CHAPTER 96………………………….
“…So you’re saying I died, and you helped my father execute the crown prince?”
“Yeah.”
“And after everything was over, you chose to die on your own?”
“Yeah.”
When Kaas finished speaking, Linaria had to ask again.
It was far too detailed to be something he’d made up.
Yet it couldn’t simply be dismissed as a dream either — she knew the mine had collapsed because of the assassin.
I have to accept it. Kaas is a contractor of time, just like me.
After her death, the hearts of the people she loved were shattered, and in the end, they took up blades of vengeance and stained their own hands with blood.
Linaria had to accept that, too.
“It’s fine even if you don’t believe me.”
As her silence stretched on, Kaas pulled her into his arms.
With her head resting against his chest, Linaria could clearly feel the beating of his heart.
It was fast and rough — proof of his anxiety.
“No… I believe you.”
Linaria would have believed anything Kaas said.
Not only his heartbeat, but also the desperate gaze that longed only for her, and the trembling in his arms as he held her tight — none of it could have been faked.
It was a raw, unfeigned longing.
“Kaas.”
“Yeah.”
“Kaas.”
“Yeah, Liri.”
In this moment, he was neither a worm nor trash.
He existed — simply as a person.
Nestled in his arms, Linaria shifted slightly, restless and uncomfortable.
When she subtly hinted that his embrace was stifling, Kaas — who seemed he would never let her go — loosened his arms without protest.
When she looked up, his face was filled with tension and regret.
Linaria cupped his cheek with her hand.
“How is it? Warm, right?”
When she’d been resurrected after her hanging, her father had comforted her this way whenever she was anxious.
He knew all too well the pain of losing someone precious.
Linaria didn’t want Kaas to drown in that same rising sorrow.
“Kaas, do you remember the first day we met?”
He nodded faintly, then hesitated before murmuring,
“I was… a worm.”
“…”
“I was thrown in front of you — pathetic and worthless.”
Kaas was speaking of his first life.
It hadn’t been long since Linaria became Maximilian’s fiancée, and Maximilian had suddenly introduced Kaas to her as a slave.
There was no way Linaria could have known about that.
That event no longer existed — because she had refused to become Maximilian’s fiancée.
But Kaas remembered it vividly.
He answered truthfully, because he didn’t want to lie to her.
Linaria moved her hand to the back of his neck and said softly,
“It was when you still had the slave’s brand.”
It wasn’t a question.
She said it with certainty, touching the exact spot where the mark had been.
Kaas flinched.
“I’m not saying I just believe your words — I mean I truly believe you.”
“…”
“Because I remember it too, just like you do.”
She had revealed that she was also a contractor of time.
But Kaas didn’t look surprised.
“Kaas, people call those like us — the ones who experience things like this — ‘Contractors of Time.’ You probably have a counterpart too.”
“I don’t care.”
“What do you mean, you don’t care?”
“Whatever the reason, you’re alive. That’s all that matters to me.”
It seemed Kaas hadn’t known that he himself was a contractor of time, nor that Linaria was one too.
But he didn’t seem to mind — as if such things were trivial.
What mattered to him was that Linaria was alive, here and now.
That alone was what kept him breathing.
Kaas must have made his contract with the Divine Beast of Time before he met me.
Otherwise, there was no way he could remember their true first meeting.
Kaas had been subjected to experiments as a child — forced contracts with divine beasts.
Perhaps that was when he had been bound to the Beast of Time.
It’s likely he was contracted without even knowing it.
It probably wasn’t intentional on the part of the imperial family — if they had known, they would have killed him and stolen the contract for themselves.
The Tower Master once said the Divine Beast of Time is the only one that can form a contract by human will alone.
If one’s desperation and will were strong enough, it could be summoned.
And the Kaas Linaria knew — even when faced with excruciating pain, even when walking the line between life and death — never surrendered, never sought escape through death.
He never stopped struggling to live.
He must have been like that since childhood.
“Do you remember if we met again after that first time?”
At her question, Kaas closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again.
He recalled Linaria, tearing the hem of her skirt to tend to his wounds.
“I remember.”
Branded as a slave, he had been treated worse than an insect.
Even then, Linaria had been the only one who treated him as a human being.
At the time, his emotions were dulled, his pain numbed — he couldn’t even recognize the warmth she offered.
But looking back now, he realized he must have felt it, faintly.
The time he spent with her had been his only peace.
They hadn’t talked much.
But just knowing she was nearby made the silence bearable — even welcome.
When he sat in the garden, pretending he was too weak to walk, he secretly wished she’d approach him.
And when she did — sitting close enough that he could catch her scent on the breeze — he felt something fill his chest.
That same scent filled his lungs now.
“What happened to me after that?”
“You… you…”
Her body had gone limp.
Her skirt fluttered helplessly in the air.
It was the first time Kaas had witnessed Linaria’s death.
“You…”
Warmth touched his cheek once more.
Linaria’s palm was there, gently cupping it.
A breath escaped him — only then did he realize he’d been holding it in.
“I’m alive. And so are you. The thing you feared doesn’t exist anymore.”
“It doesn’t?”
“It did, but not anymore. Only you and I remember it.”
Kaas’s golden eyes trembled.
“You died.”
“Not anymore.”
Turning his head slightly, Kaas pressed his lips to the palm of her hand.
“Liri, I…”
It was a deep kiss, as though sealing a vow.
“I want to kill that man again.”
The golden eyes that met hers were filled with hatred and rage.
“You will,” Linaria said.
Revenge always burned brighter when it was for oneself, not for another.
Kaas now desired Maximilian’s death by his own will.
“This time, not alone — with me.”
He had said he’d already killed Maximilian once, cruelly.
It was the death he had so longed for.
But Linaria had found that outcome the worst of all.
No one was happy.
The revenge had succeeded, but everyone had been swallowed by despair.
There had been a time when Linaria herself had vowed to kill Maximilian.
But when the moment came, the reason she didn’t tighten her hands around his throat was simple —
—to protect the ones she loved.
Linaria met Kaas’s golden eyes, eyes that held the same weight of hatred as her own.
I — no, we — can change even that cursed future.
“Anna, could you come sit here for a moment?”
After a long conversation with Kaas in the garden, Linaria called for Anna.
Something about the atmosphere felt off.
Anna blinked, confused.
Just a moment ago, my lady seemed strange…
Did she have another nightmare again today?
With that thought, she took a seat.
The spot beside Linaria was already taken, so she had no choice but to sit across from her.
He’s way too clingy for someone his size.
Kaas was practically glued to Linaria’s side.
Anna shot him a glare, finding his behavior obnoxious.
“Anna.”
“Yes, my lady!”
The instant Linaria called her name, Anna’s eyes lit up attentively.
