Infinite Regressor, Chapter 450 - I’m an Infinite Regressor, But I’ve Got Stories to Tell

**4.** What does it mean to be human? In response to this perilous cliff of a question, Sim Ah-ryeon had already stored away her answer long ago. To be human meant to be Sim Ah-ryeon. It meant being none other than herself. - Woof! Woof, woof, woof! - …… A time when she was younger. Summer vacation. There was a puppy abandoned by the roadside, its stomach covered with dust. Sim Ah-ryeon, perhaps meeting a whim of her own, decided to take the puppy home and raise it. - Ah, Ah-ryeon. - Woof! - Your name is Ah-ryeon... Sim Ah-ryeon showered the puppy with utmost dedication. In fact, even the term "utmost dedication" fell short. They slept in the same bed. Because they couldn't eat at the same table, Sim Ah-ryeon would place a bowl on the floor and eat there, bending over. Even when going out for a walk, if she found a deserted area, she didn't walk — she crawled on all fours. She not only drew the existence of the puppy towards herself but also extended her own existence as equal to the puppy. This blatant abnormality. The phrase "raising a pet like a child" is often just hyperbole. But to Sim Ah-ryeon, it was neither a metaphor nor exaggeration — it was simply a plain fact. Though the people around her looked at her as if she were crazy, Sim Ah-ryeon paid no mind. What mattered to her then was something else. - This, this is... love... Indeed, Sim Ah-ryeon was conducting an experiment. An experiment on what love is. What emotion is referred to by the term affection? How does attachment whisper through the heart? Whether love is something she was permitted to experience? - Hmm. I don't really get it... - Woof woof woof! - I heard somewhere that affection comes from lack. But come to think of it, my family is not that poor. Maybe I'm just too prosperous. Sim Ah-ryeon muttered like that. And that night, she packed a sleeping bag and an easel, and with only the puppy as her companion, she ran away from home. It was summer vacation. Sim Ah-ryeon set up her sleeping bag next to a neglected graveyard in the hills and lived there. Thanks to a nearby public restroom, she had access to water. [Middle School Genius Painter!] [Caricatures for Sale!] She funded her expenses by selling her drawings. Sim Ah-ryeon knew that her age and talent were enough to be advertised, and she wandered among local parks and riverside parks, earning pocket money. - Wow. You really draw well! - Uh-huh. Th-thank you... - But wasn't this supposed to be a portrait? It looks more like an abstract painting. Kind of like an alien. - Huh? But it is a p-portrait. - ? - ? With the money she earned that way, Sim Ah-ryeon bought dog food. Young Sim Ah-ryeon learned that a considerable amount of money was needed to raise a living being. - Woof! The hot clouds of summer drifted by. Sim Ah-ryeon took pride in knowing that she had done quite enough. Whether it was love or not. At least she was sure that she cherished the puppy in front of her more than any other living being she'd encountered since her birth. On the last day of summer vacation. When Sim Ah-ryeon returned to her tent, she found the puppy dying. - Whimper, whine... It seemed that the puppy had been hit by a car on the mountain road. The puppy loved all sounds created by humans. Whether it was the ringtone from a phone, footsteps of people, or the gray track markings of a passing car, the foolish puppy would dash out as if it had found a rib-laden bone, barking loudly. But the place was dark, and the puppy was so small — too small to notice before or after being hit... Perhaps, no certainly, when Sim Ah-ryeon witnessed the dying puppy, all the causality drew vividly in her mind. What did Sim Ah-ryeon do then? Did she resent anyone? Did she blame the careless driver? Why didn’t they see the puppy, why didn’t they notice even after the collision, why didn’t they take the puppy to a hospital immediately, maybe it’s because they found it bothersome to go out of their way that they ignored it, or perhaps they might have hit it intentionally, did she harbor such hatred? Did she blame herself? Did she think she should have returned earlier, that she could have saved it? Did she reflect that she should have trained the puppy more strictly, to instill more caution about the world, to make it known that this world was not merely beautiful but could turn mercilessly cruel and cold in an unguarded moment? Did she lament? Holding the puppy, did she apologize, admitting the fault of leaving it alone, regrets about running away with it in the first place, or that perhaps someone like herself should never have picked up the puppy? - …… At that moment, Sim Ah-ryeon was observing her feelings with utmost precision. Was she sad? What exactly is sadness? What concentration, rhythm, and color does the emotion she calls sadness possess? What is the loss of affection? What