I Made a Game Featuring Constellations - Chapter 14



The Last Ostinato

Orpheus, having gained the power of the Abyss, infiltrated the [Archive].

Avoiding the director’s eyes, he found the world containing his and Kate’s story and sneaked in.

His power as the Destroyer was immense, but the homogeneity created by the world he originated from allowed him to evade the director’s gaze.

The power of the Abyss slowly and steadily eroded the story, completely altering it.

Suddenly, beings from another world, the Abyssal monsters, invaded the world, and the war that should have occurred between Kalliyuga and Bilgamesh did not happen.

As humanity fled to the underground sanctuary from the Abyss, Ian and Kate from the other world could be together without the conflict of their families.

“It’s done!”

Orpheus cheered.

He had finally succeeded.

Kate found a world where she was safe, a world where she could be saved.

If this world were to be realized in the universe, she would come back to life.

But not everything went as planned.

Crack

There was no time to react.

A monster from the abyss bit off the saint’s head.

The abyss within Orpheus smiled faintly.

The abyss never intended to save her from the beginning.

“Ahhh!”

Orpheus screamed and reset the story.

The world containing his and the saint’s story returned to the past.

Orpheus made some changes this time to prevent the monsters from approaching the saint.

But this time, the saint came to the monsters and died.

Reset again.

He killed all the monsters before the saint arrived, but this time a traitor from the sanctuary killed the saint.

Reset again.

He killed the monsters and the traitor from the sanctuary, but then an internal conflict arose within the sanctuary, and the saint died in the process of trying to stop it.

Reset again.

Reset again.

Reset again.

Reset again.

Reset again.

.

.

.

.

No matter what he did, the result was the same.

No matter what he did, she died.

No matter what you do, the result does not change.

As long as my will resides in your existence, your survival leads to her death.

And I will protect your life.

The abyss seemed to mock him.

Reset again

Reset again

Reset again.

He had already forgotten whether it was the thousandth or ten thousandth time.

Knowing that if he gave up like this, she could never return, knowing that this was the only way, he kept repeating.

[As long as you can live, I can do anything.]

[As long as you can be happy, it doesn’t matter what happens to me.]

[So I’ll keep going.]

[The performance for you.]

[To erase myself, the dissonance to your existence]

[An endlessly repeating ostinato.]

* * *

He was real.

Not a fake like me, but a true regressor.

A regressor who could endure infinite regressions and despair to save the woman he loved.

The Crown Prince advanced with resolute determination.

Facing all the illusions, the Crown Prince finally reached the end of the path.

The core of Orpheus, located in the deepest part of the mental world.

In front of it stood Orpheus, eroded by the abyss.

“Orpheus.”

“[Archive], is it?”

His voice, tainted black, was no longer Orpheus’s.

A fragment implanted by the abyss within Orpheus.

A part of the vast abyss and the true enemy of the [Archive].

The Crown Prince raised his sword.

As he charged at the abyssal Orpheus, the battle began.

Hundreds of Orpheus’s mechanical arms shot towards the Crown Prince.

The Crown Prince swung his sword, imbued with various essences, cutting down the mechanical arms.

Despite the numerous mechanical arms, he advanced forward and slashed his sword towards Orpheus.

Then, a giant golem’s arm rose from the ground and blocked the attack.

Boom

Following the first golem, hundreds of golems appeared.

“Haahhh!”

The Crown Prince, burning his entire body, charged forward, unleashing the power of a warrior.

But it was impossible to deal with the sheer number of golems and the Abyss at the same time.

Bang!

As the golem’s arm struck the Crown Prince, he vomited blood and collapsed.

When the Abyss, mocking him, swung its arm, the golems threw themselves at him.

‘…Is this the end?’

He wanted to cut down the Abyss.

Through Orpheus’s vision, he had seen all the atrocities committed by the Abyss, and he wanted to fulfill his wish… but it seemed impossible.

At the moment when the Crown Prince, in the forced defeat event, lowered his head in resignation,

“Raise your head, provisional director.”

