Chapter 25: A Perfect Life?

Reka didn't answer immediately. His eyes remained fixed on the hand extended toward him. Although it had the shape of a human hand, there was no skin color, no visible nails, and none of the fine lines that should have crossed its palm. Its entire surface seemed to be made from solid darkness.

The shadow woman kept her hand extended while she waited for his answer. Reka slowly took a step backward before raising his gaze and, for the first time since her true form had been revealed, examining her properly.

Almost her entire body was black. Darkness covered her from the tips of her feet to her face, leaving only two features untouched. Her long hair remained clearly visible, colored a deep blue that stood out sharply against the darkness forming the rest of her body, while a pair of equally blue eyes stared directly at Reka without blinking.

He didn't recognize her. At least, nothing among the memories he currently possessed gave him any reason to recognize the figure standing before him. Even so, the words she had spoken continued echoing inside his mind.

'Wasn't this the life you wanted?'

Reka wanted to deny it, but the answer refused to come. According to everything he could still remember, she was right.

Before meeting this woman inside the loop, his life had been painfully empty. Every day followed almost exactly the same routine: he woke up, showered, went to work, returned home, slept, and woke up the next morning only to repeat everything again. There had been nothing he genuinely looked forward to, no one waiting for him at home, and no reason to hurry back after work.

Even his job wasn't something he truly wanted. Reka had continued living that way simply because it was the only life he had.

Then this woman appeared, and everything changed. Someone began contacting him every night, inviting him out, spending time with him, and telling him that he was loved. Later came the house he had always wanted, the job he had hoped to obtain, enough money to live comfortably, and eventually a family of his own.

He had children and grandchildren. He grew old surrounded by people and never had to experience the loneliness that had followed him through his younger years.

Now Reka was beginning to understand that none of it had probably been real, but that realization created another question he couldn't easily dismiss. If the lives themselves were fake, did that mean the emotions he had experienced inside them were fake as well?

He could still remember what it felt like to hold his child for the first time. He remembered the house being filled with people when he was old, along with the woman sitting beside him after both of their hair had turned white. He had experienced decades of those memories again and again, and although only fragments of those repeated lives had returned to him, every emotion attached to them still felt real.

Far too real.

Reka looked at the black hand still reaching toward him. The retreating movement of his body stopped as the shadow woman lowered her head slightly.

“Come here, darling,” she said softly, her voice echoing from every direction. “You don't need to think about any of this anymore.”

Reka didn't answer, but his right foot moved forward by a small step.

The shadow woman's featureless face somehow gave him the impression that she was smiling. “Let's live happily together forever.”

Reka stepped forward again. The distance separating them grew smaller, and the more he thought about what she was offering, the harder it became to find a reason to refuse.

Why return to an empty life when the one she offered seemed so much better? He wouldn't have to endure failure, regret, or loneliness. All he needed to do was accept her hand, and the house, the money, his family, and the peaceful life he remembered would all return.

His eyes gradually became heavy. As his eyelids lowered, the woman's voice grew softer and more comforting.

“Yes... that's it, darling. Come here.”

Reka moved closer.

“Come back into my arms.”

A strange drowsiness spread through his mind as the distance between them continued shrinking. His body felt lighter, while his desire to question the situation weakened with every step. Thinking itself began to feel unnecessary when the answer he wanted seemed to be standing directly in front of him.

“Yes...” the woman whispered. “Just a little more.”

Reka slowly raised his right hand and moved it toward hers. The distance between their fingertips narrowed from around ten centimeters to eight, then six, until only a few centimeters remained. His eyes were almost completely closed by then, and his fingertips continued moving forward without hesitation.

Then the title of a novel suddenly flashed through his mind.

Life Really Is Happy, Right?

Reka's hand stopped.

His eyes immediately opened, and he violently pulled his arm away before stumbling several steps backward. His breathing became heavy as he stared at his own hand, then quickly shifted his attention toward the shadow woman.

“Hah...”

For the first time since revealing her true form, she no longer appeared completely calm. Reka noticed a subtle change in her blue eyes, a brief flash of annoyance that vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared.

The woman extended her hand once again. “Come here, darling.”

Reka didn't move.

The novel had appeared in his thoughts at exactly the moment he was about to accept her hand, and he couldn't stop wondering why. He forced himself to remember what had happened in the bathroom before everything changed.

He had been about to read Chapter 1 of Life Really Is Happy, Right? when the woman suddenly appeared. She hadn't approached his table like she was supposed to. Instead, she had somehow appeared directly inside the bathroom stall at the exact moment the novel's first chapter was about to open.

It almost seemed as though something had been trying to prevent him from reading it.

“Why?” Reka muttered.

“There is nothing you need to think about, Reka,” the woman said. “Come here.”

