The newspaper came on a windless morning.
There was no knock, no sound, just the rustling of paper sliding under the door like a warning.
Amon sat at the table, and paused as the page settled by his feet. .
His brows furrowed. No one ever delivered anything here.
They lived deep in the forest, past the ridge, far from towns and cities. He hadn't seen a single messenger in months.
He picked it up slowly.
The headline hit him like a curse.
"Ebonrose and Eldoria Unite: Könighold Crumbles Under Siege."
He blinked. The words blurred. He read it again.
And then he saw the image. A boy with a pale face stood atop a ruined tower.
On either side of him were Veyra and Drogas, alive and smiling. That boy—no, that man—was Luciano.
Me.
His grip tightened. How the hell is he alive?
Luciano had died in Lucian's second life, betrayed and bleeding at the feet of the very commanders now standing beside him.
That future had been anchored.
Yet the newspaper told a different story.
Luciano wasn't just alive—he had won.
His mind raced. He read more.
Somehow, Luciano had unified two major nations. Somehow, he had killed the Hollow Beast. Somehow, the future had twisted without him knowing.
No. No. No....
He flipped the page, and then he stopped breathing.
"Könighold Shelters a Traitor: Princess Guinevere of Eldoria Flees After King's Death."
His vision dimmed.
So she'd been tortured again.
Her coward brother must've risen to the throne, and she ran—to the only place left.
And that became the reason for war.
Guinevere, the one he had sworn to save, had caused an entire kingdom to burn.
His chest hurt. He dropped the paper and stumbled back, gripping the wall. This can't be real. This can't—
He looked at the window. No one was outside.
Yet someone had sent this. Someone wanted him to read it. Someone had found him.
The God of Death had warned him.
"Also, be careful. I'm not the only god in this universe. And gods… aren't the only powerful things walking across it either."
He had ignored it then. Now he felt sick.
He fell to his knees, staring at the print. Luciano was alive. Guinevere was suffering. And something had reached across space to hand him this nightmare.
Footsteps approached from behind. He didn't turn.
"Amon?" Airi's voice was soft. "What's wrong?"
He didn't speak.
"Did something happen?"
He exhaled shakily. "A war."
Her hand touched his shoulder, and for once, he didn't pull away.
"I'm tired, Airi," he whispered. "I don't think I can fix this."
"You don't have to. You're not the only one who—"
"I am." He looked at her finally.
His eyes were glassy. "I really am."
She frowned. "You've done everything you could. We have peace here. You should leave that war in a different continent alone..."
"No, we don't."
Airi didn't understand, but she knelt beside him anyway. "Then we face this problem together."
He wanted to scream.
He wanted to tell her that her being here, being alive, was a miracle born from a hundred deaths. That she had killed him in another life and loved him in this one.
That his soul was fractured across centuries, and all he ever wanted was to save one girl, just one.
But he said none of that.
Instead, he let her hold him, and he closed his eyes, whispering, I won't let this timeline break her too.
---
They had slept together that night, like the others. They had trained all day, and he was tired, and she was laughing, and there wasn't anything urgent for once.
They talked about nothing important, and they kissed, and then they slept because peace was something they couldn't hold often, but they still tried to.
But then, the night cracked.
He heard the sound first—the dry, sharp snap of wood, the hiss of fire licking up the walls, and he knew something was wrong, because Airi wouldn't set the fire and there were no candles left burning.
He sat up, coughing, and saw smoke curling inside the hut.
He pushed himself up and grabbed his blade out of instinct, because that's what he always did when something broke in his life.
He ran outside, and that's when he saw him.
Karou.
He hadn't aged.
He was standing between the trees, arms folded.
"You betrayed us, Amon."
Amon didn't say anything because there was no point.
He blocked when the first strike came because talking wouldn't stop Karou.
The blade shook his arms and knocked him back, and Karou just smiled.
"Hehe, Amon… Still using that same stance?"
Amon blocked again, but slower this time, because Karou was stronger, and he knew it, and because this wasn't a fight he could win on pride.
He tried to keep his footing, but Karou's blade moved faster than it used to, and it was like fighting the version of himself he could never reach.
"You've become weaker, Amon. Or maybe I've just become stronger."
Then it happened.
"Amon!!"
He heard Airi calling his name.
She was running toward him, unaware.
"AIRI, GO BACK!"
He shouted at her to stop, but Karou didn't hesitate.
He turned slightly, lifted his blade, and in one simple, rehearsed gesture—cut her in half.
"ARGHHHH!!!!"
Amon screamed.
He screamed and moved before he could think, blade crashing down toward Karou, and fire catching his shoulder.
His skin blistered, and he didn't care.
His vision blurred from heat and tears, and his mind went blank except for the rage and pain.
He fought because there was no point in surrendering.
He fought because this wasn't the first time someone had died in front of him.
He fought because if he didn't, he'd lose again, and then this loop, this moment, this version of him would be useless too.
The battle didn't last minutes. It lasted hours. It lasted the rest of the night. He didn't remember most of it.
All he knew was that by dawn, Karou was dead, and he was barely standing.
His skin had peeled. His legs shook. His breath came in shudders.
Then, as he dropped his blade and collapsed beside Airi's body, she… moved.
No—she was alive.
Her body had healed, somehow. Or maybe not healed, but undone. She was whole again, though her eyes were wide with pain and fear, and she ran to him and caught his face in her hands.
"Amon, what happened? I—I saw him. You… You were burning—!"
"I'm sorry," he said. "I couldn't save you."
"You did," she said, even though they both knew she'd died.
They held each other while the fire burned down to embers.
But then the ground shifted.
A tremor hit. It wasn't an aftershock. It was something else.
The sky pulsed, and a sound came—like thunder.
A beam of light, too large to come from any weapon, too fast to dodge, shot down from above.
It didn't feel like an attack. It felt like judgment.
He barely turned to Airi, tried to move her aside, but the light hit them both.
There was no scream. Just burning, just silence, just everything turning white.
---
Then—
Pain, cold sweat, a table in front of him. The smell of grilled meat and spice.
Amon jerked upright in the restaurant chair, clutching his chest.
Kana was laughing at something, and Zai Ren looked confused.
The play had just ended.
They were supposed to go back to the Sect.
But he was gasping, clawing at the table, because he'd died—again—and that future was real, and he didn't know how many more times he could survive it.
"ARGHHH!!!!!"