Chapter 57
Chapter 57
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 57
Chapter Title: A Fractured World
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Three moments come in a lifetime.
Just three chances to change your life.
Linbelle, on the verge of losing her home to chimeras, was scammed by the soldiers guarding the city gate.
Half her assets were stolen. She was forcibly separated from her mother. Hunger and thirst closed in.
For a girl who had spent her entire life in a rural village, the world she first encountered was cold.
She didn't know what to do.
All she could do was confront the soldiers, believing in some flimsy notion of justice. But that, too, was futile.
She lacked strength.
‘What? You want us to keep our promise?’
The soldiers who should have been righteous were rotten to the core, and not a single passerby offered her aid.
Faced with a tangible threat, no one lent even the smallest bit of support, and with no power of her own, she was no match for them.
It was then, just as the soldiers were about to reveal their dark intentions toward her…
He appeared.
A noble dignity apparent even from his appearance, and a powerful aura that overwhelmed his surroundings.
‘It’s Allen Reinhardt.’
He ripped out the tongues of the soldiers who had insulted his family and, in the same breath, saved her from her descent into ruin.
“What is your name?”
“…It’s Linbelle.”
A life adrift at fifteen.
For her, his appearance was the turning point that would change her life.
He was different from the other nobles she had heard about in rumors.
He listened to the words of a commoner.
He understood the circumstances of a crime committed out of necessity.
Nor was he offering kindness with an ulterior motive.
He granted her request.
The next day, Inellia, who had been wandering outside, entered the city gate with a single command from him.
The gate, which had felt like an immense wall, opened effortlessly at his word, and the fearsome soldiers dared not defy his authority.
That was why she immediately agreed when he asked her to become his maid.
‘I’ll be the young master’s maid.’
Because she had learned what power was.
Because she had felt what it meant to be powerless.
Though it had only been a day, what Linbelle experienced was enough to change her heart.
But another day passed, and Inellia was kidnapped. No, she allowed herself to be kidnapped.
‘Because of me.’
A demon-like monster had blatantly targeted Linbelle, and Inellia had willingly followed the demon for her sake.
It was then that she realized power did not bow to true strength.
In the face of true strength, intangible authority held no sway and crumbled like a sandcastle.
And that held true for his enemies as well.
‘I will save you.’
The young master was strong.
He single-handedly defeated dozens of monsters, and no trap could hold him back.
She came to admire him.
‘Power, I need power.’
Power as great as the young master’s.
The strength to stand against injustice, to not be swept away by the waves.
From what she could see, there seemed to be nothing Allen couldn't accomplish with his power.
What followed unfolded just as she had imagined.
Allen succeeded in rescuing Inellia safely before anything could happen to her.
Linbelle watched him confront the chimera creator and escaped the workshop with her without hesitation.
Not long after, Allen walked out of the cave.
Along with the death of the chimera creator.
‘Yes, I have to build my strength. For myself, for Mom, and…’
To repay the young master’s kindness.
Fortunately, he said she had talent.
“You are a genius. A true genius, incomparable to others.”
He told her she was special.
That she would be able to handle a noble power called Prana.
That because she was different from others, she could surely do it.
She was happy.
Happy that she could become strong as he said, happy to receive the expectations of the one she admired.
And so, she swung her sword.
At night, and during the day.
To meet his expectations, to become stronger.
Even when she wanted to give up on her first training, even when the strict duties of a maid were difficult.
She did not give up.
However.
“Why, why isn’t it working?”
Nothing changed.
‘I didn’t try hard enough. I wasn’t desperate enough.’
She cut back on her sleep.
She doubled her training time.
She mixed training into her daily life.
The female knight in charge of her training praised her, calling it an incredible talent.
And so, a month passed.
“By any chance, is your seat uncomfortable?”
She still couldn't handle Prana.
She was desperate.
“…Hehe. The carriage is just a little uncomfortable.”
All she could do was smile like a fool.
Her still-clumsy maid duties, unlike Inellia’s, and her inability to meet his expectations filled her with a sense of crisis.
Afraid she would become a hindrance to the one she admired.
Wanting not to betray the infinite trust he poured into her.
She hid her desperation behind a cute act.
It was the same when bandits attacked the carriage.
“I’ll step forward!”
She killed the bandits with the skills she had learned.
There was no shock from the act of killing. There couldn't be.
She tried to console herself, saying it was a trial to awaken her noble power, and dismissed her trembling hands as a result of harsh training.
