Chapter 113
“Home.”
At that vague word, Noxia hesitated. She stared straight at Promeon. Promeon did not avoid her gaze.
“…Home, where?”
She had had far too many homes until now. The orphanage where she was born and raised in this life, the rented room she obtained in the capital, and even the seaside mansion where she had lived recently.
If she extended the scope to her previous life, the list of places called home grew even longer. If one stretched the definition a little, even the palace from a distant past could be considered her home.
Seeing Noxia’s confused expression, Promeon smiled faintly. As planned, he answered.
“The house you lived in here in the capital. If you want, I’ll take you there.”
Noxia’s heart sank. The moment she had been preparing herself for since dawn arrived sooner than expected.
“And if you want, you can continue living in that house from now on as well. As if nothing that happened since last autumn ever occurred.”
Now was the moment of choice.
No—more accurately, both of them had already made their choices, and the time had come to take responsibility for them.
Noxia chose the connections of this life, not the lingering attachments of her previous one. The place her heart now turned toward—and the place it would turn toward in the future—was not the man standing before her.
Promeon had already made his decision as well. He could have forced her to remain by his side, binding her there while covering her eyes and ears as she looked elsewhere. But this time, he chose a different path.
Because he never wanted to repeat the final moment of their previous life again.
Because he wanted to prevent her from longing for freedom inside the beautiful, cozy cage he had prepared—only to ultimately break herself apart.
This time, instead of recklessly breaking her wings, he had hoped that gently coaxing her with kindness might slowly win her back completely. Yet after nine months of effort, he had failed again.
So he decided to accept it, together with the sorrow that felt like a cold abyss swallowing him whole.
It was finally time to reveal the secret he had hidden all along and calmly say goodbye to the love of his lifetime.
“…Okay. Take me there.”
Noxia whispered softly. She forced herself to swallow the tears that were both useless and cruel.
Promeon turned around first. Noxia silently matched her steps with his.
In silence, they arrived before a familiar building. With a strange feeling, Noxia looked up at the place that had once been her home—and would now become her home again.
She turned toward Promeon. He met her gaze calmly.
“Promeon.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you know why Prince Elenon’s memories returned? Did you undo the spell of oblivion?”
She asked calmly. Speaking about Elenon in front of Promeon might have been cruel, but once the question arose, she had to resolve it.
They could no longer leave any knots or mysteries unresolved between them.
“No, it wasn’t me. I didn’t touch the spell. As you saw earlier at the sandwich shop, other people still don’t remember you.”
“Then how…?”
“How did the prince alone regain his memories first? I don’t know the exact answer either. But I do have a guess.”
Promeon replied evenly. Suddenly, he raised his thumb to his mouth and, with a composed expression, bit down hard on it until bright red blood welled up.
“What are you doing—?!”
Seeing flesh tear and blood flow, Noxia widened her eyes in shock. Promeon explained gently.
“My wounds don’t heal.”
“What?”
“To be precise, they heal slowly. They don’t recover immediately anymore. Before, wounds disappeared before I could even feel pain, but lately the speed has been getting slower.”
It had been the same when he took the hot soup meant for Noxia. The burn he received had healed quickly, but the pain lingered longer than usual. It was an unfamiliar sensation for him.
“My hypothesis is that the curse of immortality I received isn’t perfect. It’s immortality in name only. Maybe the curse is gradually unraveling on its own without me doing anything. That would also mean my power is developing cracks.”
Promeon shared with Noxia something he had known alone until now—and had only confessed to Karnen the previous night.
“That doesn’t mean the curse will disappear tomorrow or the day after. It took thousands of years just for it to become this unstable. It might take thousands more years to completely wear away. Maybe even longer. The beings who cursed me perceive time differently from us. To them, a hundred years feels as fleeting as a single day…”
Promeon paused, recalling the past—
the repetition of numb, meaningless seasons where a hundred years felt like a day, and longer spans of time felt equally hollow.
The thought that such endless repetition might finally end made his heart race. For nearly thousands of years, it had only beaten like that when he thought of Hermane.
Now, for the first time in ages, he felt excitement about the future without obsessing over someone he longed for.
“But this is only a hypothesis. Like I said, I don’t know the real answer. I don’t know why only Prince Elenon regained his memories while others still haven’t.”
Promeon added, gazing at Noxia with sorrowful yet gentle eyes.
