A Villain's Will to Survive-Chapter 247: Loss (1)

Tick, tock— Tick, tock—

After two hours of private tutoring, the room fell into a hollow silence—space broken into fragments, with time slipping forward in uneven ticks. Alone in that silence, Sylvia sat, her eyes resting on the assignments Deculein had left behind—revised magic circuits, a list of Etynel words riddled with homonyms, and stacks of equations meant to train her mind.

“I’m not afraid,” Sylvia muttered, her eyes staring at the pile of assignments.

Deculein, as he is now, is only a fake. Until I draw the real one, each iteration is just a fake—part of the process, not the result, and a string of errors in search of something whole. So there’s no need to be afraid if he fades, and no need to worry about what was never meant to stay, Sylvia thought.

... Chirp, chirp.

Suddenly, Swifty fluttered in with a delicate chirp, perching gently on Sylvia's shoulder. Moments later, Bearbie Panda whimpered as it climbed onto her lap and curled into place.

“Yes.”

To the two who worried for her, Sylvia offered assurance that there was no need for concern, telling them that in the world she had created, nothing would change and nothing more would be taken away from them.

“I’m fine.”

Determined not to be swayed by a fake, Sylvia composed herself and began working on Deculein’s assignment.

It’s ironic that a fake is able to teach me something as if he were the real one, but anyway.

“A fake like him doesn't shake me,” Sylvia said, forcing a smile. “If anything, he’s just ridiculous.”

“He said he pities me,” Sylvia muttered, her fingers brushing over Bearbie Panda’s head. “But I look at him, and I feel pity for him.”

***

I walked alongside Arlos’s puppet scarecrow on our way back to the guild room, and with my Sharp Eyesight, it was clear that this was no rough construct, but a combat doll crafted with finesse, making me doubt that any sudden attack would prove troublesome with it beside me.

“Professor.”

The puppet scarecrow suddenly moved its mouth, and a voice followed, breaking the silence between us.

"I’ve given it some thought,” said the scarecrow.

Each time the puppet scarecrow spoke, flecks of straw burst from its mouth like breath exhaled from a crumbling throat.

“Is this how he meant to attack Sylvia? Using your death as a weapon?”

“It could be an attack or a lesson she’ll learn in time,” I replied.

The pretense of private tutoring was merely a means to visit Sylvia, aware that her heart still trembled from the weight of the loss she bore, one she couldn’t forget, and the residual grief of a past she couldn’t bear.

In the end, even loss was just another form of experience—it would either teach Sylvia to continue living with it in familiarity or empty her out completely. Whether she let go of her grief because she became weary or carried it with her because she matured, both results would lead to a positive outcome for me.

“Arlos,” I called.

“What.”

“What business do you have here?”

“... I’ve already told you.”

“You never gave the real reason clearly. You kept it to yourself.”

The puppet scarecrow walked beside me in silence.

“Ahem—!” the scarecrow murmured, perhaps as Arlos cleared her throat, and a small bundle of straw spilled from its lips.

“Have you come to cooperate with the Altar?”

Arlos remained silent.

“Even before the Island of the Voice surfaced, I had not heard from you in quite some time.”

Arlos remained silent.

From the beginning, Arlos was designed as a villain, aligned with the Altar and playing a pivotal role as an instrument in ushering in the descent of God. However, her sudden reemergence at the Voice, after such a long absence, raised suspicions in my mind.

“Tell me—have you betrayed me?” I inquired.

"... I wouldn’t call it betrayal. Were we not merely two parties in a collaborative alliance after all?" Arlos replied.

Time slipped by as we walked, and before I knew it, I found myself in front of the guild room door.

“To me, that is betrayal.”

Creeeeak—

Opening the door to the guild room, I was met with the original form seated in her usual chair, silently sitting with her mask in place, just as she had been before.

“... It was only a response to the situation,” Arlos said, looking me in the eye. “I know I sold the Altar’s information and took your price, but what the Altar offered, I judged to be significantly greater.”

"And what is your reasoning?" I inquired with a glare, and hostility had already crept into my eyes before I noticed.

“... I was able to judge it naturally based on what I saw,” Arlos replied, letting out a sigh and staring off into nothing, as though recalling a distant memory. “Right before I got here, I caught a brief glimpse of the Altar’s ritual of manifestation for God's descent.”

My brows furrowed in a frown.

“It was at that moment I knew—remaining on the side with the Altar was the only way to survive. What I witnessed resisted all classification; neither magic nor mysticism could define it. However, it was neither majestic nor holy—only overwhelming, and from that weight alone, I felt the presence of God.”

Tsssshh—

From the ceiling of the guild room, grains of sand fell like time spilling through an hourglass, while Arlos, fiddling with her mask, bent forward, her elbows propped on her knees—as if in silent prayer.

