Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Rose was so shaken that she resorted to something she hardly ever did—drinking, just to escape reality.

“Is that a hangover cure?”

“I told you, I didn’t drink last night.”

“Drink too much and you’ll regret it.”

“I said I didn’t drink.”

It was strange enough to see Rose—someone who didn’t even enjoy alcohol—put it to her lips first thing in the morning. But Mrs. Brown seemed to arrive at her own conclusion about the situation.

“Oh dear, things must be really bad if she’s asking for alcohol this early. But no, you can’t have it.”

Mrs. Brown gently patted Rose’s back as she spoke again.

“There’s no couple that doesn’t fight. Don’t let it get you down, alright?”

“Mmh… okay. Thank you.”

Mrs. Brown had clearly misunderstood something, but Rose didn’t bother to correct her; she simply nodded and left the lounge.

“Tch. I wonder what that boy did to leave her so crushed…”

That boy.

At the mention of him, a flicker of sympathy crossed the faces of both Catherine and Caroline.

Arthur Granfield.

Rose’s fiancé—so doting and devoted it was almost too much to bear.

Just yesterday morning, she’d left looking radiant, thrilled about spending the day off on a date with him… and returned pale-faced, locking herself in her room and refusing to come out.

“What on earth could he have done to leave her that wrecked…”

As Mrs. Brown shook her head, Caroline chimed in as if to support her.

“Who knows? Maybe he was cheating. He has a pretty decent face, after all.”

“Caroline, you don’t even know if that’s true. Don’t say things like that…”

“You’re too trusting, that’s the problem. One day you’ll get scammed by some smooth-talking jerk, just you wait.”

“Excuse me? Are you calling me a naive fool right now?”

As usual, the sisters began bickering, and Mrs. Brown tied her apron strings tighter, determined to make a hearty breakfast for poor Rose.

Back in her room, Rose slammed the door shut and sank straight to the floor.

“Ha… haha…”

Even now, when she thought it over again, the absurdity of it all made her laugh dryly.

She’d already pinched her cheeks, arms, and thighs while climbing the stairs.

They hurt. But the unbelievable reality remained unchanged.

April 14th, 967.

The day Catherine Jones was killed.

The day after she’d had a massive fight with Arthur Granfield over business matters and returned in tears.

Of all possible days—today?

“Get it together, Rose Taylor. You don’t have time to sit here in a daze.”

She slapped both cheeks with her palms.

There was something she had to do immediately: before the memories began to fade, she had to write everything down from her previous life.

Rose went to her desk and opened the drawer. Inside was a well-worn red leather notebook.

Thick as a historical epic, the notebook made her eyes soften as she looked at it.

“Been a while.”

It had been ages since she’d last taken out one of her late father’s keepsakes.

She gently brushed the leather cover with her palm and opened it.

The front pages were filled with scribbled magic formulas, doodles, notes—sometimes even journal entries. Nothing was very organized.

Flipping quickly through the pages, she finally found a blank one and began to write furiously with her old fountain pen.

[Method of Regression – Ring (Artifact)
Principle of Regression – Unknown
Purpose/Reason for Regression – Unknown]

Even writing something this unbelievable made her feel oddly embarrassed, as if someone might see it. But no one would understand it anyway—so she carried on, bolder than before.

[Future Events (To the best of my knowledge)
Catherine’s accident – (Can be prevented!)]

This one—she would stop no matter what. And she absolutely could stop it.

Fired up, she circled the entry over and over, adding stars and exclamation points.

Next up: the end of the world.

She recalled the prayer recited by the demon worshippers and began to write:

[Regarding the End of the World
“The vessel of Ahadpessera. A pure Neutral maiden has been prepared as the Holy Grail.”]

Just recalling the specific words they’d used sent chills down her spine.

They knew I was ‘Neutral’—and a virgin, too.

Wind, fire, water, and earth.

These four elements were the source of magic.

Mythos were born with one or—rarely—two of these elemental affinities.

But there were always exceptions.

A rare few Mythos were born with all elemental affinities. They were called “Neutrals.”

Rose was one of them.

Being able to use all elemental magic might sound amazing… but the human body had limits—how much magic it could produce, how much it could withstand.

So Neutrals only had a quarter the magical power of a regular Mythos.

That meant their spells were limited, they fatigued easily, and their recovery rate was painfully slow.

Unless they bonded with someone through a partner imprint to share magic, they were basically half-baked magicians.

Still, Neutrals were revered as sacred, just because they appeared in ancient creation myths.

“If myths are all it takes, they may as well worship dung beetles.”

Rose snorted to herself.

From the moment she was born, everyone in Mythos society knew who she was.

And being widely known by strangers? Not pleasant.

That’s why she’d once faked her identity and fled to the neighboring country of Morgenia.

Even while hiding among the Logos, someone had still figured out she was a Neutral and approached her…

And that wasn’t the worst of it.

The ancient demon they had chosen was no ordinary being.

If your goal was to end the world, there was no better match than Ahadpessera the Heaven-Breaker.

The demon’s name alone promised chaos. His power could quite literally overturn heaven and earth.

Now, this was all future tense—but to Rose, who had lived it up to just yesterday, the catastrophe was vividly real.

If only she had died quickly, she might’ve been spared the pain, the terror, and the guilt…

But instead, they had kept her alive.

For an entire week.

To sustain the gates of hell they’d torn wide open, the cultists squeezed every last drop of her life force and nonexistent magic.

They were monsters.

Without realizing, Rose scribbled words like hell, agony, and horrific in the margins, only to cross them out.

There was no point dwelling on the misery. It was a waste of time.

“Right. It lasted a full week.”

But she hadn’t just sat helplessly, watching the world end.

Even tied up in that abandoned warehouse, she’d memorized every detail of the summoning circle she’d been used in.

Rose tried to sketch out the summoning formation from memory.

“More or less like this… I’ll skip the blind spot since I couldn’t see it clearly…”

Just mimicking the layout told her everything. A formation like this would’ve taken at least ten years to construct.

“Ugh. I should’ve practiced my magic more diligently…”

But even if she started studying again now—would she really be able to destroy a summoning circle like that before it was ever completed?

“Yeah, right. I’m a Neutral.”

And no, that wasn’t just an excuse.

Given her meager magic reserves and laughable recovery rate, it simply wasn’t feasible.

“Looks like reporting this to the Royal Bureau of Paranormal Investigation is my best bet.”

She gnawed nervously on the cap of her fountain pen.

The Royal Bureau of Paranormal Investigation.

She’d sworn to stay away from them after her parents died. For good.

Rose glanced silently between her ring and her notebook before letting out a sigh.

“Letting the world end just because I don’t want to ask them for help… kind of petty.”

As much as she hated the idea, there was no way to stop a group of demon-summoning lunatics without the Bureau.

She flipped back through her notes, reviewing them before making her report.

“Wait… hang on a second.”

Looking again at her sketch of the summoning circle, something felt off.

“There wasn’t a secondary offering?”

Most rituals used more than one sacrifice. Just in case the primary vessel had an unforeseen flaw.

“I assumed the crow carcass and golden chalice were offerings, too!”

But if that wasn’t the case…

“Wait—are they stupid? I may be Neutral, but if I wasn’t a virgin, the summoning would’ve failed completely!”