The Regressor Can Make Them All

Chapter 233

A heavy silence hung over the training ground, as though the world had come to a complete stop.

But then Amir suddenly returned to his position, making it seem like nothing had happened. However, Zayed, who hadn’t moved from the center of the training ground, was completely baffled.

“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”

“...”

“It must be worse than I thought. Forget about sparring; I should take you to the hospital—”

Swoosh!

A chilling sound resounded throughout the training ground. Moving his gaze from Amir’s dagger, which he had narrowly dodged, to Amir’s face, Zayed displayed utter shock on his face.

“Amir, you—”

“If only I had a little more time, we could have settled this through talking.”

Amir knew. He knew that Zayed only appeared lighthearted and was actually more thoughtful than anyone. But they didn’t have the luxury for a lengthy conversation right now.

Tightening his grip on the daggers given by Se-Hoon, Amir took a stance.

“I’m sorry, cousin.”

Thud!

Amir shot forward and slashed his dagger. Startled by the sharp attack, Zayed quickly retaliated.

Clang!

Four daggers simultaneously clashed in midair. Compared to Amir, who mercilessly slashed toward Zayed's vital points, Zayed could only retreat, barely fending him off.

“Amir! Wait a minute—”

What on earth was happening? Unable to comprehend the sudden attack, Zayed tried to reason with Amir, but Amir relentlessly pressed his assault.

Thud thud thud!

Pressing forward, Amir created ice spikes with Frost Alchemy and had them rain down from all sides. Encircled by them, Zayed quickly moved to counter the incoming spikes.

Swoosh-

Zayed slashed through them all, leaving a mist of purple sword aura that lingered in the air before exploding outward in all directions.

Bang!

With almost absurd ease, Zayed blocked all of the incoming attacks. However, Amir had anticipated as much and calmly continued to unleash his onslaught.

Crack!

Extending the length of his dagger with Frost Alchemy to deceive Zayed, tricking his sense of distance, Amir abruptly froze the ground beneath Zayed to break his balance before lunging forward in one swift motion. Again, ice spikes rained down from all directions toward Zayed. But now they were mingled with silent, transparent ice blades.

Observing the fight from the side, Se-Hoon couldn’t help but be impressed by how smoothly Amir exercised the series of attacks.

He’s improved a lot.

While Amir’s Frost Alchemy hadn’t changed much, it was obvious that his dagger techniques had evolved significantly.

He must have been pretty upset about losing to me back then.

Perhaps, after being forcibly shown his vulnerability when his Frost Alchemy was neutralized, he began focusing on training his close combat skills. From how he was fighting, he might even stand a chance against an A-rank opponent if he launched a surprise attack.

It was an astounding rate of growth compared to the Frost Dog’s.

Woong-

Unfortunately, it still wasn’t enough to defeat the opponent in front of him.

Zayed’s sword trembled, leaving countless afterimages that filled the surrounding space. In an instant, Zayed cut through Amir’s relentless barrage with his wall of sword aura.

He then grasped the opening and effortlessly slipped a dagger through, striking back.

Clang!

“Guh...!?”

The situation was overturned with a single move. Unlike Amir, who failed to break through Zayed’s defense even once, Zayed did it with a single move, not even needing to aim for vital spots. The sheer difference in their levels made Se-Hoon narrow his eyes.

He might not be the strongest, but he’s definitely an S-rank. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Even after a long period of confinement in the Dream Castle, Zayed had grown stronger. And while that alone was shocking enough, Zayed’s dagger technique truly caught Se-Hoon’s attention.

How many techniques did he mix?

If Amir’s technique was just his family’s dagger technique with some variations he added, Zayed’s technique was so convoluted that its origins were unrecognizable. It was a chaotic blend of countless dagger techniques, pieced together with ruthless efficiency.

A technique developed after countless failures...

Rather than focusing on the picture the puzzle pieces formed, Zayed had created his dagger technique by seemingly only caring about fitting the pieces together by shape and breaking them if they didn’t fit so that he could start all over again.

His technique was the result of cold, mechanical repetition. It was what earned him the title of S-rank in the dream realm.

It was a method that felt eerily familiar to Se-Hoon, who was watching Zayed intently, for some unknown reason.

Slice-

“?!”

Surprising everyone, Zayed’s sword aura slashed through Se-Hoon’s upper body all of a sudden, spraying blood everywhere.