“All I wanted was to use the Altar—go along with their madness, talk of the resurrection of God, make my profit, and be done with it. After all, the only thing I believed in was money, as it was the only thing in this world that held its worth. But when I laid eyes on their ritual, something inside me questioned it, and I felt that maybe this is really what they call a God, and—”

"You had made a misjudgment," I interrupted.

Arlos straightened up and looked at me—tired, as if worn thin from trying to explain the unexplainable—and said, “It's because you didn’t see it with your own eyes—”

"He is no god, but lunacy made flesh."

Was this the only reason Arlos was written into the setting as the villain? I thought.

To see Arlos fall to her knees before a lunatic and call him a God—it was pathetic and nothing more than ridicule.

"In any case, seeing you like this only proves further that your original form must never appear before the original me. Should your original form ever stand before the original me, Arlos, you’ll be nothing but preserved taxidermy," I added, shaking my head as I stared at the mask she wore.

"If only you had seen it with your own eyes—"

"I know who he is—the one the Altar calls their God, his true name, and who that wretched lunatic is."

“... What?” Arlos muttered, the rest of the words dying behind the mask as her eyes widened.

Though I may not be the real one, the scenario, as Kim Woo-Jin remembered it—the structure, the purpose, the flow of each quest—held together according to the rules of the game.

"He calls himself a god, but he is nothing more than a fake. No true god would ever plead with His worshipers, never beg a puppeteer for flesh and bone. That’s no god, but a goddamn charlatan pretending to shine."

Arlos closed her mouth.

"I do not pardon betrayal, Arlos. But the man I am now is marginally more tolerant than before—so I may offer you one last chance," I said, leaning close to her, my eyes holding hers.

“... Last chance?”

"You will have to choose, Arlos—place your trust in me, or place your faith in God. Decide before the original me arrives."

“Decide what.”

"That you have Gerek, Arlos. Should you release him when I arrive, I will die, and if you don’t, I will live."

At my words, Arlos narrowed her eyes and frowned.

“It means that I’m placing my life—and my death—in your hands. That’s how I choose to place my trust in people,” I added, pulling back Arlos’s mask to reveal the face she chose to hide, allowing me to appreciate the artistry of the face beneath.

Trust, to me, was absolute—either invaluable enough to stake my life on or inconsequential enough to send the other into exile, with no space for anything in between.

“... You.”

Just as Arlos's throat moved with a nervous swallow and her lips parted to speak...

Creeeeak—!

The door to the guild room swung open.

“Man, that hit the spot!” Jukaken said as he entered the guild room, beaming from ear to ear, his lips still glossy with the memory of a greasy feast.

Then, Jukaken caught sight of us—his eyes widened, and he instinctively took a step back.

“Whoa, what’s going on here? Were you two making out or something? The way you’re glued together makes it hard to tell.”

Arlos and I stepped back and took our seats.

“Damn it. I should’ve come in a little later or peeked through the door first. What a missed chance. Hehehe,” Jukaken added with a grin, drawing out the words as he walked closer toward us. “Or was that moment already too full for a third—”

“Silence. Must your mouth serve as a gutter with the stench of decay you're carrying, or do you enjoy merely vomiting up filth?” I interrupted.

Jukaken's expression hardened, then cracked into disbelief, his eyes widening and lips parting, stunned into silence by my tone.

“... Oh. Wow. Umm. I mean, wow... That was brutal. I worked my ass off, and this is the thanks I get after everything I just did?"

Jukaken dropped into the chair with his arms crossed, like a scolded child, and I didn't bother acknowledging him.

***

Day after day on the island, private lessons with Sylvia continued at the same hour, and as her knowledge deepened, my body bore the cost, breaking piece by piece.

The nearness of my death had grown clear, a silhouette pressed against the cage of my ribs. If this was nature's course—though I wouldn’t call it welcome, and a part of me feared it—I had no intention of pleading with life to keep me alive; therefore, it was something I could accept and meet the end on my feet.

“You’ve done well. Today’s score shows marked improvement,” I said.

The day's lesson in Sylvia's room had fortunately reached its end, and she watched me in silence, knowing my remaining moments were few, with the signs of my fractures clear enough for her to notice.

“Is this going to be our last lesson,” Sylvia asked—an honest question, with natural curiosity coming from her.

“No,” I replied, shaking my head. “The lessons will continue.”

My lessons with Sylvia would continue with the next iteration of me, and the one after that, and the one after even that—each would be reborn in turn, resuming what I had begun to complete.

“Then—can I ask something?” Sylvia asked, looking at me closely, her use of the title from the lesson disappearing along with the formality.

“Ask. Whatever it is, I will listen.”

“What kind of person was Yuara.”

Sylvia's question pierced through me like a blade slipping beneath the ribs, yet I looked at Sylvia and smiled, warmed by the ache.

Hearing Sylvia say the name Yuara stirred something deep within me, for I had always thought of that name as mine alone to speak, and knowing others knew it too made it feel almost too magical.