“Maybe… it’s because that child’s feelings for you are just that deep.”
Noxia could not reply. All she could do was stare endlessly at Promeon.
In the meantime, his wound healed. The bleeding from his thumb stopped, and soft new skin formed.
Seeing the bloodstain left on his hand, Noxia bit her lip. She wanted to scold him and tell him never to hurt himself like that again, but she felt she had no right to nag him anymore, so she remained silent.
“Since we’re already talking, there’s something you still don’t know.”
Promeon suddenly confessed. A puzzled expression appeared on Noxia’s face.
“There might be a way to break both the immortality curse I received and the reincarnation punishment Pelene received. Without waiting for them to naturally wear away.”
“What?”
Noxia’s eyes widened at the unexpected confession. Looking down at the slender face he might never see again, Promeon continued calmly.
“The probability is only about fifty-fifty, so I never told you before. I didn’t want to give you false hope.”
And because I wanted to stay by your side. The moment you learned there was even the slightest chance to break the curse, I was afraid you would push me away and tell me to go.
“I’m sorry for telling you only now.”
Hiding the real—and most cowardly—reason for his silence, Promeon bowed his head humbly. Even if he concealed the main reason, his apology was genuine.
He had known about the method to break the curse for a very long time. Even before he stormed into the underworld to forcibly retrieve his lover’s soul.
To be precise, it was closer to a possibility than a method—but it was still a lead worth gambling on.
“…What method?”
Noxia asked calmly. She did not question how long he had known, nor did she grow angry that he was only telling her now. She knew blaming him at this point would change nothing.
“A straightforward method. Kill the one who cast the curse.”
Promeon answered just as calmly, confessing quietly while feeling the weight of his sins deepen with every moment.
“You just have to kill the ancient Supreme God.”
He recalled the distant past.
The cursed hero, who had wandered this land like a ghost for a long time, could no longer endure his loneliness. After relentless effort, he eventually learned how to open a dimensional gate.
He crossed that gate in pursuit of the ancient gods who had taken revenge on him and Pelene before fleeing to another world. There, he discovered those ancient gods at war with the native gods of that world.
It was not the first time they had driven out other gods and stolen humanity’s faith. In fact, they had done the same in the world of Promeon and Hermane, expelling the original gods and taking their place.
The original Supreme God—whose records no longer remained—once received a prophecy from the gods of fate while his wife was pregnant: that his children would kill him and become the new rulers of the heavens.
So each time his wife gave birth, he swallowed the child whole.
After losing five children in succession, the goddess wife devised a trick and secretly saved the sixth child.
The Supreme God swallowed a stone disguised as a baby without suspicion, while the real sixth child grew up in a hidden cave on a remote island, nourished on goat’s milk.
When the sixth child matured, he gathered an army, defeated his father, tore open his stomach, and rescued the siblings trapped inside.
The sixth child, who wielded lightning, became the new Supreme God. The old gods who had followed his father either had their souls torn apart and annihilated or were imprisoned in the deepest labyrinth underground.
Gods were, in principle, immortal and could not be killed. But a far stronger god could strip away all their power, seal them, or destroy their souls.
Promeon believed that, as someone who had originally been human, the chance of destroying the Supreme God’s soul was slim. If he recklessly challenged the god in hopes of breaking the curse, he might instead receive an even harsher punishment.
‘Humanity once united and drove the gods away. But facing one alone…’
Promeon was completely alone. The other ancient heroes who once fought beside him had all grown old and died. Only he remained, bound to the mortal world by the curse of immortality.
‘…I’m so sick of this.’
Even if the chances of success were low. Even if failure would make things worse.
‘I want to do something—anything.’
He could no longer endure this eternal loneliness without trying something.
‘Honestly, I’d rather be annihilated.’
If crashing into the wall shattered his entire being, he would laugh in relief—finally freed from this unbearable solitude.
‘Yes… if I were to challenge the Supreme God.’
What would happen if he attacked the Supreme God under the pretense of breaking his curse?
Perhaps that arrogant being would grow irritated enough to want him dead.
‘If he destroyed my soul in anger…’
His soul would not reach paradise, but at least he would finally find rest.
In that half-mad state, mixed with desperation, resignation, and hatred, he crossed into another dimension—
and there he discovered gods already at war.
And the devastation he witnessed there was enough to shatter his resolve to seek out the former Supreme God, even at the cost of his own annihilation.
