Chapter 4
Sujon wondered to himself,
How does she know me?
And what does she mean by saying: "again"?
He looked around for a moment, thinking carefully, then turned to Princess Eleanora.
Princess Eleanora said calmly,
"In truth, this is not your first time. You have regressed hundreds of times before this. Each time carried its own punishment, and this time, your punishment was forgetting all your previous regressions. But the effects of those regressions still linger within you."
Sujon realized that
this was not his first time in this world, that he had regressed hundreds of times before this attempt, and that Princess Eleanora was not just an ordinary person, but a conscious entity striving to maintain the proper course of the story—a being fully aware of everything happening around her, whose goal was to keep events on track without letting the story deviate.
For this reason, Duke Leonard von Reichen (레오나르트 폰 라이헨)
was threatened with execution to preserve the story's path, but the servant Han Bijin mitigated the sentence. The reasoning was that the Duke had committed mistakes that could have disrupted the story's course if executed, while the mitigation gave him a chance to live—a precise decision to prevent the collapse of events.
Sujon looked at the ground for a moment, deep in thought, then turned to the chair directly in front of the princess's throne, a few steps away from her, and moved toward it slowly, his face void of expression.
Princess Eleanora looked at him in surprise.
"How do you still maintain such composure despite knowing about your past regressions and everything that happened before? You've felt the extent of the pain from your previous regressions."
Sujon approached the chair slowly, his features expressionless, as if he were someone else. Then his face showed traces of mercilessness, numbness, exhaustion, filled with pain.
Princess Eleanora tilted her head toward the chair and warned Sujon,
"You may not sit until I permit it."
Sujon sat on the chair and leaned his back against it. It was no ordinary chair; it resembled a throne, golden and encrusted with precious jewels. It was the throne of the new king, crafted especially for him and brought to the palace to replace the old throne. It seemed that the new throne had already recognized his kingship.
Sujon looked at Princess Eleanora.
"Do you know that by trying to preserve this story, you've unjustly claimed many innocent lives? You think you're maintaining the world's order, but you are like a virus trying to be the main character that keeps the story on track."
Princess Eleanora was shocked by the force of his reply, his boldness, and his refusal to obey orders. She stood there, helpless before his words.
Then she responded,
"No one has maintained the world as I have. How dare you speak to me like this, you failure? You have failed in all your previous regressions, unable even to save those you wished to save. Can you even keep the story on track until…"
In the middle of her words, Sujon felt a sharp pain in his chest, in the area between his chest and upper abdomen—a pain tied to his inner emotions.
Yes, this pain was the accumulated effect of his past regressions, the events, and the innocent people he was supposed to save in the past.
Sujon placed his hand over his chest and said,
"Pain is the only thing that never betrayed me.
Because it never promised me departure."
He looked at Princess Eleanora with a face devoid of expressions or emotions. Something had died inside that once-loving, cheerful heart. Yes, something inside him had died.
Princess Eleanora could not speak any further upon seeing that face, that determination.
Sujon said,
"I cannot promise much, but from today, I will do my utmost to change this path for the better. I may fail a thousand times, and succeed only once, but that will be more than enough for me."
This time, the princess realized that he was no longer the person who could not express his true feelings with words. He had become someone different. He no longer cared about anything or anyone except the path he had drawn in his mind.