Chapter 197
I embraced Luwen, who was trembling with anxiety. He collapsed weakly into my arms. I stroked Luwen’s head and patted his back. I could feel the strength with which he held me.
‘We were in the same space. So that wasn’t just a dream after all.’
It was an incomprehensible phenomenon, but having been reincarnated with memories of my past life, I couldn’t simply insist it was unrealistic.
Most importantly, I had never told Luwen about that dream. But.
‘I heard you ask that person who he was, young master. Whether it was me.’
Luwen had accurately pointed out the conversation we had in the space I had dismissed as a dream. Even the preceding and following conversations, perfectly. So even if I wanted to deny it, I couldn’t.
Of course, just because I accepted it didn’t mean I could understand how such an unrealistic thing had happened. It was still full of questions, but one thing seemed certain. Luwen had seen numerous futures or pasts. And now I needed that information.
“I remember.”
“…Yes?”
He sat up and looked at me. I maintained a serious attitude and spoke quietly.
“I also remember that dream, no. It doesn’t seem like a dream, but anyway, I remember everything that happened in that black space. All the conversations I had with the Luwen who lost his ear in the war.”
Luwen’s eyes widened, then the atmosphere became much heavier. He looked down in silence as if retracing his memories in more detail, then stared at me.
“…It wasn’t just a simple dream?”
“It seems so.”
Luwen, who had become serious, moved his lips slightly. Rather than struggling with what to say, it looked like he was choosing what to say first.
“Then, that, such things will really happen…”
Luwen’s confusion was conveyed completely. This wasn’t the first time I’d seen him so unstable. He was like this on the day he was rescued after being trapped in a valley flooded with rainwater.
I could fully expect him to be anxious… but I still had to tell him. Until now, I had avoided unfortunate events because I knew the future. If the end of the path I was walking was connected to death, I wanted to avoid that too.
‘Die in place of Luwen and my sister after saving them?’
If the situation was unfavorable, it was a choice I might make.
But now I had become lovers with Luwen. I didn’t want to die and leave this person behind.
‘I’ve been desperately trying because I want to live with Luwen.’
So I need to know. How and why I die.
“Explain it in detail.”
“Wait, just wait a moment.”
Luwen pressed his forehead with one hand and frowned. It seemed he needed time to organize his thoughts, so I didn’t press him and waited.
“There was something I couldn’t understand among the things that person said. That he had selected information to give to you, young master.”
“He gave me information?”
“Yes. And he said you were changing the future, young master.”
The original story. Right, I received that book from someone else. Someone wearing a black coat… person…
Suddenly my head hurt as if it would split. I involuntarily groaned from the throbbing pain.
“Young master!”
“Suddenly my head, ugh…”
My vision swayed and shook. The world spun around. I felt as if I was being pulled by something and turned around. There was nothing there, just the familiar scenery of my office, but it felt as if someone invisible was standing there pulling me.
Crack- crackle-
Was it the sound of glass cracking? Or ice breaking? My vision went dark along with a sound I couldn’t clearly distinguish.
When I opened my eyes again, I was sitting by the Han River. The lights of an unnamed Han River bridge were shining brilliantly, but there was no one around. Only heavy snow was falling, making the scenery feel desolate.
‘…Is this real? Or not?’
I clenched my fist tightly. The sensation felt real, but I couldn’t feel the cold.
Crunch- creak-
I turned my head at the sound of footsteps in the snow. A man in a black coat, Luwen, no, a man was walking toward me.
“It’s been a while.”
My hazy memories became clear. The person I met in my past life. The person who came to find me. How I met him, what conversations we had, and what my end was like – everything came back to me. As if he had returned the information he had been holding to me.
“I don’t think it’s been that long. You’re the one who erased my memory, right?”
The numerous deaths that Luwen had seen. I thought I knew what they were.
‘The treasure could only be used once. To prepare for that one opportunity, I saw countless worlds. Please trust me. It’s right to leave the memories behind.’
Yes, I had heard such words.
“You told me to trust the information in the book.”
