Chapter 132
Chapter 132
“Leilyranda!”
At my call, the woman who had been walking at quite a rapid pace stopped abruptly. As she turned to face me, I couldn’t help but flinch when I saw her eyes—the whites completely blackened.
“You seem comfortable with me. Daring to call a princess by her name.”
“Your Highness.”
The formality of address wasn’t the issue right now.
The princess appeared to be in a state where the question wasn’t whether she was a princess or not, but whether she was human or a demonic beast.
“Yes.”
“Your Highness, you’re currently transforming into a demonic beast.”
“…”
Unfocused purple eyes stared intently at me. Hideous purple veins appeared and disappeared repeatedly over what had once been white skin, as if they were bubbling up beneath the surface.
If the princess was unable to control her transformation into a demonic beast to this extent, wouldn’t many people already know about this?
[You’re wrong, Irina.]
[To be precise, Leilyranda is particularly unable to control herself in front of you.]
She can’t control herself specifically in front of me?
Why?
[Think about how Leilyranda has been acting specifically when she’s around you.]
How has she been?
As I searched my memories, what came to mind first were instances of her saying strange things to me and the instinctive fear that made me tremble.
My brow furrowed involuntarily with disgust.
“Irina.”
“…Yes, what is it?”
“You’re quite a fascinating existence.”
The moment I heard her response, I recalled something she had once said to me.
<Interesting. Since you were my first, I had planned to break you from the beginning, but you managed to survive stubbornly.>
<…>
<You’re lucky.>
Back then, I had focused only on the fact that this person was the original female protagonist and that something about her condition was strange.
But now the misaligned puzzle pieces fit together.
Leilyranda, like Sian, had gone through countless repetitions. That’s why she had become so broken.
In her repeated timelines, I was apparently a new existence that had never appeared before.
“…So that’s why.”
I don’t know exactly how many times Leilyranda has repeated, but it seems my appearance was one of the differences in this iteration compared to the past.
“I don’t know what you’ve figured out, but Irina.”
Leilyranda took a step toward me. I thought I had grown accustomed to it, but my body trembled involuntarily at the sudden proximity of her demonic energy.
Half of Leilyranda’s face cycled between becoming a demonic beast and returning to human form.
The process was so grotesquely nauseating.
“Cassis Luwin seems to cherish you terribly.”
“…Is that so?”
“Why does he treat only you so specially? He was so cold when I begged him.”
Leilyranda’s voice was accompanied by a strange resonance, much like the sound a demonic beast would make.
Before I realized it, she had firmly grasped my wrist with a grip that wasn’t human.
“That man wouldn’t even listen to me. This damned world—no matter how much I tried to save it, it just wouldn’t be saved!”
Leilyranda was screaming as if she might lose her mind. I worried that people nearby would come running at this rate.
Yet before this immense power, I could only stand frozen like a terrified herbivore, barely managing to remain upright.
“I told him to abandon this place, no. Rather, to destroy it with our own hands!”
“…”
“He refused.”
Cassis… refused, I see.
Even when he wasn’t bankrupt like now, when he had everything as a Grand Duke, he was still a righteous person.
With blood red eyes, Leilyranda added one final remark:
“He’s not even a hero. How dare he.”
Leilyranda’s face had completely transformed into a monster’s visage as she spoke these words. The moment I met the demonic beast’s red eyes, the System notification sounded.
Ding!
[SYSTEM | Quest ‘System Error – Leilyranda (2/4)’ has arrived.]
[SYSTEM | Half of the ‘System Error’ fragments have been collected.]
[SYSTEM | You can now view ‘The Destruction of the World’ with half of the fragments.]
I tore my gaze away from the rising System window and looked back at Leilyranda, who had returned to her gentle-faced appearance.
She curled the corners of her mouth up into a lovely smile.
It was the most terrifying of all her expressions I had seen so far.
“People will gather soon.”
“…Yes.”
“If you’re that afraid of me, won’t people find it strange?”
Do I look like I’m not afraid of you right now?
But in this situation, I was too frightened to utter a single word.
Leilyranda whirled around and stared blankly into the void. She seemed to be looking toward the forest and smiled faintly.
A grotesque expression, with only her mouth moving to form a smile.
The moment I instinctively felt something was wrong, I heard the distant sound of a horn—”Pwoo—”
It was the kind of sound you would expect on a battlefield.
Murmuring sounds came from all around, and Leilyranda disappeared with quickened steps, leaving me behind.
“What’s happening…”
Darkness had fallen, and there weren’t many lights. However, as people began to wake up, lights started to appear everywhere.
Just as my heart began to race with anxiety, someone grabbed me abruptly.
“Irina!”
Cassis looked exactly as he had in the barracks earlier. He appeared to have run all the way here with a pale face, as if being chased by something.
“Lord Cassis.”
“The demonic beasts are coming.”
“What?”
“An enormous number of demonic beasts—enough to call it a demonic beast legion—are heading this way.”
I recalled how Leilyranda had stared into the distance before breaking into that grotesque smile.
This was Leilyranda’s doing.
Cassis held me tightly as he spoke.
“Irina, I know you rarely listen to me.”