is death? - …… Taken almost obsessively. Sim Ah-ryeon controlled her madness for the sake of understanding it. She took sufficient time for the death of the puppy to be etched onto her heart, observing her pet's passing intently. - Mm... Sim Ah-ryeon placed a hand on her chest. - Sadness... Sadness, sadness. Sim Ah-ryeon buried the puppy at the abandoned graveyard where they had slept together throughout the vacation. School reopened. Teachers who once celebrated the admission of a genius, found themselves increasingly avoiding interaction, saying she was indeed a "truly strange child." Across the new semester, Sim Ah-ryeon painted the same theme over and over. They were portraits of the puppy. - Sadness, sadness, sadness... Her classmates exerted all efforts to avoid looking at the paintings by the unappealing child. Yet, for those who loved art, the paintings were hard to ignore, driving some who finally decided to see them to put down their brushes permanently. - Ah-ryeon, how do you... - Y-yes? - How do you paint so well? said one of her classmates. It was undoubtedly a question that required immense courage. Her trembling lips hinted at it. Even with her tightly clenched fists, she could not fully measure the total amount of courage it took. “Courage?” Sim Ah-ryeon, with her steadfast eyes yet a slightly tilted head, looked at her classmate. “Jealousy? Jealousy. Hope. Friendship.” Thus, Sim Ah-ryeon shared what she had experienced during her summer vacation. - "Get out! You crazy bastard, get out!" A week later, the parents of a classmate stormed into the school, causing a scene. Apparently, their daughter had attempted to kill a cat without their knowledge and ended up sobbing uncontrollably when she failed. “They said you have to kill a cat to make art! Some madman told my daughter—!” For the record, Sim Ah-ryeon had never said, "Death of a pet is necessary for art." To begin with, the concept of art was still too distant for Sim Ah-ryeon. She had simply explained the reason the color of 'sorrow' had made its way onto her palette. “Anger. Anger... Concern. Sorrow.” Nonetheless, the reaction of the parent was intriguing. While the teachers were flustered and at their wit's end, Sim Ah-ryeon hurriedly approached the parent. “Some madman immediately...! And who are you?” “I-I said it.” “What?” “Oh, I bit my tongue. Um, well. I told Ye-eun... to just kill the cat instead of clinging to meaningless things.” - …… “An artist grows by seeing how much they can sacrifice for their art. So start simply, with a cat…” A scream erupted nearby. Sim Ah-ryeon found herself sprawled on the floor of the hallway, musing in a daze, Ah, so this is what it feels like to be truly slapped hard. “Ye-eun’s mother! No! You mustn’t!” The next day. Rumors about Sim Ah-ryeon spread throughout the school. The demon who killed her own pet dog for the sake of art. The lunatic who urged a friend to kill even their pet cat, someone you should absolutely not associate with. “Jealousy. Malice. Justice.” Sim Ah-ryeon found it fascinating. “People’s emotions.” Simply peering into her heart and observing its tumultuous waves was endlessly intriguing to her. “My emotions.” Every time a semester repeated and a vacation arrived, Sim Ah-ryeon conducted experiments on her emotions, one at a time. “Beautiful...” The world's words held no relevance for her. “So pretty…” The anger they spewed was not her anger. The friendships and reputations they shared weren't nutrients her existence needed. Their fervent desires for overseas trips weren't her idea of a journey. “Could the color blue be prettier than the sky?” Her journeys had no maps. How curious it was. Even in this era, where humanity had explored every corner and extreme, emotions remained shadowy. “Could green be more beautiful than freshly sprouted leaves in late spring?” She was preoccupied only with her own emotions. Busy diving into the vast ocean of emotions, formless and unfathomable. Her voyages were always towards her inner ocean, not abroad. Winter vacation ended. Summer vacation ended. Winter vacation ended. Summer vacation ended. No longer could the young girl find anyone around her who painted better than she did. “So, so pretty.” The girl exclaimed in joy. “Look. It's just. Isn't it so pretty?” Yet no one answered her. The classmate who would occasionally speak with Sim Ah-ryeon had already transferred schools several semesters ago. - Ah. Sim Ah-ryeon was a species that existed as the sole member on this earth, a branch split off from humankind, possessing a moral system that could not intertwine with modern humanity. - Well, is it done, then? Hehe. People thought of her as repulsive. They lamented how someone who was supposedly the same species could act that way. It was a strange phenomenon. If they were truly a different species, even a puppy could be found beautiful, a cat pretty, and a beetle easily seen as graceful. Yet speaking of a fellow human as beautiful seemed to require special conditions. “Beautiful…” To Sim Ah-ryeon, many things, perhaps too many things, were beautiful. That was her loneliness. **5.