Seeing Se-Hoon collapse, Amir’s eyes went wide in shock.

“I guess he really was the cause of this all,” Zayed muttered calmly, a stark contrast to Amir.

“What did you just...”

“The Dream Demon probably sent him. How bothersome.”

Sighing, Zayed turned to Amir, and, with a voice now full of pity, said, “Amir, it’s you that is playing into the Dream Demon’s tricks right now.”

“What are you talking about...?”

“Do you really think this is all a dream?”

Amir’s eyes wavered. Everything felt so real, it screamed that it was reality. And even though he had memories that told him the world wasn’t real, he couldn’t definitively claim they were true. After all, with the power of dreams, the Dream Demon could easily create memories that felt this vivid.

“I...”

“You must be confused. Someone as sharp as you would have already come up with several explanations to patch the holes. But look.”

Slice-

Blood began slowly pooling, dripping to the ground from the light cut Zayed had made on his arm.

“Hey...!”

“If I really was dreaming, like you said, something should have changed the moment I felt the pain. But nothing has.”

The sight of blood trickling down Zayed’s arm, the pungent smell of iron, and the onlookers murmuring as they watched—everything felt too real. At this, Amir’s eyes finally began trembling. He quickly tried to process everything from the start.

This place was definitely a dream; he knew that. And yet, faced with the undeniable reality, he found himself questioning it.

Why can’t this just be reality...?

A reality where everyone was dead and a dream where everyone was alive, or a dream where everyone was dead and a reality where everyone was alive—wouldn't it be natural for him to choose the latter?

Clink-

Seeing Amir drop his daggers on the ground, Zayed let out a sigh of relief.

“Amir.”

“...Zayed.”

“It’s alright. Let’s first check if there’s anything wrong with you first—”

Crack-

A new ice dagger formed in Amir’s empty right hand, halting Zayed in his tracks as he approached Amir.

“Not this again...”

“That day when the Dream Demon attacked our family, Father died, turning into a hundred butterflies.”

Calmly narrating the harsh memories in his mind, Amir stared at Zayed.

“Our elders became mindless fools and our servants were massacred by the brainwashed soldiers.”

“...”

“I was caught in a trance, fooled by the Dream Demon. But you, you carried me and escaped from there.”

Only Zayed remained awake. He killed the soldiers who swung their swords with smiles on their faces as well as the servants who stood in their way, running desperately with Amir in his arms.

“It must’ve been awful. If it were me, I would likely have given up without even trying, telling myself it was all just a nightmare. I’ve thought about it countless times since that day.”

“...”

“But that day, you kept running with me in your arms. I’ve never understood how you could do that back then, but now I think I do.”

Amir slowly raised the dagger in his right hand, bringing it to his throat. He never broke eye contact with Zayed, who was rushing toward him in a panic.

“You had something you couldn’t give up, even in a dream.”

Shlunk!

Red blood stained the training ground’s floor, the metallic scent filling the air.

Zayed looked down at Amir, who lay on the ground. He had managed to pin Amir’s right hand, which had nearly grazed Amir’s throat, with his weight.

However, he hadn’t managed to stop Amir’s left hand, which was holding a bloody ice dagger that Amir had driven into his stomach.

Meeting Amir’s gaze, Zayed chuckled bitterly. “This is just cruel.”

Their surroundings fell silent, and the vividness of everything around them began to fade. Now it felt as though they were watching a grand stage play instead of living in the moment themselves.

Stunned by the change, Amir just watched as Zayed slumped weakly.

“Ugh...”

Seeing Zayed grimacing as he gripped the dagger lodged in his abdomen, Amir recovered and sprang up in a panic.

“Zayed! Are you okay?”

“You’re asking me that after stabbing me?”

Facing Zayed’s exasperated gaze, Amir flinched. But then, Zayed waved it off with a weak smile.

“I’m kidding. You stabbed me with so much enthusiasm, yet you’re apologizing now?”

“That’s not what I—”

“Never mind, I’m fine. More importantly...”

Turning his gaze toward the frozen onlookers and Se-Hoon, who lay collapsed between them, Zayed spoke calmly. “You can stop pretending now. It’s over.”

Thud.

Taking the cue, Se-Hoon sprang to his feet.

The sight of him alive, even though his upper body had been diagonally slashed through, filled Amir with disbelief.

