Theatrical Regression Life

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“….”

“I wasn’t the only one. There were people who got devoured together like this.”

Like now, together.

“… Devoured, you say.”

In that brief utterance, Jung Inho read a faint sadness that he couldn’t grasp.

Director Lee Jaehun, who had shed one layer of expression, looked as weathered and worn as an old ruin. He couldn’t be measured by the span of human arms, and though he had countless branches to cover the sky, he resembled a tree that had been left in ruins for a long time, eventually exhausting its lifespan but never collapsing.

“There were quite a few… They all ended up dead.”

“….”

“Died being killed by monsters while not getting their act together, died falling behind because they couldn’t see ahead, died clutching each other’s throats because they lost their minds a few times…”

Yet, when Director Lee Jaehun spoke of death, he was as mechanical as ever.

As calm as well-programmed 0s and 1s determining predetermined values, there was a chilling lack of even a small hint of sadness, such as when he uttered the phrase ‘devoured’. It was the same chill you would feel from a silvery elevator tinged with ash or a lump of iron.

Stopping his speech on a short line, Director Lee Jaehun soon wore a round smile.

“In the end, I’m the only one left.”

Certainly, it was a laugh that was never thought to suit him.

But his smile was like that of a child drawing on paper. It was the work of a child whose drawing skills hadn’t fully developed yet, but who wanted to create a neat and pretty picture.

Amateurish, but fitting.

“….”

It was a smile that painfully suited the one who survived alone.

“Surely you don’t want to hear my lament.”

“I’m curious though.”

“Inho-ssi, you really can’t tell a joke, can you?”

“Understood.”

Director Lee Jaehun found it extremely strange that I was pouring human interest onto him. It was as if such a thing shouldn’t happen in this world, as if he had never been in such a situation even once. It was like speaking as someone who deems it impossible because they have no knowledge of it happening at all.

That couldn’t be true.

“… If it’s not a joke?”

“I would find it quite unpleasant.”

“….”

“I don’t have any good memories of this place. It’s disgusting to look at, and just breathing here makes me nauseous… That kind of place.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I have nothing to complain about.”

Because it felt genuinely sincere, Jung Inho blinked.

“… Aren’t you sad?”

“I was sad.”

“You must be in pain.”

“I am, but.”

Director Lee Jaehun interjected.

“Just to that extent.”

“….”

For just a moment, Jung Inho pondered what ‘just to that extent’ meant. It was only enough to pass through his mind without holding much significance.

Turning his gaze to the faint and dull noise, Director Lee Jaehun was scratching his neck as if trying to claw something out.

“… You might want to stop that.”

In that moment, Jung Inho recalled the chilling air settling around him.

“….”

“I said stop scratching your neck.”

“….Ah.”

Director Lee Jaehun let out a small sigh, as if just now realizing his own condition.

He briefly looked at the hand he had raised hesitantly, then clasped both hands on his knees. Throughout the entire process, Director Lee Jaehun continued to wear a round smile.

He quipped as if it were a joke.

“My throat itches.”

“…Is that also a joke?”

“There’s no need for jokes.”

“…”.

He completely wiped away the smile only after Jung Inho glanced at the corners of his mouth. Despite the firm and unnatural demeanor, like a machine inputting commands, Jung Inho eventually turned his gaze to Dr. Ha Sungyoon.

The doctor, sighing at the gaze, got up from his seat and approached Director Lee Jaehun.

“May I take a look at your throat?”

“Is it necessary?”

“At least for you, Director.”

“Well…”

He remained silent.

He let out a laugh as if he had heard an amusing story but didn’t stop the doctor’s touch. Jung Inho recalled the moment just before he got up, when he seemed to convulse, groan, scratch his throat, and contort his body, only to collapse limply once pressed by the hand.

Jung Inho couldn’t hide his bewilderment at the sight of such a situation, which he seemed to be witnessing for the first time. Such memories gnawed at his brain.

Director Lee Jaehun met Jung Inho’s gaze and soon drew another round smile.

“But… aren’t you curious about something?”

To that, Jung Inho felt a brief sense of enlightenment.

“…What is it?”

“How to get out of here.”

“….”

“You must be curious, like everyone else.”

It was a valid point.

‘If Director Lee Jaehun is truly a survivor….’

