Ch.229[Chapter 229] Beyond the Scene

[This system is a special procedure given to inmates who have been falsely accused or have the potential for rehabilitation.]

[You can go back in time and eliminate the source of your crime.]

[This program is under the system’s management, and you can change your past within the time allowed by the system.]

[Yes. Only within the time you spend in Gachaland.]

…

Sir Dominic felt as if his body was floating.

But in reality, he was sinking.

No, perhaps he was swimming, or rolling.

“…How dizzy.”

Sir Dominic felt disoriented in a space where he had no sense of direction.

Feeling like he might vomit at any moment, Sir Dominic desperately prayed to escape this space quickly.

As if his prayers were answered, Sir Dominic soon passed through that strange space and returned to a somewhat more realistic environment.

With a thud, Sir Dominic tumbled out of a ventilation duct.

As the sound suggested, the floor was made of thin metal, which had become slightly dented from the impact of Sir Dominic’s fall.

Sir Dominic immediately stood up and surveyed his surroundings. He found himself in what appeared to be a temporary passage made of thin metal plates.

It was similar in material to emergency stairs or ladders found on the exterior of buildings.

The passage was precariously suspended between black walls that absorbed light, and it was so narrow that only one person could barely pass through.

Sir Dominic examined the passage more carefully.

The old, rusty passage was swinging on wires without even minimal safety measures, and as it swayed, he could occasionally glimpse what lay below.

Sir Dominic, who happened to look down, fell backward in shock.

“An abyss?”

Sir Dominic leaned against the railing of the passage again to confirm what he had just seen.

Below this precarious passage was an abyss thousands of meters deep, though its exact depth was impossible to determine due to the extremely thick fog.

Sir Dominic then looked up at the sky, but there were black walls standing side by side, likely hundreds of meters high, making the sky appear as just a thin line.

“Where on earth am I? They said it was a relic that could change the past, so why did it send me here?”

Sir Dominic stared blankly at this place, then got up and started walking in a random direction.

He figured that moving was better than staying still.

Currently, Sir Dominic had no means of contacting the outside world, so he decided to keep moving until he found a way to communicate.

Sir Dominic pressed one hand against the black light-absorbing wall and moved forward.

The old, rusty temporary passage began to creak as it hung from thick wires.

How long had he been walking?

Sir Dominic suddenly realized that the sky above, which appeared as a thin line, had turned red.

It must be the evening sunset coloring the sky red.

Thinking this, Sir Dominic continued walking and, surprisingly, found a person.

“…What? I’m the only one on duty today.”

“A human…I see.”

Sir Dominic briefly wondered if the figure before him was actually human.

With a skeletal, emaciated body and sunken eyes like those of a dead fish, he looked almost like an undead.

However, Sir Dominic soon became certain that he was human, for a simple reason.

He was wearing a stretched-out, filthy t-shirt covered in numerous fluorescent energy drink stains and pizza sauce stains that seemed impossible to remove.

From his appearance, Sir Dominic was convinced that he was one of the coders.

And one who had been working overtime for a long time.

“A coder, I see.”

“…You’re not a coder. Are you lost? Keep me company.”

The coder spoke with awkward context, as if he hadn’t properly conversed with people for a long time.

“I came to change the past.”

Sir Dominic got straight to the point.

Working as security for System Industries, he knew that these coders preferred direct communication rather than flowery rhetoric.

“Oh. So you’re not just lost. No, you are lost.”

The coder pulled out a can of beverage with a claw-marked cow printed on it from his pocket.

He downed the contents of the can—which was longer than his face—in one breath, then wiped the fluorescent liquid dripping from his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Follow me. Lucky for you I’m on duty. I’m the best in this field. They just have me managing servers.”

The coder tossed the empty can into the abyss, then picked up a lantern and started moving forward.

Sir Dominic carefully observed the coder as he slowly walked away, then, realizing he had no other options, followed behind him.

“Wait a moment. I need to check something here. I still have work to do.”

