System Error

Shall we talk a little more about memory?

With a few private details mixed in.

I'll skip the preamble and get to the point: compared to other people, I had a good memory.

I could recall promises a decade old that everyone else had long forgotten, and book passages that took others an entire day to memorize took me only ten minutes.

My memory was sharp. Perhaps I had a little more of the natural aptitude of a Regressor than most.

Maybe that was why. I arrogantly believed I would save the world.

What nonsense.

It was a pitiful faith.

No matter how good a memory might be, a human is still only human. And every human has limits.

Remembering a promise ten years old is one thing; remembering one a thousand years old is another. And a promise more than ten thousand years old is simply doomed to be forgotten.

Memorizing a single volume in ten minutes is one thing. Memorizing more than ten thousand volumes is not enough even if you have a hundred years.

I was a person. In the end, that was all I was.

I was only human.

My mind collapsed. Again and again. Dozens of times. Hundreds of times. Thousands of times.

Failing to save the world played a part, of course. But that was only a secondary reason.

It was because the thing called "me" was steadily vanishing. I forgot more memories. I lost old habits and acquired new ones. My way of speaking changed, and so did my stride, and even the way I breathed. The speed at which I blinked changed.

From one to ten, everything. The "me" that remained was no longer me.

"……sir! Young Master Kyle! Get out of the way!"

My name, shouted in panic from behind me. When I looked ahead, a massive beast was charging with its fangs bared. Looking at that sight, I understood.

I've… regressed again.

The last loop had failed as well.

What exactly went wrong last time?

Was it that I shouldn't have acted that way there?

Or maybe it was because I left out something I was originally supposed to do.

Or perhaps because I killed that one too late.

I don't know.

So then. What am I supposed to do now?

The thoughts were a little disordered. Hardly the thinking of a human mind. Unpleasant and bizarre beyond measure.

Still, it was fine. A little more thought and I would settle down soon enough. Or even if I didn't settle, that was fine too. Everything I had to do from this point on was already decided.

As it always had been.

—Kuuwaaaaaah!!

The beast's roar reached me a beat late. Reflexively I brought my hand to my waist, reaching for a sword. My fingers closed on nothing but empty air. For a moment I was thrown off.

Ah, right. This is the time when I don't have a sword yet.

I got mixed up now and then. Even if the regression point was always the same, once you passed a thousand loops you were bound to blank on things. After all, a single loop was not one year or two, but thirty, forty—and sometimes a hundred or two hundred years. And part of it was simply that reaching for a sword first had become a long-settled habit of mine.

These days, even after regressing, everything just aches.

Of course that was only a delusion in my head. The moment you regress, every physical wound and every mental blow you ever took simply ceases to have happened. Even knowing that, the pain still ran from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet.

No weapon, so I'll have to put it down with mana first.

Deep inside my chest, near the heart, a warm current was flowing—Mana. I drew that mana into a single small point. At once came the sensation of a rapid, hammering pulse. It felt as if a surging flame of heat would burn even the scorching pain itself away. That contradictory agony, more than anything, told me this place was real.

Still an unpleasant feeling.

As if it were second nature, I sent the mana racing through my entire body.

This should be enough.

Without hesitation I leapt forward like a bolt. My destination was the space right in front of the giant beast. The scenery around me blurred until only the monster stood out in sharp relief.

Finish it in one blow.

In that instant—the moment I closed to the beast's front—I stopped for a fraction of a second, then sprang high into the air.

Dirt and dust sprayed in every direction. I spun my body in a full turn and extended my leg. Twisting from the axis of my waist, I drove a heavy kick straight into the beast's skull.

KWAANG!

The sound of air splitting arrived with the wind. A hole punched clean through the beast from the top of its head down between its legs. A massive clot of blood burst open. Dark crimson soaked into the trees. Looking at the shape of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it, I landed lightly on the ground as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Too strong?

This part confused me sometimes too. I often poured more mana into a blow than I needed, and I paid for it afterward with pointless fatigue. It was an unavoidable problem, though. Try to hold back and I had accidentally died more than once. And dying that way left me so mortified for the rest of a loop that I barely had the will to keep living.

This should do.

I dusted the dirt from my clothes with a deliberate show of ease. I was putting it on on purpose.

"Young Master! A-are you all right?!"

A pretty young woman's voice from behind me. When I turned, a girl with a face like the sunset itself—same as every day—was running toward me. She looked as if she had been genuinely terrified. Her eyes were even red enough that she seemed about to cry.

How should I react?

The truth was, I knew. The entire reason I had been put in danger here was her. She was the one who had released the monster to kill me. I knew all of it.

So I should respond as kindly as possible.

It took serious consideration.

"Sera."

I started by calling her name.

"Y-yes! Young Master!"

Any number of lines rose to mind. What came out of my mouth, though, was the most familiar and ordinary line of them all.

"You can drop the act now. I've seen through all of it."

A long conversation would only be a nuisance. Better to get to the point. She would probably feel the same. Nobody likes a nuisance, right?

"That beast. Under normal circumstances, a creature like that would never appear in this forest. And yet it shows up on the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠very day I come out here and attacks me? Someone deliberately brought it. I wonder who."

"……."