She thought she had shown her minimum worth.
And then.
“I’ll be back shortly with Inellia.”
Linbelle was left behind at the mansion.
Alone again.
She realized it once more, desperately.
“…I have to prove my usefulness.”
She swung her sword again.
The isolation of being left behind turned to jealousy,
and the desperation for what she couldn't have became obsession.
What is this noble power?
“Pledge noble chivalry, make a sublime vow, and keep an unfulfilled promise.”
It was a phrase that pointed to the basics of Prana, piercing the core of what this noble power was about.
“What am I supposed to put into it?”
Prana contains emotions.
Promises, vows, declarations, resolutions, revenge.
However.
“Why can’t I do it? Why? Why? Why…”
She couldn't reach it.
Her mother was carrying out the young master’s orders.
In the flowing river of the world, only she remained stagnant.
So she clung to other things.
To prove she had changed, to show him.
But.
“Please, take me with you, Young Master.”
Allen did not take her.
There was no place for her on the journey to hunt the witch.
She couldn't prove her worth as she had when she dealt with the bandits, nor was she given the chance to watch him up close.
He smiled as he always did.
“I have something else for you to do, so stay here with Inellia.”
Linbelle despaired.
She felt like she would be consumed by her own powerlessness.
She felt like she would suffocate under the endless downpour of his kindness.
And.
‘…….’
Her mother was moving stealthily again.
Following the young master’s orders.
Excluding her.
“…I am.”
Linbelle’s eyes flickered darkly.
Unfulfilled longing moved beyond obsession and toward madness.
And, at the end of it all.
“Ah.”
Her eyes opened.
The first thing she saw upon waking was the ceiling of a room, familiar yet different.
“…Why am I here?”
Looking around, she saw she was in one of the many private rooms in the mansion.
“I went to the Divine Beast’s Forest with the young master… and then…?”
She couldn't remember what she had been doing just moments before.
She immediately left the room.
She headed for the young master’s familiar private study.
She knew she would find out what had happened if she went there.
But the attitude of the servants around her was strange.
“You, you’re…”
“…How are you!”
“Eek…!”
They acted as if they had seen a ghost, as if they had witnessed a dead person.
Seeing them turn their backs and walk away before she could ask anything, she gave up on questioning them. Getting to the young master was more important.
The mansion’s hallway felt a bit unfamiliar.
‘Was that there before?’
Objects that hadn't been there just a few days ago now decorated both sides of the hallway, and places she knew well felt somehow alien.
There were also fewer people than usual.
As if they were avoiding the path to this place.
‘That can’t be right.’
Who was the young master?
What reason could there be to avoid him in the Reinhardt family?
Linbelle pushed aside her stray thoughts and quickly arrived at the young master’s private study.
*Knock, knock.*
“Young Master, it’s Linbelle. May I come in?”
There was no answer from the room.
But through the crack in the door, she heard the faint sound of paper rustling.
‘He must not have heard me because he’s busy with his research.’
Was her mother out carrying another one of Allen’s orders?
Linbelle suppressed the feeling stirring within her and spoke again.
“Young Master, it’s Linbelle.”
As she spoke again, the faint sound abruptly stopped.
Then came a weak, sharp reply that she could never have imagined was Allen’s.
“It’s not mealtime yet, what is it? If it’s not important, get lost.”
It was strange.
The young master would never respond like that.
Linbelle suddenly recalled the servants who had fled at the sight of her and the alien feeling of the mansion.
She felt a chilling sensation crawl up from her feet and moved.
She would be punished for entering without permission, but she wanted to resolve this strange, trembling anxiety.
*Creek—*
“Didn’t I tell you to get lost! What are you…”
Opening the door, what she found there was…
“…How can you! You, you! How are you alive! Are you here to take me? No, no…”
An unshaven beard and bloodshot eyes.
A pale, gaunt face covered in blemishes.
The man staring at her with eyes full of fear was…
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. But not yet! It can’t be! I, I have to save my brother! Please, please…”
Allen Reinhardt.
His appearance was slightly different, but it was undoubtedly him.
“Young… Master…?”
“Go away. I’m begging you like this. Please, please… my brother is waiting for me. I’ll bow my head if you ask, I’ll beg if you want. So…”
As Linbelle approached, he backed away to the wall, then immediately prostrated himself on the floor.
“Young Master, what is all this…”
Linbelle was bewildered.
What was happening? Why was the young master suddenly like this? She tried to say something, anything.