The coder leaned his body against the fence of the passage and looked down.

His upper body tilted so far that it seemed he might fall, alarming Sir Dominic who was watching.

However, the coder spoke to Sir Dominic in this precarious position as if he were accustomed to it.

“This is where power is supplied to the server. If this goes down, Gachaland disappears for about 17 seconds. It’s 17 seconds because that’s how long it takes for the backup power to activate.”

The coder pointed down into the abyss with his skeletal finger.

Through the fog, there was a faint thick line visible, which appeared as a line only because it was so far away—in reality, it was hundreds of meters thick.

“The power is safe. Gachaland is safe. Now, let’s go. Next.”

The coder moved on with a grin.

He was still staggering precariously, but he couldn’t stop smirking for some reason.

“Actually, it’s been a really long time since someone came here. Overtime isn’t a job for humans. They say I’ll be relieved after 1738 more hours of work, but the nights here are too long. It’s been so long since a real person, not a phantom, has listened to me.”

After saying this, the coder stopped at another location.

“Here it is, Sir Dominic. Oh, don’t ask how I know your name when you didn’t tell me. The server just whispered it to me. It’s shy and only whispers to me.”

“Server?”

“This one.”

The coder ran his palm over the black wall.

“Everything about Gachaland is in here. In the form of 0s and 1s, ONs and OFFs, Trues and Falses. It’s speaking to me even now. ‘… — … … — … …. . .-.. .–. …. .. — .–. .-.. –..'”

“That means I should work harder. I always hear it in my ear,” said the coder.

Sir Dominic listened carefully to the coder’s words, but he couldn’t hear anything.

Sir Dominic seriously began to wonder if the coder had gone mad from excessive overtime work.

“Shut up. I’m still sane, server. I can work for another 100,000 years.”

…After hearing the coder’s soliloquy, Sir Dominic was about to more seriously conclude that he had gone insane.

“Anyway, this is where you change the past. More precisely, it’s just overwriting the already recorded Log…”

“That’s my specialty,” said the coder as he placed his hand on the black wall.

Then the seemingly seamless black wall opened, revealing its interior.

Sir Dominic suddenly shivered from a cool sensation.

“Oh, sorry. The server generates a lot of heat, so it always needs to be super-cooled. It’ll be a bit chilly.”

The coder apologized to Sir Dominic, having noticed his condition.

Saying he would finish as quickly as possible, the coder hopped over the railing into the opened part of the server, and soon returned to the temporary passage carrying something.

There was a moment when his fingers slipped as he tried to grab the railing with one hand, but the coder climbed up impassively without much reaction.

“Here it is. This is your past, Sir Dominic. Your false accusation is right here.”

Sir Dominic took what the coder handed him.

It was in the shape of a floppy disk, but there was no reaction when Sir Dominic received it.

Sir Dominic looked at the coder.

The coder then explained how to use it with gestures.

“To preview, peek through the hole in the middle of the floppy disk. If you want to just erase that past, throw it down there right now. If you want to rewrite it, place it against your temple. Then everything will be over.”

The coder said, placing his finger against his temple.

“Personally, I recommend overwriting. Opportunities like this aren’t common. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime event for most people.”

“Though it doesn’t really seem that way,” the coder muttered to himself.

The coder touched the open black wall again, and it returned to its original state.

Smooth, without a single gap.

Sir Dominic briefly handled the floppy disk.

And finally, having made up his mind, Sir Dominic placed the floppy disk against his temple.

“Good decision.”

The coder said to Sir Dominic with a grin.

“Don’t worry about time paradoxes or anything. There’s always a backup file. So—”

The coder watched that spot until Sir Dominic completely disappeared.

Sir Dominic’s disappearance meant that his past had changed, and there was no reason for him to exist in this place anymore.

“…Did I see another phantom?”

The coder stared vacantly at the empty space.

No one visited this massive server that supported Gachaland today either.

Except for one coder working overtime.