** From the very first moment she met the undertaker. Sim Ah-ryeon always found him fascinating and amusing. “Wow! A sea turned human!” “...?” “No. Hmm. A sea pretending to be human? The sea acting?” “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” The undertaker himself brushed her words off, unable to comprehend them in the least. But the truth was, Sim Ah-ryeon knew. She knew he understood precisely her intent. ‘Twitch, twitch!’ For, the emotions the undertaker was experiencing were vividly clear to her. ‘Twitch, twitch. How cute... Twitch, twitch.’ The undertaker was indeed an intriguing being. To start with, every time she saw him, he seemed to continually suppress an intense urge to commit suicide. ‘Suicidal urge... Hmm. But patience? It feels a bit different. Though patience is there. More like... resignation?’ It was peculiar. ‘Giving up on life is common.’ ‘But giving up on suicide? Are there cases of abandoning suicide? Isn’t suicide considered the final challenge for people?’ ‘It’s easy to give up on life. Because one can understand it; they’ve experienced it before.’ ‘However―― Suicide is not something experienced normally. Generally, it isn’t abandon suicide but rather give up.’ ‘How can one understand suicide? How can someone genuinely wish to commit suicide while simultaneously looking down on it?’ ‘Fascinating…!’ Later, the undertaker rambled about some grand project to develop her capabilities, but Sim Ah-ryeon didn’t care. Even though the project was ultimately about nailing her to a cross and making her a scapegoat priestess, even that didn’t concern Sim Ah-ryeon. ‘He's suffering...!’ Explaining that project with such a composed, endlessly calm demeanor—the undertaker's true feelings intrigued Sim Ah-ryeon. To her, his emotions shone like treasured gems from a shipwreck, sparkling brightly. ‘Why? Why does he suffer? Is it a guilty conscience?’ ‘Hypocrisy? Hmm, but the pain feels too vivid for mere hypocrisy! Wow. The suicidal urge. It's red. Black. Blue. Beautiful...’ ‘Despite being in such agony. Suffocating. Why can he drop me into hell with such a calm face?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why?’ ‘Why?’ Bombarded by emotions almost as violent as physical blows, Sim Ah-ryeon could barely maintain her senses. It was breathtaking. ‘I’ve tasted suicidal urges many times. They’re a delicacy, but hmm. The stronger the urge, the more other emotions fade, and eventually, all emotions turn monotonous. The flavor becomes identical.’ ‘Like MSG overload.’ ‘But.’ Whether awake or asleep, Sim Ah-ryeon lingered around the undertaker. He kept trying to chase her away, claiming she was bothersome, but she clung to him with relentless will. ‘[This] is different...’ She couldn’t help it. Now that she knew such a "flavor" truly existed in the world, she couldn’t return to the ignorance of the past. ‘The suicidal urge is so deep, yet other emotions are still vividly alive!’ ‘Hmm... They're not just alive. They’re strong. Intense. Powerful.’ Even walking down the street, watching him casually interact with strangers or colleagues, it was unmistakenly apparent. Affection. Friendship. Compassion. Whatever names were given to these emotions, the undertaker processed them tenfold, twentyfold clearer than ordinary people. ‘He cares about people.’ Yet. ‘He deceives people.’ ‘He wants to die.’ ‘Yet he lives.’ ‘He values... me.’ ‘Yet he torments me.’ A human. No human should withstand such imbalance. It was impossible! Humans were not built to endure disharmony this severe, both mentally and spiritually. Yet it persisted. Pure magic! A miracle! “Hah, whoo... Whoo, ha…” “...Ah-ryeon, can you explain why you’re burying your nose in my back and drooling?” “Hehehe.” Sim Ah-ryeon was happy. Thus, she indulged in even more delightful imaginations. ‘What if, what if. What if... Hmm. If I were to endure every torture and hardship for the guild master...’ ‘Would the guild master suffer even more?’ Absolutely. She was sure of it. Though a concept hard for Sim Ah-ryeon to grasp, this man considered her a "precious human," despite her being completely incomprehensible. He didn't just say it. Although verbally, he depicted Sim Ah-ryeon as some lab rat or tool. ‘I’ll try it!’ Her heart raced. ‘I’ll try it! I’ll try it! Try it, try it!’ ‘I’ll leave the guild master’s side for a few years! Yes. Because, surely, he’ll feel guilt for neglecting me...!’ ‘Thump thump. Thump thump.’ The time of patience. Sim Ah-ryeon had never had to endure anything before. Whenever she wanted to do something, she did it immediately. This decision was not about patience. From Sim Ah-ryeon’s perspective, the choice to "wait a few years to savor the delicacy" was one she executed “right away.” And thus, finally. After several years, the undertaker sought her out and offered her a meal. But the meals the undertaker prepared were merely appetizers. The dish she truly longed to savor sat in the chair across the table. “Ah-ryeon.” “Y-yes?” “Why is it that only when you meet me does your healing power seem to recover?” Sim Ah-ryeon grinned widely. She had waited for this meal alone. Therefore, she could speak freely without hesitation. “Well, if the guild master gave it his all, you could eradicate all ten tribes alone, couldn't you?” A slight jolt. Her words started to make the undertaker’s emotions stir. “The meteor shower or something... But you deliberately let others handle it. Hmm, and inevitably, there are victims. People who died.” Sim Ah-ryeon eyed that pulsation through narrowed eyes, savoring it in full. Like scraping the leftover ice cream from the bottom, she plunged a spoon of words into the undertaker's heart. “In other words... it's almost as if you killed them, isn’t it? In reality.” In that moment. The waves that had begun in the sea finally surged into a torrent. It was a tsunami. Polychromatic emotions of all sorts burst forth. It was beautiful. It was dazzling. Sim Ah-ryeon could not contain herself. Thus, she plunged the spoon in even deeper. “Murderer.” “...” Black. “Traitor.” “...” Red. “Massacrer.” “...” Blue. “Liar.” “...” The undertaker’s heart was tender. To others, it might seem hard as rock, like an ice cream frozen solid, but to Sim Ah-ryeon, it was always perfectly matured and delicious. How could they fail to recognize this? Was it lack of ability? She was indeed a blessed and chosen gourmet. “People often call me that. B-but it doesn’t fit me well... because.” “...” “Because those titles are all for... you, guild master.” “...” “Right, guild master?” Silence hung heavy in the air. Then suddenly, tears trickled quietly down the undertaker’s cheeks. “...!!” Sim Ah-ryeon jumped up. Crash! Her movements were so clumsy for a human that the chair toppled, and her legs went unstable. Yet Sim Ah-ryeon didn’t groan. As if groaning was a waste of time, she quickly righted herself and approached the undertaker. And then, she cupped the undertaker's face in her hands. The tears that had been tracing down his jaw now collected in the curves of Sim Ah-ryeon's fingers. Startled, Sim Ah-ryeon pulled back her left hand and, almost in a frenzy, licked the tears pooled in her palm. "……!" Inside her mind. "……!! ………!!" Firecrackers burst with a pop, pop, pop. ‘I want to die. Suicide. Impossibility. Relinquishment. Challenge. Resignation. Despair. Regret. Regret, regret, regret. I want to die. Humiliation. Shame. Self-reproach. Guilt. Relief. Pride. Love.’ In a mere moment, the tears had vanished from her palm. ‘More.’ Where did they go? Where were they? ‘More.’ Sim Ah-ryeon forgot to breathe. She was solely focused on tracing the source where she could taste those tears, this palette, this fireworks display. So she licked. His cheek. Rather than waste time catching the tears in her hand, she simply absorbed them directly as they flowed. ‘More. More. More. More. More.’ The heart, mind — no, the very existence of Sim Ah-ryeon quivered in ecstasy. ‘More from here.’ And to achieve that? ‘Ah!’ It was as if she had been struck by lightning; a realization quivered through her. Until now, she could never understand why two tongues mingling was considered an ‘expression of affection.’ It seemed too cliché. But no, it was precisely accurate. A kiss could achieve depths unprecedented when compared to simply drinking tears. It appeared humanity hadn't been entirely foolish in their intuitions. So, Sim Ah-ryeon kissed him. "……!!" Pop. Pop pop, pop—pop. The world before her eyes exploded in a burst of colors. ‘What is this? Guild master? What are these emotions?’ It was a feast. ‘What is it, what is it, what is it? What is it?’ Sim Ah-ryeon did not stop kissing. Nor did she stop thinking. The former was easy, while the latter was not. For it was the first time Sim Ah-ryeon had encountered such an emotion. She was unable to name it. No. She wondered if she might be the first in humanity to ever experience this. ‘Regret. Regret. Joy. Love?’ She wanted to find out. With a much stronger resolve than when she squeezed the neck of a summer puppy. ‘Love. Love, love, love? Love?’ Sim Ah-ryeon was clever. ‘Ah.’ Therefore, even amidst the continual kisses with the undertaker, she was able to discern. ‘This might not be.’ ‘The guild master’s emotions…?’ Sim Ah-ryeon attuned herself to the beating of her own heart. Although her eardrums were numbed, the vibration within her chest reverberated through other means. ‘My emotion?’ Momentarily, Sim Ah-ryeon paused the kiss and gazed directly into the undertaker’s face. Her heart did not cease to race. ‘Love?’ To Sim Ah-ryeon, the man before her — this man alone — was indescribably beautiful. ‘Love.’ That was her love.