“Now you don’t even listen to the story? Bored? Well, I suppose it would be boring. Being tormented in the same way every time!”

“……”

“But what can we do about this? Even if it’s tedious and unfair, our pitiful princess will suffer in my grasp now and in the future.”

This time it was in front of Kyle.

‘Is this another recollection?’

She thought that if she died within the recollection, it would end and finally disappear, but strangely, she was transferred to another place.

‘……When is this time?’

She looked around, her eyelids half-raised as if tired. It was certainly the Letius Imperial Palace.

Next, ignoring the finger pointing at her, she stared at Kyle’s side. Several sheets of correspondence were scattered in disarray. The flowery handwriting decorating them was quite familiar.

It seemed to be the day Kyle threatened her using her relatives as leverage. He had said he’d found out where her relatives lived under changed identities, and if Natasha didn’t comply with his request, he would secretly kill them.

At that time, Natasha crawled like a dog, clinging to the man’s ankles. She begged pitifully, pleading not to touch them at least.

“To kill them……”

She muttered emptily, recalling that time.

Her desperate pleas were merely an amusement to satisfy the other’s desires. So, when boredom knocked on the door of Kyle’s daily life, he would stir up Natasha’s sore spots.

Yes, just like now.

“Now you understand. I was quite worried you’d lost your hearing. It would be a shame if the toy broke.”

Natasha despised the other’s mocking tone terribly. Her powerlessness proved the other’s dominance by crumbling before such brazen fearlessness.

She suddenly recalled her past recollection. That time when, although it ended in death, she felt elation doing and saying things she couldn’t in her past life, that faintly satisfying moment.

‘Yes.’

If she was trapped in the cycle of unwanted recollections, then rather…

“Kill.”

Natasha approached Kyle and caressed his waist. As if he had never even suspected a rebellion from his toy, the sword’s security was surprisingly lax. Natasha flashed a smile like a sneer at her unsuspecting opponent.

“I will kill you, so you too become a ghost and try to kill them, Kyle.”

Natasha drew the sword and stabbed Kyle’s eyes.

The two eyes that couldn’t resist filthy desires finally became docile.

The two hands that had completely ruined Natasha’s long-standing foundation, the family she loved dearly, and what would have been a brilliant future.

The annoying lips and tongue that used to mock now became nothing more than a ferocious passage for expelling pain.

“Your Majesty the Emperor!”

The knights who came running at the sound of the death cry surrounded Natasha. At the knight commander’s firm order to kill immediately, dozens of blades carved into Natasha’s flesh.

It was another death, somewhat satisfying this time.

After that, Natasha inevitably woke up again. The next time was the same. Natasha came back to life in the past every time.

The interesting point was that the more she escaped from the situation, the further back in the past she moved. As if going against the past. And the only way to escape the situation was death.

That wasn’t all. Although it was just a recollection replaying memories left in her mind, they behaved as if living in the same era. They would demand answers from the silent Natasha, or respond to every different answer from the past.

Moreover, if it were a recollection, she should normally experience the exact footsteps she had gone through. For some reason, Natasha could cause completely different results within the situation she was trapped in.

Only then did Natasha realize that this was regression disguised as recollection. This strange phenomenon was not a play repeating the past. She was not an audience but an actor, playing the leading role in the play.

It meant living in a time that had been turned back.

Natasha, having grasped the logic, faced her fifth regression.

Whispers sprouting from all directions, using the clear, heartstring-tugging harp sound as a shield. The small whispering sounds piled up and reached Natasha’s ears.

“Isn’t she the last princess of the Charliee royal family?”

“I heard she rose to a high position from a lowly status… But it seems she doesn’t receive the duke’s love. It’s pitiful, but she’s getting the treatment she deserves.”

The gazes and pointing fingers surrounding her were more robust than the pillars supporting the splendid roof. They created a suffocating atmosphere that made the wide space feel cramped.

A day when sincere rudeness was exchanged naturally. Natasha, shrinking under contemptuous gazes and pointing fingers, and Sieghart, who left her like that without a care.

Because of this day, Natasha truly came to feel what misfortune was to the bone.

From the moment Cayena, that child, was pointed out as the culprit and imprisoned, all the truths that had been veiled, and at the same time, that Natasha had been turning away from, rose to the surface.

Her fist clenched as if she had firmly decided something. After that, Natasha searched for the person involved, pushing through the crowd.

The last event of the coronation was about to begin. The holy water symbolizing immortality was brought down to the protagonist who was quietly waiting for the procedure. He, holding the sacred chalice, waited for the pope’s blessing to end.

No noise was allowed during the sacred ritual. It was an implicit rule that nobles attending the event should observe.

