52. What Did You Do to My Body? — The Next Stage of the Ability.
I calmly regained my senses.
Regretting it now was too late.
Since I'd chosen the reward, all that was left was to somehow figure out how to make use of it.
The most ideal way to use it might be to tell the Principal.
Whether the Principal was an ally or an enemy was ambiguous at best... but I could just regress after seeing his reaction.
And if things went south, I still had the last resort of releasing the checkpoint.
It's still night.
I had until tomorrow morning to think things over.
The method I came up with before won't work anymore.
There was no way to fix mental fatigue, but physical fatigue would reset if I killed myself.
So I'd once considered setting a checkpoint before bed and then suiciding repeatedly before morning to buy more thinking time.
Of course, that was just a passing thought.
I didn't want to rack up more deaths if I could help it.
Now I have no idea what might happen if I lose consciousness. Better not to risk blacking out—or dying—in the first place.
If I had to die, it was best to do it in a way that left no body behind.
The black syringe had definitely wiped my consciousness clean, with an effect close to instant death.
After experiencing death so many times, I could clearly distinguish between a dead state and a living one.
I'd died the moment the syringe hit me.
My corpse had been peacefully euthanized in one piece.
What the hell did past me do to this body?
Back to the main point—let's think about the clues.
The next stage of the ability. Keywords: expansion and target.
Expansion of what? Target of what?
Simplest guess: expansion of the target.
Let's use Ritta's ability as an example.
If her ability had a next stage, what would it be?
Expand the target.
In other words, not just turning organic matter into other organic matter... but turning inorganic into organic, and organic into inorganic?
What about Mask?
His ability: reveal his own info to someone else to teleport.
Reveal his info to himself?
No—in this context, the ability itself is teleportation.
Reveal his info to teleport others...
That's broken.
No matter what ability you plug in, it's broken.
Wait, what if I apply it to my own ability?
Expand the target of regression. Make others—not just me—regress?
No, that can't be right.
If past Ivy Lane is the one who wrote the ability description and named it...
She knew everything about her own ability.
Ability users instinctively understand how to use their powers, no matter how complex.
Ivy Lane defined her ability as Memento Mori—the power to remember death.
So... let's expand the target.
What is the power of Memento Mori?
Remembering death. If death is the target of the ability...
Remember everything.
Perfect memory? But that's already covered by the status window.
And it wouldn't explain the secondary power of turning back time.
The core of Memento Mori is the power to remember death.
Regress to remember others' deaths.
In other words, regression is secondary. Not the main ability.
Regression is needed to remember deaths, so it supports Memento Mori.
Remembering death grants rewards.
That's probably not the status window's power—it's Memento Mori itself.
Then the status window just records it, passes it to the next loop's me, and displays the info.
If that's right...
Remember the deaths of all things—not just others?
No, that's off.
"Others" literally means all humans besides myself.
So I'm already remembering the deaths of all humans—all things.
Expanding the target doesn't yield answers.
Wait.
Target. I only remember others' deaths.
Is Ivy Lane an "other"? Yes, she is.
Why? When I first experienced death in this body, the status window said it remembered Ivy Lane's death.
Thus, Ivy Lane is an other to me.
My own death.
Target expansion.
Remembering my own death, not just others'.
When I died, the status window didn't mention my death.
Didn't mention my real name either.
So Memento Mori can't remember its own death.
Target expansion: Expand Memento Mori's target... and it can remember my death.
But what's the point?
Remembering my own death is one-use only.
Just to boost a single stat...?
No, this is...
I got it! Eureka!
The academy has 399 students and staff combined.
Irene Rock explained it once in class.
I'd wondered why 399—why remember 400 deaths to return to my original world.
Remember 400 deaths, and I can go back.
Standard possession story route.
...But honestly, living in this world isn't so bad.
What to do.
If I can expand the ability's target, I can remember 400 deaths.
It's possible.
I'm a student here too.
I—in Ivy Lane's body—was the academy's 400th member.
Now, all that's left is the method.
I'm not planning to return right away.
I like this world, and my resolve to become a hero hasn't changed.
I want to save everyone else.
Can't return right now anyway.
Simplest: Kill all the students and faculty myself.
But my current power is way too lacking.
I don't even want to, and I couldn't anyway.
The return condition isn't confirmed, but it's probably something like that.
If I witness 400 deaths and still can't go back... whatever, I'll just live here.
I'm not desperate to leave.
"Ah."
I realized something.
I thought picking the clue about the ability's next stage might help somehow.
But in the end, it just means there's no way to get stronger.
I only got the method to claim the final reward.
Nothing else.
...What if I apply this to the protagonist's choices?
The unchosen path. Protagonist's ability marks actions he hasn't taken yet as choices.
In other words, pre-decide future actions and get buffs for them.
Preview probabilities, perfectly optimize behavior.
Not direct combat power, but highly versatile with great user ingenuity.
Maybe see others' choices? Or assist others via choices?
Hmm. Decision made.
The ability has a next stage. That stage is target expansion.
These two pieces of info are incredibly valuable.
No one's mentioned the next stage of abilities in the first arc.
Meaning, right now, I might be the only one who knows...
High value.
Principal, Mask, Dana... just off the top of my head, people who'd pay top dollar for this.
What could I get in exchange?
They already know I'm a regressor, so my info is credible.
Even dropping this weird "next stage" concept out of nowhere, they'd at least consider it.
"Info from the future," they'd say.
If a random regressor suddenly shouts "Earth ends tomorrow," how many would believe? How many would ponder its truth?
A civilian saying it is nonsense, but me? It carries weight.
That's the power of the regressor title.
Organizations and people who know I'm a regressor won't ignore my words.
I can exploit this.
I turned on my phone.
"...Ah."
Despairing numbers...! Aside from my two friends and one teacher, there were no saved contacts!
And that one teacher was just auto-added from the class group...!
No personal chats beyond the occasional class notices!
No way to contact the Principal or anyone else...?
A regressor's words carry weight.
More precisely: only when there's someone to hear them.
Stay calm, first.
I immediately tore up the paper with the clue.
Just in case, I'd grab a lighter tomorrow.
One person knowing this info is enough. No plans to share yet.
Checkpoint.
Set.
My goal narrowed to one.
Contact the Principal—or Dana—tomorrow. Make a deal.
Getting stronger is key.
Just "strong" won't solve anything. I need overwhelming power.
Relics, stat boosts, real combat experience... if there's a way to get strong fast, selling the next-stage clue is fine.
Hell, it might even be one-sided.
Hand over the info. They hand over theirs.
I regress from this point, and poof—never happened.
Risk-free return.
This is workable.