The White Entity and the Clone from the Future
What the hell? Where did my memories go? Give them back!
After several years of seclusion following my retirement, I must have finally gone insane. When I came to my senses, a bizarre scene unfolded before me. There was no sound at all—only glowing stars and pitch-black darkness intertwined in a space that pressed down on anyone who looked at it. At first, I realized this had to be a dream and figured it was just a particularly strange lucid dream. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized the feeling itself was completely different from any lucid dream I'd had before.
"But can this really not be a dream…?"
Of course, just sitting still wasn't going to give me any answers, so I started looking around. As time passed and I gradually adapted to this strange space, something suddenly changed in one corner of the dimension.
Looking closer, the corner of the dimension was slowly twisting and cracking. Then, with the sound of shattering glass, an unidentified pure-white figure burst out from the fissure.
The white figure that had appeared so abruptly glanced around for a moment, then approached me before I could even react and began spewing incomprehensible words.
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The white figure was clearly trying hard to say something, but the words were completely unintelligible. I could only sit there listening to its bizarre noises for a long time.
> =?₩&! #)!(@.
"What on earth is it saying…?"
When I yawned a little and muttered to myself out of growing boredom, the white figure finally panicked and started frantically pouring out words I could actually understand.
"Ah! I forgot the translation!!"
"Shit! Time's already up!! You didn't understand anything I said earlier, right!?"
"Say no!! Please!!"
"Uh…?"
"No, wait—!"
With a final short scream, the unidentified white figure was sucked back into the crack it had emerged from.
When I regained consciousness again, the fantasy world everyone imagines was there to greet me. It seemed like everything that white figure had been desperately saying was about my previous life… but in the end, I hadn't managed to secure a single piece of useful information.
So there I was, reborn as a fragile newborn baby without knowing who I was or what I needed to do to return. Naturally, at first I couldn't accept the chaotic reincarnation process along with the completely changed environment, gender, name, and race.
But as I slowly adapted and looked around, I realized I'd been reborn into what seemed like a noble family. At least this life wasn't starting from rock bottom. I let myself relax, thinking things might not be so bad, and gradually settled into the noble household.
Then, after just a few years, the man I assumed was my father said something to the servants and cast me out of the family on the grounds that I was an illegitimate child. Thanks to that, I spent my childhood and adolescence in a shabby monastery instead of a noble mansion.
But perhaps because I had been so mentally and physically exhausted in my previous life, the peaceful monastery life and the warm people around me actually soothed my worn-out heart and body. Even though my living situation had changed once again, since I'd been living in the monastery from early childhood anyway, it wasn't that big of a problem.
I was slowly adapting to this world once more as one of its inhabitants. But even that peaceful life eventually came to an end.
One day, the monastery where I'd spent my entire life was half-destroyed by creatures known as erosion entities. I awakened as a saintess amid that hell filled with screams. But by the time I awakened, most people had already been eroded, and a saintess couldn't restore those who were fully consumed.
No matter how much I healed the others in that hellish place, they could only hold on for a few more minutes at most. Nothing changed in the end. Only after everyone in the monastery had been eroded without much resistance did the empire's soldiers finally arrive.
After that, the soldiers used communication magic to report the saintess's existence to the emperor. The emperor proposed that instead of killing the erosion entities as I wished, I should join the hero's party and help subjugate the demon king's army and the demon race together.
And since I had no other options left, I had no choice but to follow what was essentially the emperor's command disguised as a suggestion.
The hero's party I ended up joining by accident—maybe because they were all people whose lives, or something even more important, had been held hostage by the empire? Most of them were missing something or were in absolutely terrible mental states in every sense of the word.
And the bad feeling I sensed from the very beginning hit the mark without fail. The emperor periodically used the people from the monastery as leverage to pressure me, and I alone had to manage the hero's party, which could only be described as a bunch of rejects, for several years.
The tragedy I'd already experienced at the monastery had left my mind half-cracked, and it quickly collapsed under those circumstances. As if mocking my state, the hero gradually revealed his true colors—his threats and political maneuvering tarnished the saintess's position and image.
The endless pressure and threats from the emperor and the hero, along with the empire's citizens who had been stupidly incited and now sent only cold glares without any gratitude, slowly drove a person to madness.
