Chapter 172 - North Korean rabbit

Chapter 172

Even with a knife impaled in him, the Archbishop paid it no mind. As if the sense of pain had vanished entirely.

Arpad clicked his tongue, pulled the knife that had pierced through the back of his hand, and then kicked the Archbishop away with his foot.

“Kuh!”

Archbishop Bio let out a low groan as he was sent flying several meters back, tumbling head over heels.

Arpad knelt and brushed off the hem of my dress where the Archbishop had touched it.

“My precious wife’s clean clothes have been soiled by something filthy.”

“Thank you.”

Thanks to Arpad, I could proceed without further interruption.

I focused on the <Book of Fate>.

This was a divine artifact of immense power, a crystallization of force capable of interfering with everything from a person’s destiny to the flow of this world itself.

And I was its rightful owner.

The moment I held this book, I could feel it.

A sensation like lightning striking my spine, from the crown of my head to the tips of my toes.

An overwhelming feeling, as if an entire world was flowing into my mind.

I had felt a similar sensation before.

‘It’s similar to when Artanus showed me the truth of the past.’

Showing me memories engraved upon the world itself.

There was one crucial difference from that time.

If back then, all I could do was watch helplessly, now it seemed I could intervene directly.

‘Like Evangeline did before the regression.’

If I am the true owner of the <Book of Fate>……

I concentrated. Sharpening my consciousness to a fine point, I felt it burrow into the book.

‘The five goddesses’ divine artifacts that serve as keys aren’t all gathered yet, but it’s worth a try.’

The power of the divine artifact and my consciousness connected strongly.

Along with it, the pages of the book began to turn endlessly, following my will.

Three regressions.

And the current life that followed.

Page after page of pure, unmarked white.

It seems the pages corresponding to the future are blank.

Wandering among the white pages, I finally found ‘it’.

A single, starkly engraved sentence.

「Hilia stabbed Arpad through the heart and killed him, thereby completing him.」

The sentence, written in the Divine Language, was tinged with a faint red glow, different from the other characters.

‘So it’s true. Artanus’s draconic magic has fixed the future where I kill him.’

This red glow was the same color as the magical power Artanus used.

The taste of blood rose in my mouth.

Fresh anger towards Artanus surged within me.

But now was not the time to be angry at that lizard.

‘Perhaps the <Book of Fate> is the only way to break Artanus’s curse.’

Evangeline had nearly succeeded in erasing my existence by rewriting just one sentence in this book.

She might have succeeded if Arpad hadn’t transferred the power of regression to me.

I bit my finger and drew blood.

Arpad, having noticed something extraordinary was happening, had been silently watching what I did.

But when I bit my hand to draw blood, he couldn’t hold back and cried out.

“Hilia!”

I looked at Arpad and shook my head.

“…!”

Seeing my earnest, resolute will, Arpad reluctantly backed off, but he did not give up standing by my side.

So that he could intervene immediately if anything happened.

With the blood from my hand, I erased the curse Artanus had written in the <Book of Fate>.

And I wrote a new sentence in the Divine Language.

「Hilia did not kill Arpad.」

It seemed to have succeeded, the sentence fixed in the <Book of Fate>.

Before I could even sigh in relief, the newly written letters glowed and crumbled.

Soon, the rewritten sentence, enveloped in Artanus’s red magical power, reverted to its original form.

To that cursed sentence stating I would kill Arpad.

“…!”

A curse nearly flew from my lips. It wasn’t my will that held it back.

It was because I vomited blood.

“Hilia!!!”

It was the price for using excessive power immediately after obtaining the <Book of Fate>. On top of that, the backlash from my failed attempt to rewrite fate.

Beyond my consciousness turning black, the last thing I saw was Arpad’s face, filled with shock and anxiety.

I muttered soundlessly.

“Damn… lizard…….”

* * *

Arpad was able to safely catch Hilia as she fell.

The bright light that had been shining from Hilia’s body, so intense one could momentarily forget it was night, suddenly vanished.

The same was true for the goddesses’ divine artifacts that had been floating in the air, bobbing around Hilia as if protecting her.

*Plink, plunk.*

The jewels lost their light and fell around Hilia.

“Your Highness!”

“Lady Hilia!”

“Are you alright?!”

From all sides, concern for the unconscious Hilia erupted.

Among them, Arpad, who should have been the first to worry about Hilia, froze for a moment.

The instant he caught his falling wife, fragments of inexplicable memories stabbed into his mind.

“I hate you! Do you think it makes sense for an abduction victim to fall for her abductor?!”

“…A marriage of abduction? How barbaric!”

“Arpad, the truth is I……”

Memories that weren’t in his head.

Yet, they were fragments of memories he couldn’t possibly think were false.

Not just the memories, but the emotions of the moments experienced lodged themselves vividly in his chest.

Though Arpad didn’t notice, he wasn’t the only one who had frozen similarly.

Evangeline and Archbishop Bio.

These two experienced memories different from Arpad’s.

Memories from before the regression, of what had transpired between Hilia and themselves.

Evangeline screamed from a sudden, overwhelming headache.

“Ugh……?”

She was holding the <Book of Fate> and laughing like a madwoman.

“Aha! Ahahaha! I am the real protagonist!”

This was after she had opened the <Book of Fate>, smudged one sentence with her own blood, and rewritten it.

The sentence left in the book, like a stain, was exactly what Evangeline had seen.

A sentence written in a different color and in crooked Hangul.

The Archbishop also felt a similar headache.

Memories stabbed into his mind like an awl.

Before Hilia’s regression, Bio was making a belated confession of remorse.

Just like now.

“I was deceived by that impostor and failed to recognize you, the true Apostle. Ah, please, I beg for your forgiveness……”

He then saw Hilia, who had experienced that miserable and horrific first regression and taken refuge in the temple.

She showed such sincere trust and affection to Bio, who had been the first to extend a helping hand.

“It’s all thanks to you, Your Excellency. To be honest, I didn’t have high hopes when I sought the temple’s protection.”

“Your Excellency, the truth is, I’ve had an experience of traveling back in time……”

The true Apostle had trusted and relied on him, confiding secrets she couldn’t bring herself to tell others.

It was he who shattered that trust and betrayed her.

The betrayed Hilia looked up at him with eyes full of wounds.

“You… from the beginning, you weren’t trying to help me, you were on Evangeline’s side……!”

“Isn’t that obvious? No one would extend a helping hand to the likes of you.”

He had betrayed her trust in the worst possible way.

He had inflicted upon her pain akin to torture.

And it was he who, in the end, gave the order to end her life.

“She’s of no use now, and there’s no one left who remembers her. It’s an appropriate time to dispose of the trash.”

Following Bio’s command, the priests strangled Hilia to death, disguising it as a suicide.

“…Hahk!”

Amidst the pain gouging his brain, Bio barely managed to open his eyes.

The woman he had failed to recognize, betrayed, and killed was there.

The ‘true Apostle’ he should have sought out, protected, and through whom he should have realized the will of the gods.

Only one thought dominated his mind.

‘What… what have I done…!’

It was a realization far, far too late.

Romance, Fantasy,