Surviving Among the Entities

“Phew, haah~”

67-year-old Park Yong-ha, a Seoul resident, loved mountains.

“Indeed, the air here is incomparable to that of the city?”

The fresh air and nature he couldn’t fully indulge in within the city, and the feeling of looking down upon the world from a mountain peak made everything in society that had stressed him out seem small and insignificant, whisking that stress away.

“Gosung isn’t too bad either.”

He hadn’t even started hiking yet, but he already felt great.

‘Thanks to this, the stress I got on my way here has completely dissipated.’

He had enjoyed hiking his entire life. The rugged mountain trails, towering peaks, and diverging courses always felt like ascending for the first time, giving him the feeling of being a great explorer as he climbed the treacherous slopes.

“But Seoraksan is better.”

Seoraksan had many restricted areas, the so-called illegal hiking trails. Especially the Yongjangseong trail, infamous for claiming at least one life every year, was his favorite course – the more dangerous it was, the greater his exploratory spirit and sense of achievement upon completion.

“I want to go to Yongjangseong.”

Unfortunately, he couldn’t go there now. After being caught hiking Yongjangseong several times since the past, he had been fined increasingly heavier penalties until a few years ago when he lost the will and gave up hiking altogether. Now, even if he wanted to go, he couldn’t without regaining his past fitness and stamina.

“A mountain like this is suitable for rehabilitation training.”

That’s why he came to Unbongsan in Gosung, Gangwon Province for rehabilitation purposes. Not too high, with few visitors making it good for hiking alone – those were the reasons he chose this place.

“And being able to do some sea fishing after is the cherry on top.”

After hiking for a while, Park Yong-ha arrived at a junction and leaned against a tree.

“Ah, nice.”

He took out a cigarette and lighter from his pocket. Nonchalantly lighting up and taking a deep drag, a pleasant lightheadedness washed over him.

“It tastes even better when smoking in a scenic place like this.”

Even as he smoked, he kept scanning his surroundings. While cigarettes tasted exceptionally good when smoked on a mountain, there were just as many meddlesome people around.

‘Why do they all have to be such busybodies?’

What if it causes a wildfire? What kind of lunatic smokes on a mountain? Just thinking about it annoyed him, and he had been reported and fined for this too in the past.

“But why do they all have to butt into other people’s business like that? I’ve been hiking and smoking my whole life, but I’ve never once caused a wildfire.”

After finishing his cigarette, he dug a small hole under some dry leaves and buried the butt. As he stood up to resume hiking, he belatedly noticed the signboard hanging on the tree he had leaned against.

[Warning – This is an extremely dangerous area with safety accidents occurring every year. Risking your life on a mountain hike will only bring misfortune to your family. Please use the official hiking trails.]

‘No entry?’

Beyond the signboard, there was no visible trail – just an untrodden ridgeline.

‘Oho, an illegal hiking trail here?’

His interest was piqued. It meant there was an untrodden, dangerous trail right before him.

‘How dangerous could such a puny mountain possibly be?’

Ignoring the signboard, he brushed aside the leaves and headed towards the ridgeline. Of course, being an illegal trail, he didn’t forget to exercise caution.

‘It’s not that dangerous. These days, they make a big fuss over the slightest risk.’

When I was young, I risked my life protesting for a better nation.
I worked myself to the bone at companies for my family’s sake.
For the nation’s honor, I kept striving without rest or laziness, running and running.

‘That’s how the great nation of Korea came to be today.’

All thanks to people like us!
But what about the kids these days?

‘They start by complaining about everything.’

If it’s not a major conglomerate, they refuse to work there out of arrogance.
If the work is slightly tough, they quit without even caring about work-life balance or whatever.
Their mentalities are so weak, if you scold them a bit for their own good, they whine about you being an outdated hardliner.

“Sheesh, this country spoiled them too much. We need to revive the military-backed education from our time, enforce the long hair ban again, extend military service to 3 years – that’s how you forge a proper mentality.”

The problem is this country making a big fuss over places that aren’t even dangerous, like the trail I just entered.

‘But why can’t I find the summit?’

Park Yong-ha sensed something was amiss about 2 hours after passing the signboard.

‘This mountain wasn’t supposed to be that high?’

2 hours should have been more than enough to reach the summit. But the summit was still hazily visible in the distance, and the surrounding scenery remained rugged mountain terrain with no visible trails.

‘Getting lost?’