"Sera. The truth is, I even know that you resent our family. I know that the reason you deliberately became a maid of our house was for revenge."

The family I belonged to: the Arcadia Family. A noble house with hundreds of years of tradition, outwardly humane and kind, that had in fact committed countless atrocities. In a word, trash.

"……Young Master, what exactly are you trying to say?"

"That there's no need for you to hide your purpose from me."

In that instant Sera's eyes filled with killing intent. The gentle, worried look from a moment before vanished, and she glared at me hard—as if the second she saw an opening she would cut me down.

In fact, I have been killed right here before.

She had killed me the moment she decided there were no witnesses. As I remembered it, I hadn't even misspoken; I had spoken perfectly logically.

Which is why, in the past, I sometimes killed her first instead.

She came at me to kill me without a moment's rest every single time. Persuading her was such a nuisance that I simply started by killing her. It raised my odds of surviving a little.

But I couldn't keep doing that forever. Her talent was too great.

Simply killing her would have been a waste of something extraordinary. To save the world, I needed her. So as the years went on, as I remember it, I kept her alive. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Or maybe I didn't. Either way, these days I was making an effort to keep her alive and maintain as cooperative a relationship as possible.

"……It means I'll help you. In destroying the Arcadia Family."

"What?"

Sera answered blankly. She was looking at me with a cold expression and a sneer.

"What on earth are you talking about all of a sudden?"

From her point of view, it must have been absurd. Well, of course it was. A good-for-nothing wastrel who had lived his whole life like garbage was suddenly talking as if he amounted to something. I would have found it absurd too.

After all, I'm the discarded trash of the family.

And it wasn't as if I myself had never done despicable things. I had used my noble status to torment commoners and the like. Vicious, and childish on top of it, which was why even the people of my own house had cast me out.

So I'll have to prove first that I can actually be of use.

I had an obligation to show her at least a minimum of trustworthiness. First I tried on a relaxed, easy smile—the same deliberate performance as when I had brushed the dust off my clothes earlier. A necessary bit of staging in its own way.

"You don't find me very reliable, do you?"

I turned the question back on her. A mocking answer came back.

"……Isn't that obvious? I've been watching you for a good ten years."

Ten years. Short if you called it short, long if you called it long. Of course, to a regressor it was a length of time that barely registered. The fact that she was even bringing up a span like that was almost funny.

"Ten years? And in all that time, what exactly did you learn?"

The moment the words left my mouth ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I stretched out my hand. Just as before, I drew the mana from deep inside my body.

"In those ten years, did you ever even know I could do something like this?"

I deliberately fired the magic with force. From my fingertips a flame bloomed that warped the air around it. Just looking at it was hot enough to make sweat run.

"Stop with the pointless suspicion. It's impossible for you to destroy the Arcadia Family alone in the first place."

"What are you even saying—"

"It's simple. You don't know the Arcadia Family. But I know it well. And I hate the Arcadia Family too. So I'm saying we help each other."

Sera's brow furrowed even more at my display. If anything, she seemed to have grown more suspicious. But that was the reaction I had intended. In the end, the only thing that mattered was whether she needed me or not.

With this, she'll try to use me.

She wouldn't be able to kill me carelessly. After all this time without a single result, this was the closest thing to a real possibility she had. In the end, the choice she made was the natural one.

"……What good is there for me in cooperating with you, Young Master?"

"Don't worry about that part. Information, at least, I can give you right now."

"Information alone isn't enough."

"Then what do you want besides information? Say it. I'll give you anything."

Sera lowered her head as if briefly considering. She stared at the ground with mournful eyes, then opened her mouth in a small voice.

"……Why are you suddenly offering to work with me? And why have you been hiding that kind of power until now? Can you answer that?"

"Would answering change anything?"

"It would at least give me a basis for judgment."

"No. I'm sorry, but it wouldn't change a thing."

At my firm refusal, Sera glared at me again. She clenched her fists hard, showing her anger. I answered that look with easy indifference, as if none of it touched me.

"There's plenty of time. Think it over on your own. That would be better for you."

Sera averted her eyes from me. Whether her mood had soured or she simply no longer wanted to talk, she turned away. There was nothing to be done about it. Any plausible excuse I invented would only plant deeper suspicion in her. If I wanted to persuade her quickly, this was actually the better approach.

Sera walked past me without strength, heading as if to return to the mansion. I watched her for a moment, then followed. I had to go back too, after all.

In a few days or so, she'll say she'll join me.

That was enough. Sera was a rational girl. However suspicious she found me, if she decided I was useful she would accept the cooperation. Of course it wasn't as if there were no points of unease at all. But I could deal with those too. So I wasn't worried.

About time, I suppose.

I roughly checked the hour and muttered to myself.

……Status Window.

An ability as important to me as regression itself. The Status Window, which displayed stats, information, and the rest. Something I absolutely needed before I could begin anything. First I decided to see whether it was working properly.

The message window that floated up was, if anything, unpleasant.

Not yet, then.

At some point, I had stopped being able to call up the Status Window immediately after regressing. The message claimed it was because there was too much information. Incidents like this had grown more frequent starting from recent loops. Probably because the years I had lived had simply grown too long.

Nothing for it. In that case, I'll have to handle other business first, same as last time.

That was my decision.