Reka ignored her as much as he could and continued following the thought. Hundreds of lives had apparently repeated according to the same pattern, but during the one hundred and twenty-ninth loop, he encountered Life Really Is Happy, Right? and everything finally began to break apart.

The woman appeared somewhere she shouldn't have been. Her body couldn't be touched, Reka's memories of the previous loops started returning, and soon afterward, the entire world around him collapsed.

“That wasn't a coincidence,” Reka said quietly.

The woman's blue eyes narrowed. “What did you say?”

He didn't answer. By now, he was convinced that the novel had some connection to what was happening, although he still had no idea what that connection actually was. He hadn't even managed to read the first chapter before she interrupted him.

“Come here, Reka,” the woman called again. “You don't need to search for answers.”

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Reka grabbed his head as her voice suddenly seemed heavier than before.

“Come back with me. We can repeat everything again. We can stay together forever.”

Her body hadn't moved, yet her voice somehow seemed to draw closer. Drowsiness began creeping into Reka's mind again, making his eyelids heavy enough that he had to shake his head in an attempt to remain conscious.

“Damn it...”

The sensation didn't disappear. Instead, every word coming from the woman seemed to press directly against his mind, making his thoughts sluggish and his body increasingly difficult to control. Reka tried to step farther away, but his legs were already beginning to weaken.

Before they could give out completely, a tiny light appeared inside the darkness surrounding him.

It was faint, but in a place where everything else was completely black, even the smallest source of light immediately stood out. Reka turned toward it and discovered a phone lying on the ground near his right foot, its screen glowing brightly.

“My phone?” Reka asked in confusion.

It looked identical to his own, right down to the case, but he had no memory of dropping it there. He bent down slightly and looked at the screen, only to freeze when he saw what was displayed.

At the top of the page was the title Life Really Is Happy, Right? Directly beneath it was a single button marked READ.

Reka stared at the screen.

The shadow woman noticed the phone as well, and for the first time, genuine panic appeared in her blue eyes. The hand she had been extending toward Reka shifted slightly.

“Don't.”

Reka immediately looked at her. Her tone had changed completely. The softness and comfort were gone, replaced by unmistakable pressure.

He returned his attention to the phone just as the woman attempted to step toward it. She managed only a single movement before suddenly stopping, almost as though an invisible barrier had appeared in front of her.

The woman reached toward the phone, but her hand stopped in midair before she could get close. No matter how she moved it, something seemed to prevent her from reaching any farther.

Reka noticed immediately.

'She can't approach the phone. Why?'

“Reka,” the woman's voice echoed through the darkness, much louder than before. “Come here.”

He covered both ears, but the gesture accomplished nothing because the sound wasn't entering through them. Her voice was echoing directly inside his head.

“Come back. Weren't you happy? You had everything you wanted. You had money, a family, the job you dreamed about, and children who loved you. You never had to feel lonely or live with regret.”

Each sentence made Reka's body heavier. His legs gradually lost strength until he nearly collapsed onto his knees, and keeping his eyes open became increasingly difficult.

His gaze moved between the woman's extended hand and the glowing phone on the ground.

There were only two choices in front of him. He could accept her offer and return to the life he already knew, or he could press READ without knowing what would happen afterward.

Perhaps pressing the button would make everything worse. Perhaps he would die, or perhaps nothing would happen at all. If he accepted the woman's hand, however, he already knew exactly what awaited him.

He would receive the same perfect life again.

And after it ended, he would probably receive it again.

Then again.

Reka remained silent while his strength continued fading. The woman extended her hand toward him once more.

“Come here, darling.”

His own hand almost rose in response, but the light from the phone screen fell across his face and drew his attention back toward the READ button.

Something inside Reka seemed to push him toward it. There was no voice giving him instructions and no mysterious words appearing in his head. It was simply a persistent feeling telling him that he needed to press the button.

Reka gritted his teeth and forced his weakened body to move. One knee touched the dark surface beneath him as he supported himself with one hand and slowly reached toward the phone with the other.

“Reka!” the woman shouted.

He continued moving.

“Don't!”

Her voice became even louder, making Reka feel as though his head were about to split apart. The unnatural drowsiness kept trying to drag away his consciousness, but his hand continued moving toward the screen.

“Come back to me!”

Reka stopped briefly, breathing heavily while staring at the READ button.

“Hah... hah...”

He turned his head and looked at the woman one last time.

“No,” Reka said quietly.

The woman fell silent.

Reka drew in another breath before continuing. “If I go back, all of it would just be fake.”

Her blue eyes narrowed further.

He pressed one palm against the dark surface beneath him to keep his body upright. “I don't want to live like that. I want to face a real life using my own strength.”

The instant those words left his mouth, something seemed to explode inside his head.

BOOM!

“ARGH!”

Reka immediately grabbed his head as an overwhelming flood of memories crashed into his mind. Images and sensations arrived almost simultaneously, leaving him unable to process them one at a time.