The distance was close, so I had to look up to see his face.
“You said you were envious.”
“That hasn’t changed even now.”
He smiled weakly with a pitiful voice. I didn’t know what to call him – I couldn’t say he was Luwen, but I couldn’t say he wasn’t either.
“The book you gave me, was that something that actually happened?”
“Facts and fiction are mixed together.”
“Which parts are fiction?”
He walked past me along the bright path illuminated by the streetlight, then stopped and turned around.
“Let’s walk together for a moment.”
“Luwen is worried. I want to go back quickly.”
“I am also Luwen.”
“You’re not the Luwen I know.”
He looked hurt for a moment. My chest stung, but I had to draw the line. The Luwen I know, my Luwen, is only the one who grew up with me from childhood. Even if he has the same face and name, if the background of growth is different and the memories are different, isn’t that a different person?
‘That’s… the right way to think about it.’
If the author’s face wasn’t the same as Luwen’s and his name was different, I could be more resolute.
“I am also the Luwen you know. You just… don’t remember.”
“If I don’t remember, isn’t that a stranger?”
My mouth felt rough as if I had chewed sand. The words meant to draw a line seemed to attack me instead.
“Is that so.”
I felt an impulse to hug him as he smiled bitterly. I deliberately turned my head to look at the Han River.
“A war will happen. The scene of Luwen dying – is that fact? Or fiction?”
“Sometimes it’s fact, sometimes it’s not.”
It was an ambiguous answer, but I thought I understood what it meant.
“In the countless simulations you saw?”
“Yes.”
“Then what happened in the world where I lived with you?”
I asked as I slowly approached him.
The man didn’t answer, but honestly, I had a guess. The realistic dream I had right after entering the academy. If that was something that really happened. If that’s how I died. If the Luwen who was hit by an arrow in the arm then was standing in front of me.
“You were hit by an arrow here.”
“…You said you didn’t remember.”
Eyes filled with strange expectation caught me. He looked happy and sad at the same time. The black eyes, mixed with ambivalent emotions and looking complex, seemed painted with paint that had mixed various colors and ultimately lost all color.
“I had a dream, a dream of the moment I died. But it seems that was something that actually happened.”
“…”
“You also said the treasure could only be used once. Does that mean it’s a treasure hidden underground in the imperial palace? Did my sister, who became empress, ask His Majesty… no. Did she ask His Majesty of that world?”
I spoke out the associations that came to mind from the pictures remaining in the puzzle fragments, watching the man’s reaction.
“To save me? No, that doesn’t seem right. Was there some danger not written in the book? Like the empire being destroyed?”
“Why do you think it’s not right?”
“Well…”
An unfamiliar emotion welled up. This wasn’t an emotion I was feeling. It was similar to the feeling when I dreamed, when I was assimilated with another me.
“…You didn’t like me.”
The sadness, resentment, and sorrow of unrequited love rushed in. But what was more intense than that was affection. It covered and embraced all the negative emotions.
‘I love Luwen.’
Even in the life I don’t remember, and even now. I still love Luwen. That fact made me strangely happy.
“If I didn’t like you, I wouldn’t have spent countless eons in those black pupils. I wouldn’t have watched the end of that hellish world that ended with your death so many times and suffered.”
Suddenly the scenery changed and a dark space that seemed to have absorbed all light appeared.
The man’s presence was still there, but when I shrank back in fear of the darkness where I couldn’t see an inch ahead, blue light rippled and drove away the darkness. It was Luwen’s, no, the man’s sword energy.
On the floor were countless books. Books with the same cover as the one I received from him. I picked up one and opened it. The man didn’t stop me, and I quickly turned the pages.
Next, next, and next again. I skimmed through several more books like that.
The contents were slightly different, but there were facts that didn’t change. Father passing away, my sister falling in love with the 2nd Prince, the 1st Prince falling from grace, war breaking out.
The end of every book was someone’s death. But the book I received was different. It ended with Irene becoming empress and achieving a golden age with the emperor.
“In the book I received, I die early. Why is only that different?”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
