Surviving Among the Entities

“I’ll take a pack of my usual brand, please.”
“Yes, that’s 4,500 won.”

After buying cigarettes at the convenience store, I went back up to the rooftop. Perhaps out of habit, but I feel my mind works better while smoking.

“Phew.”

The broadcast had already ended, and “BJ SungJwa” had vanished after saying he would return tomorrow evening at 7 PM.

‘He left me an unsolvable problem too.’

As I put the cigarette in my mouth, a thought suddenly occurred to me:

‘Did my physical abilities improve down to the genetic and cellular levels? Then there would be no DNA damage, and no cancer risk from smoking either.’

I ended the unseemly thought and became lost in contemplation.

‘Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation.’

Recalling the memory of when I first encountered it in the original world.

Around the time I became seriously engrossed in “Surviving Among the Entities”, abbreviated as “SurvEnti”, the game suddenly exploded in immense popularity.

[Today’s game challenge is SurvEnti! The Kken King’s challenge!]
[Uwahh! What’s wrong with this game! No matter what you do it’s annihilation!]

A game with only a small banner ad and manic users writing “Come try it! It’s delicious, churalai churalai!” became a craze after being featured on a popular internet broadcaster’s show, flooding in countless new users.

[Wow! Entities! Wow! Annihilation!]
[How many annihilation endings are there in this game? Are there no happy endings?]
[120 days into SurvEnti cleared! New record!]

Naturally, the SurvEnti gallery – the game’s community introducing and adopting user-created entities – flourished greatly as numerous users showed off their creativity.

[Woah! SCP! The Foundation! Lobotomy Corporation!]
[They’re adding user-created entities! Awesome! I have to make one right away!]

And from a certain point, posts that seemed to be written by younger users started appearing more frequently.

[Developer! What do you think of this entity I made?]
[Developer! Please add my entity to the game!]

At first there was no particular backlash. The SurvEnti gallery was created for that very purpose, and everyone besides those young users was also registering their created entities.

[Stretchy Fruit, eating it makes your body stretch like rubber.]
[Pocket That Produces Anything, connected to the fourth dimension.]
[Door That Goes Anywhere, install in midair and open to go anywhere.]

But they gradually started creating entities that were ambiguously parodies or plagiarism.

[Ninja Who Embraced the Dark Lord, wields dark powers and can fire dark matter from his eyes. Uses black magic instead of ninjutsu since he possesses dark powers, ultimate move is summoning a black hole the size of the sun.]
[The Fastest Thing in the World, DNA composed of tachyons, can travel from one end of the universe to the other in 1 second, moves so fast it constantly reverses through time. Ultimate move is biting but its mouth is huge enough to swallow 100 galaxies in one bite.]

And they created entities with settings so excessive they could never be added to the game.

[My entity is immune to all physical attacks and magic so it can’t die.]
└[Oh~ my entity can sever souls so I one-shot you lol]
└[Even so I have 99,999,999,999,999,999 souls so I don’t die.]
└[Oh~ I can sever 99,999,999,999,999,999 souls at once.]
└[Even so I can revive 1,000,000 times in 0.000000000001 seconds.]
└[Oh~ I can swing my sword 999,999,999,999,999,999 times per second to keep killing you.]

Ultimately, they started identifying themselves with their entities, endlessly pursuing munchkin territory in hopes their entities wouldn’t be destroyed by others.

[The zemnies are going wild? Munchkin Mary Sue levels where they just do whatever they want lol]
[Ah, the zemnies’ brainlet posts are preventing the gallery from moving, what is this, real kids should just leave.]

Up to this point it was fine, just the community becoming more active. But an issue arose that couldn’t be easily overlooked – a young user used their parents’ card to financially sponsor SurvEnti.

[Developer! I sponsored 10 million won! Please add my entity to the game!]
[Entity Name: The Strongest Man in the World / Ability: Truly the strongest in the world. Weakness is mint chocolate which kills if eaten. But immune to all other attacks, and if he sincerely throws a punch it can destroy 10 billion dimensions in one hit.]

I don’t know how it was resolved. But a few days later, the gallery required 19+ age verification to enter, multiple moderators appeared, and a dislike function was added to delete highly disliked entity creation posts.

‘But this incident sparked a trend of creating Munchkin Mary Sue-like entities for a while.’

Those filled with mischievous intent to troll the developer collectively created nothing but Munchkin Mary Sue entities, prompting the provoked developer to create a new entity in turn.

‘That was the Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation.’

I think it was a rather amusing response. Its appearance probability was so low it didn’t hinder the game, but if it did appear other users could boast about it, and the uncounterable game over befitting its name matched the setting perfectly.

[The Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation appeared omg!!!! I was about to go buy a lottery ticket today!!!]
└[Literally winning the lottery lol!]
└[Wasted all the lottery luck here lmao]

“And yet.”

I lit another chain-smoke cigarette.

“In reality, I can’t see a solution.”

I recalled the Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation’s wiki setting.

[Entity Name: Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation]
[Grade: Annihilation]
[A self-governing lifeform that descended from a higher dimension to our dimension. Possessing infinite power, it calls chosen humans its avatars and bestows its power unto them. At first only granting superhuman strength, but over time adapting to that power until ultimately able to use the constellation’s full might.]
[Upon appearing, causes Earth annihilation after 5 turns.]

‘Come to think of it, this was the first annihilation-grade entity to appear.’

How can this be stopped?

‘Through another constellation?’

Constellation entities besides the Munchkin Mary Sue exist. But they were all danger or annihilation grade, uncontrollable beings making that impossible.