He remembered the day he lost his job and the rented room where he spent three months unemployed. He remembered reading a novel with 5,296 chapters, Life Really Is Happy, Right?, along with the strange question at the end of its final chapter and the comment he had written afterward.

Then came the earthquake and the darkness that followed it.

“Lord Zeldryn!”

Reka's eyes widened as another wave of memories returned.

He remembered Hera and the mansion, along with the injured body he had awakened inside. He remembered Zeldryn Giorry, Henry, Aeglo, and the mana particles he had only recently learned to perceive. Everything that had happened since arriving in that world suddenly returned to him.

Reka gasped for air while keeping one hand pressed against his head.

“Hah... hah... hah...”

Now he remembered.

He wasn't living his normal life. He had already lost his job, spent months unemployed, finished reading the novel, and somehow awakened afterward as Zeldryn Giorry.

Along with those memories, however, something much older resurfaced.

A woman's face appeared inside his mind.

She wasn't the shadow standing in front of him. She was someone from Reka's real life, someone who had once loved him and whom he had abandoned because of his own stupidity.

Reka froze as the memory he had spent so long trying to avoid became clearer. He remembered their breakup, her tears, and the regret that followed. Eventually, his memories reached the news he had never wanted to receive.

The woman had taken her own life.

Before her death, she had left a message for Reka saying that her feelings would never change. Even though they would be separated, she still loved him.

Reka lowered his head as one hand slowly clenched into a fist.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “I really was a loser.”

The shadow woman remained silent while Reka briefly closed his eyes and tightened his jaw.

“I really was a bastard. I'm sorry, A****. I'm sorry.”

His voice trembled slightly, but he forced himself to continue.

“Because of me... you ended up doing that.”

Both of his hands began trembling as the guilt he had buried for so long pressed against his chest again. This time, however, Reka didn't try to run away from it. He didn't search for excuses, nor did he try to place the blame on someone else. He simply accepted that he had made a terrible mistake.

After several seconds, Reka slowly raised his face.

“But I can't spend the rest of my life trapped inside that regret,” he said. “I can't keep living under your shadow.”

“REKA!”

The shadow woman's voice erupted through the darkness.

Reka turned toward her and saw that she was no longer calm. Her blue eyes were wide open, while the darkness forming her body moved chaotically around her.

“Don't listen to that!” she shouted, her voice echoing from every direction.

Reka no longer cared. He finally understood what he needed to do.

The phone and the READ button were the only things in this place that had genuinely frightened the woman. They were also the only things she seemed completely incapable of touching.

Reka reached toward the screen.

The harshness disappeared from the woman's voice immediately.

“No...”

His finger continued moving closer.

“Reka... please.”

For the first time, she sounded as though she were genuinely pleading with him.

“Please, don't.”

Reka didn't stop.

“I don't want to share you with those women again.”

His movement slowed slightly.

'What?'

The statement confused him, but he immediately pushed it aside and continued reaching toward the phone.

“I've waited for this moment for so long,” the woman continued, her voice beginning to tremble. “I don't even know how many years I've spent waiting for you inside this darkness.”

Only a small distance remained between his fingertip and the screen, but the woman became increasingly desperate with every centimeter.

“Everything I did was for you! I refuse to share you with those women!”

Reka ignored her. As far as he was concerned, everything she said was simply another attempt to stop him.

His fingertip moved closer.

The woman screamed.

“I even came back from the futu...”

Reka's fingertip touched the READ button.

Tap.

Light immediately burst from the phone screen.

BOOM!

“ARRRGGGHHHHHH!”

The shadow woman screamed while Reka raised one hand to shield part of his face. At first, the light occupied only the area around the phone screen, but within moments, it began spreading outward.

The darkness beneath Reka's feet disappeared as the light expanded in every direction, becoming larger and brighter with every passing second. The shadow woman stumbled backward while the black surface of her body began dissolving inside the spreading brilliance.

“REKAAAAA!”

Her scream echoed throughout the entire space.

Reka didn't answer. He simply remained where he was and watched as the light continued expanding, consuming the dark ground beneath him, the empty space surrounding them, and eventually the shadow woman's body.

Soon, no darkness remained.

There was no empty black space and no woman standing in front of him. Everything had become completely white.

The brightness forced Reka to narrow his eyes as he tried to see what might exist beyond the light. The longer he stared, however, the heavier his eyelids became.

“Huh...?”

Reka tried to remain conscious, but his body no longer cooperated. Unlike the unnatural drowsiness the woman's voice had forced upon him earlier, this sensation contained no pressure against his mind. It simply felt as though his own exhausted body were finally demanding rest.

His eyes gradually closed as the white light filling his vision became narrower. Little by little, the brightness disappeared until Reka could no longer see anything at all.

Darkness returned.