Regardless, it meant that there was a way to escape from the underworld.

So far, Director Lee Jaehun had been in reality, not the underworld. Since other colleagues from the company, including Jung Inho, remembered that time, there was a high probability that Director Lee Jaehun, the sole survivor, knew how to escape this world.

“But.”

On the other hand, I also had this thought.

He slowly opened his mouth.

“…Is that a complete escape?”

“….”

“Once you leave, is it over for good?”

Well, isn’t Director Lee Jaehun someone who was devoured again?

In response to that question, the other party calmly closed his mouth. It wasn’t a matter of being embarrassed or awkward to think of something to say, but rather a posture resembling that of a spectator watching and contemplating a play.

In the end, Director Lee Jaehun wiped the smile off his lips.

“That’s not likely.”

However, his gaze remained unchanged.

* * *

To get straight to the point, you can escape.

‘At least for now.’

Recalling the description from the novel, he nodded inwardly.

If there was no way to escape from the underworld in the first place, it would cause problems for the setting he had built up so far. Since he knew from the beginning that escape was possible, it was entirely possible to actually escape from the underworld.

The problem was that it wasn’t a complete escape.

“Even if you escape once, you’ll eventually be drawn back. Of course, this is from my own experience, but mostly.”

“…Drawn back?”

“Moreover, there are no rules. If you’re unlucky, you could be devoured again the very next day, or if you’re lucky, you could last a few years. Everything coming and going varies from person to person.”

“What exactly do you mean by ‘varies from person to person’?”

“We know that people fall into this place roughly once a year. But it’s not certain…”

“….”

“We came here on March 1st, but there are also people who come in January or February. And it’s not like I’m only drawn in on March 1st… Personally, I think there are groups treated together.”

“…Groups…”

“Former comrades who were devoured together are put in together again on the same day. When they all die, they join with other people on another day. So sometimes they meet different groups, but… since it’s an average on a yearly basis, it’s not certain when or how it will happen. Common sense doesn’t apply here.”

“…So there are no definite rules?”

“That people come in once a year? That’s probably just treated as one group, so if they’re devoured again, they come in together. Other than that… there are no set days for survivors coming in and out. And usually, before they can escape, a group is wiped out.”

“….”

“Isn’t it scary?”

Asking so, Lee Jaehun tried not to put mockery in his face and voice. It was to show a nonchalant response almost irritating to the questioner, as if asking if they were scared.

“You’ll live in fear for the rest of your life. If you weren’t taken this year, then next year, if you weren’t taken today, then tomorrow. Or in an hour…”

“…Is that how you lived?”

What was the intention behind asking that?

As the protagonist’s voice was calm like Lee Jaehun’s, he couldn’t figure out the intent behind the question. Since Jung Inho’s appearance remained unchanged as usual, it was unclear whether the intent was sympathy, astonishment, or analysis.

Considering it a somewhat meaningless response, Lee Jaehun replied lightly.

“That’s how I lived.”

Of course, it was a lie.

‘Living like that? Yeah right, I lived while drowning in alcohol.’

Until he recalled his past life, Lee Jaehun’s life was quite rich. Of course, if he hadn’t recalled his past life, he would have died soon after being devoured in the underworld, but sometimes it’s easier to die without knowing.

Anyway, Lee Jaehun up until now truly lived a happy and prosperous life, and naturally, he was never devoured in the underworld.

If I hadn’t read that novel, I wouldn’t have been able to come up with the setting.’

But he couldn’t say that truthfully, so he chose his words carefully.

“Anyway, the method to escape, albeit incomplete, is simple.”

“…What is it?”

“You have to kill at least one designated monster.”

The protagonist looked at Lee Jaehun with wide eyes.

“…What’s the criteria? Who decided that?”

For someone suddenly hit with such confusing information, he was sharp.

It was indeed a quick analysis befitting the protagonist of this world, and an accurate judgment. He was both questioning the truth of Lee Jaehun’s words and asking about the origin of the underworld.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t provide an answer to this question.

“There’s no criteria. And I don’t know who decided.”

“Then how do you find this monster?”

“There are no tricks. You just have to kill a sin and go.”

With this issue, the protagonist’s assistant in the novel’s mindset completely collapses.

