After Roderika left, he glanced back at the corpse that had once been called Godrick.
To be fair, Godrick was… complicated.
Aside from his cowardice and that blind, swollen arrogance, he did possess a sliver of something that resembled a king's dignity. At the very least, there had still been soldiers willing to follow him—men who, even at the very end, dreamed of returning with their lord to their "homeland," to kneel once more beneath the Erdtree's light.
But that came with a condition.
The moment Godrick sent his grafted scion to hunt down the Finger Maiden meant for him, that tiny fragment of dignity stopped mattering.
The reason was simple enough: Finger Maidens existed to guide the Tarnished, and nearly every limb stitched onto Godrick's body had been torn from Tarnished who were captured while still weak. So he hunted Finger Maidens—to cut off guidance at the root, to make sure more helpless Tarnished would stumble into his net.
He just hadn't expected to run into this kind of monster.
A Tarnished who didn't even bother to place demigods in his line of sight.
And since Godrick had been one of the culprits behind his Finger Maiden's death, then being torn apart was nothing but what he'd earned.
Classless bastard.
If you choose to raise a weapon against others, you'd better be prepared for someone to raise one against you.
Even he lived by that rule.
From the moment he lifted his blade toward demigods, he had already accepted the possibility that one day he might meet an enemy he couldn't defeat—an existence so far beyond him that he would die nameless in some wasteland, turning into little more than bones beneath the wind.
He didn't regret it.
He opened the group chat again—only to find the messages scrolling so fast they were practically tripping over each other, and most of them were… about him.
Forever Seventeen: "Well now. I didn't expect Mr. Tarnished to be this popular."
Chika Fujiwara: "Right? Mr. Tarnished really does have incredible luck with women."
The King of the Oldest: "Hahaha! That's how it should be. That's what befits a king!"
Chika Fujiwara: "Eh? Gil Uncle, do kings really have lots of women around them? @The King of the Oldest"
The King of the Oldest: "Naturally. A king is more dazzling than any other. Women gather around such radiance—being admired is only normal."
Chika Fujiwara: "Ooh! I thought the books were exaggerating, but it's actually true!"
NorthernNorthernNorth: "Taking notes.jpg"
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "…What, exactly, are you all talking about?"
Chika Fujiwara: "Ah! Mr. Tarnished is here!"
NorthernNorthernNorth: "The main character has appeared.jpg"
Forever Seventeen: "We're talking about your abundant romantic luck, of course. (smirk)"
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Romantic luck? Me?"
The chat made him fall into a rare, genuine silence.
Romantic luck—here? In this rotten world? With someone like him?
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "I think you're misunderstanding…"
Forever Seventeen: "Misunderstanding? Oh please. That girl, Roderika, definitely likes you."
Chika Fujiwara: "Yeah. Lady Yukari is right—Miss Roderika really does like you."
A cold shiver crawled up his spine.
He typed fast.
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Likes me? Don't be ridiculous…"
Whether Roderika truly liked him or not didn't even matter.
He still hadn't untangled the mess between Ranni and Melina. Adding a third person on top of that was begging for disaster—something far beyond even Mimic Tear "big sis" stepping in to mediate.
He had absolutely no interest in ending up dismembered.
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Enough. We're not discussing this. If there's nothing else, I'm ending the stream. If you learned anything useful from what you just saw, let me know."
Chika Fujiwara: "Eh?! You're ending it already? I haven't watched enough!"
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Next time."
He sent that and closed the stream window.
Right then, the chat page shook again—a private message request, this time from Hu Tao.
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "When the sun's out, I bask in the sun. When the moon's out, I bask in the moon, hehe."
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "Mr. Tarnished, are you free right now?"
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "? What is it?"
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "Nothing big. I just wanted to apologize for what happened last time."
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Apologize? For what?"
He searched his memory and came up empty. No matter how he replayed it, he couldn't find a reason Hu Tao should be apologizing.
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "The last time we drove off those reincarnators—I was a bit rash. I said things I shouldn't have said about the ones at your side. I'm really sorry."
Hu Tao was the kind of person who could take responsibility cleanly—if she was wrong, she apologized. Simple.
But even so, she still had to uphold the duty of the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor's director.
The dead should rest. If a soul was trapped in the mortal world, unable to move on, that was suffering of the bitterest kind. Over time, the balance between yin and yang would collapse—and that was a truth every world, no matter how strange, had to respect.
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Oh, that. It's fine. They didn't take it to heart. And it's my fault too—I didn't explain my situation properly."
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "Oh? So there's more to it?"
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "Yeah. My world might not work the way yours does. We used to have a complete cycle—souls would reincarnate after death. But the thing that maintained that order has been shattered, so the boundary between life and death has become… blurry."
That was the truth.
The Erdtree's order rejected Destined Death—the kind of death that erased both body and soul. But on the Night of the Black Knives, after Godwyn's soul was slain by Destined Death, a new kind of existence emerged:
Those Who Live in Death.
They could not truly die. Even when the soul was gone, the body still walked, lingering in the world.
And yet not every dead person became one of them.
Some died and stayed dead. Some died and didn't. The line was smeared, as if life and death had been poured into the same cup and stirred.
As for where souls went afterward… he didn't know.
He only knew it wasn't "returning to the Erdtree," not anymore.
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "I see… that really is troublesome."
Sitting on the stone steps in front of the funeral parlor, Hu Tao tilted her head and thought seriously for a while. Then she typed again, slowly.
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "In that case, I won't force it. But I still suggest you follow proper procedures—like fulfilling their last wishes. At the very least, it can soothe their spirits."
"Fulfilling their wishes…"
He stared at the words, and the weight of them pressed down hard.
In past cycles, he had treated Spirit Ashes like tools—items to be used, thrown away, replaced.
Because he hadn't known they were conscious.
But in this cycle, now that he did know… maybe he truly should do something for them. Something more than ringing a bell and sending them to die again and again.
Tarnished Who Wants to Save His Wife: "…Understood. Thank you, Miss Hu Tao."
Wangsheng Funeral Parlor Director: "Hehe, no problem! If there's anything you don't understand, come ask me again—free of charge."
He couldn't help but smile.
After closing the chat, he looked toward Kurara floating beside him, and Sorceress Sorellina standing quietly nearby.
"…She's a warm-hearted one," he murmured.
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