How to get on the protagonist’s flower path

And…

I picked up the third fragment. Immediately, the next video began to play.

empty

“Baran!”

“Yeah!”

“What if Baran’s sister became someone else?”

At Nayuri’s question, Shin Baran answered without hesitation.

“I would kill her.”

“…That’s right. Baran is that kind of person.”

With a sigh, Nayuri changed the question.

“I’ll ask a different question. What if Baran’s nemesis had multiple personalities? And what if the nemesis’s personality never appeared again?”

“Hmm… After I took my revenge, or before?”

“Before.”

Shin Baran seemed to ponder deeply over that answer, groaning before saying,

“Isn’t it different depending on where you place the essence of a person?”

“The essence of a person…”

“Whether you see the actions they committed as an extension of their personality or an extension of their body… Hmm, I really don’t know. You wouldn’t know unless you were the one involved.”

“I see…”

Nayuri quietly looked out the window. She could see the dark sea rippling.

“I’ll head straight to the rooftop lounge. Please let the others know.”

“Okay!”

Nayuri parted ways with Shin Baran and headed to the elevator. The transparent elevator carried her upward, higher and higher.

At the rooftop lounge, Nayuhan was waiting for her.

“Did you come?”

He asked her, stirring a glass of drink, as if it were nothing important. She approached him with a face that revealed no thoughts.

“Yes.”

“What do you want to say?”

He seemed calm, but it appeared that he wasn’t truly at ease, as his hand stirring the drink had come to a stop.

She looked at him, who wouldn’t meet her gaze.

“Who are you?”

“…Well, I don’t even know what to call myself.”

He hesitated and then finally spoke with difficulty.

“But if there’s one thing I can say for sure…”

His gaze fell on the red drink in the cocktail glass. His face reflected in it.

“…I’m not your brother.”

At his words, she closed her eyes tightly, then opened them again to ask.

“Since when?”

“A month before entering the academy.”

“So, at that time…”

She seemed to have guessed something. Then she laughed bitterly.

“Then I’ve been venting my anger on someone completely unrelated.”

“That’s…”

“How pathetic.”

The waiter placed the drink she ordered on the table. The bright blue drink contrasted with the red one. She roughly downed the drink.

Bang! The glass crashed harshly against the table.

“Don’t worry. That won’t happen anymore.”

As she looked at him again, there was a noticeable distance in her eyes.

He lifted his face to look at her and spoke uncertainly in response to her words.

“I took your brother’s body. Don’t you have anything to say about that?”

“Yes.”

At that, she smiled.

“I dislike my brother more than you could ever imagine.”

Brightly.

“The only reason I pretended to be okay was because he was family and because others were involved.”

A smile filled with madness lingered on her face.

“Taking that trash’s life. Living by stealing that trash’s life. That is my revenge, and that is the atonement you must fulfill.”

The unimaginable hatred in her voice filled the space around them.

“That’s enough for me.”

“…I see.”

Nayuhan’s face looked complicated. As Nayuri got up to leave, she said,

“I look forward to working with you, Nayuhan.”

After hearing her words, Nayuhan sat there for a while, looking down at his glass with a complicated expression.

185

And my expression was just as complicated.

“I’m back!”

Nayuri, who had regained her bright smile, clung to me tightly.

Yes. It was indeed the same Nayuri who had been slightly filled with madness just moments ago.

“Guess what, Nahyun? I received an apology from Nayuhan!”

“Really?”

I smiled brightly.

“That’s great…! Congratulations!”

Inside, I was trembling.

At my congratulatory words, Nayuri hugged me tightly and said,

“Yes! He said he would atone for the rest of his life!”

That… no.

I desperately tried to pull up the corners of my mouth, which wanted to drop.

“Nayuhan really has changed, right?”

At my words, Nayuri paused for a moment before smiling and nodding.

“Yes. I could finally acknowledge that now.”

“I’m glad…”

“I hadn’t been able to admit it until now, and I caused a fuss about him being someone else. I’m sorry. It must have been difficult for everyone?”

