Story Reader / Main Story / 28 Polaris Bond / Story

The stories I write are wild, diverse, and always extreme. I can be a soldier in a trench in a story, and a pioneer piloting a spaceship heading to the edge of the universe in the next.

Who knows? Isn't that how stories should go?

I've been to Kowloong. I feel like it is my second home sometimes. There's a saying in a book that goes...

You see, history isn't that different from stories. Morality is like clay in our hands that can be shifted and shaped. People's morals can be as vile as devils or as noble as saints.

I mean the things I write are nothing but stories. I write many stories and poems about people. In the end, they are all just stories.

Each story is different and so is each person. For example, the poor soul in the story I published last week in "Babylonia Weekly" is actually based on my editor, who nags me about deadlines every day.

I despise him because he used to talk about his miserable childhood. Curse of the family.

Like other writers, it's important for me to know many people and experience things. Otherwise, what would I write about? That's why I'm often not at home or in the office. Make sense, right? Nobody can stop me from finding inspiration.

My friends often say that I write disgusting, terrible, psychopathic, and nauseating stories. I break these things down for my readers because I am a sadist.

I must refute that claim. There's a reason for what I do. Who would want to write about suffering and tragedies? Shouldn't we only write about joy?

Otherwise, I wouldn't have written about that poor abandoned soul. That poor thing. My editor must be the person who deserves the most pity in the world.

In the story with the abandoned dude, I also wrote about an artist with a terrible sense of beauty and a long-haired cat with awful fur.

I spent an entire week observing my poor editor in the office so I could write this story. Maybe it was four days. I can't remember the earlier weeks, but our department asks for submissions every Friday.

The story I'm about to tell you was first published in the 5786th issue of "Babylonia Weekly", on the seventh page of the "Fiction Collection". I actually had the inspiration for it four weeks ago, but I only started writing it three days ago...

360 million years ago, 82% was wiped out.

251 million years ago, it was 95%.

199 million years ago, it was 50%.

66 million years ago, it was 75%.

10000 years ago, humans fought against this world with stones and sticks and survived.

However, since the birth of human civilization, 83% of animal species have become extinct...

The stack of manuscripts is covered in corrections and tiny notes written on the margins. It looks like it had a serious surgery that lasted a full day and has left it in shambles.

Schulz tugs at his tie and glances uneasily at the clock on the wall.

How do you know that what we see is always the truth? If you ask me, the theories and phenomena we have today only happen to be explainable by human reason and language.

The universe is under no obligation to make sense to us.

How are you supposed to get more readers if you don't write something eye-catching? If you ask me, you should change the entire structure of the star to infinitely replicable synthetic humans or something like that...

But Schulz has no choice.

Schulz doesn't trust this pot-bellied man at all, but he has no choice. Kevin has already successfully brought about many popular columns.

Schulz knows exactly what happened to those "critically acclaimed but unpopular" stories...

I've said it before. At the end of the day, we are in the service industry. There's no need to always show readers people's miserable lives, the tragedies, and suffering that feel like a lump of mud...

Everyone's life is already bad enough. Why not give them hope? We shouldn't always tell readers negative things just because our lives are terrible.

Anyways, rewrite it, Schulz, for my sake.

Or... I think you should start over.

Schulz watches him walk away. He lets out another long sigh and throws the tattered manuscript onto the table.

Such is his life.

"Babylon Weekly" is the largest newspaper in this city. "Largest" only among the legitimate papers, excluding the illegally printed ones distributed in the alleys and garages featuring seductive women.

The sky is always grey and it's always raining.

The red bricks and cement seams are covered in colorful, slimy moss and mushrooms from being constantly wet. Workers in orange raincoats scrape the fungus off the walls and let them drain away with the needles and glass shards down into the sewer.

Schulz hates thinking about these things because he has seen too much, and because he was once one of them. He doesn't want to write about these things either.

Schwartz is in charge of the urban section. Before this, this joke-loving woman was his editor.

It was inevitable because Kevin was just "too talented," and Schwartz tactfully left the fiction section and gave the position to Kevin.

Schulz holds the cigarette in his mouth and reaches into his pocket for a lighter, but finds a small, squared, velvet-covered box instead.

Schulz lights the cigarette and checks the clock. It's already 5:30 PM.

The rain outside had lightened up since he came to work in the morning, but this kind of rain is the most awkward. It doesn't look bad, but walking 20 minutes to Owen Street without an umbrella would definitely get him almost soaked.

When it rains after the smog, the raindrops carry coal ash and dirt. It's dirty. Schulz is wearing a suit he borrowed from the old man upstairs, and he doesn't want to return it stained with damp dust.

Finally, he opens his umbrella and walks into the rain.

Few people are on the street at this hour because Schulz left work early. 5:30 PM isn't usually the end of his work day.

From Graystone Street, where the editorial office is, it would take 15 minutes by bus to get to Owen Street, but about 20 minutes on foot.

Schulz feels like walking. He wants to buy a flower on the way.

So he starts walking. He is holding a black polyester umbrella in one hand, and clutching a small, red velvet box in his pocket with the other.

