The Regressor Can Make Them All-Chapter 558

Clatter-

The curtain rose once more. Under the flood of blazing lights, Puppeteer and Lea stared at each other before opening their mouths as if on cue.

“Before we start this merging process, I think it’s time for Mommy to teach you some discipline.”

“Try me. Hound Knights, deploy.”

The two clashed on the snowfield set stage.

Maverick, who wielded flames, struggled to unleash its full power—perhaps due to the surrounding environment. Soon enough, Lea found herself trapped in Puppeteer’s encirclement. However, right when she was on the verge of collapse, Swindler sent the Spatial Freezing Mechanism on overdrive and cut through the frozen space-time along with Puppeteer’s neck.

Thud!

The fall of Puppeteer’s head signaled a seasoned victory for Lea, won by patiently waiting for an opening even during a losing battle. Lea looked behind her, glancing at Puppeteer’s fallen corpse, and opened her mouth—

“Encore Performance.”

Flash!

The stage lights went out.

Clatter-

The curtain that had fallen without notice rose again, and the two were once again on their marks reciting their prepared lines.

“Before we start this merging process, I think it’s time for Mommy to teach you some discipline.”

“Try me. Hound Knights, deploy.”

The stage now was a blazing desert.

Under the crimson sun, both Maverick’s flames and Swindler’s frost lost their edge. Lea was unable to even put up a proper fight, that is, until she commanded Chatterbox to seize control of the desert with Environmental Assimilation Computation and overturned the battle.

Boom!

A dramatic victory snatched at the very last moment. Catching her breath, Lea turned toward the sand where Puppeteer’s body lay buried—

“Encore Performance.”

Flash!

Once again, the lights went out and took the tale with it behind the blood-red curtain.

“Before we start this...”

The play began anew. The two fought. Puppeteer lost. Then the play began anew once more, returning to the start. Endlessly, the performance would repeat until the desired ending was reached.

Lea, unaware, moved as she had the first time. Puppeteer, in contrast, recognized the changes and was revising the story with each repetition.

Boom!

The hidden strength and techniques of the Hound Knights were revealed one by one over the course of the performances, and countermeasures were formed each time to appear in the next.

Maverick’s Dual Wave System was nullified by broadcasting special counter-waves through speakers; Swindler’s Spatial Freezing Mechanism was countered by dimensional distortion from the mirror pillars; Chatterbox’s Environmental Assimilation Computation was undone with reverse-calculation devices.

With each power stripped away, Puppeteer’s forces became more reorganized for optimal counterplay.

Crunch!

The battle on the stage fit together like interlocking gears, and in the end, it was only natural that the Hound Knights fell. Victory had finally been forged through hundreds of repetitions—

“We’re not done here yet!”

The curtain had yet to fall, as one would think it would. Lea’s skill in enchantment had thrown a new variable into the mix.

She overlaid an additional wave onto the Dual Wave System, erasing the special counter-wave; she expanded the Spatial Freezing Mechanism to surpass dimensional distortion; and she hijacked the reverse-calculation device through an enhanced version of Environmental Assimilation Computation.

Pouring everything she had into her counterattack, Lea drove Puppeteer back to win once again—

“Encore Performance.”

Alas, even that miraculous victory dissolved into nothing once the curtain fell.

Clatter-

The gears spun once again, with Lea’s enchantment throwing wrenches anew, adapting to each scenario. But unfortunately, talent was not infinite. Thousands of encores later, even Lea’s enchantments were wavering.

...Something’s wrong.

And it was at that point that she finally realized: how could Puppeteer know everything? It was her first time fielding the Hound Knights, her first time devising enchantments based on their powers—yet Puppeteer countered everything as though she had foreknowledge?

A creeping sense of wrongness and deja vu weighed heavily on her mind. However, even though Lea wanted to pursue the question, there was no time mid-battle.

“Encore Performance.”

Her doubts never found an answer.

Thud!

The Hound Knights lay in ruins; Puppeteer stood victorious.

“Huff... Huff...”

Pinned down by Puppeteer’s automatons, Lea hung her head, staring down at the wreckage.

Seeing that, Puppeteer stepped forward to speak—

BOOOOOOOM!

Everything was erased by the Sphere that was denoted by the suicide spell hidden inside her.

“...”

Eyes wide at the unexpected end, Puppeteer made a wry smile.

“Of course... that was the kind of girl you were.”

Now she remembered Lea was someone who would opt to die alone rather than endanger her comrades—Lea’s resolve could be felt even now.

“But... that doesn’t change anything.”

Puppeteer looked up at the descending blood-red curtain.

“Encore Performance.”

Flash!

Even Lea’s sacrifice was not spared by the reset of everything. Unlike before, however, the tale ended not with Puppeteer’s death but Lea’s—which was followed by hundreds, thousands more of such deaths.

Clatter-

Until she accepted Puppeteer’s will. Until their family was whole and happy again. Nothing would end. Trapped in Lunatic’s endless theater, Lea’s body was unable to resist change.

Swish-

With each death, a fine thread attached to her; with each new thread, her thoughts dulled.

“Why fight at all?”

If it were a battle she could never win, wouldn’t it be better to forgive Puppeteer—her parents—and join them instead? Such a thought took root in Lea—

Splutter-

Lea killed herself without hesitation the moment she realized.

“Encore Performance.”

