Chapter 274 - The One Difference

# Ruined World

Under the red sky of that place, Stardust was looking with trembling eyes at a woman who had the same blonde hair as herself.

"Uh..."

That woman with slightly duller blonde hair than her own, looking much more mature, staring at her with a cold expression...

Probably, this world's version of herself. The future Stardust.

...While she was flustered, having never imagined she would accidentally encounter herself like this.

The woman who had been quietly observing her opened her mouth, seemingly not surprised at all.

"...A remnant of an illusion realm monster? I thought I'd cleared this entire area... Guess not."

After muttering quietly as if talking to herself, this world's version of herself extended her arm and clenched her fist.

Then.

Whoooosh-

Around her hand and arm, tremendous energy glowing with intense yellow light began to envelop her arm like a gauntlet.

She looked ready to attack at any moment.

Startled by this, Stardust hastily opened her mouth.

"W-wait a moment! I'm not a monster or anything."

"Hmm...?"

Still with tired eyes, the future self looking up at her from atop a pile of rubble, her arm emitting light.

Stardust, who had been flying in the air in front of her, quickly spoke before she could suddenly attack.

Though she didn't understand the situation, she decided to try explaining calmly.

"I'm... you from another world! I don't want to fight, I just..."

As she began her explanation, this world's Stardust paused her attack and quietly stood listening to what she had to say.

...So Stardust earnestly explained her current situation. Somehow she had fallen into something like a dimensional gate and ended up in this world. That kind of story.

"..."

And as she carefully observed this world's version of herself listening to the story.

Looking more mature than her current self due to her age, with a somewhat tired yet sharp impression, she had a dangerous aura about her.

She seemed clearly older than her current self, looking almost like a stranger, and because of this, Stardust found herself unconsciously speaking formally.

"...So that's how I ended up here when I opened my eyes."

And so her explanation ended.

This future world's Stardust, who had been quietly listening to her words with dull eyes until now, didn't seem particularly interested in what she had said.

However.

"...Haha. That's interesting."

"You look exactly like my old self."

She said with a somewhat bitter expression.

While Stardust was still confused by those words, the other woman turned her head and quietly spoke.

"...Another dimension, huh. No, that can't be. That's impossible."

"Still, whatever you are, I'll accept it for now. There's nothing else to do in this ended place anyway..."

Since it won't have any effect on causality.

After muttering that, she turned her head again and just stared blankly at the horizon like before.

Her attitude seemed as if she had little interest in Stardust.

...For a moment, Stardust wondered if she was still being treated as a hallucination, but she decided to be grateful that at least the woman wasn't attacking anymore and had agreed to accept her for now.

Under the red sky.

A strange moment of facing another self who looked exactly like her but was clearly different.

Though it was becoming increasingly unclear what was happening or if this was even reality.

Stardust looked behind her and decided to ask what she was most curious about first.

"Um..."

"Speak comfortably."

"Oh... okay. So what happened to this place...?"

Yes.

She asked what she was most curious about first.

Why was everything in ruins, and why were there no people to be seen? Why was everything around them collapsed?

And the answer came back very matter-of-factly.

"It was destroyed."

"....."

As expected.

Though she had anticipated it, hearing it directly was still shocking.

"...Why?"

Looking at the desolate surroundings with trembling eyes, she asked, and after a moment of silence, her other self began to mutter with a tired expression.

"....We won in the end, but since the world ended, I guess we didn't really win. To answer your question... well. Maybe it was destined to end like this from the beginning."

She spoke in a tired voice, staring blankly into space.

"There were too many. Villains, just too many of them. The enemies were strong and numerous, but the number of heroes to face them was woefully insufficient..."

As if reminiscing about the past, she continued to mutter.

"We were barely maintaining some kind of balance. But when the Han-Eun Group attacked Seoul with weapons and destroyed half the capital, that's when the collapse began..."

And so this other Stardust continued speaking calmly, either to herself or perhaps just recounting her memories.

The story of Seoul collapsing due to invasions by all sorts of villains, and how the capital was moved to Busan. Then how they rebuilt the ruined downtown Seoul and created New Seoul, only for that too to fall to the villains.