“…Young Master, what’s wrong? What’s with this all of a sudden… where’s my mother?”
“I’m sorry for letting your mother die. So please…”
“Inellia is your maid, Young Master. What do you mean, die…”
“Please, I’ve never had a maid. I’ll pay for my sins someday. So just disappear.”
But all she learned was that there was an unbridgeable gap of misunderstanding in their conversation.
“What about the others? Merchant Lord Soned, or Merchant Lord Karic…”
“Did you go to that merchant bastard Soned too? No, who is Karic…”
Perhaps only then noticing that something was truly amiss, he lifted his haggard face, reached for a pill bottle on his desk, and shoved a handful into his mouth.
*Crunch.*
In an instant, his pupils dilated, his unfocused gaze staring blankly into the air.
How long had it been like that?
After several minutes had passed and her form had not disappeared, he muttered.
“…It’s not a hallucination?”
He had thought it strange that the hallucination felt more vivid than usual.
It should have been a few more days before another episode.
But what was even stranger was…
“No, more importantly…”
You, who returned to the mansion as a corpse.
“…How are you alive?”
“Um… I’m not sure?”
A rumor spread like wildfire that Linbelle, who had died, had returned to the mansion.
Most of the servants didn't believe it, but seeing her walking around the mansion, they had no choice but to accept it.
But no one tried to associate with her.
Part of it was because she had never been close to anyone, busy as she was hunting monsters, but those who had seen her mangled corpse were quick to flee, sensing a palpable ominousness about her.
On the second day, Linbelle met Allen again.
“…Is that all?”
She told him everything she knew.
“Yes.”
From how she got here.
To the version of him she knew and his actions.
And.
Even his relationship with Julius.
Allen took a drag from his harsh pipe, a hollow smile on his face.
“Heh, so I failed in the end? Then all my actions were…”
He seemed to have figured something out from her story.
Unlike her, he was smart, so it wasn't strange that he had deduced something from her words.
“Completely useless.”
He chugged the strong wine straight from the bottle.
The amber liquid burned his throat in an instant.
“Hah, reconciling with that bastard Julius? Defeating the chimera creator? Stopping a bandit attack? Ha, haha! Truly, truly a thought worthy of me.”
*Thud—!*
The remaining liquid sloshed and swirled inside the bottle, and Allen took another deep drag from his pipe.
She found the sight a little awkward.
The young master she knew never touched alcohol, let alone tobacco.
“Truly, a thought worthy of me… Since I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.”
It was obvious what he had been planning.
To rot it from the inside out.
He could also deduce why his future ‘self’ had acted that way.
Therefore.
“I have already failed.”
“What does that…”
His future ‘self’ clearly existed and was active.
And Linbelle was with that future ‘me.’
That meant one thing.
“This place is a fake.”
“What?”
She blinked, a look of surprise on her face.
“What do you mean, this is a fake…? It feels so real.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that it’s a fake.”
He smiled cynically, a look of resignation and defeat on his face.
Time could never flow backward.
But whether through some trick or loophole, ‘I’ had eventually returned to the past, and thus, his future was set.
That meant that no matter how much Allen struggled, he could never change the ‘present.’
“So this place is either an elaborate fake or… yes, nothing more than an illusion. According to your story, it’s probably…”
Which meant.
“A divine beast… you said the last thing you saw was a divine beast, right? It must have something to do with it.”
No matter what he did here,
he couldn't save his brother.
“I’ll look into it for you. You said you were ‘my’ maid. I should help.”
It was a death sentence.
He smiled forlornly.
“……”
Linbelle watched him in silence.
The young master who pursued perfection in all things, who possessed immense strength, was gone.
But.
‘I still don’t understand everything, but…’
Even if he was different from the Allen she admired.
“Then, tell me your story now, Young Master.”
“…What?”
For the first time, he looked bewildered.
His nose crinkled and his eyebrows furrowed—an expression the ever-calm and composed Allen she knew would never show.
“It’s not fair if I’m the only one talking, is it?”
“…This is awkward for me to say, but did ‘I’ allow you to act like that?”
“Yes, of course!”
He let out a small laugh at her bold reply.
“In that case… I suppose there’s no reason not to tell you.”
It was probably about fifteen years ago.
When a younger brother was crippled because his foolish older brother was trying to appease him.
There was an older brother who swore to dedicate everything to that younger brother.
An idiot, trying to save his changed brother.
That was how the story began.