The Impact of the Author's Intervention on a Blank Page - Chapter 16
If this had been a normal dimensional transfer situation, he could have aimed for stat growth through training, using the system to cure his illness and gain abilities. But that was impossible now. Both the contract terms assigning his role and his remaining lifespan of less than two years made sure of that.
Well, even setting aside the contract and lifespan, his body could barely walk a single step, let alone train. It was simply impossible.
The only fortunate thing was that he could see his status window, but even that was infuriating. All his previous stats were grayed out with [Sealed] tags attached. Moreover, the only information about his current state showed maddening values like [Strength: 1], [Stamina: 0.4].
‘Stamina 0.4? Decimal points are even possible?’
Looking at this made him feel like a household head who’d woken up to find foreclosure notices on everything he owned.
Why were they all like this – the Operator, Abraxas, and all those self-serving gods from other stars?
There were quite a few other problems too.
Besides his physical condition, the biggest current issue was that the capital of the Izatrix Duchy where they were located was far from the central location where the events of “Dawn is Night’s Prayer” took place.
Ja-hyun recalled the unfinished original work he’d checked before coming here, but nothing changed. They had been relegated to extras in a region barely mentioned in the original story.
‘Come on, dropping us in the middle of this snowy wasteland?’
At this point, he wasn’t even angry anymore. His mind was filled only with thoughts of squeezing triple the promised points from the Operator using the difficulty level as leverage once this was all over.
***
<Nightmare>
The biggest reason Ja-hyun accepted the Operator’s contract was, inevitably, brother Kyung-woo. His brother had started showing strange symptoms over the past few months.
At first, he’d just felt an inexplicable sense of foreboding. It hadn’t been long since he’d discovered what that foreboding meant.
“Of course, I didn’t think brother was strange from the beginning.”
Ja-hyun tended to be generally lenient in viewing his brother’s actions and words. Besides, lately everything his brother did looked cute to him, making it even harder to notice anything odd.
While mulling over this alone, Ja-hyun had called upon someone he could comfortably confide in. This was, of course, before accepting the contract.
= So my dear friend, my great contractor. What exactly was strange? Please, stop beating around the bush and get to the point…. =
The fire dragon was whining in a bored tone while sprawled across the table. Seems it had already finished the 1L large drink he’d given it earlier.
What was it… Choco-something? Cookie-something smoothie… something like that. Either way, for a divine beast, it sure had quite the appetite.
The fire dragon before him was a divine beast he had contracted in his original world. While its true form was a massive dragon like those in oriental paintings, it usually stayed in a smaller form. Judging by its speech and behavior, it looked like a useless salamander, though it was actually quite a capable sidekick in its own way.
Lately though, it has picked up the habit of wearing small human clothes from who knows where. With its ridiculous appearance and occasional clueless remarks about the human realm, its already low status kept dropping further.
Despite all that, it made for a decent conversation partner – there weren’t many who knew the details of his relationship with his brother, and it was honest and fond of him. Plus, it wasn’t the type to go around gossiping about what he said, which was another point in its favor.
Ja-hyun clasped his hands together on the table, gripping them tightly.
“Brother…”
After hesitating for a while, Ja-hyun began speaking slowly in a serious tone.
“When brother wakes up… if I’m not beside him, he goes crazy.”
The reaction was explosive.
= Ugh! May I vomit up the drink I just had, my contractor? =
The fire dragon wore an expression like it had just eaten dog excrement. It looked like its ears were rotting from hearing a crazy couple’s nauseating drama firsthand. How fascinating that a reptile’s facial muscles could make such an expression.
= Aaack! Le-let go! Urgh, I meant I drank too many sweet drinks. Uwaaak! Kyaaak! =
