Chapter 150. The Person I Am (2)
“This should be far enough that idiot won’t follow us.”
No. 7 muttered as she finally let go of Yukgap, whom she had dragged all the way there.
They were now in a secluded corner of the base.
Thanks to the sudden blackout, the entire area was dark, making it perfect for a private conversation.
“I don’t know what happened, but at least the darkness means we can talk alone.”
Yukgap remained silent.
“...”
“How long are you planning to keep your mouth shut?”
“You know I’m not exactly patient.”
Yukgap finally answered in a barely audible voice.
“You should’ve just let me die.”
“I told you!”
“I’m the one who gets to kill you!”
No. 7 shouted, irritated by his lifeless attitude.
Yukgap answered like a man already half-dead.
“Then kill me now.”
“Hah!”
“Are you kidding me?”
“You’re going to die this pathetically after fighting so desperately last time?”
This was the same man who had even used that horrifying thing called kimchi to stop her.
Hearing him talk like this now was so absurd that their past struggle almost felt ridiculous.
“Everything feels meaningless now.”
“It was all stupid.”
Yukgap muttered with empty eyes.
There was no trace of life in him.
For some reason, the sight bothered No. 7.
She frowned and asked,
“Then what about the blonde you brought here?”
“You mean Victoria?”
The moment Victoria came up, Yukgap’s voice rose in surprise.
No. 7 answered sarcastically,
“Yeah.”
“That stupid-looking blonde.”
“Is she meaningless to you too?”
Yukgap could not answer.
“That’s not...”
“Victoria is... Victoria is...”
“See?”
“Your face changes the second I mention her.”
“...”
“And here I am after putting all this effort into my makeup and clothes.”
She felt bitter.
He had not even looked at her properly, yet the moment Victoria’s name came up, his expression changed.
Hadn’t he said there was nothing between him and Victoria?
Then what was this reaction supposed to mean?
“There you are.”
A familiar voice came from nearby.
It was No. 8.
Victoria was standing beside him, still wearing an elaborate princess dress.
The moment she saw Yukgap, she called out happily.
“Yukgap!”
Yukgap immediately looked her over in alarm.
“Victoria?”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Alpha brought me back.”
“I heard you were the one who brought me here?”
Apparently, Alpha had kept her promise.
Yukgap let out a breath of relief and looked Victoria up and down.
Everything seemed fine.
Except for one strange thing.
“Why are you dressed like that?”
Victoria shrugged.
“It’s a long story.”
“I was playing princess.”
No. 7 also looked caught off guard by the sudden arrival of No. 8 and Victoria.
“How did you two find us?”
“My night vision is rather good.”
No. 8 answered casually.
Apparently, he had used his surveillance abilities to locate them.
Victoria hurriedly turned toward Yukgap.
“I don’t know exactly what happened, but the facility seems to have lost power.”
“Let’s escape while we still can!”
Yukgap paused.
Then slowly shook his head.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
Victoria stared at him in confusion.
Yukgap struggled to force out words tangled with countless emotions.
“Because I’m fake.”
Then, as if vomiting out everything he had been holding inside, he continued.
“It was all fake!”
“Me.”
“My family.”
“My longing.”
“My memories.”
“Even the fact that I ended up at Restaurant Shelley and met you...”
“All of it...”
“All of it was fake!”
“A carefully manufactured lie!”
From the very beginning, nothing had truly belonged to him.
Every memory he thought was his had belonged to his original, Kim Changi.
Even his connection with Victoria had been created through Alpha’s precise manipulation.
He had simply been a naive imitation who had mistaken all of it for his own life.
“I didn’t do anything by my own will.”
“Maybe even standing here and talking to you right now is part of someone else’s plan.”
Yukgap broke down sobbing and clutched his head.
Then he finally forced himself to swallow the truth he had desperately tried to deny.
“Victoria, there was never any place for me outside.”
“I’m a weapon.”
“A weapon made by Abraxas!”
Victoria quietly watched him.
Then she spoke slowly and carefully.
“Doctor Reuben told me how the Archons were created.”
Yukgap looked up in shock.
“Really?”
Victoria nodded.
“...Yeah.”
So she already knew.
Yukgap could not say anything for a moment.
Then he gave a bitter, self-mocking laugh.
“Don’t you find me disgusting?”
“A thing pretending to be human even though I’m not?”