“That’s not true.”
“This time, please listen to me.”
This place is dangerous, demonic beasts keep pouring in, I came here to protect you… and if I were to lose you here, or if you were to get hurt in this place I came to protect you…
Cassis held me firmly, almost embracing me, as he muttered incoherently.
“I wouldn’t be able to bear it.”
“…”
“So please wait here quietly.”
With that, Cassis pushed me into his barracks.
I had approached him to warn him about Leilyranda, but Cassis, thinking I was trying to go outside, immediately blocked my way.
“You can’t.”
“I have something to tell you.”
“Later.”
He cut me off mercilessly with a resolute face.
“We’ll talk when I return.”
After saying this, he turned his head to look outside. Standing inside the barracks and blocked by Cassis, I couldn’t see anything of what was happening outside.
“I must go now.”
“Lord Cassis, I understand. I’ll wait here quietly.”
Cassis’s expression was extremely troubled. So I immediately said what was needed to reassure him. Only then did he smile very faintly.
“Lord Cassis, you need to be careful too. You can’t get hurt.”
“Yes, I understand.”
Cassis answered as he looked down at me quietly.
“Be cautious. As cautious as you would be facing a demonic beast.”
Cassis seemed to hesitate for a moment, staring at me without blinking.
I tilted my head back and blinked, waiting for his response.
Cassis bent down. His face came abruptly closer. I felt his faint breath brush against my forehead, and then warm, soft skin touched my forehead.
“Yes, I understand.”
“…!”
A voice that whispered the response.
Only then could I come to my senses.
He kissed me on the forehead!
I froze right there.
Cassis pulled away without lingering.
“I’ll be back then.”
And so Cassis departed.
I was left alone in the empty barracks once more.
It seems I must continue this long wait again.
Just as I perched lightly on Cassis’s bed, the System window appeared.
[SYSTEM | You can now view ‘The Destruction of the World’ with half of the fragments.]
[SYSTEM | ‘The Destruction of the World’ will play in 5 seconds. If you do not wish to view it, please press ‘Decline’.]
Huh?
It all happened in an instant.
[SYSTEM | 5, 4, 3, 2, 1]
[SYSTEM | Now viewing ‘The Destruction of the World’.]
* * *
Idelbach and Arschen are twin gods and the gods of mirrors.
In truth, Arschen was born from Idelbach’s reflection in an ice lake, which is why they became the gods of mirrors, and their identical appearances made them twin gods.
For this reason, people say that ‘that’ ice lake is the birthplace of gods and virtually the beginning of the world.
‘That’ ice lake, Lake Yusta Winter.
The Mirror of Gods.
“My gods.”
The place wasn’t called the “Mirror of Gods” simply because of the birth legend.
“Please abandon me.”
Sian arrived in the north during harsh, snowy weather. He knelt before the vast ice lake, barely supporting himself with his sword as he begged.
He begged the gods he had served his whole life to please let him go. That he wasn’t fit to be a hero. That repeating everything would only result in the same cycle of time.
“I have no confidence left.”
He said he lacked the courage to press on while watching the things he loved crumble. He couldn’t bear to become the kind of person who would grow numb watching the things he loved fall apart.
As Sian begged, he plunged his sword into his own neck.
The sky he saw as he raised his head was so blue and beautiful, unlike the half-destroyed world.
Ah.
Let this sky be the last sky of his life. Let him never have to open his eyes again. Let him disappear forever like this.
And so, Sian took yet another life—one more in a count he could no longer recall.
“Your Highness the Crown Prince, it’s time to wake up.”
And once again, he began the insufferable time.
Regression is not simply turning back time.
At least, Idelbach and Arschen didn’t have the ability to manipulate time.
When a world is maintained for a very long time, “bugs” emerge naturally from unknown sources.
Usually, such bugs could be handled by the heroes of the era with just a little intervention from the gods. Humans were remarkably intelligent and amazing beings, after all.
But this time was different.
The ‘bug’ was powerful, organized, and spread throughout the world like a plague.
[We’re screwed.]
[I think we need to abandon this world…]
[What? No way!]
How much effort had they put into shaping this world!
If they abandoned this place, both Idelbach and Arschen would have to start over from the beginning.
Looking at the world being half-destroyed by demonic beasts, Idelbach came up with a simple strategy.
Create one more identical world. A different world with the exact same history, people, and events.
However, a world before all the destruction occurred.
‘Replication’ was possible because Idelbach-Arschen were the ‘Gods of Mirrors’ before they were the ‘Twin Gods.’
They reflected the world in ‘Lake Yusta Winter,’ where everything had begun.
But there was a problem.
‘Replicating’ an identical world meant that the destruction would also unfold identically.
Watching the world begin its mad rush toward destruction just like before, Idelbach and Arschen concluded that they needed an ‘axis of the world’ to distinguish it from the previous world.
And so, the last crown prince of the Obedih Holy Empire and the most beloved son of Idelbach…
Sian Terezia became the ‘axis of the world.’
The replication of the world was accomplished by reflecting the world in ‘Lake Yusta Winter,’ and the ‘central axis’ was Sian Terezia.
That’s how Sian Terezia became a regressor.