This is his only formal suit. He tries to stretch his hand in his pocket downward to cover the hole that's usually not noticeable.

When he gets to the end of Owen Street, he sees a tall chimney shrouded in mist and rain. That is Owen Factory No. 2.

Owen Factory No. 2 is the only thing that makes the city's residents feel like the city hasn't completely turned into a heap of mud. The street was probably only coincidentally named Owen Street.

However, no one can say for sure what Owen Factory No. 2 actually produces.

The factory has about a thousand workers, all of whom live on Owen Street. Helena's family also works there.

Some workers say they cast two-meter iron balls every day. Some say they melt iron balls into molten iron. Others say they paint on chrome-plated boards, while still others say they punch three hundred highly precise gears daily.

It sounds like the jobs have nothing to do with one another, but all manage to produce something in the end.

Schulz reaches out and grabs the girl's arm. He isn't very strong himself, but he can easily overpower the malnourished flower girl.

He doesn't want his cheap sense of justice to ruin his day.

Um... here's the money...

(They use despicable methods to control children and give absolutely no damn about their well-being whatsoever)

(Even if they survive to adulthood... they'll just end up as addicts who die way too early!)

The rain has remained the same since he left the editorial office. It neither intensifies nor stops.

He lifts his arm to check his watch. It's exactly six o'clock.

It's ten after six. They should be home from work by now, but he still has time.

He stuffs the withering rose into his pocket and leans against the wall.

(He feels like someone's watching him...)

Schulz is restrained before he can even react. He can feel the cold steel that makes up the pair of handcuffs on his wrists.

Who are you? What do you want?

Something's not right.

How did Schulz Roseum carry out these murders? He is an ordinary, nameless writer, physically weak and unintelligent. How did he kill so many?

Helena Clinton was a factory worker, but Schulz had never even been to the factory.

He didn't live with the workers, so how can he write about them?

But that's not exactly right. I'm a writer and a storyteller.

Why can't I be a murderer?

The problem here is the method.

There is so much noise in the factory that Schulz has to raise his voice, too.

When do you get off work?

People like you shouldn't be in a factory like this. Get lost!

It isn't until six o'clock in the evening that Schulz sneaks back into the workshop. By then, most of the workers have left, the machines have stopped, and the workshop is no longer as noisy as usual.

The dust on her oval face can't hide the joy and happiness radiating from within.

She is so beautiful that even her coal-stained work clothes look good on her.

She waves at me, signaling me to come closer. But she quickly realizes she isn't dressed for a date, so she grabs a towel from the shelf, wipes the dust off her face, and blushes.

I don't have clean clothes and my dad doesn't know I'm not home, so I can't go home to change...

A rose doesn't lose its beauty just because it's wrapped in newspaper.

How did I murder this poor girl without mercy?

Helena's workshop is used to forging huge iron balls. Next to it is the workshop where her father melts these iron balls in a large furnace.

It is a futile effort. No one knows what Owen Factory No. 2 actually produced. It seems almost like an ever-changing, ever-reorganizing Rubik's Cube.

The factory's greatest advantage is its futility, which allows it to operate without regulations.

That's why this factory is the best place to hide secrets.

The girl's fingernails dig into rust and dirt, but her struggle is futile.

When she finally loses consciousness from the lack of oxygen, her hands are already tightly bound, and her mouth is stuffed with a towel.

Forgive me... Forgive me... for loving you so much...

Please forgive me, please...

When he looks up again, he notices faint engravings on the massive iron ball. He sees the ocean and the continents.

When old Baron arrives at work the next day, people find him in a foul mood. Baron looks as if he hasn't slept all night.

Baron refuses to say why when asked. He stubbornly continues his work, transporting the iron balls into the giant furnace, and melting them down. He gives the new workers who replaced Helena to recast the molten iron into new Earths.

Why did I do it?

Don't expect the actions of a third-rate writer released from a mental asylum to make sense. I am already contributing to society by not wandering the streets aimlessly.

But did I really, truly love her?

Yes, I loved her.

She was the one I should have married. We would have had children and lived a poor but stable life in this city.

I've thought it all through.

If we didn't have children, we would adopt one from the orphanage. Orphans are one of the few things this city has too many of.

At a certain age, we'll be stripped of our right to work, because this city never runs out of labor. Each person is like a machine part, tirelessly working the giant gear without a soul.

After that, I'll be stuck at home every day, writing novels about the city's pains, sorrows, and scars that nobody reads.

And my wife will have to draw crude illustrations for illegal tabloids in between household chores. I know her. Once she decides on something, no one can convince her otherwise.

I can't blame her. How can I expect her to be mentally stable when she picks this kind of hobby to make pocket money.?

Until the day I die—I'm not sure who will go first—but I'll be buried in the cemetery on the outskirts of the city.

Part of me hopes that I won't die, or at least that I'll become a topic of conversation after I die. I hope that one day, a ghost named Schulz will have a million clones and nobody can ever kill him. How cool would that be!

You don't get it! This city is already a hellish dump. We might as well become one with it!

I am Schulz Roseum. I write poems, novels, and sometimes reviews.

Who knows? Isn't that how stories should go?

Everything, all of this, is just a story.