“No! It’s understandable! Right?”

At my words, Shinbaran chimed in.

“Right! It’s true that Nayuhan changed suddenly…!”

Nayuri smiled, relieved, at our words. And I thought to myself. I was scared to death.

It turns out she had been sharpening her knives inside, huh? I decided that I would never make Nayuri my enemy.

“Huh? What’s this~? Our Yuri is feeling better?”

“I’m glad.”

Just then, the seniors who had brought plenty of games like Halli Galli and cards burst through the door.

After that, we all played together until deep into the night, when one by one, we started to fall asleep.

Except for me.

***

I sat up when everyone had fallen asleep. Perhaps because I was anxious, I couldn’t fall asleep at all.

Looking out the window, the stars were shining beautifully. It was a sight I had never seen in my previous life.

…Should I take a short walk? I impulsively moved my feet.

Ding-.

The elevator arrived at my floor.

I passed through the hotel lobby, which felt somewhat dim despite the lights, and headed toward the entrance. Right in front of the hotel was the beach, so I could hear the sound of the waves.

Standing at the entrance, I looked around and realized someone was sitting on the beach in the distance. It was Nayuhan.

Why is he here at this hour?

I walked leisurely toward him.

“Hey, Nayuhan.”

When I spoke to him, he turned his gaze from the sky to me. He eventually greeted me slowly with a weak smile.

“Hi.”

I naturally sat down next to him.

“Can’t sleep?”

“Yeah.”

He replied briefly to my question and then fell silent. For a while, we quietly looked up at the sky side by side.

Swoosh-.

The sound of the waves gently echoed in my ears.

Amid the silence, his voice suddenly broke through.

“Do you like fantasy novels?”

I paused for a moment, then answered honestly.

“I do.”

Ever since my current life began, I haven’t had much time to read novels, but in my previous life, I was deeply immersed in them. I loved the feeling of adventuring through various worlds.

After my response, he fell silent for a moment before asking another question.

“Do you know about possession?”

“I do. It comes up a lot in novels, right?”

Why is he bringing this up out of the blue? I looked at him curiously.

He was still gazing up at the sky. Then he met my eyes.

“…What if, what if you possessed a character from a novel? What would that be like?”

I swallowed hard.

Was it the magic of the night? He clearly wanted to say something to me.

“This is really just a story about novels…”

He turned his gaze to the distant sea.

“There was a man. A pathetic man who was deeply immersed in a game.”

The sound of the crashing waves could be heard.

“But one day, when he woke up from his sleep, he found himself possessed by a character from the game he loved.”

The wind blew. It was a hot and humid summer breeze.

“That man thought the whole world was there for him. So he wielded the knowledge he had accumulated from the game and went around treating people like pawns. Isn’t that really foolish?”

He said this with self-deprecation. His dark hair fluttered in the wind.

“Then one day, he realized that the world wasn’t a game. And he thought.”

He hesitated for a moment before continuing.

“‘Then what happened to the person whose body I took? What’s going on?’ But he pretended not to know. Just then, a ‘GM’ appeared who had arranged everything for him.”

He seemed to be speaking to himself.

“Everything is prepared for you, so just keep your eyes forward and run. But even if I wanted to do that, there were too many things that bothered me. Naturally, I already knew it was reality.”

He brought his knees together and curled up.

“And not long ago, it was discovered that I had been possessed. On one hand, I was relieved. I thought the inevitable had come. But…”

I gently stroked his back. He looked up at me, his face twisted as if he were about to cry.

“It’s okay. He says he wishes I would keep being that person. He doesn’t mind. Do you know what’s pathetic?”

He buried his face in his arms.

“I was relieved to hear that.”

He spoke to me in a small voice while still curled up. It was an earnest, small, and faint voice.

“You know… I’m such a pathetic human being.”

I quietly continued to stroke his curled-up back and opened my mouth.

“Hey, Nayuhan. Do you know about reincarnation?”