"I said, are you okay, big bro? You look mega tired," Amal asked with a slight grin.
"Aehehe... don't worry. It'll pass. I know because I felt the same as you when they dragged me here," she added, proud confidence in her voice.
"Don't stress about it. We don't get to choose how we die. That's just how this world works."
"Still," she added with a grin, "your little murder attempt made a lot of people happy. That bastard governor's been torturing slaves for years. You almost took him out."
She gave him a small thumbs up.
"Too bad he lived. I would've loved to see his guts spill."
This conversation again.
Zad blinked.
He'd heard these exact words before.
No. Not just the words.
This moment. This place. Her expression. Her scent. Her energy.
This was real. Time had actually reset.
Wait. That means... I have fifteen minutes before execution.
Panic surged through him.
"I better hurry. I don't think I have enough time for this."
"Amal, sorry, can you help me with something?" Zad asked suddenly.
"Ehhhhh?! How the hell do you know my name, big bro?!" she snapped, pointing at him. "I didn't even tell you yet!"
Zad froze.
Shit. He hadn't thought of that.
She hadn't introduced herself yet. She was about to, but Zad was faster. And now he had just called her by name, before she even had the chance.
A few seconds too early. A small miscalculation on his part.
"I... I overheard it. From the guards," Zad said quickly, avoiding eye contact.
Please forget. Please forget. Please forget. He chanted it in his mind like a desperate prayer. A stupid slip-up, and now he had to lie.
"Hmmmmmmmm... well," she said, narrowing her eyes. "Even though the guards never call a slave by name... maybe the executioner did? Eh, I'll believe you. Heehee, big bro."
Zad exhaled in relief.
Thank God.
Amal seemed honest, or maybe just trusting. Either way, she didn't press further.
But someone else was watching.
The Witch.
Her eyes widened.
She stared at Zad with something beyond suspicion. Her face had gone pale. Her hands trembled.
Like someone staring at a walking corpse.
"This is... impossible," she muttered.
She stepped forward slowly, voice low and shaken.
"You. Zad, right? Explain to me, right here and now, why you reek of death. Now."
Before he could respond, she grabbed him by the arm and yanked him away from Amal.
"Hey! What the hell's wrong with you, Witch?" Zad protested. "You're scaring her!"
"Move aside. The adults are talking," she snapped, waving Amal away without a second glance.
"H-Hey! You hag!" Amal growled. "He doesn't belong to you!"
Emil didn't even blink. Her gaze was locked on Zad.
Her voice dropped into something darker.
"Why in the name of the Seven Witches do you carry the scent of death? Is this the doing of that card? Are you a Hexant? No... it can't be..."
"Wait, wait, wait," Zad stammered, pulling away. "You're confusing me!"
"I need answers," Emil insisted. "You might be able to change the fate of the execution. That kind of power... I need to get back to my mana. Even if I have to make a deal with the Demon."
"Please," Zad said, stepping back, "calm down. Just give me a second."
She paused. Her breath slowed. Her shoulders dropped ever so slightly.
"...Fine."
Then she looked at him again, less panicked this time. More curious. Calculating.
"That card of yours... you still have it?"
Zad blinked. He'd shown her in the previous loop, so he figured she'd already know. As this was after that.
"Yeah. I still have it."
He held it out. The Shaytan card.
Witches could see things others couldn't.
And Emil's eyes lit up with a wicked glint.
"Oh my. Oh my..."
She grinned.
"This is excellent."
Her hands trembled again, but now with something like hope.
"I still have a chance to live."
"What now?" Zad asked.
"I should be asking you that," she replied, still staring at the card like it held the secrets of the world. "I thought you'd bring us back. Someone like you, who smells like death and chaos... I assumed you'd know how to use this."
"You must've made a deal with a demon. That power doesn't come for free. You gave up your soul for that card, didn't you?"
Zad said nothing.
But deep down... he wasn't sure she was wrong.
"By turn, I could make a deal with him too," Emil muttered, half to herself. "But I'd rather not see the demon in person. Witches and demons don't exactly get along... not face to face. A voice is enough. Just a whisper through the dark. If one ever showed up here in the flesh—"
She glanced around nervously.
"People would panic. They'd go mad. Evil like that isn't meant to exist in the real world."
Zad blinked.
What the hell was she talking about? She meant the Shaytan... right?
"Are Shaytans and demons not the same?" he asked.
"They are," she replied, calm and matter-of-fact. "In Agrabiyya, we call them Shaytans. In the Western Kingdoms, they call them demons. But they're the same thing. Just different tongues."
"I say demon because it's easier on the tongue," she said. "My Originator powers come from the West... though my Origin lies here, in this cursed kingdom under its crooked king."
So whoever gave me this card… was a demon.
"Then you're definitely a Hexant, right? Right?" Emil said excitedly. "I sensed the clown was one. And that cloaked figure behind you. But you? You reek of it."
"Wait a minute. What's a Hexant?" Zad replied, bluffing poorly.
"Oh my... you really don't know. This is a problem."
Suddenly, images flooded his memory.
The visions. The ancient voice. His own mouth had said that word before.
Hexant.