‘Since constellation entities cannot be found or located in the first place, it was a meaningless thought.’

Could it be destroyed using another entity?

‘It was impossible in the game, but perhaps possible in reality.’

The issue was where the constellation’s main body was located, and whether it could even be attacked.

“There’s nothing we can be certain about.”

I finished an entire pack. The only hopeful aspect was that reality differed from the game.

‘The story seems to have appeared quite some time ago. Five days must have long passed. But the world hasn’t been annihilated yet.’

Perhaps, just perhaps.

“It might not annihilate the world and just pass by?”

After finishing all the cigarettes, I returned to my room. The Other World Transfer Book I had put in my bag was clearly open on the desk.

[You, who strives for the other world transferees, are hereby appointed as an apostle.]
[Special Bonus for Apostles! 100% chance to transfer to a soft and happy other world upon immediate transfer!]
[Granted numerous cheat-level deception abilities!]
[In exchange, you must solemnly swear to continue recruiting other world transferees and strive to increase their survival rates in that other world as well. [Seal] <- Gently press any finger for over 3 seconds.]

I carefully closed the book.

“Thanks for the thought, but I’ll have to refuse.”

Even if annihilation awaited at the end.

“Even if the earth’s demise comes tomorrow, I will plant an apple tree today.”

For that is what makes one human.

[By any chance, do you know about constellations?]

The Art of War states: To know thine enemy and know thyself, triumph is never in peril.

[Constellations? I’ve never heard of that before. What is it?]

Singu Hwerang did not know about constellations.

[Any good constellation novels out lately?]
[Constellation novels are no longer popular.]
[I wish I could read some well-written constellation novels.]

Online, knowledge about them only existed as a web novel genre.

“So you’ve come looking for me.”
“Yes.”

The woman seated opposite nodded. Her six arms elegantly curved as she transported her teacup.

“About constellations, there is nothing I cannot speak of.”

The Suspicious Merchant had transformed from her previous indeterminate gender monster form into an appearance with a 7:3 monster-to-female ratio, revealing some femininity.

“They are existences reigning over the highest dimensions, far removed from death, capable of exerting power akin to omnipotence in the dimension you reside in.”
“But not omniscient, it seems.”
“Omniscience is a blessing granted to only an extreme few, which constellations do not possess.”

Fortunately, she was knowledgeable about constellations and readily shared the rare information.

“If I use entities from my dimension, could I destroy or drive away a constellation?”
“Impossible. Regardless of their might, lower dimensional beings cannot interfere with constellations. You could perhaps interfere with a constellation’s avatar body, but even that would not be easy.”
“So interfering with the avatar body is possible.”
“Yes, but only through certain special entities. For example, those existing in the same dimension as constellations, or entities created by existences transcending dimensional concepts would fall under this category.”

A few things came to mind, but were impossible for me to obtain or utilize in my current state.

“Thank you for the information. Then, could I perhaps purchase an entity capable of influencing a constellation’s avatar body with this?”

I extended the dream bead containing my first artistic work. She stared intently at it before shaking her head.

“I do not deal in obscenities.”
“It is art.”
“An obscenity.”
“Art.”
“Obscenity.”
“Art.”
“Please leave.”

She handed me an invitation and kicked me out. Not the elaborate invitation from last time, but the simple original one.

‘My knowledge has increased.’

I recorded the acquired knowledge in My Mind’s Notebook.

[Knowledge to deal with the Munchkin Mary Sue Constellation 1. Constellations, as well as their avatar bodies, are omnipotent and cannot be influenced. However, entities related to beings on par with constellations, or those transcending dimensional concepts, may be able to influence the avatar body.]

‘What entities could be related to this?’

[Alert! BJ SungJwa’s broadcast has begun!]

At that moment, the avatar’s broadcast started.

[Hello everyone! Did you all sleep well last night? I really pondered what content to do, how to inform you all of our great constellation’s magnificence!]

The background was dark. Nothing could be seen in the surroundings. Only darkness and the avatar were visible on screen, making it impossible to discern his location.

[Now, I’m sure you’re all curious where I am. Can you guess this place? I’ll give my autograph as the future’s most famous and greatest person to whoever guesses correctly!]

The chat exploded with responses, but the avatar kept shaking his head.

[Hah! You all lack so much creativity! The answer has already come up? All you can see is me, surrounded by complete darkness! Since there’s no correct answer, I’ll just reveal it!]

The camera panned.

[Tada!]

There was a massive, blazing celestial body.

[What is this called? A hypernova, where if it explodes it could later annihilate the earth through gamma ray bursts and such!]

The celestial body, swollen as if about to burst at any moment, was not spherical but had an unsightly potato-like shape. With nothing nearby to compare its size to, estimating it was meaningless, but if it truly was a hypernova then it was a celestial body larger than the sun.

[Since our great constellation said so, it must be true! Anyway! Today’s content will be doing a good deed too! Breaking this thing!]

The chat went into an uproar again. Asking if what he just said was real, if that celestial body exploding would truly annihilate the earth, if he was a constellation or perhaps even a god.

[Alright, then!]

One sure thing was that the celestial body vanished before our eyes.

[Done!]

With just a single clap of his hands.
As if it had never existed from the start, leaving not a single trace behind.

[Ah, the content ended too quickly?]

The avatar gave an awkward laugh.

[Brothers! Sisters! That was a bit boring, wasn’t it? Want to go destroy some other hypernovae? I’ll do it more spectacularly this time!]