Reunion

The massive white door opened with a grating screech, like bones being ground to dust.

What lay beyond wasn't the boss room of some damp dungeon.

Light.

An overwhelmingly pure white radiance that filled my entire field of vision, sharp enough to sting my eyes.

There was no trace of the dungeon's usual moldy stench, no sickening metallic reek of blood.

Instead, the air was cold and impossibly clean, the kind that scoured your lungs. Mixed with it was the strange scent of incense from an ancient temple blended with metal.

I froze on the threshold.

Is this even a dungeon?

A chill raced down my spine. My instincts screamed at me to turn back immediately.

Yet my body felt an eerie pull, urging me to take one more step forward. It was as if someone else had seized the back of my neck and was shoving me ahead against my will.

Professor Kane stepped forward first.

"...This is strange."

He scanned the surroundings slowly, as if swallowing his breath. The veteran who'd spent his life crawling through dungeons looked genuinely rattled, unable to find the right words for once.

"I've crossed hundreds of gates in my lifetime, but..."

"This kind of fucked-up structure is a first."

He cautiously traced the patterns along the door's edge with his finger. Though the surface felt like cold marble, it pulsed faintly like the flesh of a living creature.

Thump. Thump.

"Doesn't it feel less like a dungeon and more like the belly of some enormous living thing?"

At those words, Scarlet pushed up her glasses, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.

"A living thing? Professor, look at the arrangement of these patterns!"

"The mana flow is completely reversed. This isn't a naturally occurring dungeon—it's an artificial ritual, forcibly twisted and stitched together by someone! Wow, if we reported this to the academic world, it'd be huge..."

Scarlet rambled on in excitement, but her fingertips had gone deathly pale. It seemed she was suppressing her terror of the incomprehensible phenomenon by forcing herself to analyze it.

Meanwhile, Priscilla frowned and took a step back. Her face had turned ashen.

"...Ugh."

She let out a low groan and clutched her own arm. This wasn't just from the glare. Her true nature as a demon was rejecting this alien light.

"M-Master... No, Lord Roy."

Priscilla pressed close to my side and whispered in a voice only I could hear.

"This light... it's repulsive."

"It feels like my skin is burning away. This isn't holy power—it's light created specifically to erase something."

She was an assassin. A being who hid in shadows and severed lives. To her, this white space without a single shadow was nothing short of a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠death sentence.

"There are... no shadows at all."

"No place to hide... ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that means it's telling us to die."

Her pupils trembled with unease. Her demonic instincts were sounding the alarm.

This was no place for living beings.

Iris seemed to sense something too. She pressed her lips tightly together and lowered her pointed ears.

"...I feel eyes on us."

"Like thousands of them are staring down at us."

At that moment, Adelia drew in a tiny, sharp breath beside me.

She was gripping the hilt of the holy sword Astraea so hard it looked like it might shatter. The veins on the back of her hand stood out starkly white.

"Hah... Extra."

Adelia called my name in a low, suppressed voice.

"This place... feels really fucking dirty... My stomach is turning."

Adelia had always been crude with her emotions. But this wasn't simple disgust.

Her red eyes were shaking violently, as if caught in an earthquake.

"My heart... doesn't feel like my own."

"It's pounding like crazy... I can't tell if I'm excited or if I want to throw up."

"I'm irritated, sad, and longing... all at the same time."

Adelia's chin trembled faintly.

"Something is yanking me inside like it's gone insane."

She roughly seized my wrist. It was a strange grip—neither fully protective nor aggressive.

"You. Don't you dare leave my side."

"Something... I don't know what might happen."

Her words carried a heavy, ominous weight. As if she feared something even she couldn't control.

Professor Kane cleared his throat, trying to lighten the mood. It was a desperate attempt to calm the students' agitation.

"Ahem! Everyone, get a hold of yourselves and maintain formation!"

"The door is already open. We have to investigate."

The professor tried to act casual, but he couldn't hide the cold sweat running down his back.

"Roy. Could you take the lead and check beyond the threshold? Your instincts... ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠are the sharpest among us."