And again, her suicide was met with the stage’s reset. She, pitifully, had no way of knowing that her corruption was hastened by her death and repeated it endlessly.

Like that, thousands of deaths later, her entire body became bound in white threads.

Flash!

Lea awoke once more—in the audience, not on stage.

“...”

As though waking from a long sleep, she stared blankly at the rise of the curtain that revealed two puppets.

“Before we start this merging process, I think it’s time for Mommy to teach you some discipline.”

“Try me. Hound Knights, deploy.”

The puppets, one resembling Puppeteer and the other Lea, fought fiercely until the Lea puppet faltered. However, just before the Puppeteer puppet struck the final blow, it stopped.

“If it all ends like this... we’ll only repeat the same mistake,” it muttered bitterly.

“...”

“I’m sorry.”

The Puppeteer puppet then turned to walk away.

At that sight, the Lea puppet hesitated before shouting, “Running away again, like last time?”

“...”

“If you truly want to undo the mistake that you made that day... then don’t run like a coward!”

And thus, the family that had been broken long ago finally reunited. The parents finally understood their daughter’s loneliness. The daughter accepted her parents’ twisted love.

“...Is this the ending you wanted?” Lea asked softly, watching.

Puppeteer, who had taken the seat next to Lea without her noticing, kept her eyes on the stage.

“Perhaps.”

“This is too childish to stomach.”

“Hard to argue.”

The puppets embraced—a scene impossible outside the stage.

Even Puppeteer’s expression soured.

“Although it’s true everything was for your sake... it won’t change the fact we abandoned you.”

“...”

“So all we can do is cling to this fairytale, a childish ending where everything is forgiven.”

The lights over the puppets burned brighter. Lunatic’s endless play was, at long last, moving toward its scripted finale.

“When you wake the next time... everything will be fine.”

“...”

“So sleep easy, for now.”

“...”

Lea wanted to shout at her to stop spouting nonsense. However, as her eyelids grew heavier, her hatred of Puppeteer eroded.

Is this really how it all ends...?

She had done all she could, and that made it taste all the more bitter. If she had been a bit more careful, had a bit more strength... perhaps things would be different.

Unable to stop her eyelids, Lea found herself praying—to anyone, at any cost, to allow her to undo the miserable ending and start again...

THUMP!

She suddenly felt a pulse from somewhere. Lea’s first thought was her own chest... but it turned out its source lay elsewhere.

This is...

Tracing back the pulse, Lea found that it actually came from the remains of the Hound Knights scattered on stage. Their cores—devices modeled after hearts—were beating in synchronized pulses. Just what could be inside to cause that?

“With the memories stored here, you can recreate their power and skills. No matter what, this must never be destroyed.”

The Blood Crystals forged from Se-Hoon’s blood were responding to her desperate wish.

Thump!

But... what could she do with them? Lea had no clue—which was why she cast aside thought entirely and focused solely on that pulse. There was no need for understanding. All she had to do was pray.

Rumble!

The stage froze moments from its finale, the curtain seemingly caught on something.

Shocked, Puppeteer’s eyes snapped upward.

Lee Se-Hoon?! No... Not him!

He was still locked in battle with Tuner. With that possibility eliminated, her gaze quickly turned back to the stage. And there, she saw the Sphere moving on its own.

Woong!

A halo of grey light formed above Lea’s head. Then, an uncontainable force—beyond even Lunatic’s godlike authority—twisted the world itself.

“No!”

Gripped by an indescribable dread, Puppeteer reached for—

Phase Manifestation: Return to Origin

Swoosh-

With the sound of waves, the theater’s time was swept away.

***

“Before we start this merging process, I think it’s time for Mommy to teach you some discipline.”

“Try me...” 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

Lea suddenly trailed off, making Puppeteer narrow her eyes.

She changed her line?

Out of the thousands of repetitions, it was the first time Lea’s lines had deviated. Sensing something had gone wrong, Puppeteer moved to manipulate the stage to subdue her as quickly as possible—

“I see.”

She froze, her eyes moving to Lea.

“I always thought you were just a grumpy old soul... but it turns out you’re just plain old. I guess that counts as a twist.”

Lea chuckled, tossing out words she couldn’t make sense of. Her air felt different, like she’d become someone else entirely.

Puppeteer’s expression slowly stiffened.

“Lea, you...”

Realizing something beyond her perception had changed, Puppeteer moved to end her own life and trigger another Encore Performance.

However, before she could do so, Lea’s Sphere erupted with light.

Rumble-

A formless shockwave burst from the Hound Knights, blocking the blood-red curtain from descending onto the stage with a force that was on par with Lunatic’s compulsion. Even the theater’s lights didn’t shut off, merely flickering on the verge of going out.

“What...”

Puppeteer could not believe her eyes.

“Let’s stop ‌the soft play here.”

Then came Lea’s calm and steady voice.

“...”

“From here on... no rules. Whatever it takes, the first to knock the other down wins. How about it?”

Remaining silent, Puppeteer glanced up at the curtain once more and then let out a sigh.

“I suppose I don’t have veto rights, do I?”

“Sadly, no.”

With that, their gazes locked as a heavy silence fell over the stage, just like the very beginning.

Creek-

One of the lights, swaying from the clash between Lunatic and the Sphere, detached and fell slowly toward the stage.

Crash!

Puppeteer and Lea charged straight at each other.