His pace quickened. As time passed, the thoughts of getting lost and the early autumn chill started weighing on his mind.

‘I can’t delay any longer.’

If night fell, hypothermia would endanger his life. Feeling anxious, he took out his phone, but it displayed ‘No Service’.

“What the…?”

KakaoTalk, text messages, calls – nothing was working.

“Huff, huff.”

How long had he been wandering aimlessly? After an indeterminate time endlessly stumbling through the mountain, a changed scenery finally appeared before Park Yong-ha.

‘A valley?’

A valley in a place like this? At least it seemed sheltered from the wind, and somewhere he had never been before, so it might lead to the summit.

“Hello there?”

As Park Yong-ha entered the valley, he encountered a young girl.

“It’s nice to meet you, the second human to come here.”

‘Am I dreaming right now?’

A little girl in a dress, in such a rugged mountain area?

‘Could she be a mountain spirit?’

He recalled stories from his childhood – that mountain spirits live in the mountains and help those who get lost.

“I am not a mountain spirit.”
“A, a ghost!”

She read his mind! Startled, Park Yong-ha stepped back.

“Don’t be like that. This is my first attempt, you see. I thought I’d try getting a bit friendly with humans, like that vagabond does. You’re the second encounter for me, and the first attempt.”
“…Attempt?”
“Yes. An attempt to bestow blessings upon you.”

A benevolent being like the axe in the woodcutter’s tale? His fear subsided somewhat.

“What blessings?”
“If you touch my hand, your dexterity improves. If you cradle me, your physique improves. If you carry me on your back, your intuition improves.”

His ears perked up.

“And if you see my eyes, you’ll come to know all phenomena.”

Park Yong-ha pondered seriously.

‘Dexterity? Intuition? Physical abilities? All phenomena?’

Ordinarily he might have brushed it off as a joke, but every time he heard the girl’s voice, he couldn’t help but feel her words were true.

‘So this is what it means to be possessed by a spirit.’

In any case, after making his decision, Park Yong-ha spoke:

“Then let it be all phenomena.”

He had wanted improved physical abilities, but he was more curious about experiencing the feeling of enlightenment to all the world’s knowledge.

“Very well, then come here.”

As Park Yong-ha approached the girl, her closed eyes gradually opened.

‘Hm?’

His first impression upon seeing the girl’s eyes was that they were pitch black. Like the night sky, there were no whites or irises, only complete blackness as if her entire eyes had been painted over with black ink.

‘Ah.’

He didn’t feel scared. Rather, everything he hadn’t understood about the girl until then became clear the moment he gazed into her eyes.

‘This girl is an existence from a higher dimension than us.’

She had made contact using that body as a terminal of sorts to observe us lower-dimensional beings. He couldn’t explain how he knew this.

Like how a baby instinctively cries, from the moment he saw the girl’s eyes, he instinctively understood.

With his fear gone, he immersed himself deeper into the girl’s eyes. The more he did, the many things comprising this universe became knowledge that assimilated into his consciousness.

‘Atoms, quarks, neutron stars, bananas, black holes, quantum fluctuations.’

Despite having lived a life far removed from science, Park Yong-ha instantly came to know all the latest scientific theories as if it was nothing.

‘Oh.’

Moreover, he came to know the world’s secrets that even scientists had failed to uncover.

The planet closest to Earth with lifeforms is Enceladus.

The cure for baldness is made by perfectly mixing bananas, guacamole, salt and pepper, and genetically modified peanuts, then baking it at 180 degrees.

‘Oh, oohh.’

It wasn’t just knowing – those pieces of knowledge harmonized into one. Now he understood the principles of the world and grasped the solutions to all problems.

For the Earth’s climate crisis, one must awaken the ■■■■■ in Antarctica.

For humans to overcome death and achieve immortality, erect three altars in Perseverance Valley while facing the North Star and perform the dance of ■■■■.

If a human wishes to recall memories of their past life, drink liquor mixed with ■■ and do ■■■■.

‘Oh, ohhhhhh!’

And furthermore, he came to know the world’s secrets and undiscovered universal principles.

The afterlife exists. Many, in fact.

The end of the universe exists, and the end of the universe is infinite.

The number of civilizations living in this universe is ■■■■■■■. And it’s still growing.

‘Ohhhhhhhhhh!’

He knew the secrets of the universe and the principles of the world. His consciousness regressed into the past, traveling back through time.