"I want to know,” Sylvia added.

“... There is nothing for you to be curious about. Yuara was just Yuara,” I replied, closing my eyes for a moment.

I tried to picture Yuara through the dim corridors of memory, but it was like chasing light in a dying lantern, as everything inside me was winding down, and all I could feel was the absence where she used to be.

“There is no other explanation needed.”

Then, Sylvia's expression stiffened for a moment.

“Do you know?” Sylvia asked, a sigh slipping from her lips—as if she were caught somewhere between feeling sorry and regret.

“About what.”

"The Voice tried to manifest Yuara, but it failed."

I remained silent.

“The Yuara the Voice had manifested was only a shell of her. It couldn’t manifest her soul. Do you know why.”

At that moment, a small crease formed between my brows.

Reason why her soul could not be manifested is because...

"It is because of the uniqueness of the soul," Sylvia said.

It was an immutable truth that the uniqueness of the soul meant no two identical souls could exist simultaneously in this world, and the Voice, too, was no exception to this rule. The only reason it had the ability to revive the dead was because the souls of the dead wandered the afterlife, not the realm of the living.

“Somewhere in this world, Yuara’s soul is here, and she is alive.”

Sylvia then stopped speaking, her teeth ground together, and her anger was written all over her face for a moment. And in that brief moment, I could see what she was thinking, like a breath on glass.

“Perhaps Yuara didn’t die that day," Sylvia continued.

The way Sylvia looked at me, there was a hint of pity in her eyes—something I knew all too well, for once, I had looked at her in the same way, with the same emotion.

“Perhaps Yuara ran from you because she hated you. Perhaps she chose the worst way she could ever find to be free of you, and perhaps she’s out there, alive, hiding somewhere in a corner of the world, breathing.”

Perhaps, if Yoo Ah-Ra had written the setting she entered for herself, I thought.

"I believe Yoo Ah-Ra betrayed you, and because of that, I can’t help but feel pity for you, too," Sylvia continued, lowering her head, her voice barely above a whisper.

Sylvia's words came without hesitation, but sorrow had already taken hold, bleeding into her features as her eyes turned the color of overcast skies.

"It is very unfortunate. But when your next iteration arrives, you’ll have no memory of this. That’s the difference between us."

At her words, I turned to Sylvia, looked at her in silence, and nodded once.

Even I had to admit it—there was no escaping Deculein's obsessive love unless Yuara pretended to be dead, and no matter how long I turned the thought over, I could find no other solution. Therefore, if Yuara had turned her back on me out of disappointment, writing that into her setting felt almost too natural.

“I wonder.”

Sylvia looked at me without saying a word, and in that silence, I could feel both consideration and regret.

“... Perhaps that was the case,” I said with a thin smile, then shook my head and said no more.

Sylvia's eyes never left my face, carrying the kind of innocent loyalty you’d expect from a puppy too young to know fear, trying to guard its master.

"However, it is of no consequence."

Sylvia remained silent.

“Whatever it may be, it will not undo me.”

At that moment, Sylvia’s expression hardened like frost, and she straightened her back as if a string had been pulled tight, then lowered her eyes as if the weight of something unseen had pulled them down.

“But... Sylvia.”

Craaaaaaack...

And then, my body began to fade—like aged paint flaking from a canvas or a sandcastle collapsing, grain by grain, under its own weight.

“Before I die, there is something I must say to you—something no one else has ever said to you,” I said, placing my hand on Sylvia’s shoulder.

My hand on her shoulder appeared decrepit—skin peeling away, wrinkles deepening and spreading—a portrait on the edge of collapse.

“Sylvia,” I called.

Without a word, Sylvia raised her eyes—the same eyes that had stayed lowered now meeting mine.

“... It is not your fault.”

That everything Sylvia had become was not her fault. That Sylvia swallowing the Voice, and falling into such misfortune—was not her fault. That it was not Sylvia’s fault, but the cost of the conflict between Glitheon and Iliade, Deculein and Yukline—the proud houses of magic that had chosen her as their sacrifice.

Although time was too short to explain it all, I knew Sylvia was a bright child, clever enough to understand what I couldn't put into words on her own.

At my words, a faint breath escaped her lips, wavering like a candle in the wind. Then, with a trembling hand, she slowly and hesitantly reached up, her small hand brushing my cheek with the gentleness of a falling petal.

Soon enough, my sight blurred into nothing, and I could no longer see Sylvia, yet the heat of her breath touched the tip of my nose.

"Even this... you’ll just forget it like everything else."

From that dark world, Sylvia’s voice faded like the whisper of silk, and her arms held me close. Then came the brush of lips and the kiss, soaking into me like ink through paper.

“I like you,” Sylvia said.

Sylvia’s voice, trembling with tears, her heartfelt confession, the world around us stretching out and fading into the blur, drowned somewhere in the dark, until a pale light began to bloom.

... The closing pages of my memory.