But bold footsteps echoed from behind. The consecutive sounds could not be considered a mistake.

Though utterly bewildered, they couldn’t ruin the entire sacred ceremony just to point out someone’s impropriety. The priests and nobles searched for the culprit trying to ruin the event with sidelong glances.

Then, someone suddenly burst out from the crowd. Everyone fell back in surprise at the unexpected situation.

Natasha, who had run to the ceremonial place, snatched the chalice from the man’s hand. She drank the holy water in the expensive golden cup without a moment’s hesitation.

The taste of the holy water, said to be so noble it was priceless, was as bland as lukewarm water.

“Ugh, hck……”

Unlike its harmlessly described taste, its composition seemed more harmful than anything else.

Her throat burned as if she had swallowed fire. Unable to bear the feeling of reflux, she spat out the mass she had been holding in her mouth. As she expelled something like a hot lump, a red and gruesome blood clot fell to the floor.

The guards approaching to restrain her were startled. The nobles who had been quietly whispering that the duke’s lady must have gone mad soon began to shout as well.

The coronation, which should have been noble and beautiful, the event that had been proceeding smoothly according to plan until just moments ago, instantly turned into chaos, shocking everyone.

“Keck, keugh, keck……!”

Indeed, the poison said to be lethal even in small doses for ordinary people was incredibly potent. A sensation all too familiar to Natasha, who had repeatedly perished, overwhelmed her in an instant.

Her life was tenacious, as if she had developed a resistance to death. Though her entire body was experiencing excruciating pain, her stubborn vitality bought her time. Just enough time to see the man’s reaction to the dying duchess.

‘Sieghart……’

The current Sieghart would have no idea. How much more wretched Natasha’s life would become from the moment he drank the poison.

She had drunk the poison out of a desire to deny such a future.

Natasha scrutinized the man through her closing eyelids.

Honestly, she didn’t expect much of a reaction. To him, who had harmed, was harming, and would harm countless lives, how significant could a woman’s death be? Unless he found it refreshing or joyful that something annoying had disappeared on its own.

Even if he were sad, it would probably be just a slight regret at the sudden disappearance of the pest that had been buzzing around him.

‘Why are you…?’

But this was strange.

Why was the man, who she thought wouldn’t bat an eye even if she died, running towards her with a terrified expression?

How curious.

As she rose steadily from the bed, her fifth life felt somewhat awkward. Perhaps it was because Sieghart’s reaction at the end of her previous life had been so peculiar.

The calendar she checked after a while indicated the beginning of summer. Though colder and windier than other regions, the sense of season vaguely perceived through the window of the duchy was also appropriate for the number written on the calendar.

‘How long will this meaningless self-destruction continue? Until I married Sieghart, or when I first met him? Or perhaps until that day when my misfortune began.’

She couldn’t gauge the end of these moments gradually going back in time. It was truly beyond her ability.

However, there was something she had noticed: the regression seemed to be based on the footsteps of misfortune she had trodden. Perhaps she was regressing to the days when Natasha had wished for death.

‘If that’s the case……’

If it took the moment life disappeared as the starting point, it would be about two years ago when the kingdom fell; if it took the moment her soul was stolen as the starting point, it would be the beginning of her marriage.

‘Whatever it is, dying quickly is the best option.’

It was a simple calculation.

There was only one way to quickly overcome the stepping stones of misfortune. To die quickly and bring about the next regression.

As she searched for a weapon, her eyes fell on a vase placed on the table. Natasha broke the glass vase and picked up the largest shard.

It was when she had rolled up the sleeve of her negligee and placed the shard over her wrist. There was something written on the white skin.

‘The number 4?’

It was a number.

‘This wasn’t here before.’

She wet her finger with the water dripping from the table and rubbed her wrist. Even after rubbing until her skin turned red, the character didn’t disappear. It meant that someone hadn’t drawn on her wrist with ink or something similar.

As the owner of this body, she could be certain that this mark hadn’t been there originally. She was especially sure of this, having placed a blade on her wrist dozens, even hundreds of times a day.

Then this must be a brand engraved on the current Natasha.

‘How many times have I died so far?’

She suddenly recalled the number of times she had died.

Counting from her death in the snow field, it was a total of six times. This was her fifth recollection she was facing, and simultaneously her sixth regression.

‘Could it be the number of remaining regressions?’

It was a plausible hypothesis.

It might be the last clue Natasha could grasp in this bizarre phenomenon that couldn’t be explained medically or theologically.

‘To confirm……’

Natasha brought the glass shard in her hand to her wrist.

‘I just need to confirm through death.’

Soon, darkness fell.