I nodded silently.

But the truth was, it wasn't instinct. It was the Observer's Eye and the regressions that came from knowing the original story of this world.

I looked down at my right hand.

The Golden Lion King's Gauntlet.

Woooong.

Patterns that were usually invisible were now writhing violently.

Crackle.

I reflexively activated the trait.

The moment I looked at the door, my vision was consumed by noise. Red lines scraped across the screen, and black spots bloomed like droplets of blood.

Fuck... What the hell? Outsiders not allowed to approach?

Cold sweat trickled down the back of my neck.

My ability was warning me. This wasn't a dungeon—it was a stage prepared for someone.

I swallowed dryly.

"Captain. Something... feels really wrong."

Professor Kane clenched his teeth.

"We still have to go in."

He pointed urgently behind us.

"There's no retreat now. It's starting to close."

It was true. The staircase we'd just climbed was blurring like mist before hardening into solid rock.

The path back had been erased.

All that remained was the gaping white maw of the door ahead.

Scarlet gripped her staff tightly, face pale with fear.

"T-Then... let's all hold hands when we go in! If it's a spatial teleportation trap, we might get separated!"

Priscilla gave a short nod and stuck close behind me.

Iris grabbed the hem of my clothes. Her hand was ice-cold and trembling.

Then Adelia breathed out like a sigh.

"...Extra."

"I... I feel like I want to get angry at you right now."

"It sounds crazy... but I hate you so much I could die."

"...I don't know why, but I feel like I'm about to cry."

She looked like she didn't understand herself. As if someone else's emotions were overwriting her mind.

A deep sorrow, and an even deeper resentment.

"That's why it's more dangerous."

Adelia gripped my wrist with crushing force.

"So stay close."

I nodded.

And then.

I stepped over the threshold.

That was the moment.

BOOOOM—!!!

The world exploded into white.

My ears went deaf.

It wasn't mere light. It felt like a colossal tidal wave had swallowed us whole.

Rather than falling down, it was as if the world itself surged upward and devoured me.

"Kyaaaaah—!!"

Scarlet's desperate scream tore through my eardrums. The defensive magic she'd instinctively deployed was shattering like glass under the immense pressure.

"No! The magic... it's being repelled!"

"Professor!!"

"Hold on! If we lose each other, it's over! Priscilla!!"

Professor Kane's urgent shout.

The sound of Iris flailing to grab something.

But all those desperate struggles were instantly pushed away, as if beyond a thick soundproof wall.

KUUUUUUNG—!

The explosive recoil of space.

And then.

My companions were hurled away from me as if deleted.

To be precise, the door sucked only me and Adelia inside and spat the rest back out. As if rejecting uninvited foreign substances.

"Roy!!"

The moment Adelia pulled my arm and took a step forward, space tore apart once more.

Whoosh—!

I fell to my knees on the floor, gasping harshly. My vision spun.

I slowly turned around.

The door was gone.

More accurately, the door had become a wall.

The white door we'd entered through had vanished without a trace, replaced by the seamless white wall of a temple.

No sounds came from outside. No knocking, no Scarlet shouting.

Complete isolation.

"Hey!"

Adelia slammed her fist into the wall.

THUD!

Her monstrous strength left a dent, but the wall quickly regenerated. It filled in smoothly, like living flesh healing itself.

"Are you kidding me?"

Adelia's voice cracked sharply. She turned to look at me.

"Extra."

"...You."

"Don't do anything strange here. Absolutely nothing."

The remark was so out of nowhere that it nearly stopped my heart.

"Wait... what strange thing would I even do?"

Adelia gritted her teeth and clutched her head.

"I don't know."

"But right now... I..."

Her eyes trembled faintly.

"I want to kill you and lock you away."

"Even though I don't want to."

"...Damn it."

Adelia tore at her own hair. Her breathing grew ragged.

"Why am I like this?"

"This place... something here is really..."

At that moment.

A click echoed from somewhere inside the temple.

The sound of massive gears interlocking.

Adelia's body stiffened. Her gaze snapped in the opposite direction from me.