“What the...?”

“We’re still inside the Dream Castle, remember? This much is nothing,”

Nonchalant, Se-Hoon shrugged and grabbed his shoulder and waist, aligning his body back into place. Then, after a quick stretch, he approached the two.

“I was wondering why you suddenly abandoned the fight, and I guess it was because you figured everything out already,” Se-Hoon commented.

The ice dagger lodged in Zayed's abdomen gleamed faintly. It appeared crude on the surface, but Se-Hoon could tell the dagger carried the power of Awakening Dream he'd infused into it. Amir had likely manifested it with a clever combination of Winter Sky Eyes and the Frost Alchemy.

“How do you feel?”

“My abdomen hurts, and it’s cold here. I doubt I’ll be able to sleep again anytime soon.”

“Good. I’d have to kill you otherwise.” Se-Hoon words were so matter-of-factly that Zayed flinched.

Then, sighing in resignation, Zayed asked, “It looks like you know exactly what’s going on here.... Can you explain everything to me? I’m still trying to wrap my head around it all.”

Seeing the confusion and uncertainty on Zayed’s face, Se-Hoon nodded and began explaining. “To put it simply, the Dream Demon was probably using you to figure out how to become an even more powerful being.”

“A more powerful being...?”

“Yeah. But since she didn’t know how, she set a goal and had you repeat endless learning cycles in your dream.”

At the reveal, Zayed’s face twisted in disbelief.

“Is something like that even possible?”

“It may not be easy to set up, but it’s not impossible either.”

The Destroyer of Perceptions must’ve gone through something like this too.

Back then, Doppelganger had managed to become the Destroyer of Perceptions by absorbing the synesthetic mindscapes of countless heroes. There were some differences in the details, but the core method seemed quite similar.

“This is hard to believe...”

“Well, you became an S-rank inside this place, didn’t you? Then the experiment worked, in a sense.”

Zayed glanced down at his own body with a complicated expression. His memories told him he had become stronger through pure training and enlightenment, but it turned out to all have been part of a ceaseless learning loop.

“Of course, your growth is far from normal. Think of it like solving dozens of puzzles by matching the shapes alone, without caring about the images on the pieces. The result you’ll get is a jumbled mess, just like you right now.”

Although each puzzle piece fit perfectly together, it was impossible to decipher what the end product was trying to depict if one looked at the puzzle as a whole. There was no way such chaotic growth could be called normal.

Amir and Zayed’s faces hardened.

“What kind of lunatic...”

“Maybe it’s a good thing you don’t remember anything.”

How many failures must Zayed have experienced to reach where he was? If Zayed had retained all of those memories, his sense of self might have collapsed the moment he recalled them.

“Oh, by the way, this dream realm is maintained by drawing power from both the Dream Castle and the City of Nightmares. That’s why it feels so real.”

“So, I’ve been lying here all this time, oblivious like a fool...”

Hearing the bitterness in Zayed’s voice, Se-Hoon shook his head.

“There’s no need to blame yourself. Even I almost fell for it. In the first place, this place was designed to be flawless.”

Initially, there had been a slight sense of wrongness, like when one woke up groggy. But over time, the dream grew so convincing that it became harder and harder to doubt, even for Se-Hoon. If it weren’t for his habit of confirming reality every morning, he might have fallen for it as well.

And if Awakening Dream activated then, it would’ve summoned the Dream Demon.

Thinking back on it, it had been a precarious situation. But at least they gained some useful information.

“I think that’s enough for explanations. Now, let me tell you what you need to do next. If this goes well, we could incapacitate the Dream Demon in one go.”

Amir and Zayed’s eyes simultaneously widened in disbelief. They could incapacitate the Dream Demon, one of the Ten Evils, with one move?

Ignoring their skepticism, Se-Hoon continued. “As I mentioned before, the Dream Demon set up this dream realm. However, you, Zayed, are the core of the dream.”

“I’m the core?”

“Exactly. The Dream Demon probably used you as an anchor to prevent the information from becoming too chaotic. Think of yourself as the owner and the Dream Demon as the tenant.”

While the Dream Demon was responsible for creating the space, it was Zayed who had the keys to ultimately control it.

“So, if you want, you can flip this whole Dream Castle upside down.”