"Hexant is the name for those who wield power beyond imagination," Emil explained. "I'm one. The mysterious figure behind you is one. And the clown too."
"And how the hell do you know all this?"
Because of my Origin," she said. "Witch. My Origin grants me certain truths, basic abilities. I can see things. I can sense other Hexants. And I can sense you—clearly."
"Even without the power to cast spells, I can still use my basic abilities," she said with a small, clever smile. "I'm a resourceful witch. My strength may be low... but I'm not helpless. Ahehe."
She couldn't sense this before, Zad thought. Probably because I hadn't died yet… or maybe I hadn't awakened anything back then. Maybe that's why?
She puffed her chest proudly, even though she was still bound in chains.
"Aren't I amazing?" she said with a sly grin.
"But I'm not telling you my Originator. People make fun of me when I say it."
Origin. Originator. What was she talking about?
Zad tried to focus. He didn't have time.
"Listen, Witch—"
"Emil. My name is Emil," she interrupted.
"Ahem. Witch," he continued.
"Are you seriously going to keep calling me that?"
"Just listen. We're running out of time. If we don't do something, we all die."
"Obviously," she shrugged. "The executioner already tied our fates to the guillotine. Even if we escape, we'll lose years of our lives. But I'd rather lose time than my head."
Zad pushed past her rambling.
"Forget that for now. You need wine, right? To fuel your power?"
She gasped.
"You even know that? What kind of demon did you make a deal with? He must be strong."
Zad hesitated.
Maybe I should tell her what really happened. Maybe… maybe it'll help. She's a witch after all.
But just as he opened his mouth—
"The hell are you two yapping about!" barked a guard.
His voice snapped through the tension. He stomped his spear against the ground.
"Keep your damn chatter to a minimum!"
Zad and Emil both quieted, though the air around them remained heavy.
He scanned the room. Everything was the same as before.
Saifan still trying to reason with the guards.
Leon, loudly selling himself.
Amal sulking.
The prisoner second in line, The red-haired man, said nothing.
The clown smiled with his usual twisted grin.
The androgynous prisoner with cyan hair tried to avoid drawing attention.
The man who begged for his wife and kids kept repeating that he never worshipped foreign gods.
And the cloaked figure in the behind Zad remained still. Silent. Watching.
That was the one Emil had called a Hexant too.
Everything was exactly like it had been before he died.
By confirming the situations around him, Zad gained more confidence in what he was about to do.
"So," Emil said, lowering her voice, "you were saying something? Don't keep me waiting. I'm a woman who hates waiting. And dying."
Zad nodded slowly.
"I was about to say…"
He paused. He didn't want to ruin this moment. He wanted to build something. To build trust.
A primal fear inside him screamed to stop, to back away from what he was about to say, to end this foolishness.
A quiet laugh echoed in the dark, daring him to continue, to see what would happen. But Zad wasn't aware of that evil.
Still, his mind pushed forward. He wanted to trust someone. A partner.
And maybe the witch could be that.
She was a witch, right? In stories, they were wicked and terrifying—But this one… she seemed kind. Almost gentle.
He took a breath.
"I already died once," he said. "And I came back. Thanks to this card. The Shaytan card… I think I made a deal with one. I'm not even sure."
He said it like it was normal. Like it wasn't horrifying. Like he was confessing a dream.
Because in this world, where witches and demons existed, it shouldn't be strange.
But it was.
And he realized that too late.
He felt a soft tug in his head.
"A demon… a demon…" Emil muttered.
Her expression, which had been relaxed just moments ago, collapsed into pure fear.
Her eyes widened.
Her mouth trembled.
"A demon," she whispered again.
Then Amal's voice rang out.
"A DEMON!"
The guard's spear raised.
"How the hell is a demon here?!"
Even Emil, the witch, leapt away from Zad like he had the plague.
"Get away from me," she said. "You… you're not human. You're not right."
Zad stood frozen.
Why were they all reacting like this? Emil was a witch. Shouldn't she be used to demons?
Why did this terrify her?
"Kill him!" Saifan shouted.
"What? Who? Why are you looking at me?" Zad asked. "What's going on?!"
Then he saw it.
His reflection in the metal blade of a guard's spear.
His green eyes had turned black and red, swirling like storm clouds soaked in blood.
His skin was cracked, glowing faintly like molten stone.
Two horns, small but visible, had sprouted from his skull.
"I'm… I'm Zad. I'm human."
"Kill him!" screamed the guard.
Fear broke loose like wildfire.
Everyone panicked. Everyone pulled away.
Even the clown laughed — a high-pitched, delighted sound.
Zad turned toward him, confused, terrified, and that's when it happened.
Without a word, the cloaked figure behind Zad broke his chains like paper.
The same chains that held Zad down, that bound him until the blade took his head. The same chains Amal screamed against, begging to escape her fate. The same chains that tethered Emil to her execution.
The cloaked figure snapped them like paper. Effortless. As if they were never meant to hold them.
Then, they stepped forward.
Before Zad could say a word, the figure gripped his head like a child's toy… and twisted.
A sharp snap.
And everything went dark again.
So fast. So sudden.
The mysterious figure — who had said nothing when everyone else died — now killed Zad without hesitation.
And once again, Zad died.
Just like that.