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She smiled brightly and placed what she was holding onto the floor.

Chiiiiik.

As Anastasia set ‘it’ down, white steam rose from its body, as if a rice cooker were puffing out white smoke.

“What’s that…?”

“Aha! It’s nothing special~ No, no? Not at all? Well… um, anyway! It’s nothing much-ow-”

Anastasia stammered in response to Jinseong’s question, grinning bashfully, still looking like she had just woken up.

Then, she brought out ‘it’ from her dream….

To be specific, it was a tomato the size of a person’s head, covered with pepperoni and sporting pipes protruding from various spots, puffing out white smoke, while mechanical wings fluttered behind it, floating rather insistently above the ground.

Puff!

The tomato squished down like it had translated its fluffiness into sound, gently cradling Anastasia. It even inflated as if someone had blown air into it, growing to a size that could rival a beanbag sofa.

Thanks to its very nature of floating in the air, it felt as if it was soaring through the sky—or like her butt was being hugged by a cloud.

“This is a Pepperoni Implant Tomato Angel with a Novalism Type 34 steam engine!”

“Uh-huh. I see.”

Park Jinseong’s expression didn’t change, even after hearing the nonsensical name. Instead, he just nodded along, giving a round of applause as if she had brought something truly remarkable.

“It seems it could be a big help in bringing peace to your dream world.”

“Of course! My tomato army destroyed everything while bringing peace!”

Anastasia began to chatter about her experiences in the dream, talking of capturing tomatoes to form her army and smashing things in a cute, dizzying tale that sounded like pure nonsense.

She also recounted the information she gathered from the ‘captured prisoners’ and ‘warriors who joined voluntarily.’

“Did you know! Real carbonara is pasta mixed with egg yolk! It’s a bit dry, but it’s said to be delicious and healthy!”

“Seems you caught an Italian.”

“And um, when on a diet, thinking of broccoli is great! If thinking of broccoli keeps your appetite going, and you feel like you could eat heaps of it, then that’s true hunger! But if it doesn’t, it’s just fake hunger, so it’s better to endure…”

“Looks like someone was interested in dieting.”

“Oh, right! They say it’s good to add a pinch of salt when drinking milk~ The savory taste of salt enhances the creaminess, allowing you to focus on the flavor! But don’t mix it with high-quality espresso!”

“Oh dear. Seems there’s another Italian among them.”

Of course, most of what she said was useless information. It seemed like trivia that was somewhat useful but also entirely ambiguous.

That was inevitable.

After all, this wasn’t a place where one was tortured in reality.

The dream was where logical leaps took place.

It was a space where the unconscious was assembled and information was sorted, but at the same time, it was a land where having no rules was actually the rule.

Though it seemed there were rules, they were fragmented, and in between them lay gaps, free from the constraints of time and space.

So naturally, it was filled with things that were nothing short of illusions.

Thus, dreams remained a domain of mystery for humans, utilized in many ways yet uncharted and left unexplored by most. It was a topic only touched upon by those with an interest in mysteries and the mind.

However, there was one who was capable of properly harnessing these ambiguities…

That was Anastasia.

The witch standing before Park Jinseong.

Well, to be precise, her power was the act of bringing something from the dream into reality. Her visits to others’ dreams and the information she gathered were merely byproducts of her ability—

But what mattered was that she could do it.

With overwhelming efficiency.

A realm that had remained uncharted throughout the existence of humanity.

Thus, a place people neither feared nor doubted.

While they considered its connection to the mysterious, they didn’t suspect other people’s involvement much.

She was capable of bringing back information from that realm.

“Ah! And I recently heard the word ‘freedom’ has been appearing a lot in American news~”

Just like now.

“Freedom, freedom.”

Park Jinseong looked at Anastasia.

She was nestled comfortably in the inflated tomato-beanbag, smiling.

“Yes~ Freedom. Um, but it feels a bit different from your typical freedom~ It doesn’t feel quite right, with a hint of ambiguity lurking about it~”

“A twisted sort of freedom, then.”

“Yes! Exactly that~! It’s freedom, but there’s something off about it? Like a sense of libertinism?”

Anastasia began talking about the keyword ‘freedom’ that she had heard and seen.

“I’ve heard that America is a highly individualistic country, but even considering that, it’s still… Well, it’s like, you can do whatever you want as long as it doesn’t infringe on someone else’s freedom, and you can express anything? Any sort of freedom has the right to exist in the world? It was that sort of feeling!”

“It’s peculiar, yet somewhat reflective of ordinary American scene…”

Anastasia trailed off, then pulled out something that looked like a toy pen from her pocket and swiftly swished it through the air.

Lines began to appear in the air as she moved, and remarkably, they sparkled with rainbow colors.

“Um~ I can’t draw well, but roughly, there was a flag like this. It was waving all over the city, and it seemed to mean something about unrestricted freedom or something…”

Of course, that freedom was devoured by her tomato army!

Anastasia said this while showing Park Jinseong the flag.

The flag depicted symbols of stars and doves creating shapes.

“Hmm. That flag…”

The flag was familiar to Park Jinseong.

“It belongs to the Absolute Freedom Alliance.”

It was something he had not seen once since his reincarnation.

But before that, he had seen it to the point of being sick of it.

* * *

Absolute Freedom Alliance.

It referred to a certain social organization existing within America.

Or rather, to be precise, it should be described as a social organization ‘comprised of’ particular ideologies.

Those belonging to this Absolute Freedom Alliance placed an absolute value on the concept of ‘freedom’ and adhered to the doctrine that ‘as long as it doesn’t harm me, freedom should be respected,’ almost as if it were a religious tenet.

Even if the neighborhood youth committed an act of terror with a bomb strong enough to collapse a building, as long as it seemed like it wouldn’t affect them, they would respect it. Even if someone attempted to blow up a cargo ship from a foreign land with some mines procured from nowhere, as long as it didn’t seem like it would harm them, they would respect it.

They would even let someone who aimed to destroy the world go unchecked simply out of the belief that it wouldn’t hurt them or wouldn’t succeed.

Given that they assembled such beliefs, it would be hard to consider them a legitimate group.

There were many with extreme and twisted ideologies, and often the organizations formed by such individuals fell under the same designation.

Moreover, what was even more troubling was that there were those among them with abilities, despite being completely insane.

Some individuals within these ranks were lunatics who wielded power or wealth, and even ordinary middle-class individuals were plentiful, willing to risk their entire fortune for their goals.

It was a façade that didn’t just remind one of an ordinary social organization but clashed with the appearance of a cult—

Regardless of such perceptions, these individuals had quite an impressive lobbying force.

They knew how to utilize their money, power, and connections effectively and employed skilled lobbyists to evade or block blades directed at them. They were also good at attracting sponsors, and they increased their ranks well—

Truly, they could be considered a calamity.

And even if they appeared to be an evil organization bent on conquering the world,

They would ultimately—

Boom—

Be blown apart.

“Haha. Their madness couldn’t outmatch the frenzy of World War III.”

It wasn’t that they had inadequacies.

It was simply that the madness of war surpassed all imagination….

This group quickly lost power when the order of society was maintained, and they fragmented and broke apart.

Yet their legacy remained, sprouting forth.

This was because the sponsors and power holders they had attracted became dispersed among the torn groups.

And among these fragmented groups, there were those who burned conveyor belts, those advocating for replacing national elites with artificial intelligence, those arguing for sowing mines throughout the oceans to secure America, and those insisting on reviving the Rust Belt by producing military supplies to sell across the globe—many who could not be deemed sane…

These were individuals who contributed significantly to America’s mania.

 

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