Since the Dream Castle was an extension of the Dream Demon’s synesthetic mindscape, overturning it would deal a critical blow to her. And considering the nature of the Dream Demon’s power, it might even cause her physical body to disintegrate instantly.

“...”

“...”

Amir and Zayed exchanged tense glances as the weight of the possibility sank in. Eventually, Zayed broke the silence.

“What do I need to do?”

“It’s simple. You need to escape from this half-conscious state by fully waking up.”

Bending down, Se-Hoon picked up the white dagger that Amir had dropped on the ground and looked at Zayed.

“But once you step out into reality, I can’t guarantee what will happen to you. The aftermath of waking up from this dream might affect you in ways we can’t predict.”

While Se-Hoon could protect Amir from any potential aftermath, Zayed’s role as the one who would end the dream meant he would be beyond Se-Hoon’s interference.

“So it all comes down to luck, huh...”

Zayed turned to look at Amir.

“...”

Amir was gazing back with a conflicted expression, one that showed he was mature enough to suppress his emotions and focus on reality. Seeing Amir’s growth, Zayed reached out, intending to pat his head. But then he paused, as if reconsidering, and patted Amir’s shoulder instead with a small smile.

“Thank you for growing up so well.”

Amir’s eyes widened, and his lips quivered. There was so much he wanted to say, but his emotions were far too heavy to convey with words.

“Thank you too... for everything,” Amir said quietly, swallowing down his emotions.

If Zayed hadn’t been there that day, Amir wouldn’t be the person he were now.

Hearing his cousin’s heartfelt gratitude, Zayed smiled with newfound peace and rose to face Se-Hoon.

“Try not to make it hurt too much.”

“I’ll do my best.”

With resolve in his eyes, Zayed nodded.

Seeing that, Se-Hoon turned to the silent Amir beside him.

“Amir.”

“Okay.”

Amir stood by Se-Hoon’s side, and Zayed looked at them both.

“Alright, see you on the other side.”

With the preparations complete, Se-Hoon aimed the dagger at Zayed, imbuing it with the power of Awakening Dream, and projected his consciousness into Zayed’s before thrusting the dagger into Zayed’s heart.

Crack!

The world around them began shattering. The Dream Castle, Zayed’s dream, and the Dream Demon’s dream collapsed in layers. The outside world unfurled before the three of them.

Whirl-

The sky was pitch black, a swirl of demonic aura. It overlooked a desolate land, one that had sinister, purple structures looming all around them.

It was a hellscape—they were in the City of Nightmares.

Se-Hoon froze in shock at the horrifying sight before him.

What...?

They were supposed to have exited into the Pleasure District, above the City of Nightmares, but instead, they had emerged in the heart of the city. Had they fallen into the Dream Demon’s trap? Panicking, Se-Hoon scanned the area and saw the others around them.

“I c-can’t... breathe...”

“What the hell? What’s happening?!”

“No! I don’t want to go in there!!”

People were screaming and struggling, some clutching their throats as they suffocated while others were dragged into the buildings by invisible forces. Seeing the countless individuals caught up in the oppressive environment, Se-Hoon finally understood what happened.

Did we destroy the entire Pleasure District...?

It wasn’t that they had emerged from it, rather, they had obliterated it entirely.

As Se-Hoon tried to process the unexpected turn of events, he suddenly heard a voice behind them.

“Ahh...”

The voice was grotesquely distorted.

“I knew it... I knew that you could wake him up.”

Finding the source of the voice, they found the Dream Demon whose body was now little more than a hazy, misty silhouette barely maintaining its form. However, despite being on the verge of death, her voice was filled with joy.

“We know this is a dream... yet there’s nothing we can do. All I can do is dream, and all you can do is wake up...”

Her words lingered in the air, filled with twisted logic.

To fully awaken the grand dream and shake the entire world, one had to experience the deep contradiction between reality and a dream. However, the Dream Demon had already established a synesthetic mindscape, making her unable to embrace it. So, she decided to change her plan upon seeing her Pleasure District crumble at Se-Hoon’s hand.

If she couldn’t experience this herself...

“What...?”

...Then she might as well just create someone who could.

A purple butterfly landed on Zayed’s chest, and Se-Hoon immediately lunged toward it, sensing the ominous energy it radiated.

“Now... awaken.”

The purple butterfly—one of the Harbinger Shards—burrowed into Zayed’s body.