Chapter 10

Chapter 10. Galactic Martial God Chronicle - Reincarnation (1)

When I came out of the library, the sun had already tilted quite a bit.

When I checked the clock tower, it was a little past 5 p.m.

By summer standards, the sun should still have been blazing at this hour, but it was already setting. Was the time period here around early spring or late autumn?

No wonder it was not hot at all.

I had not thought about the climate at all, but it felt like I had discovered something new.

No, perhaps it was my prejudice to assume the Tower had seasons.

Was each floor of the Tower a single planet?

Or was it a dimension that contained only a specific space, like the flat Earth theory?

In the case of Gates, they said the inside was surrounded by walls made of fog, as if there were an invisible barrier, and you could not cross beyond them.

Perhaps the 10th floor was also a space similar to a Gate.

It was merely an incomparably enormous space compared to a Gate.

According to the community information, there were numerous cities on the 10th floor, spaced far apart.

There were monsters outside the cities. Near the cities, monsters at the level of Horned Rabbits and Goblins appeared, but the farther you went from a city, the more monsters from the late 10th-floor range appeared.

They said you could go to other cities, but as if the servers had been divided, the cities near this one seemed to contain mostly Climbers invited from Korea.

Climbers from other countries were in more distant cities, so the possibility of meeting foreigners on the 20th or 30th floors was higher than meeting them on the 10th floor.

As you climbed higher and the number of people decreased, it seemed people from various countries gathered in one city, like servers being merged.

“I thought I’d earn some Shop Points outside the city, but I’ll do that tomorrow.”

It was not as if I had good night vision, and I had no desire to get ambushed and have another hole punched through my heart or my head split open.

I checked the guidebook and found lodging that was not too cheap.

It was a place that cost 600 Credits, about 60,000 won, per night. Since they also sold cheap meals, I bought two portions of takeout sandwiches and went up to my room.

The room was clean, a three-pyeong studio with a bathroom and a moderately comfortable bed.

I threw off my combat boots and clothes, then lay down on the bed.

“Ah, this is nice.”

My physical body had clearly been newly created when I climbed to the 10th floor, so there was almost no fatigue, but strangely, I felt tired.

It was probably because I was mentally exhausted.

I considered closing my eyes for a moment, but then I put one portion of sandwich into the Inventory and returned to my main body.

---

Time stopped for the clone on the Tower’s 10th floor, and I opened my eyes in my main body.

While taking the sandwich out of the Inventory and eating it, I checked the second slot of ‘Multidimensional Avatar.’

[Warning!]

[This dimension is connected to the first slot in spacetime. If you spend time in this dimension, the avatar in the first slot will also experience the passage of time. Create an avatar in this dimension?]

If I selected Earth for the second slot, time would also pass for the clone in the first slot.

But I had secured lodging and even locked the door, so it would be fine for a little while.

Even if a problem occurred, it was ultimately only a clone, so I could simply make another one.

After finishing the sandwich, I selected Earth.

“This sandwich is good.”

My consciousness headed to the second clone.

---

When I opened my eyes, I was at the familiar entrance of Dong Seoul Terminal.

It was the same place I had visited every time I went on leave, and the same place where I had been invited to the Tower.

I took my smartphone out of my pocket and checked the time. It was close to 1 p.m.

I had spent around 7 hours in the Tower, but in reality, not even 3 hours had passed.

When I checked the ability window, time for my main body had stopped, while time for the 10th-floor clone was flowing quickly.

The higher I climbed in the Tower, the greater the disparity in time would become.

Still, could I have this kind of fascinating experience after leaving the Tower while ensuring my safety?

Well, leaving the Tower did not mean I would lose my ability, so it would not be impossible.

But still, had the old librarian not told me to climb to the upper floors and try to find him?

If I had received a favor, was it not a person’s duty to live up to that expectation?

“That’s all an excuse. Since when have I ever lived by worrying about what other people think?”

Yes, I had always lived however I wanted.