Orpheus’s spirit appeared and blocked the golems.

“After all the recognition I gave you, what are you doing?”

“…Orpheus?”

The Abyss was astonished by his sudden appearance.

“How, how are you… here!”

Orpheus twisted his lips.

“How many times do you think I’ve repeated this world?”

An opportunity sought through endless cycles of return.

Now was the time for counterattack.

Orpheus’s hand entered the prince.

“You are the new melody to vary my ostinato. The final tune to complete my performance, cutting through the flawed and ancient melody of Orpheus.”

Orpheus’s soul overlapped with the prince’s, moving his body.

“I’ll borrow your body for a moment.”

Orpheus, in the prince’s body, radiated brilliant light and charged forward.

“Get lost! I told you not to come!”

Countless minions of Abyssal Orpheus sprang out, blocking his path, but he crushed everything in his way.

The sword that had cut down all the golems and elder guardians reached the Abyss.

“Argh! How dare you! A mere mortal!”

Abyssal Orpheus clutched his severed arm and retreated.

He tried to gather power to unleash his true strength, but

“That won’t do.”

Orpheus’s golden restriction blocked it.

A constraint to prevent him from abandoning his own flesh.

“This is absurd!”

It applied even to the Abyss that had taken Orpheus’s body.

The fragments of the abyss were trapped in Orpheus’s body, unable to return to their original form.

[Once a soul leaves a human body, it is impossible to bring it back.]

“How dare! How dare a mere mortal defy me!”

The abyss raged, spewing mechanical devices from Orpheus’s body.

Deadly attacks poured in, but Orpheus broke through them all with his sword.

A laser severed his right arm, and a mechanical arm crushed his left.

His abdomen was split open, his internal organs spilling out, but he did not stop.

[I repeated the world to create a world where she could be revived.]

“Don’t come! I said don’t come! Ugh!”

Finally, his sword pierced through Orpheus’s body, breaking through the barrage of lasers and mechanical arms.

[The curse the abyss placed on me is that as long as I exist, she will face eternal repeated deaths.]

“I can’t… die like this…”

As Orpheus’s body turned to dust and disappeared, the fragments of the abyss within him also vanished.

[Therefore, I cut out the dissonance that is me and complete the performance for her.]

Bang!

As the core was destroyed, the surrounding black space began to collapse.

The prince felt Orpheus’s soul, which had entered him, fading away.

[The final ostinato for her.]

Finally, as every last trace of his soul disappeared, the prince awoke from the mental world in the sanctuary.

With the saint who remained in the now whole world, free of the abyss’s influence.

“Goodbye, my frog prince…”

The eternal dissonance of the performance ended, and the sky on the ground became incomparably clear and clean.

* * *

From noble mtl dot com

“Well done, Zeol.”

The director appeared in front of the crown prince who had returned to the [Archive].

“I’m sorry. I really didn’t expect it. That the Melsa Star would infiltrate.”

The crown prince just stood there blankly.

“Orpheus. That is, Ian Kalliu, he had come to see me before. He wanted me to save a woman named Kate.”

The director continued speaking, but it didn’t reach the crown prince’s ears.

“To think he would manage to repeat infinite regressions while containing the abyss. And maintain his sanity while doing so.”

The director marveled.

“Ian Kalliu. His name might go down in history. As the first being to land a blow on the abyss.”

The director picked up a book.

“The problem is that the story got distorted in the process. What should we do? The person who should have died is alive, and the person who should be alive has perished.”

[Should we kill the saint?]

The crown prince’s eyes widened at the director’s words.

“No.”

The crown prince glared at the director.

“I will not allow it.”

The determination not to let it slide if the book was touched even a little flowed.

“……Really?”

Thud

The director closed the book and chuckled.

“If that’s your will, then so be it. But since the story has been altered, I’ll give you a score of 9 on the test.”

The director put down the book and left.

The crown prince stared at the book lying on the desk.

He could see the illusion floating above it.

An illusion of a tomboyish girl and a boy with slicked-back hair, awkwardly dressed up, dancing to the never-ending first melody.