Chapter 106
For about a hundred of those years, she had been in this state. Quies mumbled softly.
Maili gestured with her eyes. Who’s Luda?
Roina silently looked toward the yeti standing outside the cabin. Maili made a strange face and gave a small nod.
“Are you sure there’s really no way?”
“Yes.”
Quies looked utterly dejected.
“To be precise, it shouldn’t be done. It would be defying the natural order. If that happens, the world will be eaten away. I can’t do that. Her illness isn’t a mere human disease.”
“If it’s not an ordinary illness, then what is it?”
Maili asked. Quies bit her lip before fluttering into the air with a soft chime.
“It’s the death of fate. The time given to her has simply run out. Even if I were to forcefully turn back time, she would only arrive at the same moment again. The truth is, it was never an illness to begin with.”
She spoke with a sorrowful expression once more.
“It’s a death decreed by her god. That means, at best, it can be delayed—but never avoided. It cannot be stopped.”
“You, you knew from the very beginning, didn’t you?”
Quies’s eyes welled up with tears before she finally burst into sobs.
“Yes! I’m a bad Quies! I know that, too. I know deceiving others is wrong! But still, I thought it would be nice if he could stay by my side forever.”
“But he lost himself. This isn’t his will. It isn’t right, Quies.”
“Luda is just like me—he has no family! For 400 years, he couldn’t accept his family’s death, so he couldn’t let go! That was his own choice! It’s not my fault that he lost himself! He gave up on his own. This is a contract between the two of us!”
That was true. After searching for centuries and failing countless times, there was no way he hadn’t known. It must have been his own decision to remain in this tranquil, unchanging time, making no progress.
“A contract? Based on what I’ve just heard, does that mean you made some kind of servitude contract with that yeti in exchange for healing the woman?”
“No! I didn’t lie! I stopped her time until he could find a way to heal her, and he agreed to stay by my side and help me!”
“Don’t play word games. Just because you didn’t outright lie, does that mean a fraudulent contract isn’t fraud? You set conditions that were impossible to fulfill from the start. Concealing the truth to make someone misunderstand—that’s lying, too.”
It was a tactic often used by lords who wanted to keep their honor in contracts while swindling others.
Maili clicked her tongue. Twisting the truth like a corrupt human—she never thought even a supposedly pure fairy would resort to such tricks.
“Anyway, as long as he can’t remember his name, the contract won’t be void! And I don’t want to tell him! He’ll leave me again! Humans are all awful! They always leave me behind! Master, I hate you! Idiot! Idiot, idiot, idiot!!”
In the end, it meant they had to find the true name Luda had recognized at the time of the contract for the clock to return to its proper course.
At that moment, something occurred to Roina. She quickly took out Diana’s diary from her coat and flipped it open.
{ Today, Rager brought me flowers again. He thinks I like them, so he keeps doing this—it’s truly endearing. }
{ Rager has finally come of age and officially become a Holy Knight of the order. Our temple is such a small place that his presence is a great help. }
{ Rager once doubted himself because he wanted to be a monk, but now that he’s doing it, he’s adapting well to training. It seems to suit him perfectly. }
Rager.
This was it.
“Rager!”
“!!!… How…!!”
Quies’s face was filled with despair. The fragile, fabricated reality she had created shattered into pieces. At the sound of the name ‘Rager,’ the yeti flinched, then fixed his gaze intently on Roina.
The figure, who had been standing still, slowly began to move toward her, one heavy step at a time. With each step, tufts of white fur fell away, shedding from the massive yeti as if he were casting off an old shell.
At last, when all the fur had fallen away, standing at the center was a young man.
His thick, white hair partially obscured his eyes, but his sharp jawline and strong physique made it clear—he was a strikingly handsome man.
“Luda…”
Quies called his name anxiously. But he did not respond to her call. Instead, he only stared fixedly at Roina, the one who had spoken the name ‘Rager.’
Twitch.
At that moment, the fingers of the woman who had been lying still with a pale complexion twitched. She let out a faint breath, murmuring softly, and then, at last, her closed eyelids lifted to reveal a pair of clear, beautiful light brown eyes.
Diana had awakened.
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