Chapter 138
Even though the silver bullet pierced through my head, I felt no pain. Even so, I could feel my body turning into something like a corpse. My eyes wouldn’t blink, and my heart no longer beat.
But my senses and consciousness still remained.
So this is what they meant by “a silver bullet that doesn’t kill you even if it hits.”
Which is why I was still able to see the looks on their faces—those expressions frozen in shock.
Shion dazedly crying, Viktor pale and despairing, Johann and Karl thrashing like they’d lost their minds.
Swaying, my body tilted backward over the railing and then fell into the sea.
The gravity pulling me endlessly down the sheer cliff made my head spin. I heard a scream so sharp it tore through my ears.
My hair and dress fluttered violently in the ocean wind. As I fell, I saw a woman climbing up along the mountain ridge—Charlotte, who had just arrived at the count’s villa.
Her lovely face was filled with horror.
Guess I really succeeded in stabbing them in the back, huh.
That moment, a ding—a system window rang in my ears.
[ ♡ QUEST SUCCESS ♡ ]
[ You successfully triggered Carl’s emotional upheaval and awakened him within the 10-minute limit ♥ ]
[ Carl receives a “Strong Shock.” ]
[ Reward: Restoration of the “Affection” function in the status window ]
[ Reward will be automatically accepted. ]
[ Congratulations! The status window for “The One and Only Savior” has been successfully completed! ]
…What?
Before I could even finish reading the notification, splash—my body sank beneath the waves.
[ This is the optimal moment to use the Invisible Dagger. ]
[ Use Invisible Dagger?
YES / NO ]
[ The owner of the status window is unable to decide. The system automatically selects YES. ]
[ Invisible Dagger successfully separates the “necklace” from the “status window.” ]
[ The status window is now completely detached from the “Necklace of the First Transcendent” and fully bound to “Odette.” ]
[ You can now use the status window without the necklace. ]
Deep underwater, bubbles rose from my submerged body, and the fast currents blurred my vision.
[ Congratulations! Odette, you are now the perfect owner of the status window! ]
Yet the system text remained perfectly clear.
…The status window is bound to me?
I wanted to focus on it more, but my consciousness grew faint. The silver bullet’s effect—turning my body corpse-like but making me lose consciousness for several hours—was kicking in.
Dragged by the strong current, I blacked out.
* * *
Bang!
The gunshot exploded as the bullet pierced straight through Odette’s head.
At the same moment, the gleam in her turquoise eyes faded, and all life drained from her delicate body. Like a puppet with its strings cut, she swayed dangerously and fell backward over the railing.
“Odeeeette!!”
No matter how hard the transcendent beings struggled, their legs wouldn’t move.
Between the crashing waves, they heard the sound of Odette sinking beneath the sea.
A beast-like wail—no one knew whose—filled the room. It might have been Karl’s.
His legs, which had refused to move no matter how desperately he’d fought, suddenly moved so easily it was absurd. The other transcendents all rushed madly toward the sea—but Karl alone could not.
Because his entire body was unbearably hot. So hot he couldn’t even stand.
He collapsed to his knees on the floor, now soaked with the blood pouring from his ankle.
Why… why…
At first, she was simply “interesting.” Something that gave him a reason to look back at a life he’d never cared to revisit.
She was constantly wary of him—even while trying to win his favor. As he tried harder to act loyal, obedient, to cater to her, he found himself observing her.
“Carl. Don’t follow me—just cover me from afar.”
She was the complete opposite of him. While he was indifferent to everything, she was fiercely earnest in every moment.
Her forced perseverance had seemed pathetic, then laughable… and then, at some point, he’d become curious. Why does this woman live so desperately? What could possibly be worth all that effort?
“If you find an injured person, forget about covering me—go save them first. If you need money, come find me.”
As he followed her gaze, he discovered reasons in the smallest things. Even the trivial things she struggled for began to look worthwhile.
With that sudden realization, like watercolor spreading, color seeped back into his black-and-white world. In those moments, his life felt like it finally had meaning.
Perhaps… it had been that way since the moment he first saw her as a child in the palace gardens.
A small girl sitting among lace under the bright blue sky. A bird perched on her finger, the same color as his eyes. Her careful whistle. Blue sky, a yellow dress, a yellow bird.
Why that memory alone had color when all his others didn’t. Why he’d turned to look at that girl. Why something inside him had rippled in that moment—
He finally knew the name of that ripple.
I obeyed. I did everything you told me to do. I didn’t break a single order… I treated you as my master with everything I had—
He ground his teeth.
You can’t leave me like this. I can’t lose you like this.
But all he could do, burning with fever, was gasp on the floor.
Then it happened.
His already burning body blazed as if it were on fire. And at the same time, blood poured grotesquely from his ankle.
The blood spread into a circle—as if Karl were a sacrifice placed at the center of a magic formation.
I’ll give anything. I have to get her back.
As if responding to his will, the blood solidified into crystal.
The thick, eerie, unpleasant veins split into six strands, each transforming into a dark red iron ring.
The rings tilted around Karl, like an armillary sphere.
Karl rose to his feet. The inscriptions on the rings were ancient Fenrir runes relating to time. Instinctively, he understood—
He had awakened the ability to manipulate time. And that he could now stop or rewind it.
“『Rewind.』”
Speaking in the ancient language of Fenrir, he commanded.
The rings around him glowed blood-red and expanded.
They grew to encompass the entire villa—and then the space up to the cliff’s edge below. Everything within the rings turned black-and-white, frozen in place.
Then the interlocking rings slowly rotated backward.
Tick, crack, tick, crack—like the warped ticking of a broken clock, time began to reverse within the rings’ radius. By exactly as much time as Karl burned from his remaining lifespan.
No matter how powerful an S-Rank transcendent was, rewinding the entire world’s time was impossible. But Karl didn’t care.
He only needed Odette back.
Rewinding time just to the bottom of the cliff was enough.
Please.
His lifespan meant nothing. Death was preferable to the endless emptiness without Odette.
But even after rewinding to the limit, almost nothing changed. They had only returned to a few seconds before—just after his awakening.
Karl used his ability again.
“Rewind.”
Again.
“Rewind.”
Again and again—
“Rewind. Please, rewind!”
But no matter how many times—dozens, hundreds—it didn’t work.
“Dammit—why won’t it work?!”
Then Karl realized it.
No matter how many thousands of times he rewound, he could never return to before his awakening.
Because his awakening had occurred a fraction of a second after Odette’s death.
“Again… just one more time…”
He didn’t stop. He kept burning his lifespan.
Over and over.
Wishing with everything he had for his master to return to him.
* * *
Dreamlike bubbles. The distant cry of a whale.
Who knew how much time had passed.
Deep beneath the ocean, Odette opened her eyes.
