Curtain rises on performance number 300. The stage is this monstrous station, and I am both actor and spectator, sometimes even the sacrificial lamb in this endless, twisted play.
A whisper slithers into my ear. The voice of Busan Station, like a cold draft: “Ready, Undertaker?” I grinned. Ready? Hell yes. My heart hammers in my chest, bracing for the next nightmarish chapter in this relentless, haunting saga.
――――――――――
Dok-seo pointed at the screen. "See? Isn't this way better than those mass-produced sentences from earlier? I'm sure the readers won't have any complaints!"
"Dok-seo..."
"This is the power of my prompt engineering! My own uniqueness! The originality of AI art!"
"You're really doing something crazy, Dok-seo..." Sim Ah-ryeon pouted and sniffled. "This is exactly why AI generation is different from a camera... You know that, right? AI uses learning data, which is the creative work that others have poured their sweat and blood into... How can that possibly be your own writing, Dok-seo?"
"It's fine! Chuck Palahniuk and Stephen King are public figures! Their work is public property!"
"Oh my god..."
"And besides, you know that canned hotel where all the writers of the Korean Peninsula stay? Who owns that? It's the Undertaker, isn't it? I'm writing for him! All the writers on the Korean Peninsula owe him! So... No one can criticize my noble cause! If they don't like it, they should write their own regressor memoirs!"
Seriously?
"Hahaha! That's right! I can look up to the sky without a shred of shame! I'll prove that this cutting-edge future technology, which is bound to be persecuted, is the way forward! I am a Prompt Artist!"
My heart and Sim Ah-ryeon's heartbeat resonated. To be able to force such a guilty rhythm upon my heart—she was truly no ordinary being.
"Dok-seo... How did you end up like this...? Even the guild leader won't be able to forgive such a heinous act..."
And thus, the genre takes a sharp drift. As Dok-seo ascended the throne of the corrupt AI and Sim Ah-ryeon blamed herself for failing to stop her, the story shifted from a Blizzard-style RPG cinematic movie to—
A horror movie. Sim Ah-ryeon’s head snapped up to look straight into my eyes.
"Right, Guild Leader?"
"......"
To be honest, I wanted to abandon my coffee and everything else and moonwalk out of there like Michael Jackson. However, the scene before me had some drug-like quality to it. It was impossible to look away.
There was undoubtedly some addictive substance in Sim Ah-ryeon's voice and tone that humanity has yet to identify. I sincerely hope that my readers also take note of this bizarre fact.
"Huh? Wait, why is there a... a man here?"
Most likely, Sim Ah-ryeon had been secretly leaving the door open every time Dok-seo started writing (or "prompting") for the past few days.
Why? Because she expected me, the Undertaker, to visit at some point.
As a result, Sim Ah-ryeon's strategy was a great success. Dok-seo’s chair creaked as she turned her gaze toward me.
"How long have you been... standing there?"
I subtly averted my gaze. "Well. Does that question really need an answer, Dok-seo?"
"It does. To be precise, there's nothing more important in the world right now than that answer."
Is that so? If it's that important...
"I've been here from the beginning."
"The beginning? What do you mean by beginning? The very beginning? Or maybe a bit later beginning? Huh? Specifically, what kind of beginning are you talking about?"
"Well... Specifically, since the moment you typed 'Protagonist: Undertaker, Regressor' as a prompt..."
"Aaaaah!"
A scream erupted.
"Aaaaah! Ugh! Aaaaaah!"
Another scream erupted.
"Gaaaaaah!"
And yet another scream erupted.
Then, Dok-seo evolved from a bipedal creature into a multi-legged one.
For the record, the most famous multi-legged creatures are centipedes and millipedes. Both share the trait of crawling on the ground.
"Why?!"
Dok-seo squirmed on the floor, showing signs of respiratory distress.
"Why?! Why did you just stand there and watch?!"
The desperate wail echoed as if it came from the deepest, most secretive abyss of Inunaki Tunnel.
A faint sound, like air leaking from a balloon, could also be heard. It was a sound so faint that only my unusually sharp ears could have picked it up.
The source was Sim Ah-ryeon's lips. She was chuckling quietly, her shoulders shaking.
So these are the ones who are supposed to be the hope of the Korean Peninsula and, by extension, the world. No wonder the world is doomed...
"Well. Dok-seo. Honestly, I'm not sure what to say to you."
"Don't say anything! Just don't say anything at all...!"
"But I still remember it clearly. The moment when you delivered that epic line: ‘I'll write your story, Mr. Undertaker.’ With my Complete Memory, it's as vivid as if I heard it just six seconds ago..."
"Nooooo!"
Thud!
Dok-seo rolled across the floor and crashed into the table leg. The laptop fell and landed on her shoulder.
"This... This isn't me! This is... I didn't... I didn't want to do this... Wait! Anomaly! Yes, Mr. Undertaker! This laptop is actually a relic of the Admin of the Infinite Metagame! That Admin deceived me! At some point, it turned into a program like ChatGPT and appeared... So that's why!"
"Dok-seo."
With a sudden motion, Sim Ah-ryeon hugged Dok-seo. She gently patted Dok-seo's back with her fingertips. Softly, tenderly, like a Saintess. Dok-seo couldn't see it, but I could observe Sim Ah-ryeon's face very well. She was grinning wickedly.
"It's okay. Dok-seo... You've certainly done something trashy, and now the guild leader, with his Complete Memory, will forever, for hundreds or even thousands of years, cherish this dark history of yours as a permanent black mark. Even if the world ends, your dark history will just be passed on to the next one... But people can repent for their trashy deeds. Yes, even if the stain on your life is indelible and will never be erased..."
"I'm going to kill you...!"
Today was clearly the day Sim Ah-ryeon would gain a lot of experience points.
I pulled the villain OldManGoryeo off Dok-seo and gently patted Dok-seo's shoulder. "It's okay, Dok-seo. I think I may have unintentionally placed too much pressure on you to write."
"Mr. Undertaker..."
"Take a break." I smiled gently. "Take a hiatus until you feel completely comfortable writing again."
"Can I really do that...?"
"Of course. I'll always be here, waiting for you, Dok-seo."
"Mr. Undertaker...!"
That day, a notice was posted on the SG-Net Novel Serialization Board.
[Author Literary Girl Oh Dok-seo... is taking a break for some time to recharge... (5 minutes ago)]
The reaction of SG-Net readers was, well, not too bad. Given how strange Literary Girl's writing had become recently, there was considerable hope that she would return in good form after a recharge.
And then...
Time passed.
[Author Literary Girl Oh Dok-seo... is taking a break for some time to recharge... (7 years ago)]
Click.
I opened the comments on the notice. Thousands of comments scrolled down.
-Anonymous: Is there any other writer in the world who says they're taking a break and actually ends up resting for 7 years???
-[Baekhwa] TwelfthGrader: Visiting the holy site again this year >_<)!!
-Anonymous: What kind of writer takes 7 years to recharge? Is 7 years "a short break"???
-Anonymous: I'm dropping this. Writer, you should just get off too^^
-OldManGoryeo: I heard she went missing in the void... Please come back, writer ㅠㅠ
└Anonymous: I saw her on the Free Board?
-Anonymous: Looks like Literary Girl woke up late again today. What a surprise.
-Anonymous: I started reading this series when I was in middle school. Will I see the ending before I die?
-[National Road] Officer: Honestly, shouldn't you refund us based on common human decency?
-Anonymous: Literary Girl you piece of shit!!!
"......"
Ah.
Dok-seo...
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