By the time we'd half-neutralized the demon king's army, my hostility toward the hero's party and the emperor had grown even greater than toward the demon king himself. Taking advantage of that moment, an unidentified organization secretly approached me.
They introduced themselves as the Abyss Society. If I joined them, they promised to separate only the consciousness of the erosion entities from the monastery and help them return to normal lives later. At the same time, they offered to eliminate the eyesore that was the hero's party and the emperor, so that together we could reach a better future in the new world they would create.
Honestly, their proposal was basically promising to fulfill everything I wanted, so even though it felt suspicious, it looked incredibly sweet. But thinking about it coldly, it was a suggestion that would clearly put not only the hero's party but also the church that still believed in the saintess, some innocent imperial citizens, and even the empire itself in danger.
At first, I drew a firm line, thinking I had to reject their offer no matter what. But as the days passed, the hero's tyranny and the hatred from the majority of the empire's citizens only grew worse, with no sign of improvement. They eventually crossed a line they should never have crossed and even touched innocent people from the church.
Seeing that, I felt utter disillusionment and made my decision. This time, I went to the Abyss Society first and joined their reform on the condition that the damage to the church members and innocent imperial citizens would be minimized.
After leaving the hero's party, the military power and intellect of the newly joined Abyss Society turned out to be far more formidable than I'd expected. Using the information I provided, they easily suppressed the hero's party and soon brought even the emperor to his knees.
Once the existing high-ranking nobles were also forced to submit, the empire finally began to regain balance little by little under the Abyss Society's command.
All that remained was deciding the fate of the emperor and the hero's party, who had been tortured until every single one of them looked perfectly presentable. I spent days and nights without proper sleep, endlessly pondering how to make them meet the most miserable end possible, studying every kind of dark magic and torture technique.
Then, a sudden sense of déjà vu hit me along with a headache. For some reason, the memories that should have come after that point were completely gone. It was as if someone had intentionally cut out everything after that moment. Whenever I tried to recall it, only faint afterimages remained.
When I came out of my hazy state, an unfamiliar space greeted me. The interior somehow felt close to that first world. Considering the bed was the softest and largest I'd ever experienced, it seemed like I was in a fairly wealthy household, though I couldn't say exactly whose.
As I slowly tried to grasp the situation, a flat, emotionless voice came from somewhere.
"You've opened your eyes."
Startled, I nearly rolled off the bed, but the woman watching from the side helped me, so I managed not to fall.
"Ah. Thank you."
The woman I faced next somehow looked similar to me, yet she gave off an empty, gloomy atmosphere. She stared at me with lifeless eyes.
"But… who are you?"
At my slightly wary question, she gave a faint smile and slowly opened her mouth.
"Well… saying I'm your future and your past might sound too much like a riddle."
"But that's probably the closest thing to the correct answer."
After speaking in riddles, she stared at me quietly for a moment before continuing.
"Yeah. This situation must still be very confusing for you right now."
"To make it easier to understand, you can think of me as you with complete memories—a clone-like being who will help you adapt to the new world ahead."
The self-proclaimed clone brought out a hand mirror from somewhere and compared our appearances one by one. Pinkish medium-length hair, the corners of the mouth slightly raised as if in mockery, and finally, pale skin. Looking again, the only real differences were the aura we gave off and the color of our irises. Other than that, the woman in front of me and I looked almost identical.
"A clone… but if you have all the memories intact, wouldn't that make you closer to the original?"
When I voiced the question that suddenly occurred to me, her expression turned cold and she answered in a rather firm tone.
"No. That's not it."
"As you know, your memories from that world are incomplete."
"The last thing you remember is the monastery being half-destroyed, joining that hopeless hero's party, and eventually joining hands with the Abyss Society to conquer the empire."
"As you probably noticed, I was the one who erased the memories after that."
"But why would I go so far as to erase the original's memories and even create a separate clone?"
"Because you were me. You'll figure it out quickly if you think about it."
The clone smiled lightly and spoke with certainty.
"I'll give you some time. For now, take a look around your new home and think about it slowly."
She guided me out of the room, giving me space to think.