"Extra."

Adelia spoke in a low, suppressed voice.

"Get behind me."

"...What?"

"Get back."

Srrrng.

She drew her holy sword. The blade gleamed with a faint, eerie light.

"It's dangerous here. Don't you dare leave my side!"

I swallowed dryly.

If an SS-class hero like Adelia sensed danger this strongly, it was real.

Suddenly, the patterns on the floor beneath us began to glow faintly.

Crackle.

A window appeared before my eyes.

"What? Separation...?"

In that instant, Adelia's body was yanked sideways. As if an invisible hand had seized her waist.

She tried to resist, but the space itself pushed her away.

"No!!!!"

Adelia gritted her teeth and reached for me.

"Adelia!!"

I reflexively tried to grab her hand.

But just before our fingertips could touch, a flood of tears burst from her eyes.

"Ahk... Roy!"

An intense, inexplicable sorrow crashed over her.

She reached for me while sobbing, but the separating space swallowed her whole.

"Adelia!!"

My voice echoed hollowly against the empty temple ceiling.

In an instant, I was alone.

"Fuck... damn it."

My heart sank with a heavy thud.

Me strategically acting as bait was one thing. Being forcibly isolated from my companions was something else entirely.

Crackle.

I activated my trembling Observer's Eye.

However.

The information wouldn't load properly.

The air here was far too artificially ordered. It didn't feel like a dungeon at all, but rather a space someone had meticulously prepared and polished.

"Fuck... this is driving me insane. What the hell is this place...?"

I let out a ragged breath.

KUNG—!

A clear rupture shattered the alien silence.

I slowly lifted my head.

Before me stretched a colossal hall. Pure white pillars soared toward the ceiling. White walls, white floors, and cascading white light.

Yet in the center of this sacred space sat the most contradictory thing of all: a black figure.

A high platform with stairs leading up to it.

And upon it, a throne.

A person sat there.

A jet-black dress. Black gloves reaching to her elbows. And in her hand, the black holy sword Astraea.

But a holy sword being black made no sense. Astraea was a blade that symbolized justice and light.

Now it was a sword of the abyss, as if it had devoured every light in the world.

The woman on the throne slowly raised her head.

Brilliant platinum blonde hair. Eyes red as blood.

It was Adelia.

But not the Adelia who had wavered between tsundere and yandere at my side.

The air around her was different. Her very presence carried a different weight.

It wasn't one person, but the heavy pressure of thousands, tens of thousands of overlapping shadows.

She looked at me and smiled. A face that looked ready to cry, smiling with profound sadness.

"Finally... you've come."

Her voice was gentle.

Yet it was brittle at the edges. A precarious tone, like old glass covered in tiny cracks.

"My Roy."

"My faith."

"My... God!"

At those words, my heart plummeted.

That title.

The night I could never forget. The last moment I had slept so happily with my head in her lap.

The final greeting she had whispered as she devoured my lips.

Crackle...!

My Observer's Eye screamed, desperately struggling to extract something. Then, with pain like my eyes were being torn apart, a status window floated into the air.

-999%...?

My breath caught in my throat.

The first time I'd seen her, her SAN had been -99%. The moment I raised that hopeless value to 0%, she had died and self-regressed.

But now the number pointed to -999%.

And at the same time, I remembered the 'other' Adelia who had looked at me like I was an insect the morning after my self-regression.

The horrific memory of her faith in me being deleted and reset.

I finally understood.

The Adelia before me was the one left alone in that timeline after I had died.

I'd thought I was the one suffering in despair after self-regressing, but she had been left behind and broken a hundred, a thousand times worse.

Srrrk.

Adelia slowly descended from the throne. The rich black hem of her dress swept across the white floor. The tip of the black holy sword scraped the ground, producing a spine-chilling metallic sound.

She stopped right in front of me.

Then she slowly reached out. As if to caress my cheek.

But her fingertips trembled so violently that they stopped in mid-air, unable to make contact.

"Roy... it's you... right...?"

She asked, her voice breaking with sobs.