I was the type who could not endure curiosity, and there were many things I wanted to know.

Because of that, I had often been called a weirdo.

Right now, I was simply curious about the Tower, about what was above the Tower, and about what the purpose of the Tower’s existence was.

My conversation with the old librarian had not fully resolved my curiosity.

Rather, it had only made my curiosity grow.

What was magic? I wanted to try learning martial arts too.

I wanted to indulge in the mysteries of this world.

If I had never experienced them from the beginning, that would be one thing. But to tell me to go back now and live a peaceful, monotonous daily life?

Was the Tower trying to shove me into hell?

I was more excited than anything.

Returning to a familiar place made the mystery that had come to me feel real.

Let us erase Earth from Slot 2 and set off on a journey to a new dimension.

I could return to my hometown anytime.

Of course, before that.

[After getting discharged, I decided to stay at a college friend’s place and do an internship in Seoul. I’ll be busy for a while, so it’ll be hard to contact me.]

I should at least text my parents. It was better than suddenly going missing.

As I tried to erase the clone again, my phone rang. It was my mother.

“Hello?”

-Son, are you discharged? But what’s this about an internship all of a sudden?

“Ah, a college friend asked if I’d be interested in an internship, so I applied for fun during my terminal leave, and somehow I got accepted.”

At my words, she answered in a worried voice.

-Still, you just got discharged. Starting an internship right away? You should rest a little.

“It’s a good thing. I need to build up my resume for employment later anyway. And I can’t just leave my friend behind and run.”

-What kind of place is it?

“It’s a place connected to my university. It isn’t a conglomerate, but it’s a pretty solid mid-sized company.”

Being at a prestigious university was useful when telling lies like this.

-All right. Are you coming home before the internship starts?

“No, home is in Jeju. How would I go? It starts tomorrow. It was originally supposed to start yesterday, but since today is my discharge day, they took my situation into account and let me start tomorrow. But from what my seniors said, it seems like I’ll be busy, going to work early in the morning and getting off late at night.”

At my words, my mother said she understood and told me to take care of myself. I laughed, saying it was only a few months, so what hardship could there be, and hung up.

When I looked up at the sky for a moment, the day was clear, and the weather was hot and summery.

“Well, a few months isn’t exactly a lie.”

For me, it might become years, but by Earth’s time, it would probably only be a few months.

Looking at the Tower in the sky, like a shimmer of heat haze, I erased the clone.

---

After returning to my main body, I erased Earth from Slot 2 without hesitation.

Then I thought about which dimension to create a clone in next.

“Huh? The number of dimensions increased?”

The names of all the dimensions were numbers, but the number of searched dimensions had increased.

It was probably because of the ties that had formed through Magic Bullet and Spirit Arts, which I had newly learned.

Or maybe it had formed through my tie with the old librarian?

They were only dimension names, but I could roughly sense through intuition what kind of connection each dimension had formed through.

“Martial arts or magic?”

Spirit Arts required talent and took a long time, so I would put it off until later.

My hesitation did not last long.

“Magic takes 1,000 years to master. If I want to climb the Tower, I need to move my body after all, right?”

To a dimension where I could learn martial arts.

Since I had learned Bluewood Sword, let us go to the dimension most deeply connected to it.

I filled Slot 2 with dimension #33669, which had the deepest connection to Bluewood Sword.

Before creating a clone in Slot 2, I thought about ‘Reincarnation,’ the new ability created when ‘Multidimensional Avatar’ reached level 10.

“Reincarnation, huh. Come to think of it, didn’t they say martial arts are easier to learn the younger you are? But I’m not really going to reincarnate, right?”

No way. It probably just creates something like a birth record in that dimension.

Even if it was medieval China like a martial arts novel, a clone with no connections at all would have restrictions on its actions.

My guess was that when a clone was made, people near the place where it appeared would have memories implanted that I had been living in the same village from before.

It would need to be at least that much to be called a superpower, would it not?

There was no way it would actually reincarnate me as a baby.

That would not be a clone.