His cheeks were already soaked with tears.
Victoria remained silent for a while.
Then she finally spoke.
“You already know how I was made too.”
“So how could someone like me call you disgusting?”
Yukgap faltered.
Robert had told him how Victoria had been created and about the Philosopher’s Stone in her chest.
“Th-That’s...”
“The only part of this body that belonged to the original Victoria Frankenstein is my brain.”
“The rest was made by stitching together corpses from other women.”
Victoria extended one arm.
Dark stitching scars remained clearly visible across it.
“If my arm gets replaced, what happens to me?”
“What if my legs are replaced?”
“My heart?”
“If only my brain is transplanted into another body, can that still be called me?”
“And if a different brain were placed inside this body, would that person really be Victoria Frankenstein?”
Yukgap could not understand what she was trying to say.
“What are you getting at?”
“There was never a predetermined answer in the first place.”
“What defines who you are isn’t how you were made.”
“It’s how you see yourself.”
Victoria looked directly at Yukgap and continued gently.
“You are Yukgap.”
“The one and only chef of Restaurant Shelley.”
“There is no other chef in my restaurant.”
“And the memories of cooking at Restaurant Shelley belong entirely to you.”
“Victoria...”
Yukgap could not speak.
He did not know why, but Victoria’s words gave him something solid to hold onto.
You are not fake.
You are your own existence.
“Um, excuse us.”
While the two were talking, No. 7 and No. 8 awkwardly interrupted.
Both looked completely confused.
“Sorry to interrupt the warm atmosphere, but what exactly are you two talking about?”
“I would also appreciate an explanation.”
Victoria glanced around before cautiously speaking.
“Well... it’s kind of a long story.”
“What is going on...?!”
No. 11 stared at the darkened facility in confusion.
The internal systems had suddenly gone offline along with the lights, so he had come to investigate.
For some reason, even Alpha’s functions had stopped.
He muttered fearfully,
“Alpha’s system has gone down?”
“This has never happened before.”
More importantly, Alpha could foresee the future.
Normally, there was no possibility that she would simply allow a problem involving herself to occur.
She would have prepared countermeasures in advance and restored the system no matter what happened.
But this was different.
Something Alpha herself had failed to predict had just occurred.
“Wake up, Alpha!”
No. 11 desperately restarted Alpha’s system.
A stiff mechanical voice soon echoed.
[Server reboot.]
[Sequence decryption.]
[Program restart...]
“Please.”
“Please!”
No. 11 watched anxiously.
This can’t happen.
It can’t.
Something like this had happened to the flawless goddess he believed in.
He was gripped by terror at the thought that Alpha might never regain consciousness.
[Lam... bda...]
Fortunately, the monitor flickered after a short while.
Alpha’s image appeared.
Perhaps because of the impact, the picture shook and distorted.
“Alpha!”
“Are you conscious?”
No. 11 hurriedly asked.
But the moment Alpha regained awareness, the first person she searched for was Victoria.
[Victoria.]
[Where is Victoria?]
“I don’t know.”
“I came because Abraxas’s internal systems suddenly stopped.”
“There is no one here except you and me.”
Alpha shook her head in shock.
[That can’t be.]
[Victoria said she would be my friend!]
The sight of Alpha denying reality was almost pitiful.
No. 11 smiled gently and tried to soothe her.
“Alpha.”
“Your friends are already here.”
[...]
Alpha said nothing, seemingly still stunned.
No. 11 continued warmly.
“The Archons, including myself, are your true friends.”
“I’ve told you many times.”
“Everyone else is simply trying to use you.”
But Alpha did not seem to hear any of it.
Trembling with a sense of betrayal she had never experienced before, she gave an order.
[Find Victoria.]
Alpha’s furious voice echoed throughout the base.
[Our game isn’t over yet, Victoria!]
“So that’s how we Archons were made?”
No. 7 asked in disbelief.
She looked genuinely shocked.
Victoria tilted her head.
“You didn’t know?”
“I never really cared enough to ask.”
They were weapons.
As long as they fulfilled their purpose as weapons, that had always been enough.
How they had been created had never mattered.
No. 8 looked somewhat disturbed as well.
“It is still somewhat shocking.”
“To think there were original individuals we were based on.”
Perhaps that was only natural.
They had discovered that they were cloned humans created from the biological information of original people.
That was not something anyone could accept easily.