"When I was dying in the academy flowerbed..."

"The one who held me until the very end..."

"That was you, right?"

"And..."

"On the day of the entrance ceremony..."

"When you took my hand and we ran away together, calling each other accomplices..."

"That was you, right?"

"And finally..."

"When you fell asleep in my lap and told me you were happy..."

"That was you, right?"

My throat closed up. No matter how I breathed, air wouldn't fill my chest.

"...Yes."

I barely managed to force out a single word.

What the hell... is this situation?

At that moment, her hand finally touched my cheek.

It was cold.

Not the temperature of a living person. So icy that it made me wonder if a person who had died thousands of times would feel like this.

But the instant that cold hand touched my skin—

Woooong—!

My right hand burned hot. The Golden Lion King's Crest reacted violently to her touch, radiating brilliant golden light.

Adelia's eyes widened at the light. Her gaze darted back and forth between my glowing right hand and my eyes.

Soon, clear tears streamed down her red eyes.

"Ah...."

She rubbed her face against the back of my hand, wearing an expression like she was dreaming.

"It's warm...."

"This light...."

"It's your warmth, remembering me."

She smiled as if happy, yet so heartbreakingly sad.

"I can't even begin to tell you how much I've longed for this warmth."

Her words hurt so much that I couldn't say anything in return.

Crackle.

At that moment, my Observer's Eye pierced through her abyss. Stats that hadn't been visible before were revealed through our contact.

50% (Sealed).

She hadn't forgotten me.

She didn't want to kill me.

This insane world was simply forcibly sealing her faith.

Her hand fell from my cheek. Her expression crumbled once more.

"The morning after you fell asleep in my lap and died coldly..."

"I slit my own throat without hesitation."

Thud.

My heart dropped to the floor.

"Because if you weren't here, I didn't want to be either."

"If I regressed and started over... you'd be alive."

She wrapped her trembling hands around her own neck. The slender neck she must have cut thousands of times herself.

"The moment I opened my eyes, I ran to you standing at the entrance ceremony."

"But... you weren't there."

"The face was Roy's. The name was Roy's."

"But the warm soul I loved was gone...."

She twisted her face in disgust.

"There was only that empty 'Extra' who didn't remember me."

"So... during that first month, I died in the flowerbed more than five hundred times."

"I thought if I was dying, you'd come and hold me like before."

"I waited, coughing up blood... but my Roy never came."

Her calm confession tore my heart to shreds.

But what came next pushed me into the abyss of hell.

"So I followed you around."

"I watched over you in secret more than a thousand times."

"But that shell..."

Intense hatred filled Adelia's eyes.

"Sometimes... it pretended to be you."

"With your face and your voice..."

"...It stole my lips... touched my body..."

"......!!!"

My mind went white.

Don't tell me... that bastard Roy from before I possessed him...

What the hell did the original extra Roy do to Adelia after I left?

"It was so disgusting I wanted to vomit."

"I couldn't stand my body being defiled with your face. So I killed him, and then I killed myself."

"But that wasn't enough to quell my rage."

"Because I had to find out why you disappeared."

Her eyes gleamed ominously.

"So I asked."

"I went to the imperial palace. To the emperor. To the great sage. To the saint."

"I asked where they had hidden my Roy."

She let out a small laugh. As innocently as a child talking about breaking a toy.

"But no one knew."

"The great sage spouted nonsense, the king sent soldiers..."

"So... I killed them all."

"......!"

"I burned the entire capital."

"I cut off people's heads one by one to check."

"Just in case you were hiding inside one of them."

I couldn't close my mouth.

Overthrowing the imperial family. Massacring an entire city.

To find me, she had become a calamity worse than the Demon King and destroyed the world.

"Don't feel sorry, Roy."

Sensing my horror, she stroked my cheek and whispered.

"A world without you... is fake anyway."

"The people in this shell of a world without your soul are just moving dolls, aren't they?"

"There's no need to feel sad just because a few doll heads broke."

Goosebumps erupted across my skin.

In her world, the only 'life' was me.