And Stardust listened quietly to the story of this future self. No, this world's version of herself. With a suddenly dizzy head, she busily compared the path this world had taken with her own.

'...The overall flow is similar. To my past.'

The names of the villains, the terror they caused, and the timing—almost everything was exactly the same.

The only difference was that while her world had managed to prevent these attacks with minimal casualties, this world had suffered significant damage from each one.

Unlike her, who had stopped the Moon Priestess incident and the Han-Eun Group incident, this world had failed to prevent them.

And villains that had been easily dealt with in her world had become heinous criminals in this one.

...And all these differences were tied to a single individual.

Someone who couldn't be found anywhere in this world.

Stardust's arch-enemy and A-class villain. The leader of a villain group who always faced her with a smiling face.

Yes.

Egostic.

The biggest difference between this world and her own was that he was nowhere to be seen here.

That's why this was what Stardust was most curious about.

And so, she had to ask this first.

"...And then the terror caused by the Moon Cult Leader accelerated the world's destruction. Gates appeared all over the Earth, and those monsters kept coming into this world for years. Cities were destroyed, and people all lived hidden underground. Not just our country, but almost every nation..."

"Wait..."

"...?"

She interrupted this world's self who had been calmly explaining, while holding her head.

...Her head had been strangely aching and her stomach churning for a while now. But she had to ask this for certain.

About his existence, which seemed fundamentally related to all of this.

So Stardust took a quiet breath and asked her.

"Do you know someone called Egostic?"

Though he wasn't in the records, just in case. The person before her was the same Shin Ha-ru, Stardust, as herself. And if it was her, she couldn't possibly not know him.

She asked with vague hope.

And the answer that came back was.

"...No? Who's that?"

As if asking what nonsense she was talking about, she answered with a frown.

And only after hearing that answer.

Stardust finally realized.

The biggest difference between the world she lived in and this world.

It was that...

Egostic didn't exist in this world.

"...Just a moment."

Feeling momentarily dizzy, she asked her future self to excuse her and leaned against a pile of bricks that looked like rocks.

Yes.

Egostic didn't exist in this world. It seemed certain from what her other self had just said.

And probably, as she guessed.

That one difference had changed the course of the world.

...The massive weapon from the Han-Eun Group that Egostic had seized—in this world, no one had stopped it, and it had destroyed nearly half of Seoul.

Death Knight, who would have been by Egostic's side, had fallen into someone else's hands and become a weapon that massacred civilians.

And the Moon Priestess's terror, which Egostic had interrupted and stopped by recruiting her as an ally—in this world, no one had been able to stop it, and it had destroyed all of Seoul before the priestess was finally killed by this world's version of herself. As a result, the capital was moved to Busan, and New Seoul was built on the ruins.

Besides them, Rhino, Weapon Master, Scream Maker... those whom he had personally restrained had survived in this world and acted openly as murderers who killed hundreds.

The White Witch, South Silver, Atlas, and others whom he had recruited as allies—in this world without him, they had nearly led the country to ruin.

In other words, the reason her world was peaceful unlike this one was just one thing.

"...Because of Egostic?"

As she leaned against the railing with an increasingly dizzy head.

"Hey... you, wait."

This world's Stardust, who had been quietly watching her, suddenly stiffened her face and asked.

"What's happening to your body?"

"Huh? My body is..."

Looking down at herself, Stardust was shocked.

Parts of her body were flickering and distorting strangely, like a TV screen with static.

As if another dimension was pulling her in.

"Huh...? What's happening?"

When Stardust, seeing her own body like this, finally realized this was the cause of her dizziness.

"...Wait. Are you perhaps... Ah. So that's what it was. Haha."

Just as this world's version of herself said that while watching her.

Once again, white light surrounded her body, just like when she first entered the dimensional gate.

"...I don't know... what's... probably, fut... you said... to him..."

With that final glimpse of this world's version of herself, still with an expressionless face but wearing a slight smile.

Stardust. Her consciousness fell back into a space that felt like a dizzy universe.

***

At the same time Stardust was meeting and talking with her other-world self.

"Aaaaargh."

I, who had chased after Stardust when she disappeared through a strange dimensional gate caused by the Moon Cult Leader, was swimming through a strange space of consciousness.

Egostic save me.