“You never know until you try using it.”

Honestly, I was anxious, but I could not endure the curiosity any longer.

I selected Reincarnation.

[Slot 2 - Galactic Murim]

---

“Mother! Stay with us! Mother! Mother!”

“Cardiac defibrillator! Hurry!”

“Charge to 200 joules! Shock! Again!”

The obstetricians on the operating table moved urgently.

However, the woman on the operating table finally breathed her last.

The doctors let out deep, stunned sighs.

“...The baby?”

“Safe. He cried until he tired himself out and fell asleep.”

At the nurse’s answer, the doctors let out sighs of relief.

They had tried to save the mother, but it was fortunate that at least the baby had survived.

“Do not worry. This was a pregnancy where both the mother and baby could have died. It’s a miracle that even the baby survived. We did our best.”

At the lead surgeon’s words, the assistant professor who had assisted him still asked in a worried voice.

“Still, isn’t he a direct-line child of the Cheon Family? And I heard this baby’s grandfather is a candidate for young family head....”

“We recommended termination several times for the mother’s safety. Even though the mother herself understood that she would die if she maintained the pregnancy, she stubbornly insisted on continuing. We have the medical records too, so there should be no problem. Rather, the fact that the baby survived like this is a miracle among miracles, so no matter how high-ranking someone from the Cheon Family is, they cannot blame us.”

As the lead surgeon said that, he thought back to the period from the very early stage of the pregnancy, when the mother had been hospitalized, until now.

At first, the mother had been weakening rapidly, but then, as if she had suddenly encountered a miracle, she began maintaining the bare minimum condition of her body.

Because of that, they had ended up having hope, but in the end, the mother had died on the operating table.

No matter how many table deaths he experienced, he never got used to them.

Even so, the lead surgeon tried to fulfill his duty.

“The guardian of the mother and baby?”

At the lead surgeon’s question, the nurse answered.

“According to the records, the baby’s father is listed as deceased, and the baby’s current legal guardian is his grandfather, Cheon Gyeong-ho.”

“...I see. Then contact Cheon Gyeong-ho, and connect the mother to the funeral hall. What about the mother’s bereaved family?”

“According to the records, she has no paternal family, and on the family registry, she is listed under the Cheon Family clan as a daughter-in-law.”

“It will be a lonely funeral.”

The lead surgeon longed for the cigarettes he had quit after a long time without them.

Dozens of centuries had passed since humanity advanced into space.

It was an era where martial artists rode spaceships and pioneered the stars.

Yet a mere human still remained far from overcoming death.

---

I cried from the extreme cold.

I kept howling, saying “Fuck, it’s so fucking cold!” with my mouth, but a baby’s oral structure could not pronounce such strong and accurate words.

Only after a warm swaddling cloth wrapped around my body could I finally stop saying fuck.

Because I suddenly grew warm, I could not even think of returning to my main body and had no choice but to surrender my consciousness to the sleepiness pouring over me.

When I came to my senses, only then could I understand the situation.

I had really reincarnated.

Tower, you crazy bastard! Just because it’s called Reincarnation, what are you doing actually making me reincarnate?!

Because a newborn’s eyesight was poor immediately after birth, it was extremely difficult to see my surroundings.

On top of that, I was wrapped in a swaddling cloth, so my arms and legs were not free, and I could not move.

No, even without the swaddling cloth, I had no strength to move. A baby’s body was helpless.

I recalled the ‘Third-Person Avatar’ ability and tried using it.

[Cannot be used while inside this avatar’s body.]

At that notification, I returned to my main body.

---

“If it’s impossible while I’m in the clone, that means I can use it when I’m not in the clone, right?”

When I used the Third-Person Avatar ability, an image of myself in a baby’s body appeared in front of me like a video.

While I was in the Third-Person Avatar state, I could see my surroundings clearly.

When I saw the environment around me, I was startled.

“Huh? This isn’t a martial arts world?”

The place I was in was a hospital, and a very modern-looking one at that.