Her red eyes lost focus as they stared into empty space. As if tracing a timeline from a very distant past.

"After a thousand times... two thousand times..."

"I gradually... stopped understanding."

She laughed dryly. The laugh was so hollow it felt like my chest would rip apart just watching.

"Who I was looking for."

"Why I was cutting my own throat."

"It was definitely someone precious... but at some point I couldn't remember the name."

"The memories disappeared, but the instinct that I had to die remained."

"Three thousand times... five thousand... nine thousand..."

I covered my mouth.

The unimaginable weight of that time. Eternal suicide repeated until she forgot even herself.

"When I had worn myself down so much that only a shell remained..."

"This other world, this temple, called to me."

She looked around the white space with wet eyes.

"'Come here.'"

"'If you come here, you can meet your real Roy.'"

"Even knowing it was a trap, I had no choice but to come."

"Because I wanted to confirm it even if I had to die tens of thousands of times."

"Whether the person I had searched for so desperately... truly existed."

She gripped my hand tightly. So hard it felt like my bones would shatter, as if she feared she'd never see me again if she let go.

"See?"

"In the end... my prayers reached you."

"My real Roy."

I couldn't hold back any longer.

Strength left my legs. I collapsed before her as if crumbling.

"Khhk... Uheuk!"

A beast-like sob tore from my throat.

Tears poured out like a broken dam.

Even saying sorry felt like a luxury.

That night. Killed meaninglessly by that damn venomous insect because of this world's corrective force.

But the result was the same.

It was because of my weakness.

If I hadn't died to a mere bug like that.

You wouldn't have been left behind in this eternal inferno.

You wouldn't have been left to go mad after being violated by that bastard and turning the kingdom into a sea of blood.

"Uwaaaaah... Uheuhk...."

"I'm sorry... Adelia...."

"Because I was... so pathetically weak...."

"....I died..."

"Khuk... Uwaaaaang!"

I didn't care about dignity or appearances.

I wailed like a child and threw my arms around the waist of the woman standing before me.

This body that had grown so cold was so pitiful and heartbreaking I couldn't bear it.

I buried my face in her stomach, soaking her black dress with my tears.

"I was wrong...."

"I'm sorry for leaving you alone...."

"I'm so sorry...."

When my hot tears touched her cold body, her previously rigid hand slowly stroked my head.

Just like that night when she had gently touched my sleeping hair.

"......Ah."

Her red eyes cleared for a moment.

"It's warm...."

"This temperature... it's my real Roy...."

She pulled my head into her embrace.

To find this one small warmth, you crossed that cold hell thousands of times...

We held each other tightly in the center of the white temple and wept.

As if to prevent this insane world and its damned system from tearing us apart.

But.

The time we were allowed was far too short.

Crackle—!

Red sparks flew in the air.

Adelia's body convulsed violently.

"Khuk...!"

She let out a pained groan and pushed me away.

"No...! No...!"

"No...! No...!"

"No...! No...!"

"No...! No...!"

She clutched her head and screamed.

Her red eyes were rapidly being consumed by darkness.

The gentle hand that had been embracing me now moved on its own toward the black holy sword.

"Roy... run... away...."

She cried out as if vomiting blood.

"The only reason... I'm still sane right now... is because I was in your arms for a moment...."

"I... I can't hold on anymore...."

"Adelia!"

I desperately reached out to her.

But she staggered backward, shaking her head.

"Please... run away."

"My Roy."

Black tears flowed from her eyes.

"I don't want to... kill the real you...."

With those final words, her eyes were completely swallowed by the abyss.

Sluuurp.

Like a doll with its emotions deleted.

The hand holding the black holy sword rose mechanically.

"Haaaaap...!"

A scream tore from her mouth, but her body swung the sword in the most perfect, cruel trajectory.

In that instant, a siren wailed from the depths of my soul.

The moment that black trajectory touched me, the very data of my existence would be permanently erased from the universe.

Shuuuk—

An absolute slash that erased space itself.

An unavoidable, unblockable line of death descended toward my head.