‘More, more!’

The further back he went, the more forgotten, erased, vanished, outmoded knowledge he acquired.

The process of the solar system’s formation.
The reason our galaxy was formed with different singularities from other galaxies.
The catalyst for the Sloan Great Wall’s creation.
The catalyst for the Eridanus Supervoid’s formation.

‘More, more!’

The principles behind supermassive black hole formation.
The things harbored beneath neutron stars.
The true nature of dark matter.
The true nature of dark energy.

‘More, more, more!’

How an individual can reverse the expansion of the universe.
What transpired in the first second after the Big Bang.

And continuing to regress through time, his consciousness arrived at the moment of the Big Bang.

‘What lies beyond this?’

What happened before the Big Bang, and what knowledge awaits me there?
Soon, his consciousness regressed to the moment before the Big Bang.

‘Ohh, ohhhh, ohhhhhhhhh!’

And…..

And

There

Was

No

One

There.

3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 5820974944 5923078164 0628620899 8628034825 3421170679 8214808651 3282306647 0938446095 5058223172 53594 ‘ex’ 08128 4811174502 8410270193 8521105559 6446229489 5493038196 4428810975 665933 ‘plo’ 4461 2847564823 3786783165 2712019091 4564856692 3460348610 4543266482 1339360726 0249141273 7245870066 0631558817 4881520920 9628292540 9171536436 7892590360 0113305305 4882046652 1384146951 9415116094 3305727036 5759591953 0921861173 81932 ‘sion’ 61179 3105118548 0744623799 6274956735 1885752724 8912279381 8301194912 9833673362 4406566430 8602139494 6395224737 1907021798 6094370277 0539217176 2931767523 8467481846 7669405132 0005681271 4526356082 7785771342 7577896091 7363717872 1468440901 2249534301 4654958537 1050792279 6892589235 4201995611 2129021960 8640344181 5981362977 4771309960 5187072113 4999999837 2978049951 0597317328 1609631859 5024459455 3469 ‘there’ 083026 4252230825 3344685035 2619311881 7101000313 7838752886 5875332083 8142061717 7669147303 5982534904 2875546873 1159562863 8823537875 9375195778 1857780532 1712268066 1300192787 6611195909 2164201989 3809525720 1065485863 2788659361 53381 ‘was’ 82796 8230301952 0353018529 6899577362 2599413891 2497217752 8347913151 5574857242 4541506959 5082953311 6861727855 8890750983 8175463746 4939319255 0604009277 0167113900 9848824012 8583616035 6370766010 4710181942 9555961989 4676783744 9448255379 7747268471 0404753464 6208 ‘none’ 046684 2590694912 9331367702 8989152104 7521620569 6602405803 8150193511 2533824300 3558764024 7496473263 9141992726 0426992279 6782354781 6360093417 2164121992 4586315030 2861829745 5570674983 8505494588 5869269956 9092721079 7509302955 3211653449 8720275596 0236480665 4991198818 3479775356 6369807426 5425278625 51818 ‘left’ 41757 4672890977 7727938000 8164706001 6145249192 1732172147 7235014144 1973568548 1613611573 5255213347 5741849468 4385233239 0739414333 4547762416 8625189835 6948556209 9219222184 2725502542 5688 ‘for’ 767179 0494601653 4668049886 2723279178 6085784383 8279679766 8145410095 3883786360 9506800642 2512520511 7392984896 0841284886 2694560424 1965285022 2106611863 0674427862 2039194945 0471237137 8696095636 4371917287 4677646575 7396241389 0865832645 99581 ‘me’ 33904 7802759009 9465764078 9512694683 9835259570 9825822620 5224894077 2671947826 8482601476

“Oh dear.”

Park Yong-ha’s body had vanished.

“Your consciousness was drawn in by the gravitational force it gained, crossing space-time?”

The girl closed her eyes again.

“The information of all phenomena gathered around a human’s consciousness ultimately takes on substance.”

I should try a bit more. It’s a pity to end it with just one attempt.

“I hope someone else comes again.”

The next day, a discovery that would shake the world of astronomy was made.

[Extremely massive black hole from the early universe after the Big Bang discovered.]
[Estimated to be at least 16 billion times the mass of the Sun, some speculate it’s a measurement error.]
[It suddenly appeared where there was nothing before. Or was it just not detected until measurement technology advanced?]

No one knew why that black hole had appeared.

Or who was inside it.