Chapter 141
There was just one problem. It would take time to completely remake the mansion.
He had to reassign the roles of the creatures, and also change the traps. Some of the creatures in the mansion had no self-awareness or reason, so they would not obey him, which meant he had to readjust things to ensure they wouldn’t pose a threat to her.
However, it was not an easy task.
All his power and control were being used up in weaving and maintaining Cynthia’s fate and her new body, so even if he tried to replenish himself through the banquets, his strength would always leak away like water through a cracked teacup.
There was no choice but to spend time gradually changing the mansion, bit by bit.
In the meantime, countless more Cynthias passed by his side.
He had never once had s*x with Cynthia, and it seemed she simply never wanted to have that kind of relationship with him. Above all, since it was a life-and-death situation, even if the mood was right, she could never really focus on it.
With Mage Cynthia, their relationship had even developed to something close to lovers, and the situation seemed promising, but just then, from the next room, she heard the screams of a companion whose brain was being sucked out by a Harvester, and everything fell apart.
On top of that, Mage Cynthia figured out Segleninde’s true identity even earlier than in other rounds. She even realized that she had already transmigrated into this world several times. She was an exceptional mage.
As always, when the final moment came, she trapped Segleninde inside a sealing magic circle and opened the doors of the mansion. She even remembered to put a fragment of her own consciousness into a teddy bear she had obtained as an item, as preparation for her next incarnation.
And just before leaving the mansion, she said to him, who could have easily broken out of the seal but just stood there vacantly without stopping her,
“I’ll never let you play with me again next time. No matter what it takes, I’ll tell the next me everything you’ve done, I’ll reveal your true nature. I won’t let you deceive me like this again.”
Once, they had been almost like lovers, so this Cynthia, in this round, was crying with a face even more wounded by betrayal.
“Don’t make that face! Do you even remember how many times you killed me?!”
“……”
“If not… then maybe you shouldn’t have killed me from the start.”
And with that, she let go of her lingering feelings and turned away.
“If you hadn’t, maybe… we wouldn’t have ended up like this……”
With those words, Mage Cynthia stepped into the brightly lit outside world.
At the same time, the sealing magic circle binding Segleninde vanished. Rather than running out the door to stop her, he unconsciously steadied his ragged breathing as he turned over the words she had left behind.
The human heart, contained in the human-like body he had created to mimic humans and lure them in, hastened him.
Now that you realize you are a being with a heart, it tells you to act like a human.
“…If only from the beginning.”
If only I could change that very first moment, would you stay by my side forever?
The moment he realized that, an irrevocable emotion gripped his heart.
It was the flaw and most selfish contradiction of all sentient beings, a lubricant for self-preservation—an emotion. And at last, he learned what kind of resonance it could bring.
The human form he wore to kill people, the human heart he made to deceive them…
These had caused him to fall in love with a human.
“From the beginning.”
Yes, from the very beginning.
If only they could truly start over with a ‘first meeting’.
If both she and he knew nothing at all.
If they could meet again as two blank slates placed side by side on a perfectly balanced scale, that would truly be a first meeting.
He would erase all his previous plans that had always ended in failure, all his calculations to keep her at the mansion, from his mind. Not only that, but even the fact that he was a being who sustained himself by feeding on humans. He would erase all memory of that as well.
Then, wouldn’t he finally be able to fulfill the role suited for this body, crafted in the form of a human?
Then, wouldn’t he at last be able to perfectly imitate a human, just as a human should?
Discussion
0 CommentsReactions
No comments yet.