As the detective commits su*cide and survivors die one after another, the protagonist and his group, who escaped from the park before, go to the hospital for treatment and come out traumatized by the building. It was almost natural for someone to be killed or nearly killed every time they entered the building.

Realizing the horror of the building, the protagonist’s group heads back to the park, where the green monsters appear again and attack them. The green monster, able to distinguish life forms by blood, was waiting for the protagonist’s group to return.

There, the protagonist manages to somehow completely kill the green monster at the cost of his own sacrifice.

‘I didn’t have enough power to physically crush the monster, but… I was able to delay it for three days by preventing it from entering the lake.’

‘The problem is that the protagonist became irreversibly injured from that battle.’

The rather gruesome description from that time suddenly came to mind.

Both legs twisted, one arm torn off. Damage to the eye from teeth-covered ivy led to loss of vision, and burns from the fire caused vocal cords to be damaged and hands to be deformed. Even with a professional doctor, the protagonist’s group, already exhausted to the point of being unable to see their hands, couldn’t have saved him.

‘Even then, he couldn’t die right away.’

Being the protagonist of this world, whether it be by chance or design, Jung Inho had a remarkable mental fortitude, as resilient as his life. Even though it wouldn’t be strange for him to die immediately, or even a relief in some ways, the protagonist held on until evening without dying.

And the next morning, he woke up in his studio apartment.

‘In perfect condition.’

In reality, if this description hadn’t existed, even if it were Lee Jaehun, he wouldn’t have gone to such lengths. He knew that once you escaped the underworld, your body would return to its original state, so he had done it just to test the waters.

Anyway, the protagonist gets the simple information that ‘if you kill a monster, you can return to the original world.’ After being dragged back into the underworld, he recalls this proposition and starts killing various monsters. As a result, he learns that there is a specific monster in the underworld that can allow all survivors to escape.

The process of doing so was so frustrating and gruesome that he didn’t want to recall or remember it. However, he vividly remembered the plight of the office worker who had to go to work repeatedly, even as his mind was dying.

‘It really gave me the chills.’

And, in fact, even if he were to return to reality like that…

“….”

Lee Jaehun quietly swallowed his thoughts.

‘Now’s not the time to use this information.’

Given how much more complicated the protagonist’s mind must have become with the breadcrumbs already being picked up and new information being introduced, it wasn’t the right time to introduce something else. New information meant new worries, so it wasn’t the appropriate time to disclose anything further.

Instead, he decided to elaborate more on the information he had already provided. It was information that Lee Jaehun, the only survivor in the underworld, would likely know.

“Well, it’s not like there are no criteria at all.”

“Is that fortunate?”

“Most of those monsters are strong enough to prepare for losing a limb or two.”

“That doesn’t sound fortunate.”

Although the protagonist spoke with a decisive and earnest voice, the complexity in his darkened eyes revealed his true feelings.

Finding it amusing, Lee Jaehun spoke up.

“Isn’t it better than being buried headfirst in the ground?”

You know, you.

‘Even though you don’t know what happened to yourself in the original.’

Although Lee Jaehun didn’t remember every detail of the novel, he knew enough to understand how the protagonist had been affected by the information he had just revealed. After all, in a world already fraught with hardship, would they have added adult content to this novel?

‘Having gone through what the protagonist did just to get a piece of information like ‘there’s a monster that can temporarily send you back to reality,’ and ‘killing that monster can bring you back to reality for a while,’ thinking about the state of mind the protagonist must have been in, the reaction I’m seeing from Jung Inho right now is both ironic and amusing.’

‘Honestly, that guy should be the one getting his head smashed in first.’

How many times had he sacrificed himself to help the protagonist’s mental state? Even now, the information he provided was invaluable, something the protagonist had discovered firsthand at great cost.

They should be grateful for being told, not panicking already. It’s too funny…

“……”

“……”

…Aren’t they?

“……?”

Lee Jaehun was taken aback.

The protagonist and the doctor were staring at him oddly. Frankly, it wasn’t the first time he’d received such looks, but it only made the situation more complicated.

Trying to forget about the setting and curse, he asked with patience, “What is it?”

“Oh, sorry, it’s nothing.”

What’s with these compassionate gazes right now?

It’s perplexing.

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